Our Old Covenant reading for this evening is taken from the Book of the Psalms. Psalm 91, beginning at verse 1. We'll be reading through verse 16 this evening, which is also the end of the psalm. The Word of the Lord. He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, My refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust, for he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge. His faithfulness is a shield and a buckler. You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness, nor the destruction that wastes at noonday. A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. You will only look with your eyes and see the recompense of the wicked. Because you have made the Lord your dwelling place, the Most High who is my refuge, no evil shall be allowed to befall you. No plague come near your tent. For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone. You will tread on the lion and the adder, the young lion and the serpent you will trample underfoot. Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him. I will protect him because he knows my name. When he calls to me, I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will rescue him and honor him. With long life, I will satisfy him and show him my salvation. Here ends the Old Covenant reading. The New Covenant reading is taken from the letter to the Hebrews. Hebrews chapter 10, beginning at verse 19. We'll be reading through verse 25 this evening. The Word of our God. Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain that is through his flesh. And since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together as the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. Here I have the new covenant reading. Please keep your place here in God's word. This will be the primary portion of sacred scripture for our evening sermon. A great duty can also be a great privilege. Today's passage gives us the invitation of a lifetime. Not an invitation to the White House or to Buckingham Palace, but to something infinitely more magnificent. We are being called and invited into the presence of almighty God himself. Nevertheless, this is not an invitation that comes with an RSVP. It's not something that you can check your calendar and say, I already have a prior engagement. I can't go then. I can't come right now. See, it's an extraordinary privilege, but it's also a command. To turn down what God is calling us to do would, in fact, be crass rebellion. We're going to look at tonight's passage under three main headings, headings which concisely state these commands. First, draw near. Second, hold fast. And third, stir up. That's the three main things I want you to remember this evening. Draw near, hold fast, stir up. In many ways, these three imperatives are the climax of the first nine and a half chapters of the book of Hebrews. Hebrews is a magnificent book. But we're not intended to admire the author for his literary artistry or for his brilliant exegesis of the Old Testament. Rather, the purpose of this letter is that we would draw near to God with a true heart and full assurance of faith, that we would hold fast to Jesus Christ and our confession of him a public confession, and that we would stir each other up to love and to good works. We begin with the astonishing privilege and the clear command that we are to draw near to the Lord with a true heart and full assurance of faith. Look at verses 19 to 22 with me. Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is through his flesh. And since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Because of Jesus Christ, we now have confidence. That word for confidence routinely has the idea of boldness. It's something that we would do openly, fearlessly. And in this particular context, it means we have unrestricted access to Almighty God. It means that we're like a beloved child running into his father's arms, right? We're coming into God's presence and we're expecting to be welcomed and embraced with love. What an extraordinary privilege that is. It really is remarkable. You know, in the Old Testament, only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies. And then only once a year, after offering up sacrifices, both for his own sins and for the sins of the people. But because Christ has come and he has given his life for you, you are invited over and over and over again throughout the day to simply rush into God's presence and expect him to greet you with love, How could this be? Well, verse 19 tells us why with that single opening word, therefore. See, everything the author of Hebrews has been telling us up to this point serves as the foundation for how we can have this access for God. It's true of him explaining to us that God is, that Jesus is both truly God and truly man, come in the flesh. It's true when it talks repeatedly about Christ's life-giving death and how he offered up the atonement that genuinely put away your guilt. And it's true of what the author of Hebrews has told us about Jesus Christ right now being your great high priest, whoever lives to make intercession for you. Everything he's taught us about Jesus Christ and what he has done serves as a foundation for this truth. We are being called by God to come into his presence and expect blessing. Our privileged and blessed access to God comes through Christ and through Christ alone. Now, symbolically, when Jesus offered up his spirit on the cross to his father, commending it into his hands, that the temple veil of the curtain was torn in two from top to