Section is that really to drive us through our knees before a very gracious, gracious God. And when we have that kind of opportunity in front of us, we have a, we have a spring of time to come together. And so if we could just for a few minutes, if we can, just a few, once a few minutes, let's just bow to Lord and prayer and ask for His, His presence with us. Our gracious God, we become before your presence this time, most humbly realizing that we are just so puny before you, but in your magnificent love you have chosen to, to love us so dearly. We are grateful to you for that, that you have condescended the man and to us in particular at this time, to care for us so deeply as you have. We ask that your presence will be with us at this time, as we come into these things that are mysteries to us, and as we try to understand you better and our relationship with you, we ask for your presence here, we ask that you would open up your counsel to us that we might be able to understand it. I pray, Lord, that you would forgive me of my sins and forgive me of the unrighteousness in my life, the cloudiness of my vision, and that these things would not stand away of those who earnestly come to seek your face and to desire to do your will. So now we do ask for your presence to be here and for your goodness to be amongst, and Christ and we pray with all thanksgiving, amen. Mike is in California today, and so he has just a great opportunity to be with that church that we have wanted to be a part of it, starting up, and so with him being gone, he has asked Tom Patton, which is preaching for us today, and so he has asked me to stand in here. In these chapters we have got before, and please, at any time you think that I am missing something, please raise your hand or shout out where you think I should be going. In this section that we have in chapter 6 and 7, we've got a lot of places we could go, and this is a survey, and we've got to be careful because we can end up not touching a whole lot at all. What I would like to do is truly an idea of a survey, and somebody's alarmed this one off. Truly an idea of a survey, I'm going to touch the last first, and so we don't usually get to the last, but I have a reason for doing so, but there's a number of things we could really be covering today in the 6 and 7 chapters of the confession. The historicity of Adam and Eve, and also just the events in Genesis 3, the origin of sin, the many historical views we have with the origin of sin, we could talk about evil, we could talk about the moral laws, we could talk about God as the author of sin, the origination of sin in the angelic world, it's effect upon man, the voluntary act of man in the course of the origin of sin, the nature of the first sin, it's formal character, it's essential in material character, the first sin is occasioned by temptation, the temperature is as Satan or serpent, and how that figurative, arguably figurative speech is used in Genesis 3, interesting and evolutionary expectation of sin, and how you look at somebody like Louis Berkhoff who wrote his book in systematic theology and how he was tremendously impacted by evolution and the evolution is concept of sin and how we're affected today in our culture by the influence of evolution and our understanding of what sin is culturally, I mean that's really a foreign word when you get out in the street, the idea of sin because of the effect of evolution, but you look at the transmission of sin which is whole chapters just in books on transmission of sin, the universality of sin, we could talk about original sin versus actual sin, we talk about guilt, pollution, depravity, inability, original sin and human freedom, objections, actual sin, there's a lot of things that we could take and go through this with and so if you'll pardon me, am I attempt to look at this, at first I was trying to chart where we were going to go and I'm really open to anybody wanting to get it into another direction and I have asked some people who are really more learned than I am in the audience that they just go in that direction and if you'll pick up with me and help me out but it's not that I don't aspire to be a real student of God's word but my time for the most part is like many of us who are lay people who take them in other endeavors during the week but what I would like to do is start off with some reading of scripture and then take this with the last verse for a reason chapter 7 and then go back to chapter 6 and leave that, leave a portion of chapter 7 but let's read first of all from the book of Job if we'll turn there, Job 38 and I've asked Rich to read the verses 4 through 7.
Who marked off its dimension? Who stretched the measuring line across it? On what were its footing set? Or who laid its cornerstone? While the morning star sang together and all the angels shouted for joy? Okay, Psalm 33 6 and Psalm 8 4 and Job 48 to 14. Don't ignore yourself with majesty and splendor and array yourself with glory and beauty. Disperse the rage of your wrath. Go on, everyone who is proud and humble him. Look on everyone who is proud and bringing love, tread down the wicked in their place, hide them in the dust together, bind their faces in hidden darkness. Then I will also contest the youth that your own right hand can save you. As I was thinking about this problem of man is expressed in chapter 6. I got to thinking trying to distill down into just a couple of ideas what man's basic problem is. I came to this conclusion and it was really interesting because after I came to this conclusion I thought of Steve Brown. My first conclusion was that one of man's first problems is he doesn't realize how magnificent God is. We just don't realize and I say we in here don't really meditate enough and really think enough just how magnificent God is. The second problem we have is we don't realize how puny we are. Now I started thinking about that and that is really true. I mean it really blinds us to being so self-centered as we are and we think so