Mark chapter 2. We love to play games, don't we? Basketball, baseball. I love to watch my kids play games. Don't you love that? Soccer. I know Zach used to play soccer. I think there's a video out there with him scoring or something or passing the ball. We love that. We love to look at games, especially of our children. The Olympic games are going on these days. saw this guy, Sean White, do some snowboarding thing. And it was fascinating. He got the gold medal. A.W. Tozer was a preacher in Chicago about 40 years ago. And he said, most people indeed play at religion as they play at other games. Isn't that true? We come to church and of course we have a mask on in our neighborhood. We want to make sure our neighbors think we're perfect and we go to work and we can't share with them what's going on in our life, of course. So we got that mask there. But how sad is it that we come to the church of the living God and we're not allowed to take that mask off? This place ought to be a place where we're able to take the mask off and we're taught to live without the mask. We're taught to live as sincere, loving believers with all of our hurts. We're supposed to grow and change in Christ, and how do we do that? Through encouraging one another. How can we encourage one another if we won't even admit that there's a whole ton of things wrong in our life? Well, this morning in Mark chapter two, we come to five incidents that run into actually the sixth verse of chapter three. And you come to master costume people. I mean, these people are Pharisees. They are hypocrites. They know how to put the mask on. and five incidents in the life of Jesus. They're all compiled by Mark, probably had heard them all from Peter. And we don't know that they're chronological, though some of them obviously are, as we're going to see this morning. And what we do is we get introduced to a group of people that don't want to be themselves. We would call them today heartless Christians. I don't want to be a heartless Christian. I want to be real, and I want to care about what Jesus cares about. And so this morning, we're going to look at two characteristics of a Pharisee, and two characteristics of a believer. And then tonight, we're going to look at two more characteristics of a Pharisee, and two beautiful characteristics of a believer. And I want you to know that this is one of those messages that the Lord has put me through the ringer on. Not only in our church, but in my family. This has been a life-changing study for me in the book of Mark. Life-changing, radical, okay? And I'm praying that it will change even all of us here. And that Tabernacle Baptist Church, beginning today, will be a place where you can come and feel safe. you can come into a place of refuge, come into a place where we are who we are by the grace of God. So let's think about this. As we go into chapter two, you're gonna find four questions in verse seven, verse 16, verse 18, and verse 24. And every time Jesus is doing something, the Pharisees are hung up on some little detail, some little form that's minor, that's non-essential. In verse seven, you hear them, why does this man thus speak blasphemies? Who can forgive but God only? complaining, bickering, criticizing. Verse 16, how is it that this man Jesus eats with and drinks with the vilest of people, publicans and sinners? Don't you know that the closer you get to God, the more spiritual you're supposed to appear? Verse 18, why do the disciples of John and the Pharisees fast, but you don't fast? Mondays and Thursdays, just like we've established. Every Monday and Thursday, you're supposed to fast. And every time the Pharisees come to see the disciples, they're just chowing down. That's not right. Get with the program. This is how you're supposed to be religious. This is how we do it. And then how about verse 24, why? Why do they on the saff day, that which is not lawful, why are you eating? Why are you eating grain? Why are you, why are you healing people on the Sabbath day? I know the Bible doesn't say that you can't heal people on the Sabbath, but our oral law that we, you know, we've added 600 laws to the fourth commandment and you ought to follow those. Why? Why aren't you with the program? Well, we're gonna find out why they're not with the program. But before we do that, let's pray. Lord, I do pray as we enter into this message, God, that you would heal hearts today, even as we saw last week that Jesus came to bind up the brokenhearted to heal them. And Lord, that you would fill us and help us to be the exact opposite of worldliness, which is not only found in the world, but it's also found in legalism in the church. And God, we pray that you would help us to love you and love people who love you. We ask in Jesus' name, amen. Who were the Pharisees? Well, there were about 6,000 Pharisees during the time of Jesus. Scribes were also called Pharisees. Scribes were a subset of Pharisees. They were like the seminary professors of their day, but they were all Pharisees. Pharisees were very sincere people. They were very passionate and very zealous. They invented the oral law. What that is is 600 laws, for instance, that interpret what the fourth commandment means, to keep the Sabbath day holy. And they invented a whole line of rituals that were outside of the word of God. Now, don't knock them. They