Raise your hand if you need a Bible. We'll be looking at God's Word this morning in Luke chapter 4. That's page 859 in one of the church's Bibles, if you're using one of those. Last time we saw Jesus going into the wilderness for his epic showdown with the wicked one. And now Jesus begins his public ministry. And we'll pick up the reading from God's Word in chapter 4, verse 14, but let's go to Him in prayer first. Heavenly Father, we thank You that You have sent Your Son to proclaim good news. And we pray that we, Lord, would have ears to hear that Word this morning from our Savior who is this One who is a great prophet, a great preacher who has given us words to be heard, words to be believed, words to be cherished, and words to be obeyed. And Lord, that is only possible by the power of your Holy Spirit, and so we pray that you would pour the Spirit out upon us here in this place abundantly, in Jesus' name, amen. Luke 4, verse 14, this is the Word of God. And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and a report about Him went out throughout all the surrounding country. And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all. And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day. And he stood up to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. And all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth. And they said, is not this Joseph's son? And he said to them, doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, physician, heal yourself. what we have heard you did at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well." And he said, "'Truly I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown. But in truth I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up for three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land. And Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian. When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built so that they could throw him down the cliff. But passing through their midst, he went away. Thus ends the reading of God's word. May he be pleased to write it upon our hearts. Well, a couple of weeks ago, we passed the 24th anniversary of the tearing down of the Berlin Wall. And that wall, of course, was built in the midst of the Cold War, following World War II, as the Communist and Eastern Bloc nations were separated from the West. Germany had been divided into four parts, which eventually became two parts, East and West Germany. And many from the East were seeking to escape to the West. And the city of Berlin had also been divided. And in those years of the early 1960s, the communists built that massive wall, which became a symbol for the separation between East and West. And the children, for those of us who grew up in that era, the Berlin Wall was the symbol of the dividing line between good and evil, at least in the Northern Hemisphere. There was a sense of fear that was associated with that wall, because behind that wall was great darkness. It was the Iron Curtain that separated East from West. And things began to change a bit in those communist countries. And in 1987, on the 750th anniversary of the city of Berlin, President Ronald Reagan went to the Berlin Wall and he stood in front of the Brandenburg Gate. And he began to lay out for the audience there that day all of the reasons that there should be further change in the communist nations. He laid out one reason after another. until finally he reached a point in that speech when he said, Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. And of course, the crowd there in West Berlin erupted in applause. And it was then two years later that that wall did come down. The point here is that words have real power. President Reagan's words reverberated throughout all of Germany and throughout the communist world as well. And those words were heard and they ended up making a very great difference. Words matter. Words have meaning because they capture for us not only truth in the material realm, but also they capture those truths that we can't see, but we know are true. And when Jesus came into the world and He begins His public ministry here, what does He do? Jesus preaches. This would be the whole of his ministry for the next three years. He would do some signs, of course, demonstrating who he was. He would ultimately go to the cross, but the primary piece of his ministry was a ministry of proclaiming words to people. Words. would communicate His salvation. And we see as He comes here to Nazareth, to His hometown, that Jesus speaks a powerful message. And you see this passage broken into two sections. There's first of all the powerful message that Jesus proclaims, and then we'll take a look at the profound response. But if we want to understand who Jesus is, we need to understand the words that he came speaking and the power of those words. We all are a people who have our beliefs shaped by the words that we hear. which in turn affects what we believe not only about things on this earth, but also the things of God. And ultimately then it is worked out in the things that we do in life. So we need to understand Jesus' words, what do they mean and what impact will they have and are they to have? Well, look at the context here as we take a look at his message first of all. You see in verses 14 and 15 that after Jesus has defeated the devil in this time of temptation, he comes in the power of the spirit. You