Well, let's turn once again in our Bibles to Luke 23. Luke 23, and I want to particularly focus our thoughts this morning on verse 34. Then Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. Father forgives them, for they do not know what they do. While our Lord Jesus hung upon that cross in great shame and agony, seven words, seven statements fell from his lips. Six hours had expired from the time when he was crucified to the time when he finally yielded up his spirit. And yet he only said seven things. But of course, having said that, these are among the most significant, important words I think our Saviour uttered during his entire earthly life and ministry. And here in verse 34, Luke records the first of these dying sayings from the cross. It is the word of forgiveness. Father forgive them for they do not know what they do. It's interesting to note that this first saying from the cross presents our Lord in an attitude of prayer. An attitude of prayer. In fact if you look you'll notice that three of his dying sayings from the cross are prayers to the Father. and another is the answer to the prayer of another. And I think this is deeply significant and instructive because Luke reminds us that our Lord had commenced his public ministry in prayer. Do you remember back in chapter 3 of this gospel we find Jesus being baptised by John in the Jordan River at the commencement of his public work? And you'll remember how, as he goes down into the water, the Spirit of God, in the form of a dove, alights upon him, empowering him for his messianic mission. And the Father speaks audibly from heaven, this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. And Luke informs us that as Jesus comes up out of the water, he was praying. He was praying. His public ministry commenced in prayer and now that earthly ministry is concluded in prayer. Those hands of his that had so often ministered to the sick and the poor and the needy could no longer do so for they were nailed to the cross. Those feet of his that had so often carried him on errands of love and compassion and mercy could no longer do so, for they were nailed to the tree. So how does our Lord occupy himself? Well, in none other than the great ministry of prayer. What a challenge, what a lesson to you and me as the children of God here this morning. Some of you here are now well into the evening of life, if I may put it kindly. You're beginning to experience the decay and decline in health and strength. You can no longer do those things that you once did in your early years. Maybe you were very active in the service of the Lord here in the past. A Sunday school teacher, a youth leader, a deacon, a women's speaker, a track distributor. But now you say, oh, it's enough just to be able to struggle here to the service on the Lord's day. You say, my ministry has been fulfilled, my work is done, there is nothing more I can do. Well, friends, take comfort, be encouraged, because you can be engaged in this vital ministry, the ministry of prayer. I do not believe that there is a more important ministry in the Christian church today And I do not believe that there is a more needed one at the present hour. The gospel may be faithfully preached from this pulpit every Sunday, as I'm sure it is. You may, as a fellowship, reach out into the local community to meet spiritual needs. You may continue to teach children and young people the Word of God. But friends, an illicit is all backed up by a unity of fervent, earnest, persistent prayer. It's all going to be a sheer waste of your time and energy. Prayer is absolutely vital, if anything, of a spiritual nature. is to be accomplished in the work of the Lord. Do you remember those rather startling, shocking words that Jesus addressed to his disciples in the upper room? He said to them, without me, apart from me, you, the church, can do nothing. And yet we so often find that hard to believe, don't we? Hard to accept. We think we can do it. We think that if we keep the evangelical wheels rolling and well-oiled, we think if we can have services as usual and the various events through the year, if we do this and that, if we ramp up our evangelistic efforts a bit more, we will certainly achieve something. But Jesus said, no, without me, You can do nothing. But conversely, thank God, the opposite is true. With him, and in prayerful dependence upon him, all things are possible. John Chrysostom, that fourth century bishop of Constantinople, said this about the worth of prayer. He said, the potency of prayer has subdued the strength of fire, it has bridled the rage of lions, hushed anarchy to rest, extinguished wars, appeased the elements, expelled demons, burst the chains of death, expanded the gates of heaven, assuaged diseases, dispelled frauds, rescued cities from destruction, stayed the sun in its course and arrested the progress of the thunderbolt. There is an all-sufficient panoply, a treasure undiminished, a mine which is never exhausted, a sky unobscured by clouds, a heaven unruffled by the storm. It is the root, the fountain, and the mother of a thousand blessings. And that, friends, is something of what has been accomplished and can be accomplished through this vital ministry of prayer. Oh, may we never despise it. May we never look upon it lightly, only a prayer meeting. My friend, you may not be able to do anything else, but you can all pray. Let's give ourselves afresh. to this vital ministry of prayer. Now as we take a look at our Lord's intercession from the cross, his dying prayer, what can we learn from it? What