You would please turn to Deuteronomy chapter five. We're reading verse six. I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever. You may be seated. Let's pray. Gracious Father, please grant me strength to preach and your people strength to hear that we might be conformed more and more into the image of your Son, we ask in Jesus' precious name. This week, we met with a couple of elders, several elders from local churches, and it just happened that our brother Paul down at Redbud Bible Church, Many of you know, I wish everyone here knew our brother Paul. Anyway, he had preached from Deuteronomy 6 this past week, as we did as well, as our brother Isaac faithfully preached that passage. I just thought that was funny. But then, just shortly after that, I got an email from Scott, and he informed me that he was starting a series, I don't know if you saw this in the prayer request, I don't know if this made the prayer request, but he's starting a series on the Ten Commandments. And I thought, Lord, what are you doing among your churches? But I can't give a specific, precise answer to that, but I do find comfort in knowing that God's people are hearing similar passages, different places, specifically Our sister churches are on a similar journey. Scott said that the title of his series, by the way, is Old Testament Foundation Stones for a New Covenant Faith. And I thought, I like that, I'm just gonna steal that. And so, you know, that's where we're gonna be for a while as well. The first stone is verse six. It's provided in verse 6 and it's really, maybe what would be better is to say it's the basis for all the other stones or it's the foundation or the footing for all the stones that follow in verses 7 through 21. So what follows, what we actually usually think of when we think of the Ten Commandments, verses 7 through 21, and those commandments there, they rest on this word. I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. And this is the basis for Israel's obedience. It conveys the reason, the motivation for them keeping these commandments. That's the big idea of today's text. The basis for obedience, specifically Israel's obedience in this context, but the basis for obedience is who God is and what God has done. So we're going to start at the end and work towards the beginning here. We're going to start with the latter and move to the former. We're going to start with what God has done and then we'll take up who God is. So in this text, what has God done? Well, he identifies himself as the one who brought you, that is Israel, out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. Israel was to keep these words because of what God did for them. Important. Israel, remember, had been slaves in Egypt for 400 years. They had dwelled in Egypt as sojourners among the Egyptians. Not that entire time under oppressive affliction, but as we open up Exodus and come to chapter 1, in fact you can turn there if you want to see it with your own eyes, we read that Israel is being afflicted that the taskmasters have been set over them by Pharaoh to afflict them, quoting with heavy burdens, verse 11 of chapter 1 of Exodus. The Egyptians, verse 14, ruthlessly made the people of Israel work as slaves and made their lives bitter with hard service. They even murdered their newborn sons. Verse 22, Pharaoh says, every son that is born to the Hebrews, you shall cast into the Nile, but you shall let every daughter live. So if we just, it's easy to read these things and think of them as almost just a children's story. So I'm not trying to disturb anyone here, but I do think it's important to understand Israel's condition in Egypt. So if we were Israel, then the law of the land would allow for, it would actually even require that baby Sims be thrown into the river. Or you can look around at young boys, and if you have a son sitting in your row, you could just imagine him not sitting there because he was taken and cast into the Nile. That was their condition. That was their situation. This was the situation at the time that Moses was born. Now follow this. Then we read in Exodus that Moses grew up. I know I'm passing over Moses' story. He's actually delivered out of the Nile. His mom places him in a basket in the Nile, and Pharaoh's daughter finds him, and so he's raised in Pharaoh's household. But just know that this is the condition, persecution and affliction of Israel in Egypt, and this is the condition during Moses' birth, at the time of Moses' birth, and then he grows up. Let's say 20 years. And then Moses gets himself into a little bit of trouble, ends up on the lam for about 40 years, right? Ends up killing an Egyptian and he's on the run from the authority. And so 40 years before God God appears to him at Mount Horeb and sends him back to Israel to rescue his people. It's interesting, we read Exodus chapter one and chapter two and we're just flying through and we're checking our boxes and we're getting our Bible reading done and it's great. 60 years. 