much of life in our families and our businesses and our church and everything we do that life revolves around us. And it really comes from these two problems that we really don't know how magnificent God is and we don't realize how puny we are. I think Steve Brown says that this way says there's three problems with man. One is God is God, man is not and I think the last part is that we forget the first two. Something like that. And that's true. How's the last part going? I shouldn't confuse you. Thank you. I was struggling all week and trying to figure that out and I've been calling about it. I shouldn't confuse you the first two. And I was thinking it was interesting that I was coming up with this apart from what Steve came up with and it was the same thing and it's really, really true. So as we get into this what I would like to do is for us to remember and I think that my prayer is as we study this part of the confession and as we get into God's word and we ask the Holy Spirit to search our own hearts. It's that we realize these things and we humble ourselves before God this day and our medications and our rest this day and in the Lord's day and submit ourselves and humble ourselves to it. We have in the survey so far we have looked at a study of God, a study of God's eternal decrees of creation and of providence. At this point in Birkhoff's book, systematic theology and in his part one which is the doctrine of God, he closes that section off. He then opens the next section which he calls the doctrine of man's relationship to God and he begins with a little bit more on the creation portion. He starts with the origin of man, the constitutional nature of man and begin to discuss the dichotomy, triacotomy nature and so forth many other things in that regard and then he talks about man as the image of God. The next he goes to and he skips over what the West Minister confession does and he begins to talk about the covenant of works because it describes the relationship that God had with Adam. Now if we look in to and that's what I would like to do I would like to jump chapter six and then come back to it and let's look at the first two sections in chapter seven and let's see what they say. The first one says the distance between God and the creature is so great that although reasonable creatures do obedience into him as their creator. Yet they could never have any fruition of him as their blessedness and reward but by some voluntary condescension on God's part which he has been pleased to express by way of it. And I would like to touch on this first because after we come to man being created then what's our connectivity with a creator and what's our our instrument our our our modem for that if you will. And so I would propose to you as the confession does that it is this what is called often called the covenant of works. It has other names such as the covenant of life that it's been up to the use the word covenant of works as opposed to that because we're going to see about the covenant of grace. And then we're going to confuse everything and we're going to call the covenant of grace the covenant of works and we're going to call the covenant of works the covenant of grace and we'll see why we'll do that in just a second. But the order is different the confession and I think there's some reasons for doing that even in some as to how historically the covenant system of study came about causes some of that I think the covenant of works is to great extent developed off the federal idea of the federal theological point of the relationship of Adam with the human race in his sin. And also the covenant of works is certainly a bridge between man's sinfulness in the next chapter after chapter 7, which is Christ the mediator. But at any rate we will look at it because I think it flows from creation to relationship to God and then to sin and what happens in that relationship. But in God's covenant to man as we look in Genesis three or we look in the first three chapters, we don't find anything that really refers to this as a covenant per se. If we do look in the book of Hosea and that's a Hosea Jolimus over that Jolimus okay so right before Joel and one scripture that's often quoted to this is a Hosea 6 chapter of verse 7. And it reads like this but like men that they transgress the covenant there they dealt treacherously with me. And this person like men is sometimes translated at Adam or like Adam and the word there that is used for men is also used for the word Adam. And this is often referred to as referring back to the covenant that God made with Adam which he transgressed. Now we wouldn't append our whole idea of the covenant that God had with Adam on this verse. But instead what we'll do is we'll look at the elements of a covenant. And in doing so we'll see the those elements are there in even in the book of Genesis. I really have always liked R.C. Sproul's sermon on Genesis the 17th chapter when he calls his most favorite chapter in the scriptures and we're God's covenants with Abraham. And in doing so lays the carcass of the animal split into and the pot goes in between and if you ever heard R.C. preach that sermon it's really a very picturesque sermon. You can sort of put yourself there in the darkness with Abraham and to watch that pot go down the center. But the idea of that was that was the relationship of a of a sovereign with his with his servant if you will. And there was all the elements that he goes into describe the elements of that covenant. The term of the concept of covenant is very prevalent throughout the ancient times and it's one which really invades as far as a good study the scriptures all throughout the Bible. And it even begins in Genesis the third chapter looking at the elements of this idea of the covenant. These are the elements that are there. There are parties to the covenant and those parties to the covenant are God and our Adam one is great and one is not. And I'm not going to get into a lot of meat of this. I will say this is