Open your Bibles with me to the book of Mark, the Gospel by Mark. We're looking this morning at Jesus Christ applying his resurrection. When Jesus Christ stepped out of that tomb, he had to come to a group of people that didn't quite understand what was going on. In fact, they weren't expecting it, they were confused, they were fearful, hiding, locking the doors. And how did he apply that resurrection to those people every time? He takes them back to what He had already said in His Word. And that's what I want to do with you. In fact, we're not going to cover everything that Jesus said. We're just going to cover the seven last words of Jesus Christ. The seven last times that He spoke. Those were probably the freshest on their minds. Those were probably those words they couldn't forget because they came from Him as He was dying on the cross. We're going to start in chapter 15 in verse 33. As we start, I remind you, Jesus lives. The tomb is empty. Death has been destroyed. God is in control. and his word is true. That's the message the resurrection brings us. Let's listen as we follow along. The devil was destroyed because he had the power of death and because at the resurrection Jesus took his own troubled disciples back to what he said. He took them back to what He had promised, and what He had offered them, and in their grief and in their sorrow, they didn't get it. And that's why He spoke seven times. And there are seven last words, and Mark 15.33 is only the first one. And the seven times He spoke to us from the cross are treasures. Even as I get to this, I think of the last words I've heard dear people to me say. I remember the last words my mother ever spoke just before she was ushered into the presence of the Lord. I remember the last words that Bonnie's mother spoke before the Lord took her home. I remember Bonnie's grandmother. I can just go through and I'm sure you can too. Of those that you love, their last words are treasures. Well, what we're going to read this morning is a treasure, because before Jesus died, He wanted to say these things. He labored to say these things. His dying lips, through the raging thirst in His dried mouth, in spite of excruciating pain, He still said these words. He wasn't silent. He, as He bore the horrors of sin, as He faced death and hell, speaks. And we should listen. You know the story. He was seized by the Romans. He was rudely, crudely, and horribly treated. He was beaten. And finally he was dragged and stretched out and nailed to the cross. And you know what I just said happened 30,000 times just in Christ's lifetime to different people. And so those soldiers as they began pushing him upward and lifting him upright on that cross, They were calloused and hardened because they had executed many. The normal response? Shrieking, historians tell us. Cursing, screaming, spitting, and always with hatred, seething up. And so as they tipped Christ up, they waited to see what this one was going to do. And as they were all looking up, his lips began to move, words began to form, and he speaks. Did he curse? No. Did he shriek? No. He prayed. In fact, four, starting with this one that we're going to look at this morning, of Christ's recorded words from the cross are prayers. Remember Isaiah had said in chapter 52 and verse 12, it says he would make intercession for his people. That's exactly what he was doing on the cross that day. Jesus spoke in the midst of all. This prisoner held by spikes, crowned with thorns, covered with bleeding wounds is about to speak to his cruel tormentors. And his lips began to move. in the Gospel by Mark, chapter 15, starting in verse 33. Now, when the sixth hour had come, God's really concerned about time. Jesus began to be crucified, it says in the scripture, at about the third hour. That's 9 a.m. Why would that be? That Jesus had to be crucified at exactly the same moment that the Passover lamb was brought in to the temple and tied to the great altar by the high priest. Continuing to read and it says, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. Again, God's quite concerned with details. The first Passover in Exodus was preceded by three complete days of absolute blackness and darkness. Do you remember the first Passover? Three days of darkness. Before the Passover Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world, suffered to the end. God covered the last three hours with darkness, and then put him in the grave for three days, all paralleling the Passover. Continuing in verse 34, and at the ninth hour, not a moment before, not a moment after, because in God's precise timetable, it had to be at the ninth hour, that's 3 p.m. So it was pitch black, earthly supernatural darkness from noon to three. But when it hit three, which was exactly the moment that the Passover lamb was led high on the platform in front of the entire nation of Israel, and the high priest would lift up its chin, as it stood there so innocently and so fearlessly, he'd lift up its chin and would slit its throat and kill it in front of the nation at that exact moment Jesus Christ, verse 34, in the ninth hour, Jesus cried out, and with a loud voice said, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, which is translated, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And Jesus cried out at exactly the exact moment that that lamb was slain as he hung there. as our Lamb of God to take away our sin. Let's bow before Him this morning. We thank you, dear Father in Heaven, for the precision of your Word. We stand here this morning holding a book that's