did it because they thought they had a zeal for God. They were very sincere. And zeal and sincerity are very important. But zeal without knowledge is very dangerous. The Pharisees were very sincere, and let me tell you, they were brilliant people. Don't think that they were like the Keystone Cops, like the Barney Fife, hey, I gotcha. No, they really cared. So the question today is, not can we locate the scribes and Pharisees in Jesus' day. The question is, can we locate the Pharisees today? No, that's not the question either, actually. The question is, can we locate tendencies towards Phariseeism in all of our hearts? I wanna tell you that there's a little Pharisee in all of us. and we need not to live according to our flesh. You can be very religious and fleshly, very religious and proud and carnal, but you always know somebody who's been introduced to Jesus because all of that's put out the window and there's a broken humility about them. And that's what we want at Tabernacle Baptist Church. So, as we come to Mark chapter 2, the first thing that we realize is that Pharisees, though they're sincere, though they're brilliant, they're blind, blind, blind. They're blind to the needs of people. They're blind to the person of Jesus, to the deity of Christ. They're blind to the power of God. And for them, serving God doesn't mean experiencing the power of Jesus in overcoming in the life. For them, serving God is knowledge, knowledge, knowledge. and they're blinded to the needs of people because they don't understand that the people need to be touched by the power of God. They just believe that people need to be instructed and they all need to believe the right thing and that's what God wants. Christianity, followers of Jesus. They're not blind, they believe. They see Christ in everything. They want Christ in all of their life and they believe in the power of God. They believe that Christ can change any situation. Do you believe that? That Christ can transform whatever you're dealing with? Maybe you've had a sinful habit for years and you can't get victory. You're always turning to it because it works. Jesus stands ready for you to come in faith for victory over that sin, whatever that is. Now, let's get into the meat of the text. We read in Mark chapter one that Jesus entered into Capernaum after some days, and it was noised abroad that he was in the house, he was in the house. So for Jesus, he is ministering at Peter's house. Remember, he had healed Peter's mother-in-law. And then all of the town came and crushed in at Peter's house. Now house is a generous term. It's not what you live in. It's more like a one room, maybe a quarter of the size of this room that we're in. and maybe one, maybe two rooms at the most, and the roof would have been made of thatch, branches, and straw, and mud. So that's where they were, and it was crowded. So Jesus comes in, he's at Peter and Andrew's house, Verse two, there were many gathered together in so much that there was no room to receive them. No, not so much as about the door, and he preached the word to them. I want you to get this. Jesus is the word of God in human flesh, and he used the Bible. The Bible is important. He could have said anything, but he used the Bible to preach. He preached the word to them. How many of you would have signed up for that class? to hear the son of God preach the word. Well, he preached to them, and you can imagine that Jesus had a big crowd with him. Yes, God was giving a sermon. On the outside of the crowd, outside of the house, there was a paralyzed man, probably a quadriplegic, and he was carried by four friends. Aren't you glad for the friends that bring us to Jesus? And they saw that the church house was full. Sometimes when our parking lot is full, people will come in and then they'll leave. I don't think this guy would have done that. Sometimes any excuse is a good excuse not to come to church. And I understand you want to get fed, but you know what? If you're getting fed and Jesus is there, you'll do anything to get there. And so this man couldn't walk. That's a pretty good excuse not to go to church, right? He couldn't walk, but his friends loved him. He couldn't get in the door. By the way, it says the scribes were sitting. Everyone else was standing, but you can imagine these scribes in this little dinky shack of a house, and they were robed in these beautiful robes, and these people were hurting, and the Pharisees are blind to all the people around them. But hey, they're doctrinally correct. So hey, they're okay. You know, they don't get it. The people are hurting. They need Jesus. They need Jesus. So they can't get in because the Pharisees are sitting in the windows while everyone else is standing, waiting to be touched by Jesus. The Pharisees don't care. They don't care about getting touched by Jesus. They're blind. They don't think they have any need of Jesus. They're just there not serving God. They're criticizing. Oh, look, look, he's going to say something and I'm going to get him. Well, they decided to go up, go up to the roof. And somehow they removed the thatching and the mud, maybe some tiles. You can imagine, this was Peter's house. And the room is just dark, and it's hot, and it's musty, and people are crowded around. And by the way, there's sick people all around. Sick people smell bad. Because