that as we get into these ideas the covenant and all of God's making of covenants with man all of them are unilateral. All of them are his stipulations and then his promises his promise of penalty and man's opportunity was to respond just as he says I will be your God and you shall be my people is a command. You will be my people is a command and all of God's covenants are commands he is our are unilateral with man. And so we have the parties here we have the terms of the covenant that are listed the terms are that Adam is to be fruitful and multiply he's to fill the earth he's to subdue it he's to have dominion over it and that he's also to eat of everything that of the garden except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so these are the conditions of the covenant that we find there. We find that there is a promise a reward and we'll have to look at this to some extent some extent implicitly but there is a clear implication that there will continue to be a life as long as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is not eaten and that's very clear in there what we want to see is that was there a test. Was there a test that if he continued not to eat that at some point in time that it would be declared that he would then have eternal life and this is the promise that comes that that is that we find here as the promise of reward for keeping all of the conditions of the covenant. It's implied in the alternative of death that there is the results of also as a result of disobedience there is the implied eternity of life in the in the implication also and if I'm not making myself clear then please either somebody make it clear or somebody ask the question pardon me. Okay we're going to go right now at this at this we're working off the implications implications so we know right now that there that you are. We know that in the scriptures and states that if they he did eat the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he would truly die that's specifically state I would like for us to look at Rome is a seventh chapter and we start getting into the especially the fifth chapter the federal head of Adam as representing the human race. But in this room in 17 whoops as Paul is talking about the about the law and had a law cannot save from sin and he says in 17 let's go with eight but sin taken opportunity by the commandment by the law produced me all manner of evil desire for apart from the law sin was dead. I was alive once without the law but when the commandment came sin revived and I died and the commandment which was to bring life I found to bring death and it's it's just stated in here is that that in that there appears to have been a reason for testing for Adam and that in that testing that if he had complied with the commandment that it would bring life and it would be in this sense eternal life. So we find the promise of reward was not only the the idea that as long as he would keep on not eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil but eventually life would be brought out and it would be eternal life. So it's so that's the part of the promise of the reward the other element we find a penalty and penalty was death in the most inclusive sense of the word and that it would bring both spiritual and soulish death but eventually also bodily death and then eternal the internal damn damnation. Now last is the sign and the sacrament of the covenant which in all probability was the tree of life. Now some of these parts here with the sign it's a little bit argumentative maybe even other parts here. Believe me a lot of this is I've really kind of got more into it this time a lot of it is argumentative but we find here the elements of this covenant that God was making with man. And so as long as Adam was obedient they got an Adam were in communion because the voluntary and we've got to remember this the voluntary as we find in this part the confession condescension on God's part to come to man. So now we have this relationship we have we have the terms of the relationship and we find in his call a covenant of works because if Adam would have been obedient to that if we would have worked through all of the conditions that eternal life would have been secured for him and all his posterity. And so that's called a covenant of works now why would it be called a covenant of grace primarily because God in his love condescended to even have a relationship with man. You can call it a covenant of grace if you would he extended himself to such puny things as we are and to have a relationship with us to even be communion with us for us to be communion with him we can call that a covenant of grace. Now Adam fail as we come to see in the fall but how does that then the second Adam they come a covenant of works because we would certainly call that the covenant of grace. Well it's a covenant of works and the second Adam had to fulfill everything the first Adam had to fulfill. He had to perform for us and all the manners of the law and so there's argument that really we all have just a covenant of works if you will. So even the covenant of grace there's been no alteration on God's part as to man's relationship with him has to come about that we are to fulfill all points of the law and so God is fair in that regard he has not changed. Now in the dispensations of time he may we may have had different how this is communicated to us in the different apparatuses we've had to approach God with but it's always been the same message of salvation. And we're just very blessed and fortunate that he has sent a savior for what we have been incapable of doing of doing that for us. So as we begin to look at this part here it says in the second section of chapter 7 of the first covenant made with man was a covenant of works where in life was promised to Adam and in him to his posterity upon condition of perfect and personal obedience. And so the covenant of works was what was that first vehicle that was made between God and man for a relationship