Faith - Lesson 4 week 2

Alright, well we are in lesson four of the faith class. We got through part of the list, or the attributes of God. We got through, I think, omnipresent, and then we were ending there. I thought about this yesterday as I was studying again. I was thinking about this, and for you, who I'm just saying, for me to end short is impossible. I thought about how do you, in less than a class, describe God? I thought about that as I was going through all this, and it was like, man, I was just getting more and more and more, and I was thinking this and this, and I was like, how do you describe the essence of God 30 minutes. As you look at it, we're going to have an eternity of learning and discovering more about him. And yet we put it on a piece of paper and get it done in 30 minutes. Yeah, we got it nailed.

Also, of all the names that he has in his actions that we can observe, you know, Jehovah, Nisai, Jehovah, Jireh, El Shaddai, etc, etc, etc. The holy one, the banner over us, the helper in times of distress. I think Vern has a sheet about all the names. Because of who he is, how he interacts with human beings like ourselves. Like you said, it just opens up and opens up and opens up.

Like I said, after studying, I was just grabbing more and more and more and more, and then I thought, you know, we're going to spend an eternity discovering more about him, and then, you know, we're trying to box this in in 30 minutes or so of trying to discuss, you know, his essence and what all of these different components are that we bring out. But each one of those is infinite, you know, omnipresent, you know, omniscient, you know, right there.

Like I said, I just kind of cracked up at the end studying and I was putting all these things together. I thought, well, this is kind of meager to put all these things together within 30 minutes. The other thing I wanted to do too, sitting in a class and getting through this, I just want to encourage you again. We're going through these things, and we're a little bit deep in the weeds, and some of these are kind of hard concepts.

As I was saying last week, I think it's really tough for us to take what we have as this definition, which is in Scripture. And so, this is what faith is. Even though our minds always gravitate back, I think, to personal faith. But this is what the Bible, the Word of God says faith is. And so we have to start here, but our minds always want to go to personal. Sitting in the class, I just feel that we're all kind of doing the same thing. Yeah, yeah, I understand, and that's the definition, but personal faith.

And so I just want to encourage you that we need to get this basis down before we get into some of the other things in personal faith, and the faith, and the principle of faith, and some of the other areas describing faith. I kind of want to encourage you. I've been excited about this class. Disclaimer, this is not a road thing. This is not what I say for you to do. It's not mechanical. It's not law. It's not this. It's just what I do personally. Personally for me, I usually in the morning I read One of the Hungry Hearts for that day and then I read a chapter.

I start at John and I go through Jude. That's really what I think John describes the deity of God, I think, and it was one of the later books after all the epistles. And then you have all the epistles which describes the church, the mystery that was to the Jews. And so that describes who we are in the body and all that.

So that's my method. I read a chapter and I just read it. I'm not doing deep study, I just read it. But as I went through it, all I kept seeing was faith. And I keep highlighting in my Bible. I don't use my electronic one, I actually use my real. And I'm highlighting, and I kept, man, faith, faith, faith, faith, faith.

And that's really what we're called to do. The only thing we're called to do. And from that faith, then we have action. It's from a position of rest. And when you look at how Paul teaches, Paul gives us doctrine first, facts. And then he said, here's how that's manifested. And that's where I think with faith, once you believe this, then you have the manifestation, the transformation into Christ, his very image. So, I want you to hold on to, you know, that we are going to get into more of these things.

I just did a kind of a, with my electronic, I just did a thing and I said, just get me from basically Acts to Jude, how many times faith is called out. And then the other topic, which I love, is grace. And I did grace. Grace showed up about a hundred, a little over a hundred times. How many times did faith show up? over 200 times.

I'm not saying this is not an in-depth study. I didn't take it in context. I didn't take it in the faith, personal faith, this, that. On my study Bible, give me faith, and it came up a little over 200 times, where grace was called out about 100, 115 times.

So, again, I just look at importance and what the Word is telling us. Faith is a key. And either by describing, you know, in Hebrews 11, where we get a lot of the, you know, we call the Hall of Fame of Faith and all that. But then there's just all through the epistles is about faith. Faith, that's the key. And, you know, as we went through the Colossians study, I was, I just, I keep, it just kept coming to me. Again, that's why I get excited about this class and where we're going with it.

