We have just confessed in our worship service the articles of our Christian faith as they are summarized in the Apostles' Creed. And we consider, we continue to expound the truth of that creed within the creed of the Heidelberg Catechism and according to its explanation. We are at the point in our exposition of Christian doctrine of pondering together the words of the stages of Christ's own coming down and going up. We call that his humiliation. and his exaltation. So when we say, I believe in God the Father, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, our Lord, and then we say that he was conceived by the Virgin Mary, and by the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary, and suffered under Pontius Pilate, and was crucified, dead, and buried, and descended into hell, that's what we're considering at this time, the humiliation of Jesus, And if you would turn in the back of your Psalter hymnals to number, page 22, Lord's Day 15, we're going through Lord's Days 14 through 16 together, you find what fathers have thought about the suffering of Christ, this amazing event and humiliation of our Savior. And the question is asked, what do you understand by the word suffered? And the answer we give, though it's only partial, of course, we understand that during his whole life on earth, but especially at the end, Christ sustained in body and soul the anger of God against the sin of the whole human race. This he did in order that by his suffering, as the only atoning sacrifice, he might set us free, body and soul, from eternal condemnation and gain for us God's grace, righteousness, and eternal life. And the question, why did he suffer under Pontius Pilate as judge? The answer is, so that he, though innocent, might be condemned by a civil judge, and so set us free from the severe judgment of God that was to fall on us. And then, is it significant that he was crucified instead of dying some other way? Yes. We could put three yeses there. Yes, yes, yes. This death convinces me that he shouldered the curse which lay on me, since death by crucifixion was accursed by God." Now, we'll stop there and just pondering those words, but we've been pondering those words not only, but all that the Scripture, Old Testament and New, has to say about the sufferings of Christ and then the glory that should follow. And we've been considering, and we shall tonight, the inspired commentary that the Apostle Paul was given to write in Philippians chapter 2 and verses 5 through 8. Let's read the first 11 verses to get the context of this amazing passage, Philippians 2, 5 through 8, and hear the word of God at Philippians chapter 2. Therefore, if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other or others better than himself. Let each of you look not only for his, look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. Then this, we'll concentrate on this. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. who being in the form of God did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation or emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore, God also hath highly exalted him and given him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of those in heaven and of those on earth and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father." And then we have a great therefore, a response. We'll get to that later. But here we have this grand chapter of the humiliation of Jesus Christ, the suffering of Christ, the stepping down of Christ from heaven to our earth, all the way to be plunged into death and the grave and hell itself. And it is said specifically that the response we are to have to this teaching of God's truth is to have a certain mind. and even the mind of Jesus, for the text says, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, and so on. There's a mighty head and a mind we are to have as we mind the things of the mind of Christ, which to have is to have the most glorious mindset, and it's to have something that is precious to us, sanctified minds, even the mind of Christ. And that, in his humiliation, is worth everything we could ever learn from God. Himself, I speak as a man, to have the mind of Christ. We are prone with the world, however, to ask, even at this point, even where God would reveal holy things, we're prone to ask, what was he thinking? And as we noted last time, the world asks that when it thinks that somebody did something rather silly and unbecoming. What was he thinking when he walked out into the middle of the road and got hit? What was she thinking when she sold her body to prostitution? What were the parents thinking when they let their kids go and sent them to the public school and didn't have any supervision and let them decide for themselves what gender they should be? What were they thinking? Now, some people even think that way and ask that question about Jesus and the Christian religion based on Jesus. What was he thinking, they say rather mockingly in complete unbelief. That's a silly thing. Why come down? Why leave the riches of heaven if heaven there is and riches there are in heaven, as you Christians say there are? Why? It doesn't seem to make sense to us. Can't wrap your mind around it. And children and those who may be new to the faith, remember, that's not such a bad thing that we can't wrap our mind around the things of Christianity. It's all really beyond