The whole idea of worship is that you are worthy of praise. In fact, you're the only one that is. You're our creator, and you're the only uncreated being. We rejoice in that fact. We rejoice that we are your creation, made by your hands, intimately known by you. We praise you for your power, your strength, your glory, your incomprehensibility, We love you and we thank you. We thank you that you've revealed yourself to us. We thank you for the cross of your son in which he paid for all of our sins, every last one of them. We thank you for the forgiveness that we have, the eternal life that we have through your son, Jesus Christ, by faith alone and not by works. I thank you for your comfort. I thank you that though death is something we experience now, It's something you will deal with. It's something you've already triumphed over. You're victorious. We praise you. In Jesus' name, amen. Boy, gotta be careful. I wasn't expecting that. I appreciate all of you who mention your condolences for my family as my grandma passed away this last week. We've been praying for her and we've known that it was coming. And ever since then, we've been praying that it would go quickly. And God answered that prayer and she went within a week of what the doctor said. They said they gave her a week and she died the next day. So that's a huge praise to me because She's now with her Savior. And I'll see her again. And perhaps you can meet her someday if you know Jesus is your Savior. So thank you. I wanted to start today by reading out of Philippians. Pastor Dan shared from Philippians the last two weeks The book of Philippians is a phenomenal book. If you're facing suffering, if you're facing the details that exist within the world because of the fall, the main idea of Philippians is peace or joy. And so with our topic in Romans 5, 6, or 11 being peace, I wanted to read from Philippians chapter 4, starting in verse 10. or excuse me, let me, starting in verse four. Philippians four, verse four. Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to all men. The Lord is at hand. Be anxious for nothing. But in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. Now pay attention to verse 7. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. So Philippians 4 verse 7 mentions the peace of God, and one of the details about the peace of God is it surpasses understanding. Now that doesn't mean that we can't understand a little bit about the peace of God. In fact, that's what we're going to set forth to do today. I hope by the end of this message in Romans 5, 6 through 11, you will understand the peace of God. And furthermore, I hope that you not only understand it, I hope that you recognize that you have peace with God, if you have trusted in us in Jesus Christ. We've talked about in Romans, click back over here, make sure, there we go. We've been talking about in Romans the outline, which I hope has become repetitive to you. I hope it's been redundant to you, because that means you've heard it again and again and again, and you're going to hear it again and again and again and again. And we're going to keep telling you again and again and again and again, because if you understand this principle, you're going to understand the Book of Romans better. You're going to understand what many theologians have argued is one of the more complex works by Paul. It's certainly one of the longest works by Paul. And in it is packed so many great and important details about your salvation, about your sanctification, and about your glorification. But not only that, wait, there's more, about God's end time program for Israel and beyond. And so whenever you can discern a outline by the author The book unpacks itself, and I firmly believe. He's not even here, so I'm not sucking up at all. But what Pastor Dave has done with this outline is tremendous. It's, in his own words, unheard of. He's not seen it before. And it's not that he's found something that everyone has missed. It's that he's emphasizing what people are not emphasizing, and that is the Hupefora argumentation. So by way of review, the Hupefora argumentation There's essentially five cycles from chapter 1 through chapter 11 where Paul is issuing a persuasive argument concerning justification. There's five cycles to this persuasive argument concerning justification. The typical format for this cycle argument is there's a theme, there's a thematic statement that's presented. Maybe it's a verse. Maybe it's a couple of verses. Maybe it's a few verses. But it's a theme that captures the point of emphasis of that cycle. And then after establishing that theme, there's times where Paul will elaborate on that theme a little bit more. But then he'll issue forth the hupephora argumentation. And the hupephora argumentation is designed to answer anticipated objections or questions. It's not a rhetorical question. A hupephora argumentation is intended to answer anticipated objections. And in very much the same way, Paul is setting forth a legal defense of the doctrine of justification. And he does so in quite a powerful way. So the five cycles, we've established in the early part of Romans the universal need for justification. Paul made it absolutely clear that every single person who has had the breath of life in them has a need to be justified. all fall short of the glory of God. Cycle number two is the good news, the only means of justification. Faith in Christ alone and not works. after establishing these two points with crystal clarity. Cycle three is the benefits of justification. This