their bodies are literally rotting. And they can't care for themselves. So just take in that smell. And take in that darkness. And there in the middle of the crush is Jesus. And there's Peter. And all of a sudden there's a beam of light that comes shining down on them. And a little clump of dirt hits his head. Do you think the people down in the room had something to say about the guys up top? You know, they didn't have power saws back then. They were just digging through the roof and trying to make an opening big enough to get this man down. You think Peter had something to say? This was his house. And there the man was lowered to Jesus. Now, what do you think Jesus was impressed with? You think he was impressed with the friend's loyalty? With their love to their friend? It says that he saw their what? He saw their faith. And you know what? When you have faith, you will run to Jesus. What's faith? Believing that Jesus can help you. Believing that Jesus is who he says he is and he can help you. That's what faith is. He saw their faith and we're gonna have a show now. The scribes are there, the Pharisees are just waiting for Jesus to trip up, and they want a show. But Jesus, on the other hand, wants a war. He wants a war. You see, Pharisees are blind to the needs of people, and they're blind to the authority and power of who Jesus is. And so you would imagine that when this man comes down through the roof, that here Jesus is gonna say, get up and be healed. Isn't that what you would imagine he would say? And so the man is lowered down, everybody's waiting, what is Jesus going to do? And he does something that absolutely shocks everybody. He says, son, thy sins are forgiven thee. Jesus says, you know, this is not about setting up a hospital in Capernaum. I'm not about that. I'm about helping people in their hurting needs and their greatest need is that they be forgiven of all of their sins. You know that guilt that kept you up at night? You know that guilt that rides in you and puts you in the hospital and throws you into depression and makes you angry at work so you lose your job and that just destroys families all over the place? That's why Jesus came. Sickness is just a product of sin. Jesus came to heal our heart, to make us new, to change us from the inside out. Well, the Pharisees did not like this. You think they liked the response that Jesus gave? They didn't like it. They're blind, blind to who Jesus is. And so Jesus is like, I want you to know that this is not about me healing people. This is about me being God and forgiving people. And these Pharisees are blind to the power of God. Look at verse 10. He says, After this time of criticism, verse 8. Let's look at verse 8. It says, immediately when Jesus perceived in his spirit that they so reasoned, what were they reasoning? That Jesus was speaking blasphemies. They weren't speaking out loud. They were thinking about this. Whoa. It's brutal to be around Jesus, isn't it? Because he knows what you're thinking. Jesus knows what you're thinking. And he knew what the scribes and the Pharisees were thinking. And you know what's even scarier than that? Jesus knows what we're thinking right now. Jesus knows what's in your heart. And let me give you some comfort. He knows your needs. It's the needs that you can't even express if you're married to your own spouse, to your own mother, to your own father. They're so deep down inside, you're afraid to share them with anybody. Jesus knows those needs. He perceives both the good and the bad because he's God. Can you imagine the shock that the Pharisees would have experienced? They're criticizing him. in their heart. And he looks at them and he says, stop thinking that. Wouldn't that kind of like blow you away? I think I would have been blown away. I think I would have just taken the robes off, resigned as a Pharisee and been like, can I be a follower of Jesus, please? That would get my robes off real quick. Well, these people are blind not only to the needs of people, not only to the deity of Christ and the place of Christ, but they're also blind to the power of Christ, to the power of God. Everybody sees what Jesus does. He says that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins. He says to the sick of the palsy, this paralyzed man, I say unto thee, arise and take up thy bed and go thy way into the house. And immediately he arose and took up the bed. And it says they were all amazed and they glorified God saying, we've never seen it on this fashion. We've never seen this before. And that's what occurs when you're in a place in your life where you're growing in Christ. And you say, I've never experienced this before. And you may have had revival after revival in your life, but every new revival is fresh and new and wonderful. And that's what motivates you in your life. And some of you haven't had a revival in a long time. You haven't met with God. You've gotten to know the systematic theologies. You've gotten to know the commentaries. But have you gotten to know Jesus? Because that's who we were created for. We were created for Jesus. Blind, blind, blind Pharisees. They can't see. They're sincere, but they can't see the needs. They can't see the person of Jesus and how beautiful he is. They can't see the power of God. They don't experience revival. Their idea of a revival is