Amen. You may have noticed the theme this morning of praise and worship in our songs of giving God the glory due to Him, for He is worthy of all glory and praise and thanksgiving, and so that's been what we're trying to think about this morning. Our text will bring us to that point as we think about it, but we've returned to Hebrews chapter 13, and we're getting closer to the end of this letter week by week, and I pray it's been a glorious letter. It has been for me. I have really I felt like it's been helpful to me and a good reminder of the gospel and of faith. And as we consider what we've been leading up to, we've been seeing that we're in an unshakable kingdom. That's really what chapter 12 brings you to. You're in an unshakable kingdom. And we wondered, well, what are the characteristics? What are the traits of that unshakable kingdom? And he gives us some. He says, first of all, that there's a love that unites us together. And that's one of the most important and, in fact, the primary thing that he points to. A covenantal relationship that is to be remembered and rightly esteemed, that there is, on top of that, a continuity of the gospel order, not only in terms of the church being given structure, but also in terms of the gospel being handed down generation after generation, that that is how it was intended to be. And then a cherishing of grace, because at the heart of what we believe is that we are saved by grace, not of works, but by grace. And so I think when you think about this for a moment, you see these are essential elements of the church and of the gospel. That we must be a people who are united by a love that is not even really our own, but a love that is shed abroad in our hearts by the power of the Holy Spirit. That we are to be found in covenant blessings that are given to us in Christ. That all of our hope is tied to those covenant blessings. That if it were not for those covenantal blessings, we would have no hope. Third, that God has ordained this order for our good, which includes both church structure and also gospel continuity. The gospel is not a new message. It doesn't need repackaging every generation. It doesn't need to be marketed. It is the truth and it is eternal. And therefore, my friends, we can have confidence in it. And then we also want to realize that it is built upon the glorious grace of God. In fact, what is the message of the Gospel? We've already said it. The shorthand for the Gospel is it's a message of God's grace apart from works. And as you think about that, it is shocking and it should be shocking. And as Martin Lloyd-Jones says, if you never frame it in such a way that somebody might say you've gone too far, and made it a gospel just entirely of Christ. And he said, then you've never preached the gospel because the gospel will cause some people to get to the point where they say, well, is there nothing for us to do? And our text will answer this today. Not in our justification, but God then calls us as justified people to live according to the Spirit. So we recognize how this came into the discussion, especially last week, that there is a desire to go back, if you will, to some strange teachings, he calls them, foreign teachings, that people think need to be added on. And we talked about that at length last week, so I won't go back through it other than to say it will continue into what we're thinking about today. And as we thought about it last week, the question was, do you need these alien or strange things added to the gospel? Do you need to go back to what Moses provided you in the law? We could say God provided you in that economy, certainly. But do you need those things? And I think the answer last week was a resounding no, right? That's why they were called strange. Think about that for a moment. We talked about this last week. They were called foreign. not foreign to Old Testament Israel. They were given to Old Testament Israel. But his point is you're not in that covenant. Now, even if you were formerly in that covenant, you have been called out of that covenant into the new covenant in Christ's blood. And therefore, those things are strange and alien to you now. There is no need to participate in all those activities of the Old Testament in that sense. They are not availing for you. Now, Paul might argue here, just in general at this point in a conversation, that doesn't mean they're wrong to do. In other words, if you were to say, listen, as a group of people want to get together and have the Passover or something, I don't think Paul's going to say that's a sin. But what he would say is as New Testament Christians, if you do that just as something that you want to do, and you're not tying any salvific power to it, you're just saying, it'd be interesting to go through the Passover picturing Christ, looking forward to Christ, or thinking about how Christ fulfilled this. The reason I want to make that point is we're not saying that they're bad in and of themselves, but if they're looked at for salvific purposes. This is why Paul had no problem in circumcising Timothy. But there were other times where Paul said, no, you will not circumcise them because that's to take the law upon themselves. But he said, listen, if you're not arguing, in other words, Paul's argument was never that Timothy needed to be circumcised to be saved. His point was what? Pragmatic. It will help Timothy as he ministers amongst the Jewish crowd that being a Jew, that he would be circumcised. So again, we need to think about the motives for things. And the author says if you're adding any of these things on, any of these meets or rituals or sacrifices on as a means of incurring favor with God, of gaining merit before God, or being justified before God, they