Thank you so much, Rick, for leading us. I love singing hymns. They're so theologically rich. Rick does an excellent job. When you sing to one another, there's that effect that it has. on one of us, right? Colossians chapter 3 makes it clear that, you know, we're to sing songs, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in our hearts to God. That's Ephesians 4. But, you know, we're to sing to one another has an admonishing effect. So hearing that, I mean, is just really encouraging and comforting and strengthening. Thank you so much, Brother Rick, for leading us so faithfully and well. As we turn to the worship of the Word, we're going to come into a subject now, and really in the weeks to come. If you were here last week, I told you we'd be looking at what we call the Doctrines of Grace, a.k.a. Five Points of Calvinism, whatever you want to pick. But we're going to look at them because, again, we are studying expositionally, verse by verse. If you're visitors here, we want to welcome you and glad you're here, you can worship with us. But we've been going through the letter to Thessalonians, the first letter. We arrive to verse 4 where it specifically, explicitly mentions election. Paul says, knowing brothers beloved of God, your choice or your election. So we thought it'd be a good idea to just pause right there in that verse, you know, kind of pull the RV over and, you know, spend some time, you know, around the campfire talking about these things, you know, what are they? What do we mean by total depravity? What do we mean by unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, perseverance of the saints? What does all that mean? I mean, these are all just, what are they, controversies? You know, I mean, they're just wars, they're hot, you know, button, topics you know if if none of these titles were given to these doctrines I would still believe in every single one of them because I think clearly the Bible explicitly teaches these and that's what we want to go by remember seminary they always taught us this be men of the text They'll be men of a system or a theological system. Listen, if it's faithful and in line with the Word of God, we'll take it. We'll line up with it. But wherever it departs from Scripture, so will we. because we want to be faithful to the Word of God. And that's why, you know, with Hope Bible Church, we're kind of a mixed bag. You know, we're, you know, we're reformed soteriologically. You know, we don't hold to a lot of all the tenets of, you know, reformed soteriology, and that can be confusing for some. You know, we believe in a national future restoration of Israel. And, you know, now you sound like you're dispensational, which, in reality, we hold to that. You can call it that. But we would just like to say is we believe those promises that were given to the nation of Israel are literal. that they will happen in the future. What's wrong with that? And it really boils down to a hermeneutic, right? It really boils down to your way of studying and interpreting the Word of God. Hermeneutics is really a science, it's an art. It's the way whereby we rightly divide God's Word to expose the authorial intent. That never changes. We believe in one meaning, although there's many applications. You really have to work hard at trying to ascertain what is the meaning, that timeless principle, and how does it apply to us today. But there are some doctrines that are just evident. Like you won't go into scriptures and find a verse that says total depravity, right? You just won't find it. It's not explicit. It's like the word Trinity, right? You're not going to run into a verse, you know, let me just give you one, Acts chapter 29 verse 1, there's no such thing. But you're not going to find one and it says, you know, we believe in the Trinity. You're just not going to find that. And so what we do is we see what is consistently taught throughout Scripture. This is how doctrines come about. This is how doctrines, just another word for teaching, instruction, this is how it comes about. There's a consistent thread from Genesis to Revelation about this specific thought or teaching or subject. And you don't have to go very far to see. that total depravity is obviously one of those teachings. Again, it may not be called that, but definitely there's a problem with man, right? There's a huge problem. The real pandemic of man isn't some virus. The real pandemic is sin that's corrupted the image of God in man. And that's the hideous reality, isn't it? That is the hideous reality that is often not talked about. You won't hear about this on your local TV news or any kind of documentary series, obviously that comes from the secular department. You won't hear none of that talked about regarding our society and how it's rapidly devolving. What you will hear though is somebody's to blame for it. It's their fault. It's their fault. It's this person's fault. And I like to say, that's proof right there that sin exists. Because you're blaming it. Right? And the real issue is, what? Our hearts. Now the big debate comes into as the extent of our depravity. And hopefully as we go through this we'll see that, you know, apart from God's grace, we are lost, right? Sin has a dominating effect and power. You think about our society today and it's just increasing. Violence is being celebrated worldwide. Nations are snarling at each other with the hope of deploying their apocalyptic weapons. Infanticide is on the rise and