over now to Ephesians, Ephesians in the New Testament. And again, this is a book that we're going through a week after a week and we're kind of drawing closer to the end now. Ephesians chapter four, starting in verse 25. Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each of you speak the truth with his neighbor. For we are members, one of another, be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil. Let the thief no longer steal, but let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone who is in need. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth, but only such as is good for building up as fits the occasion. That it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let albiterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice, be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. Amen. May God bless the reading of His Word. One of the common marketing slogans trying to sell a product is, this will change your life. This will change your life, whatever it is, whatever product manufacturers want to sell, they kind of throw this out. They're convincing you that if you just buy this product your life will be changed. It'll be new. It'll be better. I decided to Google last night products that change your life, interested to know what would come up. Well, here's a couple of products that came up that will change your life, the internet assures us. First of all, I don't know if you've ever encountered this product, but life changing product number one, a snuggie. You know what a snuggie is? A snuggie is a blanket with arms on it. And this snuggie, the internet promises, and so you know it's true, will change your life. Not only does a snuggie change your life, however, there's also this amazing rotisserie, this little oven for chickens. I don't know what's so special about this oven, but the internet assures us, it must have lasers on it or something, because it changes your life but my personal favorite. Here's my personal favorite product that the internet assures us will change your lives. It's a nose hair trimmer. And apparently this nose hair trimmer is so special that it can be used for your ears as well. So life changing products. Not only about you, but I'm a little skeptical that those products would in fact change your lives. In fact, I think as a culture, we've had so much marketing that we grow immediately suspicious. Any time that phrase, life changing product is thrown out. We just know inherently that that's not true. These products will not in fact change your life. Your problems continue. Your life goes on as normal. And yet today, as we look at Ephesians chapter four, that's exactly what Paul is saying about the gospel, that it will change your life, that it must change your life. If we, according to Paul, if we truly encounter the gospel of the good news of what Jesus Christ has done in history, his amazing ministry, compassion for others, miracles, raising folks from the dead. At the end of his life, dying a painful death on the cross and being resurrected, if we truly understand that gospel, and what it means for us, that it enables us to have life with God. According to Paul, that will change your life. And this is what we see from people who encounter Jesus. In his ministry, if someone encounter Jesus with saving faith and putting their trust in him, they were different. Their lives were changed. And despite all the cynicism in our society towards the promise that something will change your life, I think all of us have known people, perhaps ourselves have noticed that by putting our faith in Christ truly, there is a life change. The gospel will change your life. Now Paul here doesn't just settle for some blanket of general statement like the gospel will change your life. He gets specific about, yes, got three things that the gospel does to change our life. First of all, Paul says the gospel will change the way that you speak. Secondly, the gospel will change the way that you work. And finally, the gospel will change the way that you feel. So there's kids out here trying to pay attention to listening. Maybe you could draw a person. The first thing you want to focus on is his mouth because the gospel changes the way you speak. Then maybe this person that you're drawing can give us some tools, maybe a rake or a hammer or something because the gospel changes the way you work. And then thirdly, kids, you want to draw a picture of a big heart right in the middle. The gospel changes the way you feel. Now as we look at this, there's a lot of commands here. We're going to go through and there's many more than three commands. What I've done is grouped the commands into three different categories. But as you encounter these commands, don't let them become burdensome to you. As if this is just another thing in your busy, burdened life that you have to keep up with. Because that's not the point. The point is that the gospel leads us in abundant life. And in this abundant life, God guides us in a life that's pleasing to him and despite what you might think. By living a life that's pleasing to God, it is the most fulfilling, most joyful, most content-filled life you could possibly live. So this isn't commands of guilt. These are commands of freedom. And I pray that all of us would listen to the Holy Spirit as he pricks our heart, as he guides our mind to consider what ways do we need to follow God more faithfully than we already are in this new life. The gospel changes our life. Well, let's dive in first. We'll go back to verse 25 of Ephesians 4. Now, one of the things that you're going to see as we work through