God, you are so good to welcome us with open arms. Thank you for this beautiful opportunity we've had already to worship you in song and in scripture and in prayer and in contemplation. We are so thankful for your grace that pursues us, that reconciles us to you, that redeems us from the pit, that justifies us as if we'd never sinned, and that changes us to live a life for you because we want to. Motivated by your love, motivated by your freedom, and by your victory, we are so thankful that we can sing of this and pray of it communicate about it. And I pray that as we study your word, you would help us to even make a little progress today in understanding it. Your gospel is so sweet. It is simple enough to be understood by a child and yet mysterious enough and deep enough for the greatest minds to wade into and never truly and fully solve it. So we praise you for your greatness, for your glory, for your majesty, and for your grace. Father, I declare my dependence upon you. I recognize again this morning I've got nothing without you. And so I pray that you would feed your people through your word. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Who decides at the end of the day and at the end of the age? Who decides the destiny of every soul? Who ultimately decides whether someone is saved or not? Simply put, God does. God decides. God is the judge and the only judge. So the question is, upon what basis does God make his judgment? As it relates to every human soul, upon what basis does God make his decree, make his judgment? Heaven or hell, saved or lost? To make it real, Like if you were to stand before God today, the only holy judge, and he were to bang his gavel on his desk as it relates to your eternal destiny, upon what basis would God make his verdict? With that, would you take your Bibles with me and go to Galatians chapter two. Galatians chapter two this morning. Last week we dove into this text. and into a fascinating moment in church history when you had literally two apostles kind of going at it at a church potluck. And you may remember that Paul got in Peter's face for gospel compromise. Now Peter didn't actually compromise the gospel in his words. It's not like Peter was standing up at the church picnic and preaching a false gospel. He hadn't written to the church a letter that contained a false gospel, but rather Peter had compromised the true gospel, preaching essentially a false gospel by his actions. Perhaps you will remember that we illustrated this with these two tables. that before certain people came from Jerusalem, Peter was hanging out with the Gentile peeps there in Antioch. And in all manner of speaking, it was good. Like, things were great. Peter was hanging out here, eating pork chops with these people, and yet another group of people came from Jerusalem, and the text tells us they came from James. We don't know exactly if they were sent by James or if they just claimed to be from James, but they are connected in some way to a group that the text tells us is the circumcision party. This circumcision party was a group of people that were saying, Jesus is good, grace is good, faith is good, but in order to be fully in Christ, in order to be a true Christian, you need to be circumcised and you need to agree to keep the Mosaic law. You need to be faithful to keep the law. In effect, they were preaching a works-based righteousness. And so they come and they set up an entirely different table. Alright, maybe they're checking out things at Antioch and they set up an entirely different table away from these guys and their table is entirely kosher. Everything on this table is very carefully kosher in order to satisfy the demands of the Mosaic Law. And when that happened, Peter turned his back on this table and he goes over there. And for a period of time, he exclusively associates with those guys. Such that the people at this table, the Gentile believers there in Antioch, begin to question, are we all the way in? Is it actually necessary for us to be circumcised? Friends, this was the compromise that Paul is confronting. So Paul watches this unfold and eventually he says, enough is enough, and he gets in Peter's face. Now, I brought to you two applications last week. that I want to kind of reiterate simply and briefly for you this morning because I want to make sure you guys understand that I'm just drawing these straight out of the text, okay? These are not like hot buttons for me that I've cherry picked, all right? I'm pulling these straight out of the text. So in application for us, because I think we need to think this through in terms of how could we do the same thing? Like, we're not above Peter, right? We could also compromise the gospel in words, yes, but also in our actions. And so last week I brought to you this gospel compromise that is a possibility for us in terms of an unnecessary separation. An unnecessary separation. And I brought that to you because that's exactly what Peter did. I want to make sure you see that in the text, okay? When Peter went over there and turned his back on these people, he was separating from the Gentile believers in an unnecessary way, and that hypocrisy compromised, in Paul's mind, compromised the gospel. And so I said to you last week, we've got to be careful. It is necessary to separate when the gospel is compromised. By the way, just as a note of clarity, When I was talking about that necessary separation, I was talking about that in terms of an