It's a blessing again to come and be with you all in service and just to enjoy the fellowship been able to have and again appreciate the hospitality and I want you all to know that the folks down in Huntington are praying for this revival. I've been getting some texts and calls and people asking about those who are seeking and are they saved yet and just praying and I appreciate their prayers, and I appreciate the love of God's people. I know there's multiple churches represented here tonight, and that's a blessing. And when God's people come around and encourage each other, and we carry one another's burdens, and we rejoice together, and we weep together, and we pray together, and it's a wonderful thing. And I've been praying, and a lot of my prayer this week in addition to praying for the lost, is just to pray to have my heart in the right place to hear and know what God would have me to say and to be as clear as I can and to ask the Lord to write questions and try to do this in a way that would please Him. As I was preparing for this week, I had a lot of thoughts in my mind that I would be preaching about David. and some various things related to his life and the gospel. And I've not done that at all. And again, I'm going to go back to Mars Hill again this evening, if you'll go there with me. And I want to just continue to share some things that the Lord has laying on my heart from this amazing sermon. I was reading a few, a week or two ago, I finished off Brother Jeff's dad's biography, and I appreciate the effort that was put into that. That was an enjoyable read, and if I'm not mistaken, I believe he said this is his favorite sermon in the Bible. And I thought that was interesting to me that that's what direction the Lord's drawn my heart this week so far here in Acts chapter 17. I want to start reading in verse 22 and we'll read this message again and we'll focus in on our text tonight. It says, then Paul stood in the midst of Mars Hill and said, ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious. For as I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, to the unknown God. Whom therefore you ignorantly worship, remember that, whom you ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you. God that made the world, in all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands. Neither is worshipped with men's hands as though he needed anything, seeing he giveth to all life and breath and all things. And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed and the bounds of their habitation, that they should seek the Lord, if happily they might feel after him and find him, though he be not far from every one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said, for we are also his offspring. For as much then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is likened to gold or silver or stone, graven by art and man's device, and the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent, because he hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, and that he hath raised him from the dead. I've pointed out, and I'll just mention again tonight because I know folks rotate through, just the significance of this sermon. This is the most complete sermon I think of the Apostle Paul we have on record. And what's significant as well is that this is to a Gentile audience, people who did not have a reference point of growing up with the Old Testament and knowing those Bible stories. In fact, these people did not worship the God of the Old Testament they worshipped all sorts of various idols and here in Athens the capital of Greece at this place they had a whole bunch of different altars to all sorts of different gods and we talked about that and among those altars was this one altar I don't know that they probably had any statue on it. It simply said, to the unknown God. And the Apostle Paul used that altar there as a bridge to try to take to them and give them some truth that they needed to understand about this God so that he could use that as a bridge to take the gospel to them. And so this is a very profound message for us because this is much of the type of world we're preaching into today. People who don't have this reference point of Christianity. And we set the same issues that drew these people to worship their gods. People are still going after the same things today. And what I want to draw our attentions to this evening is verse 30, where it says, And the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent. And the title of our thought tonight is But Now. But now, okay? And we'll get to that in a moment. The first night we spoke about the incomparable God. Last night we spoke about the God who is near. And then tonight we want to focus our attention on this 30th verse. And what the Apostle Paul says here as he's speaking, still speaking to these Athenians, and he's gone through and talked about who God is and the way they were trying to worship Him, which is the wrong way. And he says, the times of this ignorance, The times of this ignorance God winked at. What ignorance is he speaking of? I believe he's speaking about what he started speaking about in verse 23. You have been ignorantly worshiping an unknown God. You have been ignorantly worshiping an unknown God. And in these last verses, Paul has been unfolding why their worship was ignorant. They were ignorant of who this God is. All the things we've been preaching about