us, and except God gives us a little glimpse into things divine, and even to the mind of Christ, we shall be hopelessly at sea and not understanding a thing. So we do want to ask that question, though, as we expound the truth of the mind of Christ here, His mind, and then the mind we should have, and to ask ourselves what was He thinking, but not in disbelief or discouragement or even mockery, of course not, but in faith, in faith. I want us each and myself to ask the question tonight, even as we're saying some positive statements, What was he thinking, really? What does it say, what does it say when it says, what does the Bible mean when it says, let this mind be in Christ Jesus, in you, which was also in Christ Jesus? He had a certain mind, there was a certain inclination or bent that he had to come down. What was he saying, what was he thinking, what was he intending? And I dare say that asking the question by faith and really wanting to know will lead us from unbelief and from faith then to wonder and to activity, to having the mind of Christ and living a life that is in conformity to the will of God, to God's praise and our satisfaction not only but our delight. So let's have the mind of Christ as we consider the mind of the humbled Christ. First of all, his mind and then ours. And then we ask the question in application. So what are you thinking tonight? Beloved congregation. Friends in Christ, what are you thinking? What shall we be thinking? When we come away from this word, having been fed, Christ came down. That's the truth of this text. It's the truth of the Christian faith, the apostles' creed. I believe in God Almighty, God the Father Almighty, the maker of heaven and earth. He's above it all. He made it. And in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, he's God. He's with God. And yet, he is the one who is conceived of the Holy Ghost in a womb, a virgin womb. And he suffers under Pontius Pilate, and the creed makes a point of saying that. And it's for the reason of reminding us that the judges of the earth were condemning Jesus, but also simply to say to us this was historical. Something happened in the first century AD, and there was a Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea, and Jesus suffered under him at that point. This is not an ahistorical religion and confession that's being presented here for our consideration. Christianity is not just about things eternal, but it's about things that happened in time and that are happening in time. Christianity is the marvelous religion of God intersecting time, and incarnation is all about that. And there's this sanctification of all the time called the filling up of time when Jesus steps into it. and things are never the same, and the words of God are fulfilled, and the vanity we are given in the vanity hope because of this. But he came down. That's the thing we began to expound, and we got a little ways in this. Jesus Christ, in the form of God, he came down. The form of God, that's where the starting place is. Jesus Christ is God. This is the prior Lord's days. He's the only begotten Son of God. The form of God is another way of saying that. Not just an outward form, but it's a form. It's a morphe used only here and then of himself who came and took the form of a bondservant. Morphe there too, a real bondservant, a real God. The reality of his godship is brought out also in the verb, the participle, being in the form of God, which is a unique verb here. It's not just the ordinary word for he is in the form of God and was. He is and always was is the idea. Always was this one who manifested himself to be God, he had this form, this manifestation, that he is God. As the rest of the scripture so clearly says, ascribing to him divinity, names, honors, and works like creation, Jesus is God. That's the start of it. That's where he started. If we can say started, this is an eternal decree of God. This is this mind of Jesus, that's what we must remember, which is eternal in the first place, his mind being God's mind. And he knows the end from the beginning, and the counsel of God is reflecting, this will of God reflects the eternal mind of God in the Son as well as the Father and the Holy Spirit. But then as he's contemplating going down, this is the idea here, he considered it, he did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, meaning he didn't see it as a thing to be grasped at and clutched onto so that he might not come into this world. That's the idea here of this word. He didn't think that his being in the form of God and being glorious up there was some kind of an excuse for his not to come down, to condescend, and perhaps contradict his godness, no. He was fulfilling the eternal word and the word of Isaiah in chapter 67, I believe, which says that God inhabits eternity also is the one who dwells with him who is meek and lowly. Beautiful, beautiful verb, Isaiah 57, I think. And so there's this divine possibility that he's contemplating here. It's possible for him to be God, and yet not to grasp onto his Godhead so that would prevent him from coming down. It would be like a dead end. I'm not going to go that way, as if he's conflicted in his mind. No, he considers this, he considers this, but he doesn't consider this. In his mind to come down, he's driven by this mind. There will be nothing in the way, not even his Godhead. Not even