And so I'll read from God's word from Romans chapter 10, beginning in verse 1, and I'll read down to verse 17. Let's give attention to God's holy word now. Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For being ignorant of the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. But the righteousness based on faith says, do not say in your heart, who will ascend into heaven? that is, to bring Christ down? Or who will descend into the abyss, that is, to bring Christ up from the dead? But what does it say? The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that is, the word of faith that we proclaim. Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the scripture says, everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. For the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For everyone who calls in the name of the Lord will be saved. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news. But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us? So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. And this is God's holy word. May he bless it to us this afternoon. And I invite you to turn with me in your Forms and Prayers book to our confessional reading for this afternoon from the Hatterberg Catechism, which can be found on page 226 in the Forms and Prayers book, page 226, or in the back of the songbook on page 882. And this is what we as a church believe and confess based on God's Word, and so let's confess Lord's Day 25 together. I'll read the questions and let's all respond together with the answers. It is by faith alone that we share in Christ and all His benefits. Where then does that faith come from? The Holy Spirit works it in our hearts by the preaching of the holy gospel and confirms it by the use of the holy sacraments. What are sacraments? Sacraments are visible, holy signs and seals. They were instituted by God so that by our use of them, He might make us understand more clearly the promise of the gospel and seal that promise. And this is God's gospel promise. He grants us forgiveness of sins and eternal life by grace because of Christ's one sacrifice accomplished on the cross. Are both the word and the sacraments then intended to focus our faith on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross as the only ground of our salvation? Yes, indeed, the Holy Spirit teaches us in the gospel and confirms by the holy sacraments that our entire salvation rests on Christ's one sacrifice for us on the cross. How many sacraments did Christ institute in the New Testament? Two, holy baptism and the holy supper. Brothers and sisters in Christ, in the past two Lord's Days we've considered from our catechism the all-important doctrine of justification by grace alone, through faith alone, and because of Christ alone. That is to say that we are forgiven of all of our sins and declared righteous in God's sight, not on the basis of anything in us. but solely on the basis of Jesus Christ and His righteousness and His death on the cross for us. And we can receive that declaration of forgiveness and righteousness in no other way than through faith and through faith alone. And it is by grace alone, apart from our works. And so now our catechism asks the next logical question, right? If that's how we are justified and made right with God, then where does this faith come from? Shouldn't we ask that question? Where does this faith then come from? Do we just conjure it up from within ourselves when we're just kind of walking along the beach? Or what? You know, how does it come to us? And we confess in question and answer 65 that the Holy Spirit works it in our hearts by the preaching of the holy gospel and confirms it by the use of the holy sacraments. And so it's through the Word that we come to believe. And through the Word and sacraments, we continue to be strengthened in our faith and nourished unto everlasting life. And this is what we refer to as the ordinary means of grace, both the Word and the sacraments. In Reformed churches, we refer to as the ordinary means of grace. Now, why do we call them ordinary? Well, that's because this is where God has promised in His own Word to ordinarily speak to us today. He has promised to do extraordinary things, actually, through the ordinary preaching of His Word and the administration of the sacraments. And we ought not to be wiser than God and expect Him to speak to us ordinarily in other ways, unless we have a promise from His Word that that's what He will do. And often, sadly, many today expect that of God, that He'll speak to them privately, ordinarily, or He'll speak to them in nature, His gospel message. Some will miss church and spend time hiking and going into nature and think that they can hear from God just as well as if they went to church and heard His Word read and preached. I've heard somebody tell me that before when I ask them, how come you haven't been to church in a long time? Well, I go out and I go on my boat and I hear from God out on the boat more than I do at church. Well, I say, well, you're not going to hear the gospel there. We're saying that the heavens declare the glory of God, no doubt, and we're not saying there's nothing wonderful about spending time in nature. I mean, this is camping season. A lot of us love to go camping, and that's a marvelous thing, but you won't have the gospel declared to you in nature. The glory of God will be declared, but not the gospel of Jesus Christ. And we need the gospel to be proclaimed to us on the Lord's Day. This is how God creates faith in our hearts and how he continues to sustain and strengthen our faith. We need the ordinary means of grace for that. Now, in Reformed circles, we often speak of means of grace, and what do we mean by means of grace? Well, Michael Horton puts