I have for some time have been wanting to teach on the church, its marks, its nature, the purpose of the church. And I will be up front. I did reference Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology, which I highly recommend. Don't necessarily agree with everything in there. I don't know that you could find a systematic theology that you would agree with everything in there. But it is an excellent book. I just got it back from Sylvia. She finished reading it. She borrowed it 10 years ago, so we're up for nominating her for an elder, oh, I'm just kidding. But she returned it back in worse condition than when I let her borrow it. So we're going to have a conversation about now. I'm just kidding. So I did borrow the outline. But so we're going to start. And on the Wednesdays we're in, I teach maybe for some weeks. I don't know how many more Wednesdays are left in this month because Brother Lynn will teach February. But I'll keep track of where I started and where I left off. And then we'll just keep going. I shouldn't take us too long on this particular subject. I always feel ill-prepared. So we're just gonna jump into it and see where that takes us. Amen? So again, I borrowed somewhat the outline of Wayne Grudem, but of course, it'll have its own Chris DeLuna flavor. And if you don't like that flavor, well, too bad. So the nature of the church, What exactly is the church? Now I'm going to just skip the part because I'm assuming that we all know this. Jesus died for the church. We know this, right? Jesus died for the church. He died to gather people to himself. So I'm just going to go off into the assumption that we know what the church is. Now let's turn to Romans chapter four. Now this is how Wayne Grudem defines the church. He defines it as the church is the community of all true believers for all time. The church is the community of all true believers for all time. Now, just taking that statement, I sort of created an outline under that statement. It's kind of my own outline because I'm particularly aware that when we think of the gospel, I'm aware when we think of salvation, people think in terms of Old Testament and New Testament, and we understand that the New Testament is where we come to learn the gospel. God incarnate enters the world. The gospel is preached, and so salvation is received by faith. It is the gift of God. And this is more prevalent among newer believers. At some point, they begin to think about, well, if Jesus is the only way to be saved, and there is no other name given among men by which we must be saved, then how did people come to saving faith In the Old Testament, if Jesus had not yet been born or if Jesus had not yet been preached, did they have a different standard or a different way through which to receive salvation? How many of you have thought about that at some point in your walk with the Lord? Only three people, I guess. No, I know you've thought about it. I know everyone. I know I thought about it, and I have said that there is a common misunderstanding among Christians that goes something like this, because I've been with those Christians, and engaging in door-to-door evangelism, and I remember being with a particular minister, we knocked on the door of a house, we were visiting a particular gentleman, and he presented the gospel, and technically, Every point that he presented was accurate and theological and biblical, namely that we are all sinners, all fall short of the glory of God, and forgiveness and the gift of salvation is received exclusively through Christ. So far, so good. But then he said something that I was like, what? He said, there are basically two ways to get saved. So he presented this as a way to demonstrate one of the ways to achieve salvation or to earn salvation is by keeping the law, but more so by being a good person and not sinning. That's one way, which no one can do and it's impossible. So then your only other choice is salvation by faith. And I have found that some people actually think the Bible teaches this, but I'm telling you the Bible does not teach this. Salvation has never under any circumstances, not even during the Mosaic Law, the Bible never presents the Mosaic Law as God ever having intended the law to be a way through which people could be saved, namely by perfect obedience to the law. And that's a common misunderstanding that people have. So where do we get, who is Paul arguing, where do we get this idea that somewhere in the Bible, someone is teaching that salvation in the Old Testament was indeed through good works? It was not Moses who was teaching this, it was the Pharisees who were teaching this. The Pharisees had a misunderstanding about the role and the nature of God's law. And so when Paul is refuting this idea that salvation is indeed not through the law, he isn't refuting Moses, he is refuting the Judaizers who had a misunderstanding. It's real subtle, but I find that among Christians, this happens to be a misunderstanding that people have. And so this outline that I'm talking about that I sort of I want to demonstrate is one, well, let's go to Romans chapter four. I want to demonstrate, I want to show in the Bible how salvation, or rather the way the Bible puts it, the righteousness of God as a gift was given to individuals before the law was ever given. In fact, before circumcision was ever prescribed. So that's before the law, and then salvation was