the glory of being with the Father and the felicity and happiness and joy of heaven, that's not going to get in the way. Because even as God, I must become a man. I must take on another form, another existence, another reality, as it were, without changing my Godhead. I will be both at once." This is the mystery of this text, the mystery of our confession, the mystery of the whole Word of God. God, great the mystery of godliness, God manifested in the earth. Amazing. And so, positively then, his mind was to make himself of no reputation in the Greek language kenosis, to empty himself, and in that, to take the form of a bondservant and come in the likeness of men. The idea here, as we saw last time, is that Jesus did not empty himself of his divinity. No. His making himself of no reputation was not to say he's no longer God, no. Some have thought that. Those are the ones who say the incarnation is an impossibility without God becoming less than God. No, he didn't do that. Nor did Jesus. subtract from himself some sort of the virtues or some of the virtues that he had, as if now he's no longer possessed of omnipotence, all-powerfulness, children, or omniscience, so he couldn't know everything in his divine nature. nor wisdom and so on. Some have said that, but that's not the answer either because here's the problem with that. It contradicts the truth of theology, the truth of God wherever it's revealed in creation and in the Bible. And that is that God can never say no to himself in any way or deny to himself and have no longer part of himself. like a virtue, like a bit of power, like a bit of omniscience and knowledge and so on, then he wouldn't be God, you see. Logically, we can go that far anyway. These are first principles that God has writ large in creation. There is invisible reality of God that's impressed upon the creation. God is God. He's not this fickle man. He's not the Michigan weather. He's not someone who loses anything ever or adds to himself anything essentially ever either. And so Jesus emptied himself and as we saw last time, however we want to explain this, it's not that he lost his divinity or renounced part of his divinity, that's impossible. But he certainly did deny to himself certain prerogatives or rights of his divinity, didn't he? He was one who was not going to enjoy the glory with the Father for a time being in his humiliation. That's why at the end of his life, John 17, toward the end of his life, Jesus, just before he's crucified, prays this prayer. He says, Father, restore to me the glory I had with you before the earth was. What a glorious statement of his divinity, and then his humiliation, and now his seeking to be restored to this glory, which for a while he had denied himself the enjoyment of. So that certainly fits in the rest of the scripture and ties it all together, but still there's wonder, of course. And another way we have of explaining this, this kenosis, this making himself of no reputation as if he were no longer God, as if he were empty of his full Godhead, another way we have of explaining this is that he renounced for himself for a while independence. He became one who was under God. Him who was God became now under God, that is, a servant, a bondservant. He emptied himself, taking the form, the reality of a bondservant, a slave. Greek language, powerful, slaves. Jesus became a slave, to what? To the will of God. He did not come to do his own will, but fathers, he would constantly say, I am come, my meat and my drink. Children, Jesus ate and drank the will of God for breakfast, for lunch, for dinner. Now, remember that next time you're hungry and you cry out and complain for some food. Maybe you should be crying out, help me to do your will, God. Help me to be submissive. That's my meat and drink. In that, we all have to come to grips with one time or another, don't we? How about every day? I'm here as Jesus with this mind that He had. I come to do the will of my Father. So be it. That's a good thing. So he comes in this likeness of men. He comes and he's really man. That is not just to say he's kind of like a man. Some have said that's all that this means. No. He comes and he's really like men. And in fact, he's found in appearance as a man. That's what people thought he was. Because he was a man. But that's all they thought he was. That's all. A part of it is humiliation, it is disgrace. They don't know me. They know me as a man and they know that I have no form that people should desire me. I'm not even a special man as far as appearances go. I'm found just as a man. Just as an ordinary fellow, an ordinary son of Abraham, yes, indeed a son of Abraham, but a son of man, just like every other person that's born. And maybe people would think of him because he's a man, he's just a sinner as well, though he wasn't, but here he is. He's just this one who renounces himself, as it were, and enjoys this, or doesn't enjoy now the glory of God, but becomes just like this. And in that state now, we're talking humiliation, the Bible says he humbled himself. He became poor. He renounced. Every right he had, every claim to glory and to righteousness and so on, he renounced it all, became like us and in everything the same but sin, and became obedient even to the point of death, the death of the cross. Now, so the catechism is leading us all the way here, as far as Philippians goes, to the death