this passage is that in all the different commands that Paul gives, he does three things with those commands. He says, first of all, here's what you're not supposed to do with all these commands. Don't do X, fill in the blank. But then he doesn't leave it with that. As if just fling from sin is enough. He says, not only are you supposed to flee sin, but here is what you are to do. First Paul says, don't do this, but then Paul says, but then do this. And then thirdly, Paul gives us a motivation. So as we work through these different commands, every time we're going to be asking the question, what does Paul say not to do? What does Paul say to do? And why are we to do it? Starting out verse 25, Paul says, first of all, the gospel should change the way that you speak. Verse 25, therefore, having put away falsehood, let us each of you speak the truth with his neighbor for we are members of one another. So what does Paul say not to do? First of all, Paul says, do not speak falsehood. This is one of those great children's rules. Tim Cummiem is, do not lie. Do not bear false witness. I remember as a child being memorizing verses online, how the Lord detests lying lips. That was a verse that stuck with me as a kid. The Lord detests lying lips. Well, there's a lot of reasons why this is a great commandment for us to follow and take seriously one, lying, destroys relationships. It distances ourselves from others. And so there's horizontal problems with each other when we lie, but even more importantly than that, consider who God is. God is a God of truth. Our heavenly Father is a God of truth. Everything He does, everything He is about, everything He says is truth. And He keeps His promises. So therefore as children of our heavenly Father who's got a truth, we are called to speak truth, to be like Him, to follow Him, to imitate Him as we speak truth. The Bible says something about Satan as well. The Bible says about Satan. He's the father of lies, right? Father of lies. And so have you ever noticed a child, and maybe in the grocery store in the crowd, and the child's cling to their father? And maybe this little boy gets lost for a second and then immediately runs and clings to his father's leg only. He's got it wrong. It's not his father. He just grabbed a random stranger and he looks up and he's terrified. And he realizes the mistake and he goes to his father. Well, I think sometimes as Christians, even though we are children of the heavenly Father, we get confused and we actually start following not the Lord, but Satan as we speak lies, speak falsehoods. Now, of course, Paul says it's not enough just to not speak lies as if putting tape over your mouth and living your life without speaking was enough. Paul says, no, not only are you not to lie, but you are to speak the truth to one another, to encourage each other with truth, to speak truth about yourself, being honest about your life as you share with others. Speaking truth in love about them, about others, your brothers and sisters, speaking truth about this world out there. It's not enough to just not lie, but we are to proactively speak truth to each other. Well, why do we do this, Paul, says we do this because we are members of one another. We are members of one body. We are family. And so we speak truth to one another. Consider this as you speak truth honestly about yourself. What does that do for others? That invites others into fellowship. Have you ever been around someone that you just feel like you can never really kind of get into what's going on in their lives? There have been times when I have been more guarded than I should be, and I don't really let people in. I don't really, it's not that I'm lying, but I don't really open up and speak truth about what's going on in my life, the hardships, the joys. But when you do that, you enable authentic fellowship. We're called to speak truth about ourselves. But not only that, as we speak truth about others in love with gentleness, then we encourage them. We challenge them. We spur them on to growth in Godliness because all of us have shortcoming. Every single one of us, I self definitely included. And yet, as we speak truth about others, about like two their faces, not speaking truth about you with this other person, that's gossip. But when you speak truth in love to them, that encourages discipleship. But not only that, but as we speak truth about this world, we strengthen each other's faith. We encourage each other's faith because this world out there, the culture around us, it's not speaking truth. Every time we turn on the TV, you're hearing lies, subtle, but lies that are coming out to you. I'm not anti-media. I love television, I was watching the Panthers game last night. Very disappointed at how it ended. But media isn't bad, movies aren't bad, television is bad, but you're getting subtle lies coming at you at all times. When's the last time you went to the movies and you came out more convinced than you were and you came in that your purpose in life is to glorify God and enjoy forever. That's not the way it works, right? So there's subtle lies coming at us. But as we speak truth about God, speak truth about the Bible to each other in love with humility, we are strengthening each other, building each other up. We're called to speak truth, that's one of the ways the gospel changes how we speak. But not only that, jump down to verse 29. Paul says this, let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as it's good for building up as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth. The word here is kind of, it's a word for rotten, trash, refuse. So