60 years of affliction and oppression, but in reality, chapter one probably describes an extended period of time of increasing persecution over decades and decades and decades. You're looking at easily a century before Israel cries out and is heard by the Lord, and the Lord delivers Israel from this house of slavery. All this to say, Israel not only suffered in the house of slavery, but it lived in that house for a very long time. It was in a brief season of oppression, but a very long season of affliction. So being brought out of Egypt wasn't like just moving from Illinois to Idaho because someone passed a law that we don't like. It was more like, really, it was more like being delivered out of North Korea and being brought to the United States of America. Even that doesn't do it full justice, but it's closer to the picture that we have here. This is being rescued from a condition of subjection under ruthless tyranny, from extreme poverty and physical deprivation to a condition of freedom under a benevolent ruler who is leading them into his house of wine. If you're not familiar with that phrase, by the way, we sing it in the sands of time are sinking, and it comes from Song of Solomon, chapter two, verse four, where the bride is singing about her lover, and she says, he brought me to the house of wine, and his banner over me was love. This is the basis for Israel's obedience. The basis of Israel's obedience was their freedom. Their freedom. Israel had been slaves, unloved, used, abused by a tyrannical master who worked his power to deprive them of every blessing. If we think about the way that blessing is described in the Old Testament in fruitfulness and prosperity, their taskmaster did everything that they could in order to deprive them of those blessings. But now they were free to know the lover of their souls. They were free to walk in the paths of his righteousness, which are blessings. They had lived in the house of slavery, but now they were being brought into their husband's house, a house of wine. By the way, Moses draws our attention to this in the immediate context. You heard it last week, Deuteronomy chapter six. Just think about what I described in Exodus chapters one and two. And now here again, Deuteronomy chapter six, verses 10 and 11. And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob to give you with great and good cities that you did not build. What were they doing in Egypt? Building cities for others, right? Houses full of all good things that you did not fill. What were they doing in Egypt? Filling Pharaoh's storehouses. And cisterns you did not dig. And vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant. A house of wine. This is the indicative that precedes the imperative that follows. God acted. God saved. God redeemed. God delivered. God brought them out and he would bring them in. This is the mercy of God that calls for a reasonable response on behalf of his people. Song of joy and praise as we hear in Exodus chapter 15, a genuine desire for the bride to please her husband. But This basis that I'm here describing, this basis that we find in Deuteronomy chapter five, verse six, it's not a universal basis. Think about this. Don't miss this. This is an exclusive basis. It's a non-transferable basis. God didn't bring Edom out of Egypt. God didn't bring Moab out of Egypt. God didn't bring Amon out of Egypt. Yes, we've just read about God working among those nations, but he did not bring them out of Egypt and to himself at Mount Sinai, but Israel. As Pastor Jason said on Wednesday, this is not a reference to a metaphorical deliverance. Israel could not tell Moab, you know, Moab, this is the God who delivered you out of Egypt, you know, metaphorically speaking. There was an actual historical act of redemption that is the basis for obedience of the 10 commandments. The Lord brought Israel out of Egypt. out of the house of slavery, so they should keep his word. They should keep his covenant. Let me point something out, though, and just so you realize, I'm not only talking about Israel, the physical descendants of Abraham, though, this certainly applies to them, but also the mixed multitude that attached themselves to Israel as they left Egypt that we read about in Exodus chapter 12, verse 38. And we see this applied in that same context when there's explanation given about how those who desire, who are foreigners, that is sojourners or strangers among Israel who have attached themselves to her, how they too can participate in the Passover. Why? Because they too are actually being brought out This mixed multitude is what they're referred to in Exodus chapter 12. Those who have attached themselves, united themselves to Israel, no doubt, because they know Israel's God. These words have reference to this people. That is, Israel. God's people obey His commands I'm gonna widen this out here a little bit. We've been talking about Israel. I'm gonna widen it out. God's people obey his commands because of what he has done for them. This is as true under the new covenant as it is under the old. Because he has brought them out and into his house of wine, or if you prefer, house of prayer. My concern here is to present these words that is the Ten Commandments, as the Bible does, as God does, as the reasonable response to what God has done for Israel so that we might see that God is concerned with us, with our response to who He is and what He has done. This, Deuteronomy 5, verse 6, is an example for us The new commandment, like the old commandment, is set on a foundation. It has a root, it has a footing on which it stands. The basis is that God has delivered us from the domain of darkness and he has transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved son. In other words, we are called to keep his commands because of what God has done for us. for us. God has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. He hasn't called your neighbor out of darkness into his marvelous light. I don't know your neighbor, maybe