of the cross, the death of the cross. And the catechism goes further in explaining what that was, that this was cursed of God, and that this meant he descended into hell and so on. And the catechism in the next Lord's Day we'll talk about is being buried and so on. But we're seeking here to plumb the depths because that's where the Bible leads us to and to contemplate. That's the whole idea of saying that Jesus had a certain mind and now you're going to have that mind too. You need that mind. If you're going to show that you're a Christian and a Christian church at Philippi, in Comstock Park, Grand Rapids, wherever, this is the same thing that's required of all of us that's given for us to contemplate, the same old, same old of which theologians have wrestled and with which they've wrestled this truth, but which ordinary folks like you and like I have thought also to contemplate that we might have that mind too. Jesus having a mind with regard to this means he was thinking upon this. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who thought about this. He thought, now, I don't think he was thinking to you that, OK, now I'll think about being in the form of God, and then I'll think and consider that I'm not going to hold on to my divinity and then prevent me becoming a human, and so on, as if he were thinking step by step. And all the obedience, and all the death of the cross, and all. He thinks. He thinks as God, but he thinks as, A human being, a perfect human being, all of this through, and as he's going through it, we tend to flatten out eternity in history or eternity as if eternity is the reality and history is not so real. There's no steps in it, there's no things that happen that make us ponder, things that happen that make us react, but Jesus becoming a man is in that history now. He's thinking as a man too. step by step, and the catechism is leading us all the way, as the Bible does, to the steps, and we're considering the Passion Week of Jesus, and it's Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday and Friday. It's day after day, and it's not, beloved, just another day at the office. It's another day when Jesus is thinking of these eternal things and these glorious things that are the will of God for him, and that are also his own intention, resolution, purpose. And that's what he's thinking. Let this mind be in you, who always was thinking about this. Moms and dads know what it's like when children have a certain book they're putting down, or they're reading and they can't put down, or a certain toy that they like to play with, activity they like to do, and they can't stop. They're obsessed with it. And they're always thinking about that. And we have to tell them, no, you stop. There's more important things, and you've got to come to dinner and all this stuff. It's good. But for Jesus, you see, The overarching plan of God and his being in the will of it and right in the thick of it as the center of the plan of God was always what he was thinking about. Not obsessed, but intentionally. Wasn't like he was just caught up and addicted to this mindset of his, as we can be. Certainly wasn't that he was biased, no, this is the divine meeting the human and the human and the divine and there's this amazing correlation here of the God mind and the human mind and they're one! And he's set on it. He's come for this. It's his main thought. All his life long, suffering actively and passively, suffering at the hands of men, and especially at the hands of God. Suffering in body, suffering in soul, that was the greatest. As one has said, the soul of Christ's suffering was the suffering of his soul, the heart of it. The soul of our Savior's suffering was the suffering of his soul. The contradiction of men, that was one thing. God the Father was well pleased with him. Men were not. They spit upon him. He's the Word of God. And men said, no, you're not. You're a liar. You're a false prophet. God said, this is my good son. They said, he's evil. But God also said, I lay my wrath upon you. That was the hardest thing to take. culminating in the crying out on the cross, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? I've been mindful of your will and why? Why? There's something there. Before that, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me, the cup of suffering. Jesus himself has this mind, but there's points at which he doesn't understand. has a mind, but he doesn't understand. The depths of suffering are such that they overwhelm him. They flood his mind. What Jesus has here, the virtue that's recommended here that we might have, and then I'll go on to my second point, is humility. Humility. Let this mind be in you, and the apostle's been speaking of humility, and loneliness of mind, verse three, let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look not only out, not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. And then it says, let this mind be in you, which is Christ. It's speaking of humility. It's speaking of not asserting yourself, but being selfless. Speaking of being one who knows what it is to be dependent on God, that's really what humility means. It's a virtue of being dependent on God, knowing that you are. In other words, it's a virtue that creatures are to have, and that makes them virtuous creatures, proper sons of the Creator. Humility. Now, Jesus is said here to have this