Please turn with me this morning to Acts chapter 26 as we witness the Apostle Paul telling the story. If there was one who loved to tell the story of Jesus and His love, it was the Apostle Paul. And here we find him doing that all over again, as we consider verses 1 through 23 of Acts chapter 26. Paul now is before Agrippa, before all the pompous authorities of Rome, and the Lord grants him this crucial moment in his Christian service life to tell the story of Jesus and His love. And it is where he helps us. He teaches us how we can do the same in our own days and through our own lives. Acts 26, beginning in verse 1. This is God's holy and inerrant word. Hear it with faith, Christians. Then Agrippa said to Paul, You are permitted to speak for yourself." So Paul stretched out his hand and answered for himself, I think myself happy, King Agrippa, because today I shall answer for myself before you concerning all the things of which I am accused by the Jews, especially because you are expert in all customs and questions which have to do with the Jews. Therefore, I beg you to hear me patiently. My manner of life from my youth, which was spent from the beginning among my own nation at Jerusalem, all the Jews know. They knew me from the first, if they were willing to testify, that according to the strictest sect of our religion, I lived a Pharisee. And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made by God to our fathers. To this promise, our twelve tribes earnestly serving God night and day hope to attain. For this hope's sake, King Agrippa, I am accused by the Jews. Why should it be thought incredible by you that God raises the dead? Indeed, I myself thought I must do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. This I also did in Jerusalem, and many of the saints I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests. And when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them. And I punished them often in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme. And being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities. While I was occupied, as I journeyed to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief priests, At midday, O King, along the road I saw the light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and those who journeyed with me. And when we all had fallen to the ground, I heard a voice speaking to me and saying in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads. So I said, Who are you, Lord? And He said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and stand on your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and of the things which I will yet reveal to you. I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you, to open their eyes in order to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me. Therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision, but declared first to those in Damascus, and in Jerusalem, and throughout all the region of Judea, and then to the Gentiles, that they should repent, turn to God, and do works befitting repentance. For these reasons, the Jews seized me in the temple and tried to kill me. Therefore, having obtained help from God, to this day I stand, witnessing both to small and great, saying no other things than those which the prophets and Moses said would come, that the Christ would suffer, that He would be the first to rise from the dead, and would proclaim light to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles. Amen. Thus far the reading of God's holy word. Let us pray. Almighty God in heaven, we thank you for your revelation unto us. We thank you, Lord, for its light, for its instruction, for its guidance. Lord, as we once again seek to be instructed through Your Word, with the aid, with the enlightening work of the Holy Spirit, Father, we pray, as You visit us powerfully this morning, guide us unto all truth. Help us, O Lord, not only to learn Your Word, but to do Your will. May we, O Lord, also, just like the Apostle Paul, be ready and desirous to tell the story of the one who died for sinners and who will come to judge the living and the dead. In His name, Lord, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. It is not uncommon for us to find ourselves in speechless moments. We find ourselves as speechless when something important happens, when something tragical happens. And unfortunately, we find ourselves as speechless when it's the time to preach the gospel, isn't it? We find ourselves in that crucial moment, the Lord is opening the door, the Lord is giving us that moment when we can call sinners to repentance, we can talk about the story of the Lord Jesus Christ who died for sinners and resurrected from the dead, and then we find ourselves intimidated. We think we don't have the right words, we think it's not the appropriate moment, we don't want to cause any problems and troubles, and we find ourselves then behind, hiding ourselves behind our fears, speechless. You see, here is Paul before a very intimidating crowd. We learned in verse 23 of the previous chapter how pompously this great crowd gathered together. Verse 23, we read that Agrippa, Bernice, with great pomp entered the auditorium with the commanders and the prominent men of the city. And here you have all this multitude gathered together of important people, intimidating people ready to listen to the Apostle Paul. A moment when perhaps me and you would be prone to be speechless. What are we going to say? What words are we going to use? But praised be the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of