remember the spirit had come down upon Jesus at the time of his baptism. The spirit had driven him into the wilderness. The spirit had empowered him to defeat Satan in those temptations. And now he returns in the power of the spirit. And this is significant as we will see. And he was in the surrounding country, he was in the surrounding region, especially of Galilee, so the northern part of the land of Palestine in a number of different cities and people were beginning to learn more and more about this man. They were seeing him do signs and wonders and were told in verse 15 that he taught in their synagogues. being glorified by all. People were beginning to notice Jesus in larger and larger numbers. And so not only did he go to synagogues in general, but on this particular Sabbath day, he comes to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. He goes back to that place where he had all of those childhood memories. And we're told that as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day. Now, of course, the synagogue was a place of local worship. It's the place where the priests would teach, and we see the prescription for this sort of weekly meeting apart from the temple, clear back in the book of Leviticus. This is how the people would worship. They weren't at the temple. This was sort of a little outpost of the temple, as it were, where you would gather week by week before going up to the temple for the primary feasts each year. And as we see from the life and ministry of Jesus and of John the Baptist, religion was at a very low ebb in this day. There weren't many people who really believed. The teachers taught without much authority. Now, just put yourself in Jesus' shoes here. Here He is, the Son of God, the Word incarnate, the One who has created the heavens and the earth, the One who wrote the law, the One who gave His Word to the prophets, the One who had redeemed His people throughout history. And here He comes into the world, going to the synagogue as was His custom, hearing people who preach who didn't really believe, who taught without much power, and who frankly were probably utterly boring. But what did Jesus do? As was his custom, he went to the synagogue because he knew he wasn't going there on a weekly basis to judge the quality of the preaching. He wasn't going for what he could get out of it. He went as was his custom because he knew his father in heaven was worthy of his obedience. He knew his father in heaven was worthy of his praise and his honor and his adoration. And so as was his custom, he was in the worship of God every week. And if that was true for Jesus, how much more should it be true of us? Are you tempted to skip church? Because maybe your closest friends won't be there that week, or maybe the sermon last week was just pretty boring, and you don't have much hope it's gonna be different this week. We sometimes have those attitudes, don't we? Well, we need to remember Jesus' custom. He recognized that he went to worship because his father was worthy of that worship and praise. So he goes into the synagogue and, oh, I should read one quote to you from J.C. Ryle here that captures it all quite beautifully. He says, in the days when our Lord was on earth, the scribes and Pharisees were the chief teachers of the Jews. We can hardly suppose that a Jewish synagogue enjoyed much of the Spirit's presence and blessing under such teaching. Yet even then, we find our Lord visiting in a synagogue and reading and preaching in it. And so Jesus goes. And as a teacher who was becoming well-known, he would have been invited to read and to speak. And the pattern was they would read from the law and then they would read from the prophets. And we see in verse 17 that the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. And they didn't have books, children, but these were long strips of paper that would have been rolled up. and you would unroll one side and roll up the other until you found the place that you were looking for. And when you're reading Hebrew, especially in that day, the Bible wasn't divided into chapters and verses, and you know what? It wasn't even divided into words. Paper came at a premium, and you wouldn't even leave spaces between the words. But Jesus knew the Scripture so well that He was able to open the scroll to just the place he was looking for. And he opened the scroll to Isaiah chapter 61, which we read in our responsive reading. And he reads about the Messiah, the anointed one who was promised through Isaiah the prophet. And we just went through the book of Isaiah as a congregation. Isaiah was pointing to the people, to their ultimate hope, and their ultimate hope was this promised one who would come, the seed of the woman who would set his people free. It was not a political freedom that Isaiah was promising preeminently, but a spiritual freedom. And Jesus now opens the scroll to that place. And he reads the words that would be true of the Messiah. The Messiah speaking in the first person in Isaiah. And the Messiah says, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because He has anointed me. The word Messiah, you see, means anointed one. And that's what this word here is. He is one who is anointed to be this Messiah. And what would the Messiah do? Well, the Messiah would proclaim good news to the poor. He would proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind and set at