Let's pray. Father, thank You for what we've been able to sing. We do pray, Spirit of Christ, that You would come, give us ears to hear, minds to understand, hearts to absorb and believe and put to work the truth that You have written for us, preserved for us these thousands of years. And so, Lord, we pray that Jesus Christ would have the preeminence in our thinking tonight. And because we've met together the preeminence in our living this week, Father, prepare us for what lies ahead in our lives in the week upcoming. May we live out this week as children of God, disciples of Jesus Christ, filled with Your Spirit, and may it be evident that we are not conformed to the world, that we are worshiping You in the way that we live. Hear our prayer. Make us more like Christ, we pray, for Jesus' sake. Amen. So Romans 12.1 is what I think is the focal, the fulcrum, if you will, of the book of Romans. Everything before it is referred to when Paul says, by the mercies of God. And then everything after it He looks back at this because it's because of the mercies of God that you should live like the following. And the way that we are instructed to live in the instructions given from 12.2 to 15.13 is worship. Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. So starting with verse 2, you have what this worship looks like. And Paul, God is very kind to us to say, here's what worship looks like. And it's not talking about corporate worship services. It's amazing. how much is not said in the Bible about how to conduct a worship service. We have enough given to us to know, we know they sang, we know the Word of God was central. Kind of an indication in 1 Corinthians 16 that maybe they took up a collection. They certainly collected money on the first day of the week. They prayed. They observed the Lord's Supper. I think the whole life of the church can be summed up in Acts 2.42 that those who believed His Word and were baptized devoted themselves to the Apostles' Doctrine, to the Fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer. Those four elements is what the Church is. But when Paul is talking here about how to live in view of the doctrines that he has outlined in chapters 1 to 11, he calls it worship, and he gives an outline of what that looks like. And that's what we're going to keep on water skiing through tonight because, oh my, Romans 12 alone you could be in a preaching series for a good long time. My father died at the age of 80, having pastored for 60 years. He never did anything else that earned him income. Anything else he ever did before that he didn't get paid for. He was a massive man, very strong. He grew up in a small fishing village in Conception Bay, Newfoundland. At the age of 17 he was converted and wanted to become a preacher. And he came to Canada, which Newfoundland was not then, and studied. He was in the denomination he was ordained in for a couple years and then dumped it because of what he saw as liberal tendencies. I don't know what he would say today. What made him leave his denomination was nothing compared to a lot that's going on. Shortly before he died, I asked him after all his experiences and all his years of pastoring what his greatest desire was for the evangelical church. He hardly hesitated at all when he said this, I want the man sitting on this side of the church to reach across the aisle and take the hand of the man sitting across from him." I said, that's it? He said, yeah, that's it. He wanted Christians to be united. He wanted them to love each other. Why did Jesus come to the earth? Wow, that's easy. And we, you know, to give his life for ransom for many, to seek and to save that which was lost, and we've got a lot of answers that all relate to the cross, and they all do, but I bet we hardly ever think of this one. Ephesians 1.10 says that Jesus came into the earth to unite all things into himself. We don't think of that very often. My father wanted the church to be revived and the revival in his mind was Christians coming to love one another as the Bible says they should. And it was not loving one another in any way that would get the attention of the world. It was simply Christians who up till now couldn't even sit on the same side of the church together, reaching out to one another, expressing the love of Christ to other intangible ways. I thought he could have done a lot better than that after 60 years of pastoring, because when I had asked him that, I had only been pastoring 10 years or so, and I knew so much more than he did. But he was a lot more right than I thought. What is the greatest thing in the world you can do? It's the absolutely greatest thing in the world you can do. The greatest thing in the world you can do is keep the greatest commandment. Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. What's the second greatest thing you can do? Now you're on to me. There you go. The second greatest thing you can do in the world is love your neighbor as yourself. My father wasn't a fool after all. Obey the greatest commandment. Obey the second greatest commandment which falls out of the first. For John will tell us in 1 John how can you love God whom you haven't seen and not love your brother whom you have seen. We go into these chapters in Romans and then this mind-bending stuff in chapters 1 to 11 and then we get to this section beginning in chapter 12 where he says, therefore, and where does your mind go after you've gone through Romans 1 to 11 and seen all these incredibly mind-warping doctrines and the gospel opened up for us in such glorious ways. And then you get this doxology at the end of chapter 11, from him, through him, to him, are all things. Therefore, Present