the saints, because through His Spirit, He promised, be not afraid when you come before these great authorities, I will give you the words to speak. And we see this promise fulfilled in these verses, how the Lord Jesus comes alongside the Apostle Paul and assists him and empower him and give him the words to speak, teaching us this morning how to speak as well in such moments. How do we bear witness before kings and common folk? This is what this text really is teaching us this morning. How is it? How is it that we do? Well, what we learned this morning is that we bear witness to Christ, boldly proclaiming what He has done for us. That's how we preach. That's how we witness. That's how we announce the Lord Jesus Christ boldly. We boldly proclaim what He has done for us. We notice this in three headings this morning. We bear witness to Christ, first of all, announcing from what He has freed us. He has freed us from our fallen original state, from the blindness of our own sin, and we see that in verses 1-11. Secondly, we notice that we bear witness to Christ announcing by what He freed us. From what He freed us, but also by what He freed us. And He freed us through His own power. It's not through our own natural ability of man, but coming and meeting sinners in their road to perdition. Graciously meeting sinners appointed to be saved to eternal life, He comes. It begins with Him and He meets us. But thirdly, we notice in verses 19 and 23 that we bear witness to Christ announcing for what He has freed us. We announce from what He has freed us, by what, but also for what He has freed us. There is a purpose for our freedom. There is a purpose for the removal of the blindness. And we'll notice that the purpose is obedience and witnessing. And therefore, Christians, this is how we learn this morning, how to bear witness before kings and before common people, how to bear witness of the Lord Jesus Christ, the true King. We bear witness boldly proclaiming what Jesus has done for us, what He's freed us from, how He freed us, and for what He freed us. So if you turn your attention with me to the very first eight verses, you notice here how the Apostle Paul is given the time now to speak, and he begins by addressing Agrippa very respectfully. Now remember, Paul is no politician. Paul is not trying to make friends or make enemies here, but Paul is diligently fulfilling the third commandment. Remember, the same way David did, We notice that over and over again in the book of 1 Samuel, how David honored the authority of Saul as king, honored his position as king. We notice here in the very first two verses and throughout the whole speech, the whole witnessing before Agrippa, how he is respectful to them. Notice he acknowledges the relevance of Agrippa being there present. He says, especially, verse 3, especially because you are an expert in all customs and questions which have to do with the Jews. You see, Paul is not simply fulfilling the fifth commandment, honoring father and mother, honoring authority, but he also acknowledges that Agrippa As he is in his position, appointed by the Romans to be someone who mediates the relationship between Jewish people and Romans, Roman authorities, they are one who is acquainted with the theology, with the background of the Jewish people and will be indeed a valuable judge in this situation. Well, after then this brief introduction, what we know that the Apostle Paul seeks to establish is his own background. King Agrippa, you don't know me. Let me tell you who I am. Let me tell you a little bit of my lifestyle. It says I was a Pharisee, verse 5, the streakest sect of our religion. And he was not only a Pharisee in knowledge, he was also a Pharisee in life. Look again in verse 5, he says, I belong to that strict sect and I lived a Pharisee. I not only embraced their thought, not only embraced their views and ideas, their interpretation of the Bible, but I also lived as one. Now the Apostle Paul is saying that, notice again in the next verse, is to make a very interesting connection. What is the connection? is that he is now not denying what he learned during his time as a Pharisee. In what sense? Look at verse 6. It says, I stand here and I am judged for the hope of the promise made to God to our fathers. The very same promise that the Pharisees believe. Well, if you do remember Acts 13, when Paul comes to preach to the Jews in Antioch of Pisidia, that's exactly his argument. He begins talking about the promise. Would you turn with me very briefly to Acts 13, just so we can refresh that in our minds. He's speaking in the synagogue, verse 23 of Acts 13, he says, From this man's seed, David's seed, according to the promise, God raised up for Israel a Savior, Jesus. So notice, in other words, the Apostle Paul is saying to Agrippa, this seed of the promise that was promised all back to the old fathers, this is the promise in which any Pharisees stand, and that's because I am being persecuted. Obviously, he's being persecuted because he's saying that that promise was fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. And yet, Paul is saying, here is what a true Jew is. A true Jew is one who awaits for the promise of the Lord and sees that promise being fulfilled in Christ Jesus, as I proclaim to you this morning, or as I proclaim to you in this meeting. The Apostle Paul is not distancing himself from his Jewish background, but he's saying, because I am being faithful to my Jewish background is that I profess this Jesus to be the Messiah. In Him, all the promises