The Gospel of Matthew, at the very end of the Gospel of Matthew, Matthew chapter 28, verses 16 through 20, a passage that is typically referred to as the Great Commission. Remember the setting, Jesus has risen from the dead, but this is before his ascension into heaven, and our Lord addresses his disciples in Galilee. Hear the word of God. Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshipped him, but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of our God endures forever. Let's pray for the Lord to bless. the preaching of his word. Heavenly Father, we do ask that by your Holy Spirit, you would once again open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word. We pray that you would encourage us, that you would feed our souls, that you would challenge us. If necessary, rebuke us, Lord. We pray that we might be strengthened by what we hear today, and we ask that you would set a guard over my lips, that I might speak only that which is faithful to your Holy Word. We pray these things in Jesus' name and all of God's people said. Amen. You may be seated. Well, dear ones, the title of my sermon this morning is Foundations of Faith, Our Trinitarian Confession. And if you're following along in your sermon outline, I would again direct your attention to a number of words that you can be listening for in the sermon, if that helps you follow along. I especially wanna highlight the words trinity, monotheism, salvation, and foundation. Well, dear ones, as many of you know, I recently began a new sermon series in which we are reviewing the biblical foundations of our holy Christian faith, a series in which we are being guided by the Bible-based affirmations of that classical ecumenical creed of the historic Christian church known as the Apostles' Creed. And it's called the Apostles' Creed not because it was penned by the apostles, it is an ancient creed, a baptismal creed, but it is a creed that nevertheless reflects the teachings of the apostles that are revealed to us in the New Testament scriptures, and hence it is called the Apostles' Creed. And it's important for us periodically from time to time to go back and review the basics of our faith and to remind ourselves again, what is it that I believe? Why do I believe it? And why are these things important to me as a Christian and to us as a Christian church? Now, friends, on the last Lord's Day, we consider the very first affirmation of the Apostles' Creed, namely the affirmation, I believe in God. And we grounded and based that affirmation upon a very foundational text of Scripture, namely Genesis 1, verses 1-3. You're all familiar with Genesis 1-1. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now, as I pointed out on the last Lord's Day, Absolutely nothing is more foundational, more fundamental, more central to our holy Christian faith than the existence of the true and living God who is revealed to us in the pages of His inspired Word, the Bible. Based on our study of that Genesis passage last week, we saw that the true and living God is an eternal being. He is beyond time, space, or matter. He's transcendent, so He's eternal, that He is a self-existent being, and also that He is a necessary being. We learned on the last Lord's Day that without the true and living God revealed in Holy Scripture, there would be nothing else. And without God, there is no sound basis for human logic or reason, since God himself is the necessary prerequisite or precondition for all human intelligibility. Human logic is and must be grounded upon the divine logos. the divine living word who is Christ himself, the word made flesh. And so again, we consider the importance of the existence of the true and living God. However, friends, as you probably know, historic biblical Christianity is not the only faith system out there that acknowledges the existence of one true God. That is to say, Christianity is not the only religion out there in the world, the only faith system that can be described as affirming what has been called ethical monotheism. Certainly traditional and orthodox Judaism, traditionalist Islam and other Unitarian sects and religions also affirm and believe in only one God, thereby affirming the principle of ethical monotheism. But dear ones, the difference between historic Christianity and these other systems of ethical monotheism is of course what? The doctrine of the Trinity. Beloved, as Christians, we are not mere theists or mere monotheists, we are rather Trinitarian monotheists. Yes, we are monotheists, we believe in only one true God, but we are Trinitarian monotheists as opposed to being Unitarian monotheists. And that's incredibly important. to our faith. In fact, the doctrine of the Trinity is so foundational to our faith that even this brief, bare-bones creed known to us today as the Apostles' Creed is arranged in a three-fold division that affirms the three persons of the Holy Trinity and the biblical truths that are typically connected with each of these persons. In other words, the way that the Apostles' Creed, which is this very basic, bare-bones creed, the way the creed is structured is in accordance with the three persons of the Trinity. And so, for example, the first division of the Apostles' Creed is headed by the statement or affirmation, I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth. There's the first person of the Holy Trinity, God the Father. The second division is headed, of course, by The affirmation, I believe in what? I believe in Jesus Christ, his only begotten son, our Lord. There's the eternal second person of the Trinity, the eternal son of God. And of course, the third