between our God and us. Now so with that with the covenant of works I would go on now at the chapter 6 unless anybody has anything they like to offer with that or any questions you might have that Frank would be glad to answer. So that's kind of the idea of the covenant of works what I really hope to do in this time that we have together is just really kind of give what I understand to be the pretty much the Presbyterian interpretation of the scriptures. So there's a lot of other things that we can intellectually wrestle with yes. Is there a position on a length of time for the covenant of work because we know with Christ there wasn't a possibility of him thinning but with Adam even though he was great Sunday or one day where he'd be for obedience the next day. Okay, I follow that off myself to do not know the answer to that. Does anybody know anything specific about that? What was the duration that Adam was supposed to have had to have secured the position of eternal life made on Saturday with the Bible Wednesday?
Yeah, in just speculation and I think as long as we're not dishonable the God we can speculate and though we know that Christ could not sin Jesus did have to earn salvation for us. I've always really just speculated that the event of transfiguration was an event that stated that that was done that the deity of Christ was personified and that he was prepared now for sacrifice. I own speculation on that but there wasn't he did have to earn our salvation he did that's the reason why we could talk about the works of Christ. So at some point it's known it's done and now he's ready to sacrifice another half.
I think the one time some of the things we share sometimes is there's ever things we share at the time of communion but the one thing we share is we come to sinners there is that we know at that table we come to a real realization of all the wrath of God. It has been poured upon Christ on our behalf and so we come to that table with joy knowing that and in the remembrance of him we take those elements into our body so it's very much fun. We're going to get to that especially just a few minutes when we talk about this part of sin.
One that was without the one that you wanted to one that you would want yourself one that you would really one that was perfect to die for a term for your sins. And so with Christ Christ came here and he went through all the temptations we did he earned he went through all struggles that we did that he just didn't feel so he was perfect just like those perfect a term it was before Christ came looking at Christ. So so Christ coming he did he had to do all the things that we have to do. Now what's interesting about that too is that we find that before Christ went to the cross he was inspected by the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the scribes and all they could come up with was that he was without blemish and so we do find the inspection even before his sacrifice Adam or Jesus. Well that that is the mystery that is the mystery for us and I know that it's so easy to go back that back that black box and say that something happens in there but the mystery is is that God is without sin but also he was man and as such you know he had to be pure to be in our place for himself and they go back to that old argument you know of you know how much was he man well he was just as much man as if he had not been God but how much was he God well he was just as much God as if he had not been man. I mean get all into that part there and I will not be able to help us satisfy. Jesus was completely man. He was completely man and he was also completely man so but he was completely man and he didn't fail him. Well anybody else like to attempt to resolve the efforts that Christ had to make in acquiring our salvation for us in the back. I want you to read he was five. That's a wonderful passage for us. Though he was a son yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered and that he had been perfected he became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey him. All right let's go on if we can then to chapter six now now we have man created we haven't looked at it we know there's discussion out there about the nature of man about him being made the image of God about his relationship to God but something happened and so what was that. Let's read then from the first section and it's our first parents being seduced by the subtlety and temptation of Satan sin in eating the forbidden fruit. This their sin God was pleased according to his wise and holy counsel to permit having purposed to order it to his own glory. I like to do a couple things in this area here and then go on to the next not trying to flee for your prime and difficult questions but there's other things in the other fish to fry later I think they're more important. And the first one is is that our first parents sinned and we find out in the scriptures we find that that that was done by the seduction of Satan by this fallen angel who himself had already sit wanting to ascend and be like the most high. The first point I would like to make is that of the factuality of the historicity of the event of Adam I mean of just of Adam himself we find him referred to specifically by name from Job to Paul. We find that even in the genealogy of Christ that it is traced all the way back to the first man. So those are the evangelical Christians who take the Bible at what it's literally we will understand that Adam was a person who had ten fingers or nine fingers and two thumbs and two arms and two legs. It was just like us except that he had a clearer vision of what life was all about it first and became clouded because of a very bad decision that he made but he was a real person. The second thing is is that we would look at Genesis 3 and though we find some figurative speech there that Genesis really wanted us to take that portion of the scripture as history. And so it is a historical event which was portrayed there and that event actually did happen. And so we