received by faith even to those who were under the law. And the last one is real easy and obvious. Salvation is given as a gift by faith to those after the law, which is us. Salvation before the law, before circumcision, salvation during the Old Testament era, the Mosaic era, and then salvation in the New Testament era, which is us today. So I hope to demonstrate that through scripture. We'll start with Romans chapter four. Now I'll read verse 16 to get you to think about what exactly Paul is talking about, and then we'll back up to verse one. But in verse 16, the apostle Paul writes, That is why it, so you may want to underline the it, because I hope you're asking yourself, what does the it refer to? That is why it depends on, what is that word, church? Faith. That is why it depends on faith in order that the promise, what promise in particular? So now we have two things. The it, what does it refer to? And the promise may rest on what? may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring, the person in view there is Abraham, and be guaranteed to all his offspring, not only to the adherent of the law, so that's the person under the law, the promise will come to the person under the law, not only to the adherent of the law, but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham. Now, let's back up to verse 13. For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be the heir of the world did not come through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. Now, if you are somewhat familiar with the biblical chronology, as in, if you speak of Adam, oh yes, I know Adam, the first Adam, that is in the book of Genesis, he's the first human being. If you say something like, well, David, not David, man, I had just a moment of Shadrach, the three Hebrew who were thrown, huh? Yeah, those guys. You say, oh, that was during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian captivity of Israel. Or if you say King David, well, that was the second king. Or 1 Samuel, well, that was right before they instituted a king and a monarchy. So if you're somewhat familiar with the chronology of the Old Testament, whenever a certain character is mentioned, in your mind, you should say, well, this is somewhere here in the biblical chronology. So if I mention, for example, Noah, where does that come up? What is associated with Noah? That's the flood. And after the flood, Noah settles down with his family. They begin to repopulate. And then very soon after, Abraham is introduced in Genesis chapter 12. Now, here's my question to you. When does the law, when does Moses come in the picture? When do the Hebrew children come in the picture in which they're under Egyptian bondage? Now they've grown into, off the top of my head, I don't remember the population, but what would you say, Brother Lynn, the population was when they came out of Egyptian bondage? I think some people put it maybe at a million, I don't know. I heard two. Two million, yeah. One or two million. That's a lot of people from Abraham, because when we meet Abraham, he's childless. So how much time transpires between the calling of Abraham and then the children of Israel who end up, which are the offspring of Abraham, they end up under Egyptian slavery? Several hundred years. And the law is delivered through Moses after the Exodus. So when you read Romans chapter four, something like this, if you read Romans chapter four, verse 13, for the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be the heir of the world did not come through the law. If you are familiar with biblical chronology, you would say, well, of course it didn't because the law wasn't introduced until several hundred years later. You understand? For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be the heir of the world did not come through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is the adherence of the law who are to be heirs, faith is null and the promise is void, for the law brings wrath, but where there is no law, there is no transgression. So the Bible is telling us that Abraham was justified before God, before the law was ever introduced. Go ahead, Brother Lynn. Pastor Chris, I'm also thinking of Job, who- Job, yes. Long before Moses. Yes, because the story of Job is probably, like Brother Lynn said, in Sunday School, one of the oldest accounts, one of the oldest books of the Bible. And so, yes, Job would be another example wherein he is confident that in his flesh, he's alluding to resurrection, he would see God. This is before Moses ever gives the law. Do you understand? So, the question is, well, how did people come to saving faith wherein all of their sins were forgiven, They were justified by God, and they had no fear of eternal condemnation if number one, the law had not yet been given, and number two, the gospel had not even been preached, at least not in the manner in which we see it in the New Testament. You have a question, Isaac? The law, isn't it a part of works? The law does promote works, but the law itself does not teach that salvation... is earned if you can just manage to perfectly keep the law. That's not a teaching of the law itself. Now, these questions bring up, or that question brings up other questions about, well what exactly was the role of the law if it was not to achieve salvation? And that's because I think there has been much, there has been a deficient, The evangelical