division is headed by the affirmation, I believe in the Holy Spirit, referencing the third person of the Holy Trinity. Dear ones, what this means is that not only is the God in whom we believe and who we confess an eternal being, not only is He a self-existent being, not only is He a necessary being, He is also unavoidably a Trinitarian or triune being. In fact, from the standpoint of God's Holy Word, Any so-called monotheistic God who is not also the triune God revealed in the pages of scripture is not actually the true and living God. The God of Unitarian monotheism, in whatever form that Unitarian monotheism takes, is not the same God that we worship. Well, but Pastor, the Trinity wasn't revealed in the Old Testament Scriptures. Are you saying that, well, actually the Trinity is revealed in the Old Testament Scriptures? It's revealed in seed form. It is there by implication. The details of the doctrine of the Trinity are, of course, expressed more directly and explicitly in the New Testament Scriptures, and it's more understandable now to God's people with the coming of Christ. But the Trinity is throughout the Scriptures in both Old Testament and New Testament. Now, just by way of review before we dive into our text for today, what do we mean when we talk about the Trinity? What is the Trinity? Well, the Trinity is the affirmation, the doctrine that says that there is only one true God. We are not tritheists. We do not worship three gods. There's not one God who's divided up into three different parts. Each person of the Trinity is fully A 100% God shares fully in the one divine being or essence. But this one eternal God exists eternally in three co-equal, co-eternal persons, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. And it's when we make a definition like this or express this definition that many scratch their heads and say, that's confusing. And to which I say, duh, yeah, it is confusing because we're talking about the infinite God. We cannot fully comprehend or wrap our brains around this truth, but we believe it because God's word reveals it. I like how our larger catechism, our Westminster larger catechism defines the Trinity. The question is, question nine, how many persons are there in the Godhead? The Bible-based answer of our larger catechism is this. There be three persons in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one true eternal God, the same in substance, which is an old-fashioned way of saying essence or being, the same in substance, equal in power and glory, although distinguished by their personal properties. So there is one true and living God who exists eternally in three divine, co-equal, co-eternal persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Now, as we dive into our text for today, the first thing I want to point out is that the truth of the Trinity is foundational to the church's faith and mission in the world. The truth of the Trinity is absolutely foundational to the church's faith and mission in the world. Now our passage for this morning is Matthew's record of our Lord's so-called Great Commission. In other words, our resurrected Lord Jesus' marching orders to his church, the divine commission which defines the church's mission and calling in this present age of redemptive history, this age between our Lord's first advent and his future glorious second advent. Jesus is telling us what we as the church are to be about the business of doing while we await His second coming. In this passage, that is what He's instructing us in. Let me just point out, it's not our Lord's main purpose in this passage to give us a detailed teachings on the doctrine of the Trinity or what have you, but nevertheless, the foundational centrality of the doctrine of the Trinity is revealed here in Christ's great commission by the fact that the covenant sign of initiation into the church, the covenant sign of initiation into Christ's community of discipleship, for that is what the church is. What is that? Sign of initiation, it is baptism into the triune name of Almighty God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Notice again what Jesus says to his disciples. He says in verse 19, go therefore and make disciples of all nations, all ethnic group, ethne, ethne is the Greek, make disciples of all nations. baptizing them in the name, notice it's not the names, plural, but the singular name. There's one God, one being, the name of the Father and of the Son. and of the Holy Spirit. Now again, let's remember the setting and context of this passage. This is post-resurrection but pre-ascension. Christ has been raised from the dead, the tomb is empty, Jesus is alive from the dead, and he's already appeared a number of times to his apostles and to others as well. And he now appears to the 11 and perhaps to some others as well in Galilee. Look at verse 16, it says, now the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. Why did they go to Galilee? Well, they went to Galilee because the angel at the Lord's empty tomb had told them that they would see Jesus in Galilee. If you go back to verse seven here in Matthew 28, At the scene of the empty tomb, the angel says, then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead and behold, he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him. See, I have told you. So that's why they head to Galilee. And it is perhaps here at Galilee that Jesus not only appears to these 11 disciples, but perhaps this was also the scene, the occasion where Jesus appeared to more than 500 of his broader group of followers at once. The Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, I believe verse