find in the confession it's just simply stated that our first parents sinned. One thing I would like to not spend a whole lot of time in this area in the origin of sin but to just make a comment about this where God was pleased to permit having purpose to order it to his own glory. There are some terms that I think we've got to be careful with and those terms are decrease predestination for ordination to order to ordain. When you look back into the external decrees there is a big difference between being made between somebody being predestined to eternal life and for ordained to a reverberation or to hell. And even as we come in this word order here and so the writers of the confession were very careful about semantics and that's something we have to also be very careful about semantics. I don't think God has to worry about predesting people to hell because why? Everybody is already destined to hell anyway. So some of these things we get is that you hear a lot of discussion about terms people really don't even know what the definitions are to begin with. They conjure up a lot of ideas of what this idea of predestination, the sovereignty of God, the decrees, maybe degrees instead of decrees and so forth. But one thing I would like to mention about this we find that we talked about God being the author of sin and we find here that he ordered this sin. If you're looking and not going back to anything fancy but there are about 30 different definitions of order. A couple of my thought I was just still out for us to realize that we really need to go back in these things at times and just really look at our terminology before we get all wrapped up and trying to wrestle out whether God was the author of sin or not. There is a commanded direction instruction usually backed by authority. It might be a person orders something to happen where a commander might order his troops to go to a certain direction and there's a direction and instruction at that. You might finally order a bacon and cheeseburger. But there's all different types of things where you can command a direction. There's the sequence or arrangement of things or other events, a series or succession. Another definition is a fixed or definite plan system, a law of arrangement. Another one is a state or condition in which everything is in its right place and functioning properly. I think as we look at this last part is where we find that God is pleased to permit. This permission, this promise of will of God is not some casual willy-nilly thing that he says, oh this is going to happen so I'll let it happen like that. That's very much purpose in God's economy of time and things. But we find that having purpose to order it to his own glory that we find that there is the arrangement of these things in the course of history. And not just really ordering the sin to happen so we want to get away from that idea of God being the author of sin. Now what I would like to do is I go to the second one that is by this sin they fell from their original righteousness, a communion with God. And so they came dead in sin and holy defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body. So I'm going to move real quickly to some things here and that was in this is that we find it so stated in here that they became dead in sin, holy defiled in all faculties and parts. And here as we begin to study this we find the total inability, we find the guilt, we find the total depravity, we find the thoroughness of the sin that's in effect upon human condition. And we find the death that comes about by sin, there's nothing pretty about this event at all. This is a devastating event that happened to mankind. Going on to section three and it says they being the root of all mankind. This idea of Adam being the federal head was, is really a theology that is certainly not accepted by all. And it's one that we as Presbyterians do warmly embrace because we believe that's taught clearly in the scriptures, even specifically in Romans the fifth chapter. The guilt of this sin was imputed, the imputation of guilt, and the same death in the sin and corrupted nature conveyed to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation. And then four, from this original corruption whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good and holy inclined to all evil to proceed, all actual transgressions. What I would really like to do in this area here is I would like to talk about sin a little bit because I think we really understate it to a great extent in our own lives as Christians. And it's certainly understated in the world. This past year I think was one that I really concentrated more in trying to understand about sin, wrestling with it in my own life and just trying to get a better handle on what sin was all about. I started thinking as I was reading through different books like Jeremiah Burles, the evil of evils and Thomas Watson's, what was Thomas Watson that I forgot. I also read, what was it? No, it's not about identity, I haven't read that one yet. One was the doctrine of repentance, the mischief of sin, the mischief of sin. And in others it just really, things started with me. I started thinking about my neighbor next door. You know Bob's a nice guy, he's about 80 years old and he's very nice people and they've kind of helped me build a utility house in the back and he's helped me add on a room. We've talked about different things and until recently he's shown absolutely he's been dead in Christ. If he was to die today he would go to a Chrysler's grave. And I said, but why for eternity? What is Bob and Mary and Dunn that would spin them forever and ever where time does not count and they would continue to burn and hell forever? What have they done to serve that? As far as me knowing them I've known them for about 20 years and they're very good people and I have another neighbor to the other side of me is the same way. And if she was to die today she would go to a Chrysler's grave. We already know right now even at this moment