Well, for the past three weeks we have considered prophecy about the Messiah. In fact, we titled it, The Promised Messiah. All throughout the Old Testament there are various prophecies about the coming Messiah. And as we looked at that, we saw it in Genesis, In Genesis 3.15 with the Proto-Evangelion is what it's called. It means the first gospel. And then we saw the Messiah promised in the Old Testament. We saw that in Jesus these things were affirmed and even fulfilled. And then we also looked at his messianic titles. Now there's one title that I want to look at this morning and I just want to spend the remainder of our time on it and it's found in Matthew chapter 1 and it's in verse 23. And what is that title? Well the title is this one right here, Emmanuel, God with us. Now you remember in Matthew Chapter 1, we have the story of the birth of Christ and we also have the story of the angel appearing to Joseph in a dream and explaining everything that has taken place with Mary. She was found with child of the Holy Spirit. And he had considered putting her away because the unfaithfulness demanded death. Mary was to be put to death for her being pregnant because she wasn't pregnant by Joseph and Joseph's trying to figure this out and the angel again is explaining to him how this has happened. It wasn't with another man. We know from the Gospel of Luke that we're told when the angel appeared to Mary she explained to him what was going to take place and she believed. Now that's much different than when the angel appeared to Zacharias as he's there offering the incense as the priest that year and he didn't believe what the angel was saying. And so that's why the angel said he would not speak until these things were fulfilled. And I guess we could say that Elizabeth had a really good pregnancy because she didn't have any feedback, at least verbal feedback from her husband, right? He was quiet the whole time, all during her pregnancy. But as he is explaining this to Joseph, she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus. And then we have the definition for what the name Jesus means in verse 21. For he will save his people from their sins. That's the definition of Jesus. In fact, this is really the Hebrew word Joshua. or Joshua, whichever way you want to say it. But it means Yahweh saves. Now, we have the prophecy that's given, and this is from Isaiah 7 and verse 14. All this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel. which is translated God with us. Jesus is the Emmanuel. Jesus is God with us. And when we think of the incarnation, we think of God becoming flesh and dwelling among us. Jesus is God who became flesh. Now you don't want to be like some have and confuse the understanding of the Trinity. Some people believe the Trinity is this, God is playing three roles. Not three individual persons, but three roles. He is the Father, He is the Son, He is the Holy Spirit. The problem with that, that's a third century heresy. It's called modalism. And there's some people that believe that today. One of famous TBN preachers named T.D. Jakes. That's what he believes. And that is a heresy. The early church rejected that and branded it as a heresy. God is not playing these roles. It's one God existing in three persons. And they're all individual. You have the Father. You have the Lord Jesus Christ, and you have the Holy Spirit, and all three are the one God. But they're three individual persons. And listen, the word Trinity does not appear in the Bible. That's the Latin word. But the concept does. In fact, the very first verse in the Bible is Genesis 1.1. It says, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the term for God is the Hebrew word Elohim. Now here's what's interesting about the word Elohim. The word itself is a singular term, so that would point out the oneness of God, one God. But I am on the end of the word is plural. It's the strangest thing. You've got a singular plural word. And what it basically means is that this one God exists in a form of plurality. In fact, later on you'll hear a verse that says in Genesis, let us make man in our image, in our likeness. Do you hear the plurality? It just matches up with what's said by the word that's used of Elohim. The God that we serve is one God, but he exists in a form of plurality, and the plurality is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and they're the three that you see working all throughout the Bible. Now, I've mentioned to you in our past studies that Jesus is not mentioned by name in the Old Testament. He's mentioned by types, he's mentioned by titles, he's mentioned by other names. These prophecies that spoke about him, and as we looked at them in the New Testament, he was the only one that could fulfill them. And especially with him coming when he did, because as I pointed out last time, in 70 AD, the temple was destroyed. And when the temple was destroyed, so were all of the genealogical records, because that's where they were kept. So today, or even after 70 AD, someone coming along and saying that they're the Messiah, they would have no way to prove it. There are no records. So even in the future, It says that there are going to be many coming and saying they are the Christ. They are false Christs. And when they come forward and say that they're the Messiah, they have no way to prove it. No way whatsoever. And so, hence, you come to Matthew chapter 1. And when you come to Matthew chapter 1, listen to how it begins. The record of the genealogy of Jesus, the Messiah. And then it gives us all the way down through verse 17 is genealogy. This is the genealogy that trace back all the way to Abraham. When you go in Luke, there's another genealogy. That second genealogy is showing the Messiah traced through Mary's