are false sacrifices. That's going to be our point today. They are false because they do not do it. We are not justified by anything that we do. And so we want to look at that today. Now we might say even in the Old Testament the message of the Scriptures is that it's never been by human hands that we are justified, never by our own works that we're justified. If there's anything Paul's trying to get across is that if you thought that's what the Old Testament was teaching, you never understood it. Because Abraham was not justified by what he did, he was justified by faith. What he did flowed out of that faith. And that's the proper understanding of what James adds to that. But he says, Abraham was justified because he believed God and God accounted unto him for righteousness. End of story. Well, I don't know, would David agree? Great King David, would he agree? Yes. Because David was looking forward to that covenant in which he could say that God takes our sins as far as the east is from the west. It's not we pay for them today and come back again next year and next week and next month, but we're looking forward to the promise of God that all of our sins will be taken away because we have a sacrifice that is sufficient, a sacrifice that is once and for all, a sacrifice that gives us right standing eternally before God. That's what they were looking for, and that's what we're proclaiming today. That is the gospel, that Jesus did that. I didn't do that. Jesus did that. You didn't do that. Jesus did that. And so today as we think about this, I want us to look at our text. I'm going to read the whole chapter up to verse 16 and then we'll talk about it. Let brotherly love continue. Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some have unwittingly entertained angels. Remember the prisoners, as if chained with them, those who are mistreated, since you yourselves are in the body also. Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled, but fornicators and adulterers God will judge. Let your conduct be without covetousness. Be content with such things as you have. For he himself has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. So we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear. What can man do to me? Remember those who rule over you, who have spoken the word of God to you, whose faith follow, considering the outcome of their conduct. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Do not be carried about with various and strange doctrines, for it is good that the heart be established by grace, not with foods, which have not profited those who have been occupied with them. We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat, for the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priests for sin are burned outside the camp. Therefore, Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood suffered outside the gate. Therefore, let us go forth to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach. For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come. Therefore, by him, let us also continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name. But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices, God is well pleased. Today I want us to look at three points. First of all, recognizing false sacrifices. Second of all, rejoicing in Christ's sacrifice. And third, and finally, offering an appropriate sacrifice. We need to think through this today. So first of all, recognizing false sacrifices. We see the continuity of the passage, right? It's continuing forth to say there are sacrifices, but it's already defined for us what aren't sacrifices. What are not the things that God desires? What are not the things that we should put our hope in? And we've just heard this warning about returning to the Old Testament practices as a means of having favor before God or of being justified before God. And it's interesting because when you think about this for a moment it seems pretty clear that this is the message really of Hebrews in general. Isn't it? Don't get distracted by the types. They're pointing to the anti-type. Don't get distracted by the shadows. They're pointing to the substance. And that's true even of these rituals, even of these things that were given in the religious practices of Israel. They were not the end in themselves, but they pointed to the end. And that is Christ and what He came and accomplished. And so there's a danger here. Obviously that we can be drawn back to these things as a means of works, a means of making ourselves right before God, a means of seeing them as an acceptable sacrifice before God when they are not. And they only were temporally. And that's the entire point Paul gets at. And I think our Baptist fathers got right that the old covenant had a place. It was not to be eternal. It was not an administration of the covenant of grace. But what it was, was a national covenant for a people that made way for the coming of the King. And as we think about that for a moment, we'll see we would not want to then bind ourselves under an anticipatory covenant, but we would want to be in the realization of the fullness of what God has given us. And this reminds us anyway of the gospel, which says what? There must be grace. There is no hope for man apart from grace, that the gospel has at its roots grace itself. Outside of grace, there is no good news in the gospel. And see, that's exactly what's happening in Galatia, right? Where Paul says that they've brought in a gospel that's no gospel at all. What does he mean? It's good news that isn't good news at all. Why is it not good news? It's the same old formula of what you must do to make yourself right with God, which is impossible anyway. That cannot be good news. It's