Peter Allison's sermon titled 'What Describes a Faithful Man?' explores the attributes and responsibilities of a faithful individual through the lens of biblical teachings. The sermon begins with announcements about church activities and prayer requests, including a potential church plant near Waco and members dealing with illness or travel. The core of the sermon is a detailed examination of the qualities that characterize a faithful man or woman, emphasizing diligent labor, avoidance of frivolity, and the blessings that come from faithfulness. The sermon references key biblical passages, including the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal from 1 Kings 18, illustrating the power of faith and prayer. It also references Proverbs 28, highlighting the importance of labor, integrity, and the dangers of seeking quick wealth. The sermon underscores the need for perseverance in faith, the role of the church community in supporting one another, and the significance of abiding in Christ to maintain faithfulness. The sermon concludes with the celebration of the Lord's Supper, reinforcing the themes of love, sacrifice, and commitment to God's will.

The day that Christ is risen. A couple announcements. I had a couple, there's a group of people, they've got about 10 families or so in, over near Waco that are looking to start a church and I agreed to preach for them this afternoon when I thought it was about two hours away I thought I'd be able to do it closer to three hours so I'm going to have to leave a little before the afternoon class about two so art has agreed to to lead that this afternoon. We'll be continuing our study of Revelation with Dr. Phil Kaiser.

But you can pray for that group over there. They're looking at the CPC, among other places, and looking, Lord willing, if the Lord leads that way, to the plant a church. So they've been meeting weekly for quite some time as they go through that process of deciding what they will be as a church and where they would unite. So please remember that this afternoon. And then there's a number that are ill.

I know the Harhoffs have illness in their family today. So you can remember that as well. Rochelle is traveling back on a three-week trip back east to visit family and friends, so please remember her time. Any other prayer requests this morning or thanksgivings, thanksgiving that we can join with you? Yes, Christopher.

Congratulations. Good to see you. So, Catherine and I are engaged. Oh, congratulations. Applause Good to see you.

This morning as well. Send our greetings to your family. And, I guess nobody can top that. So let us prepare then our hearts and bodies and minds to worship the Lord Jesus Christ. O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave. Jehovah reigns. The nations tremble. He dwells between the cherubim. The earth shakes.

Jehovah is great in Zion, and He is high above all the peoples. Praise His great and awesome name, He is holy. Exalt Jehovah our God and worship at His footstool, He is holy. He has answered the prophets of old. He was to them the God who forgives, though he took vengeance on their deeds.

Let us exalt Jehovah our God and worship at his holy hill for Jehovah our God is holy. To you who are called, sanctified by God, and preserved in Christ Jesus, mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you. Let's begin our worship this morning singing hymn 392 in your red trinity hymnal, hymn 392. O come, O come, O come, O come, O come. Good morning, my child.

On your birth-day, he shall be. God, my first-righted man. God, you are so beautiful. I choose not that you are better. Good-bye, my child.

You are the King of Kings, I trust that you'll be here. The new and the glorious, the spirit stands on air. With the glory of the sword of God, you know why you are here. You are our only God here, in life through our new descent. Under our years, God love you, with you our God is born.

May our near being be strong, our happy night of hope. O, you who have saved us. Seated. There's a lot in that hymn. The church her voice raises to you, to the Lord.

Paul said that it is through, that is in the church, that God has chosen to display, or through the church that God has chosen to display, His manifold wisdom. This also speaks of a promised land that we are viewing yet distantly and that's what Hebrews speaks of when in Hebrews 4 it says if Joshua had given them rest, God's people, if Joshua had brought the final rest then He would not have afterwards spoken of another day. And so therefore there remains for us, yet today, there remains a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered his rest has himself ceased from his works as God did. And so there is a rest that we look forward to entering.

Our confession of faith this morning deals with the perseverance of the saints. Let us confess our faith reading responsibly. And I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. Neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand. But the Lord is faithful who will establish you and guard you from the evil one.

Of us they would have continued with us, but they went out that they might be met, that none of them were of us. Nevertheless, we may, through the temptations of Satan and of the world, the prevalence of corruption remaining in us, and the neglect of the means of our preservation fall into grievous sins. And there is no one who calls on your name, who stirs himself up to take hold of you, for you have hidden your face from us and have consumed us because of our iniquities. Do not be furious, O Lord, nor remember iniquity forever. That thing that it refers to there of course is Bathsheba.

It is through the temptations of Satan and of the world and the prevalence of the corruption remaining in us as well as the neglect of the means of grace that we fall into grievous sins. Peter calls us to give heed to make our call on election sure, for if we do these things, we will never stumble. Things, we will never stumble. Well, it's our privilege this morning to receive more members. And so I'd like to ask Brynn and Jackie Duncan and Peter to please come forward.

There's a little more space over here if that works. Well, Brynn and Jackie and Peter, we thank our God for the grace that He has given to you and that having accepted God's promise of salvation, you have persevered your whole lives in it and given ample evidence of that in and through the work that God has done in you and through you and to Peter for your profession in the faith in which you have been brought up. And so for this, we glorify our God and Father, Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father. And we've also rejoiced that in His providence, He has brought you here. And given you a desire to unite with us.

And so we ask that you testify to that desire and to your faith by answering these following questions. Now, these vows can sound very formal, and maybe you've heard them enough that they Either you well understand them or they go right over you without understanding them So let me just give you a simple summary of what's in these vows that they are about to take, what they mean. They basically mean this. We're saying that we love each other. That we will be patient and kind.

We will not envy or boast or be arrogant or rude. We will not insist on our own way. We will not be irritable or resentful. We will not rejoice at wrongdoing, but we will rejoice with the truth. We will bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, and endure all things, God helping us.

If you recognize that, that is what love is. We were to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and our neighbor as ourselves. We have a special calling as this local body to love one another. Now I ask of you, Bryn, Jackie, and Peter, do you believe the Bible consisting of the Old and New Testaments, to be the inspired and inerrant Word of God and its doctrine of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ to be the perfect and only true way for a man to be saved? And do you confess that because of your sinfulness, you abhor and humble yourself before God, and that you trust for salvation not in yourself, but in the Lord Jesus Christ alone, do you?