bottom. that made clear that there was now access for the people of God into the Holy of Holies, into God's own presence. But beloved, that was only the symbol. It's not the tearing of the temple veil that provides us access to blessing with God. It's the rending of the veil of Christ's own flesh that gives us access. This is not merely a new way. It's a new and living way. What does that mean? I think it means this. This Jesus, whom everybody, Jew and Gentile alike, came together and united to put him to death. This Jesus, he's alive. He's alive giving you this access. In the words of Charles Wesley, no condemnation now I dread. Jesus and all in him is mine. Alive in him, my living head, and clothed in righteousness divine. Bold I approached the eternal throne and claimed the crown through Christ my own. Amazing love, how can it be that thou, my God, shouldst die for me? Now, Kristen tried to confirm that with Google while we were driving down here today, but Charles Wesley got that idea from this passage, and Google let us down. So I don't know where he got that truth, but those words of this beautiful hymn actually clearly represent what we're being called to do here in Hebrews. Because of Jesus' life-giving death, we have peace with God. We've been justified. Because he lives to make intercession for us, we are bold. to approach the throne of grace. You know, none of us can just rush into the White House. Don't try it. They will stop you. But you know, we can't even go to the Apple headquarters in Cupertino and just walk in and talk to the CEO, Tim Cook. And these are just human beings who have but their breath and their nostrils. Every single heartbeat that they get is held in God's hands. It is his gift to them. And yet you, because of Jesus, can go into the presence of the creator of heaven and earth knowing that he is for you, knowing that he is eager to receive your prayers and to work on your behalf. Well, the question is obvious. Are you taking advantage of this privilege? The author of Hebrews is not raising that question. I say raising it, but implicitly he is. He's not raising that question to make you feel guilty. He's raising that question to encourage you, to say, look at this extraordinary thing you have. Won't you take more frequent advantage of it and spend more time with your Father who is in heaven? Now, naturally, we need to draw near to the Lord with sincerity rather than pretense, that is, to draw near with a true heart. That doesn't require any explanation. But I do want to draw your attention to this expression with full assurance of faith. You're going to see this more as we keep moving through Hebrews, but there are a number of passages in Hebrews that we can call the warning passages. that sometimes get wrenched out of context, and people either beat themselves up with it, or someone else beats them up with it, making them fearful about their relationship with God. Now, those warning passages are part of God's Word. They are God speaking to you. You ought to take them with complete seriousness. But I trust when you read them in context, what you will see is that they are not designed to lead you to dread. They are not designed to lead you to doubt. They are designed as warnings to encourage Christians to remain in the faith. In tonight's passage, which is also the very word of God to you, tonight's passage tells us that we are to approach the throne of God with boldness, with confidence, and with the full assurance of faith. Beloved, we do not come into God's presence wondering whether or not we will be accepted. We come into God's presence knowing that we will. It has been rightly said that we, that is God's children, we approach God in prayer, not as beggars at the back door. but his beloved children at the family table. That's you. God bids you to come to his table and talk to him and receive blessing. We draw near with complete confidence, and we can only draw near with complete confidence when we are looking to Christ in faith. We look to Christ in faith knowing that Jesus Christ is entirely sufficient to give us full and blessed access to our Father who is in heaven. Now, this is simple, but it's not always easy. Therefore the Lord, inspiring the author of Hebrews, moves right from this simple but extraordinary invitation to calling us to hold fast. To realize that while it's a simple thing on our behalf because Jesus paid it all, it takes effort on our part to hold fast to this truth. The letter continues by calling us to hold fast to our confession. Look at verse 23 with me. Verse 23. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. Most commonly, when we use the word confession in a Christian context, we tend to think about coming clean, confessing our sins to God. That's not what this means here. In this context, the word confession has the same idea as when we talk about the work of the Westminster Assembly as our confession of faith. It's about confessing who Christ is and what he has done and all the truths that God has revealed to us about himself. You have to remember, the original recipients of this letter were being tempted to deny the centrality and the necessity of Jesus Christ to our life with God. Please mark those words, the centrality and the necessity. I suspect that many of their Jewish family members would not embrace Christ, Many of their Jewish family members would have been fine with them believing that Jesus is the Messiah, as long as it's a private set of beliefs, as long as they continue to engage in the