ecclesial separation. So we as a church gathered together and as a church organization, we don't fellowship with, for example, the Catholic Church or the Jehovah's Witness Church. or the Mormon church because they preach a different gospel. By no means did I say that you need to separate from your co-workers who perhaps claim to be Catholic, right, or Jehovah's Witness. They need you to befriend them and share with them the true gospel. So we're not looking to separate from people that we're in life with. We're talking a more ecclesial separation. We have to be careful as a church that when the core tenets of our faith and certainly the gospel doctrine we believe, when people espouse that, we need to be looking to unify and looking to put our arms around people that believe the same things we do. Perhaps they are practicing things a little bit different, but we can say, hey, praise God for you, brother, because we are indeed brothers, amen? and we will share eternity with them. So we have to be careful about an unnecessary separation. The second thing that I brought to you last week, I gotta think of it for a moment, or maybe I need to cheat. We talked about a uniform culture, all right? And again, I want you to understand that this is coming straight out of the text, all right? This unnecessary separation, this is exactly what Peter did. And the uniform culture that we talked about, this is exactly what the Judaizers wanted. They wanted one table. Effectively, they would have loved to have seen the Antioch church adopt a practice to say, this table is out. It's phased out. We're all actually over there. And so lay aside all your cultural stuff, Gentiles, all right? And let's come together underneath the Mosaic law. I said to you last week, what we need to strive for is unity apart from uniformity. When the church of Jesus Christ has unity, not uniformity, that's a beautiful apologetic for the gospel. It states very clearly and loudly that what unites us here is Jesus. So many of you ladies who decorate tables, you guys love centerpieces, right? Don't you? You can shake your head. You guys love centerpieces. Dudes don't care. It's just like, throw the barbecue up here. We don't care. All right, but ladies, because they're refined and dignified and wonderful, they love centerpieces. The point here is to say that the centerpiece of the tables we gather around needs to be Jesus Christ, him crucified, the gospel of Jesus Christ, nothing else, amen? That's the centerpiece. That's not what was the centerpiece over there. It was circumcision. It was faithfulness to the Mosaic law. It was a bunch of other things. And so Paul gets in Peter's face to say, not appropriate. In fact, you are confusing everyone. All right, you're compromising the gospel and you needed to be called out. So, all that is a way of review. A question I want to engage with you right now though is this. Perhaps you had this question last week. Why in the world was Peter vulnerable to that to begin with? Why was Peter in this moment vulnerable to that to begin with? Now, if you look at your text, you'll notice with me, again, this is Galatians 2, 11 through 14, that certainly fear was involved. Right, Paul tells us that he feared the circumcision party. However, I want to ask the question that kind of goes beneath that and ask, what was beneath that fear of the circumcision party? Anything we are afraid of, there is something beneath it that is causing us to have a kind of fear. And so as we think about that question, I think what we will discover today and I think helpfully think about is that I think at one level, at one level, Peter's compromise in this moment is understandable. You see, for the Jewish people, there was essentially two kinds of people, two categories of people. You had, again, this is under the old covenant, really two kinds of people. There were Jews, And then there was everyone else, Jews and Gentiles. There were God's people, people that were faithful underneath the Mosaic law, thus they were morally distinct via the law, and they were holy. As opposed to everyone else in society that were not underneath the Mosaic law, thus they were lawless, or you might say pagan. Immoral. Why? Because they weren't even cognizant of the Mosaic Law, not even functioning remotely underneath its requirements. Thus, to the Jewish mind, they were morally and socially repugnant. They were idolaters. They were worldly. So the Jews were God's people. This is their mindset. We're God's people. We are lawful, as opposed to the Gentiles. We're not God's people. They were immoral. okay? In fact, morally repugnant because they are identified with the world and not with God. In fact, I think you can see this in your text. If you look down with me at Galatians chapter 2, notice verse 15. We're going to come back to this, but understand that this is a continuation of the scene, okay? Two tables, there at the potluck in Antioch, and this is Paul's speech. Okay, so think about it this way. When Paul got in Peter's face, he eventually gives a speech in front of all the church people, and this is what he says. Verse 15, we ourselves, this is Paul to Peter saying, Paul, or excuse me, Peter, you know that we, we, we're alike in our upbringing. We ourselves are Jews by birth and not, note the next phrase, Gentile sinners. Well, what in the world does this mean? Does Paul mean that he and Peter weren't sinners as we tend to think of it? Well, of course not. What