of the kingdom, all the promises of the resurrection is made true. Actually, His resurrection is indeed the proof that He is the one that we should wait for. But you see, as the Apostle Paul lays out his background, he rushedly goes to talk about how he was enslaved into blindness. Verses 9-11 points us to that sad reality. of how the blind zeal to tradition, the blind zeal to false interpretation, the blind zeal to personal, particular, private ideas lead one to a path of destruction. After talking about the promise, look, verses 8 all the way down to verse 11, the apostle Paul speaks about what did he do while he was blind. You see, his stepping stone to talking with Agrippa is to talk about what he has been freed from. Look at my state, he says. I was a persecutor. I was slaying the saints, he says. Verse 9, Indeed, I myself thought I must do many things contrary to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. I placed myself in opposition to the one I was hoping and expecting for. What a blindness! The natural state of any man, the blindness of sin, the blindness of the fall, the perdition of the original state. That was what marked the initial life of the Apostle Paul. And isn't that terrifying? Because here is a man who was living according to the tradition of his fathers. Here is a man who was living according to the interpretation of the Word. It's not someone who was apart from the Word, but someone who had the prophets, who had Moses, who had the law, who had biblical revelation. And here is him opposing the one for a period in his time, opposing the very one he should submit unto. It's terrifying. It's a reminder. to all of us here this morning, isn't it? That one may be born into the church, that one may attend church and profess faith and partake communion and read the Bible and go through Sunday school and yet be incarcerated in the blindness of the fall. It's terrifying. It's a call to self-examination, isn't it? The Apostle Paul was a persecutor, and as a persecutor, he was breaking so many commandments. One who was faithful to the words of the Father were breaking that very word. Look, as a persecutor, he killed innocent people. He killed the saints, breaking the sixth commandment. Verse 10 talks about his misusing authority. He received authority from the chief priests, and he misused that authority, breaking the fifth commandment, Attacking the true church of Lord Jesus Christ. Not only that, he says, I also tried, I forced them into blasphemy. Verse 11, I compelled them to blaspheme, making them break the ninth commandment when he could. A man who, again, please pay attention to what the Apostle Paul is describing. Look at the terrifying scenario that he's describing here about his life previous to Christ coming to him. It's a life of doom. It's a life of illusion. It's a life that is destined unto eternal perdition. That's the stepping stone of bearing witness to kings and common folk. That's how we tell the story. We tell the story and we bear witness to Christ announcing from what He has freed us. Talking about the original state of man. Talking about what naturally now man, what natural man can do. And what natural man can do, Christian, let us be reminded this morning, is to break God's law over and over and over again. Is to distance himself. All that natural man can do is to distance himself from his Creator over and over again. Unless His Creator with His mighty hand comes and grabs him and takes him from the pit of sin and removes the scales of blindness, the path of natural man is enmity against God, no matter his status in life. No matter if he is a king in ancient Rome, no matter if he is a powerful magistrate in the American Republic, no matter if he is educated, intellectual, who teaches in the universities, or he is a poor member of the common folk or an unskilled worker, it doesn't matter. That's the state of natural man. They're lost in blindness and they live in opposition to him. That's the stepping stone of bearing witness to Christ. It is an intimidating stepping stone, isn't it? It can be. And it is precisely because of this false idea that this stepping stone is intimidating that so many have put aside the doctrine of original sin, put aside the doctrine of original perdition and the fall of man, and they don't go there. They begin with the phrase that Jesus loves you and have a wonderful plan to your life. They talk about the blessings that comes for Jesus Christ, but they never touch on the issue of natural perdition, of the natural fallen nature of man. That's not the starting point of the Apostle Paul. He begins with his own perdition. He begins with how he himself was distant from the Lord. Christian, let us never be confounded or intimidated to have this stepping stone. Our fathers were not. Boys and girls, do you remember what's the structure of the Heidelberg Catechism? Right? The three S's. What's the stepping stone? Sin. Isn't it? The three G's. What's the stepping stone? Guilt. Isn't it? That's a stepping stone to Christian education, to understand God's plan of redemption. The stepping stone of our fathers. They were not ashamed of it. They were ready to make us learn and understand it. Paul was not ashamed of it. He used it in his own speech before the authorities. Are we going to be ashamed of it? No. We'll proclaim it. We'll proclaim it. Because it's only when man sends his misery that he's ready then to see the only way of salvation. That's what we see now in verses 12 to 18. Now that the apostle Paul acknowledges his own misery, he