And do you acknowledge Jesus Christ as your sovereign Lord, and do you promise in reliance on the grace of God to serve Him with all that is in you, to forsake the world, to mortify the deeds of the flesh and to lead a godly life through you. Will you be a faithful member of this congregation, share in its worship and ministry through your prayers and gifts as you are able. Offer your study and service and so fulfill your calling to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Will you participate faithfully in this church's worship and service in the breaking of bread and in prayer. And lastly, do you agree to submit in the Lord to the government of this church, and in case you should be found delinquent in doctrine or practice to heed its discipline.

Very good. And as these have been received into full communion of our church, It is our duty to receive them, for we in Christ are members one of another. And we are to be one, Jesus said, even as the Trinity is one. And so we as the people of God, as the congregation, are covenanting to assist one another, including these, in our Christian faith by prayer, by godly example, and by encouragement. We all need to be encouraged.

It's a part of our ministry to one another. And so I ask you, as a congregation, do you receive these members in the Lord and promise to pray for, encourage, and minister in their lives as the Lord leads. If so, please say, we do. Very good. Well, let me offer a prayer.

Heavenly Father, thank you that you have brought us into your family, that you have made us, your children, your sons, your daughters, that you have given us the spirit of adoption by whom we cry Abba, Father, and that you have made us joint heirs with Christ, our elder brother, but you have also Lord brought us into your family of saints and called us to love one another and encourage one another to look out for the interests of one another. Lord, we commit ourselves to this and ask that you would enable us to do this, for in our own nature we acknowledge our inability to do this. Lord, we acknowledge that we are, often our patience is tried, and our commitment is feeble. So we ask, Lord, that you would strengthen us, that we as one body might be fitly joined together and nourished through what every joint and ligament supplies. Father, we ask that you would add to us more families, that we may have a greater portion of the gifts that you have given to your church, that you might extend our ministry and our witness in this community, a witness for good, a testimony to Jesus Christ and to Your Word.

And Father, we ask that You would give to us a love for one another that we might be known by that love as Your children. Father, we pray for Your blessing upon Brynn and Jackie and Peter as they joined with us. We ask for your blessing upon their labors, upon their homes, and upon their faith and their discipleship. Lord, we pray that you, as we have spoken this morning, may grant to them perseverance, and may they know the reality of your promise, that as we are diligent in these things, we will never stumble. So Lord I commit them to You who is able to keep us from stumbling and to present us faultless before the presence of Your glory with great joy through Jesus Christ.

Amen. Brother, welcome. Our scripture reading this morning is 1 Kings 18. Hear God's Word. And it came to pass after many days that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year, saying, go present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the earth.

So Elijah went to present himself to Ahab. There was a severe famine in Samaria, and Ahab had called Obadiah who was in charge of his house. Now, Obadiah feared the Lord greatly, for so it was while Jezebel massacred the prophets of the Lord, that Obadiah had taken 100 prophets and hidden them fifty to a cave and had fed them with bread and water. And Ahab had said to Obadiah, Go into the land to all the springs of water and to all the brooks. Perhaps we may find grass to keep the horses and mules alive, so that we will not have to kill any livestock." So they divided the land between them to explore it.

Ahab went one way by himself and Obadiah went another way by himself. Now as Obadiah was on his way, suddenly Elijah met him and he recognized him and fell on his face and said, Is that you my lord Elijah? And he answered and said, It is I, go tell your master Elijah is here. So he said, How have I sinned that you are delivering your servant into the hand of Ahab to kill me? As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my Master has not sent someone to hunt for you.

And when they said, He is not here, He took an oath from the kingdom or nation that they could not find you. And now you say, Go tell your Master Elijah is here, and it shall come to pass as soon as I am gone from you that the Spirit of the Lord will carry you to a place I do not know. So when I go and tell Ahab and he cannot find you, he will kill me. But I your servant have feared Jehovah from my youth. Was it not reported to my Lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of Jehovah, how I hid one hundred of men of Jehovah's prophets fifty to a cave and fed them with bread and water, and now you say, Go, tell your master Elijah is here, he will kill me.

Then Elijah said, As the Lord of hosts lives before whom I stand, I will surely present myself to him today. So Ahab went to meet Ahab and told him, and Ahab went to meet Elijah. Then it happened when Ahab saw Elijah that Ahab said to him, Is that you, O troubler of Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel, but you and your father's house have, in that you have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and have followed the Baals. Now therefore send and gather all Israel to me on Mount Carmel, four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and the four hundred prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel's table.

So Ahab sent for all the children of Israel and gathered the prophets together on Mount Carmel. And Elijah came to all the people and said, How long will you falter between two opinions? If Jehovah is God, follow him. But if Baal, follow him. But the people answered him, not a word.

Then Elijah said to the people, I alone am left the prophet of the Lord, but Baal's prophets are four hundred and fifty men. Therefore let them give us two bowls, and let them choose one bowl for themselves. Cut it in pieces, lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it. And I will prepare another bowl, and lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it. And then you call on the name of your gods.

And I will call upon the name of Jehovah and the God who answers by fire he is God so all the people answered and said it is well spoken now Elijah said to the prophets of Baal choose one bowl for yourselves and prepare it first, for you are many. And call on the name of your God, but put no fire under it. So they took the bowl which was given them, and they prepared it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even till noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, no one answered. Then they leaped upon the altar which they had made.

And so it was at noon that Elijah mocked them and said, cry aloud for he is a god. Either he is meditating or he is busy or he is on a journey or perhaps he is sleeping and must be awakened. So they cried aloud and cut themselves as was their custom with knives and lances until the blood gushed out on them. And when midday was past they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice but there was no voice, no one answered, no one paid attention. Then Elijah said to all the people come near to me.

So all the people came near to him, and he repaired the altar of Jehovah that was broken down. And Elijah took twelve stones according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of Jehovah had come, saying, Israel shall be your name. Then with the stones he built an altar in the name of Jehovah, and he made a trench around the altar large enough to hold two sias of seed. And he put the wood in order, cut the bowl in pieces, and laid it on the wood, and said, fill up four water pots with water and pour it on the burnt sacrifice and on the wood. And then he said, do it a second time, and they did it a second time.

And he said, do it a third time, and they did it a third time. So the water ran all around the altar and he also filled the trench with water. And it came to pass at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice that Elijah the prophet came near and said, O Jehovah God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Let it be known this day that you are God in Israel and I am your servant and that I have done all these things at your word. Hear me, O Jehovah. Hear me that this people might know that You are Jehovah God and that you have turned their hearts back to you again.