Paul is getting at is really this kind of distinction. We, Peter, you and I, we grew up underneath the Mosaic law. We grew up believing that we needed to keep this and do so meticulously. Thus, we are in a different category from these other people who aren't even aware of these laws. So what he's saying in verse 15 is not that he and Peter weren't sinners. What he's saying is that we grew up entirely different. We were not in that category of lawlessness. We're all sinners. But Peter, you and I had the law and they didn't. Thus, I think you can begin to see the conundrum, the difficulty. Because for the Jewish mind, for the Jewish believer, think Peter, he grew up with this understanding that the dividing line between God's people and the rest of society was the law. It was God's moral standard. Thus, in Christ, it was very easy for many early in the church to just sort of maintain these distinctions. Okay, so look at the screen for a moment. You see Jew Gentile. For many early in the church's history, they maintained those distinctions and just sort of titled them different, right? It's a Jewish Christian. Now, and then everyone else, and someone might say, well, what about the Jews who got saved? Well, they would have said, they become, or excuse me, the Gentiles that get saved, they become effectively Jewish Christians. Why? Because on their way into the church, what happens? The males get circumcised, and they sign their name on the bottom line to say, I will faithfully keep the Mosaic Law. I'll sort of earn my way in, earn my right to be in this family. Gentiles could become Christians but a certain way, along a certain path. Thus there was lots of confusion in the early church. And at a level I think we can understand that it was indeed understandable. I mean, guys, think about texts like these. Perhaps this is a little too small to read. If so, I apologize, but I'll read it for you. Leviticus chapter 20, 23 through 26. This is just one little snapshot of the book of Leviticus and a bevy of laws that I could read to you that the Jewish mind would have subscribed to, especially someone like Peter or Paul, This guy who was like, man, I was all about the law. All about the law. They would have known texts like these. Okay, and this is what was ingrained in them. Think about it. Leviticus 20, verse 23. God here says, and you shall not walk in the customs of the nation that I am driving out before you. I am the Lord your God, who has separated you from the peoples You shall therefore separate the clean beast from the unclean and the unclean bird from the clean. You shall not make yourselves detestable. I mean, think about this language. You shall not make yourselves detestable by beast or by bird or by anything with which the ground crawls, which I have set apart for you to hold unclean. You shall be holy to me For I the Lord am holy and have separated you from the peoples that you should be mine. So God's people under the old covenant, God's people were to follow his customs, follow his laws, follow his norms, and thereby bring honor and glory to him as a distinct people. completely separate from the rest of the world. And so I think a common statement in the early church would have been something like this. Well, in Christ, it's not like God's standards are lowered, right? Are we saying here in this new thing in Jesus Christ that God's standards of holiness are lowered or lessened? Thus, for many early in the church, their mindset was, I'll never eat that food in that place. Never. Right? I'll never get a tattoo or sway to that tune. Unthinkable. Right? And at a level, hear me, at a level, I think we can understand that it is understandable. So Peter's compromise in this moment is a bit understandable. Why? Because that table over there, he felt more natural there. You got tracking with me? He felt way more natural over there. This is appealing more so to his upbringing and what was sort of ingrained in him, right? This is effectively in a natural condition, Peter's jam. And I think you'll see that in a text we're gonna go to here in a moment. Because I wanna say while it was understandable at a level, it was nevertheless inexcusable. This moment in Galatians chapter two, while understandable at a level, was nevertheless inexcusable. So if you would take your Bibles and go with me to Acts chapter 11. Let's go there together, please. I would love for you to see this. I think Paul is saying to Peter in this moment, dude, you of all people should have known better. You should have known better. This is fascinating, guys, fascinating. So we're not going to read all of chapter 10. In fact, Peter in chapter 11 is going to summarize a good bit of it. But let me just summarize it briefly for a moment, and then we'll dive into chapter 11 for a few moments. So Peter gets this vision, okay? Again, this is early under the new covenant, but Peter gets this vision of God, it's of a sheet, and just for sake of simple illustration, God brings a pig before him on this kind of first century movie theater screen, all right? And Peter is seeing this, and he sees a pig, and God says to him, through this vision, in fact, if you have a red letter edition, you'll find that it's the words of Christ, likely, in this vision. God says to him, Christ says to him, rise, kill, and eat. And Peter's response, you can read it for yourself in chapter 10. Peter's response is, no way! Kind of what I was just talking about. Peter's response is, no