if you kind of get this visual image in your head, you probably won't forget it. Imagine trash just flowing from your mouth as you speak, rotten garbage coming out of your mouth. Paul's challenging us, let no corrupt talk come out of your mouth, slander, gossip, hateful speech, putting each other down, judgmentalism, negativity spoken at others. That's not what we're called to do as Christians. It's actually worse than trash coming out of your mouth, because this word says it doesn't, not only is it corrupt, trash coming out, but it's corrupting talk. Paul says, no corrupting talk. Have you ever noticed that if you have maybe some fruit, this is one of the commentators point, is that, if you have fruit in your fridge and mold starts growing on it, if you don't take that little strawberry, for example, out of the box, what happens? The whole strawberry box becomes moldy. It becomes corrupted. Well, Paul is saying the same thing is true of our speech, if we're not careful, it not only corrupts us, not only is it, are we vomiting trash, but we're corrupting the body. Paul says, don't do that, but of course, Paul doesn't stop there, he says, not only does the gospel change you by keeping you from corrupting talk, but we are called to build one another up.
We're called to encourage one another. The book of Hebrews has a lot to say about encouragement. Hebrews chapter 10 says we are to encourage one another, how often, daily? Paul says, daily, encourage one another. Hebrews 10 goes on to say that as you gather together on the Lord's day, like today, you were called to encourage one another. How often do you come to church with a mind of intentional encouragement? I can't wait to see so and so, so that I can encourage them. Lift them up, build them up. Paul says, that's what we're called to as Christians. Why are we called to? Well, Paul says because we give grace to each other as we build each other up, as we speak words of encouragement, we are giving grace to each other. And how could we not do that when God has so abundantly given us? God pours, he's got the fire hose on him, pours grace upon us, not just a little faucet dripping grace, he pours grace upon us. And as people who've received the fire hose of God's grace, how could we not speak grace to others? That's our motivation for doing it. We have received grace, and so we speak grace to others. You know, again, the world out there, the culture would suggest that words are not that powerful. It's have a little interactive time here. I'm gonna start the saying that everyone knows and I want you to finish it. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words may never hurt you. Exactly right. Well, that's a lie. You've all just spoken of faucet today. Good job. The Bible says that words are actually powerful, but God is a God of truth, and he uses words, and he speaks words. What did he do at the very beginning? He spoke, and the world was created through word. Christ himself is called the very word of God. Christ himself went on the boat, spoke words, and the seas were still. Peter, looking at Jesus, at one point in his ministry, says, Jesus, we have nowhere else to go, but you, and he says, because you have the words of life. And as Christians, you and I have the words of life, because God has spoken those to us. And we have words of life to give one another, words of truth, words of encouragement. Now, I want to caution you. I know that many people are really gifted with encouragement, some aren't. Regardless of where you find yourselves, don't encourage you not to say or think. Yeah, that's just not my spiritual gift, encouragement. I know some people are good at that, but I like to just, I like to tell like it is. I like to speak truth. Now, God makes some people to tell like it is, but even those of you tell like it isers are still called to speak encouragement, because this is a challenge, this is a command for all of us. We can't just say, well, it's not my spiritual gift. God says, we are all called to put each other up, because again, the world is attacking us with lies, with discouragement, with hopelessness, with depression, speaking words, insateness, speaking words in our mind, and it's reinforced with our own sin, words that tear us down. We are called as Christians to speak words that build us up. The gospel changes our lives, it changes the way we speak. But it also changes the way we work. Let me invite you to look at verse 28. Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. Well, again, Paul says, here's something that you are not to do, but here's something you are to do, and here's why. Paul says, first of all, let the thief no longer steal. Again, this is one of those great commandments you learn as a kid. It's important stealing and being a thief causes all kinds of problems, violence, chaos, and insecurity, and not only to that, but even the thief himself grows in his sin as he grows in covetousness. And so, you know, not stealing is a wonderful command, but Paul doesn't just say don't sin. He says don't sin, but instead of being a thief, instead of being a bank robber, I want you to go out and have an honest job. Find honest work, work hard, work efficiently, work as unto the Lord. Did you know that I'm sure you did, but perhaps you've forgotten that your job, no matter how mundane it feels, no matter how much of a grind it feels like sometimes, no matter how much at times you possibly may even hate going to work. This is a wonderful obedience to the Lord. This is wonderful glory that you are giving to the Lord. There is a celebration in heaven when you work as