And then the fire of Jehovah fell and consumed burnt sacrifice and the wood and the stones and the dust and it licked up the water that was in the trench. Now when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and they said, Jehovah, He is God. Jehovah, He is God. And Elijah said to them, Seize the prophets of Baal, do not let one of them escape. So they seized them and Elijah brought them down to the Kishon and executed them there.

Then Elijah said to Ahab, Go up and eat and drink, for there is the sound of abundance of rain. So Ahab went up to eat and drink and Elijah went up to the top of Mount Carmel and then he bowed down on the ground and put his face between his knees and he said to his servants, Go now look toward the sea. So he went up and looked and said, There is nothing. And seven times he said, Go again. Then it came to pass the seventh time that he said, there is a cloud as small as a man's hand rising out of the sea.

So he said, go up and say to Ahab, prepare your chariot and go down before the rain stops you. Now it happened in the meantime that the sky became black with clouds and wind and there was a heavy rain. So Ahab rode away and went to Jezreel. Then the hand of Jehovah came upon Elijah and he girded up his loins and ran ahead of Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel. To the entrance of Jezreel.

May his commandments ever be with us to make us wiser than our enemies. This is one of the amazing stories of scripture. This is one of those Bible stories that even young children know and Even people that have maybe grown up not in a Christian home but maybe have been a few times to Sunday school. This is one of those stories that even they might know. This Elijah confronting the prophets of Baal.

The prophets of Baal. There are many many aspects in this passage that can give difficulty in exegeting. But there are some very simple things and one of them is that the New Testament tells us that Elijah was a man of like passion as we are. He's like us. He wasn't anyone any different than we are.

He's a person. Same kinds of weaknesses, same bodily needs. In fact in the next chapter It talks about Elijah becoming depressed Depressed yes Elijah this great man of God becomes depressed and weary and ready to give up. But here in this chapter, by the grace of God, he is mighty. But he is a man of like passions as we are, James says, and he prayed and it didn't rain.

And he prayed again and it did rain. James is using that as an example to teach us that the effective fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. It's significant. It's very significant. If there is, It means that when we are facing a drought, we can pray and we can believe that the Lord will provide rain for us, given There are other things that we need to remember as well, such as God's judgment upon us for unfaithfulness and disobedience, and so there may need to be repentance.

But we can have this confidence that The prayer of faith God hears and he answers even ours This is this is some of the problematic aspects are killing of these 900 people right, how is this different from you know, let's say the the Chinese government massacring people in Tiananmen Square? Something that we condemn and rightly so. Here there's 900 people. They haven't murdered anybody that we know of and say that they did. There may have been human sacrifices involved in there.

But these are 900 people that are executed. They're killed. Is that, how is that just? How is that right? Well, Ahab is the lawfully appointed king.

He's a lawfully appointed civil magistrate. He's a wicked king, but he is still carrying this authority. He's ordained by God to be God's servant and to execute judgment or God's wrath on those who do evil. And so it is Ahab here, not Elijah, that convenes a court. Don't miss that.

Elijah tells Ahab, You call all Israel together. Gather all Israel together on Mount Carmel. The 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah who eat at Jezebel's table. Ahab convenes this, what in essence is a court. So it is Ahab's responsibility to carry out the law of God.

But he's been failing at it. He's been failing at it pretty miserably. In fact he's condemning the righteous like people like Naboth and killing executing them and Justifying the wicked like these prophets of Baal and so a lot at Elijah's Direction a have the civil magistrate convenes this court of all the congregation. Now we should remember that when the Bible says all the congregation or all Israel, it's usually not referring to every person individually. It's referring to the entire nation representatively.

Remember the biblical government is a Presbyterian government or Republican government, nothing to do with the Republican Party, but it is a representative government that Republican government is Presbyterian government and it's the biblical government So when he gathers all Israel That's not referring to every individual person wasn't gathered on Mount Carmel rather. It is the representative leaders of Israel that are gathered together representing the entire nation of Israel They are they are the ones in whom that authority is vested We know that because of places where it says all Israel goes to war. Well, we know women were forbidden to go to war. Children didn't go to war. So we know from the way this is used and other places where it talks about all Israel gathering together to make a peace treaty or to send a delegation.

Well, we know that children weren't there in discussing these things. Rather, this would have been a smaller number of the representatives. So we have here the leaders. These are the ones in whom the civil authority is vested. They have gathered together.

They are, in essence, convening a court. Elijah then proposes this proposition, who is God? Is it Baal or is it Jehovah? That's the question that he's putting to this court. And he proposes a way to answer that question.

And all the people agree as to how this question will be answered. They agree to the nature of the evidence that will be presented and that they will accept in answering this legal question before them. Who is the God of our nation who is the true God that we are called to worship and we've read the story this these prophets of Baal prepared their sacrifice and they jump and dance and scream and cut themselves. This is demonic. They are worshipping demons.

Demons demand blood sacrifices from people. They give it. They cut themselves so that the blood gushes out of them. Gushes out of them. Knives and lances.

As was their custom, they did this. That's why the Bible says we're not to make any cuttings on our flesh for the dead or to mark ourselves. This is the service of demons. But nobody answers. No voice answers them.

And then Elijah gets his turn. Just as it was proposed And he calls all the people together and he prepares his sacrifice. First he repairs the altar of God. And he lays a sacrifice on it properly and then he has it doused with water, with 12 water pots, four pots three times, totally drenches the sacrifice. So there's no tricks here.

He's making it sure that there's no tricks here. There's nothing, no hidden fire up his sleeve. No fire hidden in what he's put on the altar. No fire hidden in the wood. He's making sure that everybody, even the greatest skeptic, is convinced that this Sacrifice is drenched, it's wet, it's nothing, no fire in it.

And then Elijah prays, just as he has done before. And he calls on God to answer. And of course God is the God, the true God, Jehovah God is the God who hears, unlike the idols who can't hear. And God responds. And God sends fire and consumes the sacrifice, the wood, even the stones and the dust and the water that's in the trench.

It's gone just like that. It's so incredible, so astounding, such a strong and overwhelming demonstration of the power of God that all the people fall down on their faces and proclaim that Jehovah, He is God. But then Elijah calls the people to do their duty. Ahab has convened the court. The test has been proposed.

The question has been proposed. The question has been answered. If Jehovah is God, then these other prophets are false prophets and they have worshiped. See, this is the ingenuity of what Elijah proposed. These representatives, this court, has just witnessed 850 prophets worshiping another God, worshiping a false God, for all day it went on, almost into the evening sacrifice.