is where we're at right now. We are in the benefits of justification. Not only are we saved, which is in and of itself amazing, right? If God stopped there, he'd still be worthy of all praise, right? But he doesn't. And so there's so much that we learn about God based on what he does in creation, but also what he gives us abundantly. As it was mentioned in Sunday school, our cup overflows. It's overwhelming when we recognize the blessings of God. Cycle four, we've not gotten there yet. Pastor Dave's outline is more benefits, and I agree with that. I've altered it slightly. I've called it the permanency of justification. Because in it, he talks about there, therefore, is now no condemnation. It's pretty permanent, right? If you're in Jesus Christ, can you ever be out of Christ? No. And then cycle five is kind of the wrench in the whole outline. Doesn't match our alliteration quite as well, but it's the explanation concerning Israel. After Paul goes through all these arguments, and he talks about you can trust in the promises of God, God said it, that settles it, right? Done deal. Potential objection, what about Israel? Didn't God make promises to Israel? Did God fulfill those promises to Israel? Well, unless you're a replacement theologian, he has not. The church is not Israel. Israel is Israel, right? We pay all this money to go to seminaries to learn that Israel means Israel, Babylon means Babylon, God means what he says, and if the plain sense doesn't make good sense, what do we do? Then we seek for other senses, right? And so Paul then establishes a great climax to his story, his argument, to explain that God's not done with Israel. And in fact, I'm excited to get to 9 through 11, because dispensationalists traditionally, I think, have explained the distinction between the church and Israel as saying God has put Israel on the shelf. momentarily, and he's working through the church. That is not the case. And Paul makes the argument in 9-11, Israel is still being saved. And he says, Hello, I'm a Jew, and I'm saved. And he explains the doctrine of the remnant. and that there will always be a remnant of Israel. And furthermore, there's arguments that can be made that God has been working in Israel, even though it maybe wasn't quite as clear until the 1940s, right, when Israel became a nation again, and all of the Jews started flocking back to their homeland. I believe that that is of divine appointment. God is doing that. And so we'll get there, of course. But we're in cycle number three, the benefits of justification. If you have other questions about the only means of justification, please come talk to me or talk to Pastor Dave. Reach out. Because that's the most important argument, right? Is, OK, he's defending justification. The only means of justification is quite important to that, right? But we're talking about the benefits of justification in cycle number five. Now, you'll remember a few weeks ago when I taught through Romans 5, 1 through 5, that basically you can summarize, or I summarize, the benefits of justification as three things. Peace, grace, and hope. Interestingly, through the rest of chapter 5, he elaborates on that theme. He elaborates on hope in verses 1 through 5. He talks about the hope and how Perseverance grows our character, and character leads to hope, and hope is worth it. This week, we're going to talk about peace. What does peace mean? What is the peace of God? And then the rest of chapter 5, if you were to place emphasis by way of how much is said about one of these three topics, grace receives the most treatment. Grace becomes the primary factor. And that's why grace is dealt with heavily in chapter 6 and 7. In other words, the whole argument that's taking place in Romans 7, it begins in chapter 5. In fact, arguably, it begins in chapter 1, right? Because Paul didn't start writing in chapter 7. He started writing in chapter 1. And so these cycles are almost, we were talking on Wednesday night about the cycles of, the book of Judges, and it's kind of a spiraling downward. Well, the cycles of Romans is like a spiraling upward. He's going up and up and up into the climax of God's eschatological promises and present promises to Israel, and how that is important for us as well, as we are grafted in as a wild olive branch. So we're in the cycle number three, the thematic statement, faith, or excuse me, hope, grace, and peace. The elaboration takes place in verses six through 21, and then the hupophora argument is six, one, through seven, 25. The title of today's message is The Peace Treaty of God. The Peace Treaty of God. And so with that, all of that preamble, we'll finally read our passage. in Romans chapter 5 verse 6. Paul continues, he says, For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation. There's essentially four parts to this passage. First of all, dealing with the treaty, the peace treaty of God. Verse six tells us about the timing of the treaty. We'll deal with the timing aspect of this treaty. Part number two is the ratification of the treaty. That's important, right? How do we know a treaty is legitimate if it's not signed, right? Or ratified. Part number three is the motivation of the treaty. Why would God make a treaty? What's behind him? Wanting to do this, what motivations are there behind the treaty God made? And then lastly, what's the extent of the treaty? What does the treaty include? What is the benefit package, if you will, the fine print of this treaty? And that's in verses 9 through 11. So dealing with, oh man, I didn't