Is it, do you believe this stuff? Faith. It's of God. It is God. And when I go through the Colossians 1, the one that I said really helped change things for me was in the Colossians. Colossians 1 where, in Him all things hold together. In Him all things hold together. Depends on translation. In Him all things hold together. Do you believe that? When we look at the sovereignty of God, if He's holding all things together, is He in control of all things?

So, when you go through that trial, you know, one of my isms, I always say, Oops! Missed that! No! He allowed that. And if you pair that with You can't be separated from his love. What's he doing? He's drawing it to himself. Dependency. I like Mike's thing that Miles told him. I love that thing he said last week.

If there's a boundary of Christ in Christ's body, and as you get closer, Satan's out there with a pit bull. You know, and he uses Satan to draw you where, not to jump across the line, but to come back, drive you back to him. And that's what those circumstances, those trials are meant to do.

I realize it looks more like personal faith, but if you take it just as a general statement of faith. Chuck Colson, about 20 years ago, put out a little blurb that got passed around the Christian world. 5% of our life is the circumstances that happen to us and 95% is our response and our attitude. And although it's a personal application, still one can extrapolate and make the general principle that if you really come back to this fundamental definition that faith is reality, if that's acting in your life through the power of the Holy Spirit, than wherever your body is going. Whether it's going to assisted living, or whether it's going to Timbuktu, to witness to third world people, whatever is happening with your physical body. If you believe that God is sovereign, that God has a plan.

He's got people in assisted living who need encouraging and building up as much as people sitting here in this room. God's got something for each one of us to do by faith. Just like the guys in Hebrews 11. And it's not only, you know, we try and push that to missionary or evangelism, but I think the key thing is his personal involvement with you. That he wants a relationship with you. and all his actions are to drive us to him because he wants fellowship with him.

Get a hold of that one. That the God of the universe wants intimate relationship with you. So much so by my other favorite is Abba Father, Daddy. A relationship so intimate that I can call the God who holds all things together, Daddy. That's what he wants. The evangelism and the other things are secondary, I think, to his personal relationship with you.

He wants that established intimately, and as close that we become transformed, the renewing of your mind, to have Christ's mind. That's the number one purpose. Conform to the image. And that, I think, is the number one thing. Then, from that position, You were able to evangelize, teach, do all these things. Yeah.

I was just thinking about, you talked about personal. I went to a thing this Friday and it was kind of about good things happening or bad things happening to good people and personalizing it and the guy used the example of Joe. and how that all came about by God saying, you know, have you considered my servant Job? And, I mean, just realizing that, you know, God is orchestrating. One of my favorite ones, I think, you know, from some of my past and, you know, being involved in other things and being, you know, 20-20 hindsight, my favorite is Joseph.

What man meant for evil, God meant for good. Like I said, he's in the bottom of the pit going, hey brothers, hello, what's this plan? What is this plan? But God knew exactly where he wanted him. Potiphar's wife and all the different things that transpire with him. You've got to be thinking, wow, where am I going with this one? But when he gets to the position that God had him, He knew exactly why.

And that's why I say when you start understanding that God is sovereignly in control and all He wants is a fellowship, these things that happen to you are to draw you to Him, that dependency upon Him, that relationship with Him. That's when you then serve. That's when you serve from a position of rest. test of faith too, because then if you go like, well, forget it, this bad thing is happening to me, so therefore God is not good and all that, it just kind of builds it more too. Well, it's to bring you to dependency upon Him. It's to show you, I think a lot of times, your selfish nature, your flesh basically, and your dependency on the flesh rather than dependency upon Him. And so, you know, that's why, like I said, I always go back, how do you get in James?

Consider it all joy, my brother, when you encounter various trials. Well, if you know he's in control and you know he loves you, okay, I'm going through the trial because he's drawing me to him. Praise God. You know, it's awfully hard in the midst of a trial. But when you have that, you can have the peace that surpasses all understanding. Because you know he's in control. That's why I say, but it all comes back to faith. Do you believe this? Do you believe this? That it's real. God is the one who is real and who's said all this stuff. Left us the word, left us the Holy Spirit to convict us of this.