liberty those who were oppressed and proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. He would come and preach and he would speak words that would change people's lives. And Jesus, having read here from the prophet Isaiah, we're told in verse 20, rolled up the scroll. He gave it back to the attendant and he sat down, which was common for teaching in their day. And as you look at verse 20, you see that the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. People were at rapt attention, wondering what this preacher would say. And we have here one of the shortest sermons recorded in the Scripture. Jesus is able to summarize the whole in this one sentence. Look at verse 21. Today, this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. Here are all of these things that the prophet Isaiah had promised that the Messiah would do. He would come to proclaim good news to people who were living under the shadow of bad news. He would proclaim good news to the poor, these people who were impoverished not only physically, but also spiritually. He's coming to proclaim liberty to the captives. And to understand that line, we need to understand the mindset of the Jewish people. Because you see, people might have to sell their land, or they might have to go into servitude of others, to go into slavery because of their deaths. And the Lord had appointed years of liberty, or years of jubilee that would come. Leviticus 25 verse 10 says, You shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you 49 years. Then you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the day of atonement, you shall sound the trumpet throughout the land, and you shall consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan. So you see, every 50 years was to be this year of seven sevens, a year when people would be set free from their slavery, when land would be returned to its ancestral owners. And it's because the Lord valued freedom for His people. They were not to be in bondage, but God had made people to be free and to be able to serve Him. And so people would have looked forward through the Old Testament to that year of jubilee. Those who were in debt up to their ears would have heard those trumpets ring. And they would have known that that blast meant that they were free from all of their debts. And that was to be a picture of what the Savior was to do. The Savior was to come and to bring that kind of liberty He came to bring sight to those who were blind. And we sang about that in the 146th Psalm. There are people in this world who are physically blind, but that's not essentially what Jesus is talking about here. He's talking about those who are spiritually blind such that they cannot see the truth. We're also told that He came to set at liberty those who were oppressed. Those who were beaten down. Those who were being trampled upon by masters who were unjust. And these who labored under such discomfort. Jesus came to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. A year of grace. And Jesus proclaims all of this message and ultimately He would bring this about by going to the cross. The one who held all of the riches of the world. And all of the riches of the universe in his hand as the second person of the Trinity gave up all of those riches and he became poor so that we who are poor might become rich. He's the one who is the only one who was ever truly free. The only truly free being in all the universe submitted himself to coming to earth in the form of a man. and to facing limitations as a man so that we might be free. He's the one who could see the end from the beginning. And he came in time in order to look us in the eye and to bring salvation to sinners. He's the one who came to set at liberty those who are oppressed and to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. There's a man who lived in the Southfield Reformed Presbyterian congregation who just went to be with the Lord a couple of days ago. His name was Ray Stevenson, and he was just a few days shy of 100 years old. And he was a very faithful man who had been converted at a young age, hearing Job preached at a funeral. When the preacher used that verse, my days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle. And he saw how brief his days were, placed his faith and his trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Lord gave him many days, but those days went by very quickly. And one of the things that he had committed himself to do was to be a faithful husband to his wife. And she began to suffer from dementia and began to decline. And eventually she needed care beyond what he could provide. And so they moved into a retirement facility and they had to be on the dementia care unit floor of that unit. And we would go and visit them. And of course he was in his right mind and thought very clearly. And as we would visit, people would try the doors, other residents, or you might hear a scream coming from the others. And this man, would look at me at certain points as these things happened and he'd say, do you have any idea what it's like? And then lean in to live in an insane asylum. And I don't know. I could only experience it for a few moments. But it was painful. And in that we have a picture of what it's like to see what Jesus did for his bride. He came into hostile territory because he loves his bride, the church. And he's willing to give of himself, of his very life, in