understands and he confesses this misery before the kings, how he was living in opposition to the Lord Jesus Christ. He describes the work of the saving Lord towards him. What should capture our attention in verses 12 through 15 is the meeting. Notice how the Apostle Paul focused on the meeting. Now this meeting is unilateral, isn't it? Because Paul is not seeking Jesus. No, Paul is seeking to destroy the church. Look at verse 12. He is going to Damascus. He is in this journey, not seeking for the truth. He says, I was on the journey to Damascus with a commission from the chief priests. What was his commission? To drag back to Jerusalem, as he has explained it before, that he would go even outside of Jerusalem, verse 11, he would go even outside of Jerusalem, bringing them back from foreign cities to Jerusalem. That is his commission. Paul is not on a spiritual religious trail. That's what people like to deceive themselves sometimes, isn't it? That's frequently seen in the superstitious of Rome. That's frequently seen in the spiritualist days of our age. They will say, I am in a religious pursuit. I am in a religious quest, in a spiritual quest. I'm seeking to be enlightened, they say. Well, Paul tells us a different story. He tells us the Rio story. The real story is that natural man is never in the trajectory of God. Natural man is always in the trajectory in opposition of God. There is an enmity until the King comes. It's interesting to notice how he addresses, look at verse 13, he addresses Agrippa as king, but right when he speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ in verse 15, he addresses Christ as Kyrios. That's the Greek word for the true Lord. Verse 15, responding to the one who comes to him in midday. Notice how he paints this as a supernatural encounter. It's midday, the sun is up high, it's bright and sunny and hot, and the trail down to Damascus, but then comes this overwhelming light that makes him and the other two fall down. Verse 14, and when we all had fallen to the ground, I heard this voice saying to me, The King of glory comes to the encounter of a belligerent, obnoxious, and insistent sinner. That's how salvation takes place. The Lord comes to our encounter. It's never the other way around. He's never one who is in a quest for spiritual things. No, natural man is in a quest for perdition. Natural man is in a quest to go deeper and deeper into his own fantasies, into his own ideas and illusions. No, it is only when God comes from heaven and when the King Jesus, the true Lord comes and reveals himself as the living Christ, that changes a sinful man is completely changed. Look, verse 15, there are two things I would like to bring to your attention in Jesus' revelation to Paul. He says, I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. First of all, the Lord Jesus identifies Himself as the living Christ. The one who your leaders, your chief priests, told you that I am dead. I am not. I am alive, actually. I am victorious. You see, remember, that was the banner of the Apostle Paul all the way through and through. He's saying, the reason I'm being persecuted by the Jews is because I'm preaching the resurrection. Well, here is the Apostle Paul preaching the resurrection all over again. He's saying, the Jesus that they say are dead, he is alive, and he came to me. And he made me fall from my horse, and he put me on my knees. It made me acknowledge Him as King and Lord. But secondly, notice that the Lord Jesus Christ, in His declaration to Paul, reveals to Paul that He is in unity with His people. Paul was persecuting, as he himself declared, he was persecuting the church. But now the Lord Jesus comes and not only reveals himself to Paul, but he also reveals that I am in unity. If you persecute those who profess faith in me, you are persecuting me. In other words, the Lord Jesus is saying, I am an active king. I protect my subjects. I am an active king who sustains and provides and who will assist my subjects, those whom I have died for, those whom I sacrifice my body, shed my blood for. They are under my protection, Paul. And how dare you to attack them? You are attacking me as well. Powerful message, isn't it? For the Romans who looked at Caesar as the protector of the realm, Would ever Caesar say, you're persecuting me when you kill a Roman soldier? Caesar could care less about his slaves. Would Agrippa have this sort of speech? If you slay a Jew as the king of the Jews, the appointed king of the Jews, you are also slaying me? Certainly not. The Apostle Paul is describing the Lord Jesus and the words that the Lord Jesus spoke to him and powerfully showing to Agrippa and to the whole multitude how different, how perfect, how sweet, and how powerful King Jesus truly is, the true Lord. Isn't it interesting as well how the Lord Jesus comes to the Apostle Paul with confrontation? confrontation. When the Lord Jesus says, you are persecuting, the Lord Jesus is not simply connecting himself with his people. The Lord Jesus is also revealing to the Apostle Paul, here's your sin, Paul. To the point that the next section, verses 16-18, testifies to us the complete reversal of what happens with the apostle. You were a persecutor, but now things will change, Paul. You were a persecutor, lost in your blindness, lost in your sin, but that's all gone because I have come with power in your life. In verse 16-18, Paul talks about his commission. It's a transformative commission. He moves from being an opposer and a persecutor to being one who promotes and witness and who actually