the last two days, that God is creator. They didn't understand that. They didn't understand that this unknown God is Lord. They didn't understand that this unknown God could not be contained in a temple or anything that they built. They didn't understand that there was no image to which they could liken this God. There was nothing in this world like Him. That He was the maker of all things and the sum of everything still could not explain Him. They didn't understand that this God was independent, as Brother Nick again mentioned. He didn't need us. He doesn't need to be fed by us, to be propped up by us. He doesn't need our belief in Him to exist. He is completely independent. ignorant that God was their supplier, that God was the one who was giving them life, and giving them breath, and giving them all things. They were ignorant that they were all of one blood, and that we all have the same nature, the same problem, the same sin issue, and can have the same solution through Jesus Christ. They were ignorant that God had established their times and their bounds, and that God had been moving through all of human history to bring them to this point where they could hear the gospel and be saved. And they did not understand and were ignorant of the fact that this God is near right now, and that they could feel after Him and know Him. They were ignorant in their worship. Because again, this God did not need them. He didn't need their drink offerings. He didn't need their food offerings. He didn't need their incense. Whatever else they might offer up, God did not need that. In fact, he was the God who was holding them together every single moment. They did not know that this God not only didn't need them, but wanted to know them. that this God wanted to have a relationship with them, that this God wanted to enable them to be able to worship Him in a way that we describe as spirit and truth, meaning with a sincere heart and in a way that He's prescribed, not our best ideas. They didn't know that. They did not understand. They were ignorant about the idolatry that they were doing, that they were worshiping things that were no gods. In fact, Paul even quotes their own philosophers. This struck me today as I was studying. He quotes their own philosophers in verse 28 and 29. It's like even your own poets have said that we are the offspring of God. And then he says, if we're then the offspring of God, we shouldn't think that the Godhead is like gold or silver or stone, graven by art and man's device. What the Apostle Paul was telling them and he was showing them, and this is a really important point, was that the gods that they were trying to worship and their whole system of worship was not internally consistent, meaning it didn't work. He's like, even quoting from your own people, the things you do don't make sense. I mean, your own poets have said we're the offspring of God. Well, why would you think then that God can be made to be like gold or silver or anything else you can make with your hands? It doesn't make sense. What you're doing doesn't make sense. Folks, the same thing is occurring today, and it continues to occur in our society. People come up with their own constructs of how they want to do religion, how they want to make things work. The whole idea of being able to work our way to heaven and trying to understand that, like we're going to somehow do enough good works to get us there, is completely ignorant of what the righteousness of God is. Like anything that we could do could even compare to the righteousness that He has. It doesn't make sense. Not when you really understand things. Our society and the systems they're coming up with and the things they're trying to push. I watch as our society goes back and forth with their trying to push the whole gender ideology and then what's happening at the same time to women's sports. And you see this thing going back and forth, and it's like, you can't have it all. You know, you can't have all of these things. This thing is blowing up on itself, and our society is gonna continue to do this as long as people try to do things of their own imagination, because fundamentally, it won't work. It will just not work. Not only can it be frustrating for us, but it's never going to work, and that's what the Apostle Paul is showing them about their idolatry. He's like, it doesn't make sense. And yet they had built their whole lives around these things, thinking that somehow by worshiping these gods and doing these things, they were insuring themselves of the things that they needed. In fact, that really was their intent. The Apostle Paul was confronting here the ignorance of their intent. Why did they even have this altar to the unknown God? Why even do that? I mean, they had I don't know how many other altars there. Didn't they figure they had covered the bases? As I was studying this and doing some reading, the best thing that I could come up with and understand is that this was kind of like an insurance policy. It was kind of like an insurance policy. By having this altar here to an unknown God, they wanted to make sure their city of Athens was protected. And in case there was some God they didn't know about or they missed, but if at least they tried to say, hey, we're trying to do something here, maybe this God wouldn't come along and destroy their city. Their intent in this worship was like insurance. And folks, that's much of the