way, I've never tasted that and never would. God, why? I'm a good Jewish boy. I have been raised believing this was wrong, okay? This was morally wrong. So Peter says, no, never, I'll never do it. And so God says, hey, wait a second, Peter, I'm God, you're not. All right, track with this, friends. God says, I'm God, you're not. And so God gives him this vision three times, three separate times, because it took a while to get through Peter's dense skull, right? God's like, I'm on the throne, okay, you're not. So God gives him this vision three times. And it was very relevant because right after the vision, some messengers come from a guy named Cornelius. And God had told him in this vision, when these guys come, I want you to go with them without even asking, okay? Without compulsion, just go with these guys because I have something for you to do. And so, effectively what is happening is that there was a man who was a Gentile named Cornelius and He was a God-fearer. In some ways you might say he was a believer under the old covenant. He hears about Jesus and is pursuing that, is seeking that. He sends these messengers to Peter. Peter goes, and when he goes, he preaches the gospel and the Holy Spirit. that fell on Peter and the other apostles in the early church there in Acts chapter two, the Holy Spirit falls upon Cornelius and his entire household in the same way, and Peter is blown away. And he's like, the grace of God, the grace of God has saved this man and has saved everyone in his house apart from, this is important, apart from the Mosaic law, simply by faith. by grace, through faith, alone. Well, guess what happened? Peter goes into Cornelius' house, which was unthinkable for a Jew, all right, to go into a Gentile's house, and he ends up fellowshipping with him. The vision was fresh in his mind, fellowshiping with him. You can imagine the first table, and they're having some good old crispy bacon up in Cornelius' house. And the church in Jerusalem hears about this, guys. The church in Jerusalem hears about this, and many down there throw a fit. And their mindset is, what's up with Peter? What's up with this kind of compromise? Like, this is not cool. The Mosaic Law still remains, their mindset. Okay, so Peter's gonna have to answer for his actions. So see it for yourself in Acts chapter 11. Now the apostles and the brothers who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God. So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcision party, isn't this interesting, a lot of the same things we're seeing in Galatians 2. Same language, even same context. The circumcision party criticized him saying, You, Peter, you went to uncircumcised men and ate with them? But Peter began and explained it to them in order. He's like, guys, just hear me out for a moment. By the way, this is a beautiful moment in church history. Beautiful moment. Verse five. Peter says, I was in the city of Joppa praying. And in a trance, I saw a vision, something like a great sheet descending, being let down from heaven by its four corners. And it came down to me. Looking at it closely, I observed animals and beasts of prey and reptiles and birds of the air. You just read about that in Leviticus. So Peter instinctively is like, no, no, unclean, verse seven. And I heard a voice saying to me, rise, Peter, kill and eat. But I said, by no means, Lord. For nothing common, nothing common or unclean has ever entered my mouth. Pause right here. Parenthetically, I wanna say, really? Like he never snacked on a little piece of bacon, never? I don't know. I'm not sure I'm buying it, Peter. All right, verse nine. The point there is he's horrified. It's not clean. Verse nine. But the voice answered a second time from heaven, what God, remember what I said? Peter, I'm God, you're not. There's one being on the throne. It's not you, Peter. What God has made clean, do not call common. This happened, Peter says, three times. and all was drawn up again into heaven. And behold, at that very moment, three men arrived at the house in which we were, sent to me from Caesarea, and the Spirit told me to go with them, making no distinction. These six brothers also accompanied me, and we entered the man's house. Skip down to verse 15. As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them, just as on us at the beginning, verse 16, and I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. If then, this is Peter's argument to the early church. If then, verse 17, God gave the same gift to them, as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. Who was I that I could stand in God's way? Verse 18, when they heard these things, they fell silent and they glorified God saying, then to the Gentiles also, God has granted repentance that leads to life. I feel like we should clap at this point. Partly, yeah, you know what? Partly because I think this is a beautiful example of like the church, these people that are there, they actually listened. Guys, can you imagine like a political debate where one guy's like, just hear me out on this logic and the other guy's like, you know what? I agree. No chance, right? In this moment, these people are all hopping mad, like, Peter, what are you doing? You're going soft, you're going liberal, you were eating with Gentiles, what's going on, man? And Peter is like, just guys, hear me out. And he walks them through how God himself brought his word, and he compelled them, and they actually listened, and they glorified