he has. I understand that that might not be true of every single one of us. He hasn't called my neighbor out of darkness into his marvelous light. He's called us. He's called us to be his disciples. He's called us to follow him. He's called us take up our cross. He's called us to so love one another that the world actually identifies us as his disciples by that love. On what basis has he done this? On a similar but far, far better basis. He hasn't just delivered us out of Egypt and brought us to Mount Sinai and entered into covenant with us. He has brought us out of the world that is passing away, out of the old creation. He has brought us out of, delivered us from sin, death, the law, so that we might Serve him as we are. We've been delivered from a far more tyrannical master than even the Pharaoh in Egypt. Really, you think about that condition and that state, and it should break our hearts to think that any people endure such evil. Our condition was worse. We served the prince of the power of the air, every single one of us. We gladly followed him. We did his bidding. We did these things in which we are now ashamed. We have been delivered from that domain of darkness, have been transferred into the kingdom of his beloved son. This is the very structure of Romans, is it not? We heard from Romans chapter six, and we heard of that deliverance from sin, death, and the law. If we kept reading through Romans, we would actually read in Romans about how we have actually been freed from the law by the Spirit, by the work of the Father who sent the Son as a propitiation for our sins so that now His life is applied to us and anyone who is united to Christ has the Spirit of Christ at work in them so that they have the law written upon their hearts and they desire to walk in a manner worthy of this gospel precisely because of God's deliverance. You can't get to Romans chapter 8 and read Romans chapter 8 and not understand that God has intervened in space and time in a historical event that has actually transformed this people that are now His We have people who are able and desire to, genuinely desire to more fully reflect the love that we have come to know from the Father through the Son by the Spirit. It's changed us. The law of Christ stands on this footing according to Romans chapter 12. Paul just summarizes it as the mercies of God. Romans chapter 3 verse 21 through the end of chapter 11 summarized in these words, the mercies of God. That is a far better basis than the basis for obedience that Israel received in the words we find in Deuteronomy chapter five, verse six. Basis of our obedience are these words. I am the Lord your God, who has brought you out of the world, out of the dominion of sin and death, and to myself. And so, just as Israel was to keep these words on the basis of or because of what God had done, so also are we. And just as Israel was to keep these words because of who God was to them, so are we. Let's turn and consider that. Israel was to keep these words because of who God was to them. These words were spoken by God to Israel at Mount Sinai. Don't forget the context, by the way. If you're still in Deuteronomy 5, you look at verses 1-5, remember that God brought them to himself at Mount Sinai and he makes this covenant with them. He speaks directly to them. With these words, if you look at chapter 5 verse 22, it says, these words that the Lord spoke to all your assembly at the mountain out of the midst of the fire, the cloud and the darkness with a loud voice and he added no more and he wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me, that is Moses speaking here. And so we see the significance of these words. These are exceedingly important words that are given to his people. Do I insert this here now? Yeah, looks like nothing to lose. So these 10 commandments are really, in the Hebrew, it's 10 words. As it's translated in the Greek, the Septuagint, it's 10 words. As it comes into the Latin, it's 10 words. It's where we get the term Decalogue. That's our English version of the 10 words. Eventually we get to the Geneva Bible and it's translated as 10 commandments and it's been that way ever since. I'm fine with that. I just want us to understand that the Hebrew term words or things or matters is a little more broad than our 10 commandments. So we come to the 10 commandments and we're looking for 10 commandments, rightly so. It's a little more challenging than that. We think we know them. What's the first commandment? You could probably give it to me, right? Well, no, not exactly. And here's why, because they've been enumerated differently throughout time. So what I mean by that is the Jewish Orthodox consider this the first commandment. This is the first commandment. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, full stop. All right? Roman Catholicism and Lutheranism, Lutherans and Roman Catholics both take this as the first commandment all the way through the commandment not to make idols. And then they divide the last commandment. I'm just pointing out that it's been enumerated differently by different people, we, coming from the Protestant Reformed faith, We've just always known it as the 10 commandments that start with the very first one, you shall have no other gods before me. We're one of the few that separate verse six from verse seven by the way. Verse six is almost always held to be either, it is a prologue, it is definitely a self-identification by which the Lord is demonstrating his authority and giving us the basis, but it's also directly attached to all that follows. This is to say that these 10 words are one, a unity, and two, can be conceived of a little bit differently on exactly what God or how God is instructing His people. Does it change anything in the interpretation? No. No, doesn't change a thing. This will come into play as we get into verses 7 and especially again at the end when we get to verse 21. Right now it's just a put a pin in that. I would also point out that they have a special name. These words alone are given, they're called the 10 words. That's a proper noun, it's a title, it's a way of referring to what God has said. By the way, there's at least 15, I count 17 imperatives here. So not just 10, there's at least 15, lots of, but these words are the covenant. Talking about the significance. They are the words, the only words that are written by the finger of God. Most likely indicating the directness by which these words are conveyed. They're communicated coming directly from God himself. These words, these words are the only words that are placed inside of the ark. The rest of the covenant of the law is placed next to the ark. These words, in other words, have the pride of place. They are preeminent among all the other words. They are the words. The narrative context also emphasizes their special character. They are the covenant. Chapter four, verse 13. As one commentator says, they were the central constitutional core of the covenant. I think when we keep this in mind, there is a reason. When we keep this in mind, we understand that verse six gives a unique, non-transferable basis for Israel's obedience. Not only what God did for Israel, but who God is to Israel. The basis for Israel's obedience was their covenant relationship. The basis for obedience conveyed here is not who God is in himself. He doesn't say, I am the self-existent God. He doesn't say, I am the omniscient God. I am the all-powerful God. He says, I am the Lord your God. This is not who God is in relation to humanity as a whole. This is, it's easy. It's just so easy to miss this. These things are true. God is creator and sustainer, and he is the king of the whole world. He's the God of all the nations. Here's the difference. He is the still reigning king, but he is the rejected king. throughout the world. That is, people in general live in a state of enmity with God. Rebellion against God. So that it's not true to say to your unbelieving neighbor, I want you to know the Lord your God in the same sense that it's being used here in Deuteronomy chapter five, verse six. There is a sense in which you can say it, the Lord is their God, but he's not the Lord their God in this sense. The basis of who God is in verse 6 of chapter 5 is in relation to Israel. Not just their king rejected, but their functioning king. That's what the covenant does. He is now their suzerain and they are now his vassal. They agree to this covenant. They are restored. Enmity is removed. There is a right relationship between Israel and God. The Lord is Israel's husband. If you want to see the language for that, we've seen it several times. I'm going to turn there again, but Jeremiah chapter 31 references what's transpiring here and says, though I was a husband to her, Israel, I'm sorry, the Lord is Israel's father. Again, in this covenantal sense, this is not true of the nations. We see this in two ways. He says, I am the Lord, or Yahweh. This is God's name. God has lots of names that are used in the Old Testament to refer to God. This one is, it's special, okay? It's unique. It's not a generic or general term like Elohim. It is a name. In fact, we saw it today, did we not? This is worth turning to, I think. Exodus chapter three, gonna turn a couple chapters, or I'm sorry, yeah, a couple chapters before what was read. Most are familiar with this, but this is Moses, the Lord appearing to Moses in the burning bush at Mount Horeb. That's actually the same place as Mount Sinai. But Moses has been sent back to Israel in order, because the Lord is going to redeem Israel through Moses. And we read in verse 13, This is the second time that Moses has attempted to rebuff the Lord's offer. It's not an offer, but Moses attempts to sidestep it. And Moses said to God, if I come to the people of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask, what is his name, what shall I say to them? God said to Moses, I am who I am. And he said, say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you. God also said to Moses, say this to the people of Israel, the Lord, Yahweh. God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob has sent me to you. This is my name forever and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. And you go to verse six and it says, I'm sorry, chapter six and verse six. Say therefore to the people of Israel, I am the Lord and I will bring you out. If you back up just a little bit, it says, In verse three, I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name, the Lord, I did not make myself known to them. Which is interesting because the name, the Lord, or Yahweh, is used a lot in Genesis. Much of it in narrative, that we understand. Moses inserts it in his narrative. But it's also found on the mouth of people. For instance, Abraham in Genesis. And so what is the Lord? what does the Lord mean by this? That by this name I did not make myself known. I think this helps us better understand what he means in Exodus chapter 3 when he gives him this name, I