do, I knew I was forgetting something. This is going to be all out of whack. You know, when you do a slideshow, you like to have the transition so it's all mysterious and educational and such. So that's going out the window. I apologize for that. But now you're getting it full force. So first of all, we see, when we were without strength, is the first thing we see in verse 6. Strength is the Greek word asthenon. And the idea basically means unable to do anything resulting in peace. It's to be without strength or inability. Tied to the concept that we are discussing, it's the inability to do anything that would result in peace with God. And that's true, right? This is echoing back to the discussion of cycle number one, the universal need for justification. There is nothing we can do to have peace with God. And that's a depressing thought, right? Nothing we can do. Except, of course, he's already talked about the good news, that the only means of justification is through his son, Jesus Christ. But he's making the point that the timing of this treaty, when we were without strength, when we were unable to do anything resulting in peace with God, in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. The New American Standard Bible translate it better. He says, at the right time. At the right time, Christ doth die. So what time is that? Well, you don't get the mystery of my transitions, but it's 33 A.D. is the date I give. This is according to Harold Hohner, who's done a great work on the dating of the life of Christ. But conservatively, it's within the years 26 and 36 A.D. Interestingly, believe it or not, Jesus was not born on zero. He was actually born in like four and a half BC, which is strange, right? I won't go into detail explaining that now. It's just one of those things that I learned at seminary that was confusing, but you just go with it. And it's too late, because now we'd have to readjust all our calendars and everything, right? So part of this timing aspect, thinking about why this frame of time, whether you take the conservative 26 to 36, or the more particular correct version of 33 AD, why that time? We've been, the Earth has existed for about six to 7,000 years. And we could debate that in another time, but six to 7,000 years, roughly. Why the year 33 AD? Well, interestingly, some of the accompanying things that were around this time, the Jews were ungodly during this time. Gentiles were also ungodly during this time. And in particular, what I think is in view here is the response to the Messiah. The Jews rejected the Messiah. The Gentiles rejected the Messiah, right? Who killed Jesus? Who's guilty of the death of Jesus Christ? That's a trick question. Jesus, right? Jesus laid down his own life. But that's the whole argument, right? The anti-Semitic argument is that the Jews are Christ killers. And a lot of great evil has been done to the Jewish people because of that. And that's not true. If we were really being technical, both had a hand in Jesus's death, but Jesus laid down his own life, right? And the Gentiles part in that was through Pontius Pilate, right? He had every right, every authority within him to let Jesus walk. He even had the authority of his wife, right? Strongly urging him to have nothing to do with this man, and did he listen to his wife? Nope. So the moral of this lesson, men, listen to your wives. They will often give great counsel. But there's also the prophetic setting spoken in Daniel. And so briefly, I want to take a step back. B.C. typically referred to before Christ. Or then there's the insidious B.C.E. Oh no. Is the whole world falling apart? Has God lost His seat on the throne? Has He lost His sovereignty if we go by B.C.E.? ? Which means before Common Era, right? Or after Common Era? Well, what happened that would delineate the before and after of the Common Era? The life of Jesus Christ. Either way, history is patterned after Jesus Christ. We don't have to worry about silly arguments or battles or wars over semantics. Bottom line is, at the perfect time, the great changes within the world that was going on centers on Jesus Christ. So I want to talk about those based on the prophetic setting spoken in Daniel. Daniel mentions four seceding empires that are going to take place. The first begins with Babylon. This is where the time of the Gentiles began. And Babylon conquered a great swath of territory. They conquered the land of Israel in particular. And they were defeated by Persia. Now, Persia is interesting in this setting the stage, if you will, for the timing of the coming of the Son of God, in that they allowed Israel to rebuild the temple and rebuild the city. And that has led some to conclude that Cyrus, the king of Persia that allowed the Jews to do this, was a believer. And I want to say that he was not a believer. Yes, he worshipped Yahweh, but it was a sub-god to all of the other gods that he worshipped. And his primary god was Marduk, in which he said he was the servant of Marduk. And so his philosophy was, he was a polytheist. And his idea was, if I let the people of this region worship the god of that region, that god is going to bless my empire. You see? So he was limiting God, putting him in the box of the boundaries of the promised land. Is that where God is? No. And that's why I love, there's so many great narratives in there where God is, the articles of the temple are placed within the, with the articles and the idols of Babylon and what happens. And the false gods are tipped over. And it's so hilarious, right? Just reading