true. We know it's true because you promised that Jesus would come, and He did. And you promised everything about His coming, and it happened. And then you promised that He would die, one for the many, and He did. But Your Word said that Your Holy One would not see corruption, but that He would rise, and He did. And so therefore, Jesus, You live. Your tomb is empty. Death has been destroyed. God, You are in control. And this morning, we know Your Word. It is true. I pray that that true word, recording your seven last words, will ring in our hearts. And that those who come here in need of forgiveness would hear your word of forgiveness. In need of assurance would hear your word of assurance. In need of confidence, knowing that you can take us safely home, would hear that word of confidence. And that all of us, would leave here with that word of triumph on our hearts that you finished the work. It is finished and we can rest in you who are risen indeed. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Bless every moment that we hear your voice through your word this morning to our hearts. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. Remember what Christ had gone through. This passage picking up in verse 33, has just zipped right by all the events that have taken place. Jesus was acquitted by the highest court of the nation. God went to great details to let all of us know that Jesus was sinless. The highest court of the land said in the form of Pilate, I find no guilt in him. Judas, the betrayer, who lived and worked alongside of Jesus Christ for over three years, said, I have betrayed innocent blood. Pilate's wife said, this man is a righteous man, have nothing to do with him. Over and over, the scriptures tell us, down to the centurion at the foot of the cross. But all that has transpired. And Jesus is hanging on the cross. And what is the first thing that comes out of His mouth? A prayer. As I told you, Isaiah 52, that's the chapter just before the famous 53rd chapter. Isaiah 52, the last verse says, He would make intercession for transgressors. We find him beginning with this. And if you're a Bible marker and you've never marked them, this is one of the seven words. I'm going to show you all seven this morning. And this is what we call the word of anguish. He said this, Eloi, Eloi, Lama. Eloi is my God. Eloi is my God. Lama. Sabachthani is two words that runs out into our English. Why have you forsaken me? And you know what the answer is? The reason Jesus was forsaken by God. The reason that Jesus cried this cry of agony is so that we would not have to be forsaken by God. You see, the bottom line of the Gospel is this. Either you're going to pay your bill for your sins, and I'm going to pay my bill for my sins, or we're going to let someone else do it for us. And you know what? When we think that we can do enough good to please God, then we are thinking that we're, what, going to pay our own bill. And those people that go through life, and you meet them and I meet them, and I talk to them all the time, when you share the gospel, you hear them say, and I say, do you have an assurance that you're going to have? And they go, well, I think my good works have outweighed my bad. You ever heard them say that? I mean, it's a very common response. You know what? They think they're paying for their sin and they don't realize what happened right here. Jesus said, my God, you have forsaken me. And the reason God forsook Christ was so that he would never have to forsake those who place their trust in him. We looked at the difference between historic faith and saving faith. Historic faith is he lives. I mean, one and a half or two billion people are proclaiming that today. That's historic. In fact, even the pagans are proclaiming that today. That's the Christian holiday for their God who lives. Do you know what saving faith is? He lives in me. Can you say that this morning? Can you say that because of Jesus' word of anguish, we remember that word because it speaks of Him absorbing the wrath of God against our sin? Either He absorbs God's wrath or you have to absorb it forever. Only a perfect God-man could absorb in six hours on that Friday the wrath of God that takes eternity in hell to pour out. Either you forever pay for it, or He paid it all. And we therefore trust in Him. He lives, that's a fact. He lives in me, that's salvation. Jesus spoke this word of anguish, His last word to assure us that He absorbed all the punishment for our sins forever. Now the Apostle Paul distilled down salvation. to one little verse, 2 Corinthians 5.21, it says this, For He, that's God the Father, hath made Him, that's Christ the Son hanging on the cross, to become sin for us. And when that happened, when He became sin for us, God turned away from Him. And that's part of what that blackness for three hours was all about, that God forsook Christ. Why, Paul says, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Christ. Because we were in Christ on that cross, He was bearing our sins. If we place our trust in Him, He paid the debt. speaks a word of anguish to remind us that he suffered for us. You know, the hymn writer, Charles Wesley, reflected on this word. It's called a word, it's actually four in Greek, but we call it the word that he spoke, this L-O-I, L-O-I, Lama Sabachthani. As Wesley reflected on that word of agony, he wrote a hymn. Let me read it to you. It says, Arise, my soul, arise. Shake off thy guilty fears. that you haven't done enough good and you might not make it and maybe one sin too many will hit you and