eight, says that after Jesus rose from the dead, of course he appeared to his apostles on numerous occasions, over a period of 40 days, but on one occasion, he appeared as the resurrected Lord in his resurrection body. He appeared to more than 500 of his followers at one time. And when Paul wrote that statement in 1 Corinthians 15, at that particular time, most of these eyewitnesses to the resurrected Jesus were still alive, though some had died, Paul says. But there were multiple eyewitnesses to the resurrected. Lord Jesus Christ, and so perhaps this was the occasion where that occurred. But be that as it may, the 11 disciples go to Galilee, they go to this mountain to which Jesus directed them, and it says in verse 17, when they saw him, they worshiped him. They worshiped him. But then Matthew adds an interesting side note. But some doubted. Now the scholars have a field day trying to decide who are the some that doubted. Is he saying that some of these 11 who had already probably seen Jesus a number of times in terms of post-resurrection appearances, that some of them doubted? Or is Matthew referencing some of the broader disciples of Jesus who may have also been present, initially doubting because perhaps they didn't know, is this really Jesus or not? Perhaps they doubted at first because they weren't close enough to see him clearly. But however we may understand this statement that some doubted, it's a very honest statement. You see, what's important about this this statement is that it's a detail that helps to support the historical trustworthiness of this account. Think about it, if Matthew's gospel indeed, if the gospel accounts are mere religious propaganda and mythology as the skeptics and the atheists and the critical rationalist Bible scholars would have us believe, then certainly details like this that might throw, make the disciples appear in a bad light, certainly Matthew wouldn't want to include such details. But the fact that Matthew includes this potentially negative assessment of the 11 disciples or other disciples of Jesus on that occasion shows that Matthew is interested not in promoting propaganda, but in telling the truth. And how true to human nature is this? How true to human nature is this? It is true to our fallen nature to have sinful doubt even when the truth of God and even when the Son of God is staring you in the face. And so, I think again, this is testimony, this statement is testimony to Matthew's honesty and to the Spirit's inspiration of this passage. But then again, it goes on in verse 18. It says, Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Now let's pause there. Ask yourself the question, didn't Jesus as the eternal Son of God, the divine Son of God, didn't he already have all authority in heaven and on earth? Why then does he speak of the Father giving him all authority in heaven and on earth at this particular occasion? Well, we need to understand that yes, in his divine nature, Jesus has always had all authority in heaven and on earth. But Jesus in his incarnation is the God-man, the Word made flesh, Emmanuel, God with us. the theanthropos, as the theologians call it. So in his post-resurrection state, there are no longer any limitations upon our Lord's exercise of his universal divine authority. Remember that during his earthly ministry, the Lord Jesus chose to limit the exercise of some of his divine attributes on many occasions, but now with his post-resurrection state, all authority has been given to him as the God-man, as the mediator, as the Messiah. And so, though Jesus as the divine Son of God is indeed equal with the Father with respect to his deity, yet as the God-man, he submits to the Father and in a sense is given his authority by the Father. And what this means, brothers and sisters, is that Jesus as the Messiah, as the God-man, reigns over the entire universe. All authority has been given in heaven and on earth to him. Jesus rules the furthest galaxies, the furthest stars, and he rules at the microscopic level down to the smallest microscopic particle. all authority has been given to him by the Father. And then verse 19, we have this commission. Jesus says, look, I'm able to give this commission, I'm able, I have the authority to order and command my church, go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them, teaching them, and so forth. Dr. William Hendrickson points out that this literally in the original says, having gone therefore make disciples. The imperative in this passage is to make disciples. And that is the central focus of the mission that the resurrected Lord Jesus assigns to his church. What are we to be about the business of doing? Are we to be about the business of changing political laws or being culture warriors or social justice warriors? No. Our business as a church is to be about the business of making disciples. That is what we are commanded to do. The other participles in this commission, the participles going, baptizing, and teaching, simply describe different aspects in the process of disciple making. And these participles do have an imperatival force to them. You know, he's not just saying, well, as you go along, make disciples and baptize. He's saying, go, make disciples, baptize, teach. There's an imperatival force to all of this. But all of this should raise the question in your mind, okay, okay, we're supposed to go make disciples. What is a disciple? Well, children, many of you are disciples with respect to your education. Raise your hand if you're a student. A disciple is basically a pupil, a learner, a student. And if you are a disciple of Jesus, that means you have