those stories. But Persia expanded their empire. They were conquered by Greece. Now, interesting things happened under the empire of Greece. One of which was the established language. Greece was the common, in fact Koine Greek is common Greek. It was a trade language amongst all the early nations. And basic, quote, peace. Because at this time, empires are rising and falling. There's jostling for power any time that happens. So there's going to be skirmishes and battles, wars taking place all over. But under Greece, it was relatively peaceful. Ironically, it was at the hands of Alexander the Great, who was probably the world's greatest conqueror, apart from Christ, right? Christ won up him. But the established language, everything has kind of been brought under the umbrella of the Grecian Empire. And then there's Rome, where Greece slips over, and it's all Rome now. Still using Greece as the common language, but have you heard the phrase, all roads lead to Rome? There's a reason that's a saying. It's because all roads lead to Rome. And so travel during these times, Rome was the center of the world. All roads led there. Merchants in the city of Rome, that was a place. That's why Paul wanted to get there and to share the gospel. And it also means that the explosion of the gospel into the world was, the wheels were, or the tracks were greased, if you will, with the road systems. So at the perfect time, God sent his son into the world. In fact, all that takes place in, you might have heard the term, the 400 years of silence. That's the years that transpired from the Old Testament prophets to the coming or the declaration of the coming of the birth of the Son of God. They call it the 400 years of silence. I don't think it was silent at all. Yeah, God wasn't speaking through prophets during this time, but he was moving. And I've even made the argument he was doing things in the world that can be paralleled with all the great things that he's done that were told about in scripture. So we see the timing of the treaty. Next, we see the ratification of the treaty. And I want to talk about salvation typology. First of all, what in the world is typology? Well, a smart man by the name of Donald Campbell says, a type is an Old Testament institution, event, person, object, ceremony which has reality and purpose in biblical history but which also by divine design foreshadows something yet to be revealed I like that definition because typology is a slippery slope we talk about the study of scripture and we interpret scripture literally and historically and grammatically and then when you get to typology it seems that goes out the window because it's almost a three-pass to allegorize scriptures why because you say all of this Old Testament event is a type or a shadow of something else No, I like how he emphasized has reality and purpose in biblical history but which also by divine design, not human design, foreshadows something yet to be revealed. In other words, we can't just pick here and there what we want to be a type. And that's led some. Roy Zuck, for example, is very strict with his typology boundaries in which unless the Bible clearly calls it a type, it's not a type. And at once I held that view, but I think there's some types that are types that aren't called types. Make sense? All right. So here's some salvation typology. First of all, Adam and Eve. In Genesis 3.21, we're told that God rejected their clothes of fig leaves. And what did he give them? Garments of skin or tunics. Where does skin come from? Animals. Hard to be a living animal without skin, right? So most likely, the implication here is that the animal was killed to cover the sin, the nakedness of Adam and Eve. And so we see the first stepping stone, if you will, in salvation typology of death covering sin, ultimately leading up to death being the full satisfaction for sin, which is Jesus Christ as we sung and worshiped. But then there's the burnt offering, the meal offering, the peace offering, the sin offering, and the trespass offering, all instituted in the Jewish religious system that God told them to do, to follow, that I want to talk about. The burnt offering mentioned in Leviticus 1, 3 through 17, the process was to bring an unblemished male from the worshiper's livestock and offer it at the door of the tabernacle, a meeting. The worshipper would then put his hand on the head of the offering to be accepted on his behalf. And so the idea is there's a symbolic gesture where there's a transference of the sin of the individual onto that animal. That animal is then sacrificed. Do you see any connections with the death of Christ on the cross for our sins? So in the religious sacrificial system, we start to see God making this point abundantly clear concerning substitutionary atonement or substitutionary propitiation. Propitiation, sorry. For sake of time we'll skip through these but all of these add a little bit more to the Typology if you will of what Jesus ultimately fulfilled and so if you were curious to read these read the first few chapters of Leviticus and and that's why I Serious, I'm serious when I say this the book of Leviticus is one of my favorite books. I except chapters maybe 12 through 18. That's a little uncomfortable. It's still Scripture, right? So in light of salvation typology, Christ died for the ungodly. So based on all of those foreshadowings, all of those types of the sacrificial system, the substitutionary sacrifices, Christ died for the ungodly. Who is that? It's me. It's you. It's everybody. He died for the