can we take home from it this morning? Well I think it's designed to teach us at least three very simple things. And in the first place it brings home to us that the Bible is the Word of God. Here we have proof and confirmation that the Bible is what it claims to be, the inspired, the infallible Word of God. Now you may be thinking, but how, in what way? How is this prayer from the cross proof of the veracity, the truthfulness of the Scripture? Well, in this way, that this very prayer was the direct and literal fulfillment of biblical prophecy. You see, in Old Testament times, hundreds of years before the coming of Jesus into the world, the prophets were given a most unique insight into the coming, the birth, the ministry, and the death of our wonderful Saviour. They prophesied of the place of his birth and the exact circumstances of his birth. They prophesied his rejection by his own people, the Jewish nation, and how he would be betrayed by a close friend. they prophesied the precise nature of his sufferings and his death, that he would be crucified with criminals, that his hands and his feet would be pierced, nailed to a tree. All this was fulfilled to the letter. And now as our Lord prays for his enemies on that cross, he was again fulfilling the word of the Sovereign God. For in Isaiah 53 verse 12, the prophet describing the suffering and the agony of Christ at Calvary 700 years beforehand declared, and he was numbered with the transgressors, and he bore the sin of many, and he made intercession for the transgressors. There we have it, the very prayer that was literally fulfilled when our Lord prayed for his enemies. Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. The prophetic nature of the Saviour's prayer clearly proves the Bible to be the Word of God. And friends, what a comfort, what a consolation that should be to us as believers this morning. because we can take up this book and we can read it and we can rest upon it and we can lean and stand upon its promises and we can go into the future and we can think about those prophecies that are yet to be fulfilled concerning our Saviour's second coming and we can do so with the utmost confidence because we know that not one word that God has ever spoken has fallen to the ground. Everything will come to pass just as he has spoken it, because the scripture cannot be broken. Yes, our Saviour's dying prayer reveals to us that the Bible is God's inspired, infallible words. The second thing I think we can learn from this dying prayer is that it reveals to us the blindness of the human heart. Here we see the blindness of the human condition. Listen to what Jesus prays. He says, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. They don't know what they are doing. Now that little expression doesn't mean that the enemies of Christ were ignorant of the fact of his crucifixion. They knew full well that they had rejected him and cried out away with him, crucify him. We don't want this man, Jesus, to reign over us. They knew that their vile request had been granted to Pilate. They demanded a murderer to be released, Barabbas, and Jesus to be delivered to death. They knew that this had been done because they were eyewitnesses of the crime. So what does our Lord mean they don't know what they're doing? Well of course what he meant was that they didn't realise the enormity of their crime. They didn't realise the heinousness of their sin. They didn't realise that they were crucifying the Messiah, the very Lord of Glory, the Saviour of the world. And yet they ought to have known their blindness, their ignorance was inexcusable. Those Old Testament prophecies which had found their fulfilment in Him were sufficiently plain to identify Him as the Holy Lamb of God. You see, they ought to have known, and yet in their blindness they took the Lord Jesus Christ, God the Son, and the Son of God, and they put him to death in such a barbaric fashion. Extended on the accursed tree, besmeared with dust and sweat and blood, see there, the King of glory, see, sinks and expires, the Son of God. Friend this morning, do you find that incredible? Do you find that almost unbelievable that such a thing could have been done? Well I have to tell you this morning that this blindness, this ignorance was true not only of those who put our Lord to death in the first century AD but it's equally true of every man and woman, boy and girl, born into this world. Because we are born in a state of blindness and ignorance of God and spiritual things we just cannot see. Do you remember how Paul puts it in 2nd Corinthians 4? He said, but if our gospel is veiled, he says it's veiled to those who are perishing. Whose minds the God of this world has blinded who do not believe. lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. You see humankind, in general, is in a state of spiritual darkness, of moral blindness. And that's why the unbeliever may read his Bible through a thousand times. He may sit in a service just like this and hear the message of the cross again and again, and yet he'll be just as far from the kingdom as he was when he was born. Paul says, the natural man does not understand the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned. You see, unless the Spirit of God makes the truths of the Gospel clear to the unbeliever, then all the reading and all the praying and all the reasoning and persuading in the world will never bring about a single conversion. There must be this sovereign work of the Holy Spirit breaking into that person's darkened mind with the glorious