We're going to continue in our study of the letter to the Hebrews will be in chapter nine. If you want to open with me to chapter nine of Hebrews. We'll be reading, starting in verse 22 through the end of the chapter. And according to the law, one may almost say all things are cleansed with blood and without shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. Therefore, it was necessary for the copies of the things in the heavens to be cleansed with these things, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us. Nor was it that he would offer himself often as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise he would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world. But now once at the consummation of the ages, he has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And in as much as it is appointed for men to die once, And after this comes judgment. So Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin to those who eagerly await him. Let's look to the Lord. Father, so much in this passage for us to unpack this evening. We just pray that you would be with me as I attempt to do that and that you would speak through me. And Father, my thoughts will be clear and that I would have the words that you would want me to say. Father, we look at your son tonight, we look at his appearing, and it's such a tremendous, tremendous thing that we look at tonight. I just pray that, Father, you would open our hearts and our eyes and our minds to this passage, and that through it, we can have assurance, and Father, that we can trust even deeper in the saving work of your son. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Now as we look at this passage this evening, a glaring question comes to mind. And that question really forms out of the final two verses, verses 27 and 28. The rest of the passage can be a little bit confusing at first glance, but those last two verses really jump out, don't they? Let me just read them again. And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ also having been offered once to bear the sins of many will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin to those who eagerly await him. These are oft-memorized verses, and maybe you in your life have memorized these verses as well. Many have. They stand as a confirmation of the final days when we will be glorified and enter heaven. But they do pose a question, at least in my mind, regarding the security of our salvation. Many Christians wrestle with this topic. Is my salvation secure? Is my salvation a permanent condition? You've heard it said, once saved, always saved. Is that true? Or can a person lose or walk away from their salvation? I mean, if a person is saved, born again, is that it? Or is there something more that needs to happen? in order for them to go to heaven. Why does the New Testament indicate in different places that we are saved through faith, that we are being saved, and that we will be saved? Why is salvation spoken of in three tenses, past, present, and future? In our passage tonight, our writer presents the evidence that we need to answer these questions as he continues to compare the old covenant with the new covenant. Now, he's been stacking all of those sacrifices of the law, the sacrifices of the first covenant. He's been stacking those against the once for all sacrifice of Jesus Christ. He's been showing us the reason why God instituted the old before bringing in the new. We looked at that last time. The killing of animals was to serve as a daily reminder of the seriousness of sin and of the cost of forgiveness. The Hebrews had to watch as that blood drained from the wound in the neck and as the life drained from the body of the animal. And this was done by the priest. No mere Hebrew could do this for himself. The priest was the only ordained person who could do this. He was the intercessor. He was the mediator between God and that sinner. And yet, as we have learned, those daily and those yearly sacrifices could not cleanse the sinner's conscience. It could not make him perfect, could not atone for his sin. It simply covered it. The blood of Christ, on the other hand, which was shed but one time, does cleanse the repentant sinner's conscience from dead works to serve a living God. That's what we read in verse 14. And that's where the writer has brought us so far. But now in these verses that we read in our passage this evening, he turns and he will focus on the eternal difference between the old and the new covenant. See, up to now, we've been focused on the efficacy of what Christ did in sacrificing himself, on the efficacy or the power of it, the immediate efficacy of it. His sacrifice truly cleanses the believer, as opposed to the sacrifices that were associated with the law, because they could not make anyone perfect. But the blood of our great high priest who ministers in the true tabernacle, his blood perfects us. So the comparison so far has been on the immediate efficacy of the one versus the other. Which one is better? Now we'll be looking at the eternal aspect of our salvation. through Jesus Christ. This passage can best be broken down into the three appearances of Christ. Jesus makes three eternally significant appearances. Now, we know about and we talk of two of them, don't we? There's the first coming, which is the incarnation. And that has already occurred. And then there's what we call the second coming. And that's what we are waiting for. But there's a third appearance of Jesus Christ. And it fits in between the other two. That third appearance is not here on earth. But it's in heaven before God at the altar of the heavenly tabernacle. Now that brings us to the high priesthood of Jesus, and it brings it into very sharp focus, and it should, because this third appearing, this one where He appears before God, that actually determined whether or not Jesus would one day return to us. And moreover, it determined whether or not our salvation is real and whether it is eternally secure. And so that's why our writer puts that appearance first in this passage. The other two are down later in the passage in verses 26 through 28. But this heavenly appearance is discussed first, and that's because the entire security of our salvation centers around it. And it's presented to us as yet another comparison between the old and the new. This is actually the third comparison that we've seen in chapter nine. And it's a culmination of the other two. So let's