even seen as a luxurious convenience instead of seeing it for what it is, murder. You have terrorism, right? Lies, theft, divorce, rape, poverty, murder is on an all-time rise. Also, you have false religions, cults, and the constant suppression of the truth of God. As a matter of fact, what's on the minds of voters today are four things. The first one is inflation. The second one, you ready, is crime. Everybody knows there's what? A problem. And there's no solutions at all, no matter how much money you throw at it, no matter how much money you spend, no matter what genius comes along, guess what? It just doesn't work. It's temporary, it bends, there's the issue, but it's never, it's not fixing it. And the greatest one of all is the suppression of the truth of God. It's everywhere. That's the real pandemic here. And then you have your own personal experience, right? Think about your families and what you're going through with them, the struggles, the breakdowns, the afflictions, the distortion of the destruction of the family unit, the confusion of gender, the attraction of same sex, alcoholism, drug abuse, adultery. And to compound all of that, you have your own besetting decisions that you constantly struggle with. And this is the grim reality for humanity. You know, whenever you talk about sin, it's depressing. It's just really burdensome. It's the elephant in the room. Let's just not talk about this right now. I would go on to say if you don't talk about this, you don't get a healthy understanding of this, you cannot come to appreciate the greatness of God's grace. This is really the black cloth in the jewelry store that the jeweler uses to lay down and then puts the diamond of God's glory and grace. It shines brightly when the lights run through it. Every facet of that diamond, it is just shining. That's why we need this doctrine. Again, within this chaotic world, again, what is the common denominator that binds it all together? What is the root cause of all these issues? As you've guessed, it is sin. It has enslaved the soul. It is deep. It is dark. It is destructive. And again, having a healthy view, a correct and healthy view of sin is vital to the Christian life. How can you again come to embrace and rejoice over God's sovereign mercy and grace toward saving wretched sinners if you don't understand what you've been saved from? Even now as believers, how can you fight and combat sin that is present in your own life right now? You have to have a healthy understanding. How can you understand even ready for this? The holiness of God. If you don't understand sin and the way God sees it, no matter how small it is, the way God sees it, it's gross, it's despicable, it's slimy, it's nauseating, it's loathsome, and it's sickening to God. It's offensive to Him. I'm just a messenger. I hate to be the bearer of bad news. God hates sin. It will not dwell in His presence. No matter how much we try to convince ourselves we're good people, no matter all that stuff, God sees right through the veneer of it. And He sees the truth for what it is. And it starts early, doesn't it? As early as kids, the moment they're out in the womb, get ready. Many of you moms know this, even now. When we talk about the sin, we're talking about the doctrine of Hamartiology, which is the study of sin. And then there's teachers today who debate over, again, the depth, the extent of sin. They try to redefine it, put it in more palatable terms so it doesn't offend nobody. There's teachers of secular society who just peddle a distorted view of man and sin. You have the 19th century German theologian and philosopher Friedrich Schleiermacher who taught a liberal view of sin. This is what he taught. Ready? Quote, sin is not against God, but he's against the dominance of the lower nature, which is sensuality that's in us. And he's against the higher nature, which is the intellect. There's this battle between the two. And that to him is sin. That dominance. And then there's the evolutionists that teach that sin is just a ready, quote, residual animal passion from earlier evolutionary phases, end quote. That's big today. That's really the bedrock of our society's problems today. That's really where it's all coming from. It is the source of most of the thinking today. We're just animals. We're just brutes, right? We're just products of, you know, this primordial soup. trying to figure out life with no purpose at all, and the strongest is the one that's going to win out at the end. And believe me, I don't think it started with Charles Darwin. He just made it public. Then of course you have secular humanism, which today runs rampant, and in my opinion is very involved in churches today. which teaches this, ready, quote, sin is ignorance and the antidote to sin is just a good education. That's it. Go get a good education. There you go. And then you have men like Norman Vincent Peale, Robert Shuler, those are part of creating the self-esteem movement. And if you follow that train, okay, you end up with guys like Rick Warren and Bill Hybels. And they basically teach this, sin is just negative thinking about yourself. That's it, just change the way you think. Think more positively about yourself. And what you do here basically is you boil down sin to this way where it can be handled and really these things become the savior to the person. It's really an attack against Christ, in my opinion. But what matters really is what the scriptures have to say, right? What