mind of humility. How can that be? If he's God and the definition as it were of God is that he's not humble, he's not proud either, but he's high. And humility is the word which the Bible itself has to describe those who come to the earth and are of the earth and are creatures and they come from the dust and they go back to the dust and they need every breath from God and they need every food, a bit of food from God. They need all their sustenance, all their heart, every heartbeat and all their air or they just fall apart and fall away. And that's the mind that Jesus was to have, the mind of a humble person, selfless, renouncing his own ego, which wasn't selfish. But nevertheless, the Father was the one he was serving. And human beings, too, for whom he came to die, he was mindful of them. And he wasn't going to look out for his own rights and his own crown, but also the interests of others. And he went all the way to death. And this was for his glory, the glory of himself as well and of the church. I want to move on here, just speak of our mind. And we're called to have it here, called to have it. I began last time to remind ourselves that if we're to have the mind of Christ, who was in the form of God first, and that's where he started, we have to remember that's where we start in a way, in a very real way. You start, beloved, with God. You don't get to God by having the mind of Christ and thinking good thoughts and he pats you on the back and he assures your mind that you've thought well enough and now you're gonna be mine, no. It's because we're gods that we're called to have the mind of Christ and to not pretend that because we belong to God, that's what I mean, because we're gods, we belong to him. Because of that, we're not exempt from being in this earth and doing the hard things like serving and things we might think are beneath ourselves as Christians, like loving the ungodly. No, this is exactly what we're called to do here. Though you are those not in the form of God, but you are in the fellowship of God and partakers of the divine nature and have this glorious existence in God's fellowship, you got to come down off your ivory theological throne and out of the ivory theological palace and mingle with the world. And B, among people who are desperately in need, unbelievers not only, but also believers in the church. And this is the focus here of the apostle. In the church, there's people who need you to have the mind of Christ. In the church, there is conflict. And there are sinners, yes, duh. Just look at yourself. And they need you to be as Christ to them. That's the onus of this text, the burden. If there be any consolation in Christ, verse 1, any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit of Christ, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded one to another, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind, This is the point, and the great ground of it is the mind of Christ. Up came down that we might go up to be in this world serving and making ourselves of no reputation and emptying ourselves of all prerogatives and rights we might think we have, being countercultural, yes, in a culture full of those who assert their rights. We're called to deny ourself, take up the cross, and have the mind of Christ that we have already. You know, we already have the mind of Christ. If we're Christians, 1 Corinthians 2, we have that. Now you have to have it again, and again, and again. And the idea, of course, is all of these exhortations in the Bible are this way. They exhort us to be children of God and be holy because these exhortations are speaking to people who are the children of God and who are holy and yet who have a long way to go to be consistent children and perfectly holy. And so the call to have the mind of Christ is to have the mind you already have, but now start thinking with your mind. and turn off the television and the internet and put down the phone and stop majoring on thoughtless things and amusements. Be Christ's. It's a real struggle, isn't it? The Bible even says over and over in so many ways, don't mind earthly things. Don't. Even, you know, things that aren't bad. were to be as if they don't exist almost. 1 Corinthians 7. I say this even to newlyweds. If you're married, be as those who aren't. I say this to those who have the prospect of marriage. If you're not married, remember to stay that way. This is what the apostle says in that sanctified chapter of 1 Corinthians 7. If you're rich, be as those who don't have riches. If you're poor, be as those for whom it doesn't matter. Now this is the holy aloofness of a child of God for whom the world is passing away, you see, and for whom the world doesn't mean anything, not a thing compared to the fellowship of God and to serving God with all your stuff or even though you have no stuff that you'd like. Oh, if anything, any text, this text is a call for us to go outside of our comfort zone big time and have a mind which will be a mindset and which will give you a worldview and which will lead to an activity that is not crowned with anything but more suffering. and problems and conflict from one point of view. You know, Jesus had this mind and he himself faced such suffering and he had emptied himself as divine prerogatives and was this man of sorrows. But all the time he was being encouraged, like, for example, by the fact that he