it well when he writes that means of grace are creaturely media through which the Spirit delivers Christ and all of His benefits. We are effectually called into union with Christ by the preaching of the gospel. Through this ministry of the Word, the Spirit gives us faith in Christ. He further ratifies His gracious promise by baptism in the Lord's Supper, the signs and seals of the covenant of grace. So let's spend this afternoon just meditating on these means of grace and what the source of faith is and the sustenance of faith. The source of faith and the sustenance of faith. First, the source of faith. Where does faith come from? Well, we heard in Romans 10 very clearly, right? Faith comes from hearing and hearing the Word of Christ in Romans 10, 17. The source of faith is the Holy Spirit working through the preaching of the Word and the Word about Christ, the message of Christ, the gospel. And God's Word is, according to Hebrews 4, living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. That's how we should think of this Word. It's living and active. It's not a dead letter, but it is the Word of God. It's His Word for you today, the Word that you heard this morning and the Word that you're hearing now. He's speaking to you. One more time, Horton's helpful. He says, it could also be called God's performative Word because it is speech that does what it says. It not only teaches and exhorts, but is the means through which something new is actually brought about. Preaching is the sacramental word. This is how the kingdom comes. God himself preached the world into existence. We sang about that, didn't we, in Psalm 33, that by the word and spirit, the heavens were made, and he spoke the world into existence. He adds, through the prophets and apostles, he preached a new covenant community into being. And by the continual ministry of the Word today, he continues to preach his kingdom into existence, expanding its borders and adding immigrants daily. That's what the preaching of the Word does. It's living and active. And so far from being a mere lecture or simply a time of instruction or a motivational speech, the preaching of God's Word is how God creates faith in His elect people and how He continues to sustain and strengthen that faith and transform them into the image of Christ. And God's word never returns to him void. That's something that has kept me in the ministry for all these years. When I start to feel like my efforts are in vain or futile, I have to remind myself, it's not in vain. How do I know it's not in vain? Because God promises that his word does not return to him void. Isaiah 55 says, for as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return, there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth. It shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it. In other words, you cannot encounter the word of God without being changed in one way or another. You're either softened by God's Word or hardened by God's Word. But it is God's Word, and it accomplishes the purpose for which it is sent. In the book of Acts, we see this. As the gospel spreads, you hear these reports of how the gospel's spreading. And as the gospel spreads, it's synonymous with the kingdom of God spreading. Often it says in Acts, and the word of God spread, or the word of God prevailed. This reminds me of what Martin Luther said, the great Protestant reformer of the 16th century Protestant Reformation. This is what he said regarding the success of the Reformation. He said, take me for example. I opposed indulgences and all papists, but never by force. I simply taught, preached, wrote God's Word. Otherwise, I did nothing. And then while I slept or drank Wittenberg beer with my Philip of Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that never a prince or emperor did such damage to it. I did nothing. The Word did it all." You see, when Christ is faithfully preached, you're not just hearing about Christ, but you're actually hearing Christ. Right? And Jesus said, my sheep hear my voice. Right? When he speaks in his word, his sheep hear his voice. We see something of this truth in our passage in Romans 10. In verse 14, Paul asks, how then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? Now, if you have an ESV Bible, you'll see a footnote for that second question where it says that it could be translated as this, and how are they to believe in him whom they have never heard? Well, what's the difference? Well, it omits the word of there. which means that you don't just hear about Christ, but you actually hear Christ in the preaching of the Word. And I believe that the footnote is a better translation, that in the preaching of the Word, you actually hear Christ speaking. We don't have time to get into why I think that's a better translation, but Paul says a similar thing in Ephesians 2.17. He says in Ephesians 2.17, Christ came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. Now Paul is writing to the church in Ephesus. And we might ask, did Christ ever travel to Ephesus? No. So how could Christ preach peace to the Ephesians? We did it through the preaching by the ministers of the word, through the apostles and evangelists and pastors and teachers of his word. Christ actually preached through them. And so when the faithful preaching of the Word takes place by ministers of the Word lawfully called, Christ is speaking. God's Word is powerful. It accomplishes His purposes. It's living and active. It creates. It judges. It saves. Christ Himself preaches through it. And so the most important thing to regard during the preached word is not whether the preacher was good looking or how he dressed or how eloquent his speaking skills were, how many, you know, jokes he told or stories he told. Not that there's