does God think? That's what we care about, right? We care fundamentally about what God thinks. When it comes to life and godliness and this world we live in, its past, its present, and its future, I care fundamentally about what God thinks. I don't care about my little peon reasoning and all that, my finite thinking. It doesn't matter. What matters is what God thinks, and that's what I care about. What does He have to say about this? This is, as Christians, what we should want to know. What is sin from His perspective? Remember, theology, good theology, starts from God down, never man up. If you're doing it from man up, that's man-centered, and you're going to come up with a distorted theology for sure. Is man just sick? Is he just, is he dead? How deep does sin reside in a person? What effects have come as a result of sin? I love this quote from, I'm always reminded of the words of A.W. Pink, who said this, quote, The doctrine of total depravity is a very humbling one. It is not that man leans to one side and needs propping up, nor that he is merely ignorant and requires instructing, nor that he is run down and calls for a tonic, but rather that he is undone, lost, spiritually dead. Consequently, he is without strength, thoroughly incapable of bettering himself. He is exposed to the wrath of God and unable to perform a single work which can find acceptance with God. Almost every page of the Bible bears witness to this truth." End quote, and I agree with him. Out of the 1,189 chapters in Scripture, there are only four that does not mention sin, sinfulness, or even death. That's Genesis 1 and 2 and Revelation chapter 21 and 22. From Genesis chapter 3 to Revelation chapter 20, it's all sin, death, destruction. enmity towards God. That's the history of mankind, brothers and sisters. It is dark. And I'm not an optimist. I don't see it getting any better. We may get little reprieves here and there that we enjoy and praise God for them, but they're temporary. And this really is the age where we see this flesh out. It's until Christ comes. That's when the darkness has to scatter, right? And that's what we're looking forward to. And this morning, we're gonna examine Psalm 14, one to three. Hopefully we get through all of it. We're only gonna see two views of the depth of sin and man so that you will come to have a greater appreciation of the grace of God in your life. Two views of the depth of sin and man. And the first view is from David himself, right? Verse one. And then we'll see the Lord's view. Found in verses two to three. Those are the two views we're gonna see quickly. And it's good to see from Scripture, because again, we want to be led by Scripture. Scripture is our authority. We want to obey it. We want to submit to it. And we really want to hear what God has to say and align our desires with it. David's view of man. Let me read to you Psalm 14. I could have picked many passages, of course, but I figured I'd pick one being that it's Communion Sunday where we can get a good idea of it. Let me read to you Psalm 14. The fool has said in his heart, there is no God. They are corrupt. They have committed abominable deeds. There is no one who does good. The Lord has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside. Together they have become corrupt. There is no one who does good. Not even one. What a outlook on life, right? It's totally different to what commercials try to pitch at you, right? I mean, we've got more commercials about medicine than we do about anything else. You just take this pill and you'll have a better sleep. You just take this pill and you'll have a good life. If you're weak in this area, don't worry, we got that. I mean, doctors are taught to just keep the prescription book right at their side. Why? Because if there's something wrong with you, we'll whip out that. I remember going with my dad to visit, I'm sorry, take him to his doctor's appointments. He has Parkinson's disease. And every time we visited this doctor, I mean, he pretty much did routine things with my father, always asked the same questions, nothing was ever different. I mean, we would travel an hour and a half just to see this man to basically go through the same thing. But then every time my dad tried to tell him of a problem he had, that doctor was quick to come back, like, oh, don't worry, Mr. Vargas. We got a pill for that. We got a prescription for that. By the time my dad left that visit, he probably had three or four prescriptions. I mean, that's insane. But that's doctoring nowadays, right? Just be full of drugs. And so as we look at this, I want you to keep this in mind as we examine Psalm 14, because I think it's very important, especially whenever we talk about the doctrines of grace. There is this, like, lopsidedness to it. Most churches or most theologians, they only think this, doctrines of grace, about the Bible. I think that's a little imbalanced there, because whenever we talk about the doctrine of grace, we have to remember that, or the doctrine of salvation, it doesn't exist within a vacuum. In other words, the doctrine of soteriology, which is the study of salvation, is not on some island somewhere, you know, but instead it fits into a bigger scheme of God, which is namely His kingdom priority. That's what we have to fundamentally keep in our minds. We have to keep in our minds that the doctrine of soteriology does not exist within a vacuum. It is part of a bigger scheme of God. I think what we'll do