way people worship God today. Isn't it? It's like, I want to live my life. I want to do the things I want to do. I want to achieve my goals. And I'm going to sprinkle a little God on it, like an insurance policy, because I don't want God to mess it up or take it away. I want it to all go well. I want to be able to achieve the worldly success I want. I want my family to be healthy and my kids to do this and all this. I want my operation to go well and all these types of things I've got to face. And so if I sprinkle a little God on this, it's basically an insurance policy that things will go well. Folks, that is not Christianity. It doesn't work like that. Jesus himself said on the Sermon on the Mount, there are gonna be a lot of people who come before him on that last day, and they're gonna say, Lord, Lord, didn't we preach or prophesy in your name? And didn't we do miracles in your name? Didn't we cast out demons? We did a lot of good things in your name. I mean, they expect, many people expect because of the things that they do, they bought insurance for eternity. And the Lord's gonna say to them, depart from me. You who work sin, iniquity, I never knew you because this God is calling us to know him. He's calling us to a transformation, to a change, not just to do a bunch of good deeds. And so as the Apostle Paul is talking to these people, he's telling them, your worship has been ignorant. You don't know. And God is coming and he's confronting this time of ignorance. In fact, he's saying God has winked at this ignorance in the past. And that perked my curiosity to think about what does it mean that God winked at that? As I was digging in, to wink at in this context means to overlook, to see beyond. What it does not mean is that God ignored all of the sin that was occurring up to this point. It doesn't mean that God dismissed all the sin that occurred up to this point. Or that they were not held into account for all the sin that happened up to this point. Because we know from the Bible that the Lord was judging nations back in the Old Testament as the Israelites came into Canaan. There's a specific timing that the Lord held off that happening until judgment was ripe upon some of those people. God judged the Babylonians when they didn't treat the Jewish people the way the Lord wanted them to treat them and then had them taken out and put the Medo-Persians in. And these kinds of things happen. God has judged nations since the beginning. And God has actively judged individuals. God judged the Egyptians and the Persians and all these kinds of things. So this doesn't mean that God has just ignored what all the nations have done. It doesn't mean either that God has not made himself available to people who weren't Jewish up until this point because there are numerous instances of people who were not Jewish knowing God. And some of them, we don't even know how they knew God. But apparently they desired to know God and God allowed himself to be known to them. Like Melchizedek. Where did he come from? That's the point. We don't know. We don't know who his father was. We don't know who his mother was. We don't know where he came from. All we know is that there was this guy who was a priest of the Lord and even Abraham authored ties to this guy. So he was a godly man, he knew the Lord, and he wasn't Jewish. What about Job, where did he come from? Or Ruth, or Rahab, a woman who was a prostitute living in Jericho. Every time there was a person who had a heart to know God, God allowed himself to be made known to those people. So it doesn't mean that God only had salvation for the Jews. What that literally means is God was looking beyond all this time while all of this ignorance of idolatry was going on throughout all of these nations. God was looking forward beyond this time to a day when he was going to hit it head on. And that was this time. The Apostle Paul was there at the hotbed of idolatry in Athens and he was coming to hit idolatry head on because he was there seeing all this and his spirit was moved within him and he had to speak. because he knew. And I want us to think about this because I've been thinking about this a lot. This revival has been so good for me. It's been a great chance for me just to kind of stop everything else going on in my life. And even in the busyness of being a pastor, I can lose sight of the things that are important and just kind of stop and think and pray. And being with you all has revived me. It's helping me to, about the things and to sharpen the things I'm praying about. And it's been a blessing. I've been blessed by the fellowship and I thank God for it. But one of the things that just struck my heart last night in the message is just thinking about how God has been moving human history to get out the gospel. God is doing all this. God is wanting His Word to go forth. And we shouldn't be so afraid to evangelize, to talk to somebody about the Lord, because God is moving on the other side, whether we see it or not. He wants all men to be saved. And when the Apostle Paul went into Athens, even though he didn't have his whole team with him and he was there and he saw all this rampant idolatry, his heart was stirred because he knew at this point in time where he was at, God was ready to start telling people about how they could be saved. And so he had boldness to go into that place in Athens and stand there before all these people who knew nothing