lineage. This first genealogy is showing the Messiah traced through Joseph's lineage. So it shows that he is Messiah. And then as I said, we looked at all these other things, all these different titles, and all these different prophecies, and specifically spoken again, carried over into the New Testament, and applied to the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the promised Messiah. He is the one who has come. And we're not just saying that. This is not blind faith at all. We're saying we have a record right here. We have a written record about the Lord Jesus Christ. And that written record is 100% accurate. And I'm not saying that just because that's my opinion. I'm saying that because that is easily proven in the Bible. In fact, the Bible that you have in your hands, yes, you have a translation, and so do I. But what we have right here in the original languages are copies of what the original said. Now, there is no original. It was destroyed just over time. But they produced so many copies. And the copies tell us what the original said. And we get all the way back to 125 years after the original. That is the closest any ancient document gets to an original. And so you should be proud of what you hold right there in your hands. That's sitting right there on your lap. That this Bible right here is the word of God. And you can trust it. You can trust what it says and you can trust it with your life. In fact, that's what you're doing when you trust Jesus for salvation. You're trusting him with your life. With your present life and with your future. And you're saying, I believe what the Bible says about Jesus. And I confess him as Lord. He is Lord. He is King of kings and Lord of lords. And he's coming back again. And this one who has come and this one who has fulfilled these prophecies, this one is God in human flesh. Now I want to show you a few places where Jesus claims to be God, okay? These are direct claims that he has made. Let me have you go first to John chapter 8. John chapter 8. Now in John chapter 8 he's in a dialogue with the Jewish people and he has said a lot of things to them. He's even told them that Because they accused him of seeking to glorify himself. And he says in verse 50, I do not seek my glory. There is one who seeks and judges and truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death. And then when he said that about death and not seeing that, that's when they commented on what he just said. Verse 52, Now we know that you have a demon, they said. Abraham died, and the prophets also. And you say, If anyone keeps my word, he will never taste death. Surely you are not greater than our father Abraham, who died. The prophets died too. Whom do you make yourself out to be? Well, Jesus answers, If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my father who glorifies me, of whom you say he is our God. And you have not come to know him, but I know him. And if I say that I do not know him, I will be a liar like you, but I do know him and keep his word. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and was glad." These are monumental statements that he's making. And by the way, what he's about to say is really going to set him in an uproar. They said, so the Jews said to him, you're not even yet 50 years old and have you seen Abraham? And here's the clincher right here, verse 58. Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am. Now they knew exactly what he just claimed because of the next verse. Therefore they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple. Now why did they do that? Well, what they were doing was fulfilling Leviticus 24, 16, which says, Moreover, the one who blasphemes the name of the Lord shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall certainly stone him, the alien as well as the native. When he blasphemes the name, he shall be put to death. They believed that Jesus had just blasphemed God, and that's why they picked up stones to throw at him. They weren't just throwing rocks at him. They were trying to kill him. They said what he had just claimed that he is the I am of Exodus chapter 3 and verse 14, that that was blasphemy. Because if you remember when God appeared to Moses in the burning bush and he told Moses, when Moses asked, who shall I say it is who's sending me? And God said, I am. And Jesus, when he made that statement in John 8, 58, he was claiming to be the I am. Now if he's claiming to be the I am, he's God, that's what he claimed. Now we know from John 17 five as he's praying in his high priestly prayer, he refers back to the world was, he says this, now father glorify me together with yourself with the glory which I had with you before the world was. That takes us back to John one one, the beginning was the word, the word was with God. He was with God before there was a creation because he's God. Then in verse 24 he prays this again, Father I desire that they also whom you have given me, and that's a reference to the disciples, be with me where I am so that they may see my glory which you have given me. For you loved me before the foundation of the world. Again talking about his pre-existence. Now, as I said, Jesus makes these statements and it just turns the Jewish world upside down because of what he is saying from this. Now, over in John chapter five, if you want to follow any of these verses, they are on the back of your bulletin and you can also follow with me. But John chapter five and verse 17, Jesus makes this statement, because they were upset that he was working on the Sabbath. That's what verse 16 says, for this reason the Jews were persecuting Jesus because he was doing these things on the Sabbath, but he answered them. Here's the first problem that they point out. He says, my father. So he's referring