dissecting God. The thing they look forward to is a new book that just dissects God. People who do that are cold, they struggle with sin, and they don't have the power of God in their lives, and that's not what we want to be. We don't want to be blind. We want to be believing like that paralytic. And when you believe, you'll cross an ocean to see Jesus. You'll go anywhere to help a hurting person, because you're hurting, and when Jesus touches you, you want to touch everybody else and help them. But there's a second thing that we learn about Pharisees in Mark chapter 2. They're inwardly boastful, but followers are broken. Pharisees believe they are righteous. Followers know that they are sinful. And they take good truth and they misapply it. Think of it this way. How many of you like coffee? Just humor me here. You like coffee, even on occasion, okay? How many of you like coffee with lots of cream and sugar? Me too. How many of you like your coffee to be ground before you percolate it? Yeah, all of us, right? Because, you know, I can't remember the last time I had coffee beans in water. Can you? Why don't you like coffee beans in water? Why? Because the coffee bean's not broken. And you can't see what's inside of it. You can't get the flavor. God wants us to be broken. He wants us to be moldable. He wants us to be pliable. And when you come to know God, it's like a lightning bolt. He breaks every part of your life, and he remolds your thinking. Imagine you go to the store, you get a filet mignon. You lay it on the counter. $25 piece of meat. And you say, you know what, to the grocer, here's $15. I want 40% off. What do you think the grocer's gonna say? How much do you have to pay, 40%, 50%, 60%, how much? 100%. You know what, God doesn't want 40% of you. He doesn't want 60 or 80 or 90 or 99. God wants 100% of you. He says, come to me and be broken and be multiple. Are you broken today? Last week at the Olympics, Shawn White won the gold medal in snowboarding. And he had two runs. The first run, he was so fantastic that he had the golden hand no matter what he did as long as he didn't fall on the second run. It was so amazing. But the second run, he went and he outdid the first run. He did something that had never been done before. I don't even know what it was called, but it was awesome. He like flipped three times. And everybody could not believe it because he risked the gold medal, because he didn't want to give 10% or 20%. He wanted to give 110%. And don't you believe that God deserves 110%? That's why Jesus came. He didn't come so that we could be inwardly boastful. He came so that we could be broken, so that we could give all that we are to Him. He wants 100% of you. So now we come to our story that really illustrates this. Jesus goes from the house of Peter, in Capernaum. And he's got an entourage like you can't imagine. And he goes to someplace that everybody knew. Everybody knew this place in Capernaum. It was worse than the dentist. It was like going by the garbage heap. It was going to the taxman. Everybody knew the taxman was in Capernaum. He worked for the enemies. He worked for Rome. And while everybody was struggling and hurting and poor and starving, he was rich and beautiful clothing and he had wicked people around him. He had guys who were a lot bigger than anybody in Israel who would hurt people if they didn't pay the 20% or so that Rome demanded, or I don't know what it was. Whatever it was, he didn't charge 20%. He usually charged 30 or 40%. Can you imagine? Everybody in Israel knew who Matthew was. Because of the way he looked, he looked better than everybody, he wasn't hurting, and he was robbing people every day. And they'd say, oh, he'd say, 20%? Oh, no, for you, 25%. Oh, you're complaining? 30%. 30%, well Rome says it's only, oh no, that's all been changed. Can you imagine? He could change the rules anytime he wanted to. And only the worst of the worst people hung out with him. People knew Matthew, they hated him. But there was someone in Israel that loved Matthew. Is there anybody in your life that you just can't stand? You just can't get along with? You might even hate them? Jesus Christ loves them. How dare you hate them? So Jesus goes with his entourage, no little show here, and he comes to Matthew. Can you imagine the look that he got from Jesus? Matthew looked into his eyes and saw somebody who loved him, somebody who cared. I can imagine in the days that Matthew was doing his job, thinking, well, there's that Jesus and he's talking about forgiveness. And look at who's coming to him. Maybe, maybe there's mercy for me. Maybe he has something that he can give me. And Jesus walks up to Matthew and he says, Follow me. You think Matthew had to think about that very long? Isn't that how Jesus is? When you truly understand who he is, you just run to him. You know that he'll love you right where you are and he's unconditionally loving you. And so Matthew goes, I don't know what the conversation was, but it was probably something like this. You know what? I know that I can't hang out with my friends anymore, at least not the things that I was doing. You know what? Wait a minute. Maybe you could tell my friends how much you love them. Can we have a party at my house and you be our honored guest? And so they did. And they all went over to Matthew's house. And it was