God. They're like, okay, I guess we were wrong. Now, pause right here for a moment. Do we realize what we just read in light of Galatians 2? This is happening before, probably several years before what happens in Galatians 2. In Acts 11, Peter was in the opposite position. He was being called onto the carpet for associating with the Gentiles, right? And in that moment, he makes a strong defense to say, guys, nothing additional is required. Gentiles can access salvation by grace, through faith in Jesus, period. Nothing more. They don't need to be circumcised. They don't need to be faithful to keep the law. They need to simply believe, trust in Christ alone. In fact, I witnessed it. I saw the Spirit of God impact these hearts and dwell these new believers and God changed them. And I witnessed it. I witnessed the grace of God on display. This is what Peter says to these people here in Acts chapter 11. And I think this is why. Guys, in Galatians chapter two, what Peter does is inexcusable. He should have, of all people, he should have known better. Which is why Paul is like so agitated to say, okay, we have to settle this. Because your actions right now are going back on your words. You're acting hypocritically. And so Paul gets in Peter's face and does so publicly to say, you're acting right now like actually it is necessary for these believers over here to be circumcised and to be faithful to keep the law. actual fact, you are communicating, Peter, salvation by works. Now with that in mind, let's go back to Galatians chapter 2. Okay? Please continue to track with me. Galatians chapter 2, Paul here effectively says, it's inexcusable what's going down. And in this speech, He begins to lay down an argument that I think is so beautiful and so important for us as a church. And we're not going to fully digest this argument because he continues it for a couple chapters, all right? But it's a lot to do with a word that's really important for our faith. See it for yourself again, verse 15. Again, this is Paul's speech in that moment there in Antioch. We ourselves, he says, are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners. Yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ. So we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law. Because by works of the law, no one will be justified. So again, verse 15, Paul says to Peter, we, of all people, we know what it's like to be underneath the Mosaic law. You and I were raised underneath the Mosaic law. We were not lawless. In fact, Paul elsewhere, for example, Philippians chapter three says, I was meticulous under that law. Okay, probably far more meticulous than Peter, who was a fisherman in Galilee. Paul was on his way through the ranks to be a Pharisee of the highest rank. Okay, so Paul's like, I know what it's like underneath the law. Peter, you know what it was like underneath the law and we were meticulous about it. So we actually are in the best position in this entire room, we're in the best position to understand that being faithful to the law did nothing. to earn righteousness for us. You say, Dustin, where do you get the word righteousness? Well, look at your text, verse 16, and notice with me a word that's repeated there three times. Three straight times. It's the word justified. Justified. Justified. This takes our mind and our hearts before a bench. before a judge, it's a judicial term. And it gets back to that opening question, upon what basis does the judge of the universe, the God, the decider, upon what basis does he bring his gavel down upon his desk for a human soul? Upon what basis? And friends, notice with me your text. With that imagery of a judge in mind and of a bench in mind, note your text. What does verse 16 say? And again, this is Paul's argument to Peter. We know. Peter, we know that a person is not justified. The word justification means declared righteous. It's a judge saying, I declare you something. Innocent, guilty. justified or not. Justification is God declaring a soul to be righteous before him, to be made right with him, and able to be adopted into his family. So Paul is saying, verse 16, what? Peter, we know something. We know that a person is not declared righteous by the judge, by works of the law, but through what? through faith in Jesus Christ. For by the works of the law, end of verse 16, no flesh will be justified. No one will be declared righteous by the judge because they performed. So Paul effectively before the church is saying to Peter, Peter, you know good and well, you know good and well that God never said, wow, Paul. In A.D. 37, your little thermometer that tracked your Bible reading, it got high enough for you to be clicked over into the righteous category. That's what Paul is saying. Peter, you know that's not the case. Right? In fact, you and I are in a good position to know that I was far from God as someone who was meticulous to keep the Mosaic Law. I was far from God. How was Paul justified? Not because he was faithful. Paul was justified when Jesus stopped him in his tracks on the road to Damascus and Paul recognized, I've had it all wrong this whole time. This whole time I thought I could, in myself and in my strength, please God. I could be righteous. And God stopped me in my tracks and I encountered Jesus, the Messiah, who I didn't think I needed before. But now I recognize He's the one I need. Apart from Him, I can do nothing. This is the moment, guys, this is the moment that Paul was justified. That's