about the God of the Old Testament and speak to them about Jesus. because he believed that God was wanting this to happen, that God was behind this. And there were indeed some people in the midst of that crowd who, after hearing him, they wanted to hear more. In fact, certain ones claimed to him down in 34 and got saved. They got saved. People who had been worshiping these idols heard this message and they got saved. Because he knew that God was working on the other side of this. God was overlooking all of this time of ignorance. He was looking past it to a future point, looking toward a future day. Well, when was that day? Well, it's right now because Paul says, but now, but now he has been looking past all of this ignorance so long, looking toward this day, but now God is speaking. But now God is commanding all men everywhere to repent. He was looking toward this day when God set up Israel. Israel was set up as a beacon in the world. But when the Lord set up his church, he gave his church search and rescue lights and sent us out into the world. You understand that? That there's a distinct difference in that the Lord was wanting us to go out with the light and take it out into the midst of this ignorance and darkness. Take the gospel of people who need to know about Jesus Christ because the Lord is ready now to confront this ignorance head on. What changed? Why now? What was it that was so profound and significant about this moment that God was changing the way he operated, the way he worked? What was it he was looking toward when he was winking at, when he was dismissing or moving past this ignorance going on? What has changed in the way God works? Why now? Why now? Well, we started talking about it last night. When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law when the time was right. God sent his son, Jesus Christ, and with the coming of Jesus came this deeper revelation of God than we had ever had, than Moses ever had upon Mount Sinai. You know, I think the Hebrew writer speaks about the glory of Mount Sinai compared to the glory of Mount Zion to which we have come, you know, and the rejoicing of the angels and all of these things, and the glory that came with the revelation of Jesus Christ and what Jesus Christ accomplished makes all that Moses got on Mount Sinai, which made his face shine, it made it as nothing, as like a shadow in comparison. Because John said, no one had ever seen God, the only God who was at the Father's side, but the Son. He has made him known. Jesus has made God known, which means to tell fully, to provide detailed information. Jesus Christ is the door to knowing this incomprehensible God. Jesus is the door to knowing the unknown God the Apostle Paul was speaking to them about. Jesus is the door to knowing the God who is near. What did Jesus reveal to us about God? I want to talk about that for a few moments tonight. I want us to think about that, because it's so important to understand what was this additional information? Well, first, Jesus taught us about God's character. He showed us what God was like in a way that leapt off the pages of the Ten Commandments and the Old Testament scriptures. I love in the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus is correcting not the scriptures, but their understanding of the scriptures, where they had taken the Old Testament and essentially kind of neutered it. And they made it all very observable with the laws. And Jesus said, you know, you've heard, you know, not to commit adultery, but I tell you, I tell you what's really the intent is about what's going on in the heart, because sin doesn't originate in the hand, it originates in the heart. And if you're looking upon a woman to lust after her, you've already committed that sin in your heart. And in many other ways, Jesus opened up our eyes to understand what God's intention was the entire time. He allowed us to see that, to know the purity of the heart of God through His teachings. And through his miracles, the way that Jesus tirelessly helped people, people lined up to see him. You know, many of us would have to shut down the doors for the night and go rest, but Jesus would just keep going and going and going and helping everyone who came to him. He showed us that compassion that God has and that his concern is for all. He showed us God's compassion, his willingness to heal and to love by eating with those who the righteous Pharisees wouldn't touch. In fact, he was judged for that. He was judged for eating with sinners and talking to them because the Pharisees had already written them off. They already saw their lives as being unredeemable. But we see from Jesus not only a willingness to converse with them, but a willingness to come into their life and change their life. To take a life that seemed like it was broken and beyond repair, and Jesus be able to take people who have been engaged in all sorts of sin and wickedness in their life and turn them into devoted and faithful disciples. Because the Bible says that he's not going to break a bruised reed. He's not going to throw away... I mean, a bruised reed is like, you know, back then they would use reeds, like the kids would make a flute out of it, or something like that. And if it got blue bruised, you couldn't play it anymore. You'd just toss them away, because reeds were a dime a dozen. But the Bible says that Jesus wouldn't throw away a bruised reed. Something that