These prophets have been engaged in false worship in front of the people, in front of the very court. And so Elijah calls them to render a judgment. See, it's just like somebody going into court that you are accusing of stealing and the person while he's in the court proceeds to steal from the judge and the clerk and all the attorneys and and other parties and the other observers and does this right in broad daylight of the bailiff and everybody can watch it. Then everybody's become a witness to the crime that is committed. And you don't even have to present any other evidence.

These prophets have just spent six, four hours, we don't know exactly, some number of hours, a better part of a day engaged in false worship right in front of this court. And what is the punishment for worshiping a false god, for the blatant, willful worship of a false god. It's death. He that worships another god shall die. That was the law in our land under our original constitution.

Worshipping another god in a public way like that in a provocative open display of idol worship is a capital offense. And so Elijah then calls this court to render a just sentence. And they do. These people who have engaged in false worship are taken down to this brook and executed there before the Lord. And so Elijah brings the people to do what their elected, or in this case not elected, but their representative leader has failed to do.

And that is to bring justice and to bring God's wrath on those who do evil. And that is what's happened here. That's what's gone on. This is a civil sentence imposed by a civil court on those who have committed a capital crime. This isn't Elijah engaging in vigilante justice.

He used the lawful leaders, the lawful officers, civil officers of that day to carry out a lawful civil sentence. Sentence. Let us go to the Lord with our prayers of confession and petition. Our gracious Father in Heaven, We come as your people having read your law, having seen, having read of how it was applied and how you brought justice. And we recognize and are convicted of our own sinfulness that we have not always had you for our God.

That there have been many gods that have, false gods and idols that have competed in our heart at least, with you. And that we at various times and in ways have served, whether we have not sought first your kingdom and its righteousness, or we have put first the disciplines of this world, of our wealth and estates, instead of putting first your kingdom and its righteousness. Lord, where other things have been more important to us than you, than time in your word and in prayer, Lord, we ask your forgiveness. We do recognize and acknowledge that our hearts are quick to generate idols, and that having put one down, we so easily and quickly find another. We ask, Lord, Your forgiveness, And we ask that You would sanctify us and cleanse us.

We ask for Your forgiveness for our things that we have desired that You have not given to us, where we have desired things that belong to others. We ask, Lord, Your forgiveness where we have not loved one another, especially those who are closest to us. We pray, Lord, that all that we do might be motivated out of our love to You and love for one another. We ask Your forgiveness where our words have not been edifying, where our words have not been edifying, where our words have not been filled with grace and seasoned as it were with salt, to building up, to encouraging, to blessing. We ask your forgiveness where our words have been spoken out of vain glory or empty conceits, out of a desire to advance our own glory and not your own.

We ask, Lord, Your forgiveness where we have not honored, properly honored the authorities that You have placed over us. We ask Your forgiveness where we have not lived a decent and orderly life subject to your providential rules and constraints. Lord, we ask your forgiveness where we have been discontent with your provision for us and have longed for more with an unholy longing. Oh Lord, teach us contentment with food and clothes and shelter. In these, Lord, you have provided most richly and faithfully and abundantly.

And for that we give you thanks. We ask, Lord, that you would give wisdom to us, that we might discern the times and foreseeing danger may appropriately hide and protect us. Lord, you are the God who hides the righteous from the wicked, even as you hid these prophets through the work of Obadiah. Even as you hid Elijah in the house of a widow, such that all the nations of the earth could not find him. So Lord you do hide your people in your secret pavilion.

You give your angels charge over us lest we dash our foot against the stone. You keep the plague and the pestilence from coming near our dwellings to those who have made you their habitation. So Lord we ask for your protections this morning upon our homes, upon our businesses and livelihoods, upon our families. For Lord our help and our security is in your name. We lift up our judges and rulers, county executives, those who make decisions on our behalf and we ask that they might be led and governed by what is right and true.

That they might rule according to your commandments and not the dictates of their own hearts. May they fear you. And even where they don't fear you, Lord, may they be moved to do justly by the perseverance, the persevering and the persistence of those seeking justice. But Lord we ask that they might willingly and gladly render justice, condemning the wicked and justifying the righteous. Lord, we ask that they might hear your word, that you would bring it to them through your people.

But that even they themselves, Lord, may they have a copy of your law and read it regularly as you call them to do, as you command them to do. Father, we lift up our legislatures as they are meeting once again. Lord, we pray that the strongholds of satanic and demonic powers that have great sway in that hall, Lord, may they be stopped. May their power be broken. Lord, may you preserve those who are your own there from being moved and protect them by your mighty power from harm and danger.

And Lord may you cause through your sovereign omnipotent wisdom and power, cause righteous laws to be enacted. May you cause the truth to be testified to in that hall and before those men. We ask that you would strengthen the hearts and give courage and boldness to those who are standing for the truth. We pray that you would protect them as well, even as you protected Elijah from the wicked designs of Ahab. For you, Lord, are the same yesterday, today, and forever, And your arm is not short, short in that it cannot save.

Father, we pray for those who are without charge, those elders that are without charge in our in our Presbyterium. For those men who are working as evangelists in various fields we ask for your blessing upon those labors. We ask for your provision and guidance to those who are seeking your will and direction, for where and how you call them to serve. Lord, we Lift all of these things up to your strong and precious name through Jesus Christ. Amen.

Psalm 121c. And the star-spangled banner yet wave, O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave, O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave, O say can you see, by the dawn's early light, What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's For the love of heaven and the love of life, I'll be your light. And I'll be your light, your light, your light, your light, your light, your light, your light, You are forever more. I will be forever more. We will be forever more.

Forever more. I will be forever more. Proverbs 28 for our scripture reading. I'd like to read beginning at verse 19. He who tills his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows frivolity will have poverty enough.

A faithful man will abound with blessings, but he who hastens to be rich will not go unpunished. To show partiality is not good, because for a piece of bread a man will transgress. A man with an evil eye hastens after riches and does not consider that poverty will come upon him. He who rebukes a man will find more favor afterward than he who flatters with the tongue. May these testimonies be our meditation giving more understanding than our teachers.

Almighty Heavenly Father, we ask that now you would open our eyes that we might behold wonderful things out of your Word. We ask that you would feed us this morning with the bread of heaven and I ask that you would sanctify and cleanse my sinful lips That through this vessel of clay the riches of your glory might be opened to us Lord may you be present May you give to us faith And may you give to us sight in Jesus name. Amen. Well, what describes a faithful man or woman? How would you know if you saw one?