not a place for good illustrations and even some humor in a faithful sermon. But the most important thing is how faithful was he to the text of God's Word and preaching it and declaring that which is in accord with sound doctrine. According to the Second Helvetic Confession of the Reformed Churches of Switzerland, it says, the preaching of the Word of God is the Word of God. Wherefore, when this Word of God is now preached in the church by preachers lawfully called, we believe that the very Word of God is proclaimed and received by the faithful and that neither any other word of God is to be invented nor is to be expected from heaven, and that now the word itself which is preached is to be regarded, not the minister that preaches. For even if he be evil and a sinner, nevertheless, the word of God remains still true and good. But what is the preached word without the Holy Spirit? Well, the Holy Spirit works with the Word, and the Word needs the Holy Spirit to be efficacious, ultimately. The Holy Spirit is the one who makes the Word effectual, brings it about. We see this in creation, right? You've got the Holy Spirit hovering over the waters of creation, and the Word is spoken, and the Holy Spirit effects that Word. The Spirit is married to the Word. They go hand in hand. Just to give you an example from the Bible, if I were to ask you, how is a person born again? Well, growing up, I always remember that story of Nicodemus coming to Jesus in the middle of the night and Jesus saying, you must be born again by the Spirit. And so my initial answer is the Spirit. Maybe that was the first thought you had. Somebody must be born again by the Spirit. But then when you look at 1 Peter 1, Verse 23, it says, you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable through the living and abiding Word of God. So you see there that it's through both by the Spirit, through the Word that one is born again. The Spirit works with the Word. The Spirit makes the Word effectual in the hearts of God's elect people. And notice it's not just the word that Peter mentions in 1 Peter 1, 23 through 25, he adds, he says, not just the word generally, but he says, this word is the good news that was preached to you. That's important, right? Because you can get up and preach the law all day and a person won't be born again if you only preach the bad news. And never mention the good news. One will not be born again. You must preach the gospel. You need to preach the Word in its entirety, both the law and the gospel for one to be born again, for one to be saved, for one to be nourished and find strength in the Christian life. The gospel must be proclaimed. And that's why we confess here in question 65 that the Holy Spirit works faith in our hearts by the preaching of the Holy Gospel specifically. And that's what Paul says in Romans 10, 17, faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ. And so the person and work of Christ must be proclaimed week in and week out from the pulpit if we want to see people born again, and if we want to be strengthened in our faith more and more and find the fuel that we need to live the Christian life so we don't burn out. And what is the implication of all this then? Let me just make a couple application points. In light of all this, we ought to cherish the preaching of the Word. We ought to cherish the faithful preaching of the Word of God. We need to sit under the faithful preaching of God's Word with eagerness, with prayerfulness, with joy, with delight, with expectation that we will hear from God. This is how He speaks to us. This is how He feeds our souls. Don't you want to hear from God? Don't you want to be fed? That's what we need to ask those who forsake the gathering of God's people on the Lord's day, and we need to ask ourselves when we're tempted to just sleep in and miss church. Don't you want to hear from God today? Don't you want to be fed spiritually? That is one implication. We have to cherish the preaching of the word and never miss out on the means of grace when it's offered to us, especially in our, the church will remember. And furthermore, this should transform how we prepare for worship. As God's children, we should look forward to worship. Preparing for worship doesn't start Sunday morning. Preparing for worship starts Monday morning. And it goes all week as you prepare, you pray for the ministers, you prepare the sermon, you pray for yourself, that God would prepare your heart to receive it, you pray for others that'll be gathered, you spend time in God's word, cherishing it throughout the week. When you get the Sunday preview and you say, oh, what are we gonna hear about this week? You can look at that in advance and meditate on it. I guarantee you, if you start to prepare more like that, the word will come alive more and more. Often when I receive perhaps some negative feedback on my preaching, often I take it humbly. I try my best by God's grace to take it humbly and respond and grow from it. But I also like to ask people, but tell me about your week and what it looked like. Did you pray at all the whole week for me as I prepared my sermon? Did you spend any time in God's Word? Did you pray at all? When I sent out the text I'll be preaching on, did you read it in advance? Did you pray about it? And about 99% of the time, it's, no, I don't do that ever. I just show up. And isn't that our consumeristic mindset? That's what we do all week, right? We're just consumers. We just show up and serve me, right? We also all have a responsibility to prepare for worship, and so let me just encourage you to do that. And we should also delight not only to hear God's word once on the Lord's day, but twice, right? Because two meals are better than one, right? Two meals are better than one. I