been enrolled in the school of Christ. You learn of Jesus so that you may live for Jesus. You learn about Jesus so that you may, in faith, be a follower of the Lord Jesus. So a disciple is essentially a pupil, a learner. Through baptism and conversion, we are enrolled as students in the school of Christ, the church where we learn how to be followers of Jesus. And what is the extent of this commission? Well, Jesus says, make disciples of all nations. The Greek word is taethne. Ethne is the word from which we derive the word ethnic. And the nations here does not merely mean political entities. When we think of nations today, we tend to think of, well, there's Brazil, there's Australia, there's China, there's Spain, there's South Africa, and what have you. But no, what Jesus means is all people groups. Here in our nation, the United States of America, there are multiple ethnic groups, multiple nations within our political entity known as the United States. So this encompasses all people groups, not just all political entities. It includes Gentiles as well as Jews in fulfillment of God's covenant promises to Abraham. as expressed in passages like Genesis 12.3 and 17.5. You see, friends, with the resurrection of Christ and his ascension into heaven to the reign at the right hand of God the Father, God's covenant promise to Abraham that all the nations would be blessed in him, that promise would begin to be fulfilled on a worldwide scale. And the past 2,000 years of church history is demonstration of that fact. Now in the Old Testament there was a sort of a narrowing of God's saving grace. The narrowing of God's saving grace and covenant mercies in Old Covenant times and under the Mosaic administration when grace was mostly limited to the Jews, that was ultimately to be in service to the eventual expansion of the covenant to all nations with the coming of Jesus the Messiah and with his call to the church to take the gospel to all the nations. No longer was the Savior's mission to be limited to the lost sheep of the house of Israel as it was during his earthly ministry. As Matthew himself records, I believe in Matthew 10, Jesus says, I must go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. That's what his focus was during his earthly ministry. But now with the resurrection from the dead, the gospel is to go to the nations, to the Gentiles. The Gentiles too were to hear the glad tidings of great joy. And that's why we're here today. because we by grace have heard the glad tidings of great joy. So we are to make disciples, but how are disciples to be made? Well, we are told in verses 19 through 20, Jesus mentions baptizing them in the name of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. Disciples are made through two means, by means of baptism and teaching. Another way of saying this is through the word and sacrament ministry of the church. Baptism, of course, is the covenant sign of initiation into the covenant of grace. Trinitarian baptism is a sign and seal of being brought under the authority and lordship and protection of the triune God. And what is to be taught to these who are being discipled, to disciples, the baptized? What is to be taught? Jesus says, teaching them to observe Some of the things that I have commanded you? No, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. Not just teaching a few essentials, but teaching the whole counsel of God, in other words. Disciples of Jesus are to be taught to observe all that I have commanded you, as Jesus says. Here our Lord Jesus speaks. The argument can be made that Matthew is presenting the risen Lord Jesus here as the new and final Moses. I mean, think about it. Moses was the mediator of the old covenant, and he was the great prophet of the old covenant. But Jesus is, of course, the mediator of a new and better covenant, and he is the ultimate prophet with a capital P, the ultimate prophet, priest, and king, for he is the Messiah. And just as the first Moses received the law from God on Mount Sinai, so here the Lord Jesus Christ issues forth his commandments from this unnamed mountain in Galilee. And so Jesus says, teach them to observe all that I have commanded you. The church is to teach disciples of Jesus all that he has commanded. And that means it is to teach both law and gospel. And the goal of discipleship is not just faith in Christ, although that's absolutely foundational and essential, but to teach practical obedience that springs from such faith. In some, my friends, the mission of Christ's church is to make disciples of Jesus who will trust and obey. But again, friends, notice that all of this assumes a Trinitarian framework. Now, we have here the Great Commission, but we also have here the Great Comfort. After Jesus gives this worldwide commission to his church to make disciples of all the nations, to baptize them in the name of the triune God, to teach them to observe all that he has commanded, how can they do this? How can we in the church ever accomplish this calling, this commission that Christ has given to us? Jesus says, and behold, I am with you always. to the end of the age. This is the great comfort behind the Great Commission. It's interesting in Matthew's Gospel at the beginning of this Gospel account, Matthew explains that the virgin birth and incarnation of Christ means that Jesus is Emmanuel, which he explains in Matthew 1, verse 23, Emmanuel means God with us. Jesus is God with us. He came to us to dwell in our midst, and that's the ultimate fulfillment of the covenant of grace, that God would come to dwell in love and friendship with his people. But you might think, wait a