your bodies as a living sacrifice. Where does that take you? Yeah, I want to be a martyr. I want to be Ridley, you know? Dying, being burned at the stake in the city of London. I want to be John Knox, of whom Queen Mary said that what she feared most in her kingdom was the prayers of John Knox. That's a living sacrifice. And yet you don't find that. Find that here. I'm utterly convinced that the Christian life is the evidence of the power of God at work in those who've been saved by grace. But I'm also convinced that this power is not what most of us think it is, because when we think of power, you know, politicians want to be put in power, What is the evidence of the power of God at work in a follower of Jesus Christ? Paul's letter, his letters, stun us with the answers to that question. What does power look like in the New Testament? With the end of this whole section in Romans 15 verse 13, we read this. May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may... Now what comes next? By the power of the Holy Spirit you may... do what? Abound in hope. Not give up hoping. The Christian hope, not like the kind of hope our culture has, I hope I get a bike for Christmas. I hope it doesn't rain tomorrow. No, real hope. Believing in something that hasn't happened yet, but we know beyond any doubt that it will. Because God said so. That God keeps His promises. That by the power of the Holy Spirit, you may abound in hope. Well, that's not going to make the news. No, it won't. But it is the evidence of the Holy Spirit that you don't give up your hope. And that's power. 1 Corinthians 1.17 says this, For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. God sent me, Jesus Christ has sent me to preach the gospel in words that are not eloquent and not wise in the ways of the world. Because if I preach with eloquence and wisdom, people won't see the power of God. The power of God is preaching a simple gospel, a powerful gospel, in ordinary ways. So the Christ will be seen, not me. That's what this is about. That's the power of God at work. Verse 18, 1 Corinthians 1, For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us are being saved. What is it? The power of God. A foolish message. A message that a man nailed to a cross 2,000 years ago is what you need now in order to live forever with the God who made you. Come on! Tens of thousands of people nailed to crosses during the Roman Empire. What's different about this one? This is what's different about this one. This one will save you from your sin. Well, probably. I don't know. I mentioned my funeral this morning. You've got to sing, and can it be? And maybe I'll leave directions that this text could be preached from. 1 Corinthians 1.26, Consider your calling, brothers. Not many of you were wise, according to worldly standards. Not many were powerful, as the world counts power. Not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world, to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. There's power. Common, ordinary, unimportant, uninfluential, unrich people living in a way the world can't live. The power of God. Listen to Paul talk about power in 1 Corinthians 2 verses 3 to 5. I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling and my speech and message were not in plausible words of wisdom but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power. But we think power or the world thinks power is the opposite of weakness, fear and trembling. And they must have plausible words of wisdom. Paul says, I had none of that. What did I have? I had a demonstration of the Spirit and the power. That your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. What do you want the Evangelical Church to be, Dad? I want this guy to hold the hands of the other guy instead of clenching his fist and wanting to bop him on the nose. That's not very influential. That's not very newsworthy. No, it's not newsworthy. It's just what the Bible says. I mentioned to a lady this morning, I might read this text this evening, and here it comes, Ephesians chapter 3. I may have said this to you before. I think the Bible repeats itself a lot, so I think I have the right to do it too. But in Ephesians chapter 3, verse 20, sort of the doxology at the end of this section of the book of Ephesians before Paul gets into the practical stuff. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think according to the power at work in us. Now to Him who is able to do more abundantly than you can ask or think God can do more abundantly beyond anything we can even begin to imagine. Where? Where? According to the power that is at work in us. Now, if you have a power in you of the God who can do exceedingly, abundantly more than you can ask or think, what can you do? Well, here's what you can do. Chapter 4, verse 1, Therefore, therefore, since you have in you a power that is of the God who can do exceedingly, abundantly, above all that you can ask or think, therefore, I say, walk in a manner worthy of your calling. Well, of course, I've got this great power. How do you walk according to that? Man, alive. Boom! Sarnia is saved. Boom! Boom! I'll heal you. I'll walk on water." I urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you've been called. Here it is. Here's the power of God, the power of a God who can do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think. Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you've been called with all humility, gentleness, patience, forbearance, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Do you know what that is? That's the power of a God in you that can do exceedingly abundantly above all that you ask or think. This is stunning. I want that guy to hold the other guy's hand. Power of God. So your work is going to transfer you to Asia, and he gives you three options. You can go to the city of Sardis, you can go to the city of Philadelphia, or you can go to the city of Laodicea. You may recognize those names, churches, the last three churches of the seven churches of the Revelation. And so you're a Christian, you can go to one of these three cities, so you check out the churches in these cities. Go to the church at Sardis. Jesus says to them in Revelation 3.1, you have the reputation of being alive, so you go to this church. What does a church look like that has the reputation of being alive? Places hopping. It's got a ministry for every desire. It's doing things right. people give money and it's just falling out of them nice building big long list of pastors that everybody wishes was pastoring their church all kinds of things happen they're alive well then you think of Laodicea what's Laodicea? well Laodicea you go to the church there they say we're prosperous we don't need anything wow that's not bad I spend my time with people who are prosperous and don't need anything So the church of Sardis, Jesus says, you have a reputation for being alive, but you're dead. And the Laodicean church says, we have nothing. We have need of nothing. And Jesus says, you don't realize you're wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked, Revelation 3, 17. And in between the city of Sardis and Laodicea is the city of Philadelphia. And you go to the church of Philadelphia. And Jesus says to them, I know that you have but little power. So you go to the church at Philadelphia, and they're small, and they're not very influential, and they're not that well liked. I think I'll go to Sardis. They're alive. And the interesting thing about the church at Philadelphia is Jesus says nothing negative to them. It's one of the churches that Jesus has no complaints about. He has complaints against five of the seven churches, but not this one. It's small. It doesn't make the news. It doesn't have that big reputation of being alive. It can't say, I'm prosperous, I have need of nothing. Jesus threatens to close down the Laodicean church, to kill the Sardinian church, And he has nothing bad to say about the Philadelphia church. We need to start praying in the power of God, but boy, we better be measuring it right. So we get into these parts of the book of Romans that tell us about what a life of worship looks like. We're not gonna find things that we normally think of as great and glorious things as we talk about greatness and glory. The pulpit's not a place just to get the bees out of your bonnet. But I just often wonder if evangelicalism, if we're getting it, it's not about the bigness and the influence and the greatness and the so much that we all clamor after. given the gospel of free sovereign grace that is outlined in Romans 1 to 11, how shall we then live? Well, let's not be conformed to the world. Okay, what's that look like? Let's start in verse 3. It's just so amazing. For by the grace given to me, verse 3 says, I say to every one of you, get off your high horse. Not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think. Saved by free, sovereign, electing grace. Chapters 1 to 11. Now, go worship God. How will we do that? Well, first of all, don't think so highly of yourself. Because if you do, you'll rob God of glory. The first thing Paul says as he begins to tell us what real spiritual worship looks like is, don't think so highly of yourself. The world will just say the exact opposite. Read Romans 3, 10 to 18 that I read to you this morning, you know. None righteous, no not one. It'll help you. It'll help us. It should help us. This is talking about me. But we can read Romans 3, 10 to 18 and see it so much in our neighbors. But this is talking about my neighbors, but talking about me. In 1 Corinthians 6, Paul lists all these horrifying sins and then he says, and such were some of you. This was you. And in Ephesians 2, he says, you like the rest, like everybody else. You're dead and trespasses and said, this was you. but God who is rich in mercy. You want to worship God? Bow. That's where it starts. Bow down. You can't bow down to God while thinking highly of yourself, too highly of yourself. more highly than you are. Doesn't mean you can't recognize your gifts. Interestingly enough, this whole section where he starts with don't think too highly of yourself is about the use of gifts in the church. I've had, I pastored for 35 years. Makes me just a little more than half the man my father was. And people come, pastor, you need me. We had a guy said, God's called me the pastor here, to preach here. We don't think so. I said, what else can you do? I can sing. I said, OK. You want to sing sometime? We'll have you sing. So he introduced the song for 25 minutes. And so we spoke to him. No, no, you can't preach and call it singing. And so we left. Why? you don't represent, you don't acknowledge me. And Paul talks about gifts here and the way to start talking about gifts is don't think too highly of yourself. We can envy those who are more gifted or we can long to be as gifted. Paul says be humble and just use your gift. If your gift is prophesying, prophesy. If it's teaching, teach. If it's being merciful, do it. I find it interesting, if you're going to show mercy, be cheerful about it. Shoot, I can give to the poor. I can help people. But now you want to be happy about it too. And so use your gift. Where are you gifted? Use it! But don't go around grumbling that you're not as good as somebody else. And don't go grumbling that you think you're better. So before