as we sit here the rich man is riding in pain and in hell. But what has somebody, even I can sit back and we can think of some people through history that we've known that even some we even read in the recent newspapers and we say well because of their deeds that they've done and the people they've hurt. And I can certainly understand them spending forever and ever in hell. But why would Bob and Mary and spend eternity pain for their sins? And God has been very gracious and not strikingly dead and questioning him but those things I think he permits us to ask that we might grow. We think about sin. And if we were to think about the smallest of sins, if we talk about moral transgressions of the law and we made a ledger, well make this ledger and we're going to put the big ones here and the little ones over here. And we started putting down the ledger, big and little sins. You know we can get this murder in adultery and all this stuff down here and have a little white lies and things like this down here. But you know what the smallest of sin was in my regard? It's a cum quad. This is a cum quad. I don't know about this. I know it's a sin to eat all the way through a cum quad because it's sour in the middle. But you know I've taken, you know, eating that I think per se. Do you think that was sinful? Even though I ate it in front of y'all, maybe rude. Was eating of the fruit per se sinful? No. Was it adultery? Was it murder? You say per se, it was just simply eating the fruit. That's a very little sin. But it's spun the rest of us having to deal with this posterity, millions and millions and millions of people into a black hell for the rest of the eternity. That's pretty serious. So what is it then that makes this so bad? God's hatred for sin is an infinite hatred. He is an infinitely holy God. The only way that he can hate sin is with infinite hatred. Sin in itself is most opposite to God. The nature of sin is so opposite to God that there is nothing so contrary to God. Absolutely nothing so contrary to God. There is nothing else except sin that is not from God. There is only sin that God has not made. Now there are other evils that God has made and uses. God will use evil in our lives. Take affliction for example. Affliction is a type of evil. But we should desire the worst of affliction over the most minor of sin. As Jeremiah Burles uses the expression that if God brought us to the precipice of hell and as we looked out over there in eternity, as we were making his image, our desire would be to throw and fling ourselves into hell and spend the rest of eternity there in that affliction rather than commit the smallest of sin because it is so opposite of God. And so we don't realize really the full weight of sin and what it means. If we were to have one, you see man's position in the garden, it was simply his duty to be obedient. The reward was after a period of time of obedience was eternal life. But he, but just simply his duty was to obey. If all we had was one minor thought sin. And the rest of our life we spent was good. We would be Armenians to say that we had a right to go to heaven. And we'd also be wrong because there's nothing that we could do because sin is so evil and it is so bad. There is nothing that we and ourselves could do could overcome if all we had was one minor, simple thought sin. It says that sin is so opposite to God that if it were possible that at least drop of it could get into God's nature, God would gistily cease to be God. But he would no longer be holy. If God did not hate sin as much as he does, if it could be conceived that God could hate sin somewhat less than he does, he would instantly cease to be God. And how many times, I don't know how many times you have, but I know I've done at least one time of my life where I said, God, if you adjust, just turn your back on my sins. But if God even begins to even ignore sin, not bring sin into justice, he would cease to be God. Let me read from Jeremiah Burles here. And so why, how does this appear? Thus if God ceased to hate sin, if God did not hate as much as he does, then he did not hate sin infinitely for there cannot be anything infinite and less than infinite standing together. These two cannot ever stand if it is so, if there should be a degree under that, it must be finite. Now if God's hatred for sin were less than it is, it would be but a finite hatred and if it were a finite hatred than God cannot be infinite holy for infinite holiness must have infinite hatred against sin. Now, so where do we stand with God? This whole thing is we study today and as we come about and bring ourselves to look at the last minutes of confession of faith, I think as we look at sin, what it really needs to do is we really need to realize the tremendous weight of sin. And I don't know about you, but I wish it was just simply eating the fruit of course per se was not wrong, it was because God said don't do it. And so therefore eating fruit is not transgressive or moral law, but transgressing the commandment of God is a moral law. And in doing so that one simple act brought down in a very serious way, all of us. And we cannot just simply cast it off to Adam and Eve. What I would really like to do and close on these three things is that what we have to realize is that either that sin is tragically, tragically evil. And we minimize, we minimize God as God, we minimize the puneness of man and we minimize sin in our lives. We just live comfortably next to it so much. Now here's the part that I would like for us to make sure that we don't get past this corruption in section five of nature during this life does remain in those that are regenerated. And although it be through Christ, pardoned and mortified, yet both itself and all the motions thereof are truly and properly sinned. Now you every wonder why you continue to sin, it's just in you. Now what it's just not gone yet and it won't be gone. I am glad for chapter 15 as we come to it and hear. And that is the repentance unto life. And we have