minute, isn't Jesus getting ready to go back to heaven? How can Jesus say, I'm with you always to the end of the age? Friends, even though the resurrected Lord Jesus would soon ascend into heaven and no longer be present with His church in the sense of His physical, bodily, incarnate presence, nonetheless, Jesus promised that He would always be present with His church even to the end of the age. How would that be possible? Well, this, of course, as we know from the rest of Scripture, this is made possible by the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. Again, notice the Trinitarian implications the pouring out of the spirit at Pentecost, and that should comfort and courage and embolden our Lord's church. Christ does dwell among his church through his spirit, the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. So friends, by good and necessary inference, this passage demonstrates that the truth of the Trinity is foundational to the church's faith and mission in this world. Let me ask you, dear Christian, is the truth of the Trinity foundational to your confession of faith? Well, I wanna share just a few more things with you before we wrap things up. This was the main point of my sermon today, but I wanna take us to a couple other scriptures as well. I want us to next consider that the mighty works of the triune God in creation, providence, and salvation also show the doctrine of the Trinity to be foundational to our faith. It's easy to see the doctrine of the Trinity here in the baptismal formula of Matthew's account of our Lord's Great Commission, where Jesus very explicitly says, baptize them in the one divine name, the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But the united testimony of Scripture shows that the Scriptures themselves are Trinitarian. You see, Scripture, let's consider first of all God's works of creation and providence. God's works of creation and providence are presented in Scripture as being Trinitarian works. Scripture presents God the Father creating through the divine agency of God the Son and by the presence and action of God the Holy Spirit. We touched upon that a little bit on the last Lord's Day when we consider Genesis 1, verses one through three. I pointed out from that passage that The name for God that is used there in that passage, Elohim, Elohim is actually a plural. and the reason it's not translated as God's is because the verb to create is in the singular, and so it's a plural of majesty, which certainly is compatible with the Trinitarian doctrine, but we also see reference in Genesis 1, verse 2, to the spirit of God, and then in verse 3, God says, let there be light, and so forth. God creates by means of his divine creative word, And that ultimately points us to the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we see that all three persons of the Holy Trinity are involved in the creation of the world. This is affirmed by the Apostle John in his prologue, John 1, 1-3, in the beginning was the Word, that's Jesus, that's the divine Logos, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, face to face with God the Father, and the Word was God, Jesus is fully divine. All things were made through Him. Without Him, nothing was made that was made. Again, Jesus is presented as the divine agent of creation. And in Colossians 1, verses 15 through 17, you can look this up later if you wish, but in that passage, Christ is presented not only as the divine agent of creation, but as the preeminent Lord who providentially sustains all creation, preventing it from falling into chaos and disintegration. Children, have you ever wondered why is it that the universe holds together? Why is it that when you get up in the morning, you don't all of a sudden just disappear? Why is it that there is an order to creation? The Bible says it's because Jesus is holding it all together. If the Lord Jesus were to remove his hand of providence from the world, from the universe, everything would disintegrate immediately, instantly. Everything would go out of existence, poof. all would collapse into chaos. It is only the sovereign hand of the Lord Jesus, the Father through the Son and by the Spirit, moment by moment, sustains the universe. And this is affirmed in other passages like Hebrews 1, verses one to three. Let me just briefly read that passage. Hebrews 1, verses one to three. The author of Hebrews writes, long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. The son is involved as the divine agent of creation, the father creates through the son. And then look at verse three. He, Christ, is the radiance of the glory of God, and the exact imprint of his nature, which is another way of saying Jesus is fully 100% God, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. Christ upholds the universe by the word of his power. Again, Christ is presented as the divine agent of creation and the providential Lord who upholds the universe by the word of his power. In other words, friends, God's works of creation and providence are Trinitarian works. And this shows the importance of the truth of God as a triune being. But not only are God's works of creation and providence Trinitarian works. Hallelujah, God's work of salvation is also a Trinitarian work. You see, when it comes to creation in Providence, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit work together in perfect harmony with one another. And so the Father creates through the Son and by the agency of the Spirit. The Father sustains all things through the work of the Son and by the Spirit. There's no contradiction among the persons of the Trinity. The same is true in our