he talks about the use of gifts, Paul says, don't think too highly of yourself. Just use your gift. Just go serve Christ. That's how you worship God. Don't look down on those whose gifts aren't as prominent. My mother used to tell me, you have eye trouble. Just the letter I, that's what she meant. I do have eye trouble. I have this kind of eye trouble and I have the kind of eye trouble that she told me I had. Get off your high horse, you would say to me. You have eye trouble. It's interesting that in this list of behaviors, we start in verse 9. So in verse 3, it's don't think too highly of yourself. And then in verse 16, it says, just a minute now, verse 16, don't be haughty, never be wise in your own sight. Three times. Don't think too highly of yourself. Don't be haughty. Don't be wise in your own eyes. Three times he deals with pride in this list when we start talking about worship. Because you can't come into the throne room of God and worship as long as you think you're something. And I deserve better. That was Isaiah's problem. I may have said this to you. I don't know. But anyway, here it goes. The first five chapters of Isaiah, especially Isaiah chapter five, you go to it, and we won't read it there, but I think it's 11 times that Isaiah says, woe to you. Woe to you, woe to you, woe to you, woe to you. And God gave him the message because Israel needed to be woed upon. Great sins. But I think something's happening in Isaiah like happens in a lot of preachers. Easy to point. And then in Isaiah 6, God says to Isaiah, come up here a minute. Come visit me. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and lifted up. His train filled the temple. He was surrounded by these seraphim. And what they do for a living is across the throne, crying out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. And when I saw it, I fell flat on my face. And I said, I'm dying. Woe is me. What was me? You want to worship God? Get a view of God. Oh boy. Worship me. And you know what God does when Isaiah falls? What's He do? He picks him up. Ezekiel has a vision of God. The wheel within a wheel, that whole thing. In Ezekiel chapter 1 you get into the first verses of chapter 2 and it says, And I fell down like a dead man, and the Spirit of God picked me up. Daniel has a vision of God and God comes and picks him up. And John in Revelation has a vision of God, terrifies him. God picks him up. That's what God does. He who humbles himself will be lifted up. It's incredible. So how do we worship God? We humble ourselves, even in the use of the gifts He has given us. We sometimes think our gifts are earns, don't we? E-A-R-N-F. They're gifts. They're not things we've earned. What are you good at? It's gifts. Verses 9 to 21, secondly. We can't go through all these. Paul just rattles them off. Let love be genuine. Love can be faked. Love can be counterfeit. It can be spoken and not felt. It can be uttered and not meant. It can have the appearance of being present when all that's present is a poor counterfeit. God says, yes, I love my enemies, but the measure of it is when we really have enemies and how we treat them. Leave room for vengeance, this text says at the end in verse 19. Leave it to the wrath of God. Let God deal with them. Loving your enemies means you don't try to get your vengeance. It's just all here. This is how we worship God. Let love be genuine. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love does not think evil. Love always hopes, always believes. Love, that must be real. And the opposite coin of that is to hate what is evil. Look at that. Let love be genuine. This is how we worship God. hate what is evil. Love does, 1 Corinthians 13, 6, love does not rejoice in evil but rejoices with the truth. Isn't it interesting that the opposite of evil is truth? We live in a horrifying world. Abuse, terrorism, cruelty, injustice, persecution. Hate it. Hate it. Wilberforce hated slavery and campaigned for 60 years to see the slave trade put to an end. George Mueller hated homeless children or children being homeless and started however many orphanages he started in the city of industrial London. My friend Mike in Toronto hates the fact that little girls are kidnapped around the world and put into the sex trade so he works to rescue them and every now and then I get an email from Mike with all these exclamation marks we've rescued another one and he's doing something because he hates evil William Carey hated the thought of millions of Indians not knowing about the mercies of God. So he went to India and taught himself over 13 languages and translated the Bible into those languages. His wife went insane during the work. Hudson Taylor hated the thought of Chinese people being enslaved by sin and China giving them the gospel. You want to worship God, hate what is evil. And know that that at least means being some small part of the solution. For look at the last verse of chapter 12. Don't be overcome by evil, because you hate evil. But overcome evil with good. How do you overcome evil? Do something good. Don't just curse the darkness. Light a candle. That's what this says. This is hating evil, triumphing over it. Listen to some verses out of the book of Titus. When I was growing up, and maybe you too, I grew up thinking good works was just about the most wicked thing on earth. And it's true. We're not saved by good works. We're saved in order to do them. We know Ephesians 2, 8 and 9. Do you know verse 10? For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourself. It is the gift of God, not by works, lest any man should boast. But we are God's workmanship, created to what? Do good works, which He preordained that we should do. We're saved to work. Titus chapter 1, verse 16. They profess to know God, but they deny Him by the works. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work. Chapter 2, verse 7 of Titus. Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works. Chapter 2, verse 14. Jesus Christ who gave Himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession who are zealous for good works. Chapter 3, verse 8. I'll get there in a minute. This saying is trustworthy. I want you to insist on these things so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works. These things are excellent and profitable for people. Chapter 3 verse 14, let our people learn to devote themselves to good works. Overcome evil with good. Why? Because the world is evil and it needs help. Why is it your job? Because we have received the mercy of God. I beseech you, by the mercies of God, present yourselves as living sacrifices, holy, acceptable unto Him, which is your worship. Here's worship. Overcome evil with good. And it doesn't have to be big and spectacular. That was the point of the early part of the message. It's not the big spectacular. It's not Wilberforce only. It's you. doing little things because you have been saved by grace and you're going to have a genuine love and you're going to hate what is evil and when you see it you're going to overcome it with good that's incredible and it just goes on and on there's a whole bunch of them in this whole section and you should be glad that I'm not going to take the time to look at them all chapter 13 we'll just really water ski over that Submit to those in authority over you. Yeah, I don't know what your favorite title for the Prime Minister is. We are called to submit to Him. When Paul wrote Romans 13, he wasn't writing to a group of people who lived in a liberal democracy with a lovely guy running the country. He lived in a military dictatorship. I don't think it means never oppose the government because we know it's better to obey God than men. And when the Nazis come and say, you must not hide Jews, we don't hand the Jews over to them because it's better to obey God than men. But we are not people of anarchy and we are not fomenting rebellion. We're trying to follow God here and we will submit and we will pay our taxes. And we will give honor to whom honor is due and respect to whom respect is due, as Peter puts it in 1 Peter. So we will not be anarchists. We will not be trying to overthrow the government. We will obey God in this. And if the government makes me disobey God, then I will obey Him rather than them. And I will pay my taxes. Why? Because I am a worshipper of God. That's why I will do this. Chapter 13. I'm only picking out a few. I only picked out a few this morning. Chapter 13, verse 8. Debt is slavery. The church I was in for 21 years in Thistletown had in that neighborhood at least four of these payday loan places. And I once told the church, if you ever hear that the payday place, payday loan places all burned down one night, you turn me in. Because I'm the one who did it. What a horrible thing they are. I know they say they're helping people. But the only people they're helping are people who don't make enough money to survive and they take that check in and they get 75% of it back and then they cash and get the whole thing later. Debt's slavery. I don't know, maybe you got some in here in debt. We bought a house when we were at Thistletown and then when we moved to the Mission we sold it. You know what we did with it? We got rid of all our debts. Yeah, yeah, yeah, good stuff. Not everybody can do that. Oh no man, anything. Get out of debt if you can. But then this word says, except. Oh no one anything except. What? You're supposed to be in debt. To love each other. Now, metaphorically, look around the room at the people in this room. What do you see? Don't tell me. What do you see? I'll tell you what you see. You see creditors. You owe them. You owe them something. Owe no man anything except to love one another. You owe it to them. You owe them love. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love is gentle. Love keeps no record of wrongs. Love always hopes, always believes, always trusts. You owe them that. Pay your debts. Pay this debt. Because that's how you worship God. That's one way in which you worship God. What's the greatest thing you can do? Love God. What's the next thing you can do? Love your neighbor. My father wasn't a fool after all. Owe no man anything except to love him. Chapter 13 verses 11 to 14. Wake up from your sleep. Salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. The night is far gone. The day is at hand. Let us cast off the works of darkness. Put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime. Not in orgies, drunkenness, sexual immorality, sensuality, quarreling, and jealousy. You can't live like that and call yourself a Christian. It's just not possible. And so we will be people of purity. We will. We will fight in our own hearts not to be addicted to the sexual immorality of the AIDS. An amazing thing. What goes on tonight and I, you know, I tongue-wagged on you this morning about it. A strange world we live in that can celebrate sexual immorality on the one hand and then complain when men are sexually immoral on the other. We will not be sucked into this. Gentlemen, we will take precautions that we do not watch the pornography that is so prominent in our world. because we will not walk in sexual immorality and sensuality. We will not. And right after sexual immorality and sensuality, he talks about quarreling. Oh man, I'm not going to be sexually immoral, but please, let me quarrel. Surely it's not wrong. He's