unto the Lord. Your discipleship, your worship doesn't stop when you walk out these doors on Sunday. Your Christian living isn't just, it is about coming together, that's crucially important. It's vital, in some ways it's the pinnacle of our week coming together, but it doesn't stop there when you walk out Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. These are opportunities for you to continue your worship, continue to give God glory by the way you work. But why do we do honest work, Paul says? We do it so that we may give to those in need. We may give to those in need. You know, Paul isn't content just to keep our hands out of other people's pockets. You can't stop there, yes, you shouldn't be doing that. Well, actually, Paul says, I actually really want your hands in other people's pockets, but I want you to be giving them money rather than taking. Paul challenges us with this command because it makes us the anti-thiefs. Not only are we not stealing, taking what others have and taking it for ourselves, but we're taking what we have and giving them to others. This is a radically different way of thinking about making money. The world makes money to accumulate possessions and to have security and possessions aren't bad, but God gives us a better reason to go out and work, a better reason to make money. It's so that we could give generously to those, there's at least two things in order to do this that have to be true. First of all, and this is why Paul says it, you need to work in order to make money. It's hard to give if you're just sitting on the couch all day, playing Xbox or whatever you might be doing. We work so that we can have money to provide for our family and to give. This is why it's a radically different way of thinking about money, thinking about work. We have hard work and so that we can give to others, but not only that, you need to have honest work, but also you need to have a free heart. Because that's what sets us aside from a lot of the world as Christians, the world works hard, Christians work hard, the difference in the gospels that we are freed of our captivity to money or at least we can be. Through the Holy Spirit. You see money, the love of money, the Bible says the root of all evil, the love of money, it puts shackles on our hearts, it puts shackles on our hands so where you might be inclined to give love of money, pulls your hand back, disabling you from giving. We need free hearts and how do we get free hearts believe the gospel? What does the gospel say that God has generously given everything to you, not even withholding his own sign? What does the gospel say that the gospel says that God is a heavenly father loving to give to us in abundance. He loves to provide for us and if we're convinced of that, prevents of God's, convinced of God's provision in our lives, we would just be more free to give because we're less worried about what happens when that money goes out for a conflict that our heavenly father provides for us. The gospel frees us up to give and again, this is a way that the gospel changes our lives but finally we see one other thing. The gospel changes not just the way we speak, not just the way we work but also the way we feel. Let's jump back up to verse 26. Be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger. Then let's jump to verse 31. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice but be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. The gospel changes the way we speak, the way we work and the way even the way we feel. You might think we can't control the way we feel. The Bible would respectfully differ with you on that. If that's your idea. God even through the gospel changes our heart, our emotions, the way that we feel. And Paul would say, here's the don't. Remember there's the don't, the do and the why. Here's the don't according to our emotions. Don't be controlled by anger. Don't be controlled by anger. Now remember anger itself is not sin, not necessarily. Jesus himself was anger and actually put a whip together and drove the people in his anger out of the temple. It was a righteous anger, a holy anger. Anger is not enough itself sinful. It can be, but not necessarily. Most often the problem isn't our anger itself it's what we do with our anger. Do we let our anger drive us towards violence? Do we let our anger fester and grow and become putrid and drive us to and then there's the list, bitterness, wrath, clamor, slander. Anger's one of these things, it's like if you'll excuse an analogy that fits very well in my life but you might find it a little bit distasteful, we have dirty diapers in our house, okay? Because we have kids in our house that produce dirty diapers and that's just a reality. So at some point I'm sure I will be past the stage and I will think that it is in poor taste to use a dirty diaper analogy in a sermon, but this is my life, I apologize. Dirty diapers, now we get dirty diapers and what do we do? We clean them up and get them out of the house. We get those things out as quickly as we can. But conceivably we could, instead of that, decide you know we got these dirty diapers, we'll just push them under the furniture. Now we can see them, right, no problem. We do that and all of a sudden our house is disgusting. If we do that. Well anger is like that, anger, we just tend to sweep it under the rug. As long as we're not having these outbursts, these violent outbursts enraged at people, then we're okay, right? Well our heart is still diseased, our heart is still poisoned by anger because we're not taking it to the Lord, we're not having short accounts with