order that we who are in such a place of oppression and darkness and hopelessness might be delivered. And my friend couldn't do anything to deliver his wife from that oppressive situation. But Jesus does, and that's why He came. And so when He says to the people who were there, today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. What He's saying is, I am the one who is anointed. I am the one who has come to free you from all of your bondage, from all of your decay, from all of your hurt, from all of your oppression. Those are Jesus' words. And you may say, well, they're simply words. What do they mean for me? Why does it really matter? Well, friends, we begin to see something more of why it matters, not only by seeing this profound word from the Lord Jesus Christ, but also the profound response of the people. Look at their response in verse 22. and all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth." They said, what a wonderful sermon. We didn't even realize that this young man was growing up in our midst and here he is. What a wonderful message he preaches. Is this even possible given that he's Joseph's son? But Jesus could read their hearts. He knew why they were saying these things. You see, they had heard about the signs that he had done in these other places. And Jesus confronts them in their unbelief because he knew that what they were begging for was for him to prove himself. And so he says to them in verse 23, doubtless, you will quote to me this proverb, physician, heal yourself. In other words, prove what you're really saying. Show us some of these wonders. We've heard what you did at Capernaum. Do it here in your hometown as well. See, they heard these wonderful words. They loved the gifts that were promised, but they didn't want anything to do really with the person, with the giver. They loved the benefits and the idea of the benefits, but they didn't want the benefactor. They simply wanted signs and wonders. They wanted things given to them. And Jesus, reading their minds, tells them exactly what it is that they're looking for. You see, they didn't believe. And why is it that they didn't believe? It wasn't from their perspective that it was their fault. They blamed Jesus for their unbelief. He hadn't done enough. To prove himself. And they're looking for more. And this is the nature of proclamation and faith, isn't it? Jesus proclaims the wonder of his salvation. And he tells them that these things have been fulfilled in their hearing. not in their sight, but in their hearing, because faith comes by hearing, as we know, from the Word of God. And so these people are saying, we haven't seen enough, you haven't proven enough, you haven't given us enough. Bertrand Russell, that famous atheist, said that if he were to see God at the final judgment day, as the question was put to him, he knew what his response would be. He said, my response will be, not enough evidence, Lord. Not enough evidence. And that's an astounding statement. Especially when one stands before the judge. And when one calls him Lord. You see, Jesus has proclaimed the truth. And he calls on people to believe it. And he then shows them what the nature of true faith and true belief is. He shows how these words become truly powerful in the life of an individual by giving two examples from the Old Testament. He reminds them. He says, truly, I say to you, you know these things. No prophet is acceptable in his hometown. Even the people in the Old Testament didn't believe the prophets that came from their hometowns. And just a bit of an aside, but we ought to remember the same things as we see young people grow up all around us. We see children growing up, and we can be condescending, and we can remind them of how much we remember them when they were so young. Friends, don't forget that the Lord loves to work through such children, and He loves to work through them as they grow up. Don't despise the day of small things because they may be the very instruments that the Lord uses to bring radical and powerful change in your life over the course of many years. Jesus reminds them though that the people in the Old Testament, they despised the prophets who came from their hometowns. And he tells them that in truth, look at verse 25, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens were shut up three years and six months and a great famine came over all the land. And Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath in the land of Sidon to a woman who was a widow. Elijah was ministering and there was this great famine that came because of Ahab, King Ahab's unbelief. And so Elijah leaves the region of the Jews and he goes up to Sidon. And you remember that he goes to this widow and what does he ask her to do? There's a widow and she has a son and he asks for her to make him some bread. And she says, but my son and I only have enough. for one more meal. And we're going to eat that meal, and then we're going to starve to death. And Elijah told her to go ahead and feed him. And that if she would, her pot of flour and her jar of oil would not run dry. And what did she do? She fed him. She walked by faith and not by sight. She was willing to take the prophet at His word, unlike all of those people in Israel. She believed, you see, without seeing. And the Lord rewarded that faith, and she lived. And the same thing was true for Naaman. Here's this Syrian who comes seeking