am, and Yahweh in the Hebrew sounds very similar to the verb I am, and so there's this clear connection between Yahweh and I am, and he is saying Now, there's all sorts of debate about exactly what the Lord means by this, but I think that he means that he is revealing himself. He is who he is, and not in the self-existent sense, but in the sense that he is going to make himself known through what he is doing in redeeming Israel. They will come to know God, all right? So, When he says in verse six, I'm sorry, in chapter six, that by this name, I did not make myself known to them, he is referring to what he is doing in order to show them who he is. The Lord, this name conveys God's covenantal commitment and love, which is being made manifest through taking Israel to be his people and becoming their God. By the way, if you're still in Exodus 6, great, if you're not, you don't have to turn back there, but listen carefully. Verse seven says, I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. I will. I want you to hear that. I will. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know. I will. This is what he's doing. He's speaking to a people who, if we're just reading the language as we receive it, who are not his people. I will take you and I will make you my people. It implies, it doesn't imply, it means that you are currently not my people. Now, I understand, there's a sense in which they are because they're the physical descendants of Abraham. So though they know it not, they are God's elect people. But what God is going to do is to actually actually make them his people. He's going to do something that's going to change their condition so that they are in right relationship with him so that it is true to say in a different sense that I am your God and you are my people. Not quite where I want to do this yet, but I'm going to do it here anyway. This helps us, I think, understand our salvation better. How so? Let's just take what we just heard. I'll say it again as plainly as I can. Israel and Egypt is not yet God's people in an important sense. God is going to do something that's going to make this people his people. We just think of Israel and we think, well, it's God's people. There is a sense, yes, absolutely. They're the physical descendants. We see God is blessing them in Egypt in chapter one. They're fruitful and multiplying, absolutely. And yet God says, I am going to bring you out, and I am going to take you and make you my people, and I am going to be your God. So not, but you will be. So also, God's people, there is a time when they are not, and then there is a time when they are. And you can think about this two different ways. There is when Jesus comes, when God sends his son born of woman, born under the law, God's people have been exiled because of their sin and iniquity. They have become not his people, Hosea chapter one, okay? This is a picture of enmity. We think of Israel. Israel is God's people. Yes and no. There's still the physical descendants of Abraham. There's still the nation that has the promises, if you will, and yet their situation, is one of being back in Egypt. They are once again living in a state of estrangement from God. But God does something in time and space and intervenes to take this people that were called not my people and make them his people in the final and fullest way that he would ever do that. Through Jesus the Christ fulfilling all righteousness, In that last act of obedience, he ultimately takes upon himself all the sins of all of God's people, from Adam to the very last believer, and he propitiates, that is he satisfies God's justice, righteous justice against sin. And what happens is that in his atoning substitutionary sacrifice, and then in his resurrection, he is accomplishing. a new exodus by which he brings out his people, and he brings them to God, and the final condition will be what is described in Revelation chapters 21 and 22, when we dwell in the presence of God forever, and then we hear those words in Revelation 21, I am, behold, God dwells with man, and I will be their God, and they will be my people, right? Okay? That's the first sense. That is, God does something in time and space, in history, in order to change the condition of his people from enmity to reconciled, from estrangement to near. There's a second way that this works. That is, there is a time when you, even though you actually, I know this is hard. Even though you hung on the cross with Jesus Christ, that is, he bore your sins nearly 2,000 years ago, there was a day for every single one of us that we were not his people. His love for you precedes what happened in time and space, but something happened in time and space that moved you from enmity to reconcile, from estrangement to being brought near, from not my people to my people. And it happened in your lifetime. In your lifetime, you heard that this marvelous thing had been done. that God, the true and living God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit had worked this great redemption that was held out for you. You need only believe. You cried out. I mean, maybe you didn't literally cry out, but that's what happened. You cried out to the Lord and you were saved. And in your crying out, you were brought through the judgment waters and you were brought into right relationship with God under this new covenant so that it is now true of you that you are his people and he is our God. I labor to convey this point because if it gets all ooey gooey and