the moment when he was effectively clicked over into that righteous category by the judge. It had nothing to do with his performance. Amen is right. It had nothing to do with his performance. So, likewise, likewise, and this is important, guys, track with this. Likewise, Paul is effectively saying to Peter, you know that you are in the best position to know that God never said to Cornelius, wow, Cornelius, man, when you got circumcised, and when you cleaned out your fridge, and you covered your Roman tattoos, that was the moment, I saw that, I just want you to know, Cornelius, I saw that, and that clicked you over into the righteous category. Paul is saying, Peter, you know that's true. So why are you acting like it's necessary? Tracking with us, friends? That's the confrontation. And one of the reasons it's so meaningful for us today is for us to be reminded and perhaps assured this morning, first of all, that your salvation, our salvation is not riding on you. or anything you could ever offer. Amen is right. Perhaps you are here today and you're going like, this is all interesting, but I definitely am not a Christian. And some of this is all hitting me like for the first time. Can I just say to you, friend, if that's you, I'm just saying that Jesus died for you. Jesus died for you so that you could be saved, you could be forgiven, and it doesn't require that you would perform. It doesn't require that you would do anything other than recognize I'm a sinner. I have broken God's law in countless ways. I'm an idolater at heart. To turn from that to trust in Christ alone, this one who wants you and died to redeem you, we would invite you to trust him today. Okay? But if you're a Christian, if you're a Christian, is this not beautiful hope for us? Is this not beautiful, blessed assurance? That we can sing he's mine and I'm his, not because I've performed well, not because I've done well, not because I've satisfied certain requirements, but simply by faith that God just showered me with grace. It's a phenomenal thought. And I hope that this brings your heart hope and courage and help, especially because we are naturally, I think a lot like Peter, we are naturally prone to assume that God is satisfied with us and or pleased with us when we perform well. Why was Peter over there at that table? The text tells us that he feared the circumcision party. It's very likely, my friends, it's very likely. We don't know exactly Peter's motives. It's very likely that he was concerned about his reputation. People back there in Jerusalem are gonna think that I've gone soft. I've gone weak. All right? What is that? In a very subtle way. The focus is shifted upon himself and what he's doing, his performance. We're all tempted this way. Could I just remind you this morning, if you are a believer and you've been trusting in Jesus for a long time, could I remind you again today, your salvation has nothing to do with you. Amen is right. It has everything to do with what Jesus has done for you. It's a beautiful thing. I don't know if we know this song. I have it written down here somewhere. Maybe I can remember it. I don't know that we know the song, but it goes like this. No list of sins that I have not done. No list of virtues that I pursued. No list of those I am not like. can earn myself a place with you. But God be merciful to me. I am a sinner through and through. My only hope of righteousness is not in me. It's only you. Is that our song? I hope it is. Our salvation is not riding on us. Secondly, our culture must reflect this truth. Guys, our culture here must reflect this reality. We must guard against front-loading the gospel with words or actions that imply actually certain requirements are necessary in order for you to be fully in. We must guard against front-loading the gospel to say unless these things are true, someone cannot be a true Christian. We don't have time to go to Acts chapter 15, but I wanted you to see, and I just would encourage you to do this in your own time. I wanted you to see how this is resolved finally with Peter. It is a raging debate in the early church, but it gets settled in Acts chapter 15, and you can just read the first half, really, of that chapter, maybe in your own time this afternoon or in community groups, and see it for yourself there that Peter, he comes back to the truth. This moment in Galatians 2 helps Peter see the light, and in fact, at the Jerusalem council, he stands up and articulates exactly what Paul articulated to him, that Gentiles, all people, are able to access God's grace and salvation by faith alone, not by adopting certain requirements. So our culture must reflect this truth that everyone, no matter where they come from, everyone is welcome at the table by God's grace through faith alone. Amen? Everyone. This is our hope. This is our song. Let's pray. God, thank you so much for your grace. We are so thankful that you do not just put in front of us a list of requirements that we have to check off and accomplish in order to merit favor with you. For Father, we understand that we could never keep that list and that in trying, we will just be either proud or guilty. proud when we think we've kept it and guilty when we realize we definitely haven't. So thank you that you make it clear through your word that you declare people righteous, right with you on the basis of what Christ has done for them and their simple reception of it. We thank you and we praise you in Jesus' name.