Old Testament cultic practices, and very importantly, as long as they were willing to pretend that their fellow Jews who were not embracing Jesus as the Messiah were just fine. You know, different strokes for different folks. Well, it turns out that 2,000 years later you face a very similar challenge. Almost all of your unbelieving friends and family members are quite fine with you being a Christian, as long as it's a personal, private set of beliefs, and as long as you are willing to pretend that all those people who don't embrace Jesus Christ, well, they're perfectly fine the way they are. Different strokes for different folks. Beloved, that's not just an error. It's a damnable lie. As I told you a number of times before, the Enlightenment category of religion does not fit Christianity. It does not fit Old Testament Judaism, and it doesn't even fit Islam. See, the Enlightenment idea took religion, it used to be a perfectly good term, you read Calvin's Institutes, it's the institutes of the Christian religion. When the Enlightenment came, that got moved to being a bunch of private beliefs that you happen to hold yourself in your own place, without making any claims on anyone else. But you can tell that's not right when you read the New Testament. You know, when John the Baptist and Jesus come, they do not come proclaiming the religion of God is at hand. They come proclaiming that the kingdom of God is at hand. See, the right category for Christianity is comparative kingdoms. Jesus Christ is Lord, he is king, and you cannot relegate his claims to something I just happen to believe. That's deadly. See, Jesus is not a way, a truth, and a life. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. Nobody comes to the Father except through Him. Our Lord Jesus Himself clearly teaches us this reality, but be honest, you need courage to hold this plainly in the world in which you live, right? To not practically deny what Jesus has taught us simply by remaining silent. Where then can we get the courage that we need to hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering? You need courage. Where do you get it? Here's where you get it. We hold fast to the confession of our faith because Jesus is faithful. The reason why you can be confident in your faith is the one who promised is always completely faithful to his promises and to you. Furthermore, in spite of the very real struggles that we will face in maintaining our good confession in this world, it is not a confession of despair. It is a confession of hope. We have confidence for the present Because our great high priest, right now, is enthroned over the entire universe, over every single molecule. And he is governing all things for the good of his church. And he is interceding for you. Always. We have confidence for the present because of that. And we have confidence for the future because our Lord has told us that he's going to come again and bring us to himself. that where he is, we will be also in his father's house. And he who promised is faithful. He will surely do it. Are your circumstances making it particularly challenging for you to hold fast to your confession right now, perhaps with a particular individual at work, perhaps with a family member? Are your circumstances making it hard to do the very thing we're being called to by the author of Hebrews. But this will be true of you. If it's not true of you tonight, it will be true of you at various points in your life. It's just part of being a disciple of Jesus Christ in a broken and fallen world. What do we do? We stop looking at our circumstances and we fix our eyes on Jesus. We don't hold fast to the faith because someone gave us a really good seven-step plan on how we can hold fast to our faith. We hold fast to our confession of Jesus Christ, because Jesus Christ has laid a hold on us, and because he is faithful. So first, we're called to do things about this. Now, I wanna be clear, this is not a self-help plan. I've just told you that you don't need a seven-step plan to do this, you just need to fix your eyes on Jesus. Nevertheless, the Bible does tell us there are things we ought to do. First up is we need to saturate our minds with the Word of God. There's an extraordinary degree of comfort that comes from having the promises of God just called to memory. You're thinking about these struggles, and you're thinking about your place in life, and then you remember that Jesus says, my sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can snatch them out of my hands. My Father who has given them to me is greater than all. No one can snatch them out of my Father's hands. I and the Father are one. Or you think of the concluding words of Romans chapter eight. I mean, tens of millions of Christians throughout church history have received an extraordinary amount of comfort from these words. Paul writes, for I am certain that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Well, that is good news, but you will only be comforted by that if you know it. See, you've got to get God's word into your head and into your heart so that it goes with you everywhere that you go. There simply is no substitute for meditating regularly, and this opportunity provides deeply upon the word of God. Second, we need to make sure that we're sharing our lives deeply with at least a few other Christians, a few brothers and sisters in Christ. One of the most important things that young people need to do when they're heading off to college or they're heading out to a job and they're