really in this whole tragedy of the fall of man and a sin coming across us and through us and in us is that God has given us a vehicle. And it's we as Christians, we need to call upon God more for his mercy and it is not an insult to the work of Christ. In fact it's an appeal to the work of Christ and we should do so daily. Paul talks about a repentance unto life he talks about. And we need to see the part that repentance plays in us as sinners. You know what one of our biggest problems is, is we all dress up when we come to church and we get our ties and our nice dresses on and we look pretty good but we're just sinners deep down inside. And we all wrestle with that deplorable condition. And the thing is you know that I do and I know that you do. The thing is what we really just really kind of pass over it. We're all hurting in that regard. We all will always continue to hurt until Christ comes and takes all of that away from us. And so the vehicle he has given to us is this repentance unto life that we are to repent of our sins and we're to come before Christ, humble in ourselves to Him and just latching on the whole of the work he's done on our behalf and realizing that it's all been paid for. But we must continue to come to Him daily in repenting of our sins. Not living as I was taking the morbidity of this cloud of life but knowing it and recognizing it. And I don't know if you're like me, you know, you have some some prevailing sins in your life, you're wrestle with and you get that big bear down, you get them stuffed in the pouch and you go along and you think you're doing okay and so then you find out it's a little bit here, a little bit there's something else and you get a little comfortable. And the next thing you didn't realize that bear's got all that pouch is only your shoulders again because you got comfortable with all the other stuff you didn't realize that we are still sinners. And as the book is the confession says here, now it's going to be with us until we die. I think that if anything for us to as we approach this portion of the confession of faith that it refers us back into the illumination of the scriptures in our lives is that we just need to recognize. That we are in desperate need of Jesus. We are in desperate need of the work He's going to have. And we are so blessed by His love of us. I think I just close and I'll tell you about one little thing that I'll never forget. About 15 years or so ago, I was in Kalahas and somebody asked me to go to a gospel scene. And so in going to the gospel scene it was this assembly of God's Church and they had this gospel group just singing away. And we were sitting way in the back and it was really a lot of fun. I had a good time there. But all of a sudden, and I was told about who he was later, it was this old man on the second bench. And this old man on the second bench, white here, stood up my size, 90 years old, they were singing a real, a real lively song. But it was talking about the grace of God and the love of Jesus. And it was done in that lively gospel fashion, gospel scene fashion. And old man, I'll never forget, got up and started dancing down the aisle, started here. And he was just twirling and his hand was going up just like this and he danced down the aisle, danced back and sat down. I didn't sing anything else the rest of the time. But the old man was so caught up in the joy of knowing that he was blessed by God, called out to be his people. And I said to myself, I wish that I could be able to throw off all these inhibitions I have and be even like David where he danced before all the people. And it's like Mike says, you know, when he reads and we come to that portion and where it says that the script was read and it says the Lord of the Lord, and we respond, Frank's be the God. There is that outpouring of Frank's giving from us. We hear the word of God. And I pray that as we come to this and we see how despicable sin is and how what a deplorable condition we're in, that we repent of our sins, we repent of it daily and realize that we have been extended to us, we have the graciousness of God in Christ Jesus. And we just be filled with the desire to love him and to live for him and to be grateful before him for his goodness to us. Before we close the enemy, just I think we just that hit the time. There's anybody who have anything. There's a lot more to be said about this area here. Any thoughts, any questions? Yes, that. That's a good point. I think that the work of Christ was a work. I would think that as we look in the, I think Matthew the fourth chapter in the temptation of Jesus was real temptation. It's something he really wrestled with. It caused for the angels to minister to him at the end. So I think it's a good point that we don't want to, though, though we ponder and wonder about the mystery. We don't want to insult the work of Christ. Okay, good. Thank you. Okay. Good point. The only thing where I think I possibly deviated and could be a beating hand in this whole regard is that some people think it was an apple. I may be proposing those to come quite. Let's have that. Yes. Okay. Let's bow and look forward to going to worship those who haven't been there. Our gracious father will come to you at this time. Thank you that we can be reminded of your great work for us knowing that we are so unworthy and so undeserving of these things. And so therefore, so very, very grateful, grateful that you even condescended to root to to commune with us and desire for communion. But even more grateful father, that while we were at sinners, that you gave your own son to die for us in our place, and all your wrath has been poured upon him and I stood. And then we have this glorious opportunity, this glorious occasion before us to spend eternity in fellowship and in peace and in reconciled to you. Our hearts truly are overjoyed with thanksgiving and we take and bring these things to you in Christ's name. What a wonderful name it is and here's Emily Prey with all thanksgiving. Amen.