to God as his father. Listen, at this point, no one was looking at God in that way. God was more like a father of a nation, not necessarily the father of an individual. And so Jesus says, my father is working until now, and I myself am working. Now what did he mean by that? My father's working and I'm working too. What's that sound like? Equality. Verse 18, they got it. For this reason, therefore, the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him because he was not only breaking the Sabbath, but also was calling God his own father, making himself equal with God. So those are direct claims. In John 10 and verse 30, he made this statement, I and the Father are one. Again, they understood what he was saying because the next verse, the Jews picked up stones again to stone him. He's claiming this equality with God. He's saying God is his Father. He's claiming to be the I am, and they got it. The Jews understood it. They instantly grasped the implications of his remarks that he was God. And they also understood, even by the John 1030 statement, that that was an illusion to Deuteronomy 6-4 in claiming divinity. And this is what he said to them. He claimed, these are direct claims. Now, as I've said on past occasions, how many times do we have to have this pointed out to us in order for us to believe? Some people need a lot of it. Some people need little. I tend to be the one that doesn't need a lot of information because I believe the Bible. There's not parts in here I don't believe. I believe all of it. I mean, I'm all the way from the beginning all the way to the maps. I believe it all. because there's verifiable proof that this is the truth. And Jesus said you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. And I'm one that stands up here 41 years ago and have been set free from my sin and set free from the punishment of my sin because Jesus took my sin and my punishment in his place. He stood in my gap. He stood there for me. He took what I deserve and he took what you deserve. The thing that I deserve is the same thing you deserve. We all deserve death and hell and judgment. We don't deserve the kindness and the goodness of God granting us a gift of faith or a gift of repentance and granting us eternal life. None of that is something that we can earn. But it's something that he has freely given to us. It's given to all those who believe. Now there are two other responses that Jesus had that proved his divinity. One was in the area of worship. Jesus accepted worship. Now either he would be God or he'd be a lunatic, right? To accept worship. In the book of Revelation, John bowed down two times to the angel that was revealing all of these things in the book of Revelation to him, and two times the angel told him to get up. Worship God. I'm a creature just like you. And what do we have going on in some of the churches today? They worship angels, don't they? And here this angel said two times, get up and don't do that. Don't worship me. The one you worship is God. We don't worship saints, we don't worship angels, we don't worship the creation, we don't worship any other created thing, because all of those things are idolatry. We worship the one and true God, and we're not to have any images of this one true God, but we're to worship Him. And Jesus accepted that. And there are two places I just want to show this to you. One was from his disciples, and you remember this. When Jesus made his disciples get into a boat to go ahead of him to the other side, he had sent the crowds away, and after he sent them away, he was up on the mountain and he was there praying. And when it was evening, he was by himself. And the boat that the disciples had got in, they were already a long distance from the land, about three miles. And they were being beat up by the waves and the wind was just blowing everywhere. And it was the fourth watch of the night. And at the fourth watch of the night, you know, Jesus saw them. He didn't just see them from the shore, he saw them from the mountain he was on. Because, as we'll talk about in a few minutes, he had that divine ability to do that. But what did He do? They're out there in the middle of the Sea of Galilee and they're being beat up by this storm that's come down upon them and they're thinking they're about to die. They're going to drown and most of these guys were professional fishermen. They grew up on that lake. They knew all about that lake. And Jesus comes to them walking on the sea. Listen, I think the fact that they were three miles out was to show that there was no way to fake this miracle. If you're three miles out in the sea, you're not gonna walk on any rocks. You're not gonna walk on anything to make it appear that you're walking on water. That's the kind of stuff that the critics will say. I had one time where I was a mile out in the ocean. We had an opportunity to go on one of the aircraft carriers years ago and they took us a mile out and we got to see the planes catapult off the ship, off that aircraft carrier and come back in. It was the most amazing thing. But I was thankful that I live on dry ground. And I was happy for that dry ground when the end of the day finally came. I can't imagine being on one of those things and being out to sea for, you know, eight months, nine months, a year. I can't imagine that. In fact, we were told that there are a lot of suicides on those aircraft carriers because some of those guys just can't handle it. being gone that long and being away from their family and being out to sea. And that's all you see. You don't see land. You just see water everywhere. So that makes us, we need to pray for the military, right? Those who are involved in that. So he comes walking to them on the sea. And then it