the yoke we talked about that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear. And so again, there's this reminder that we do not want to hollow out the gospel. We do not want to replace the idea of grace with something that we can do where it's no longer the gospel at all. At the heart of our author's thoughts in this passage, it's that it's impossible to return to the Old Testament sacrificial system because what could you find there anyway? It was pointing forward. There's nothing that you can find there. There is no grace really there. Now, it is a gracious covenant in the sense that God didn't have to offer it. is gracious in the sense that He set apart a nation for His work. Paul deals with these things in Romans. Well, what benefit was there then in having a covenant with God? And Paul says, in every way, right? You held the oracles of God. You were given the covenants and all these revelations of God. They just weren't the end. They were pointing to something. And my friends, you took the road map and you didn't follow it. You didn't understand that it was pointing to something. And so, my friends, what it was pointing to was your need of grace. That you cannot, by the law, make yourself right before God. This letter itself has exposited this over and over again. Why Yom Kippur every year? Because it's never enough. There's never a year where we say, the high priest did it right this year. He did it perfectly this year. No error at all. Guess what? We never have to do it again. But when Jesus came as the fulfillment of Yom Kippur, as the perfect and spotless Lamb of God, and He perfectly kept the law, perfectly died on our behalf, when He did that, it was once and for all. That's the point. That's the point that He's getting at. And so all those sacrifices of the Old Testament system have run their course. That's what He's saying. They've run their course. What they pointed to has come. When the type comes, excuse me, the anti-type comes, the type falls away. When the substance comes, the shadow falls away. That's what he's been pointing to throughout this entire letter. Well, what do we need? We needed what Abraham looked forward to, his seed. We needed what David was looking for and the one who would sit upon his throne, the messianic high priest and king and Lord who would write all things. Who would put back, if you will, what was undone in Adam. And so we come to this and think about it for a moment. What are you going to get by going backward to what was shadow? Again, over and over again, we see that it can't be done by works. In fact, Paul in Romans, and actually several points in Romans, makes these categorical distinctions. But in Romans 11 he says this, And if by grace, then it is no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more of grace, otherwise work is no more work. Now what does Paul mean there? How are we to understand, he's asking in Romans 9-11, how can we understand if this is the heritage of God for His people, this gospel of Jesus is the fulfillment of all those things, how do we understand why so few Jews are in the church? And Paul says, well, there are Jews in the church. Paul says, I'm an example. Peter's an example. There are countless examples, but if what you mean is there aren't as many as you would have thought or expected, then what he says is that's just what's always happened. In fact, he goes back to a time in the Old Testament where the prophet says, Lord, I alone remain, right? And God says, no, that's not true. There are thousands who have not kneeled, bowed a knee to Baal. And Paul says what? Even now there remains a remnant of grace. A remnant of grace. God has kept alive a portion, a portion of Israel. But then he wants to say this. Well, what do we mean when we say grace? He says, and if by grace it is not of works. They didn't do it. God did it. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. If it is works, it isn't grace. It's just basic categorical definitions. For years when we come to texts like this, I'll say, if you have a contract with your employer and he doesn't write you a paycheck, you can take him to court. Why? He owes you something. It's a wage. It's a contract. It's something you have earned. You worked and you receive a wage. That's what Paul's talking about here. If it's something that you earned, you're owed it. God owes no man. God owes no man. See, what God is doing is giving something like a bonus. And if last year your boss gave you a Christmas bonus, and the year before he gave you a Christmas bonus, and ten years in a row before that he gave you a Christmas bonus, but you don't get one this year, you think you're going to be able to take him to court? No. He doesn't owe it to you. A bonus is a gift. And you cannot demand a gift. A gift is given freely. Or, guess what? It isn't a gift. That's what Paul's saying. If I can take you to court and say you owe me this gift, then I'm going to have some kind of contract by which you agreed to pay it to me, and therefore it isn't a gift but a wage." These are categorical things that must be separated, Paul says, in the gospel. And the gospel is of grace, not of works. Paul says in Ephesians 2 that it is not of works lest any man should boast. In Romans, he says, if Abraham had made himself just before God by what he did, then he would have reason to boast. What does he mean? If I've earned my way to salvation, I can say, give me all the credit. Give me all the glory and all the due. I did it. But my friends, that is not the gospel, is it? No man can boast. In fact, Paul tells us in Romans that the gospel is the opposite of that. It knocks every man's needs out from under them. It silences every mouth before God because no one can earn