So before we open the Word of God, I want to lead us in just a time of reflection and prayer for the things that are near and dear to our heart and for our loved ones that are here and not here this morning. So let's pray together. Heavenly Father, I thank you that as your children we have gathered together to submit our lives to you as living offerings, as pleasing offerings. And so, Father, I ask that you would keep us faithful to the task of bringing your kingdom to bear in all the areas of our lives. And so, Father, we thank you for those that have surrendered to the call to take the word of God to the ends of the earth. Father, for the missionaries that are supported by our church that we pray for each and every week. And so, Father, I pray for our missionaries in South Asia as they seek to bring the good news to those that have none. that are deceived by false worldviews and false ideologies and false gods like Allah and Vishnu. And so Father, we ask for you to bring light into a dark world. And Father, for your servants to bring that light, the light of Christ, to those who are perishing. So Father, would you bless their efforts. Would you bless the efforts of our missionaries in the Philippines and in Russia with the training centers for pastors. Father, make the churches more and more faithful as you make our church faithful each and every day. Father, we praise you and give you such glory and honor for what you do in our midst. Father, we thank you for Elaine and Juliana's engagement. Father, for the beginning of a marriage that would honor you in every way. So Father, I pray for them, that you would hold them and keep them. Give them a great desire for your word and for your ways. And Father, for that same thing to be true for every marriage represented in this room. That we would honor you to the uttermost. That we would image Christ's love for his bride, the church. That in every marriage, in every wedding, that Father, you would be glorified and honored. God, we thank you in a similar way. I want to ask for your thanks for my nephew being born, for Jaden Battershell in Dallas, Texas. God, what a sweet gift to Garrett and Kelsey. And so, Father, I can't praise you enough for what you have done to bring life where there was no life, to bring a miracle to a family that I pray now will raise him up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I pray for other children in our church family that have been born or about to be born. So Father, I pray for Kaylee Berkey, for her health, for you to sustain her and keep her until the birth here in a few weeks. And also we pray for Malvin, of aunt's health. Pray for you to sustain him in the hospital today. And God, I know that what is heavy and weighing on our hearts today is the election in just a few days. Father, I pray that as your people, we would vote and participate in what is righteous, that we would oppose what is evil. And so, Father, we ask that based on your righteous standard, that Amendment 3, that would seek to make abortion not only legal, but promoted and prized and privileged as a quote-unquote right. Father, may you strike it down. May you spare us from this judgment upon our state. And so, Father, we ask for you to install righteous rulers, because we know that every ruler has been given authority, every ruler has been given their opportunity, because their authority and their power comes from you. So, Father, we ask for righteous rulers, but in the absence of righteous rulers, Father, we trust you, and we trust that you would chastise your people, and we ask for you to bring repentance and revival to our nation. So God, it is with many of these requests that we just entrust our lives to you, trusting in you to provide, to direct, and to bring about the miracle of new life and faith. So may our faith be strengthened this morning as we open your word and trust you to be guided by you each and every day in love. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. So friends, let us open to Matthew chapter seven. And we're going to be looking at just one verse this morning, but ultimately what I hope we find in this verse is many different aspects, many different observations about what God's love and our love for others because of God truly looks like. Because up until this point, over the last few months, as we've been looking through the Sermon on the Mount, I feel like it can be at times to just be crippling just the weight of the number of instructions that Jesus gives us. Back to back to back. Consider this. You've heard it said this, but I'm going to give you this instruction. Consider these blessings. Consider fleeing this immorality, this evil. And with the Sermon on the Mount, there's more commands than you would find maybe in the Ten Commandments that are easy to kind of wrap our mind around in some capacity. But there's much less than the 613 laws of the Torah, of the Old Testament law. And so the good news I have for you this morning is that what you don't need to do as a Christian who wants to follow Christ and obey the instructions of the Sermon on the Mount is to frantically memorize each and every observation, each and every command, and then just say, well, I'm gonna memorize each and every one, I'm gonna put them in front of me each and every day to make sure that I live them out just perfectly as Christ commanded. Because I want to show you that what is given in each instruction is then summarized right before us in a very clear, very easy to understand command. A rule, a golden rule. Because what we've basically done over the last few weeks is we've seen this last instruction in the Sermon on the Mount, close out this section of chapter seven, verses one through 11, is now kind of summarized in verse 12. We