is persecuted. The Lord Jesus says, I will make you a minister, verse 16, to witness about these things and about the things that I'm yet going to reveal you. I will deliver you from the hands of the Jews and from the Gentiles. Verse 17 is fascinating because it tells us two things, again. It tells us, number one, what is the extent of this proclamation? Which, again, really makes a lot of sense to the public to which the Apostle Paul is preaching, right? He's proclaiming to Jewish authorities the gospel of Christ, the story of Jesus, but he's also proclaiming to the Roman authorities who are surrounding him. And he's saying, both Jewish and Gentiles, they all stand in equal footing before the Lord. They're all sinners in need of a Savior. And they will persecute me. That's the second thing. Jews and Gentiles stand in equal footing. There is no difference between them. And both of them will persecute you, but I will deliver you. There will be protection. There will be caring. But there is a transformation. You see what the Apostle Paul is describing here? How? And verse 18 is really telling, isn't it? What is the Apostle Paul going to do? He will be a vessel, an instrument in the hands of the Lord to remove the darkness from the eyes of those who are in darkness and bring light unto them. He's going to be used to deliver those who are in the power of Satan and bring them to the Lord through the proclamation of forgiveness and sanctification by faith. That's exactly where he was. He was in that blindness. He was in that enslavement. He was the one who was under the captivity of Satan. But now, once freed, here's the transformation. You're not an opposer. You are a subject. You're not your own ruler and Lord. You come in subjection to the Lord. As a commentator explains beautifully, he says, conversion includes a radical transfer of allegiance and so of environment. It is both a liberation from darkness of satanic rule and a liberation into the sphere of God's marvelous light and power. He comes from blindness to freedom, from enslavement now to service to the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's how we bear witness of the Lord Jesus Christian. Are you sometimes at a loss how to bear witness to Christ? Here is the second element of bearing witness to Christ. We talk about what He does for sinners. We talk about how He comes and how He invades sinners' lives according to His own will, from a part which all sinners will be lost. And when He comes, He changes. He comes to the sinner and He changes the sinner. He makes the sinner a subject. He makes the sinner a servant. He brings the sinner into conformity to His will. That's a very unpopular message these days, isn't it? Because what we hear today is how Christ is Savior, how He free me from my sins, But when we talk about transformation, abandonment of sin, revolution in my life, putting aside that which is contrary to the image of Christ and marching towards aided, sustained by the power of the Holy Spirit in conformity to the one who saved me, that second part becomes uncomfortable to people. They want the Savior, but they don't want the Lord. They want the forgiveness, but they don't want the newness of life. They want the pardoning, but they don't want to walk the walk. But this is how we bear witness to Christ. We bear witness to Christ proclaiming how He free us. What are the elements he uses? Christian, be ready to talk about the marvelous work of redemption of the Lord Jesus Christ. Be ready to speak about how he changes sinners and be ready to show how Jesus changed you, yourself. For wouldn't it be hypocritical to be talking about a king who changes, but people look at my life and your life and there's no change whatsoever. Year after year we are found ourselves by those who surround us and even by our own self-examination falling into the same snares, into the same traps, into the very same sort of sins that we now acknowledge are indeed contrary to the image of Christ. That's why James, writing his letter in chapter 1, calls us not to be simply hearers but doers. of God's Word. It says that in verses 22 to 25 of chapter 1. Let us be ready to bear witness verbally, but let us be ready also to bear witness with our lives that that what we announce of Christ, this transformation, this meeting, this encounter that throw us on our knees is true beginning with us, that this is true in our lives. Here we see how all sorts of spiritual haughtiness are broken, don't we? Anyone who boasts in himself here in this passage is broken immediately. That's not what the Apostle Paul is doing. His trust, his transformation, the change that happens in his life has nothing to do with the pharisaical principles that he followed from his youth. It has nothing to do with his legacy or previous life. It has everything to do with the supernatural sovereign act of Christ in his life. All haughtiness is broken in this very basic principle that salvation, as we read in Isaiah, salvation is of the Lord. It must make us look to salvation and to our brothers and sisters with humble, compassionate, and ready to forgive eyes. Because it is a reminder that whatever we are, it is by the grace of Christ that we are. Whatever we find ourselves in our Christian walk, we are only there because Christ took us there. when we bear witness of a Lord who saves sovereignly and who frees sovereignly through His own supernatural intervention in our lives, transforming us when that's our proclamation that places us in complete dependence and humility. Christian, is this how