to be healed from his leprosy, and the prophet Elisha tells him to go and to dip in the river Jordan seven times. And he didn't like the idea very well. He wondered why he couldn't have at least dipped in one of the clean rivers of Syria. And his servants finally convinced him to just go do it. Just act by faith. And so he went. He hadn't seen what would happen, but he acted by faith, dipped in the Jordan seven times, and he was healed of his leprosy. You see what these hearers have in common? They hadn't seen the power of God, but they heard the word of the Lord, and they obeyed. They placed their faith in God. And they had heard far less than so many of those people in Israel who rejected it. And so Jesus is saying now to these Jews in His day, and these would be like the churched people of today, you've heard the Word of God all your life, you've had prophets grow up in your hometowns, and you have been unwilling to listen. All of these benefits that the Lord promises He has come to give must be believed. And we must believe that all of these things are true only through the Anointed One, Jesus Christ. You see, Jesus is put before us in the Scriptures day by day as we read it. He's placed before us week by week through the preaching. And God calls on people to believe And they're just words. They're just words. And that's what's so frustrating. If you're one who wants to see others changed through these truths, you can't do it. All you can do is lay these truths before others, before our children, before other people in our community. And faith is necessary to lay hold of the Lord Jesus Christ. Many of you know Barry York who has recently moved from serving our congregation in Kokomo to the Reformed Presbyterian Seminary. And many years ago when he was a graduate student at Purdue University, he was working with some Chinese students and there was one young man who heard the teaching about Jesus and he heard through this Bible study time and again what it is that Jesus had come to do, that Jesus came to die to set people free from their sin. and that those who believed in Him would be redeemed. They would be set free. And he listened week after week, and finally it hit him as it were. He said, oh, you mean most people say, if I see it, then I can believe it. But what the Bible tells me is if I believe it, then I'll see it. And Barry said, yes, that's it. And he came to faith in Christ that particular day. He became like the widow of Zarephath. He became like Naaman of Ol. Friends, where are you today? You're hearing these same words about the power of Jesus, the one who has been anointed by the Father to proclaim good news to the poor. and you're sitting here hearing these words with two choices before you, either to be like the people of Nazareth of old and say, there's simply words. If he'd really do something spectacular, then I might really consider believing. or you'll see the reality of what Jesus has come to do, and your response will be one of faith and of repentance, to confess your poverty and your need, to confess that you are blind, to admit that you are oppressed and enslaved by your own sin, and you will by faith lay hold of the Lord Jesus Christ. And maybe you're sitting here saying, well, Those are interesting things to think about. Maybe I'll do it later. Look back at Jesus' words in verse 21. He says, today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. Jesus doesn't gather the people for religious exercise to think about the wonderful glory days of old. Nor does he even point them ahead to look forward at what is to come. The very first word out of his mouth in his sermon is today. He came on that particular day to bring salvation. And He continues to speak today. When He goes and ministers to Zacchaeus, as we see later in the book, He says when Zacchaeus comes to faith, today salvation has come to this house. When He's ministering to the thief on the cross who comes to faith, as we see in Luke chapter 23, the man believes in Jesus. And Jesus says, today you will be with me in paradise. You see, Jesus' moment of salvation is today. Today is indeed the day of salvation. Today is the day for you to consider the person and the work of Jesus Christ. Today is the day for you to ask, do I believe? Do I believe that Jesus is the Messiah? That He is the Anointed One? That He is the One who can set me free? And those who believe in Jesus Christ, you see, they hear those words. And they recognize that they are more than words, but that they convey reality. And they take them to heart. And they're broken in their sin. And they confess that sin. And they're stirred up to a lively faith in Jesus Christ, such that they see the difference between good and evil. And there is a wall that's broken down in their hearts. And there's radical change that comes in their lives. Well, you see the response of the people here. They were filled with wrath because they understood what Jesus was saying. Jesus is saying there are two ways to go here. Either you believe in Jesus Christ or you reject him. And they rejected him and wanted to throw him over the edge of a hill. And we're not sure exactly how it is that he evades being thrown over the hill, perhaps by just simply powerfully looking at them such that they stepped aside and he walked through. Or maybe the mob was so enraged that nobody really kept track of where Jesus was and he just walked out