are not to judge others, but instead, as we are full of grace, we are empowered to bring this task, asking, seeking, knocking upon the Lord to give us what we need to then distribute God's grace to others. because he was so gracious to give it to us. Or maybe to say it another way, we are to love our neighbors with grace, empowered by supernatural grace, with the exception of verse six, but by the rule of verse 12. And so it's that rule that we're turning to this morning. And so if I were gonna summarize what we're gonna go through this morning, is that the golden rule is the active filter for loving obedience to God in our actions towards others. So the golden rule is the active filter for loving obedience to God in our actions toward others. So if we're gonna describe love, I wanna show you four observations about God's love and the love that we show. throughout this one verse. And so, the first observation is love for God and man receives. Love for God and man receives. Because as we look at the Golden Rule, it says, And that one little word, so, is intended by us to say, then, or therefore, because of what has come before, now what logically follows is found here in verse 12 in this instruction. And what happens at the end of verse 12, for this is the law and the prophets, shows us that what Jesus has started teaching in chapter five, verse 17, is now kind of enveloped, or like in an envelope, or in inclusio is the way some scholars say it, where when Jesus taught about the law and the prophets in chapter five, verse 12, or verse 17, he is now bringing to a close in chapter seven, verse 12. And so if you think about, and you can turn back there for just a second, in chapter five, verse 17, says, do not think that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets. And then he begins to say, what does he really mean? He came to fulfill them. And how do his believers, how do his disciples that follow after him, because he's fulfilled the law, how do we now fulfill and live out the law? And so that comes to a close in this section. So if you think about the sermon as a whole, if you think about kind of what is Jesus teaching us, Well, you start back in chapter 5 verse 2 with the Beatitudes, and then the salt and light, the blessings of being God's disciples, God's people. Then follows with the big body of the sermon, which we're closing out today, from chapter 5 verse 17 to chapter 7 verse 12. Because who we are as the blessed disciples, who we are as the salt and light of the world, are going to live out the implications of that in the body of the message. And then the closing exhortations, the kind of instructions of why we would do this, what are the blessings that are going to come for those who walk the narrow path, for those that see the fruit of God's work in their life, who build their house on Jesus. That's ultimately going to close out this sermon and instruct us for what living in the Kingdom of God looks like. And so as Jesus fulfills the law, He then calls His disciples to obey it. And ultimately, this is what the summary command gives us to apply what we've received. We can only apply what we've seen demonstrated for us. And we know that happens in every single one of homes, a home with children. A child has a lot of difficulty grasping the acts of obedience, the instructions of their parents, unless they see their parents actually living it out. Well, what does it look like for a child if their mother asks their father to do something and he completely disregards the request? Well, what's gonna happen to those children? They're gonna start disregarding the requests of their mother. And so the same thing is true of the love of God. When we see the love of God, when we receive the love of God, then we want to then extend it and magnify it to others. And you see this throughout the sermon. So you could look with me just briefly, but in chapter five, verse seven, in the Beatitudes, it says, blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. And that same principle is then applied in the Lord's Prayer in chapter 6 verse 12, and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. And then in the conclusion in verses 14 and 15, for if you forgive others their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. The enduring principle is this, we've received forgiveness, so therefore we give forgiveness. We've received mercy, so therefore we give mercy. And the same is true of God's faithfulness. God has always been faithful to us. So when it comes to the truth of the reality of the endurance of marriage, that husbands and wives should be faithful to one another, not divorcing or not having sex outside of marriage and destroying what was intended to be the covenant of marriage, God's gift of sex in marriage, is ultimately destroyed when we don't see that God's faithfulness is supposed to instill faithfulness in us. Because when we divorce, we mock God's image of Christ in the church. When we have sex or sexual morality outside of marriage, we destroy the union that God had intended between one woman and one man. And the same is true of anxiety. When Jesus is giving instruction not to be anxious, He's not saying, don't be anxious, just grit your teeth and bear it. He's saying, because God is so gracious to provide everything you need, receive what His provision will give you, therefore, there's no reason to be anxious. And then therefore, there's this reality of what you've received that then just flows out of you in a peace that can flow to others. And lastly, we see this in what's directly applying to our text this morning is our love for our enemies. We love our enemies because God loved us while we were his enemies. He died for us while we were still in our sins. We died for us while