Well, we want to ask you to turn to the Gospel of John, Chapter 7. We're going to be talking today about one of the greatest dangers that faces us. A great danger that you face, that I face. A danger that really, in a lot of ways, far exceeds any other danger that you're facing. A lot of times in our life we think that we are at risk of financial loss, or the loss of a job, or the loss of a relationship, or the loss of something in our life that we believe or are convinced is absolutely essential to life. And we fear the loss of those things. We fear the danger that it represents to our life. But there is a danger that is far greater than any of those. And that danger is a closed mind to Christ. And that's what we want to talk about this morning, is a closed mind to Christ. It is perhaps the greatest danger that anyone walking the planet today is facing, is a mind that is unwilling to hear from God, unwilling to consider the things that he would have to say to us, It's a closed mind to Christ, and it is a terrible, terrible danger. And we see this in this passage from the 40th verse to the 52nd verse of John chapter 7, among other things. But this is the thought God has given to us today from these scriptures. And so let us read together, beginning in verse 40 of John chapter 7. We know the context. It is the Feast of Booths. Jesus is speaking and the people are confused as to who he is. It says in verse 40, when they heard these words, some of the people said, this really is the prophet. Others said, this is the Christ. And that is, by the way, two different things in the mind of a first century Jew. But some said, is the Christ to come from Galilee? Has not the scripture said that the Christ comes from the offspring of David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David was? So there was a division among the people over him. Some of them wanted to arrest him. And we remember that the Jews, the Pharisees, had sent officers among them to go and arrest Jesus. And they'd done that, by the way, some four days prior. So for four days, they had been out attempting to find an opportunity to arrest him. And it reminds us of this in verse 44. Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. The officers then came to the chief priests and Pharisees who said to them, why did you not bring him? The officers answered, no one ever spoke like this man. The Pharisees answered them, have you also been deceived? have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in him. But this crowd that does not know the law is accursed. Nicodemus, who had gone to him before, and we remember that in the third chapter, Nicodemus, who had gone to him before and who was one of them, said to them, does our law judge a man without first giving him a hearing and learning what he does? They replied, Are you from Galilee too? Search the Scriptures, or excuse me, search and see that no prophet arises from Galilee. A closed mind to Christ is what I could not help but see when I was studying this passage of Scripture and praying and trying to come up with what God would have us to hear today. A closed mind, and there are many things that we see about a closed mind to Christ, and I think the first thing that we see is that a closed mind to Christ, how does one know what are the symptoms of a closed mind to Christ? The first one is arrogance. There's a great deal of arrogance on the part of the Pharisees in this passage of scripture. Couldn't help but notice it. Twice they ridicule and mock. They say here in verse 48, have any of the authorities or Pharisees believed in him? great arrogance of mind. One of the things that results from being closed-minded to God, to His Word, to the Spirit of God, to a preacher, to a friend who is trying to witness to you about God, one of the signs that your mind has closed to Christ, closed to the gospel, is that there is an arrogance that builds up in your own heart. and arrogance, these people, these Pharisees believed they were the standard. They believed they were the rulers. They were the ones to determine what right and wrong is. That they were the standard by which people ought to judge right and wrong. They believed they were the ones to say what was good and what was bad. And they believed that all other people were at some disadvantage to them because of their position as Pharisees after all. They had worked and been disciplined for a long, long time to get into the place that they were. And there was just this arrogance about them. And we see arrogance in the world today almost, I believe, perhaps on a scale that we've not seen in some time against the Christian faith and the Christian message and against Christ. An arrogance that I believe has settled and set up in the minds and hearts of so many people today, and it's identifiable because there's a great arrogance against the Christian faith. And in these Pharisees, we see an arrogance against Christ. And it demonstrates and it betrays. There's a great lack and a closed mind to Christ. Just arrogant. You know, there's a sister characteristic to arrogance that almost always comes along the ride. It's contempt for other people. Arrogance always engenders contempt for others. That is what these Pharisees did when they look at Nicodemus, a man, by the way, who we might say more about in a moment, simply asked them an honest, fair, and right question. Instead of answering his question, they say this to him, are you from Galilee too? Search and see, no prophet comes from Galilee. This contempt for others, this dismissal of others, this dismissal of what others might say, this dismissal of this crowd. And they look at them and