Well, the book of Proverbs gets down into these nitty-gritty aspects of our lives. It addresses our vocations and our business. It addresses our relationships with people, our financial dealings, our economics. Proverbs is just filled with these kinds of instructions because God's Word is sufficient for every area of our life that we can be thoroughly equipped and furnished for every good work. And you know that our lives involve much more than just the time we spend Sunday here in corporate worship or the time that we spend in studying the scriptures.

Our lives involve earning our living. They involve working in the world that God created, working with wood and metal, working with the earth, working with animals to raise food, working with crops, and every other aspect, every other vocation in between all that, working with people, and dealing with relationships. And Proverbs just addresses every one of these areas in very practical ways. And so this morning, this text, it's a little chiasm, gives us eight characteristics, if I counted correctly, eight characteristics of the faithful man. Of somebody who is a righteous man.

And The first one that it gives us is that a faithful man labors diligently at his calling. A faithful man labors diligently at his calling or her calling, if it's speaking of a woman. Not everyone's calling is to till the land, but everyone is called, man or woman, child, adult, Old or young, everyone is called to labor productively. Everyone that is capable. Obviously little babies aren't capable of laboring productively.

Maybe older people, as they lose their strength, are not able to labor in the way that they used to be. But all that are able, were called to labor productively. This is actually the exact same command word for word that's given in Proverbs 12 verse 11 where there it deals with the home and being well-rooted and being established, or establishing a godly legacy. It brings it, But here it's in a little different context. It's in the context of of what constitutes a faithful man.

A faithful, because faithful men are the backbone of society. The backbone of a stable culture. And this chapter we've seen is dealing with the civil government and rule and how kings are to behave and not behave but foundational to any civil society are faithful men. Faithful men. And so we can say then that the backbone of a stable and prosperous culture is a society of people, of men especially, who are diligently laboring at their callings.

Labor, you see, is a creation ordinance. That means it predates the fall and our fall into sin. Adam and Eve were called to labor and they were expected, God commanded them to work six days out of every week, even before there was sin. Of course, what happened after the fall is that our labor becomes toil, it's sweat. It becomes difficult.

There is sorrow, there's an element of sorrow and futility in our labor. We make mistakes, we waste things, we ruin things, we and so on. Adam didn't have that problem. But Adam was called to labor. Labor in that sense is good.

It is good for us and it is good for our culture, our society. It is the productivity of people who are laboring diligently at their calling that establishes wealth. It's what we produce. It's not the government sending us stimulus checks. That's not wealth and it's actually going to result in great poverty, as it destroys our money and destroys our economy by debauching or ruining our money.

Engaging in labor that brings order and increased utility and fruitfulness in the world that God made by using the resources that God created to create beauty, to create function and so forth. This is fundamental. This is fundamental to our glorifying God. The catechism question for this week is the chief end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever or to glorify God by enjoying Him forever. Fundamental to glorifying God is exercising labor.

Labor is the means that God is ordained to provide for us. It's how we eat. It's how all of our needs are met. Those who are strong and in the prime of their youth are called to labor for those who are not. So that's why fathers labor for their children and provide for them before they're able and also for those who are sick or weak or firm or otherwise unable to labor.

Those who have strong bodies, this is the means that God uses to provide. Uses to provide the goal of our lives ought to be to mind our own business to lead a quiet life, minding our own business. Paul urged his Thessalonian brothers that they increase, that you increase, he said to them, more and more, that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands as we commanded you that you may walk properly toward those who are outside and that you may lack nothing. See, Labor is the means that we lack nothing, and the means by which we walk properly and decently with respect to those outside the church or outside our home. Mind our own business, working with our own hands.

And Those that are in the habit of stealing are called to not steal and to work with their own hands, that they may be able to supply the needs of others. That's the opposite of stealing. Now, to be able to do this, to be able to labor diligently at your calling requires a diligent preparation and that boys and girls is what your childhood years are for. Is that preparation for that lifetime calling. You have about 18 to 20 years where your parents will provide for you.

Your ability to eat is not directly tied to your ability to work. They will put the food there, but if they love you, if they're good parents, they will be teaching you to work. They will be expecting that as you grow, year by year, day by day, that you produce, that you begin to work as you are able. And that time though comes to an end. And if you have used that time well, then you will be able to provide for your family, for yourself and your family.

Now God teaches these skills. God teaches these basic skills of how to labor and provide. Isaiah 28 makes that very, very clear. How does the farmer at say, know when to stop plowing and when to plant? How do you know when the soil is the right texture?

How do you know when it's broken up enough but not too much? Well, Isaiah says God teaches the farmer that. How do you know how to thresh the various different kinds of grain because it's not all done the same way. Anybody that cooks knows you don't make all food in the exact same way. There's many different ways to prepare it.

There are many different ways to thresh different kinds of grain. How do you learn all that? How do you know how to do it this way with one grain and another way for another grain? Well, Isaiah says God teaches that skill to us. And so the Lord is the one who enables us to prepare for diligent, a lifetime of diligent labor in our calling.

Notice also here though the importance of ownership of land. It is he who tills his land, his land. He's not tilling somebody else's land. He's tilling his land. To be tilling somebody else's land is really what a slave did, a servant did, tilled somebody else's land for them.

Now there's nothing wrong with that, it's honorable. If that, and the Bible says that if you are come to the Lord as a slave, then you should seek to be content there. But if the Lord gives you an opportunity to be free and no longer a slave, then you should take that opportunity. And so it's right if you are a servant, not wrong to be a servant. It's an honorable way to live.

But if the Lord gives you the opportunity, we are to seek our freedom so that we can till our own land. See, private ownership of land is important to a stable society. It enables a society to have roots. And one of the things that's been done to destabilize our society is to destroy that connection to ownership of land. One, very few people own their homes anymore.

The bank owns most many people's homes. But also the separation from land and from our own business. Roots are what enable a tree to survive a drought or to survive a storm. Roots give stability in a storm. And societal roots are what enable societies to survive in difficult times.

And when people have made a lifetime investment in their land, then they have a commitment to that land that other people who have not invested their life don't have. And it's not just land here, but I think just like this tilling your land as you're speaking to, laboring in your calling, The land here refers to the capital, one's capital, one's tools, one's tools of one's business or one's trade. So it may not be soil that we're talking about, it might be buildings and equipment and so forth. There was an event in Athens, Tennessee shortly after the end of World War II where corrupt politicians had overrun the town and were in the process of stealing an election. Well, that was the first election after most of the World War II troops had returned home.