we were still in rebellion against him. He loved us to the point of sending his son for rebels. And so the love for God and man first must be something that's received. It's something that comes out of what has flown, come out of this sermon and is flowing into God's, Jesus' instructions that are to come. But the reality is that first we want to understand God's love for us and our love for other men. We must first receive it and believe it. But the second observation is that love for God and man acts. It's active. And so I'm gonna read again the golden rule. So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them. And what I want you to notice about this is that the instruction of Jesus is positive. It's preemptive. What you wish they would do to others, do to them. And so it's been noticed by scholars throughout the centuries that the golden rule is very similar to instruction that's found in multiple religions and multiple times throughout history. Confucius, a teacher from the East, said, do not do unto others what you would not wish others to do unto you. We have to notice the distinction between what Confucius is teaching and what Jesus is teaching. What Confucius is saying is, do not do unto others what you would not wish others to do unto you. And the same is true of the Jewish teachings and the halal, which is the same time of Jesus or even preceding Jesus, he would say the exact same thing. Do not do unto others what you would not wish others to do unto you. Now, if this is what Jesus taught us, that what we're talking about is just do good to other people, because you don't want them to do bad things to you, do you see how that ethic is ultimately just selfish? Don't do bad things to others, because then they're going to do bad things to you. So, what do you do? Don't do bad things to them, and they won't do bad things to you. It ultimately puts the focus where? On yourself. Not on others. And this is why Jesus calls us not to act just for the reward of good actions that would come back to us. This is not the law of reciprocity. This is not the law of the new age, as if you just wish good things out in the universe, and good things will come back to you. Friends, that is the epitome of selfishness. That is the epitome of thinking that the universe revolves around you, and all you have to do is be somewhat doing good things, and then good things will come back. What Jesus ultimately calls us to do is to destroy our selfishness, which is why we must see that in acting preemptively to love others, to do to them what we wish they would do to us, is ultimately the self-destruct button on our selfishness. You must kill your selfishness in order to obey this command. And we see this particularly if you see the parallel or the other instruction in Luke 6, verse 31. Because I've said several times throughout the Sermon on the Mount, you can turn there with me if you'd like. Luke 6, verse 31. because the Sermon on the Plain in Luke 6 has a lot of similarities to Matthew's Sermon on the Mount. And I've said that these sermons are likely the same sermon, but arranged differently for the sake of the author's intention. And you can see that author's intention right here in this passage, because What Luke does is arranges the sermon so that love for your enemies precedes the golden rule. So if you started back in verse 27, but I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. And to close out this section in verse 31, and as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them. So what is Luke doing? Luke is arranging the Sermon on the Mount to show the connection between our love for our enemies The same others that is found in the Sermon on the Mount, in the Golden Rule, can include, must include, our enemies. The context is we love our enemies as we do good to them, as we wish they would do to us. And we can see the same thing lived out in the early church. If you turn to Galatians chapter 6, Because what we find in the New Testament is Matthew, Mark, Luke, John are the gospels, that's the life of Jesus, the teaching of Jesus. But then the disciples, as they formed the church, as they spread the gospel message, then there were letters from Paul, who was sending letters to different churches. And so he sent one to the church at Galatia. And so in Galatians chapter 6, we see him encouraging them to practice the golden rule. because they don't leave behind the teaching of Jesus, they live out the teaching of Jesus. And so it says, so then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone. So there's that inclusion, not just the ones that are doing good to us, but to everyone, including our enemies. And this is where it's helpful and instructive, and especially to those who are of the household of faith. So the context of Luke 6 and Matthew 5 says not just those that would already do good to you, but your enemies also. And then in Galatians, Paul is telling, for the sake of the church, practice the golden rule in the church. Love them especially. How much more destructive would it be for Jesus' followers to not practice the golden rule with one another? And so to negatively refrain, to do as Confucius and the Jewish scholars and others throughout history have said, just don't do bad things to others and they won't do bad things to you. That might even be possible just in our flesh. Without Jesus, without the empowerment of the Holy Spirit, it might be possible for us to just refrain from doing evil to others because we think selfishly that they won't do evil to us. But to actually follow Jesus' teaching, takes a genuine love that surpasses what selfishly is good for us. To be truly loving to them, and that's what's truly divine. That's what we saw when we looked at loving our enemies back