then you won't make it to heaven. Shake off those guilty fears, Wesley said. The bleeding sacrifice in my behalf appears. Before God's throne my surety stands. My name is written on his hands. Did you know that forever Jesus bears the scars of the cross, I think far more than the cinematographers portray. In Revelation 5, when Jesus shows up in front of the throne, like this hymn says, before the throne, my surety stands, do you know what it says? He looks like a massacred lamb. That's the literal rendering of the Greek, A little dot right here and a little dot right there and a little dot right there and a little dot right there sure doesn't look like a massacre to me. I think probably his face will still bear his visage, as Isaiah said, was marred more than any human. I think that forever All of us who know Jesus Christ will see Him in heaven and we'll see the scars on His face, His hands, His side, His feet. And we will well up with a wave of remembrance that that's because of my sin. Wesley continued, five bleeding wounds he bears received on Calvary. They pour effectual prayer. They strongly plead for me. What do they plead? Forgive him, O forgive, they cry. Nor let that ransomed sinner die. My God is reconciled. His pardoning voice I hear. He owns me for his child. I can no longer fear. With confidence I now draw nigh. And Father, Abba, Father, cry. Jesus spoke seven times from the cross, the first one being His cry of anguish, of agony, of separation from God. He cried that out so that you and I would never have to experience separation from God. Do you know for sure that Jesus Christ bore your sin? Have you asked Him to pay your bill? Have you asked Him, not for you to pay part of it and for you hoping that you make it, but have you said, I can't save myself. I am unable to do enough good to even merit any favor from you. I humbly bow before you as the publican beating his breast in Luke, saying, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. That's what the Word of anguish tells us. The second word is in Luke, and let's turn there. We go from Mark to Luke. Next book, turn to Luke 23. And if you're a Bible marker, you can write number two. That was the word of anguish. Luke 23 and verse 34 is the word of forgiveness. The word of forgiveness. So if you have accepted Christ's anguish, you say, He gave himself for me. He died in my place. He suffered God's wrath so I don't have to. If you've done that, then you can experience the second word. And here's the second word in verse 34. Then Jesus said, And Luke doesn't throw in the actual words for us. He just gives us the translation of them. Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. You know, the last one he gave us the LOI, LOI, Lama, Sabachthani. And now Luke is just trying to get to the message and he says exactly what Jesus said. Then Jesus said, Father, forgive them. Now notice, what is this second word from the cross? It's another prayer. What's Jesus doing on the cross? Isaiah saw him 680 years before the cross. He saw him praying. He's praying again. He's looking up and he's saying, Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do. That's the word of forgiveness. That's the pity without end. Do you remember Bernard of Clairvaux, the 11th century hymn writer from Germany? He said, O sacred head now wounded with grief and shame weighed down. He goes on and on through looking at the cross and he talks about thy pity without end. the forgiving pity of Jesus Christ. This is reminding us of Jesus offering His love to us even though we're sinners. Do you remember what the best-known verse in the Bible says? For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Paul adds, while we were yet sinners, Christ died. Do you know the word of forgiveness? Do you know how you get the word of forgiveness? that whosoever believeth in him." Those who believe in him that his anguish was for their sins, not for Idi Amin, the butcher of Kenya, not for Joseph Stalin that killed 20 million of his own Russians. For me, I've sinned enough in the first few moments of my conscious existence when I became willful and selfish and wanting my own way. I've sinned enough going my own way and never turned from it. I don't need to be a butcher. I just want my own way. And God says you're guilty. So guilty you cannot be in my presence unless you let my Son take your sin. Have you, Aladdin? Have you heard his word of forgiveness? Do you know that here the only intercessor there is, the only high priest there is, is praying for sinners? Have you received His forgiveness? Christ's last words assure us that He offers to us His love even though He knows we have failed Him, sinned against Him, and resisted Him. He still loves us. Father, forgive them. But He qualifies it. What did He add? Father, forgive them for what? They know not what they do. Caiaphas knew what he was doing. He wanted to get rid of him. That was the high priest. He never said Jesus didn't do the miracles. He never said that Jesus didn't raise from the dead. He never said that Jesus didn't multiply the bread. He just didn't want him to exist anymore because he hated him. John says he hated the light and he wanted the darkness rather than the light. So Jesus wasn't forgiving Caiaphas. He didn't forgive Pilate. Pilate knew what he was doing. The only guy that had a personal interview with Christ, his last moments on the earth, and Pilate didn't respond to that interview, that personal working time of Christ. So he wasn't forgiven Pilate, he wasn't forgiven Judas. Judas never said he was a