whole world. He died for the whole world. The concept of cutting a covenant. We talked about this last week in Sunday school, right, with Genesis 15? The idea of cutting the carcass and dividing them in two and the parties of the covenant walking between them. When a covenant or a treaty is made, contract is made, it needs ratified. The ratification of the Abrahamic Covenant was what took place in Genesis 15. Jesus is the sacrifice or the ratification of the New Covenant. And so the way that I would explain this is the New Covenant has not been fulfilled. Why? Because it's made with the house of Israel in the house of Judah. Yet there's a relationship between the New Covenant and the death of Jesus Christ. What is that? Well, it's the ratification. The New Covenant has been ratified. It's just waiting for the other party to sign, if you will. Communion is a remembrance of the death of Christ. So what we're doing when we take communion, when we take the bread and we take the cup, and we're remembering the death of Christ, we're remembering, essentially, God signing on the dotted line. Because that's what he did, right? He made a covenant with us. Not a superimposed covenant that exists outside of scripture, but he made a contract. He who believes in my son will have everlasting life. And he signed with the blood of his son. Communion, therefore, is the peace we have with God. So we have peace with God. Now the motivation of the treaty, there's a human motivation and there's a divine motivation. The human motivation is stated in verse 7, for scarcely for a righteous man will one die. The idea here is he's speaking of rarity. Scarcely for a righteous man will one die. He's saying this may happen, but it would be rare if it did. But he adds to this, yet perhaps for a good man, someone would dare to die. If there was a good man found and his life was on the line, there may be someone that would say, you know what? I'll take his place. So he's saying that that's a reasonable possibility from the human viewpoint. That's a human motivation. In fact, we see this with the military. They die for our freedom. They don't know us. But they die for the values that our country was founded on. But then there's the divine motivation. But God demonstrates his own love toward us. So you see a contrast here? In that while we were still sinners, Not while we had good qualities. Not while there was a positive outlook. While you were at your very worst. While mankind, lumped in as a whole, was completely rebellious and an abomination before the eyes of God. He demonstrates his love in sending his son to die for us. Christ died for us. So then the extent of the treaty. There's received justification. You see this in verse 9a. Chapter 5, verse 9. Much more than having now been justified by his blood. Having now been justified. We receive justification. There's also substituted punishment, right? We're justified by what? His blood. His punishment was in our place. Do you see that? Delivered from RAF. Now, here we come to a controversial question, and it's amazing how much there's a time warp when you start going, because I thought I had plenty of time, and it's nearly gone. I'll deal with this just briefly. But delivered from wrath, first of all, context is king. This was one that I wish I had the animation because I just revealed my hand before we get there. But context is king when you deal with this. The question is, which wrath is it? Is it sin unto death or eternal damnation? Well, if you flip back to chapter 1, What did we say the wrath was in chapter 1, verse 18? For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness. Well, if you remember back, and if you keep reading, the wrath appears to be that when man suppresses the truth and unrighteousness, God gives them over to a foolish and darkened heart. In other words, He'll harden their heart. And that's the wrath of God revealed from heaven. This is repeated in 2.5, 2.8. 3.5 talks about a little bit different wrath, and then 4.15. So this has led some to believe that saved from wrath, in this sense, is talking about that physical potentially sin unto death. Because if God gives you over to unrighteousness, what's eventually going to happen? Potentially, you're going to be taken home early. Doesn't mean you lost your salvation. But this is a doctrine we see in scripture that believers are taken home early, right? First Corinthians, there's people abusing the Lord's table, and they are taken home. Still saved. We'll see them in heaven. But they were taken home early. So there are men that I greatly respect that take this view. Zayn Hodges is one. Rene Lopez is another. That talk about in fact st. Hodges had some strong words He said that if if you take another view and you say that this is talking about eternal damnation You're committing I said Jesus because it's not you're reading into the text What's not there because the flow and the usage of the word wrath means this and I agree with him, right? That is how Paul is using wrath however Context is king, right? Now, near context trumps far context. Does that make sense? Near context trumps far context. The context in this immediate passage is about Jesus dying for our sins, right? That's eternal damnation. That's eternal punishment. He took our penalty upon himself. That's the nearer context. Therefore, if it came down to it, I would side with, this is talking about eternal damnation. We are saved from God's wrath through his son, Jesus Christ, because of that substitutionary atonement. Now, that being