And you know, it doesn't happen over, we're a fast food generation. Throw it in the microwave, 30 seconds, we're done. drive-through, get it done, we're fast, we want it done. As we discussed last week, this is a growing process. When you look at Hebrews, the milk of the word, the babies and this, and then the meat. There is a process by which we go through of growth. And that's a process to bring us to Him, to that intimate relationship with Him, our dependency upon Him. But it's all based on faith.

Do you believe this? That it's real? God is the substance, the reality. We've been in the weeds, as I say, kind of getting this and kind of cranking our brains a little bit about how this fits to what we think faith is. Faith is always centered around us, our personal faith. But this is the essence of it. I just want to encourage you as we go through this. As I said, through my reading, I kept seeing faith, faith, faith. Fight the good fight of faith. Everybody forgets that last part. We're supposed to fight Satan, we're supposed to fight the world, we're supposed to fight... No, fight the fight of faith.

Anyway, I want to encourage you to hang in there. We'll get into more of these things. Like I said, there's over 200 references to the word faith used over 200 times. Again, I think it's an important thing that we study. Now, getting back to the lesson four, we were at self-existence.

Self-existence, what does that mean? And this is, again, the essence of God. Self-existence. Nobody else brought him into being. Okay. Other thoughts? He's not dependent on anyone else. It'll never end? He's not dependent on anything else. Or anyone else. Can I go back to faith? No. We're not in this class, you can't. Oh wait, yes you can.

Okay, so I was thinking about how this applies to Christ. you know, because obviously then that would be another quality of Christ. And for him to go through everything he did and have faith in the Father that he would be faithful for his death and resurrection and all of that. That must have taken faith. Absolutely. Do you think, and before time, that's why I say the definition of love, the definition of love is, even before he created us, he knew he had to sacrifice his son, and he still created us.

But they had already agreed to what the payment was going to be. Do you think there was a day he doubted us? Are you sure about this? Let's check the contract again. Do you think he ever did that? You've got a second opinion. Let's have a thought about this. When you say that, I think of when he said that because of the choice set before him. He endured the cross. Go figure that one. He believed. He knew what was coming. How do you do that without faith?

The beauty of that to us is That was to bring us into that intimate relationship in John 17. The union with Him. Sharing His glory. That was all because He wanted to bring us there. What a demonstration of that eternal love. That infinite love. When you think about the joy, the joy is because He's going to bring us to what? So we can glorify God forever. That's the joy, knowing that He's going to bring us in for an eternal relationship with God, to glorify Him. Oh, He's in. It's a joy to do that for Him. The definition of love should just be Christ. Open up Webster's Dictionary and it should just say Christ. That's the definition of love. When you mentioned John 17, and when you think of the infinite, eternal, all-powerful God in John 17, His main focus was on us.

Yeah. When He says, not only you, but who will believe, that's us. All these things He's talking about, sharing His glory, having the union, Go back to the beginning of the union between God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and He's saying, I want that same union with you. Just grab a hold of that one in your finite little brains. And again, by faith, do you understand that? Do you believe that? He wants to share His glory, His eternal glory, with you. and have a union. And again, the one who holds all things together, he wants to have an intimate relationship where you call him daddy. Back to the definition.

Christ knew the definition. Faith is God. The reality of the nature of God. He knew what that nature was. So one could respectfully say that Christ was not so much exercising faith in a personal sense, He was exercising faith because he knew the definition of faith. And he knew the reality that what God had planned, God not only would be faithful to do, but he had the power to do it. He had a purpose in mind of what it would accomplish, etc. etc. etc. So is it any different for us? No. No? The faith should be the same. That's where we're going. That's conforming. Yeah, but that's what I mean. We should have the same. The same faith. It's real. It's God. You've brought up faith and love. Let me throw in the third one, just as a quick note. A verse that's become very special to me in these last months, and it's become a very much reality in my inner life.

In Romans 15, 13, Paul says, May the God of hope fill you with joy and peace. And He does, He will, He has. May He fill you with joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. And it's not a doubting hope. So he uses the agency of the Holy Spirit as Holly often reminds us, to bring about in us the confirmation of this faith. That's his job, to convince us.

That's the Holy Spirit's job. But again, it comes back to, do you believe it? Yes. And that's this whole class. When we get down to it, this is the basis, the foundation for it, but then it comes to us on the personal side, the personal faith. And that's what I'm so excited about. Who was I talking to? Oh, I was talking to Ingrid about this. It's almost spiritual insanity when you think about this.