sinner, he just said that he shouldn't have done it and it made him really feel guilty and he went out and committed suicide but he never ever had godly sorrow leading to repentance. Jesus said forgive those who don't know what they're doing and so he forgives us. and especially if we call upon Him. But look at verse 43. I want to get to the third word. We have to go through all seven because each speak to us. The first word we saw is the word of anguish, Jesus suffered for me. The second word is the word of forgiveness. Now look at verse 43. This is the word of assurance. Now remember, Jesus is in the middle cross, stretched out on the cross, and you can just barely look one way and the other with your head. And remember, both thieves started out cursing and swearing and railing King James, but one has a change of heart. And that's where we pick up in verse 43. And he says, previous to this, remember me when you come in your kingdom. And Jesus said, verse 43, this is his third time speaking that we're looking at here. And Jesus said to him, assuredly, I say to you today, Not tomorrow, not after a few hundred years, or a thousand years, or not after enough prayers, or you know, not after you have soul sleep, and all this stuff. But today, you, so he's dealing with him as an individual, today, you shall be with me. Not alone, not off in some corridor. You're going to be with me in paradise. That's called the word of assurance. Jesus Christ says to him, I want to take you with me to heaven. Now, did he ever say that before? Yes. Just before the cross, the night before, Jesus said some of the most beautiful words in the world. We all love them. John 14, 6. I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. And Thomas said, how do we get to the Father? And Jesus reminds him this. He says, I am going and preparing a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again for you, just for you. I'm going to come and get you, and I'm going to take you to be with me?" Look what he says to the thief. Look right down at verse 43, "...today you will be with me in paradise." Ere the day was past, before the night hit, this lowly, guilty, doomed sinner, this thief, heard the greatest words of all from the King of Heaven, the Lord of Glory, "...today you'll be with me in paradise." Third word, the word of assurance, is so beautiful that a hymn writer, 250 years ago, wrote a great hymn. There is a fountain filled with blood. His name was William Cowper, the man that wrote it. There is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emanuel's veins, and sinners plunge beneath the flood, lose all their guilty stains. Do you know what the next stanza says? The dying thief, hanging on the cross next to Jesus, rejoiced to see that fountain in his day. He was looking at Jesus, He says, I deserve to be on this cross, I deserve the anguish, but I'm asking you to take my sins. And he looks at Jesus, and Jesus looks right back at him with the word of assurance. And he says, today, you don't have to get down and amend your ways. You don't have to get down and go do some good works. You don't have to get down and make restitution for all the stuff that you did wrong. You don't have to get down and get baptized. You don't have to get down and join the fledgling apostolic New Testament church. Today, you're going straight with me to heaven. That's the word of assurance. And Jesus Christ's last word here assures us he has a place in heaven reserved for us. If we've heard His word of anguish and trust in His sacrifice, if we've heard His word of forgiveness and ask Him to forgive us, we can be assured we have a place. Well, the next one is just a little bit further down. Look at verse 46. If you're marking, here's the fourth one. verse 46 of Luke 23. This is the word of confidence. And this is Jesus showing us the confidence we can have because he had that confidence. And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, he said, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. Now, for the harmony of the Gospels, if you put all the Gospels in order, in all the events, probably this is the last thing Jesus said. But I'm going not through chronologically, I'm going through each book's listing. Probably Jesus said, it is finished, and then he looked up and said, into your hands I commit my spirit, and put his head down. But we're not looking at a chronology here, we're just looking at each one individually. Probably it was the last one, but because the loud crying in verse 46 was probably what we're going to see in John. when he says, it's finished. Because it says that he shouted that loudly. But we'll come to that in a moment. But this is the word of confidence, I call it. Because look what Jesus says, into your hands I commit my spirit. And then he breathed his last. And Jesus spoke of his power here to keep us secure forever. Because God was able to take his spirit and he could commit his spirit to God. He says, you can commit yourselves to me and I am able to keep you from falling. Remember Jude 24 and 25? Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling and deliver you faultless before God's presence with exceeding joy. Jesus says, I'm in charge of your eternity. I'm in charge of your future. If you will turn it over to me now, if you will not try and go your own way, make your own way to heaven. If you'll let me, you can be confident. that I'm able to keep you. A little earlier in the Gospel of John, he said this, my sheep hear my voice, I know them, they follow me and verse 20 of chapter 10 says, and I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. That's confidence. I was detained this week, probably many of you have the same thing happen, I pulled out on my way somewhere and all of a sudden I found myself behind a procession, a funeral procession. It was very short. It was just the hearse and one other car. And they didn't have enough money, they didn't have the police stopping all the roads and everything like that. And I thought it was very interesting just to, you know, I stopped behind them and then it was a one-lane road and there was no side to get off on, so I just followed them for a while. And I could see the flowers and I could see the box, you know, through the curtains in the back. And I sat there reflecting on Resurrection Sunday. You know what? If the person whose body was in that box had in their lifetime, while they had life and breath, placed their hope in the anguish of Christ in their place and asked Him to forgive them and say, I know that you died in my place, then you know what? They were far better to not be on this earth. I thought about that when I got where I was going and I saw the paper about how many of our precious soldiers had died. all those horrible things this week, and I thought, you know, every one of those soldiers, especially the one on the ground that everybody was kneeling around, that we all saw the picture of, every one of them who had placed their hope in Jesus Christ, I am confident that they were taken right out of wherever they were in that conflict, and they had their spirit committed to the one who said, you'll never perish, and he came to Iraq, or as in the hearse this week, came to Broken Arrow, and took them home. Do you have that confidence this morning? Or you kind of don't want to talk about that? You know, the older people get they don't want to talk about death. They don't want to talk about it. They don't want to talk about it because it's discouraging, it's depressing. That's the sign you don't know. The one who said, I am the resurrection and the life. Then you don't have the word of confidence, the word of assurance, the word of forgiveness, the word of anguish. Well, keep going. Now we have to get to John chapter 19. So go to the right, next gospel, and this is the end. You don't have to turn any further. The last three words are in John's gospel. We listen to Jesus now from the cross, and this is what he says in chapter 19 and verse 26. Jesus now is addressing an earthly need. Remember I said most of his prayers are to God, but three times he speaks to people. And here is one of the speakings to people. Jesus, verse 26, Therefore when he saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing by, said to his mother, Woman, behold your son. And of course to John to take care of her. What is this all about? Why is this in there? I mean, what is the emphasis of this? Well, what it's talking about is Jesus is expressing He shares in our humanity. He knows our needs. If you know anything about that culture back then, a widow had a hard life. If her husband died, she was in trouble. She could beg or could go into prostitution. Those were about the only two businesses that were available often. And of course, knowing the law of God, she couldn't do the one and so she became the other, a beggar. So you hoped in your oldest child that it would be a man that he would provide for you. And Mary had that. Joseph wasn't around. He died somewhere in Christ's childhood. But Mary had this son. But yes, she already knew the prophecy that he was going to die. And so there was always a concern with her. And so Jesus, knowing her concern, looks down at her and says, don't worry. You're going to be taken care of. John, take her and care for her. Take care of him as your own son." And he made that little connection right there. Why did he do that? Why do we have this drama of hell and the gates of hell and agony and eternal, all this is going on and Jesus does that? Why is that? because it says in Hebrews, a wonderful word, inasmuch as we are partakers of flesh and blood, he likewise shared in the same. Jesus is saying here, I share your humanity, I know your needs, I want you to know, I know what it's like to live on earth, I know the struggles you go through, I know the fears that you have, I know the pains that you have, because it says that he partook of flesh and blood and was tempted in all ways like we are. And this is a word of comfort. That's what I have written right next to verse 26, the Word of Comfort. Jesus wants to assure me He knows what it's like to live on earth. He knows what it's like to struggle with day-to-day needs. He knows what it means to face the same temptations we face. And He says here, I can help you. I can provide what you need, Mary, us, this morning. Have you let Jesus speak the word of comfort to you? Have you committed, cast all of your cares on him? Come unto me, he said, all you who labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. Take my yoke, learn of me, and you'll find rest for your souls. The word of comfort. I'm human, he said. I know what you're going through. Trust me. Keep going, verse 28 has the next word, the word of agony. The word of agony is Jesus, it's the shortest of all these words from the cross. It's one word in Greek, dipso. That's all he said. By this time, by the way this is at the very end, this is according to the chronology of the cross, Jesus has just come through the three hours of darkness. And as the darkness is just ending toward 3pm, at that instant he says dipso. That's all he