you are living your Christian life? This is how you're bearing witness of Christ, proclaiming from what He has freed us, but also by what He has freed us. But as we're telling this story, that's not the end of the story. There's more. As we tell the story, we notice that the Apostle Paul in verses 19 to 23 adds another aspect. It's the purpose of salvation, the purpose of the blindness to be gone, the blindness to be healed. What's the purpose? The purpose is submission. The purpose is obedience. Verses 19-21, notice how he emphatically explains to Agrippa that he was totally subject to Christ. He says, therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision. How could I? How could I dare to be disobedient to this Christ? to the Sovereign One, to the Lord of Lords, the Kings of Kings, who resurrected in His glory appeared to me. How could I dare to go against His Word? How could I justify any sort of disobedience? What kind of excuse could I give? It is impossible. He says, I was not disobedient. I speedily obeyed the Lord. He says, I declared first in Damascus and in Jerusalem and there was persecution. And here is his message. Notice his message. Three elements. Please look at verse 20. Number one, that they should repent. Repentance is the stepping stone, not only of Paul's telling of the story, but of Paul's proclamation of the story. He begins with sin. He begins with guilt. He begins with repentance. But then he moves, notice again, verse 22. He preached that repentance, that they should repent. But as they repent, they are not to be desperate. As they acknowledge their sin, they are not to grow desperate. But they are turned to God, the source of all hope, the source of all salvation. And now that they have turned to God, look at the third aspect of his message. They are to do works befitting repentance. If the first step was true, then the third step will also be true. If the first aspect, which is truly repenting, is true, then the third element, which is living a life of abandonment of the sin I repented of, will also be true. This is the summary of apostolic preaching. And Christian, let me tell you this morning, you should not receive any other preaching that does not follow apostolic standard. If you're listening to any other sort of preaching that does not follow apostolic standard, it's not true biblical preaching. The stepping stone is repentance. The next step is turning to God, the source of all comfort, the source of all forgiveness, the source of all transformation. The third step is live according to the command of your Lord. That's how we announce and we bear witness to Christ. Christian, we bear witness to Christ announcing for what? He freed us. He freed us unto newness of life. He freed us unto obedience to himself. But also He freed us to witnessing, verses 22 and 23. As we come to the conclusion of this section, notice that that's exactly how Paul describes what he's doing now. He says, therefore, having obtained help from God, I now witness to small and great. That's exactly what I'm doing. And I'm standing not on my own shoulders. He says, I am standing on the shoulders of the prophets and of Moses. I'm not doing anything new, Agrippa, but I am following through with the message that was proclaimed by my fathers and by your fathers, that this Christ would come, suffer, die, and resurrect for His people. We are called to Christ from our deadness and blindness unto obedience and unto witnessing. Christian, is this what is marking your life? The call is exactly the same for you and for me this morning. The response owed to the King is exactly the same. As He calls us unto His fourfold, as He calls us from darkness unto His light, He also calls us unto obedience and witnessing. Let us therefore tell the story. Let us tell the story beginning with our children. Let us make sure that they understand sin, salvation, and service, guilt, grace, and gratitude. Let us make sure that they are soaked in the Word of God, learning from what we were freed, by what we are freed, and for what we are freed. That's how we bear witness. And as we begin and as we continue, as we persevere in bearing witness in our own homes, we move them to the highways and byways. We move to the different corners of this great country. We continue to proclaim and to live for Christ's glory, even now until He comes again bearing witness before kings and common folk, proclaiming what Christ has done for us. May the Lord Help us in this for His glory. Amen. Let us pray. Almighty God in heaven, we thank You for Your Word and for its clarity. Lord, we pray for boldness, for boldness to vividly and accurately follow a true bearing of witness to Christ in our own lives, beginning in our own homes, O Lord. beginning our own marriages. Help us, O Lord, to witness this biblical pattern of sin, salvation, and service, of guilt, grace, and gratitude. O Lord, we pray for boldness as well to proclaim the gospel to those who surround us. to those who are in opposition to you, to those who continue to travel throughout the road of Damascus, the road of opposition, the road of enmity against you. Lord, grant us the wisdom, the boldness, but also the words to proclaim, O Lord, this story. How sinners in the hands of an angry God will be destroyed eternally, but how sinners in the hand of a gracious God are saved and enjoy eternal life. Lord, may we delight in the grace that we have experienced in Christ. May we, O Lord, rejoice this morning that we too can tell this very same story. In Jesus' name, Father, we pray. Amen.