had a professor in seminary, Dr. Godfrey, Robert Godfrey, and when people would ask him, why do we have to go to church twice? he would say, you're right, let's go three times. My daughter Ella asked me this afternoon at lunch, you know, when I talked about two meals are better than one, he said, but daddy, we eat three meals a day, why not three? I said, well, you know, that's right, but we also have these weak bodies, we need to rest them a little bit between the service, and we also follow the pattern of scripture, right, where Israel worshiped in the morning and the evening, And, but you could, you could do three, right? And so that's another implication. We should delight to gather, not just once, but even twice, as the church has historically. And furthermore, if faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of Christ, then this is what the lost need to hear, right? If you have lost loved ones, if you wanna see your lost loved ones born again, I just told you how that happens. It's by the spirit through the preaching of the word, through the gospel. And so pray that they'll hear the faithful preaching of the gospel in the church, and invite them to church. Say, won't you come and check out the church I'm a part of, and I'd love for you to visit it, and pray that they'll hear God's word preached, and God will use that to open their hearts, and always be ready to share the message of Christ with them and others from God's word. And furthermore, Another implication of this is pray that God would continue to raise up faithful ministers to preach the gospel here in Regina and throughout the world, and support that work not only with your prayers but also your finances and your resources. Investing in gospel ministry is investing in eternity. I watched after preaching this morning on the idea of our sanctification process being like gold refined in the fire, and I mentioned that video about gold being refined, a YouTube video, I showed that to my family today, and my children were amazed by that, and said, wow, whoever owns that must have a lot of money, you know, that company that refines all that gold. And I said, yeah, you know what, I actually met a guy once, he's a member in one of our URC churches, And he's incredibly wealthy. And he made a ton of money because he owns some gold mines. And I said, you know what his house looks like? It's probably not much different than ours. Because he uses all that money to invest in eternity. He supports the work of church plants, missionaries, seminaries. So too ought we to be considering how we spend our wealth and if there's a way in which we can more and more invest, not only should we be giving to the offerings of the church so that the gospel ministry may continue here in Regina, but also to the work of church plans and missions. And so where does faith come from? Well, the source of faith is the spirit working through the preaching of the word, both the law and the gospel of Jesus Christ. But then what is the sustenance of faith? what sustains our faith. The sustenance of faith is the Spirit continuing to work through both the Word and the sacraments. In other words, the audible Word and the visible Word. We need to come back to the Word over and over again, especially when it's preached on the Lord's Day. And even more, we can spend time in private worship reading God's Word and in family worship. And let's not forget that throughout most of church history, people don't have a personal copy of their own Bible. For 1,500 years, we're blessed to have multiple versions of the Bible, audio versions, printed versions, and study Bibles, all kinds. Let's not take that for granted. We just sang, right, about God's Word being more desirable than gold, even much pure gold. And it's sweeter than honey from the honeycomb. Is that true of you? Let me just encourage you to spend time in God's Word daily. That's how God sustains your faith each and every day and throughout your life is through the Word of God. And you can read it throughout the week, meditate on it, but then especially on the Lord's Day. But then he also sustains our faith through the sacraments. Let's consider those. Why did God give us sacraments? Well, God gave us the sacraments to confirm the promises of the gospel to us as we confess here. Now, He didn't need to give us sacraments because His Word is true and He does not lie, but God in His goodness, He condescends to us in our weak faith and He increases our assurance of what He has promised in His Word by giving us sacraments. He uses them to strengthen our assurance. This is what we confess in the Belgian Confession of Faith, article 33. that our good God, mindful of our crudeness and weakness, has ordained sacraments for us to seal His promises in us, to pledge His goodwill and grace toward us, and also to nourish and sustain our faith. He's added these to the word of the gospel to represent better to our external senses, both what he enables us to understand by his word and what he does inwardly in our hearts, confirming in us the salvation he imparts to us. Isn't that beautiful? You see, I grew up in a church that taught that baptism and the Lord's Supper were actually more about my commitment to God than his commitment to me. It was all about my commitment to God. That's what baptism and Lord's Supper were all about, was my commitment to God. Baptism was a sign that I have decided to follow Jesus and I'm publicly declaring that. And the Lord's Supper was about merely remembering Jesus' death and recommitting myself to God. But then it blew me away when I learned that the Bible actually teaches something much more rich than that. Sacraments are means of grace that God uses to assure us of His commitment to us. They're first and foremost