could get out. He is so parched and so compressed by all the weight of sin. And we know the story of what the soldiers did. But I want you, before we go into that, think about this. How did Jesus' ministry begin? It began with gnawing hunger. Forty day fast in the wilderness, Matthew 4, Luke 4. Forty days of fasting, gnawing hunger. How did Jesus' ministry end? Raging thirst. He who began hungering and feeling our pain ended with the single most intense agony expressed in one word, I thirst, dipso. Well, the soldiers respond. In fact, the Roman Army's drink of conscripts was vinegar wine. All Roman legionaries carried these skins of wine vinegar. It kind of wasn't the good stuff, it was the low-grade stuff that everybody got. And it was good, it was antiseptic, it kind of relaxed them and did what wine does, and so they carried it around. So it was very present. So Jesus, when he said, I thirst, notice what it says in verse 28, that what the scripture said might be fulfilled. What did the scripture say? Psalm 69, 21. They gave me gall for my food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. And so Jesus, Jesus who had drained to the bottom the cup of God's wrath against sin, doesn't suffer a bit more than he needs to. And he now has finished his suffering, so he asks for a drink. Why? Because he didn't want to go out whimpering. He didn't want to go out low. He wanted to go out with a shout of triumph. And that's his last word we'll see in a moment. And how can you shout when you're totally parched? So he got a drink. He thirsted. He had to drink to allow him to shout his shout of triumph. And this last word from Christ of, I thirst, assures us he knows where we are, he knows how we struggle, he knows our pain and suffering, and he wants to help us. He wanted that drink because He says, I want you to know. I want you to know that I understand your anguish, your agony, your pain, your struggle. I have suffered too. And I receive comfort and I will comfort you. But now look at verse 30 and here we end. And this is what Jesus says in verse 30. When He had received the sour wine, He said, one word, in Greek, to telestai. Only he didn't just say to telestai. He shouted. The scriptures say that he shouted triumphantly that it is finished. Now if you could have had spiritual antennas on and if you could have heard the shockwaves going through the spiritual realm when he said that, We know what happened. The scriptures say that through his death he destroyed him that had the power of death. But as Jesus received the vinegar and his lips were moistened and his voice returned, he shouted, it is finished. And at that word you could have heard tombs exploding, chains breaking, prison walls crumbling, barriers that had sprung up ever since the first sin beginning to fall. and gates opening as death fled before the Lord of life. Jesus spoke seven times from the cross. He spoke the word of forgiveness so that we can know that we are forgiven. Do you know that this morning? Do you know as John sang, he's alive and I'm forgiven? and heaven's gates are open wide. He spoke the word of assurance so we can know that we're heaven-bound. He spoke the word of comfort to Mary so we can know we're not going alone, He'll care for us. He spoke those words of anguish and agony for us to know He feels our pain and He'll never leave us. He spoke the word of confidence so we can know we are accepted in the Beloved. And He spoke this final word of triumph so we can know that our salvation is assured. I wonder this morning Have you heard His voice? Have you heard Him speak to you? My sheep hear My voice, He said, and they know Me, and they follow Me, and I give them eternal life. Do you know that you have eternal life? Can you say this morning, this Resurrection Day, that God has forgiven my sins in Jesus' name? Not historic faith He lives, but saving faith He lives in me. Do you know that this morning? If you don't, right where you're sitting, looking at me, right now, from your heart of hearts, you can say, God, be merciful to me. Forgive my sins. I want Christ to live in me. I want to be in Him. I want His anguish to be for my sins. I want His forgiveness to be for my sins. I want the assurance my sins are gone and will never be remembered. And I want to know the confidence that because He lives, I'm going to live forever too. If you don't know that, you can ask for that right now by faith. Because, it says, whoever believes and repents shall be saved. Do you believe enough to turn from your own way to Him and let Him save you? That's the message. He lives. The tomb is empty. Death has been destroyed. God is in control. And His word is true. and whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Let's bow together for a word of prayer. Dear Lord, I ask you to move in hearts, draw some who have historic faith in you to saving faith this morning. May they make that little eight-inch move from their mind to their heart. May they place their hope and trust not in that they've done enough, but that you did it all. And may they believe. whom to believe is life eternal. And I pray that this will be the greatest resurrection day they've ever known because they've heard your last words and believed you. We pray also that you would help us to not just be excited about your resurrection today, but that we would be going through this world telling people, I tell you he's alive and I have been forgiven and heaven's gates are no longer barred to me. They're opened wide In the name of Jesus, we pray that. And all of God's saints said, Amen.