is we'll take that out and we make the Bible all about what? The doctrine of salvation. That's really unhealthy. That's only part of the scheme. We have to always keep that in mind. And remember that really the main theme of the Bible is God's Kingdom priority. It is establishing His Kingdom on earth. Remember, you have to keep in mind Genesis 1 and 2. What was God's intent all along when He created man? For the man to what? Rule and reign on earth. We have to always keep that in our mind. And then you have the fall. Then you have what? Salvation, redemption, right? And you know, you can even see really the result or the end result is the glory of God. But really, that's the main theme of the Bible. It's establishing His kingdom, His kingdom priority. It's God's mediated reign on earth through His prized creation, mankind. Of course, that was usurped from man. Man really gave that over to Satan. That's what that was really all about. He snatched that. Remember, he wanted to be the one to rule and reign. He wanted to be like God. God instead gave it to a creature lower than him, man. By then, sin was already in existence, right? In the heart of Satan. He was cast out of heaven. He was in the garden, right? Using a serpent. And by the way, keep this in mind. When God created angels and men, He created them with volition. That they can choose. They're not robots. And that's how He ordained it. And what His creation shows us, of course, apart from the elect angels, which we'll get to later on, and elect humanity, what we see is that they will always choose the opposite. And this is all part of God's decree. But that's why you have to have Christ to take on human flesh, because He alone is going to fulfill those covenants that He gave to man. He's the only perfect man that can absolutely fulfill those covenants and rule in rain on earth. That's why we're looking for a real rain on earth, a thousand-year rain, as the Bible teaches. And this is central to God's plan. It is after the fall that sin becomes a problem, and there was a need to rescue man from the judgment of God. Man's plight, listen to me, is massively deep. And there is nothing that man can do to get out of this plight. Nothing. And sin has not only affected mankind, but even this world. This world is cursed. It wants to be freed from this curse, this bondage. So we have to keep that in mind. That's really the big picture there. And again, as we examine Psalm 14, remember it's written by David, just as it says there, Psalm 15, it's a Psalm of David. Remember David was the king, the one that God established a unilateral, unconditional covenant with, the Divinite Covenant. David is credited with over writing 75 Psalms. He's the dominant writer here in the Book of Psalms. The Book of Psalms is all about worship to God in a fallen world. It's how the faithful reacts to a cursed world. David was not only a valiant warrior, but also a talented songwriter. He's the sweet psalmist of Israel. David is also a theologian. Keep that in mind. David was a theologian. David was a prophet. All his writings are inspired. So we can learn much about really God and sin in this world through David's writings. And they're laden with doctrine. By the way, it was the duty of the king to lead his people in truth. Guess what? That has not changed. Every leader in whatever country, even this country, whoever leader, whoever is the established leader must lead in truth. But it was the duty of the King to do this. The way of the King, listen, was the way of the people. You understand that? The way of the King was the way of the people. Look at 1 Kings, look at 2 Kings, look at 1 and 2 Chronicles. What typically happens? Whoever's ruling and reigning, that's gonna be the way of the nation. And I could go further with that, but I won't. You can go to Law's Bible study on Tuesdays, and Jim Lee's, and they will inform you more. But the kings were to shepherd the nation of Israel. David was to shepherd the nation of Israel in truth. And this psalm in particular is about the depravity of man. And the only one who can save man is God. If you were to read all seven verses, you will see his prayer is at the end. Oh, that salvation, verse seven. Oh, that salvation of Israel will come out of Zion. Ready? When the Lord restores his captive people, then Jacob will rejoice and Israel will be glad. Who are they waiting for to do this, to turn this problem around? It's nothing but God Himself. And that's simply just explicitly taught right there. And this is what he writes about. I love what James May says, commentator says this, quote, this psalm is not concerned with the plight of an individual, namely David, but with the state of society as a whole, end quote. This is all of us. This is the whole nation. It is a lament psalm. David is lamenting because of how the grip of sin... Listen, he has right theology. He knows what happened. He knew when the fall took place in Genesis chapter 3. He knew the effects of it. He knew it even in his own life. Psalm 19, right? About his heart. Search me, O God. Psalm 139. David knew all about this. It was a lament due to the way God's people, Israel, were even being treated by wicked and evil people, as we'll see here in a minute. And so David takes this opportunity, and really, these Psalms are inscripturated, always remembered in the Word of God for the nation of Israel, and by extension, us as well, so that we can learn, too, about sin and evil and God's