it. Well, I should say Christ alone could come and fulfill the righteous demands and go to Calvary's cross and die for us and that we are made righteous. How? By our works? No, by standing in Christ by faith, by God's grace. And so, my friends, as you think about for a moment that entire section, Paul is using Israel as an example of what the gospel is and what it is not. We are saved by God's grace as we put our faith in Jesus Christ, right? That is the glories of the gospel. It is by faith through grace that we are saved and this is told to us over and over again. Now how are we not saved? Paul gives us that in depth too in Romans 9-11. because he says some interesting things about Israel. And these are important for us to think about, especially as we come to a text of Jews who have come to the gospel and are thinking of going back. Paul, one chapter earlier in chapter 10, begins to talk about his kinsmen according to the flesh and he says, Paul's not a hater. Paul wants his kinsmen according to the flesh to come to know the Gospel and to be saved. That's his heart's desire. That motivates a lot of his early mission work. He wants to see that happen. And in fact, if you go to the end of Romans 9-11, at the end of chapter 11, it actually is what motivates his work unto the Gentiles. Why? He says because his hope is that in evangelizing to the Gentiles that they will so far come into the Gospel that it will stoke a jealousy within Israel and that they also will then come in. So even as Paul's ministering to Gentiles, he has a little bit of a desire as a Jew to see that be the means by which God brings more Jews in to the fold of the faith. But once you hear what he says, recognizing that his heart's desire is to see Israel saved, he says, for I bear them record. What does he mean? I'm giving testimony. I'm giving testimony on behalf of Israel that they have zeal for God. They are zealous. They are passionate. It's sad, isn't it, that in our own day we think that's the most important thing. If you've got zeal, there's no question you're on fire for the Lord. You are a Christian. But Paul says, wait just a minute here. Read this entire line. Don't stop halfway through. He says, they have zeal, but not according to knowledge. Zeal that is not according to knowledge can be a damning thing. It can lead you down into the pits of hell because you can be going in the wrong direction with zeal and fly into your own destruction. So there must be zeal according to knowledge. And so if you think, well, how did this happen? Well, here's what it says. Listen to what Paul says in the very next line. For they being ignorant of God's righteousness. They didn't understand it. They didn't understand how we gain righteousness before God. They thought it was by works of the law. They thought it was through the temple. They thought it was through all these things. Being ignorant of the righteousness, God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness. Did you hear that? Paul says Israel in general has sought to establish their own righteousness. How? By works of the law. How am I going to be righteous before God? Do more. Do better. Do these things that are commanded to me in the Old Testament. I want you to think about this for a moment because establishing their own righteousness, Paul says, means something specific. He says, going about to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. See, what this tells us, there's only two paths of trying to be made right before God, and that's by faith or by works. Those are the two, by faith or by works. And in fact, if you were to read this passage in Romans, Paul goes to give Moses' testimony of these two ways. that there are two ways to try to make yourself right before God. One is by works and law, one is by faith and grace. And he basically says, if you're going to try to go by law, what does Moses say? That is, the one who keeps the whole of the law will be righteous by it. You want to be made righteous by the law, you better never mess up one time, because the law is a difficult taskmaster. The law holds you to a perfect standard, God's perfect standard. And the problem is no man in Adam can keep it. No man in Adam can keep it. Jesus Christ came and kept the law for us on our behalf. My friends, he says the other way is that the gospel, this is paraphrasing Moses, the gospel is far away but God has brought it to us. He has brought it to us. by His grace. Moses was preaching the gospel in Deuteronomy. God was preaching the gospel in Genesis. It's been throughout the entire Bible, the message, you cannot climb to God. You cannot earn a righteous standing. It must be given to you by God's grace. And so, my friends, we see this is the message of Scripture. All the works of our hands are insufficient. We have a lot of hymns we sing that have lines exactly like that, right? Nothing in my hands I bring, only to the cross I cling, or simply to the cross I cling. Many, many hymns that we sing that detail this very thing. If you think for a moment, that can't be right. No, we must do something. We must work our way to salvation. There has to be more than this. I'd remind you of what Paul says in Romans 4. God justifies whom? The godly? No, Paul says God justifies the ungodly, those who aren't like God, those who aren't righteous, that while we were yet without strength, Christ died for us. My friends, that's the gospel. There's nothing to earn. It's all of grace. All of grace. And so my friends, when you're looking here at this idea that they're going to somehow go back to the law, go back to Moses, go back to the old covenant, go back to the synagogue and somehow gain something. No, you lose everything. You lose everything because Jesus, the old Reformational