moving away from their parents, maybe in a new town, is right away find a few committed Christians and fellowship with them. Find a church and worship there. They can't be out as lone rangers in this world. Truth be told, we don't stop needing such connections and mutual fellowship just because we're getting older. as I am, and a few of you are as well. You know, many of you know this illustration. It's a very common illustration for preachers. I have no idea who first came up with it. But it's the preacher who's talking to a guy about his need to come to church, and he doesn't care. He's not paying any attention. They're out on the deck of their house, and they've got a little barbecue grill. And he takes the tongs, and he grabs a burning hot coal out of the fire. And he simply places it aside on a rock, and they go, I'm talking for one. and then he picks up the coal in his bare hands. Beloved, that's true of us. See, left to ourselves, apart from an extraordinary work of God's grace, like we see with Joseph in Egypt, for example, but left to ourselves, we will gradually, or perhaps not so gradually, begin to grow cold. See, we were never intended to be isolated. God created us and redeemed us into a family. so that we would stir up each other in love and good works. Critically, as I say, holding fast to the faith is not a solitary activity. Instead of the Lord calling us to live lives of splendid isolation and isolated devotion, the Lord calls us to stir up one another to love and to good works. Look at verses 24 and 25 with me. Verses 24 and 25. The author of Hebrews continues, And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together as the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day draw near. Frequently, frankly, most of the time, our interactions with each other are just living in the moment. That's actually great. You ought not to script all your conversations that you're going to have with people in the church. One of the joys of being part of a genuine family is you can let the guard down and just be yourself. You don't have to worry if you say something a little bit wrong or a little bit off or whatever. We love each other. So that's totally true. On the other hand, we should notice what the author of Hebrews here is telling us to do. The author of Hebrews is calling us to consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. This word translated consider means observe carefully, to study attentively, and to think deeply about. This is not a casual consideration. Let me ask an obvious question. What sorts of things in your life would you give this sort of attention to? to really focus on something and try to work out how you're gonna make it happen? Well, the answer's obvious. Something that's important, right? You don't do this for everything. That would be, you know, drive you crazy. You do this for things that are important. And what the author of Hebrews is saying to us, what God is saying to us through this passage is, thinking about how you can stir up your brothers and sisters to love and good works is that important. Your normal life, you're going to go through things, and you'll sometimes just say things that are encouraging, because it just comes out of you. And sometimes, if you're like me, you'll say things that aren't entirely helpful, and that's all fine. We're living together. But go home and think about who you're stirring up. Think about how you can help them. And please note, the author of Hebrews is not simply talking about encouraging one another. As valuable as that is, he actually has a vocational focus here. He's saying you need to be focused on your brother or sister fulfilling their calling on their lives to be disciples. Love and good works. That's what Jesus tells us. When Jesus is asked to summarize the law, he says you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. You're all responsible to do that. The author of Hebrews is saying you're also responsible to help each other do that. to stir up one another, to love, and to good works. Turns out that Cain was not only a wretched murderer, he was also tragically wrong. I am my brother's keeper, and so are you. Well, how do we stir each other up? Verse 25 tells us that an important part of stirring each other up is not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. Corporate worship stands at the very center of Christian life. It's not a nice optional extra. It's something that we are all called to do. It's something that we need to do for the benefit of other people. It's not something that we do when we don't have something more exciting planned on Sunday. And what the author of Hebrews is making clear is it's not just important for you. It's important for your brothers and sisters. I should say that it's very common when this passage gets quoted for it to be quoted in the context of you need to be at corporate worship. It's important for you Now, beloved, that's entirely true, but it's not what the author of Hebrews is saying. He's saying your involvement of getting together with your brothers and sisters in Christ to stir them up for love and good works is good for them. You need the church, but your brothers and sisters need you as well. I should say that while we need to be thoughtful about stirring up one another to love and good works, this does not mean that we need to come up with some sort of complex plan for how to pull this off. You know, standing next to your brothers and sisters and singing confidently the great hymns of the faith