salvation. Let's look at the first view here, and this is David's view of man found in verse one. Notice right away what he says there. The fool has said. Right? The fool. Man, that's not kind words. You're not taught to call nobody a fool. The Bible doesn't have a problem with it. The Bible doesn't have a problem with it. That's just what they are. The Greek word that's equivalent to the Hebrew word is where we get our word moron. It's moronic. It's always directed towards a person who not only doesn't believe, I think it's a double negative, doesn't believe there's a God, but doesn't want to even obey God. They know there's a God, but they don't even want to obey them. So it's even, it's more than just that. And by the way, there's no such thing as atheism, right? There's no such thing. It's hard to be an atheist. And by you being an atheist shows you believe in something, right? I mean, and you have to borrow from so many other worldviews, namely our worldview, just to make yours work. It just doesn't work. You can be more of an agnostic. You just don't know. But atheism, I don't think so, right? But here's the fool. The word is ascribed to a person who do not obey God, These men were willfully and morally insolent to the law of God. Again, May says this, the man is, ready, mistaken about reality. You want to know why? Because when you try to erase God out of the equation, what happens? Your whole reality is distorted. Your whole reality is distorted. You kick God out, you really have a disturbed reality. And by the way, the only reality that exists is God's. That's the only reality. We live in God's reality. We don't even have a reality. We're not that powerful, right? We can't speak and things happen. God has a reality and we're in it. So what do you think that means? We just can't go about doing whatever we want to do, right? There's actually a moral law. There's real laws that are present. Who creates those laws? It's God. And when you disobey those laws, there's what? Consequences. In other words, this man is a rebel. He's a rebel. This person has no fear of God, which is the beginning of wisdom with Proverbs 1, verse 7 states. This person is in constant disobedience to God. And it isn't just so much his acts that make him disobedient to God. Isn't that scary? It's not so much what he does that makes him disobedient to God. It's his very nature that makes him I mean, filthy before God. Hey, I'll take it. That sounds like a good guy there. Who's that guy? Should have him come here more often. This word fool, you can track it to 1 Samuel 25. There was a man by the name of Nabal. You know who Nabal is. Why was he a fool? Because he didn't recognize who David was. And David at the time was who? The anointed king of Israel. Of course, he was waiting for his succession. But he didn't recognize that. Really, he was against God. Because you have to understand, in the Old Testament, in the history of Israel, to go against the Mashiach, the anointed one, the king, the Messiah, that's what they were, to go against them is to go against God. This is why when you read the Precatory Prayers, they pray the way they pray. Because to go against the king is to go against God. And so here, Nabal is going against who? David, right? He's not willing to help him, although David is protecting him, keeping watch over his flocks. You know, messengers are sent to Nabal. Nabal's like, hey, look, David needs your help. Can you send him some supplies and so on? Nabal says, who's David? Who cares? There's many people who rebel against their master today. Who's he? He knew who he was. He's willfully rejecting him. And by doing so, you reject God and his ways. And when the fool speaks, because he says, when the fool has said, past tense, when the fool speaks, it's always disconnected with reality. You ever talk to people like that? You're like, what in the world this person just said? I mean, are you serious? I don't watch many videos, but whenever videos are sent to me and you see just the lopsidedness of it, it's just bizarre. You just laugh at this. You really can't believe that. You really can't believe that. I just want to tell them that. You think you're a woman? You really don't believe that. You just can't. I just don't believe you. I just don't believe you." And I mean, that's the kind of, it's just really disconnected. And God, of course, doesn't fit in the worldview. James Montgomery Boyce says this, quote, the reason the person is a fool and not merely mistaken, that's key, is that he knows there is a God and yet he chooses to believe and act as if there is none. That's it. They know the truth. That's why it's possible to be an atheist. It's possible to believe there is no God. You know there's a God. You're working hard at suppressing the truth as Romans 1 teaches. Notice where the fool has said this. I think this is interesting. He hasn't spoken this publicly. Right? Where has he spoken this? Where has he said this? David tells us, in his heart. Right? That's the location of this fool's belief. It is the heart, not the organ of course, but it's the spiritual being of that person. This is the control center of the human being. It is the spiritual side of the human being where all the affections and the intellect and the feelings and the emotions and the conscience and his moral capacity, all of that, all of it, All of that, by the way, is affected by sin. All of it. It's corrupt. That's what sin does. Sin attaches itself to the