in Matthew chapter five. We love our enemies because God loved us, and we act positively before they can even act, before they can even do something good towards us. Because that is God's standard. That's what God did to us, that's what we received, and now we act. And that's what our love towards others really does. And it's summarized in the Golden Rule. Now the third observation we can make about the Golden Rule, if you turn back, well we're going to turn to Leviticus in a second, but we're going to turn to Matthew chapter 7. A third observation is that love for God and man wishes for what is truly good. Love for God a man receives, acts, and now wishes for what is truly good. What's assumed in the golden rule is that we wish for something that is good based on God's standard, not just our own. And this is why we see this standard in the law and the prophets, in the totality of the scriptures, that we can't just wish what is good for us based on what we just think might be good, but actually what is objectively good. We wish they would do what is truly good. So turn with me to Leviticus chapter 19. Leviticus 19. Because we need to remember that what Jesus is teaching doesn't come in rejection of the Old Testament, but in fulfillment of the law. So, Leviticus 19, verse 18, after he's talking about not hating your brother in your heart, he says, you shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself. And this is what's so instructive for us, because we're going to connect this to Jesus' teaching and the great commandment in just a moment. But we have to understand that what Moses does here with the Holy Spirit, inspired instruction from God through Moses says, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Why? I am the Lord. I am Yahweh. I am God. And therefore, what truly is loving, what truly is good, comes from me. This instruction comes from me. And so what we want to, what we need to observe, just kind of almost as an aside, as like kind of a rabbit trail to follow for a second, to understand the golden rule, so whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, we have to assume that we love ourselves. We have to assume that. We have to assume a general self-interest because we truly love ourselves. But in our culture today, most people think that the problem with most human beings is that we don't love ourselves. You need more self-esteem, that if you just were affirmed in what you feel, then you would feel better, that everything would be right. But that is the contrary assumption of the scriptures. The scriptures actually assume that we don't want to harm ourselves, that we truly do love ourselves. We love ourselves and that is what motivates us to love our neighbors. And so what I need us to understand for just a moment is that for those of us that have gone through depression or self-loathing at some level, What you need to understand is that what the world would offer you is just to say, feel better about yourself, let me give you all these reasons why you should just feel better, or let me give you these pills that'll help you feel better. But self-loathing is really not a lack of self-love, but it is a desire to be better for things to actually be good for you. When we dislike who we are or what we've done, The standard is not to just turn it around and to make us feel better about what we've done. It's actually to seek after what is truly good. We love to actually stand in what is good and right and true. That's what God actually offers us that's different than the world. Because when we dislike what we do, when we dislike who we are, when we feel discomfort in what we have become, What God assumes is what we should assume about ourselves, is that we desire to truly be better like God, to be perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect. We actually love ourselves and we despise what is not good in us. And the gospel says, yes, recognize your frailty, recognize your limitations, recognize what you have done wrong. And the solution is not to double down on what you've done, but to actually look forward to Christ and say, Christ, you can change me. You can transform me. You can show me that the love that I have for myself is fulfilled because I've received love from you. And this is important, that we assume, like the Bible does, that we truly do love ourselves. Because we must see that that's the basis upon which we then love others. And so I want you to turn with me to Matthew chapter 22, because we're going to see Jesus' instruction in the Great Commandment. Because they ask Jesus, the Pharisees ask Jesus, almost as a point of trapping Him, but in a way of saying, Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law? And so verse 37, Jesus answers them. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. And on these two commandments, this is where it connects back to the golden rule, depend all the law and the prophets. We are motivated to love others because our one true wish is to love and serve God, to love and please Him with our heart and mind and soul and strength. We wish to let our conscience, informed by God's Word, to guide us and act in ways that please Him. And that's the important part about our conscience. We can act in ways and distort the truth to where our conscience is seared, and that's what we've seen in our country. where it is almost right side up is upside down, and left is right, and good is evil, because what they've done is they've instructed their conscience in the ways of Satan, in the ways of the world, to love what is evil. And what we come back to, what we wish, informed by the word of God, is to truly love what God loves. And that because we love ourselves inherently, then we wish to love others and to act preemptively