church, I think this is an area where we're very deficient. There's not a lot of teaching on the role. I think the only way in which we think of the law, oh, the law is bad. The law brings wrath and the law condemns you. And so we speak in a very negative way about the law as if the law itself is bad, but the Bible doesn't speak that way. The Bible says the law is holy, righteous, and good. We are the problem, not God's law. And so this is certainly an area where much teaching is needed concerning the role of the law of God, and there's different aspects of it. Now, Paul's argument in Romans is this, and my point is the same. Salvation before the law. So let's go back. Verse 21 says this. Now, what exactly is the righteousness of God. I'm going to grab my coffee. Do you guys mind if I drink coffee? It is a Bible study. Okay, so when you think of the righteousness of God, what exactly comes to your mind when you think of the righteousness of God? Perfection? Holiness? Anyone else? Now, here's what's interesting, and this happened during the Reformation era when Martin Luther made an amazing discovery. The belief was that if you're going to be right with God, you needed the righteousness of God. And the misunderstanding was this, that the righteousness or the holiness by which God himself is holy, that that's what you needed. But Martin Luther, having read Romans, understood that that is not what Romans is describing. He's describing the righteousness of God that you receive as a gift, as something that is credited to you, or rather imputed to you. So when you work, you produce wages, and if you have direct deposit, those wages go into your bank account. And when you look at your bank account, every dollar you see is a dollar that you earned. Yes? That's your wage. Now, if someone decides to give you a monetary donation for whatever reason. Hey, man, God bless you, brother. You know, give me your bank account so I can deposit some money so you can... Now, when that money goes in your bank account, it's still dollars, but guess what? It is a gift that you received from someone else. Brother Gilbert says that it's sweeter. And you know why it's a little bit sweeter? Because you're more quick to spend it and exercise freedom with it. But when you earn it, you're a little bit tighter with your money. That's why teenagers, when they're given money, it's like, woo! You know? It's like there's no bottom to that pit. I saw a video of a black and white little girl throwing money out the window and then somebody had made a meme. This is what it's like raising daughters and just throwing money out the window. But that does bring up an interesting point, Gilbert, that if God's mercy isn't earned by us, but it's freely given, then we should bask in it freely. Not in a wasteful kind of way, but in a way that should bring rest and freedom So the righteousness of God isn't referring, at least not in the context of Romans 3, it's not referring to the righteousness by which God himself is righteous. It's talking about a kind of righteousness that God gives you as a gift, sort of as a title. And so the question is, well then how do you receive this, how do you receive this righteousness of God? And it says, It says in verse 21, but now, Romans 3.21, it says, but now the righteousness of God has been manifested, listen, apart from the law. Now, he doesn't mean outside of the Bible. That's not what he means. Apart from the law, he doesn't mean apart from the Old Testament or apart from the Bible. He means that there is another way through which we can be right with God. And then what does the second part of the verse say? Although the law and the prophets bear witness to it. Here's what he's saying. The Old Testament, the law, And the prophets testify that salvation is by faith. He's saying that this isn't, the gospel is an Old Testament teaching. Go ahead, Lati. You see, but that right there, where it says, but now, like as if there was another way before that. No, again, I do think, yeah. No, I think it's not now as in God scrapped plan A and introduced plan B. It's more as in now it's been revealed. Something has been revealed that has been there the entire time. Now it's revealed. Now we see it. It's like if you walk into this room and all the lights are off, and you don't really see anything, and you turn the lights on, you say, oh, now I see the chairs. Well, they weren't introduced when the light was turned on. The light simply revealed what was there all along. And so I think that's what it means, but now the righteousness of God has been manifested, and that's where the biblical word mystery comes in, is that something is being revealed now that was not previously known, not something introduced that wasn't ever there to begin with. Well, it's referring to the Old Testament, isn't it? It is, yeah. So it says that the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it. Watch this. The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. So then here's what happens. In chapter four, there's so much more to cover here and to follow the argument, but let's fast forward to Romans chapter four, and he gives an example of someone in the Old Testament who was living before the law was given, and we're told this man And I don't mean to belabor the point, because you hear it from me all the time, but only because it's here and it shows up again, especially since I started teaching again on Sunday morning from Genesis and we've been talking about Abraham. But I want you to see that Paul here in Romans chapter four says, what then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our father, according to the flesh? What did Abraham do to gain, or rather to earn, something from God? And of course, what's in view here is justification. Verse two, for if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. Verse three, now, here's what Paul is doing now. He's preaching the gospel from the Old Testament. For what does the scripture say? Meaning, in this case, what does Genesis say? Abraham believed God, and it, Abraham's faith, and it was counted to him as righteousness. Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due. And to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies, who? The ungodly. His faith is counted as righteousness. So now we have the first character demonstrated that they were saved in the Old Testament before the law was given, and then now we're introduced to another character who lived under the law, namely David. He's making the same point. Look at verse 6, Romans chapter 4. Just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness, apart from what? God counts righteousness apart from works. God will look at a person and say, you are righteous before me and it has nothing to do with whatever works you may have or may not have done, but rather I'm counting you righteous on the basis of your faith and righteousness is a gift from God. And it's for who? It's for the ungodly. So Just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one whom God counts righteousness apart from works, and he reads from the Old Testament, blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not hold his sins against him. So Abraham before the law, David during the law. And then so that was my point. My point is that salvation has always been by faith through grace. Those who belong to God belong to him on the basis of faith. Now, here's the second point. So the church is the community of all true believers for all time. So there is a sense in which you can argue that the church didn't start at Pentecost. The New Testament church, as we know it even today, in that respect, in other words, the giving of the Holy Spirit in a way that was different than the Old Testament, yes, we make that distinction, but there's a sense in which you can argue that the church is a concept, not merely a concept, a reality rather, that starts even in the Old Testament. I don't think we'll have time to get into that. So the church is the community of all true believers for all time. So, any questions or comments before I move to my second point? I just read today, a couple of days ago, where it said that this teaching of faith with grace alone does not leave room for self-congratulation or self-glorification. Yes. Romans chapter 3, Leti. Leti is saying that she heard this week that this teaching that salvation is by grace through faith, it removes all boasting. There is no room for any self-congratulations for having been in Christ. It destroys boasting. Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded by what kind of law? By a law of works? No. but by the law of faith, for we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. And here's the second point that I'm bringing up, or is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also. Go ahead, Dad, you had a question? I wanted to repeat Romans 3, 20. Yeah. It talks about the works. For by the works of the law, no human being will be justified in his side, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. Yeah, that's right. He read Romans 3.20. Now, this is not something that Grudem brings up in his book, but I think it's an important emphasis. He defines the church as the community of all true believers for all time. But I wanted to add that the church consists of believers from all ethnicities. The church consists of believers from all ethnicities. I wanna emphasize that point because that's the point that Paul emphasizes as well. In the Jewish mind, according to Paul, there are only two kinds of people when it comes to ethnicities, at least in these broad categories, Jewish people and non-Jewish people. Jew and Gentile, those are the two categories of people. Now, of course, we know that there are more ethnicities, but Gentiles is a broad category, basically non-Jew. Now, Matthew 8, let's turn there very quickly. So my last point for tonight is to look at this idea that not only is the church the community of all true believers for all time, But the church consists of believers from all ethnicities. And I prefer the word ethnicity because not different races, because that's not really accurate. There's only one human race. There aren't different races of people. There's only one human race. And the one human race is characterized by many different colors. But it is not correct to say that there's more than one human race. There's only the Adamic race, but within the human race, there are different ethnicities, different people groups, and tribes, and things of that nature. Now, one of the things that the Old Testament taught, and it's picked up in the New Testament, is that God would not only save Jews, as he promised those who are children of Abraham by faith, but that it would also include non-Jews, which is us, and even Jesus himself, alluded to