says, when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified. And they said, it's a ghost. And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, take courage. It is I. Do not be afraid. And Peter said, Lord, if it's you, command me to come to you on the water. And he said, come. And Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came toward Jesus. Listen, he's doing this. This is a professional fisherman. You get out of the boat, you go down. You don't walk on water. Any of you ever walked on water? It's like one of those lizards. You ever seen those lizards walk across the water? They're running. It's surface tension on the water. That's what they're able to do that for. But there is no surface tension on the water that could hold our weight. And so he's walking on the water, he's going toward Jesus, and long as he had his eyes on Jesus, he could do this. But look what happened. He took his eyes off Jesus. Seeing the wind, he became frightened and he began to sink. It's not like he just went bloop. No, it says he began to sink. The more he got his eyes off Jesus and the more he got his eyes on the storm, was going down. And he cried out, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched out his hand, took him, took hold of him and said to him, Oh, you have little faith. Why did you doubt? And when they got into the boat, here's another miracle. The wind stopped. So not only have Jesus walking on the water and Peter walking on the water to go out to Jesus, they get in the boat and the wind stops. The storm ceases. And then it says, And those who were in the boat worshipped him, saying, You are certainly God's Son. See, I really believe the miracles were for the disciples. It was to build their faith, and it certainly did do that. Jesus did a lot of miracles, and they didn't even get it half the time. The feeding of the 5,000, they didn't quite I mean, they experienced that miracle. They saw Jesus create food and just kept giving it to the people. And now in Mark 8, when we return back to Mark, we're going to the feeding of the 4,000. And you would think that they had remembered what happened with the 5,000 because Jesus initiates this conversation with them about the people. They'd been there with them for three days and they were hungry. And Jesus was concerned that when they'd leave, they would faint along their way because they hadn't eaten. And the disciples, again, you would think they would remember the feeding of the 5,000, that Jesus was well prepared and adequately could feed 4,000 people because he had fed five. And truthfully, that was only numbering the men. If you take the children and the women with him, that was probably more like 25,000 people, not five. And here's another 15 to 20,000 people in Mark 8 with the 4,000. And so here's where they doubted. Where are we going to get so much food to feed all of these people? That's what they asked. It's like, come on. Are you that dull? You don't remember? And Jesus has to call to their remembrance of the feeding of the 5,000. But Jesus accepted their worship. You don't have anywhere in this text Him telling them not to worship Him. Nowhere. Right after it says that they worshiped him and said, you are certainly God's son, verse 34 says, when they crossed over, they came to the land of Gennesaret. It just continues on in the story. It doesn't say anything about stop. Don't do this. Same is true in John chapter 20. Jesus has now resurrected. He appeared to the disciples one time, but Thomas wasn't there. And when he appeared the second time, Thomas was there. And you remember, Thomas, he was refusing to believe unless he saw Jesus and saw the nail prints. And so Jesus appears. And he tells Thomas to put his fingers into his side and into his nail prints and be believing. What was Thomas's response? My Lord. And my God. And Jesus said, Blessed, or because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are they who did not see and yet believed. You know, you see and you believe and you're blessed for that. But think about those who will never get to see what you see and still believe. That's us. We've never seen Jesus in the physical flesh. I know there are people out there that claim that. They probably are high on ramen noodles or something, you know, to make such a statement. But I'm sorry, I don't believe you if you say that. There's no proof of that. But there is proof here that they did. And if we could see him now, he wouldn't have said that. But again, He accepted worship that was reserved for God alone. It says in Exodus chapter 20 verse 3, you shall have no other gods before me. And he says, you shall not worship them or serve them. For I am the Lord, your God, and I am a jealous God. He does not want us bowing down to any other person, any other thing, calling something else or another person God. But Jesus accepted this. Another response that Jesus had was where He stated that He had the authority to forgive sin. And if you remember the story in Mark chapter 2, you remember the the paralytic they brought to Jesus and when they saw the crowd they couldn't get to the door so they went up on the roof and they dug a hole in the roof, you remember that? A huge hole to let this man down. And they let this man down right in front of Jesus. And it says, And Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the paralytic, Son, your sins are forgiven. But there were scribes sitting there and And they were reasoning in their hearts, why does this man speak that way? He's blaspheming. Who can forgive sins but God alone? And immediately Jesus, aware in his spirit that they were reasoning that way within themselves, said to them, why are you reasoning about these things in your heart? Which is easier to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven, or to say, get up and pick up your pallet and walk? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, I say to you, get up, pick up your pallet and go home." Jesus had the authority to forgive sin. Listen, if God alone is the only one who can do this, what is that saying about Jesus? Right? If God alone has the title of being the I Am and Jesus says that He is the I Am, what's it saying about Jesus? What's it saying about His claim? Now there are other things that obviously point out to the fact that He is God and that He possessed these divine characteristics or what we would call attributes. I mean if you just take John 1 when we were talking about that about him being in the beginning with God and him being God that would speak of his eternality that is an attribute that he claimed. If you were to go into other places like for example in Mark chapter 4 or even go to the passage I just read to you about him walking on the water and him calming the sea and The wind stopped. Well, even in this situation here, there was this fierce storm that came up, and it says here that he was asleep. He's asleep in the boat while this storm is taking place, and they're trying to maneuver this boat through the storm, and they finally wake him up. And when he wakes up, it says he got up, he stood up and he rebuked the wind and the sea and he said, hush, be still. And it says, and the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. Immediately the storm stops. And what was their response? Who then is this that even the wind and the sea obey him? And so what do they see there they see his omnipotence they see his power or even like in Luke chapter 7. They went to the city called Nain. The disciples were going along, accompanied by a large crowd. As he approached the gate of the city, a dead man was being carried out. He was the only son of his mother. She was a widow. There was a sizable crowd from the city that was with her. And when the Lord saw her, he felt compassion for her. And he said to her, do not weep. And he came up and touched the coffin. And the barriers came to a halt. And he said, young man, I say to you, arise. And the dead man sat up. and began to speak and Jesus gave him back to his mother. And their response was this, fear gripped them all and they began glorifying God saying, a great prophet has risen among us and God has visited his people. And then John the Baptist sends two of his disciples to Jesus to find out if he is the expected one or do they look for someone else. And Jesus responds, go and report to John what you've seen and heard. The blind receive sight, the lame walk, the leopards are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have the gospel preached to them, and blessed is he who does not take offense at me. So what are we seeing here? We're seeing his power over sickness, over diseases, over death. My goodness, if you have that kind of power, you've got to be God. No human can do what you're doing. Oh, yeah, we have the false prophets, false teachers out there trying to do these things, and they get caught in their lies. And the amazing thing is, I've always said this, if they really possess this gift, why aren't they at the hospitals? Why do we even have hospitals? Why aren't they at the funeral homes? Because they don't have this power. You've got to go where they are. They don't come to you. So we see that, and even if you were to go to John 11, and you remember Jesus comes to the tomb of Lazarus, and what does he say? He tells him to roll the stone away, and he calls out Lazarus by name, and he says, Lazarus, come forth. And what does Lazarus do? He comes forth. And he's bound in this garment, these grave clothes, and they tell him to take them off of him, loose him, let him go. And they witnessed that miracle again of him raising the dead. Well, if he had that kind of power, he also had the ability to read people's minds. He'd know what you think before you even say it. He knows what you're pondering in your heart right now. He knows if you are marveling over these stories just as they were at that time. Luke 5.22, and we read this also in Mark's account. where he said, why are you reasoning in your hearts? And right before that, here Luke says, but Jesus aware of their reasonings. He was aware of this. He knew what they were thinking. And if he knew what they were thinking then, he also knew about future events. And in the future events, In Matthew 24, when Jesus said in Matthew 24, 2, Do you not see all these things? Truly I say to you, not one stone here will be left upon another which will not be torn down. And he was right there at the temple, and he was talking about the destruction of the temple. Now this was future. And it did happen in 70 AD. The Romans under General Titus, they took over Jerusalem in 70 AD. as part of their suppression of the Jewish revolt. The temple was completely destroyed. The Romans tore it apart stone by stone. They retrieved the gold from it, melted it down as they burned the temple. The historian Josephus confirmed in his writings this destruction just as Jesus foretold. And everybody knows about this. So we see some of these attributes that he carried, eternality, omnipotence, omniscience, and even omnipresence. What's that mean? He can be everywhere. He's aware of everything, he knows everything, he can be everywhere at the same time. You and I can't do this, and when the Great Commission was given to the disciples to go make disciples, he tells them, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. I'm with you always. That's comforting, isn't it? Especially on those days when you're struggling and you go to the Word of God and you read something like this where he says, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. And you