somebody else would have thought was just useless. People that we look at and just say, yeah, they're just past helping. That's not who Jesus threw away. He didn't. He had compassion because he knew the power that he would have to be able to mend that life and to do something profound and amazing with it. We learn something about God from Christ in that. And we learn more about God's character from the temptations And those three temptations, I don't know if you've ever studied that, but when you dig into those temptations, you understand what was at stake, and you understand what Christ was looking for. When He was tempted with the bread, I mean, He had fasted 40 days and nights. That one's pretty obvious to us. He was incredibly hungry, and He was being tempted to use His own power for His gain, for His good, at His will, because the Father had sent Him into the wilderness to fast. And He was going to do that until the Father said to stop. And the Father hadn't said stop yet, so to do that would have been to disobey the Father and say, I know what's best. God is leaving me. God's not taking care of me. I've been here 40 days and nights. I'm hungry. I've still not eaten. I'm about to starve to death. God must have forgotten me. I'm going to go ahead and do this because I can. How many of us In our life, when we know that God has called us to do something or wants us to do something and it's hard and we don't immediately have the ability or strength to do it, we just back out and quit. Or we take matters into our own hands and look for some other way because God's way seems to be too hard. Well, my friends, Jesus didn't break at that. Neither did He break when Satan took Him up to the top of the temple and told Him to jump off, because doing that would have been a clear manifestation of who He was, His identity as a Messiah. Those were the types of parlor tricks that the Jewish people expected the Messiah to perform. And to do that, don't you think that Jesus wanted people to know who He was? We know that He wanted people to know Him, but He wanted them to know Him the right way. They had to come to Him the Father's way. They had to have it revealed to them by the Father, which is art in heaven. You know, when Jesus was speaking to His disciples, He's asking, who do you think that I am? You know? And when Simon Peter answered, you are the Christ, the Son of the living God, don't you know that Jesus was so happy and blessed art thou? Simon Barth showed us, because man hasn't told you this, but my father's told you this. I'm glad I'm looking at somebody right now who knows who I am. Don't you think that Jesus wanted all those people to know, but he would not do it the earthly, carnal way. He had to do it his Father's way. And when he was offered all the kingdoms of the world to simply bow down to Satan. Don't you know the Bible says that there's a day coming when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess? Satan was trying to offer Jesus an end run. To come around, Jesus, go ahead and take their worship. Go ahead and take the world and all those things. That's what you're ultimately wanting, right? Well, Jesus wanted that and he desired that. But he didn't want some sham of worship of men's hearts who weren't changed. Of people who didn't truly see and understand because what's that worth? It's worth nothing. He wanted hearts of people who were truly changed, who were regenerated, which would require the work that he would do on the cross. And so he was not willing to just give up and give in, you know, and do the things that Satan wanted and worship him because he knew what Satan had to offer him was nothing. But how often do we give in? and go for the flashy things that Satan offers us, thinking it's what we really want, not realizing that it's really not. It's really not the thing that we desire. Jesus was tempted. He was tempted in every point, and Satan came at him. He came at him at those things that he desired, good desires that Christ had. He came at him, but Jesus would not budge an inch. And even there, not in the wilderness, but in the garden, when he had to face the opportunity to walk away from that. And he dreaded the cross. He dreaded the feel of that sin and separation. For those who are lost, what you're feeling right now, Jesus dreaded that too. He didn't want to have to feel that separation from his Father. He didn't want to have to carry that weight to the cross and all that it would mean. But there he was in the garden, just like our first parents were in the garden. And the Lord told our parents in the Garden of Eden, That if they ate of that fruit, the day they ate, they would die. Well, they ate of the fruit, and here is Jesus in the garden, and He's praying to the Father because the promise of death was ultimately going to fall upon Him. And He was willing to take that for us, and to go to the cross, even though He prayed if there would be any other way, let this pass from me, but He was willing to go and do it. He was willing to go and suffer because it was the Father's will for Him to do so. So our Savior showed us and demonstrated to us the perfect, impeccable character of God, tried and tested in all points, yet no sin. That's why our good works aren't good enough, because I don't know about you, but on my best day, I never come close to that kind of righteousness. I have never come close to that kind of perfection and purity