they say, this crowd that does not know the law is a curse. This crowd that is not as privileged or as intelligent or as educated or as religious or as righteous as we are, how can we ever think that they would know what's right? As they look at this Jesus, and they hear Him preach, and they hear Him teach in a closed mind, and it manifested itself in arrogance and a content. So I want to ask you as we begin today, and we've all faced this danger at one point in our life. If there's anyone who's young enough and they have not been held accountable by God, perhaps you've not yet, but one day you will. But all of us have confronted this danger. And if we do not overcome this danger by the grace and the mercy of God, this is the greatest of dangers we'll ever face. A closed mind to Christ. And I ask you to examine your heart. And one of the places that you can see a closed mind to Christ is an arrogance and a contempt that sets up in your heart. arrogance in how you see yourself and a contempt for how you see others. But not only do we see this arrogance and this ignorance, we also see great prejudice. A closed mind to Christ demonstrates itself and manifests itself in prejudice. And prejudice is just in its simplest form to pre-judge. It's what the word comes from, it's what it is, to prejudice, to prejudge, to make an assumption, to judge a thing before one knows all there is that needs to be known about a thing. And that's what we see here when these Pharisees talk to this man, Nicodemus, and they talk among themselves. They did not listen to Jesus. In fact, it seems to me that they didn't even go to hear him. Not at this moment. They sent officers to go arrest Him. Instead of going for themselves, they send other people to come and arrest Him and bring Christ, the Son of God, before them in their presence. And this is another manifestation of an arrogance or of a closed mind to Christ is that often we place God in subjection to us rather than placing ourselves in submission to Him. And it's a sign of a closed mind to Christ, a mind that is unwilling to hear. And that's what happens here with these Pharisees. They send them off and they do not listen. They do not hear him. Nicodemus asked the question, do we do this? Are we to judge a man before we hear him? Sometimes people judge Christ this way, and this is what I think the world has done to a great degree. They've judged Christ before they've ever given him an opportunity to speak to them. They've judged the scripture before they've ever even read it. They've made a judgment before they've ever even heard the case. And I think many people dismiss God and they do not get saved because they have dismissed him and prejudged. That is what if there's an analogy to be drawn here in our day and in our time, because we don't have Pharisees in their white robes today. We don't see them on the streets or on the hillside or see them not walking more than three quarters of a mile and doing all of these 613 or even more commandments specifically and religiously. We don't see them, but we see their arrogance. We see their minds that are closed to the Gospel. But do you know what we see today? Is the world in general is arrogant and dismissive and prejudicial to the Word of God. And I find great irony in that because today the world promotes and says we should be tolerant and listen and be open to all sorts of things and yet they're prejudicial to the message of Christ. Is that not what's being done when the Bible and prayer and the Christian ethic and the Christian ideal as demonstrated in scripture has been removed from our public sphere? Is that not exactly what's happening? There's a prejudice. There's a prejudice against what God has said and it demonstrates and it betrays a great closed-mindedness to Christ. It's one of the greatest obstacles that a preacher has or that anyone has in sharing the gospel with someone else is a closed-mindedness and an unwillingness to hear what God would say to them. I wonder how many people today are living their life today completely dismissive of the Bible and the Scripture, not because they've read it for themselves and decided that it's not for them, but because they've listened to the so-called experts in our society who have said that it is nothing more than fairy tale and a bunch of stories, and that God is a cruel, mean God. How many people have truly, from Genesis to Revelation, read it through and said, I decide I am against this God. They're prejudiced. Are you? Have you decided before you yourself open this book and read it? One of the greatest recommendations that we can give to a lost world is read your Bible. Read it. honestly and sincerely. And when you get to that part where Jesus, the Son of God, stretches out His arms and dies for the whole world, I tell you and I ask you, can you in that moment turn from Him? And I have wondered, with the world so prejudiced against the Christian faith, I've wondered, what specifically is it that people are so prejudiced against in the Christian faith? Is it the part where God says to love your enemy? Is that what's unworthy of our time and effort to consider? Is it the part where the Bible says that we're all sinners? Do any of us deny that reality? Absolutely none of us do. Satan has almost made that a joke today. We're all sinners and I'm a pretty good one. We're all sinners and we're just all the same. The problem is now what he's turned that into is we've forgotten what the consequences of sin is. Consequence, according to the scriptures, death, separation from God. That's what we read about in the third chapter of Genesis, when Adam and Eve, all from that one single