mixed up in our head and conflated, then we miss the very basis for our obedience. The basis for our obedience is that you, dear saint, you were really, really in a bad way. Do you remember? Do you remember? His wrath hung over you. I know, it's hard to think like that because we've come to understand that His wrath was satisfied on the cross and yet, and you were estranged until it was applied. You were not near. You were not His people, but now, but now, He is your God. He is your Father. He's your husband. You are his child. You're no longer a child of disobedience, but you're a child of light. It doesn't matter what you feel like. It doesn't matter what you did this morning. What matters is that God has intervened in time and space to save you, that's what he's done, so that you might know who he is and who he is to you is a loving, gracious, merciful father. He is a loving, jealous husband. He will not give you up. He is a faithful shepherd who will carry you all the way home. This is your God. And that's the basis for our obedience. You see, when we really come to hear that, when we really come to understand that, when we understand that humanity was separated without hope until Christ came. and fulfilled all righteousness, and propitiated the wrath of God, and brought God's people near, made us one in Him. And then that's been applied to each of us as we understand that, that we have really, in time and space, we have moved from enmity to friendship, reconciliation, and love. Then and only then will your heart slowly, oh, ever, ever, ever so slowly, but really, genuinely be warmed towards God. If this truth, what God has done and who God is, is not before our eyes, then we have no hope. of loving God and loving others. We can fake it all day long. We can do all sorts of things that the world would call love, that would look like love, but what Jesus commands flows from a heart that is in awe of God. For you that love the insert, God's people obey His commands because of who He is to them. I think we've hammered that. The church's commission is to do what? What are we commissioned to do? What are we commanded to do? Make disciples, right? We're called to make disciples. Disciples are what? Followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. They hear their shepherd say, follow me, and they follow him. They hear their shepherd's voice and they They obey Him. Not perfectly. That is in there somewhere, this deep desire to follow their Lord. Disciples are people who, as I stated earlier, John chapter 13, verse 34 and 35, there are people who are known by their love. But there is no love without grasping this truth. I am the Lord your God. What good is it to call people to some semblance of obedience if these words, I am the Lord your God, are not true of them? This is why the apostles went proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is the only way to make disciples. Disciples love because they have heard and believed that God loved them first. Or in Old Testament terminology, they have heard and believed that in Christ, God the Father has said to us, I am the Lord your God. All people should obey the will of God, but how much more should we love the lover of our souls who is bringing us into his house of wine? Oh, I am my beloved's, my beloved's mine. He brings a poor vile sinner into his house of wine. I stand upon his merit, I know no other stand, not even where glory dwelleth in Emmanuel's land. So, how do we apply this? In one sense, I've been applying it throughout, but just to, I would encourage this, understand. that the reasonable response to the gospel proclaimed this morning, not just in the sermon, but in the songs that we have sung and the passages we have heard read, that the reasonable response, think Romans 12, verses 1 and 2 there. The reasonable response to the gospel is doing what Jesus commanded us. This is what our text teaches, that is that God genuinely loves his people. He has moved heaven and earth to make us his own. We didn't do this. We didn't run to Zion. We were carried in the bosom of our shepherd. We didn't escape sin, death, and the law. We were ransomed by the precious blood of the lamb. We haven't done anything to deserve our new station, our new life, this love that we are learning to believe. We didn't elect God, He chose us. We didn't love God, but He loved us. And here we are. He says, I am the Lord, your God. Those who have this basis, learn. Slowly but surely, they encourage one another to walk in the ways of our Savior. Here, and to build our house upon his words, to imitate him, to follow as close as we can that more and more we might be conformed to his image. The basis for obedience is who God is to us and what God has done for us. We come to fully understand that through Jesus Christ. Let's pray. Gracious Father, Thank you. For so great a salvation. Father, thank you for a better basis. Father, we thank you that. Though we feel often. The struggle. To respond rightly. We know what you require us to do or. We know what you forbid and yet. Father, we often fail to do what you require and yet do what you have forbidden us. Father, would you renew a right spirit within us this morning? Father, would you remind us of just how deep and wide your love for us is? Father, would you help us to understand what you have done in the sending of your Son and in the sending of your Spirit and who we are now because of it? Father, thank you for being our God. We pray this in Jesus' holy name.