light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Or could there be someone here in this service this morning? And you have heard the gospel preached many times. You've heard this message of the cross again and again. And yet you're absolutely baffled by it. You cannot grasp its meaning. It's all foreign to you. It is, my friend, because your understanding is darkened. Your eyes are blinded. There is this mist. There is this veil in the way. You are not yet. a Christian. Our Saviour's prayer from the cross, Father forgive them, brings home to us the blindness of the human condition. And yet you know the remarkable, the amazing thing is that you are the very ones for whom the Saviour was praying when he lifted his wounded hands and said, Father forgive them. For they do not know what they do. So here we see that the Bible is the Word of God. Here we see the blindness of the human heart. And then the third thing that we see here is humanity's greatest need. Here we see humanity's greatest need. What does our Lord pray from the cross? What is this first prayer to his Father? Father, forgive. Forgive them. Now I'm sure that some of you may have come into this service this morning with deep and urgent needs on your heart and mind. You're full of anxieties this morning and worries and cares. Maybe some of you are worried about health. You're worried about that recent visit to the doctor, worried about the results of that blood test and those investigations that have been taking place in hospital. Maybe you're worried sick about the diagnosis of the big C. You say, how will I cope if I have cancer? Or what about if I'm facing the last enemy, death itself? How can I stand before God in the judgments? Or maybe some are simply worried about finance. Worried about making ends meet. Worried about the spiraling mortgage interest rates. Worried about the cost of living, the winter fuel bills. How will I cope? What if I'm made redundant and I lose my job? What about this and what about that? Or maybe some of you are worried about another loved one. You're worried about what's going on in their life, those trials, those difficulties. You're worried about that mental illness. Maybe you're worried sick about your children, wondering where they are this morning, wondering whether they'll ever turn to the right path. There could be no question that these are all deep and urgent needs. But I have to tell you this morning that none of them, not even all of them put together, are your greatest need. The greatest need of humanity this morning, towering above all these other earthly needs, is your need of forgiveness. The need to be right with a holy God. Because unless your sins are forgiven, you will perish eternally. You see, the Bible tells us that God is holy, just, and righteous, and sin will be punished, and sin will be judged. And Paul reminds us in Romans 1 that the wrath of God is revealed, literally, it's being revealed from heaven on all ungodliness and unrighteousness of man. Friends, we need forgiveness. We need a saviour. And you know the glorious, the wonderful good news this morning is that God, in his infinite love and mercy, devised a way whereby our sins might be blotted out, past, present and future, cast into the depths of the sea, remembered no more, and that we might be reconciled to him. And that way was the way of the cross. It was there at the cross where God's mercy and justice met. It was there at the cross where sin was punished and God's law was fully satisfied. It was there that the holy, spotless, perfect Lamb of God took upon himself our sins and our penalty that we might go free. Do you remember the words of the hymn? Bearing shame and scoffing rude, in my place condemned he stood, sealed my pardon with his blood. Hallelujah! What a Saviour! You see, it was on the basis of that blood-stained sacrifice that Jesus was able to lift his wounded hands to the Father and plead, Father, forgive them! For they do not know what they do. Now the question that we need to ask at this point is was our Lord's prayer from the cross answered? Have you ever thought about that? Was that prayer fruitful and successful? And the answer of course is absolutely, absolutely. Wonderfully answered. Because the father can never deny his son. And I believe that that prayer from the cross was answered the very instant the words left his lips. It was certainly answered, wasn't it, in the conversion of the dying thief. Because Luke reminds us that Jesus was crucified between two criminals. Two notorious thieves from the city. And Matthew and Mark unite to remind us that at the beginning both of these men crucified on Jesus left and right were exactly the same in their attitude to Jesus at the start. They both reviled him. They joined him with the mob in heaping insults and ridicule upon him. But then suddenly, somehow, out of the blue, one of them has a complete change of heart and a complete change of attitude. How could this be brought about? Was it not when he heard the prayer of our Saviour from that cross, pleading for his enemies, for those who were ridiculing him and torturing him, Father, forgive them? For they do not know what they do. This man had never heard such love, such grace, such forgiveness, such kindness as this. His heart was melted. His eyes were suddenly opened and he begins to realize who Jesus must be. He must be the royal king of love, the king of heaven. And so he publicly reeks his companion. And then, in an act of incredible faith, he lifts up his eyes to Jesus on that central cross, and seeing