know what? You go into Hebrews 13, you find out he says, I will never leave you nor forsake you. And you go, Lord, thank you for that. I'm not alone. I'm never alone. I just have to remember that you're right there. I was telling someone last night with my son Samuel and these seizures that he has, Sometimes he's in the middle of them and there is no stopping him. We can't stop him anyway. There's nothing we can do. We just try to be there for him. But he could be in the middle of it, jerking all over the place. And, you know, we're praying. And I'm just praying, God, would you stop this? And I've seen it time and time again. All of a sudden it stopped. Just stopped. That's when you get, you know, the goosebumps. It's when your hair rises and you're going, oh my Lord, I am in the presence of a holy and righteous God and that he would hear my prayer and that he would do this for my son. I told that to Teresa's dad last night. That's who I was talking to. And his first response was, wow. Yeah, that's kind of me too. I have that same response. But he's omnipresent, he's with us, we don't have to fear, we don't have to say we're alone, we're never alone. Remember that hymn? No, never alone, no, never alone. We're never alone, we can sing that all day long. Just amazing, just amazing, listen. Jesus is God. He claimed to be God. He accepted worship as God. He possessed the same attributes that the Father and the Spirit has. And even people that were near him They had the same response. They identified Him as God, like we said of Thomas, my Lord and my God, or we said of John, who is writing about Jesus. In fact, in 1 John 5, 20, he says, We know that the Son of God has come, has given us an understanding, so that we may know Him who is true, and we are in Him who is true, in His Son, Jesus Christ. And then he says this, This is the true God and eternal life. And you have statements like that, even of Peter, where he says, Can't get any more clear than that. That's how they saw him. Paul was the same way. Titus 2.13, he called Jesus our great God and Savior. The writer of Hebrews, he is recording a statement that God says about Jesus. It says, but of the Son, he says, that he is referring back to God the Father. He says this, your throne, O God, is forever and ever, and the righteous scepter is the scepter of his kingdom. Your throne, O God." That's the Father speaking of the Son. And then, of course, probably one of the greatest things that confirmed His deity was the fact that He had authority to lay down His life and to raise it up again. In John 10, 18, He said, No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father. And then what do you hear? He resurrects on the third day. And Paul, even writing in the book of Romans, tells us about God's Son who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh, who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead. Jesus resurrected from the dead. All these things point to the true identity of our Savior. So as you're worshiping Him, this Christmas, realize more than just a baby who came. You know, don't get all hung up on the first coming, get hung up on the fact that he's come. And what does all this say about him? And then think about the fact he's coming back again a second time. But when he comes a second time, he's not coming as a babe in a manger. He's coming back as judge. And he will judge the nations. Charles Spurgeon said this, we write Jesus's name upon our banner for it is hell's terror, heaven's delight and earth's hope. Is Jesus your hope? He is if you embrace all that we have just said this morning. and you confess him as God. Romans 10, 9, that if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. For the scripture says, whoever believes in him will not be disappointed. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. For the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on him. For whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved." My prayer is that God will open your heart to him. If you don't know him, that today would be the day of salvation, the best Christmas gift ever, right? The best gift ever you would ever receive. is to receive eternal life from God himself. Well, as we conclude this time together, we're gonna share together in the Lord's Supper. And as we do that, will you bow with me right now? And will you, in your heart, just prepare yourself as we take of these elements and as we have the opportunity to remember the Lord's death, burial, and resurrection. Our Lord, when he went to the cross and died for our sins and was put in the tomb, he didn't stay there. He came out of that tomb. Death could not hold him. No tomb, no matter how secure it was, could keep him. But he came out of that tomb on the third day, just as he said. The angel said, he's not here, he's risen. Just as he said, come see the place where the Lord lay. And that's exactly what they did, right? Father, we thank you for this time that we've had together today. And we thank you for what this week means to all of us. And I pray for each of us in here that we will worship you through this week. We will worship you on Christmas morning. And we will tell our families and tell our friends that this one that we worship is God. He's God who became flesh. And Lord, as we have this opportunity now to come to the Lord's Supper, the Lord's table, we pray Lord that you will cause us to reflect on the work that you've done in us. Lord, what you did when you brought us to the understanding of the gospel. You opened our heart, you opened our eyes, you helped us to see our sin, you help us to see the sacrifice that you made on our behalf and that you did it for us. I pray God that you would help us to see these things and Lord God to respond appropriately.