from the mob. That sort of thing happens even in our day as well. but Jesus eluded their grasp on this particular day. And yet the story remains for us. Will we or will we not believe? And there's one other piece that I want us to consider here today. And that is that we can only believe by the power of the same spirit who anointed Jesus. Jesus came speaking these words with power because he was anointed by the Holy Spirit. And the only way in which hard hearts change, the only way in which blind eyes are open to see the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and his resurrection is by the power of the Holy Spirit. And we need to pray, friends, that that same Spirit that was poured out upon Jesus would be poured out upon us, because that is how these words will take root in our hearts and in the hearts of other people. Charles Haddon Spurgeon was known as the Prince of Preachers, preaching in 19th century London. And the Metropolitan Tabernacle could hold roughly 7,000 people. And Spurgeon, as he would prepare to preach, was on the lower of two platforms as they would work through the early part of the service. And the people would sing. And as the congregation was singing in anticipation of the preaching, he was aware of the fact that there was scarcely a seat in that auditorium in which someone had not been birthed into the Kingdom of God. He was aware that his words The Word of God was powerful and that people would be changed. He was aware of the fact that His words would be transcribed and millions of copies of the Penny Preacher would be distributed the following days throughout London, would be wired to the United States where hundreds of thousands more would read those and people all over the world as well. And as he would prepare to declare the word of God, he was aware that they were merely words apart from the power of the Holy Spirit. And so as the congregation would sing in anticipation of the preaching of the gospel. He would mount one of the two spiral staircases that went on either side of this platform up to a higher platform. And on that platform, there was no pulpit. There was simply a writing desk on which he could set his Bible and his notes. And there were 15 steps on each of those staircases. And with each step, he would affirm this creed. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Spirit. As he took that last step onto the platform, then he would begin to preach God's word, knowing that he could do nothing in and of himself and that these words would fall on deaf and hardened ears and that blind eyes would continue in their blindness unless the third person of the Trinity came into that place. and regenerated hearts and made people new and gave them eyes to see and ears to hear Jesus Christ. And the same thing is true in our day, friends. These are merely words apart from the living God. And we need to pray. And we need to pray desperately that the Holy Spirit would fill our breasts, that the Holy Spirit would fill the hearts of the people to whom we speak, our own children and to people all around us. Because if the Holy Spirit who anointed Jesus is not pleased to be in our midst, we will see hardness of heart and we will see our culture and even our churches seeking to throw Jesus over the cliff. But if the Lord is pleased to pour out His Spirit upon people, we will see the kind of response that was seen at Pentecost of people recognizing the power of the Word of God and seeing captives set free all around us. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank You that You sent Your Son into this world to preach and to bring good news to people. We pray, Lord, that you would pour out upon your people that same spirit that you poured out upon Jesus. That spirit was needed for him to preach with power. And that same spirit is needed if people are to receive those words for what they really are, the word of God. And Lord, you know that in our homes, we read your word day by day. And you know that as we gather week by week, we hear those words read. And week by week, too many people just don't respond. They despise the Savior, and their hearts are hard. And Lord, we pray that you would be pleased to warm the hearts of your elect, that they might bow the knee to Jesus Christ. Lord, if there are any here today who have not heard this news as good news before, We pray that you would cause them to see their own poverty. That, Lord, you would hear the hearts of some crying out, I have nothing to give the Lord to pay off my debts. That they would see, Lord, that you are the wealthiest banker in all the universe and that you were willing to come and to take on the debts of your people and to pay with the price of your own blood. So Lord, hear the cries of those who confess today that they are poor, and they are blind, and they are oppressed, and they do need a very great Savior. And we pray that Your Word would take root in their heart today. And Lord, if there are others who come to the place of worship week by week, and their hearts are growing colder, we pray that You would inflame them with a love for the Savior, and that they would see that they need not only the words on the page, but they need the fire of the Spirit within. And so we pray that you would fill them afresh with your Holy Spirit. Lord, we thank you that you've given us a very great Savior, and we pray that we would believe Him in Jesus' name.