outwardly just a mere man dying in weakness, he calls him Lord. He acknowledges that he is a king, the king of heaven. And he says, Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom. And he receives that wonderful word of assurance. Today you will be with me in paradise. What an answer. And then our Lord's dying prayer was surely answered in the conversion of the Roman centurion. For conversion it surely was. There can be no question, no doubt about it. He was a hardened Roman soldier who had been used to crucifixion. He must have witnessed many hundreds, if not thousands of similar sites. But he had never seen one like this. Luke tells us that when he saw all that had transpired that day, when he saw how Jesus died, he suddenly breaks out into praise and into worship. He praises God and acknowledges Jesus as the righteous one. In fact Matthew and Mark go even further and tell us that he confessed truly this man was the Son of God. What a powerful intercessory prayer from the cross. But of course we know that that prayer was also answered seven weeks later, on the day of Pentecost, when there were Jews gathered in Jerusalem from all over the known world, there for the Holy Feast. And we read how the Apostle Peter stood up in the midst of the crowd and he began to prove to them from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ. And then he begins to directly accuse them. He calls them out and he says, you have taken him and by wicked hands, you've crucified him, whom God has raised up. And we read that when they heard these things, they were cut to the heart and they began to cry out in unison, men and brothers, what shall we do? And Peter says, repent. and be baptised every one of you for the remission of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. And Luke tells us that that very day three thousands, three thousand repented, believed, were baptised and added to the church. What an answer. And by Acts chapter 4, the number had increased to 5,000 men, excluding women and children. Probably 15,000, 20,000 by now. And when we come to Acts chapter 6, we find something even more startling. Because Luke informs us that many of the priests in Jerusalem were also obedient to the faith. I mean, just consider that for a moment. The very ones who were so hardened against the Lord, seven weeks earlier, who were crying away with him, crucify him. We want Barabbas, deliver Jesus. They are the ones who now fall at his feet and they acknowledge him as Lord. And friends, I want to tell you this morning that our Saviour's prayer from the cross is still being answered to this very day. C. H. Sturgeon, in a very wonderful sermon on this very prayer from the cross, says, I love that little word, them. He says, what I love about it is its indistinctiveness. Because Jesus doesn't say, Father, forgive the Romans who have crucified me. Neither does he simply say, Father, forgive the Jews who have willfully rejected me. He says, Father, forgive them. Them. He calls it the big little words. He says because it's very broad in its intention. It takes in not only those who put our Lord to death in the first century AD, but it also takes in all those people in every age and in every generation who have come to repent and believe through the Lord. And that includes you and your believers this morning. Friends, have you come to realise that you are the fruit, you are the result of our Saviour's dying intercession, when he lifted his hands, praying, Father, forgive them. Forgive all those in Knuxley Road, Christ Baptist Church, Belvedere. Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. Let me ask you in conclusion this morning, what effect has our Lord's dying prayer had upon your life? What is your experience this morning? Have you come to the obedience of faith? Have your eyes been opened like these that we've been mentioning in the New Testament, who came to believe, who received forgiveness of sins through Jesus' blood? Have you come to the cross as a penitent? Have you realised this morning your greatest, your deepest need, the need of forgiveness? Have you become right with God? Are you reconciled this morning? Oh my friend, if not, then I urge you, while there is time, come to Him. Acknowledge your sinnership and your need of His saving love and power. Reach out to Him this morning. He bids you come. He says, come to me, all you who are weary and a heavy burden, and I will give you rest. Come to Him in repentance, come to Him in faith, put your trust alone in Him, and He will bring you to God. He will bring you into that life eternal, that life more abundant. You too will be ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven, and you will go out to this church with joy, led forth with peace. Come to the Saviour, who is even interceding at the Father's right hand. Forgive them, for they do not know what they do. But I'm sure that I'm speaking to the majority here this morning who are already believers, and you know the joy of sins forgiven. cross apply to my life this but it applies in this way been forgiven you yes having received from the cross you must now free you see Jesus was no hippie Jesus practiced exact what he preached sermon on the mount right at the beginning of his public minister said that it was said you shall hate your enemy but love your enemies Curse you. Do good to those who hate you. Pray for those who spite you and persecute you, that you may be saved. Father in heaven, who makes his son rival in the good and sends rain on the just. Jesus loves us, and he expects you and me.