command of God, don't eat of this one tree. And I've just, I had another letter this week and it was asking, why did God put that tree in there? Such a common question. And it's a good question, a question that so many have, if God is so good, Why did He put the tree there that could cause them to fall from His presence? And the reason that He did, the answer to the question, is without the tree of the knowledge of good and evil to not eat from, there was no way for them to demonstrate their love of God. When there is no ability to do wrong, then there is also no ability to do right. God gave us that command, and sometimes people look at the commands of God and they say, what a strict God, what a, He just wants to ruin my fun and life, He wants to take away my fun and life, and what He's doing by those commands is giving you the ability to love Him, and to show Him and to demonstrate to Him that love. God gave us two eyes to see with, two ears to hear with, two hands to feel with, and one mouth to speak with. I wonder, If the point is that we ought to at least be listening, feeling and thinking and touching and examining twice as much as we're speaking. Too much of the time we're already prejudiced against it. A closed mind is a hard thing to break through, but I pray the spirit of God will do that. in your heart and in your mind, if that's the case. And when I use mind, I mean the inner man, the mind and the heart that comes together, that forms the volition, the will that is you, that is your choices and your desire. Both are involved. The signs of a closed mind to God is an arrogance. I've often wondered when someone is arrogant, it demonstrates, I believe, a weakness, not a strength, even in what they believe. arrogance, ignorance, and prejudice. But what's the danger here? What's at stake? You might say, what is the big deal? I don't understand. What's really at the heart of this? What is the danger of a closed mind? The danger is that you can go through your whole life believing a lie. You can go through your whole life believing a lie. And I will tell you today that that is undeniably true because I believe different things about God perhaps than those who do not. One of us is believing a lie. When a closed mind God takes over the heart and the thoughts, we find that there is a great inability often for them to even understand and to come to wisdom. Proverbs chapter 14, 12, there is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death, the danger. What's at stake here? Everything. Everything's at stake. What do you have to risk to open your mind long enough just to consider what God actually said? What the Bible actually presents as truth? What the Spirit of God would truly say to you? Because what's at stake is the opportunity to live according to the truth rather than live according to what you've made up or a lie in your own understanding. What's at stake is this danger that we are living or that is presented by a closed mindedness to God is a life that is lived according to a lie. That's what's at stake. It's this closed mind, as we've said, is this terrible obstacle. And Jesus, I believe here, in this whole week of the Feast of Booths that we've been reading about and in the midst of now for some months in the seventh chapter of John, what he is saying again and again and again, what he is communicating and the teaching that he is bringing, I think he's trying to shake the very foundations upon which the Pharisees had based their lives. He's trying to shake them out of their closed mindedness. He's trying to present to them things and be so abrupt maybe in his teaching and he was. I am the bread of life. He who does not eat me and partake and drink my blood cannot see the kingdom of God. All these things that he was saying, he was trying to shake the very foundation of their lives because the very foundation of their lives was built on a closed mindedness to Christ. He was trying to break down the gates of their closed minds. And I pray that the Spirit of God would do the same for you and me if our minds are closed to Him, that God would break down those gates of closed-mindedness so that we might hear Him and understand Him and see Him, and that our foundation, no matter how shaky it might get in our life, that we would realize that we are in great need of Him and that that foundation needs to be Him. In the seventh chapter of Matthew, a very familiar passage of Scripture, the 24th verse, Jesus speaking, everyone, no exceptions, everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock, and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house. But it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock. Now we're going to read about those who had their minds closed to Christ. And everyone, no exception, everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it." When God shakes the foundation of our life, it's not comfortable, but it is necessary for Him to show us that our foundation is faulty. The mountain climber tests his ropes and his clips and his gear long before he's hanging on the side of a mountain trusting it. There's no closed mindedness to that man saying that I don't want to know if there's a problem with my gear. I'm going to trust it. He tests it before. I want to ask you what is the foundation of your life? Have you opened your mind enough to the gospel message to examine the foundation of your life apart from Christ? I tell you today, if it's not Christ, it's sand. It's all that it is. Is the foundation of your life money? I tell you today, you won't ever have enough. Is it a relationship? I tell you, that other person's gonna disappoint you. If you