people, but it festers, it grows, it becomes disgusting, it actually changes your life and it leads you in sin. Paul says we must put aside being controlled by anger and so Paul says, don't even let the sun go down on your anger. You get that thing out, pray to the Lord, confess to one another, be reconciled. Of course not only are we called to put off anger but we're also to put on love. It's not enough to just not hate each other. That's Christian. It's not enough to just not have disdain for the people you see across from the aisle. That's good, I'm glad, hopefully you don't disdain them, but the Bible calls us to more, God calls us to more than that, calls us to active love for one another. Being tenderhearted, having compassion, having a heart that goes out to your brothers and sisters in Christ. Having a heart that is soft and aches with them as they suffer, a heart that according to Paul is quick to forgive because let's be honest, we sin against each other. It happens, it's a reality. There will be times I promise you that at some point you'll be upset with me because I'm sinful, I'm imperfect and that's true for all of you. As you look around, if you're doing life together, you will be offended at times, it's a reality. Yet, Paul asks us to put on forgiveness, to put on love, being quick to forgive, quick to love. Why do we do this because God in Christ forgave us?
And that could be the formula for every single one of these commands. We love because God loved us. We forgive because God forgave us. We have tender hearts and compassion for others because God was compassionate for us. This is the biblical command. The gospel changes everything, even the way that we think, even the way that we work, even the way we speak, even the way that we feel. The gospel changes everything. Now, as we close, consider this, there's a couple of times when Paul mentions the devil and the Holy Spirit. I think Paul mentions the devil and the Holy Spirit so that we'll pay attention and take this a little bit more seriously than we otherwise might. I think sometimes when it comes to how we speak or how hard we work or how we feel, we just sort of think it's inconsequential, not a big deal, right? Everyone says things they don't mean. Everyone gets angry, no big deal. God would invite us to see it very differently. God invites us to consider that the realities that we see are much deeper than what's visible. There are spiritual unseen realities and so Satan himself prowls around looking for the door to be open, looking for opportunities to come in and create even greater sin and death in your life. And so Paul begs us to not give the devil a foothold in our lives. Not only about the Holy Spirit, not only is the devil present, but the Holy Spirit is present with us leading us and holiness, leading us in repentance, giving us a strength to live a life that's pleasing to the Lord. And so all of these small encounters today, maybe even coming before coming to church, you had a fight with your spouse, maybe even getting through the door of the church, you feel this anger inside of you. The gospel says Christ understands and he forgives and he leads you into a new life. The realities, the spiritual realities beg us to take this seriously. But in all this, don't miss the gospel. There's been a lot of commands here, commands about your speech, about your work, and about your emotions, but don't miss the gospel in all this. Are you ready for it? Here's the gospel. All these things that I've been talking about, you can't do them. You can't do them. The gospel reminds us that you will never, on your own, you will never be pure enough in your speech, ever. You will never be faithful enough in your work. You will never be pure enough in your heart. It's impossible. Own your own, all of these commands do nothing but continue. Show you how far short you are of God's glory, that's the gospel. Or at least the beginning of the gospel. Because the gospel continues to show us that despite how far we are from God's grace, from God's holiness, yet Christ Himself comes. And whereas we fall short of God's holiness, Christ measured up completely. And so he came and did all the things that you and I can't, speaking with truth, speaking in love, building people up, working diligently using His time well and having a heart that loved with compassion, tender heart, He did all of these things. Have you ever seen an example of someone working on a project and the person working on the project is just not doing a great job. And maybe yourself, maybe you're here and you're watching a friend, working on a project, you know how it's done, you're an expert in this field. You just know that, and this person is just making a mess, and the more they work, the worse it gets. It's just a disaster. Finally, depending on how patient you are, you might wait five minutes, ten minutes an hour, at final at some point, if it just gets worse and worse and worse, what do you do? Finally you say, let me just get out of the way. I'm going to get here, and I'm going to do it. I want to show you how it's done. And you do it and it's good. Because that's exactly what Christ did for us. He sees us bungling in our sin. He sees us falling short in every category possibly. And finally he says, you know what? Just please move out of the way. Allow me to do it for you. Allow me to worship God for you. Allow me to obey God for you. Let me do it for you. You can't do these things on your own. And so Christ came and he did them for you. And then, and this is where we end, Christ invites you back into the picture and says, now, I have done them perfectly for you. Now let's do them together. Of course you will be imperfect, but I'm going to lead you in a new life of holiness, growing from this day until the day you die and you're going to get better. And you'll never be good enough to earn God's love. And that's why I'm here with you. And yet, there can be growth in holiness. Yes, there can be growth in the way we speak, purely truthfully to build others up. Yes, there can be growth in the way that you work. Honestly, and give your money to the church. Give those to the need. Give those on the mission field. You can grow in that. And yes, you can grow even in the way that you feel towards others. The gospel is that you can't, but Jesus did. And so with Christ, you can. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for these gospel promises. We thank you for your faithfulness to love us despite our sin, despite the filth in us, despite the ways that we've fallen short of your commandments. And yet, you've faithfully loved us. And you sit your son to be our rescuer, to be our savior, to draw us out of a life of sin and into a life of holiness. Father, we are perfect. We are woefully imperfect. And yet in your love, allow us through the grace of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit to grow in Godliness. Not in order to earn your love, but because you've already loved us in Christ. We thank you for your promises. We thank you for your word. And we thank you for the Lord's supper reminding us again of your grace. And it's in Christ's name. We pray. Amen. We're getting ready to do the Lord's supper. And as we prepare for this, I would invite you to consider. If you're married, if you've got a close friend. There are times in life when you have quality time and there's times where you just have time together. As a parent and as a husband, I spend a lot of my life with my wife. Often times. However, a lot of times that those times spent with my wife, it's doing the dishes together, cleaning the house together. Playing with the kids together, which is wonderful, cleaning dirty diapers together. A lot of times it's not quality time. And then there are also times when we set aside a date night to spend time together in quality, to spend time closely together, to commune together with the special closeness. And it's not that we're not together all the time, but there's times where we need special quality time. Those Christians is true with our Lord as well, with our Heavenly Father. He's with you always. We know that. You can't flee from His presence if you tried. He is always with you. And yet, we need quality time with the Lord. That's why hopefully you spend some time at some point sitting down and you open your Bible and you pray and you have some devotional time quite time before the Lord. It's special quality time. That's why we come together as a church. We have some special quality time with our Lord and Savior. We spend all of life with them, but there's quality time. Did you know that also the communion, the Lord's Supper is quality time with the Lord? God says to us, Christ says to us, this is a remembrance of what He did. As we take the bread and take the cup, this is a reminder of His sacrifice for us, what He did for us, but it's more than that. It's a reminder to us of what He's done, but it is also a way to spiritually commune with Him, where we are closer with Him. And we don't understand this, but we believe it because of our faith that Christ and the Lord's Supper is especially present with us. And so this is a joy, it's a privilege to come to the Lord's table and to participate in a special quality way with our Lord, strengthening us, giving us the faith, giving us the strength that we need to go and live a life that is pleasing to our Lord. Let me read to you, God's Christ words to us. Matthew 26, now as they were eating Jesus took the bread and after blessing it, He broke it and gave it to His disciples and He said, take eat. This is my body. And He took the cup when He had given thanks to them saying, drink it all of you for, this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many, or the forgiveness of sins. If you are someone sitting here today and you are just so aware of how woefully inadequate you are on your own. If you are very aware of your need for Christ because you get it, you know that you can't measure up, you know that you will never be perfect enough. And this is a meal for you to commune, to have a special quality time with your Savior as He is spiritually present with us. It's a time to grow, it's a time to cherish. This is a privilege. And yet if you are not someone who is trusting in Christ, maybe you are curious, but you haven't got to the point where you say, with confidence, I am a sinner and I need to save you. And I would encourage you to, as the usheres pass out, the elements later, just let it pass you by. We are glad that you are here. But I would encourage you to take this time instead of participating in the Lord's Supper, take this time to meditate. What would it be like to have a Savior who loved you so much that He would die for you? A Savior who would bring you into a new life. I am going to pray and then we are going to have the elders pass out the elements. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your grace, your faithfulness to us, your presence in the Lord's Supper spiritually. And I pray that we would be nourished and encouraged as we spend this quality time with you, commuting with you. I pray that you would use these to our strength, to our benefit, to your glory. In Christ and we pray. Amen.