about His commitment to us who believe. It doesn't mean that it excludes our commitment to Him. I'm not saying that. It includes that, our commitment to Him. But first and foremost, it's about Him to us saying, I love you. I'm committed to you. I will be faithful to you. You will be my people and I will be your God. They ratify His promises to us in Christ. Now, there is nothing new about Christ that we get in the sacraments that we don't already get in the Word. Nevertheless, they aren't unnecessary or unimportant. Sinclair Ferguson put it this way in his book, The Whole Christ. He says, of course, we do not get a different or better Christ in the sacraments than we do in the Word, but we may get the same Christ better. with a firmer grasp of His grace through seeing, touching, feeling, and tasting, as well as hearing. And so, you see, the sacraments aren't superfluous. They are a wonderful means of grace that the Spirit uses to further write the promises of the gospel on our hearts. But what is a sacrament? would confess that they are visible, holy signs and seals. That's the, you know, I like mnemonic devices. Just think of S, sacraments, signs, seals. That's what they are. Sacraments are signs and seals. They were instituted by God so that by our use of them, he might make us understand more clearly the promise of the gospel and seal that promise. And this is God's gospel promise. He grants us forgiveness of sins and eternal life by grace because of Christ's one sacrifice accomplished on the cross. And so think about these two things. Sacraments are signs and seals. As signs, they are material elements, physical elements that represent Christ and His saving work. And we see in the Old Testament that God always attaches signs to His covenant promises. Genesis 17, He attaches the sign of circumcision to the Abrahamic covenant, which He established with Abraham in chapter 15. He says to Abraham, you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you." Genesis 9-12, you remember the Noahic covenant, after God brought Noah and his household through the floodwaters and safely into that new creation, God promised to never again flood the earth, and what did He give him as a sign of that promise? Well, He gave him the sign of the rainbow, I heard it. The sign of the rainbow, and did you know that more literally in the Hebrew, it's the sign of the bow? Because children, the rainbow is actually like a bow and arrow. Think of that, a bow and arrow. And this is a sign, it's a sign signifying that God has hung up his bow. It's no longer turned, is it, towards earth. And that's what the sign of the bow in the clouds represents, the rainbow. And so, as signs, the New Covenant…and so, as signs, the New Covenant sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper point us to the one sacrifice of Christ on the cross, and they point us to the reality that they signify. In every sacrament, we must distinguish between the sign and the thing signified. And that's what we do in this question and answer 67. Are both the Word and the sacraments then intended to focus our faith on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross as the only ground of our salvation? Yes, indeed. Yeah, you know, there's an exclamation mark there. I didn't hear you guys. I didn't hear that in your tone here earlier. Yes, indeed, the Holy Spirit teaches us in the gospel and confirms by the holy sacraments that our entire salvation rests on Christ's one sacrifice for us on the cross. And so the point here is that the sign, we shouldn't get just focused on the signs, but we look through the signs, kind of like windows, looking through them to see the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. That's what a sign does, right? It points to something else and not to itself. So for example, think of a picture of a beautiful tropical location like Hawaii, for example, with its sunny beaches and clear blue water, beautiful sea creatures, lush trees and flowers, mountains and so forth. When you see pictures of a beautiful place like Hawaii from a tourism company, what is the purpose of those pictures? It's to make you want to go there and experience the real thing, right? Imagine if you saw me lying in a lounge chair with my bathing suit on and all my beach gear nearby while staring at a picture of Hawaii in the middle of Saskatchewan. And I say to you, oh, so glad you could join me in Hawaii. You'd think I was pretty weird, right? Why? Because it's just a sign. It points to something else. It's there to make me want to go to Hawaii and experience the real thing. That's what signs do. They point us to something else. And the same is true in baptism and Lord's Supper. There are visible signs pointing us to something else. And what is that something else? To the work of Christ in His perfect life, His sacrificial death on the cross, and the forgiveness of sins that we have in Him through His life, death, and resurrection and ascension. Water is a sign, right, that reminds us that just as we, you know, take a shower or a bath and it washes away the dirt on our body, so too, God promises us that by, not by the water itself, but by the Holy Spirit and through the blood of Christ, He will wash away all our sins, cleansing us from the guilt of all our sins and our justification and the corruption of our sin and our sanctification progressively over time. And the bread and wine are not themselves the literal body and blood of Christ, but the bread is a sign pointing us to the body of Christ which was given for us on the cross. And the wine is a sign pointing to the blood shed on the cross. And as we feed on the sacrifice of Christ by faith, which is the hand and mouth of the soul, we are nourished. The spirit nourishes us and strengthens