of motive and heart on my best day. I would have caved at the bread. But Jesus endured all of that and showed us the perfection of God's character. He revealed to us through the cross God's judgment. I know some people say, well, you know, is God really that serious about sin? I mean, is it really that big of a deal? If you want to know how God feels about sin, look at the cross, because His Son Jesus took upon Him the sins of the world, and God did not spare them. Even though it was His Son, He poured out the fullness of His wrath upon Jesus Christ. That's how God feels about sin. He hates it so much. It is so wicked and unrighteous that when His Son took it on, He allowed His Son to die. He gave His Son over into the hands of wicked men to be slaughtered and die. God is 100% serious about sin. And that's why you need that sin that's on you right now. If you're lost, my friend, you need that sin to be washed away. Because if that sin hangs upon you, it will hang upon you forever. And it will hang upon you and drag you down into hell. Because God has prepared a place for those who do not know him called hell. God is serious about sin. but God is also love. And we've never seen such a demonstration of love that if you were to look at the cross where Jesus went and died, you see the love of the Son for the Father, that Jesus would go there because His Father called Him to do that. You see the love within the Godhead. You see the love of God for the world that He would give His Son. that He would give His only begotten Son to die for our sins. You see the love of God for humanity. You see the love of Jesus as He was praying for those who were crucifying Him. Having that spirit of being willing to forgive them, desiring to forgive them, praying that these people who were crucifying Him would be forgiven, praying for them. You see a kind of love that is unlike any love because these people who were doing this are like us. They were sinners. He didn't die for righteous people. He died for sinners like you and me. You might die for your kids. You might give up your life for your country. Truths and principles that you believe in. But how many here are willing to give up your life for somebody who hates you? Who wants to throw you off the throne? Who wants to trample you and your beliefs under their feet? They want to get rid of you. They don't even want to believe in you. They want you out of the way. How many of you are willing to die for people like that? Because that's who Jesus died for. That's who God gave his son for. People who hated him. People who did not want to follow him. People who want to go to heaven, but just didn't want God to be there when they got there. Right? That's who we all are. But God gave his son. Jesus died in obedience to the Father and out of love for us. Jesus Christ revealed God's character and his judgment and his love. And not only did Jesus reveal these things and give us an example and teach us about this, but there were things that Jesus accomplished during his ministry. He made a sacrifice. He died on that cross, taking our sin, and he was buried, and on the third day rose again, proving through that that what he said when he died on the cross, it is finished. truly did complete and finish the wrath of God against sin. And he rose that third day victorious. Jesus Christ made a sacrifice that was sufficient for all. And let me just throw this in there. If you think about things, I overthink things. That's probably pretty obvious by now. But if you've ever wondered, well, how could the death of one man be good for the sins of the whole world? Well, Jesus was more than a man. Jesus is involved in the creation. Every life that has ever been born onto this earth, every life that's ever been held in the womb, Jesus has been involved in giving that life. He's been involved in giving that life, and because he is the origin of that life, He was able to be the price for that life through his death on the cross. His life was unlike any other life there has ever been. He was man, yes, but he's also God. God in the flesh, the God, the giver of all life. So his life was uniquely set through who he was, but also his perfection to be able to sacrifice himself for all of us. Jesus Christ had to die to gain the power to redeem human life. Brother Derek said it the other day, and I'm 100% on this boat, that the power God demonstrates when He saves His soul is greater and more glorious power than God demonstrated in the creation of the whole universe. Why is that? Because He had to buy that power. There was a price to that power. He had to give his son to have that power. And because he gave his son, because he was willing to do that, God has the power to take lives that are broken and cursed by sin and renew them to save them, to make them whole. God has the power to take a life that has been ruined and completely remake it and make you into one who is fit to walk the streets of gold. He can do that. He had to die for that power, but he gained it, he promised it, and he found it, and he did it. And through Jesus Christ, God has given us a revelation that is sufficient for all ages. for every age, every time, from that time, and hence, all things we face, we keep thinking, oh, there's a new thing, and, you know, these days are harder than they've ever been, it's harder than it was for our parents and our grandparents, and how can we address these new