this, or not just alluded, he actually taught this, Matthew chapter eight. Now, the context is this. I'll read from verse five, because what we have here is, as you know, Jesus was called to witness only to fellow Jews. Of course, he isn't wrong when he does minister to Gentiles. But the norm is that God had a program by which he would spread the gospel, and the Bible taught that the Jews needed to hear it first, and they heard it from none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. And then even during his earthly ministry, Jesus instructed even his own disciples when he sent them out to preach, this is before he was crucified of course, to not go into any towns or villages of the Gentiles or the Samaritans, but to stick strictly with the Jewish people. because they were to hear it first. But there are occasions in the New Testament where he does have encounters with non-Jews. And so in verse five of Matthew chapter eight, it says, when he entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him. This would be a Roman soldier. He's in charge of about a hundred soldiers under him. And that's where we get the word century. But when he entered Capernaum, A centurion came forward to him, appealing to him, Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly. And he said to him, I will come and heal him. But the centurion replied, Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man under authority, with soldiers under me, and I say to one, go, and he goes, and to another, come, and he comes, and to my servants, do this, and he does it. When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, which would have been made up of primarily fellow Jews, truly I tell you, not one in Israel have I found, with no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. He's making a reference to non-Jews. How do I know this? Number one, I know this because this saying is made as a response to this faith of this centurion who's not a Jew. He has not been privileged like the Jewish people. He has not been privileged with having the scriptures and all of the things that the Jews received from God, the temple worship, prophets. He's an outsider, and yet look at his faith in Christ. And so Jesus is essentially saying, this centurion who is a Gentile, who has less reason to believe than my fellow Jews, Many, many more like him are going to come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. And now he's going to refer to his fellow Jews while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And to the centurion, Jesus said, go, let it be done for you as you have believed. And the servant was healed that very moment. So why does he say that the sons of the kingdom, meaning the Jewish people, will be cast out? Because it is required of them to get in on the same terms as Gentiles, and that is through faith. There aren't two programs for salvation. There's only one. So the church, consist of believers from all ethnicities who will come from the East and West and North and South. Now let's look at Revelation chapter five. This is the end. This is the end of where we're closer to the consummation of all things. So this is a prophetic passage. Romans chapter five. You know the context here. It's about the scroll and the lamb. And I'll just read from verse one. You ready? Revelation chapter five, or as some people say, revelations. Verse one reads this way. Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, who is worthy to open the scroll and to break its seals? And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it. And I begin to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it. And one of the elders said to me, weep no more. Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has conquered so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals. And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders, I saw a lamb standing as though it had been slain with seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. and took the scroll from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. That's amazing, isn't it? And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the 24 elders fell down before the lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song saying, worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals for you were slain and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation and you have made them a kingdom and priest to our God and they shall reign on the earth. So the church consists of believers, not only from all time, but from all ethnicities. and the church will inherit the new heavens and the new earth, and you can only do that by faith, not by works, not by being of a certain ethnicity. It matters little if you're a Jew, and you can claim Abraham as a blood relative. None of it matters. You have to get in on the same basis as everyone else, and that is body. You have to get in on the same way that Abraham got in, which is faith. Isn't that interesting? Amen. Well, that concludes our study this evening. Go ahead, Brother Gilbert. That's a great question. That's a great question and very complex. Man, that's really, he's, Gilbert is asking that Jesus didn't come to abolish the law, but rather to fulfill it. Your question has two parts. Number one is, you're talking about the distinction between, or the difference between fulfillment and abolishment. And then the other one is, what role