saying, you know, Jesus plus something is nothing, right? It's in Him alone. You add anything to Him, you hollow out the gospel. And so my friends, we need to recognize this is one of the primary points we're going to get to as we're thinking over and over about these things approaching Reformation Day. and in our Wednesday night studies. Pretty important points. But that brings us to our second point this morning. We need to recognize that Jesus is the only sufficient sacrifice for the sins of man. Only one. The Bible tells us that many, many times as we walk through it. But my friends, we need to recognize this because it is important. It's the heart of the gospel. No one can boast of our contribution to the gospel because we've contributed nothing or If we wanna quote Philip Melanchthon, oftentimes this gets attributed to Edwards, but I've never seen that Edwards said it. Melanchthon did say it, or something very close to this. The only thing you contribute to your justification is the sin that made it necessary. It's the only thing you contributed, right? Was the cause by which you needed to be delivered, or the thing you needed to be delivered from, that's what you contributed. Sin, evil, rebellion against God, that is what you have contributed. And if you go back to Romans, chapter 1 is about how the nations, the Gentiles, have gone astray in every way imaginable. And chapter 2 is Paul knowing his Jewish audience is going to be like, yeah, those Gentiles are terrible, you know. And he's like, you've done the same things. And you have less excuse because you received the law. And that's why the gospel knocks everyone's knees out equally before them, because whether you had the law or you had conscience, revelation from God, whatever it may be, you are guilty before God. All men are guilty before God. And so, my friends, when you think about this, we all recognize the need that we have, and that's why it's the gospel of amazing grace. God didn't know it. There's no reason that I can fathom He would look upon me and say, you know, I'm going to send Jesus to die for that guy. But I'm thankful He did. I'm thankful that He did. I'm thankful for His grace, even if I can't understand it. It's the gospel of God's grace because as we think about it, we should receive it a certain way. We should receive it as a free gift, one in which we put our thanksgiving and praise. And we're going to come to that in just a moment. But that is what should happen. And if we don't receive it in such a way, then it means we don't esteem it very highly. If we think we need to add to it, we don't esteem it very highly. My friends, we live in an age, I think it's common to the church's history that the gospel isn't esteemed very highly. You know, it's amazing, isn't it? I think when you think about the parable of the sower, we talk about this from time to time, but it's important to keep in mind that as that seed is being sown out across these different soils, there's a question of why it's effective in some and not others. And I think If you go back and look at what the Reformers wrote about this, they said this is really answering the question of why can multiple hear the gospel and one person be so bored they fall asleep and another person say this is life changing. This is the glory of God. This is everything I have ever desired. This is what my soul needs. How can that change? How can that difference be? And he says the parable of the sower tells us a couple of things. It isn't the sower's fault. The sower's just throwing the seed out. It's not the problem of the seed. That's the gospel. There's no fault in the gospel. It's a problem in the heart of man. If there is not a desire to give praise and glory to God, that is a problem in the heart of man. And my friends, we see this. And so as we think about this for a moment, we recognize that we ought to be a people who praise and give glory to God and are thankful for the gospel even when it might be difficult. even when it might be difficult, even when we might suffer for our testimony, we might go to jail, we might lose our job, we might be killed because of the gospel, we should still be thankful and rejoice. Now that is a challenge. There's no doubt about that. That's a challenge our brothers and sisters have faced for 2,000 years. 2,000 years. And so as you wrestle through this, I want to say something else the gospel is not. I say this from time to time. But it's important that we think about this. The other sacrifice that we have to remove from our minds with the gospel is the idea that somehow we've sacrificed for the gospel. I don't mean adding to our justification. I mean that, oh, we've sacrificed so much for the gospel. God knows what it's cost me. Now, there's occasional times that Paul says something like that, but the reason Paul's doing that is to defend himself against people that, in other words, really what Paul's saying is, you don't know the half of how much I've suffered in this gospel ministry. He's not saying that as a way of, like, God owes me something. He's saying it to correct the people who think that if God is with you, you'll never suffer. The super apostles. Paul says, no, you don't realize how much the gospel has caused me suffering, and yet I give thanksgiving and I rejoice in the Lord. Praise God I've suffered as I have, if it's been in his service. Well, why can't we say that we sacrifice for the gospel? Because Jesus told us directly, we don't. We don't. He gave two parables, two parables to us that tell us it is not a sacrifice. Well, those parables are, of course, a man who's out in a field and he stumbles upon a treasure buried in a field. I guess it's through some water been washed out a little bit and he