salvation. According to the United Witness of Holy Scripture, just as all three persons of the Trinity work in perfect harmony in the works of creation and providence, so all three persons of the Trinity work in perfect harmony when it comes to human salvation. The United Testimony of God's Word is that God the Father decreed and planned our salvation in eternity past, if we can speak of. and eternity past. God the Son accomplished our salvation when He became incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ and died on the cross for our sins. And God the Holy Spirit applies to us in due time the finished work of Christ. In other words, God the Father chose us, God the Son redeemed us, and God the Holy Spirit regenerated and sanctifies us. This glorious, marvelous working together of the persons of the Trinity in our salvation is marvelously brought out by the Apostle Paul in passages like Ephesians 1, that glorious opening. doxology, this divinely inspired run-on sentence, I believe in the Greek, that verses 3 through, I believe, verse 14 are one sentence in the Greek, because Paul is so excited in expressing these glorious truths, but notice how all three persons of the Trinity work together for our salvation. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he, God the Father, chose us in him, in Christ, before the foundation of the world, there's the election, there's the Father's work, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the beloved. In Him, in Christ, we have redemption through His blood. So the Father has chosen us, predestined us. We have redemption through the blood of Christ, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished on us in all wisdom and insight and so forth. And then you skip down. to the latter part of this opening section of Ephesians, where he talks about our eternal inheritance. Verse 11, in him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. Notice verse 13, in him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with, what? or whom you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory. Isn't this glorious? What this means, brother, sister in Christ, is that all three persons of the omnipotent triune God are working harmoniously together for your eternal salvation. Oh, be comforted, believer. Be comforted in knowing that your eternal salvation has been planned secured and sealed by your sovereign triune God. If you are repentant for your sins and are trusting Christ alone for your salvation, it is because God is at work in you both to will and to do according to his good pleasure. Take comfort in that. All three persons of the Godhead are working in harmony for your eternal salvation. And remember, if God is for us, God, the eternal, sovereign, omnipotent, triune God, if this God is for you, what's the conclusion? Who can be against you? Praise be to God. I wanna close very briefly with four implications of our Trinitarian confession. First of all, God's revelation in Scripture is Trinitarian. The Father reveals himself through the Son and by the Holy Spirit. God's word, we are told, is breathed out, theopneustos, all scripture is theopneustos, breathed out by God. And in the scriptures, the breath of God and the spirit of God are closely associated. And that breathed out word, that written word of God, reveals Jesus, the living word. All of scripture is Trinitarian. God's revelation in scripture is Trinitarian. Secondly, Christian prayer and worship are Trinitarian. If you go to a so-called Christian worship service and Jesus is never mentioned or hardly mentioned at all and there's no implicit reference to the Trinity, you might as well have gone to a Jewish synagogue service or a Unitarian service. True Christian worship, true Christian prayer is Trinitarian at heart, at base. In the New Testament scriptures, God's people typically pray to the Father through the Son and with the aid and help of the Holy Spirit. That's not to say that it's wrong to pray directly to Jesus or directly to the Holy Spirit, but the typical pattern of prayer is to pray to the Father through the Son and by the Holy Spirit. Thirdly, the church's missionary and evangelistic labors are Trinitarian. We saw that in our passage for today, where the goal of discipleship is to get baptized converts baptized in the triune name to learn under the authority and covenantal protection of the triune God. And finally, as disciples of Jesus, our baptism relates us covenantally to all three persons of the Trinity. As our passage for today tells us, Jesus says, baptizing them in or into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. We have been baptized into the one divine name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. What that means, brothers and sisters, is that we have been brought under the authority, lordship, and covenantal protection of our great and sovereign triune God. So let us trust Him. Let us worship Him. Let us live for Him. And let us confess Him to a world filled with idolatry and false gods, a world that desperately needs to know Him in the glory and the graciousness of His sovereign triune being. Amen. Let us pray. Lord and Father in heaven, we give you thanks and praise for your son Jesus and for the presence of your spirit. We praise you, oh God, for your triune majesty. We ask that you would help us to see the practical implications of these truths and help us to worship and serve you accordingly. We pray these things in Jesus' name and all of God's people said, amen. Let's rise as we respond to what we've heard. Let's rise and we'll sing together. Hymn number 467, Cast Down, O God, the Idols. 467.