does the law play for anyone today? So that's a two-part question, and Brother Lynn will be more than happy to answer that. Let me put it this way. Fulfillment is a very loaded word because it means different things. Number one, the law has standards that reflect God's holiness. You shall not murder because God is the author of life. God loves life. God is the living God. Murder and death are completely opposite. God is a God of faithfulness, loyalty, and that's to be expressed in the marital relationship. Therefore, God hates adultery. God is a God of truth. There's no darkness in Him. There's no deceit. God loves the truth. He is the truth. Therefore, God hates lies, and on and on. So the law, one aspect of it, it reflects God's own holiness. So Jesus living in obedience to those holy standards is one form of fulfilling the law. But there is the predictive prophecy aspect of it and that Jesus came to fulfill the law. In other words to to fulfill the prophecies that were made concerning him. So that's another aspect. And I think that there's a third aspect in which he came to fulfill the law in this way. He came to be the actual lamb that the Old Testament, in which they had only as a shadow. So the animal, the lamb in the Old Testament, for example, the Passover, they observed the Passover and they sacrificed the literal lamb, but that lamb was a mere symbol of a greater reality. And so when Jesus comes, he fulfills the Passover in that way. So you see how fulfillment can have different meanings. And so Jesus was accused of being anti-Moses or speaking against the law of God or speaking against the temple, and he was not. he was tearing down the false interpretation of the law that the Pharisees and Sadducees had of the day. So for example, when he would say things like, you have heard in times past that it was said unto you, the sense in which he's citing the Old Testament, yes, but then he's also doing away with the Pharisaic interpretation of the law, and he would give the true meaning. And so that's its fulfillment. What is the role of the law for us today? The law, still applies in certain respects because when, what do we talk about? We're talking about the law as a means of justification. So if we want to be made right with God, don't look to the law because that's not its purpose. Okay, so then what is the purpose of the law? It has other purposes. And so your question, who is the law for? Well, it's for everyone. So the question is sort of, it can be simplistic, but the answer really isn't. It's more complex. And that's why, at the beginning, I was saying that this is teaching that is very much needed. Go ahead, Leti. Don't give me that confused look. Just kidding. No, it was not to do with this. Romans says, the righteous shall live by faith. Yeah. Does that? Yeah, that's a very, that's a really good question too, Lati. Because, yeah, we were taught differently in the Word of Faith movement, the righteous shall live by faith, meaning everything that happens in your life, your faith is the cause of it. In other words, your belief, the righteous shall live by faith, meaning your faith is a force that you send out and you make things happen. That's not the meaning, the righteous shall live. In other words, God is not going to kill you now because you trust him. The righteous will live, or rather, your life will be spared if you trust God. You shall live by faith. Does that make, do you understand? And yeah, when you get taught differently, man, it's hard to get rid of bad teaching. Yes, and that's huge with with Martin Luther But it was before Martin Luther too, but he was known for yeah, I know anyone else You weren't told works will save you. Yeah, so Brother Raul is saying that when he used to go to church as when he was much younger, they would affirm officially that salvation was not by works. So you're saying that what they said was one thing, but what they practice was different. What was different is that they won't tell you salvation if it comes through works, but keeping. Yes, yeah, that's a very common error. Raul is saying that you don't get in Christ, you don't receive salvation by works, you get in by faith, but then after that, then you gotta maintain yourself through works. Now, I don't think they would officially teach that, but I think in practice, that's what would be conveyed, right? Yeah. Yeah. In other words, you start off by faith, but you finish by the flesh. I mean, it's a very common error. And it brings misery, because I've been… It's very deceitful. That's why I think that… I was telling a person this week that even in the very first… I mean, obviously, because we've studied There were already people that were going in there and teaching something like that. Yeah, yeah. Even before the church got started, Raul is saying that this error has been around since the very beginning in the New Testament church. This is exactly what many in the church were teaching, that okay, Jesus, you believe in him partly to be saved, but you still need circumcision and you still need to keep the law of Moses and the combination of the two, that's how you'll be accepted by God. Anyways, I can't see the clock, but I think I have gone over. All right, how many of you guys enjoyed the study? So I'd like to teach on the doctrine of the church, but I thought, man, the very first thing that I have to get away is what exactly is the church?