stumbles upon it and he goes, oh my goodness, this is a treasure a multitude of times worth more than anything I own, but the field is not. So he goes home and he sells everything he has and he goes back and he purchases the field and gains the treasure in the field. Now, what would you do, brothers and sisters, if that guy was complaining about what he had to sacrifice? I had to sell my house. I had to sell my property. Yes, I did get a treasure 25 times greater than I had before, but you don't know how it cost me, how I suffered. You'd be like, shut up. Nobody wants to hear this. Nobody wants to hear this. It's nonsense. Jesus says for us to complain about what the gospel cost us is the same thing. What have we not received back? So more account we can't count it at all, right? An infinity more we've received back. You give up a home. Well, Jesus tells us that we'll have a mansion right in my father's house. There are many mansions in my father's house. There are many rooms that were not, so I would have told you, but if I go to prepare a place, I will come back that I may receive you to myself, that where I am, you also may be. You lost an earthly home, you receive a heavenly one. You lose your life, praise God you receive an everlasting one. You don't lose anything, there's no sacrifice. The other one that he spoke of was a merchant of pearls, you may remember. If you're a merchant of pearls, you study pearls, you love pearls. Just fill in the blank for whatever you love. Stamps, coins, whatever it may be, right? And there's that one, right? Everybody has that one thing they're looking for. Maybe a particular baseball card or something. You're looking for it. You hope one day to find it, to own it. That would be a great treasure to you. This merchant to find pearls is going around and he's got a lot of average pearls and lesser pearls. Maybe a few good pearls, but he's praying one day he'll find a great pearl. That's what drives him, motivates him. And one day he finds the greatest pearl, the largest, most beautiful pearl he's ever seen. And he goes home and sells all those lesser pearls, all those average pearls, so he could have the great pearl. Which one of you would say that you want to hear him bellyache over giving up those insignificant pearls? Again, Jesus says it's no sacrifice. There's nothing that you've given up that won't be repaid an infinity fold in glory. Now, not as paying us back. That's what the whole point is. It's not a sacrifice. So, my friends, we cannot speak of sacrifice as anything we need to add to our justification. We also cannot speak of sacrifice in terms of what it's cost us to serve the Lord. It's all grace. And it's all gain, all grace and all gain. But my friends, that doesn't mean there are no sacrifices at all. It's just we have to think newly and rightly about what sacrifices we are called to. And so we are called to offer an appropriate or fitting response. And that doesn't mean we offer anything toward our justification. We want to say this very clearly. It doesn't mean that we contribute anything in that end. But being saved, being born again by the Spirit, being empowered by the Spirit, having the love of God poured into our hearts by the Spirit, all these things bringing forth the fruit of the Spirit means we are called to do something that God accounts as a sacrifice. Now what does He mean by this? You may remember in the temple, like the sweet smells of the sacrifices going up to Him, they pleased Him. There are things that we do by faith that will please Him. And so what does He call sacrifices that please Him? And again, outside of faith, it is impossible to please God. These must be done by faith. Whatever your work is that you're thinking of doing here for God's glory, if it's like, I hate it, I don't want to do it, don't do it, right? It doesn't please God. It must be born of faith. God doesn't need anything from you. He doesn't need anything from you. And so my friends, think about this for a moment. The first thing the text tells us is very important. As you look at our verses for today, it begins with this. Therefore, based on all that we've been saying about the Old Testament system and its inability to aid our justification, he says, therefore, let us go forth. Let me try to look at the wrong place. Therefore, by Him, let us. By Jesus. Jesus is the one who makes our worship acceptable to God. Jesus as our mediator is what makes what we offer acceptable to Him. He is our mediator and high priest. So it's only by Jesus. If you say, is it possible for someone outside of Christ to praise God in a way that pleases Him, Hebrews tells you no, it is not. Because it must be by faith, and specifically by faith in Christ, and it must be through Christ, offered through Christ. My friends, these are important things to have right if we understand God. He says, let us by Him continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God. It is fitting and right that we praise our God. It is fitting and right that we give Him praise, that we do that by prayer, by fellowship, by being active in our churches, all the means of worship that there are, right? We want to always be careful not to think worship is just singing. Right? Singing is a means of worship, but it is not by itself worship. Worship includes even hearing the Word. Why do you sit here and listen? I don't see you over at my house in my front yard waiting for me to speak from my porch through the week on whatever topic I want to speak on. You come here because it's God's Word being proclaimed. You give value or worth or weight to the Word of God, and therefore we come and listen, not because of me, but because of the Word. I pray that if next week I'm preaching from Dr. Seuss or