Look at all the things he has told us that's true about us right now. And we doubt it or we don't believe it. or we don't know it. But the ones you know, in him all things hold together. Just go down, he got his love, transformed, the very mind of Christ. But when you think about it, we choose, I think through the flesh, nah. But it's spiritual insanity to do that.

As I said last, it's a growing process. To where He wants us to be drawn to Him, and it's a process. It's growth. We say it, grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus. 2 Peter 3.18. We're to grow. It's a process. But when you think about it, it's insane that we don't believe this stuff. If we truly believe it's real, it's God, But it takes us a long time, a process. I think what you were saying about Miles has a chapter in his book on time. You know, it's time. It takes time.

And it may not be insanity, it's just the capacity isn't there. I call it insanity because if you really think about it, you know, why do we doubt this? Well, you know, when you say a little kid, you know, it's like to begin You'd say, why doesn't a little kid believe that if they continue in their way, bad things are going to come from it? They just don't have the capacity. What Claire said is true. Knowing is part of it too. But you can call us insane. I'm calling myself insane. I was using myself. The reference was personal.

We can agree with you on that. That's true. That's an easy one. You can know that one instantly. I think we all have little types of insanity. Alright, so self-existence, basically he needs nothing outside of himself to exist. We need a breath, we need a heartbeat, we need all that to exist. He doesn't. All of these things outside, we need a lot of things to exist. He doesn't. He just exists. Self-existence.

And I think he gave the, one of the ones was, I think in the lesson was John 8, 58. Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, before Abram was born, I am. And then John 14, 6. Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me.

I also had a couple other ones. John 17, 5. Now, Father, glorify me together with yourself with the glory which I had with you before the world was." So, again, before there was anything, he had the glory, shared the glory with God. And then 1724, Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me be with me where I am. What a fantastic verse. So that they may see my glory which you have given to me, for you love me before the foundation of the world. Before there was anything, they existed. Self-existence. Okay? Next one. Love. So, what about love? Yes? That's another big topic.

I like the first John 4, 8. I mean, because as you grow as a Christian, I think that becomes more apparent in your life. I had it a long time ago when I was going through some horribly miserable self-inflicted times. I went and I talked to a pastor and one of the things he said and I never forgot it was that if we had any idea how much God loved us it would radically change our lives. Oh yeah. And over the years I've come to realize that that doesn't happen instantly. It takes a long, long, it's a lifetime. And I think that's it with any relationship. It's time. Time is again the factor. And this is, I'll read it, 1st John 4, verse 8.

The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. What is that little word in between, is? What is it? Essence. God is love. Faith is reality. An essence verb. That's real. That's with faith, real. God is love. Again, the definition, God is love. When you start to through the conviction of the Holy Spirit. He'll work that into you. God loves you with an eternal love.

He says it in Romans, you can't be separated. Name all these things that can try and separate you from the love of Christ. Nothing can separate you from that love. You remember in one of our previous classes we had the circle. Where does it start? God is love. We loved him because he first loved us. But it starts at God is love. And again I go back to the fact that he loved us so much that he created us knowing that Adam was going to sin. And he'd have to give up his son. What better demonstration of love than that? Again, raise your hand. Who has that plan? It's only because God is love. God demonstrated his love toward us, and while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

So, grace? Is that one of the words on there? Grace. So, who has our definition? You who have been through the grace glass, come on, one of you. Something immutable. I deserve blessing? The unlimited unmerited blessings of God based upon the past completed actions of Christ. Close enough. You have to give me a break. I've been here. I know, some of you have been through the class a couple times now.

The unlimited and unmerited blessings from God based on the finished work of Christ on the cross. That's our definition, which I think is a very good definition. Could you say that again? We're going to have to have another grace class I can see. Another year of grace and another year of identification I can see. That's how I came in.

It's the unlimited and unmerited blessings of God based on the finished work of Christ on the cross. But it doesn't mean that it started when Christ died on the cross. There was grace before that based on what he was going to do. The time thing. I don't know, the gracious acts, but the operating system we live in now and function in is based on Christ.

I think gracious acts But the grace principle, and there's in Romans, the reigning principle is grace. There's a verse. We reign in grace, I think is what it is. And that's the principle which we live in. And that's what we base this definition on. So, that's based on Christ.