good things that God has created and he distorts them. It's like distorting a beautiful painting, like throwing soup at it or something. You just mar the whole thing. That's what sin does. It attaches itself. Like we learned in Sunday school today about emotions and feelings. All those good things God does, but when you add sin into the equation, it now attaches itself to it and distorts everything. Now it's no longer wanting God. It wants self. It wants autonomy. It wants to glorify itself. It hates God. All of it is affected by sin. Listen, even your choices, even your choices. Now, hear me out. You make real choices, okay? You do have free will. You make choices all the time on things to do, right? Like today, I'm just gonna go and, you know, I gotta go renew my registration. You make choices like that. They're free, right? but you're not free in what you want to do. There's the difference. That desire is captive by sin. This is why I have a problem with somebody saying, God is only gonna do something on the basis of his choice alone. Well, listen to me. Your choice is held captive by sin, and if scripture is correct, it's in bondage to sin, and you don't want God. You're changing everything about God. And we'll look more at that here in a bit. Charles Spurgeon says this, quote, if the affections were set upon truth and righteousness, the understanding would have no difficulty in settling the question of a present personal deity. But as the heart dislikes the good and the right, it is no wonder that it desires to be rid of that great moral Elohim who is the governor, the patron of rectitude, and the punisher of iniquity, end quote. Carl Spurgeon is right in considering his day and age when he was fighting against the early stages of evolutionism. Really, he was fighting against the early stages of postmodernism. Which does what? Questions reality, right? Be skeptical. This is what universities are teaching today. How do we know that's really true? Change history, right? If we don't like it, let's just erase it. Backspace, delete. Start all over again. And here's the worst thing you can say in his heart. What is he saying? What is he believing? What is controlling him? What is the MO? It's this phrase here, there is no God. And when you say that, this is what our society wants. No God. What are you doing? You're removing accountability. You're removing authority. You're disconnecting yourself from reality. And really everything we see today, as you heard me say over and over again, it's an attack on every institution that God has created. It is man saying, leave me alone, God. I don't want you. Now let's be real. Let's personalize this. How often as believers we do that. Let's be real. We make choices every day, do we not? We make choices all the time about the things we want. As believers, you know, there's that principle of sin that still exists in us, right? There's that principle of the new nature. It's in constant battle with one another. Paul talks about this in Romans 7, the things I want to do, I don't do. The good things. Galatians 5, 16, being led by the spirit or led by the flesh. It's still there because of our flesh. Until we're glorified, which is what we're looking for, we're constantly going against this. But this is the fool's confession. In his heart, he's secretly saying there is no God. And as you'll see later here, and I don't think we're going to have time to get to it, but as you'll see here, it's expressed in his life. It's expressed in his life. This is his confession. This is his conviction. This is his belief. You want to know why people do what they do? You want to know why they stay away from church or stay away from the truth of God's Word or even stay away from you? If you're teaching and talking about Christ at your dinner table or to your neighbors, anybody, you want to know why they stay away from you? It's because of Christ. Out of his heart comes his real desires, his depravity. It's a cesspool. It stinks. Jesus said defilement doesn't come from without side, right? Defilement comes from within, Matthew 15, 18. For out of the heart overflow what? Right? Evil thoughts, adultery, murder, theft, false witness, blasphemy. These are the things that come from without of a person. That is what defiles them, which tells you about the heart right there. It is captive. It is in prison. Martin Luther gave a good illustration. He said, it is so bad. You are so in bondage to sin that you're like a prisoner who's in a prison cell and the guard has come and opened the door to the prison cell and you don't even want to get out of it. You love being in it. And as you can see there, they're corrupt. God sees them as what? Corrupt. Rotten. Spoiled. Marred. And I'm going to stop right there for now, but I don't want to leave you on this depressing note. And praise God, we're about to celebrate communion which reminds us of what? The death of Christ Jesus. I hope you get some of it. Lord will pick this up next week, but I want you to see that through all of that, God is gracious and merciful in saving us. And that the Son would be willing to take that upon Himself. 2 Corinthians 5, 21, God made Him who know no sin to be sin so that we might become the righteousness of God. That to me is beautiful. I know I'm not worthy of it, but praise God for His mercy and grace, right? And we can celebrate that. And we're going to do that right now with the Lord's Supper. Let's get ourselves together and prepare.