They just spent four or more years risking their life to preserve their way of life and to preserve the freedom of their country. And So when they came back to their roots, back to their hometown, they put a stop to it. And they used the town armory to arm themselves as citizens against the very corrupt and wicked sheriff and his deputies. But here's the interesting thing. The governor had the, in this case, the governor had the National Guard mobilized and could have sent them in and probably overwhelmed these citizens who were seasoned warriors nonetheless, but still it's a small town and small in number.

But he didn't and here's why he didn't because those National Guard troops he rightly reasoned would be very hesitant to fire on veterans just returning from fighting in World War II. See, there was a connection there. The societal connection that preserved justice. Now, socialists believe that the primary purpose of the civil government is to care for the people, but that's not what the Bible says. The primary purpose of civil government is to bring God's wrath on those who do evil.

And the purpose, the means of provision is for those who are laboring diligently at their calling. And so like I said, not everybody owns acres of land, that's not what this is about. It's not saying everybody needs to become agrarians or farmers. What it is speaking to is that we should be aspiring to be those who produce with our own tools, who develop our own businesses. And blessing is promised to those who labor diligently.

And we'll talk more about that in the next verse. But second characteristic of a faithful man is that he avoids unprofitable, empty, or meaningless activity. He who follows frivolity will have poverty enough. A faithful man avoids empty or meaningless activity. There are two errors that we can make when it comes to the use of our time and particularly our labor.

We can fail to work diligently and waste our time with frivolity, or we can fail to stop work and rest. And both failures lead to problems. Maybe one might be called a workaholic, somebody who never rests. God has commanded, not just given, but God has commanded us to take one day of rest out of seven, to rest from our labor. It's important, it's important physically, it's important spiritually, so that we take that rest.

And failure to do so can lead to problems. But what's speaking about here is failing to labor diligently and spending time following for reality. Failure to labor diligently leads to poverty. Oftentimes failure to rest properly leads to a great financial wealth, but a poverty of relationship wealth. The Bible commands us to do both.

Rest and recreation are not unprofitable activities. But it is in rest and recreation that we maybe are most prone to engaging in unprofitable activities. So we need to ask ourselves, does our rest involve, does it add value to our life? Does our entertainment add value to our life? Movies, theater, sports should have a purpose.

They're certainly not wrong, but they should be purposeful. They should not be mindless indoctrination. Games should train the mind or provide laughter or bring us closer to one another or help us understand the complexities and the nuances of things that we have not personally experienced. They should be to inform us our entertainment, our recreation, should add value to our life in some way. Secondly, we can ask about our use of time in entertainment, in recreation, and rest.

We can ask what desires. Does it cultivate in us? Does it lead us to praise God? Does it lead us to desire to lead a godly life? Does it lead us to love our wives and family, to submit to our husbands better?

Is that what it produces in us? Kent Hughes writes in The Disciplines of a Godly Man and he first wrote this book 30 years ago. He's updated it but he says quote, it is impossible for any Christian who spends the bulk of his evenings, month after month, week after week, and day in and day out, watching the major TV networks or contemporary videos to have a Christian mind. Unquote. He said it's impossible.

He was writing that 30 years ago. 30 years ago. What desires does our entertainment cultivate in us? And thirdly we can ask does it compete for time spent with Christ in his word and prayer? Recreation, rest, restoration is good and necessary but it should be in its proper season and shouldn't displace the other disciplines of godly and faithful people.

So a faithful man avoids unprofitable, empty, or meaningless activity. But thirdly, a faithful man abounds with blessings in verse 20, the first part. A faithful man abounds with blessings. That's what the Bible says, God blesses a man. What are these blessings?

Well, they are blessings of salvation, first of all. Blessings of salvation, justification. That we are declared righteous and are no longer under condemnation. That's a blessing. There's blessing of redemption.

We have been bought back from bondage to sin and to Satan. That's a blessing. We've been renewed, regenerated. We've made new creatures in Christ. We've been given a new life and that's a blessing.

We are sons. We've been given sonship. We're adopted. We're not orphans. Uncared for.

That's a blessing. We're joined heirs with Christ. We have an inheritance, and that's a blessing. We're reconciled, we have peace with God. We're not at enmity, we're no longer under His wrath.

We have forgiveness. The debt that we owed has been paid. We have eternal life. We have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. We're like, as Psalm 1 describes, a fruitful tree that's planted by a river of water that produces its fruit in its season.

Psalm 128 speaks of the blessings of family. A faithful man who fears the Lord has blessings of family. He has gladness in a wife who fills her home with good, his gladness in his sons and daughters around his table who are strong sons and beautiful daughters, strength and beauty. Those are great blessings. And the Bible says that those come to faithful men.

I purchased some things this week from a man that was selling out, selling everything he had. He's moving to Thailand. You know, He's worked very hard all his life, that was obvious. And he's worked smart. That was from talking to him a while that became obvious as well.

And he had massed quite a fortune on his property. He had his few acres and he's built himself a really nice place. Very smartly, very wisely, not waste any money. He has, he's worth millions I'm sure, but he built a modular mobile home because for taxes, you know, mobile homes depreciate. Foundations, stick-built homes, you know, will appreciate on the appraisal.

And he was looking for how do I minimize my taxes. Smart. So he's very smart that way. But he obviously had millions. He just tell from all the stuff and the buildings that he did have.

You know, homestead, lands. You know one thing he didn't have? He had no family. He had all this and just him. He said in fact, he even put a garbage disposal in his house.

You're not supposed to put garbage disposals on septic tanks. He put a garbage disposal in his house to increase the amount of waste going into the septic tank because he was just one person and wasn't enough to keep the septic tank going. He had nobody, nobody, no family, no family around him. He apparently had a wife. He lived alone on this place and apparently had for a while.

He has a wife in Thailand, that's why he was going there. But I never heard him once in all the hours I was talking with him. Never heard one mention of children or grandchildren. So despite having all of this great financial wealth and these tools and so on, he was a poor man. In one sense, you almost felt sorry for him not having any relationships, not having a wife nearby or children nearby.

There are also the blessings of faithful children. Remember we are those who are in Christ our heirs. The covenant promised to Abraham to be God to us and to our children. And that's a great blessing, to see our children grow up, to write with their own hand that they are the Lord's to say with their own mouth that they belong to the Lord. Well, the next characteristic of a faithful man is that he doesn't seek to get rich quick.