probably something of a farewell party. And here they are, eating and drinking and amazed in the grace of God. And the Pharisees are there. Who invited them? I don't know. But they were there. And it says, It came to pass, in verse 15, that as Jesus sat at meat in his house, in Matthew's house, many publicans and sinners sat also there together with Jesus and his disciples. For there were many, and they followed him. There were many. I don't know, maybe he called all around Galilee. Not called, they didn't have a telephone system, but somehow, listen, there's somebody who loves me, who's able to forgive me. He forgave this man's sins and healed him, and he can forgive me. There's hope. and there was a great party. And who do you think was there? There was thugs, there was tax collectors, there were prostitutes, there was every kind of riffraff. Do you know Jesus loves rejects? Did you know that? You feel like a reject? Jesus loves rejects. If you're a reject, you're prime candidate for the kingdom of God. He loves rejects. The world just kicks people out and throws dust on them, doesn't care about them. Pharisees don't care about people, they're blind, and they're inwardly boastful, but you know what? Jesus loves those who see themselves as low. I want you to check this out. The Pharisees don't like this. In verse 16, they couldn't handle it. There's a lot of sinners in the house. The Pharisees don't like this. Pharisees saw Jesus with the sinners. In verse 16, when the scribes and Pharisees saw him eating with publicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, how is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners? Why is he doing that? That's not good. That's not part of our law. You're not supposed to do that. We're the separate ones. We're the Pharisees. You can't have part in these things. Well, Jesus had something to say. Verse 17, when Jesus heard it, he said unto them, They that are whole need not the physician. but they that are sick. When do you need a doctor? When you're sleeping well through the night and everything is going fine in your life? When do you need a doctor? Tell me. When you're sick. And when do you need Jesus? When you know that you're a sinner. You can only come to Jesus if you know you need him. You can only come to Jesus if you know you need him. And that's true when you get saved and it's true after you get saved. Every day you know you need him and you keep going back to him because he heals your broken heart. He helps you, He loves you, He knows where you are, He remembers your frame, He knows that you're dust, and He loves you, He wants to live in you, and He wants to live through you. Jesus isn't dead, amen? He's alive, where do you see Him? I see Him in you, and when I serve you, I'm serving Jesus. And Jesus is saving rejects today. He's saving those that are rejected by society, and he loves them, and he died for them. He says, he wants to point something out, a simple but profound truth. He says, I came not to call the righteous, right in your margin, those that think they are. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. The closer you get to God, the more righteous you feel. True or false? True or false? False. The more righteous, the closer you get to God, the more spiritual you feel, the more wonderful you feel. True or false? False. You say, prove it. Well, I'm gonna prove to you the truth. And here's the truth. The closer you get to God, the more unspiritual and sinful and undone you feel. Think of Abraham in Genesis 18, 27. When he meets with God, discussing the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, begging for mercy, In verse 27, he says, Lord, I'm but dust and ashes. He meets with God and he's saying, I don't have any way to plead with you. I can't twist your arm. You're God and I am but dust and ashes. The closer you get to God, the more undone you feel. Think about Isaiah. He gets in God's presence and says, woe is me, I am undone. I'm a man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. The closer you get to God, the more sinful you feel. What about Peter in Luke chapter five and verse eight? God, the son does a miracle of fishes. Peter falls down before Christ and he says, depart from me for I am a sinful man, oh Lord. The closer you get to God, the more unrighteous you feel. Think about John. Peter was a baby Christian when this miracle took place and he had this experience. But John was the closest he'd ever been to God in his life. He was on the Isle of Patmos. He was an apostle. He was writing the Bible. And in John 1 17, he has a vision of Jesus. It says, I fell at his feet as dead. I fell at his feet as dead. The closer you get to God, the more sinful you feel. But I want you to know. In Jesus, there is no condemnation. You may feel sinful, but you are justified. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Look at what John hears from Jesus. It says, he laid his right hand upon me as he was laying there as dead, saying unto me, fear not, I am the first and the last, fear not. You feel so sinful, but I want you to feel the touch of Jesus upon you. I want you to know that He loves you, He cares about you, and you may feel sinful, but He gave His life for you so that you wouldn't be condemned. He loves you, and you can't be more sinful than Matthew was. You can't. He was the worst of the worst. He betrayed everybody, and that's exactly who Jesus went after. So whatever you're dealing with, come to Jesus. And you say, I've come to Jesus, I know Him, I love Him, keep coming to Him. Somebody said this, you can't read the writings of Einstein and not feel a little stupid. You can't stand at the base of a great mountain and not feel small. And you can't kneel at the feet of the Savior, the holy, spotless God of the universe and not feel sinful. but know that that omnipotent God has given his life to make you clean. Amen. You see, Pharisees are blind, blind, blind. And they are inwardly boastful. They think they are the standard of righteousness. Now, we've located the Pharisees in Jesus' day. Let's locate them here. Do you look at yourself as the standard of righteousness? Do you look at yourself? You know, you've got it right. You know, when I first came to this church, you know me, I'm kind of zealous. You know, I would see truths in the scriptures that were amazing. Truths that I'd never seen before. And I came to those truths, and I understood them, and I loved them. And I love them to this day. But I went farther in so many directions than God goes. And we have to be careful when God shows us something precious that we don't say, we're the only ones. I did that. I would be on the phone with a missionary. He would be on fire for God, ready to go to the mission field, and I'd say, do you believe the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith? Well, he doesn't even know what that is. And in all of my zeal to not have a superficial Phariseeism, I went right to the other side, and I became a Pharisee. Do you think God can have mercy on Pharisees if they come to Him humbly? Amen. Let me tell you this story about Alfred Nobel. Alfred Nobel was a very, very rich man in the late 1800s. You might recognize his name because of some prize they give away. Alfred Nobel, up until this time, was not known for peace, but he was known for war. And this is a true story. He woke up one day, and he picked up his newspaper, and he turned to the obituary section, and the head article of the obituary section was him. True story. Alfred Nobel, dead. And he read his own obituary. Would you like to know what people are thinking when they go to your funeral? What do they think about you? So here it is written in black and white for him to see. And it says basically Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, was responsible for more deaths than any other living person in the world today because dynamite was used in war. put the newspaper down, shocked and horrified. He was a rich man, and that day he made a change. He decided to put his money into research, into peace, and he set up a prize that we have today for research, for scientists in the study of peace, the Nobel Peace Prize. What are people gonna say at your funeral? Oh, they knew the Word of God, but they didn't love people. Oh, they knew the Word of God, they caught everybody, everywhere they were wrong. But they never really saw life change in somebody else's life, not even in their own. I want to put off the robes of the Pharisees, and I want to put on the robes of Matthew, because that's my real robes. That's my real robes. That's who I am. And I'm coming to Jesus with my sack of money that I gained by ill repute, and I'm coming to him with my robes, and I'm kneeling down before the Son of God, and I'm saying, Lord, I'm sinful, and this is all I have. And you know what Jesus says? Sure, let's have a party. Let's celebrate, because Jesus didn't come. He didn't come to call the righteous. Who did he come to call? Sinners! Everybody who's been on the sinner wagon, raise your hand. Everybody there on the sinner wagon. Everybody on the righteous wagon, raise your hand. All right, all right, so we're making progress here. I want you to think about Tabernacle Baptist Church. not as a place to show off your mask. Isn't my mask a little better than your mask? Look at my mask. This is not a costume party. Tabernacle Baptist Church is a hospital for hurting sinners, and guess what? Jesus is the physician, and he's here to heal us. And I pray, I pray that the tone and the sense that you feel today from the Word of God is what carries this church far beyond today. Because this is not a place for Pharisees. Pharisees, get out. Sinners, come in. Jesus came for sinners. Amen. We'll have the last two tonight. So if you want to meet Jesus, come on tonight because he's going to be here. And even if you have to park way over there in the Presbyterian lot and walk over here, come and see Jesus tonight because he's going to be here with us. Let's stand together and we're going to sing just as I am, just as I am without one plea. 319 and what we're going to do is you don't even have to sing. But if you want to sing, please do. But we're gonna have our heads bowed and our eyes closed. And I don't do this very often, but I want you, if God has touched your heart and you're just coming to him with whatever you've got, I want you to come forward and I want you to kneel at the front here. And I want you to call on God to bring down his presence and his healing power in your life. Let's do that as we begin to sing number 300. and 19. So please, please come as we sing this verse. Just as I am without one plea, but that thy blood