because we've received that love. So let's go to a fourth observation before we close. Love for God and man ultimately frees us. Love for God and man frees us. Now we read earlier in Romans chapter 13, as Jacob was reading, that the same connection in the Sermon on the Mount from the Great Commandment is found there in Paul. The law and the commandments, when they're summed up, when you just need one simple instruction for how we are to live before God and before others, is to love your neighbor as you love yourself. To not covet, to not steal, to not commit adultery. All these things are summed up. Just love your neighbor as you love yourself. You're going to train your conscience, you're going to train your loves. And ultimately what it does, as we're going to turn to Galatians 5, we're going back to Galatians. Galatians 5. is that when we love our neighbors as we love ourselves, we truly find freedom. We find freedom in God. So, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, chapter 5, verses 13 and 14, it says, For you are called to freedom, brothers, Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. What I want you to see is that true love matches and brings about true freedom. It frees us from our sin, it frees us from our flesh, and it frees us from our selfishness. The selfishness that we talked about is the negative ethic, but true selflessness is the positive command of the golden rule. To love and to serve God and others first before ourselves, it gets the focus off of us and it frees us with this obsession that we have with ourselves. And what this truly frees us from in selfishness is the trap of sin's vicious cycles. A cycle of doom, if you will. Because the cycle of selfishness often sounds like this in our homes. If you do this, I would do this. And ultimately what that is, is manipulation. You hold out in front of them, if you will do the right thing, then I will do the right thing. But if you don't do the right thing, I'm not gonna treat you any better than the way I'm treating you right now. And oftentimes this can happen in a misapplication of a proverb, in a misapplication in the word of God. And one example is Proverbs 15 one. A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. Now what could happen is when there's anger in a home, you could say, why are you angry at me? I'm giving you a soft answer. Or if you would just give me a soft answer, then it would turn my wrath away. I wouldn't be so angry if you wouldn't be angry at me. You see, the problem with that is that we're not applying the golden rule. What Proverbs is intended to do is to say generally what happens is if we will match the anger, we're just gonna escalate things. Instead, we are to respond to anger with a soft answer. We are to preemptively show love and care. It is consistent with the golden rule. To do otherwise is just manipulation. Because then we'd just be in this cycle of saying, you haven't done kindness to me, so I won't do kindness to you. Or you could say it in this way, if you didn't do that, then I wouldn't have done this. You're simply shifting the blame onto the other person. You're saying if you hadn't done X, Y, and Z to me, then I wouldn't have responded X, Y, and Z way to you. And this is the identical blame shifting of Genesis chapter three. You go back there and you look. God comes to Adam and Eve after they have fallen. They have taken of the fruit. They have done explicitly what God told them not to do. And what does Adam say when he's confronted? He says, God, the woman you gave me was the reason that I fell into sin. It's your fault, God. It's this woman's fault, God. And we have to understand the blame that we give will be returned to us. The cycle of doom, the cycle of selfishness, where we're just waiting on other people to treat us right, is a cycle of, it's a trap, and it will keep us from doing the positive, good, lovely, serving things that God truly commands of us. That cycle of just waiting on others to do what we hope they do so that we can be kind to them, it's opposed to the gospel. The gospel says that God in his mercy came to us while we were yet sinners. That before others can even think about doing something good to us, we think, how can I do good to them? The gospel actually frees us from demanding of others and frees us to actually just love them as they are, without any condition, because we know God's objective standards. We wish for God to truly love us, and this is not like the love of the world that loves without any objective reality. This is love that is based in wishing truly what is good. To get out of the cycle, to be freed from it is to be free of judgment, as we saw in chapter seven, verses one through six. is to seek God's help in his means of grace, of asking, seeking, knocking, and then we apply the golden rule. In all the instruction that Jesus has given us, it is the filter by which we love and obey God, and that actually informs our actions towards others. Only then will we be truly free from the selfishness and the sin that binds us. So if we apply this principle, if we apply the golden rule to our relationships towards others, even those that don't deserve it, especially for those in the household of God, then we will be truly loving as God loves us. But it won't be easy. I don't wanna tell you just like this is a quick fix, easy thing, you go home, I'm gonna apply the golden rule and everything will be good. I want you to understand that as you apply the golden rule, what God is doing is changing you to love like he loves. And at times, that is a painful process. You cannot obey the golden rule without becoming like Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. And I read a really good illustration from C.S. Lewis this week, so I'm