something, you leave. If nothing else, to send the message clearly to me, we're not going to tolerate that nonsense. We will get up and walk out if you do that. Well, you're here to hear the Word of God. The Word of God. And so my friends, as you think about this, we offer the sacrifice of praise in many ways by showing that God is worthy of our lives, of serving Him. If we understand God's greatness, that goes without saying. But I want you to think about this for a moment because in how we praise Him, He gives us some direction. The sacrifice of praise to God, that is the fruit of our lips. That little hint of the word fruit, karpos, it tells us something very important in the Greek. This is a spiritual fruit. This is a fruit of the Spirit that we praise and give glory to God. This is an effect of the Holy Spirit's transformation of our lives. Again, how is it possible only in Jesus to do this? Because otherwise you don't have the Spirit's abiding presence within you. You aren't transformed by the Spirit. You don't have His fruit. And unfortunately, many people prove that to you. And so, my friends, we need to recognize in the text the importance of this, of being transformed, of having a changed heart by the power of the Spirit, and that in that we bring forth fruit of our lips. This fruit comes from our lips. And that fruit is only possible, why does Jesus say in John's Gospel? Because we remain in the vine, right? We remain in the vine. And so, my friends, He further tells us what that is. What does it mean to bring forth this fruit, this praise? giving thanks to God's name. Giving thanks. We had songs this morning about Thanksgiving. We are coming to a celebration in November of Thanksgiving, right? It's a day in which we are supposed to set aside time for Thanksgiving unto God. That's what the holiday was about. Now it's about I'm thankful for whatever, my family, whatever. That stuff's good. Give thanks to God for those things. But the thanks goes to Him. That's what it's about. But we aren't to be a people of a day of thanksgiving. We're to be a people who are of thanksgiving, ever thankful, because God has given us reason to always be thankful. And that's what Paul tells us elsewhere, right? To pray without ceasing. To rejoice always. To always give thanks. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for us. I say this so many times. People say, I just don't know what God's will for my life is. It's like, yeah, you do. Read the text. It tells you. Rejoice, be thankful, be prayerful. That's it. That's what he tells you. That's the starting point. Once you master that, we'll work beyond that. But start with that. Because how many Christians are like, I don't know what job I'm supposed to have. I don't know this or that. And you're like, you're not a rejoicing person. You're not a thankful person. My friends, start with those things that are clearly revealed to us. Be a person of joy and thanksgiving and praise unto God. And this reminds us of the second point. By the way, Notice that first point of give glory to God. It's very much in keeping with what Jesus called the first and greatest commandment. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. I think I could trace through the opening part of Colossians today this very theme of giving glory to God and then what is closely aligned with it. Doing good to your fellow man. Because Jesus said the second commandment is very closely aligned to it. It's this, that you shall love your neighbor as yourself. That's also in that opening section of Colossians. And it's also here, as it's tied throughout the scriptures together. In fact, what does he say here? After giving your, or in conjunction with giving your sacrifice of praise to God, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name, then we should not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. to give and to share is pleasing to God because it says we care about others, right? We love our other as ourself, our neighbor as ourself. Now, again, we can say, well, this applies primarily to the church. We can say that it does say, do good to all men, especially to the household of faith. There is a special goodness that we should share for one another. But this is a command that God gives us toward all men to be good, to be caring, to offer a cup of water if somebody's thirsty, this sort of thing. If we're able to serve, we serve. What is the antithesis of these things? What is the antithesis of the greatest and second greatest commandment? It's not hard to figure out. Existence in Adam. Why? I think only of myself. I praise only myself. I give glory to myself. If you want to work that through, I would encourage you to read Romans chapter 1. where he talks about the struggle in the heart of man to give glory not to God, but to idols, right? Because we like to give glory to things we create. Why? Because we're really giving a glory to ourselves. If I come up here and speak all day about this pulpit that I built by hand, look at this pulpit. Have you ever seen such an outstanding pulpit? Am I giving glory to the pulpit or am I giving glory to me? We know the difference, right? I'm giving glory to me. I'm saying, look what I did. Look what I did. My friends, that's the danger of idolatry. Really, we're worshiping ourselves. So my friends, as you think about this today and you come to this text, recognize the way we worship God is to take his word seriously, to believe what he says, that we are to love him with all that we have and to love our neighbor as ourselves. And that is a very difficult calling. In fact, it's impossible in our own strength. And so my friends, we need to pray for the Holy Spirit's help if we are to live in a way while pleasing to God.