And again, what is that? Unlimited and unmerited. The key, I think, on this one is unmerited. And it's always the flesh that wants to do something. It's always the one that wants to go back to a law, some system that makes it relevant to doing something. And yet grace is unmerited. And there's a verse, let me have it. If grace is based on works, grace is nullified. There's a verse on it, I think I have it down low. Yeah, Galatians. Yeah, well that's the whole book is on. I love people who try and get back to the law. Have you read Galatians? Have you read Romans 7? We're not under the law. Yeah. Well, as Vernon sometimes points out, regular service to follow.

Grace was operational long before God showed His graciousness in sending Christ to die on the cross. Because, not by works of righteousness, But by God's grace, we've been saved. And when we read about Abraham, what's the comment about him? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. So the principle was still operating, even though people were trying to live it out in the flesh. God knew that the only way they were going to obtain Merit, let's call it, was through God's grace.

And between grace and mercy, there's some fine lines there. It was Romans 11, 6. But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works. Otherwise, grace is no longer grace. Oh yeah, I was looking at Ephesians 2, 21. Which ones? 21, I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died needlessly.

That's really strong. Oh yeah. And actually some of the ones in the CBS class out in Parker, they're struggling with this law thing. And it's so prevalent in a lot of churches and a lot of things, either the law or the law principle, that they have a hard time shifting out of that. But you read verses like this, and it's like in Galatians 3, 23, 24, that the law was a tutor to point us to Christ. What's the next verse? But now that Christ is here, it's no longer needed the tutor. And then all these verses in Galatians, under Romans 7, we're not under law, we're under grace. We're not under law, we're under grace.

You're dead to the law. And it's like, no. And who is the one who is wanting to grab onto that? Well it's the flesh, it's the sin nature because it wants something to do. Under grace there's nothing to do but say thank you. I think of it as the spirit of Christ living within us and not I but Christ. Christ fulfilled the law, why would he need it anymore? If we're going to live under the law, then we're not letting Christ live through us.

The law is tied to the flesh. We're in the flesh. We're in the spirit. So, it's gone. And yet the old man still wants to have relevancy. You've got to do this. To have God smile on you just a little bit more, you've got to do this. No, you don't. You're in Christ. He sees you in Christ. What more do you need?

In Ephesians 1.7 and 2.7, show us the riches or the unlimited aspects of grace.

In Ephesians 1.7 and 2.7, the riches of His grace demonstrated. Yeah, I mean, Vern can get into the definition of what the riches are lavished in. So, mercy. So, what is mercy? Not getting what you deserve? Yeah, basically, and then is mercy.

We deserve nothing but wrath and punishment. In his mercy, he withholds everything that we deserve. So, and then I think he had Exodus 34, 6 and 7. And then I add another one the Ephesians 2, 4-8, but God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved, and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. Oh wow. No way!

I was worried about you not showing up and not being five, but they all laughed when I said that was going to be short. One of the aspects that we don't often bring up, that you guys do here in this church, and I love that, is not only how it gives us all these riches in Christ at Christ's expense that He did it for us, but When you think things are really bad, read the verse that talks about God is restraining evil now, and that when he lifts his hand, it's ugly. It's going to be ugly. This is bad now. Wait until the Holy Spirit... That's what Mike said, or whoever told him. This is the best hell looks like. Let's quickly go on.

Immutable. What does immutable mean? Unchangeable. Unchangeable. So I had one that I think of. I don't know if you have better verses. I have James 1, 17. Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of light. Light with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow. Never changes.

There is also Hebrews 13.8 which was Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.

It seems like immutable too, you can't break it down to any smaller pieces and I think that would be good of God. We could say faith and grace and love and all that but you can never break him down to just the smallest part because it's all just so big. I don't know if that fits in immutable, but that's true. Immutable is just the, you know, which gives, is he ever going to renege on the, how about that eternal love thing? Is he ever going to, you know, hey, you know, I'm thinking twice about this.

You know, you were really bad last Saturday. You know, We have great peace, rest, and comfort in the fact that He does not change. Again, it comes back to our faith is reality. It's God. He doesn't change. All those promises that He has for us here don't change. It's not based on us, which is our center of the universe concept.