and the psalms and reciting the creeds and praying and so on, it's all stuff you're just supposed to do in worship. That encourages them. That strengthens them. I remember a study I read, must be 20 years ago now, but I trust it's still true, that showed that the children of parents who sang the hymns and recited the creeds out loud, this might surprise you, because in our church, like, everyone does that. In a lot of churches, there's a lot of people in the church that, they're just kind of there, right? The children of parents who sang the hymns and recited the creeds out loud were much more likely to stay in the church when they became adults themselves. I am not saying that there's a direct cause and effect relationship here. That would be a mistake. Your children's faith is not something you can do with a light switch or a technique. It's by God's grace. You might be the greatest parents in the 21st century, and your children may end up being unbelievers. Eli was a rotten father. His kids were not faithful. But Samuel, by everything we know about him, must have been a righteous good father. And his children didn't walk in his ways either. So don't make this something that's going to make you feel guilty. But do realize that your own active participation in the Christian faith is something that God very much can use to stir up your children to genuine faith and to love and good works. I'm intrigued by the fact that even the apostolic church, there were those who made a habit of being infrequent in gathering with the saints. If I didn't have that in the New Testament, I would have thought that came later. But the truth is the circumstances change, but human nature does not. Why were they infrequent? I think we can assume it's for the same reasons as today. Busyness, other things to do. and spending so much time in church could have led to persecution and ridicule. That can, to some degree, in our own day, right? Same sorts of issues, but I think actually underneath it all, the biggest one is this, being religious without being devoted to Jesus. It's quite possible to like church, but not to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. See, the Lord is calling us to something far better. When we gather, we come alongside one another. We begin to genuinely share our common life in Christ with the result of mutual encouragement. This, of course, takes place outside of corporate worship as well. It normally gets addressed at corporate worship. That's not the only time you guys spend time with each other, with other Christians. This is something that we do. in the ordinary course of our life. Kristen and I belong to a supper club that met this last week at the Fury's home on Monday night. It's a great joy to have these face-to-face relationships where we're just sharing our lives, and we laugh together, we cry together, we pray for each other, we play a game. It's great, right? I can say, do it because it's joyful, and it is. I'll tell you something else. Because our lives are intertwined with each other, it makes it a lot harder for any of us to drift off. Because there's people that I meet with regularly and we talk about Jesus together and we just share our lives. I'm also part of a minister's fellowship that meets once a month during the academic year at our church in Manchester. One of my dear friends has said this numerous times. If it wasn't for his shared life with the other ministers, he would have left ministry years ago. See, the truth is, we need each other. It's not just that he needs other people. Beloved, you and I need other people, too. We need each other. I do want to say something rather pointed to the men here this evening. The women in this church are a lot better at this than we are, right? We may be doing a lot of things right in the Christian faith. Right? I know you, and I know that you're doing that. But the women in this church are really good at investing in each other's lives, and we men need to step it up a bit. Right? Both for the glory of God, but also for the good of our brothers. We need to step up and invest more in each other's lives. Why is this stirring up so important? Because we are closer to our salvation than the day that we first believed. The day of our death or the day of Christ's second coming is closer. I don't think the author of Hebrews is trying to say, well, you know Christ is going to come back any moment now. I mean, maybe the any moment, but he's not saying, you know, it's definitely going to be in the next few years. It's going to be in your lifetime. That's not what he's getting at. The point is simply that in this life, your time is limited. You don't have forever. to share the gospel with your children, with your neighbors, right? Today is the time to tell people about Jesus. You don't have forever to stir up each other to love and good works. You have an opportunity now, right? There's an urgency to this. We do not have forever to make a lasting impact for the sake of the kingdom of God. We do not have unlimited time. So spend your time wisely. for the sake of the gospel. Now thankfully, there are a lot of ways that we can stir up one another to love and good works. You do that, many of you do this regularly to your personal example. Simply, you're not even thinking about it this way. I told you earlier you have to consider it. But if you're just following Jesus, you're gonna do a lot of this just naturally. Your life shows that you're prioritizing loving the Lord, walking with him, worshiping him. Jesus