This is mentioned actually twice in verse 20b and in 22a. A faith, He who hastens to be rich will not go unpunished. So a faithful man doesn't seek to get rich quick. He doesn't desire to avoid the labor for which we were created. The desire for wealth by itself like that leads to trouble.

Paul told Timothy, those who desire to be rich, if that's what you're grasping for, they fall into a temptation and a snare and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. So that's the desire to be rich. The desire to be rich quick is even worse. It's really one step worse than just a desire to get wealth. People that have gained their wealth over time through hard work and diligent labor tilling their field know how to manage their wealth that they get.

It's the skill of being able to manage the wealth that enabled them to get the wealth in the first place, with the blessing of the Lord, of course. It's by the Lord's blessing that we get our wealth. But the Lord uses means, too. And so people who don't have wealth often don't have it because they don't know how to acquire it. They don't know how to manage it.

And if they were to receive sudden riches, they would most often lose it just as quickly. The skills to use wealth properly are the same skills that enable people to acquire it in the first place. And it starts by being faithful with a little. If you're faithful with a little, God will bless you with more. If you're faithful with that more and you use that wisely, the Lord will give you more.

With all the lotteries that we have today, the stories of people who have gone from riches to rags abound. Just Google it. I even know personally people that have acquired a lot of wealth suddenly without having to work for it over time and then a few years later they're worse off financially than before they got the wealth because having a lot of wealth and not knowing how to manage it just meant they knew how to create bigger problems that they didn't know how to solve and get themselves into stickier and worse situations. But a desire for hasty wealth implies a willingness to cheat. Someone who wants to get rich quickly lacks the patience and discipline to build wealth dollar by dollar through diligent labor six days a week.

And so this type of person is someone who is most tempted to cheat to get their wealth. To get wealth by defrauding others. This also talks in verse 22. It says, a man with an evil eye hastens after wealth. Now that evil eye, that's a metaphor that's used in Proverbs 23 verse 6 and in the New King James, that same phrase is translated a miser.

A miser. A miser is someone who has set his heart on wealth and therefore has no desire to share anything with anyone. He's got to keep it all because he wants wealth. And he thinks if I spend less then I'll keep more. If I give less I should say.

If I give less, if I share less, then I'll get more, but it really works the opposite. It doesn't work that way. A man with an evil eye hastens after riches and does not consider that poverty will come upon him. The Lord gives to those who are generous and who look out for the needs of others. A miser may give somebody a gift, but the Bible says that they don't mean it when they offer that gift.

And it says, don't eat the bread of a miser nor desire his delicacies. Why? Because he doesn't really want you to take the gift. He's offering it maybe because he has to to look good, but he hopes you don't want it. So we need sometimes discernment when a gift is offered to know when a gift is offered in sincerity and when it's offered for the benefit of the giver to ease their conscience or to make themselves look good.

Now, a faithful man is also future oriented. Second half of verse 22. A man with an evil eye doesn't consider that poverty will come upon him. One mark of a faithful man is that they are looking to the future. They consider the long-term implications of their spending decisions today.

They're thinking, How will this affect things down the road? When money is hard earned, it's not easily given up. When it's hastily earned with little sweat or patience, it's easily given away for things with no lasting value. And so people that have earned, gotten money easily, they give it away easily and have nothing down the road and can end up, there are many, many ballplayers, famously, who had great earning and income, who are poor today, who are exactly what this verse is speaking about. They didn't consider that poverty will come upon them.

Now verse 21 is the center of this chiasm. Notice the chiasm just briefly. Verse 19 is talking about a faithful man and verse 23 is speaking about a faithful man doing their duty. And then verse 20 and 22 are talking about hastening after riches. That theme is in both of those.

And the middle one is a faithful man doesn't show partiality. So in the chiasm, the middle point, center, is the key point. So this verse is the key point. And faithful man is impartial. He's just, he has integrity.

A faithful man can't be persuaded to act unjustly for some gift, big or little. Unfaithful men are just the opposite. They will betray their trust for a mere piece of bread. German concentration camps are filled with these kind of unfaithful guards. And so are many of our prisons in our nation today.

They abound with guards who break the rules and show partiality to anyone that offers them a piece of bread. Something that's not all that valuable and doesn't last all that long. But this is particularly important for those who are in a position of rule to those who must render judgments. We're not to be partial, we're not to treat people with favoritism, either for better or for worse. Judges should know the people that they are judging.

That's the ideal. Now, today it's considered the opposite. Today if a judge knows somebody in the trial before him, then he's presumed to be unqualified. But that's not a biblical model. Judges should know the people that they are judging.

The Bible speaks of judges over 10, judges over 100, and judges over a thousand families. Well, a judge over 10 families is going to know those 10 families that he's responsible over. Unless you think that that is a nanny state, remember judges should not have prosecutorial power. One of our main problems today is we have these district attorneys who take it upon themselves to go out and prosecute people rather the biblical model is that when somebody is aggrieved injured and they're not able to work it out together among themselves, then they come before a judge and they bring the case before the judge, not the judge going out or sending somebody out to drag people into the courts, which is what goes on today. So these judges of ten, they're not going out and trying to drag people into their courts.

They're there when people have a disagreement. They can come to the judge. So the judge would have known the people they were judging. And it was important then that They not show partiality to one person and justify them when they were wrong or render a light sentence for something they did. Anybody that's worked in some of the Muslim lands where they do have these kinds of tribal judges knows that's a big problem there.

A faithful man is bound by duty. It's easy, or I should say it's not pleasant, it's not easy, to have to bring a rebuke. It's a hard thing to do. And it ought to be a hard thing to do. If it isn't a hard thing to do, then it's probably not being delivered with the right heart attitude, with the right motive, And it probably won't be effective either.

It's not a pleasant thing to do, but it's the right thing to do when it's needed. And a faithful man will bring it. Faithful are the wounds of a friend. A friend is somebody that loves us, that cares for us, that when they see that we're in danger, they're willing to bring that rebuke. But a faithful man is also bound by the truth.

They're not given to flattery. It's easy to go with the flow, to praise someone when everyone is praising them. Or to praise someone when they can give us something, when we can get some benefit from them. But a faithful man won't stoop to bend the truth in either of these situations. See flattery is what you tell a person to their face that you would never say behind their back.