marry him, you're married to him now, they're gonna disappoint you a lot. I know that in my case, I am a disappointment often, but there's love that overcomes those things. Is your foundation your job, your profession? These Pharisees, their very identity was wrapped up and full of this idea that they somehow were righteous when they weren't. You think Jesus' words weren't shaking the very foundations of their life? And they had a choice to make, didn't they? Listen or close their mind. What's the foundation of your life? Whatever it is. If it's not Christ, it's sand. Because even if you were to gain all the money that truly then you could say, I am content, you're gonna let it go one day. Even if you found the friend that was just the best friend you could ever have, you're gonna say goodbye to them one day. All of these other foundations are sand. Don't you see that? It's sand that is just going to slip through your fingers. The only thing that will not be separated from you and this life to the next is a relationship with God through his son, Jesus Christ. That's it. It's the only rock. Jesus was trying to break through this closed-mindedness by shaking the very foundation of their life, and sometimes people don't like that kind of preaching. They don't like that kind of confrontation. They don't like it because their mind is closed, and often they respond with these symptoms of a closed mind, arrogance, ignorance, and prejudice. By the way, isn't it interesting? that in these people who thought that they knew everything, they were ignorant. I don't, these things that they listed. No prophet comes from Galilee. Sure they do. Jonah came from Galilee. Did you read the Old Testament? This was an idea they had in their own minds. No prophet comes from Galilee. Search and see. Well, we did, and his name is Jonah, and he came from Galilee. Jesus is to be born in Bethlehem. I don't read anybody here saying, Jesus, where were you born? Because their minds were already closed. They didn't want to know the answer. They could see the very miracles that he performed. The lineage of David was in his line. His, not his earthly father, but his, or excuse me, his earthly father, Joseph, was a descendant of David. All of the Old Testament prophecies were coming true right in front of them. And what did they do? They're arrogant and dismissive and ignorant and prejudiced because their minds are closed to Christ. What's right in front of them? The feeding of the multitudes, the healing of the lame, the giving sight to the blind, the raising even of the very dead. And they see him and they say, have any of the Pharisees and the authorities that we believed? Are you from Galilee too, Nicodemus? This belittling and this accusation and these insults that are just frankly eighth grade in their maturity. They look at this instead of opening their mind and considering and answering Nicodemus' question. They keep their mind closed and they dismiss it. And what they often do is they find other people whose minds are closed and they find strength in their numbers. But I don't care how many people are on the wrong side of the truth, it's still the wrong side of the truth. It doesn't matter. And for a great part of history, the majority has been wrong. And according to Jesus himself, it is the broad way with many on it that leads to destruction. And all of those people walking down that path with a mind closed. Tunnel vision, isn't it? It's just I find it so ironic what the world accuses Christianity of. A closed mind is what they themselves have. A closed mind to Christ. Jesus trying to shake that closed mindedness off of them. by challenging what their foundation was built upon in their life. And I want to do the same here today. Challenge it if it's not Christ. I want to challenge the foundation of your life if it's not Christ. If what you wake up in the morning for and what you find comfort in and what you strive for every day is not the glory of Jesus Christ, you're building on sand. And that day, even if you're a child of God, if you wake and you live your life trying to build things that are not of Christ, you've built a sandcastle on top of a rock, you're not gonna lose your salvation, but you've sure wasted some time and effort. And he's trying, the Lord's trying to shake this foundation, I'm trying to shake it in you as well. And I make no apology for that. There are remedies. to this closed-mindedness. There are remedies to be found in Proverbs 11, verse 2. We find the first remedy, and it's if arrogance is a sign of a closed mind, then certainly humility is a sign of an open one to Christ. Proverbs 11, verse 2, when pride comes, then comes disgrace. But with the humble is wisdom. You want to grow in wisdom? You're going to have to start with a humble heart and an open mind to God. You're going to have to set aside your preconceived ideas. You're going to have to open your mind so that God might communicate truth to you. Humility is a remedy. Humility of mind and heart to understand that apart from God None of us would have the knowledge of God. Do you realize that? These Pharisees thought that they were righteous, and God noticed their righteousness, and so He said, boy, those are fine, fine people. I'm going to bring them home. They're of the lineage of the house of Israel. They're just upstanding citizens. They've religiously followed the observance of the law, and I am going to bring them to heaven because of how good they are. That is not the message of Scripture. The message of Scripture is that all are unclean. All have gone their own way. All have sinned. That all includes you. Includes me. Humility of an