gonna read it to you. So I think it's really helpful to think about, okay God, I want to love others like you love them, but sometimes it's painful because as we do that, there are difficulties that come with it. So C.S. Lewis said, when I was a child, I often had a toothache. And I knew that if I went to my mother, she would give me something which would deaden the pain for that night and let me get to sleep. But I did not go to my mother, at least not until the pain became very bad. And the reason I didn't go was because of this. I did not doubt that she would give me the aspirin, but I knew that she would also do something else. I knew she would take me to the dentist the next morning. I could not get what I wanted without getting something more than what I wanted. I wanted immediate relief from the pain, but I could not get it without getting my teeth set right permanently. And I knew those dentists. I knew that they started fiddling with all sorts of other teeth which had not yet begun to ache. They would not let sleeping dogs lie. If you gave them an inch, they took a mile. Now, I might put it that way, our Lord is like the dentist. If you give him an inch, he will take a mile. And that's why he warned people to count the cost before coming Christians. Make no mistake. He says, if you let me, I will make you perfect the moment you put yourself in my hands. That is what you're in for. Nothing less or other than that. See, friends, the golden rule is the active filter by which we will change how we see the world, how we see others, and how we truly practice love. The Golden Rule can transform our parenting, helping our children see the fact that they are to sacrifice and love not because of what their sibling has done to them, but because they are to actively, positively love their sibling before their sibling even loves them. This should inform our work. How do we lovingly, carefully be excellent in our work? We don't work just as well as the person next to us, saying, I'll put more effort if my boss would just give me that raise. I'll put in the equal amount of effort as my co-workers because I don't want to be doing more than what I should be doing. No, instead, the golden rule to love your co-workers, to love your boss, to love the company, to love the people that benefit from the work that your company produces is to put in excellent effort, to love them before the rewards even come. It transforms how we work in school. Kids, whether you're homeschooled or you're in public school, the reality is, is that the golden rule instructs you, I do excellence in my school. I don't cut the corners. Because kids, the reality is, is that love of God and love of your parents, love of your teacher, love of the other students around you, is to say, I want to know and pursue what is excellent, not because of what it's gonna give to me, but because I know this is God's standard. It transforms our marriage. It transforms our marriage to say, I am going to love my spouse like Christ loves the church. I'm going to sacrifice for them. I'm gonna help them, even though they may be in a season where they don't wanna do anything kind to you. Because this is God's standard, it transforms every relationship that we have. And so my question as we close is who here wants to truly love? Come to Christ. He will begin that hard work that the dentist does in our teeth. He will begin fiddling around and changing our heart one golden rule application at a time until we are becoming perfect like our Heavenly Father is perfect. It will inform our conscience to know what is truly good Because only Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit, transforming your heart and your mind, can unleash the good in your life for your family, for your friends, and especially for our church, and even for our enemies. And he will do it through you. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we need your Spirit. We need to receive your love. We need to act in love. We need to wish for what is good. We need to be free. And so Father, I pray for the person here this morning that has yet to come to Christ, yet to bend the knee, yet to submit to the truth of the scriptures. Father, with the conviction of their desire to truly love, bring them to you. would they see the beautiful ethic that is greater than anything else that has ever been preached, anything else that has ever been put forward. Father, may they see the excellencies of Christ and may they come to you. Father, please encourage them not to leave today without putting their faith and trust in Christ. Otherwise, their sin condemns them. Otherwise, the gospel is not for them. Otherwise, Jesus is not for them. Father, may they submit to the kingship and the lordship of Christ. Father, I pray for the Christians here in this room that have neglected this principle, that have neglected the golden rule, and have seen their relationship suffer because of it. Father, give them the faith to apply it. to see the world through this filter, through this lens, and to kill their selfishness. Father, give us that gift as a church, as we would kill the selfishness of ourselves, what we think is good, what we think is right, and Father, may we consider others as greater than ourselves. And in all of this, God, I pray that what you've begun in us through the Holy Spirit, you would bring to the completion on the day of Christ Jesus. Father, prepare us for the day that we return to you. Prepare us for the day of resurrection, where we see you face to face, where we see the beauty of your plan, where we see the glory of the true golden city. Prepare us for that day. Father, thank you for your word, and I pray that we would apply it this week. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.