There's a certain sense in which Holly, I think, is right in that if you ask the ordinary person on the street, what's the big thing about God? And they'll say, well, God is love. You know, Jesus loves me, this I know. They've been singing this song in Sunday school when they were little kids. So they usually think of love. But God is all of these things.

He is not changing in any aspect of His character. He is still holy and righteous and merciful and etc. etc. etc. Nothing changes. So in a certain sense, what Holly is saying, I think is true, that God is all of God, all the time. It never changes. No aspect, no essence, none of his essence attributes change.

You can't describe him with just simple words. Yeah, and that's what I was saying. I love that we're going to try and describe God in 30 minutes. Anyway, truth, quickly, we can get through that one. It's pretty easy. What is truth? That's a pretty easy one. Okay, easy. Okay, pilot. Depends on what's the context there.

Basically, he gave John 14.6, Jesus said to him, I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me. So, what again do we see in that? What little thing that we see? I am essence. I am truth, Christ says. definition.

How about faithful? I think that's kind of wrapped up a little bit immutable in that he's faithful, it's real, it never changes, that's who God is. But God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted above what you are able, etc. And that's the 1 Corinthians 10, 13.

No temptation has overtaken you, but as such is common to man. And God is faithful. What's that little word? Who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you'll be able to endure it. So, we have that little is again. God is faithful. So, again, what does actually faithful mean? Faithful. Full of faith. You know you can't do that with me. You can't use the words in the definition with me. You just can't get away from that. Yes, we can. Yes, you can.

It has a lot to do with the immutable qualities He's not going to change his decisions, who he is, what he stands for, that he loves us, etc. And he has our lives held in his hands. to direct as needed. We're actually in Christ. I go back to that John 1028, which I always used to hold on to. It doesn't drop us along the road. Well, if he is, he's dropping Christ, because we're in Christ. I think I've told you that I used to hold that John 1028. Whenever I doubted my salvation, I'd bring up John 1028.

We're in his hand. It says, in hand, we can't get out of his hand. I can't crawl out of his hands. I'm just trying to get out of his hands. through the identification truths, I'm in Christ. I'm not in his hand. I'm in Christ. How do I get out? In Christ. In Christ in us. Well, I know, but I mean, I'm in Christ. He gets out too. I never doubted my salvation from that day. It's never even been a thought. If you understand, you died on the cross, positionally, and were placed into him. Never doubted it ever since that day. It's not a definition, but you go back to what you brought up earlier in Romans. What can separate us from the love of God? Nothing. And also the covenants in the Old Testament. What did they depend on? They depended on the faithfulness of God.

There's a section there where it talks about in the New Testament, one of Paul's letters, when he's saying, if we do this, and we do this. If we are unfaithful, yet he remains faithful. Right, there's no changing of him, the immutable part. That's what I said, the faithful and immutable. I looked at Zodiates and the word faithful in the Corinthians. His definition of that is worthy of belief, trust, and confidence. That was pretty good. Again, it's an essence where God is faithful. He's faithful in every aspect of our life. He is faithful in everything that He's ever said, everything He's ever promised. He is faithful in carrying out every single promise. Faith is reality.

Alright, we need to close. So, I think that was the second bell. Let's close. Heavenly Father, we thank you. We thank you above all that you are faithful and the very essence of our faith is the fact that you are real. And we just rest in that fact as we understand everything that is related to faith is the fact that you're real. It's the substance and the proof is that you are real. And all the promises that you have, everything you've told us about who we are in Christ is true.

And again, we just pray for the Holy Spirit to convince and convict us of all these truths and to draw us into just a more intimate relationship. Again, so much so that you want us to come before you and say, Daddy, we just thank you that you have provided that way through the Lord Jesus Christ. and his dying on the cross, and our co-crucifixion with him, and us being placed into your Son. Now you see us only in Christ. And as we see our sinful lives and different things, you see us in Christ.

And we thank you that there is nothing more required. There is no action, no work, no law, nothing. other than we are in Christ and you see us in Christ. And we rest in that fact. We rest in the fact that you are unchangeable. We rest in the fact that you're sovereign. We rest in all your attributes, that they are true. And we just thank you for that. And we just pray for Vern in the next meeting again, just to accurately bring us the word and prepare hearts to receive it. And we thank you and pray in Jesus' name. Amen.