understanding that if God had not sought us, if God had not sought Adam and Eve after they sinned in the garden, they'd still be lost today. And I understand that had God not sought me when I was 11 years old, and by His grace and mercy my mind opened to the truth that I was not saved even though I thought I was. Had He not sought me and by His Holy Spirit convinced me, convicted me, and showed me His Son on the cross, and showed me my separation from God, and my eternal destruction in hell apart from Him, had God not sought me out and humbled me My mind would remain closed to Him today and I'd be just like the world, belittling, arrogant, dismissive, and ignorant. It's only because of God that we can say that we are none of those things, not because of us. Another remedy is the desire for the truth wherever we find it and wherever it leads us. A remedy for an open mind is a sincere desire for the truth wherever we find it and wherever it leads us. Closed mindedness can lead not only people individually to destruction, it can lead entire groups of people to destruction. when it becomes more about who's speaking the truth than it is about the truth. No matter where we find it and no matter where it takes us, a sincere desire to understand the truth of God's word. I remember when I was 19 years old and first visited Calvary Missionary Baptist Church, there was a realization that what I was hearing was true. It was true. And quite frankly, it condemned much of what I had heard for some 15 years. But it was true. And when we have a desire in our mind and in our heart to discover and understand truth, it doesn't matter where we find it or where it leads us. We follow it. We do with it what we ought to do with it. Again, also a willingness to hear is a remedy. Just a willingness to hear what God would say, and a willingness to obey. I have often thought, and I've shared with you before, I truly believe that there are times, at least, if not many, that our difficulty with Scripture is not an intellectual difficulty. It's not an IQ thing. It's not a, I can't puzzle out what this verse means. It's an unwillingness to obey what is simply said. It is a view of scripture that sounds like this. It's clear what it says, but it can't mean what it says because that would be so difficult. That seems so strange in our culture, in our lives. That seems so absurd even, we might use the word if we were to dare. That seems so ridiculous and silly that we are to forsake all and follow Christ. It's not a difficult thing to hear or to understand. It's a difficult thing to obey. Our difficulty, your difficulty with repentance is not a difficulty in understanding what it is, it's a difficulty in submitting to do it. The same for us all. As we come towards a close today, I want you to understand what you find. This is a beautiful, beautiful picture to me, what you find when your mind is no longer close to Christ. And whether these officers were saved, I don't know. There's absolutely no way for me to tell, or anyone, I believe, to tell Vestapon what's given to us in the word. But they say something that's very telling, do they not? They've been sent by these Pharisees and these authorities, go arrest him. And that word arrest in the Greek, it means seize, take him. Enough with what this man is saying. He's a blasphemer, and he needs to be put to death. Go, seize him, and bring him to us. Four days go by. And they come back to the officers, or they come back to the priests, and the high priests, and the authorities, and they come to him, and they're empty-handed. And the Pharisees look around, and they say to the officers, where is he? Why is he not with you? We sent you to go get him four days ago. Where is he? What do they say? No one ever spoke like this man. For four days, they're looking for an opportunity to seize him. And each time they hear him, There's a fear, no doubt, of the crowd. They don't want to cause a rebellion. They don't want to cause too much of an uprising because Rome did not look favorably on such things. And so they were trying to do this tactfully, and yet they were given this job to go and to seize him, to take Christ. and they never had opportunity. It's the last day, the great day. Jesus is proclaiming the message of the gospel. These officers come back to those who'd sent them, and they're asked, why is he not with you? And they say, no one ever spoke like this man. I couldn't help but remember that moment when I was saved. No one. No one had ever spoke like God spoke to my heart that day. Some people say, how will I know when I hear from God? How do I know when it's God speaking to me? Often times it's phrased this way, how will I know when I'm saved? The answer is you'll know. When your mind is open to Christ, And it's no longer closed. And the light of the truth can start to shine into your heart and make you to understand by the Spirit of God that you're a sinner, but that Jesus came to save sinners just like you. And the door of your mind and your heart is thrown open. And the gospel message then is inserted in there. And your mind is no longer closed to the truth that's been right in front of you for so long. But your mind closed to it. All of a sudden it's open. And it is like this. No one ever speaks to me like God speaks to me. It's what makes A sermon remarkable and wonderful, not that the man is speaking, but that the Spirit of God is speaking through His Word to you. How will I know when God is speaking to me? You'll know, there'll be a realization come to your heart of your need of God. And all of a sudden, when you start to look around in your life, and you start to see the foundation of