got a BMW and you know, no, you can't want that. And I love Paul's list in the Bible. You should read the list of sins that Paul gives. These little sins that we are willing to put up with. Right next to murder, I think it's right next. In Romans 1, when he lists these horrible sins, right next to, I think it's next to murder, it's in there anyway, is gossip. Murder and gossip. Murder and gossip? Come on. I'm not going to kill somebody, but shoot, let me enjoy something about his sin, you know. Let me be able to talk to him about it. Pause it. No. We're worshippers of God. This is not legalism. This is gratitude. Look what God has done in chapters 1 to 11. We read, we began this morning, Psalm 116, how shall I repay? what God has done for me. And then it says, I will hold up the cup of my salvation. Do you know what that means? It means I will ask God for more. That's how you thank God for what He's done for you. You don't go and say, ah, you saved me and now I've got all these wonderful things to give to you. No, you say, here, fill this, keep filling it. My cup's cracked, it leaks. Keep filling this, keep filling this. And that's what this is. It's a response to grace. That's what this is. And then you get into chapter 14, and yeah, it's getting late. Aren't we glad? Chapter 14, the stumbling block issues, and there's three mentioned in the book. In chapter 14, he mentions the food you eat in verse 2. One person believes he may eat anything. Well, another person only eats vegetables. That means that the church should have in it carnivores and vegans. They're both welcome. We won't tear each other apart. Wow. Veganism wasn't the issue here. It was ceremonially unclean food and so on. But there it is, about the food you eat. Verse 5, one person esteems one day as better than another, another esteems all days alike. Oh my word, you mean to say that in the same church we're going to have Sabbatarians and non-Sabbatarians? in the same church? No, no, no. No. We're going to tell the Sabbatarians, you go over there and worship. But that's not what Paul tells them. You got persons esteeming this day and people not esteeming this day. Some people think all the days are the same. Other people say, no, some days are special. Get along. And then the other issue is in verse 21. It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. So here we got people, I absolutely never take a drink or God sends you straight to hell. And then the other person says, no, that's not so. And I have wine with my meal. And Paul doesn't say, worship in different churches. He says, love one another. Wow, because that's how we worship God. We're not going to let this destroy us. We're not going to let this interfere with us. these are what is said in verse 1 what's called in verse 1 not to quarrel over opinions opinions church was almost destroyed in the early centuries of the church because should we should we stand when receiving the Lord's Supper or sit? quarrel over opinions that's the mark of the church Paul says, come on, let's worship God. Don't quarrel over these things. Then you get to chapter 15. We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, the reproaches of those who reproach you fell on me. boils down to love one another. Ah gee dad, maybe you got it right. So that, look at verse 6, so that together, in verse chapter 15, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, welcome one another. the Sabbatarian welcoming the non-Sabbatarian, the meat-eater welcoming the non-meat-eater, the drinker welcoming the non-drinker, and vice versa. Welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you. How did Christ welcome you? Well, He welcomed you because you were so good and had everything in complete order. No. He welcomed you and changed you for the glory of God. So in chapter 15, verse 1 says, don't live to please yourself. Verse 2 says, please your neighbor. Verse 3 says, imitate Christ. Verse 5 says, live in harmony. And verse 6 says, glorify God with one voice. And then he says, after saying all that, abound in hope. Why would we do all this stuff? Because of His great mercy. That's why. Are we worshippers of God? Yes, we are. And we want the world to worship God. And we want these texts to describe us. This is rubber-meets-the-road stuff, isn't it? But it's not newsworthy stuff. It won't make the front page tomorrow that we can love a Sabbatarian. It's not going to make the news, but it pleases God. And it's how we worship. It's not going to make the news that I forgive you when you sin against me. It's not going to make the news when I don't get jealous because your gifts are better than mine. But heaven rejoices over this. And we need to consciously do these things because We love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and we are here to bow before Him and worship Him. And may God, in His powerful grace, give us the ability to do so. Let's pray. Father, thank You for Your Word, we pray. that we would read it and understand it, believe it, accept it, and that we would put it to work in our lives, help us. These are hard things. We thank You that we have in us one who can do exceedingly abundantly of all that we can ask or think. And so, Father, we pray that we would be exhibitors of that great power because we are completely humble and gentle and forbearing in keeping the unity of the Spirit and the bond of love and the bond of peace. Do this for us. Do this for the praise of Your glory that you may be honored and that other people will see and hear from us of the great work of Christ on the cross. Bless us. Send us out with a desire to be a blessing to others. We pray for Jesus' sake. Amen. God bless you.