things? Well, guess what? Jesus is not surprised by any of this. God is not surprised by any of this. God has never been surprised ever. Ever. And through Jesus Christ, the Lord has given a revelation, it says in Colossians 2-3, that in Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Through Christ, through knowing Him, through His Word, God has given every bit of wisdom and knowledge we might ever need to walk through whatever this world is going to hold for us. We have a sufficient resource in Jesus Christ. And I can't answer every question for you. I can't give you all that, but I can tell you the answers are there. And if you search it out, the Bible says it is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but it's the glory of kings to search it out. And if we have a heart to search out and to know what God would say and what He would have us to do and what wisdom we need, whatever circumstance, in Christ the Lord has treasured there everything we're going to stand in need of. everything. He has given us sufficient revelation for every time, every age, every nation, every place. And he's given us a high priest who is well acquainted with our sorrows, with our grief. Through the life that Jesus lived, I can't tell you how much, how much, how real, how real and present the Lord is in times of trouble. And now no matter what you face in this life, whatever difficulty you encounter in this life, whatever you lose in this life, There is a God that we can go to, a God and His Son, Jesus, who walked this earth as a man. And though He did not sin, He tasted all of our sorrows and our griefs. He carried them, He bore them, He understands, He knows. He knows what it is to be hungry. He knows what it is to be weak. He knows what it is to be tired. He understands what it is to weep at a grave. He knows all of those things. He understands that. And we can go to Him and seek solace and comfort and strength from Him. But it's not just like He's got facts for us or power. He has compassion for us in our deepest and darkest moments because He understands these things. And so, that's why the apostle said, but now, God had allowed all this idolatry and all of these things for so long, and he had put Israel as a beacon, but now, that his son had come, his son had died, his son had risen, and he is sending his church, the Lord is sending the search lamps out and going out to humanity to confront this ignorance, to shine light in the darkness, and say, look, we have a revelation in Jesus Christ, and it is the answer to everything you need. Everything you need in every place and every time, go out with this. But now, but now God is commanding. He is actively reaching out and this is not a suggestion. This is not an idea. It says God is commanding who? All men. Where? Everywhere. But now, God is commanding everybody in every place to repent, to turn to Jesus Christ, because we have a sufficient Savior, we have a sufficient revelation. God is ready to confront every bit of this head on with every resource of heaven completely poured out. And his command to people, and the ignorance that has been going on, and everyone who has lost We are in ignorance, friends, and we're lost. I know we can be raised in Christian homes and think we know a lot, but truly, unless you know that you know, you don't really know. Right? Unless you know the Lord, you don't really know anything. You don't really yet know anything, and I know that sounds mean. That's okay. You can get mad at me. But I hope that God would at least stir your heart to consider that there's something that you don't understand yet, there's something that you don't know, that there's something that you're missing, and that God wants to shine the light in the darkness that you're in. God wants to reveal to you His Son. And not just as a bunch of facts, but for you to come to know Him and to know His peace. And what He's calling you to do is to, it just says it in one word here, to repent, to turn. That's what the word repent means. It's a turning. It's a turning, not just of the mind that we have to understand new things, because you do have to understand new things to be saved. Nobody gets saved unless they've heard. They have to hear the truth. It has to somehow enter into your mind. But it's not just facts, folks. It's got to go into your heart. There has to be a change on that inner man and who you are. And that's exactly what the Lord can do through His Spirit and His Word. He can go inside you and He can change you. You know, it's possible for you to feel different about God. It is possible for you to feel different about life and everything else going on. It is possible for you to have hope where you have felt that there is total darkness. It is absolutely 100% possible for you to feel these ways because God can do it. God can work this change in your heart. What he's calling us to do is repent. Well, repent from what? Repent from what? The repentance I believe the Bible speaks of in regard to salvation is a repenting from the sin of idolatry, self-reliance, and unbelief. Repenting from the sin of idolatry, which is counting something or someone else as your God. The sin of self-relying, of relying on yourself, and the sin of not believing and trusting Him. That is ultimately the repentance we have to face when it comes to salvation. You know, we tell people, and it's important, you don't have to get cleaned up to come to