your life, be it a job, money, relationships, this or that that's not Christ, all of a sudden, all of it begins to look like the sand that it is, and that that you once thought was sure and steadfast, all of a sudden becomes very uncertain and unsteady, and nothing but sand that drifts away with the tide. And you begin to see that and you begin to understand that. And then you begin to realize that apart from Christ, I have no hope. And you begin to cry out to him in response to his conviction of your heart. And you'll know when he hears you. Because you're going to hear that voice in your heart that takes you from guilt to forgiveness. From darkness to light, from death to life, that voice. that speaks to your heart. And like Elijah, it'll be the still, small voice, I believe, most of the time. There will be times when he speaks through the thunder and the lightning and the tornadoes and all of these things, no doubt, but I believe that it is that voice that is softer, yet louder than them all, that identifies the voice of God in the heart. consistent with what the Spirit of God has said in His Word, He speaks to you in your heart and He makes it real for you. And your mind becomes open to Him, to hear Him, to understand what He is trying to say to you. No one ever spoke like this man. I've often, and I don't believe this is a good thing, necessarily, but I have often wondered, Lord, what must it have been like to sit on the mountainside and hear you teach, to hear you preach? What must it have been like for those apostles gathered around you on that ship when they thought that they were sure to capsize and the storm was sure to overtake them, to sit there and watch you simply say, peace, be still, and have the storm calm. Lord, what must that have been like? And I think that perhaps that's not a good thing because He's already done the same thing for me. I do know what that's like. I do know what that feels like. I do know what His voice sounds like in my heart. I do know Him because one day He opened my mind and caused me to understand that His voice takes me from guilt to forgiveness, from arrogance to humility. from hopelessness to hope. And I pray He does the same for you. Because it is at the moment that God speaks, it is at the moment that your mind opens enough and your heart is open enough to when the Spirit of God communicates truth to you, even if you would desire that that door be shut, something, the power of God, your own true desire to finally find the truth, and to finally be done with the emptiness of life apart from Christ. There's something in you that keeps that door open just enough for the Spirit of God to communicate to you, and I pray that He does so long enough for you to shove that door wide open and say, God, more of you and less of the world. More of you and less of me. More wisdom from you and less lies from the world. It is at that moment when He communicates to you that all rests. Your eternity rests in that moment. It's like a fulcrum, a lever, a turning point, a place where you're either going to continue to go to Him or you're going to shut the door. And I tell you today, if you shut the door, there's going to be a day come when you will be amazed at your own close-mindedness. You'll be in awe of it. How could I have been so close minded? I pray that God would help you to understand that he desires to save you, that he desires to give you the peace that you're seeking, that you desire to fill with all of these temporary things. He desires to give you a rock where you have nothing but sand. But your mind must be open. You must respond. It's coming together of God's will and ours. This grace of God to even in the first place, call us to himself. In that moment. Rest your eternity. That's why. It's so dangerous to have a closed mind to Christ. I'm not talking about you losing a life of blessing as a child of God, as horrible as that would be. I'm talking about you losing your life eternally because of a closed mind to the Spirit of God and to Christ and to be like these Pharisees who show us by way of being the opposite of what we ought to be, show us how we can come to Christ and to find Him. I ask you in the beginning, and I ask you again, to examine your heart and your mind. Is it open to Christ? Clearly, our call is for those who don't know Him to come to Him and find Him. That is the call. But I remind you, even if you do know God, I remind you it's possible for you to close your mind to His leadership as well. You'll never lose your salvation. We believe that strongly. We believe Scripture proves that and demonstrates it. I know many disagree. But you can waste many days of your life not opening your mind to the continued leadership of God in your life. Closing your mind, thinking you already have the answers when you've not even heard the problem. Is your mind closed to Christ? If it is, I pray that God would open it. That the Spirit of God would which shine the light of truth into your life, into your heart, that you would respond to Him through repentance and submission to Him, obedience to His call to cry out for forgiveness until you find peace with Him, until you're regenerated, made new in the likeness of Christ. Old things pass away and all things become new. All of these things that the Bible tells us is so clearly defined in scripture about salvation. And to Nicodemus, he's already said, you must be born again. All of these things that he says until it becomes real and true for you. And don't close your mind. But listen. And heed. We pray God will be with his word and he will be with us through the remainder of the service. Let's go and have some food.