us, just like when we eat food, and it nurses us physically. So sacraments are signs, and we always have to distinguish between the sign and the thing signified. There is a union without confusion. But they aren't merely signs. We also confess that they are seals. And so what is a seal? What do we mean by this? Well, a seal is something that certifies. In ancient times, a king, when he wanted to write a letter to somebody, he would pen a letter, And then what would he do? Well, he would take, you know, he would seal it up in an envelope, and he'd take wax and drip it on the envelope, and then he'd take his signet ring, which bore his seal, the seal of the king, and he'd press it on there. So the person who received that letter knew it was from the king, right? Because if you just got a letter saying, this is here ye, here ye, you don't have to pay taxes this year. Seriously, this seems legit, right? I mean, no. Let's see this. Oh, well, it's got the seal of the king. Well, that makes a difference. But then you might be thinking, did somebody steal his ring? Right? But that's what a seal does. It certifies, it assures that this message is true. It's from a person who bears the authority of the king, somebody who can actually bring about these promises and will. We use seals today. The Canadian government has an official seal on our passports, and the Saskatchewan provincial government has an official seal on our driver's license. So too does God, the great King of all, give us seals of His promises. He gave Abraham the sign and seal of circumcision, and Paul calls circumcision in Romans 4 a sign and a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. And so, that's what a sacrament is. It's a sign pointing to the work of Christ for us, His saving benefits, and it's a seal assuring us God uses it, the Spirit uses these sacraments to assure us those promises. And in the New Covenant, God gives us how many sacraments? Two. and two only, right? And that's why we confess baptism and the Lord's Supper are the only two sacraments. Now, that might seem obvious to us Protestants, right? But why do we have that there? Well, it's because at the time this was written, at the time of the Reformation, coming out of the Roman Catholic Church, how many sacraments does the Roman Catholic Church believe in? Seven, right? And so we want to reform back according to God's Word. And baptism in the Lord's Supper are God's chosen signs and seals of the new covenant. They alone were immediately instituted by God to represent Christ and his benefits and to confirm our interest in him, as the Westminster Confession puts it. And so there's two, baptism in the Lord's Supper. But does everyone who partakes of the sacraments receive the promised blessings? that are signified by the signs? You know, if somebody shows up and they have no faith in their heart and they just take the Lord's Supper, are they blessed? Do they receive means of grace? Are they saved in any way? No. Sacraments, as I said earlier, just like the Word of God, are made efficacious by the work of the Holy Spirit. Apart from the Holy Spirit, they have no effect. Sacraments don't work like magic or medicine in and of themselves. There's nothing special about the water, bread, and wine in and of itself. You know, if that was the case, then we might as well just, you know, get a squirt gun and squirt everybody and baptize them. That sounds kind of nice right now, actually, but not in worship, maybe afterwards, right? The Holy Spirit has to use the sacraments and open one's heart and only works grace in the hearts of His elect. And so, not only does the Spirit make the Word and sacraments efficacious, but also the Word of God must be attached to the sacraments. Without the Word, the sacraments are meaningless. We need the Word to explain the sacraments, and so we understand what's going on. But also faith is necessary to receive the blessing of Christ in the sacraments. Apart from faith, the recipient doesn't receive the blessing signified, which is Christ and His saving work. And in fact, they receive judgment. Just as you can't have an encounter with God's Word being changed in one way without it having some kind of effect. Same with the sacraments. They can either be means of grace or means of judgment. We see this, for instance, in 1 Corinthians 11 when Paul says, for anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. We'll talk about that more down the road here in the next few weeks. But faith is necessary to receive the blessing of Christ in the sacraments. Faith is the hand and mouth of the soul. And so let us always partake of the sacraments with faith. looking to Christ and His saving work. So what is the source and sustenance of faith? Well, faith is created in our hearts by the Spirit through the preaching of the gospel and is sustained and strengthened and nourished unto everlasting life through the Word and sacraments. And so thank God for the Word and sacraments. May we diligently attend to them with faith and be fed and nourished on Christ by the Spirit unto everlasting life. Amen, let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your Word, and we pray that Your Holy Spirit would write it on our hearts, as You've promised. and strengthen our faith, nourish our faith, and transform us more into Christ's image as we remember Christ and what He's done for us on this Lord's Day and His life, death, and resurrection and ascension as we look forward to His return. We pray that You would strengthen and nourish our faith and mold us more into His image and help us to go into this world and love and serve our neighbor and glorify You and always be ready to share the hope within us until Christ comes again. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.