Jesus. You know, you don't have to get your life right to come to Jesus. Jesus came to people in the midst of their brokenness, in the midst of their sin, the woman who was caught in the very act of adultery and drug out by her accusers. Just moments ago, she was committing adultery with a man brought right before Jesus. And in that time, in that moment there, in that place where she was about to be stoned to death, Jesus was able to rescue her from that situation. And it was at that place that Jesus saved her soul and then told her to go and sin no more. You see, you don't have to remember all of your sins to be saved. I've heard people trying to recount everything that they'd ever done. My wife told talks about that in her testimony. She was raised Catholic. And when she realized that things weren't right, she didn't even know what to call it. She wasn't raised to know she was lost. She just knew that she had this weight of sin on her and it needed to be God. And she got down in her dorm room. This is before we ever met. And she'd heard a sermon on repentance. And she got down and she was trying to pray. and all she knew was the things she'd been taught, and she was trying to confess every sin, and she realized pretty soon, I can't even remember them all. I can't even remember them all, and none of us here could remember the ones that we even knew about. And I tell you, there's a whole bunch of sins we've committed we never even knew about. I do not stand in front of you as somebody who's got it all together. There are so many things wrong with me, and I don't even know all of them. I'm not even aware. I'm not even aware. God knows. But I'll tell you what, when you go to God and you're looking to be saved, what you need to turn from is holding on to or clutching anything else but Him. That's why I say idolatry. That's why I say self-reliance. That's why I say unbelief. Because the repentance of salvation is turning from anything else that you hold to and putting all of your trust in Christ. All of it completely in Jesus Christ. That's the kind of repentance that God is calling us to. You cannot come to Christ clutching any other form of support or comfort. You have to go look solely to Him. And I tell you, there's testimony after testimony after testimony in this place of people who God brought to that very point. And I tell you, it seems like sometimes it's the hardest place to get, but once you get to that place, He meets you right there. He meets you right there in that place. He is very, very, very, very near. He's not gonna miss the moment. He's not gonna miss the moment. He's the one creating the moment. He's the one working to bring the moment to pass. He's not gonna miss it. And when you get to that place of quitting, trusting anything else in your life that you think might somehow convince God to save you, and you simply come to Him as a helpless sinner, He will save your soul. He has been moving heaven and earth. He has been giving his son. He's been revealing himself all these things to save you. I appreciated so much the testimony Brother Corey shared last night of his co-worker who had been involved in organizing a lot of things that are very ungodly. And she didn't have to give any of that stuff up to be saved. She probably didn't even realize she had to give any of that stuff up to be saved. But she got to a place where she knew she needed peace, and she couldn't find it in herself. And she looked to God, and God brought her to that place of brokenness, and she got saved. And then she realized there were some other things in her life she needed to repent of. God did all those other things on the back end. After she was saved, after she was sealed, after she was set for eternity. And what a marvelous evidence of a real conversion. Because that's what we're looking for. We want the real deal. We don't want just to hear somebody tell us what we want to hear. We want the real thing. And I hope you want the real thing tonight. I hope you won't settle for anything less than what God is so willing to offer you tonight. But now, but now, God commands you to repent. But now, as He has given His Son, He has given His truth, He has sent out His church, this place is here. God has orchestrated and ordained this night that you might hear the gospel. But now, God is telling you, you need to move. You need to seek Him. You need to turn from yourself. You need to turn from Jesus. And I encourage you to seek Him and call upon Him until you find Him. And that is all we're interested in here tonight, is to being a place where you might do that and to encourage you to obey what God has commanded you to do. because this is between you and him tonight. And I hope you feel more than my words. I hope you feel God's spirit speaking to you tonight. And what he's telling you is repent now. Repent now as we have a song tonight. I encourage you this evening. Seek the Lord. Repent. Turn to Jesus and be saved. Because you have the gift of this moment. And I don't know whether there's going to be any more for you. I don't know whether there's going to be any more for me. And if I could go out on any note, it would be to tell somebody about Jesus. This would be a good way to go out if this is my last night. But for you, you don't want to go out and have this be your last night if you don't get things right with the Lord. But now, God has commanded you to repent. As we sing, seek the Lord.