said, aren't both true, essentially? So if we take the argument that Paul is saying that Jesus Christ you will also be saved from the wrath that's revealed from heaven back in 118 where God will give you over to unrighteousness if you continue to suppress the truth and the key word there is continue if you continue to suppress the truth God says fine if you're not going to listen to me have it your way so if we are at peace with God Aren't we going to be accepting the truth that he receives us? And if we stop, then we're no longer living in peace? Doesn't mean we're not ultimately at peace with God, but we're not living in that peace with God? So I think at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. But I would side with this talking about eternal damnation, which leads to a really important conversation on the gospel. When I preach the gospel, often I say, if you trust in Jesus Christ, you have eternal life. And so in other words, I emphasize the positive. And that's good, right? There's nothing wrong with that. But allow me this time around to emphasize the negative. And that is to say, if you don't trust in Jesus Christ, you will. Go to hell. Go to hell. Now that one's not as fun, right? That one's not as warm and exciting. But what's the positive side of that is if you do, you won't go there. You see? But you have to know what's at stake. You have to. I have family members that I'm going to stand before that don't know the gospel. And frankly, they don't want to. And it makes me sad. It's true. But it makes God infinitely more sad. Why? Because He crushed His Son on the cross. He was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquity. The chastisement that brought us what? Peace was upon Him. So when you share the gospel, share the good news. It's good news after all, right? If you trust in Jesus Christ, you have eternal life. But if you don't, the punishment remains. So by way of application, I'm a little bit over. I apologize. But my grandma died, so I'm going to take a little bit more time. Application number one. Do you have peace with God? That's what he's talking about, right? If you've trusted in Jesus Christ, the answer to that question is yes. But then there's question number two. Do you live at peace with God? Because you can have peace with God, but not live at peace with God. How is that? If you're not in fellowship with Him. The best illustration I can think of is a marriage, right? If you are fighting in your marriage, or disagreeing, or arguing, are you still married? Duh! Right? If you are out of fellowship with God, are you still saved? Duh! If you trusted in Jesus Christ, you have eternal life. But there's a possibility that you're not in fellowship with God. So the application here is, do you live at peace with God? And that peace, by the way, surpasses all understanding. And so that means that when you're facing the trials of this world, which we've talked about last week, trials have a way of changing our perspective, getting our eyes fixed on Jesus rather than the world. If we're fixed on Jesus, our trials seem a lot smaller, right? And that's the peace of God, because we know that He's in control. We know that He has a plan. We know that no matter what happens, it's only temporary, right? Even if we suffered for the rest of our lives, it's temporary. Do you understand the basis by which you have peace and live at peace with God? Grace. Right? It has to be. Because if it's about what you do, it's no longer grace. And this is what Paul is going to elaborate on through verses 12 through 21. This is going to stir up some major Hoopa for argumentation. Why? Because the potential accusations leveled at him, claws are going to come out, right? And that tends to happen when we talk about grace. But you need to understand that it's by grace alone that you're saved, sustained, and one day will be glorified. And so you need to understand the basis by which you have peace and live at peace with God is through Jesus Christ. And so I would encourage everyone here, or maybe through those listening to the recording through the sound of my voice, if you've never trusted in Jesus Christ, now is a great time in the words of Pastor Dave, right? The second best time, right now. Trust in Jesus Christ. Believe on him and be saved. And if you don't, the punishment remains. Because He took your punishment. And as we saw, Jesus paid a little bit, but you'll pay most of it, right? That'd be a terrible song, right? Tune-wise, lyric-wise, all of that. It'd be terrible. He paid it all. And he did it because he loved you. Because he did it when you were at your worst. Which means that he's going to know the bad days that you're going to have in the days to come. Does he stop loving you then? No. Father, we thank you so much for your love. We thank you for your patience, your long-suffering. We thank you immensely for your grace. We thank you for the peace that we have with you through your son Jesus Christ. I pray that this would embolden us to proclaim this message to our loved ones. I pray for the memorial service in a couple weeks for my grandmother, where I will share this message with friends and family that are Catholic, Mormon, Atheist, agnostic, and perhaps a wide range of other beliefs that don't acknowledge you as the authority, the sovereign creator. But I hope to bring the message that not only are you the sovereign creator, but you died on the cross for our sins. We love you, we thank you, and we pray the rest of our day would be blessed. In Jesus' name, amen.