You tell a person to their face what you would never say behind their back, praise. You tell them to their face, you don't actually believe it, so you never say it to someone else, because your desire isn't to praise them, your desire is to receive something from them, or to be seen as praising them. If it's true praise, you'll be just as glad to say it when the person is not present as when they are present, maybe even more so when they're not present. Where flattery is only useful when the person being flattered is going to hear it. Now, see, gossip is the opposite.

It's what you say behind someone's back that you would never say to their face. But a faithful man is bound by the truth. He's bound by duty. Now we, we are not faithful men in all these senses apart from Christ. Christ is the faithful man.

That's what the writer of Hebrews said of Christ. Therefore, in Hebrews 3, Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of the holy calling, consider the apostle and high priest of our confession, Christ Jesus. Consider him who was faithful To him who appointed him just like Moses was faithful in all his house For this one has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses in as much as he who built the house has more honor than the house. For every house is built by someone, but he who built all things is God. And Moses indeed was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward.

Moses was faithful in his house as a servant, but Christ as a Son over His own house, whose house we are if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end. Christ was faithful over His own house and therefore has more glory than Moses who was faithful as a servant in the house." But here the writer says, whose house we are? We are part of this house that Christ has been faithful over, His own house. Whose house we are, if we hold fast to confidence. Christ is the faithful man in whom we live.

We live because He lives. We are righteous because He is righteous and we are in Him. We are in His house. Remember that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. We are faithful because He is faithful and we are in Him.

And if we're not abiding in Him, then our faithfulness is only a faithfulness of the flesh. And it's only in the flesh. It's not an abiding faithfulness. We have to abide in Jesus Christ if we are going to be faithful, if we are going to be like the faithful man that's described in Proverbs 28. Jesus taught us to abide in Him.

Abide in Me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I, Jesus said, am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit. It's only when we're abiding in him that we are faithful and able to labor diligently and are calling and receive these blessings that abound to the faithful man. Without me, Jesus goes on to say, you can do nothing.

If anyone does not abide in me, is cast out as a branch and is withered, and they gather them and throw them into the fire and they are burned. There's nothing lasting there. But if you abide in me and my words abide in you, you will ask what you desire and it will be done for you. Amen. May God enable us to abide in Him, to persevere in Christ.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word that is our guide to our feet, a light to our path. May we hide it in our heart that we might not sin against you. May we take heed to its warnings and its admonitions, admonishments, that we may cleanse ourselves from secret sins. Father, we ask for your blessing upon our homes, upon our families, upon our labors, as we do them heartily unto you. Lord, we ask that you would establish the work of our hands and that you would use us to bless many.

May the joyful sound of your gospel fall from our lips. We ask this in Jesus' name, amen. Hymn 99. Oh that the straitened hill of pride, The old one here, and he makes his way, for he and he, both have in thinking, he and he, as ford and in his sight, Come with me, and he has gone and given his son, Shall ever sin the law of his life. For in thy mercy shall endure thy covenant, I will not be shall endure, I will not be let it go.

It's true that grace I have entered, forever of life and freedom. Our home, we love and trust in you, and our ears are full. And shining brightly for your race, our students come from boundless praise. And as we hear your reaching, The title song, They did not lie, O Lord, shall we, Not lie, dear, makes and never tell. They would not escape, O Lord, And praise and praise to thee, O Lord, in your favor, may your shine.

All praise to thee, O Lord, in your favor, may your shine. Please be seated. Thee is the glory of the King. Please be seated. It's our privilege once again to come to the Lord's table, to feed by faith upon Him, to be fed by Him.

It's a table that where Christ's grace is given to us by faith. I'd like to just read very briefly from the Westminster larger catechism. The duty of Christians after receiving this sacrament is And that it teaches us is to seriously consider how we have behaved ourselves here and with what success if we find quickening, life, and comfort to bless God for it and to ask for it to continue to watch against relapses, to fulfill our vows and to encourage ourselves to frequent attendance. But if we find no present benefit, more exactly to renew our preparation to and our carriage at this table, in both which If we can approve ourselves to God and our own consciences, we are to wait for the fruit of it in due time. But if we see that we have failed in either of these, we are to be humbled and to attend upon it afterwards with more care and diligence.

And it is spoken earlier of how we prepare to come to the Lord's table. I won't read that this morning, but if you would like sometimes, like this afternoon, If you want to refresh yourself on that you can read those earlier questions. But let's come now to this table and ask the Lord to bless this meal. Heavenly Father, thank you for this bread and this cup and we ask that you would set them apart now as these signs and seals of your covenant with us. Lord, we remember your death.

You died because you loved us. You died for us because you loved us. Oh Lord help us today to meditate upon that sacrifice, the extent of your love for us. How amazing it is to us. Lord we ask that you would through this table especially deepen our love for you.

For we only love you because you have first loved us and given yourself for us. So our love for you Lord is your work in us. We ask that you might work a deeper and fuller and richer love As we have a deeper and fuller richer understanding of your sacrifice of its efficaciousness And and of and a knowledge, Lord, of you. We are reminded of that woman of whom you have forgiven much, who so deep was her love for you that she washed your feet with the tears that fell from her eyes. And she dried them with her hair.

What a picture of love. We ask Lord that you would bless us at this table today. In Jesus' name, amen. Our Lord Jesus Christ, in the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread and having blessed it, he broke it and gave it to his disciples as I, ministering in his name, give to you, saying, Take eat, this is my body which is broken for you. This do as often as you do it in remembrance of me.

He took the cup and gave it to his disciples saying, This cup is a new covenant in my blood which is shed for many for the remission of sins. All of you drink of it. Please come forward. Psalm 138b. Psalm 138b.

The world. The days of sin, the night of the world, the holy way, the great the great the holy way. The holy way the God of humanity, I will give my life For in the land without your birth In the land without your birth You will have to live a day without your birth The day of our lives, the day of our days, It will shine through the day, I know the day of our Lord is coming. Hallelujah, oh, when broken hearts your name is heard. Hallelujah!

When broken hearts are no longer mine, in heaven's midst I'll adore you now and all the earth the world. In the world, I have been my life to earth and earth for me. In that heaven, you will know the truth. And when, of my love. And I am not a saintly thing.

I am not a saintly thing. I am not a saintly thing. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.

Amen. And send me down on the ground like I always find you, Who longed within faith for you and glory I am sent, of the United States. In this day and age, the United States will be eternal. The world is a place of peace, a place of peace, a place of peace. The world is O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.