would do miracles, flashes of divine glory. And there was his baptism when God the Father said, I am pleased with this son. He begins his public mission and I'm pleased with him. I want him to know that. I want everybody around to know that. And then at the transfiguration, he's reminded as Jesus that yes, it's the will of the prophet Moses, the prophet Elijah and the lawgiver Moses that he go the way of the cross and that he is the one who's the glorious son who's, and there's glory that awaits. So Jesus was encouraged even in the humiliation, so much so that people have said that even before he's exalted in the resurrection and in the ascension, there is a very important part of humiliation, and it is called exaltation. Because the two are not separate. There's this coming down, but at the same time, the coming down of the Son of Man is glory for the Son of Man. and there's the encouragement of the Holy Spirit of God, press on, and there's glory that is to come in the way of obedience. Well, this is the same thing that we need to be encouraged by as we have the mind of Christ and we're seeking to have the Bible inform us more than CNN and Fox News and so on. As we're seeking to have Jesus speak to us and Jesus be our friend more than the world, We need to remember there's glory in this. There's a lifting up of the soul and finally of the body and resurrection for all of those who die in Jesus Christ, who flubbed it up all along to be sure, but whose heart was a heart after God's own heart because he puts it there. And whose mind was the mind of Christ, even though they weren't so mindful of the things of Christ, because God puts that mind in us. Never forget that. You start from glory. Because God has started, he's begun, as Paul says in Philippians 1, the work he has begun. And he's going to finish it too. Have the mind of Jesus. Read your Bibles, attend to the preaching of the gospel, be among each other, serving each other, being a blessing to each other. Being kind and not conceited and ambitious and selfish ambition or conceit. Esteem others highly. Take it on the chin when others mock you for this. And remember that the apostle himself says in Hebrews 12, 4, you have not yet resisted to blood. You think that your mind and your being mindful of Christian things and seeking to do them has led you to suffering? Which of us has resisted to blood? Which of us has been so pained and so inhibited by the world Which of us has had such faith and experienced such persecution for the sake of the cross? I dare say hardly any of us. Our shame is that we're ashamed of having this mind. It's meant for him death, cross, curse. It means for us who will follow Him, same thing, that we don't have to atone. But glory that awaits, that's what I want to leave you with. The glory's there, the encouragement's there all the time, but there's a glory that awaits. And all those who have the mind of Christ now will enjoy the mind of Christ forever. That mind will be to praise God forever in the communion of the bride, the church of Jesus Christ. Meanwhile, you persons with your minds, and you have great minds, you know, every single one of you. It's not about IQs. It's about grace. You have grace minds. You think according to the truth of grace in the gospel. That's what I love about you. It's beautiful to see the mind of Christ at work in you. And you minding the mind of Christ. And you seeking to get back on your horse when you fall off and be those who are reconciled at the cross and understand. Jesus' mind is to love you to the end. And therefore, you shall be loved to the end and beyond. The opposite of the proud mind is the mind we're given, the opposite of Pharaoh, who is God that I should let his people go, the opposite of Satan, who said you shall be as gods, having the mind of Christ and humility, is to say, we shall be servants of God in this church, in our world, with Christ's mind. What a great mind, what great grace. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Amen. Father, we pray that you would bless us To have the mind of Jesus, oh Lord, we thank you for that mind, that in him you've shown yourself mindful of our human frailty not only, but mindful that we are poor sinners in need of redemption. Thanks, Lord, for equipping us with the word of God. Now the preaching of the gospel for another week of intentional, resolute Christianity. God bless everyone. When our minds have been straying, Lord, bring them back. And we've forgotten that wonderful view you've given us of purpose in life, no matter what calling we have. We pray to remember it now, and never to forget it. Give us to pray, give us to be on bended knee as Jesus himself was, though he had the great mind of the perfect servant of the Lord. Give us, Father, to be dependent as we are in the humble state of our humanity and of sinners who need a Savior. Give, Lord, joy and peace and encouragement. Say to us, Father, every step of the way, these are my beloved sons in whom I am well pleased. These are mine, and I send my son to die for them, and they belong to him now, and they will forever be mine, and soon one day in glory. Bless this congregation. We go now in peace. We go now to be on the mission of the ages, reflecting the mind of God and the intentions of the Savior to save His own. Hear our prayer for Jesus' sake. In the pardon of sins, every one, we pray. Amen.