is central in your life. And therefore, if you are living with a love for God and walking in His ways, other people will see that. They'll see it without you having to hold up any signs. It may stir up someone else to think, that's a better way for me. But I will tell you, it may also be used for your brother or sister who's struggling, who's having difficulty hanging on because the circumstances are so tough, and your example inspires them to say, yes, yes, together, we're gonna hold fast to the faith and we're gonna do what is right to the glory of our Father. We stir up each other by regularly talking about the faithfulness, the grace, and the goodness of our God. See, you are not the message. Jesus is. If we find ourselves talking all the time about our church, our programs, my Bible study, we're actually missing the whole point. Right? It's not about what we're doing. It's about who Jesus is and what he has done. I mean, it's fine to tell people about other things, too. This is not some kind of hard, fast, rigid rule. But I want to encourage you to actually take time this week to commit yourself to telling people, people who know Jesus already. The gospel's for everybody. Just say things like, the Lord has been so good to me. I am amazed at what he's done for me and Jesus. the smallest ways you can think of, speak about the faithfulness of your God. It will stir up your brothers and sisters to love and good works. We hold fast to our confession of faith because he who promised is faithful. So that's the goal. Let's talk more about the faithfulness of our God. We also stir up each other to love and good works by the distinct gifts God has given to us. You read 1 Corinthians, one thing that becomes clear is God doesn't give all the gifts to anybody. He gives some gifts to one person, some gifts to another person, some gifts to another, so that we come together and we use our gifts for the benefit of the whole. How are you using your gifts? Think about that. What can you do? Don't make it complicated. You do not have to become a concert pianist. Right? You don't have to become a great orator. Just see your brothers and sisters and say, how can I help them? How can I encourage them? How can I serve Jesus by serving my brothers and sisters? By the way, you don't even need to have answers. That's actually one of the things that slows Christians down a lot. You think, I've got to be able to answer all their questions to help them. You don't need the answers. Frequently, the way you stir people up the most is simply by asking questions. What has the Lord been teaching you lately? That's a good question. Do you have someone on your heart that you want to reach with the gospel that I can pray with you about? That's a good question. There are all sorts of questions like that you can ask. They're just things that Christians should be doing. How can I pray for you? I want to challenge you to make the application of these verses specific. Talked this morning about not delaying application. We've got a grand plan to do something great in the future. Boy, am I going to be an encourager 10 years from now, right? I want to encourage you this evening, right now, to make this as specific as possible. Who am I going to encourage? And how am I going to do it? And I would ask, even kind of reflecting on your life this way, whose life would be impaired if I wasn't around, because someday you're not going to be. Because if there's nobody, you can just kind of slip away. That should make it really clear. You're not being an encourager. You're not stirring up your brothers to love and good works the way that God is calling us to do. And on the flip side, who is stirring you up? I know the women are better at this once again than the men, but in order to be stirred up to love and good works, we've got to let people in. Who are you being vulnerable enough with that they, not everyone, but we're not talking about, you know, dancing emotionally naked in front of the church, right? Who do you let in enough that they know what your hurts are, what your hopes are, what you're struggling with, what you're dreaming about? You gotta let some people in. Now I know that's not a very New England thing to do. New England, as one of my friends said when COVID hit, they told us we have to stand six feet apart. That's awful close. So I know this is not a New England thing, but it is God's plan for you, the people of God. You need to open up and let some of your brothers and sisters into your life. Do not allow the devil to convince you that you can be a strong Christian in isolation. You can not. You need your brothers and sisters in Christ, and beloved, they need you. Therefore, beloved, draw near to the Lord, for he is already reaching out to you with loving arms. Hold fast to Jesus Christ, For his grip upon you is far stronger than your grip upon him. He who promised is faithful, and stir up one another to love and to good work. For you are not walking this journey alone. The God who calls you is near. He is the same God who holds you secure, and he has surrounded you with brothers and sisters to encourage you in your steps. This week, may you find yourself moving closer to his heart, resting more fully in his faithfulness, and discovering new ways to kindle up love, love for God and love for neighbor and those who are around you. And go out tonight with joy, knowing that he who has begun a good work in you, he is faithful. He will surely bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. Amen.