just review really quick what we've learned in chapter nine. The first one tells us that the first covenant, the first comparison tells us that the first covenant was not sufficient for sin. It could not actually atone. And it introduced to us the work of the high priest on the Day of Atonement. If you recall, we looked at the earthly tabernacle. We had those nice little handouts. And we had the earthly tabernacle, where we had the outer courtyard, and then we had the tent with the two rooms. Only the high priest was permitted into the inner room. All the priests were permitted into the outer tabernacle, into that first room. but only the high priest into the inner room. He was the only one allowed to go into the most holy place and he was only allowed to go there one day a year. And this was a big day. This was a high holy day for the Jews. It was called Yom Kippur. We know it as the day of atonement. And this was the day for the Jews that determined whether or not God accepted the sacrifice for the sins of the nation. This was a big day in their year. The high priest, he took center stage on this day. He made an appearance to the people before going in to the Holy of Holies. And then, after he made his appearance to the people, he would take the blood from the sacrifice and he would enter through the veil with that blood. And when he passed through that veil with that blood, he was now appearing before God. This was a very tense moment. It was a tense moment for the high priest, but it was also a tense moment for the people. All of Israel pensively waited as the high priest was within the most holy place. They didn't go back to their tents. They didn't separate back to their tribes. This was a big moment in their lives. I mean, should the high priest do something wrong while he was in there, he would certainly die. And should God not accept the offering, well, then the high priest would surely die. In fact, God actually made provision for the people to know if the high priest was still alive during the time that he spent in there. In Exodus, in the 28th chapter, we learn that Aaron was instructed to put bells on his priestly robe so that it shall be heard when he enters and shall be heard when he leaves the holy place. Jewish tradition, and there's no verification for this, this is Jewish tradition, but it states that they would have tied a cord around the ankle of that high priest as he went in there. And if they heard the bells stop or if they heard a big thump, they would yank on that rope and drag him out because nobody else was allowed to go in. And so the high priest would make an appearance to the people before the sacrifice, and then He would appear before God within the veil, and then there's the third appearance. And that's the one that everyone was waiting for. Would He come back out? It was never a guarantee. If He did, well, then God accepted the sacrifice. And their sins were covered for another year. Their national sin was covered for another year. anxiously waited. They were very aware of the potential danger that the high priest faced while he entered the Holy of Holies. And that only contributed to the tense atmosphere of that day. The community would likely be engaged in deep personal prayer and reflection during the high priest's time in the Holy of Holies. And then when he would finally reappear before the people, there was a great celebration. Everyone felt such a burden lifted. There was a great sense of relief because all was well with God. And in this way, we see that the high priest is making three appearances on that great day. There's two in front of the people before, at the very beginning, at the very end, and there's one before God. And beloved, Jesus Christ makes three appearances as well. And that's in our passage tonight. We'll be looking at that. Now, we also see a second comparison. We learned about a second comparison in chapter nine, and this one was between the two covenants also, and it was in regard to the sacrifice. Now, the first comparison was between the actual sufficiency or efficacy of each covenant. The second comparison we looked at looked at the sacrifice itself, at the blood itself. The first was the blood of the bulls and the goats, and the second was the blood of Jesus. The first only cleansed the flesh. It could do nothing for the conscience. But the second cleanses the conscience. Why? What's the difference? Because the blood of the second, the blood of the new, the blood of our great high priest is perfect. It's pure blood, it's untainted with sin, it's unblemished, and it's offered, if you remember, through the power of the Holy Spirit. So then, the ceremonies have been compared, and then the sacrifices have been compared, and now we see a third comparison. That's what we'll be looking at this evening, the third comparison. And that comparison, the one we'll be looking at tonight, is between the three appearances of the Jewish high priest and the three appearances of our great high priest, Christ Jesus. Let's begin in verse 22. And according to the law, one may almost say all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. Therefore, it was necessary for the copies of the things in the heavens to be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. So we start here with a summary of the previous comparison. It was necessary for the earthly tabernacle, the one that the Levite priests used, it was necessary for that tabernacle to be cleansed with the blood of bulls and goats. Why? Because that's how God ordained it. That was the prescribed remedy for sin. That was what God had instituted in the old covenant, the covenant of the law. Remember last week when we saw Moses? Where was he? He was at the altar and he had hyssop that was bound together in wool and he was using it as a brush and he was sprinkling the blood on the vestments and on the people. That was at the altar that he had built because the tabernacle had not yet been given to Israel. And it was Moses who consecrated the ceremony. This was, remember, the inaugural, the very first sacrifice of the law. And if you recall, the Greek word for that is the ankinizo, the first, the kickoff, the inaugural, the number one, the very first. And then in verse 21, we noted that Moses was not the one that carried out the ritual after the tabernacle was built. That became the role of the priest, but we see it here credited to Moses, and we said that was because he was acting as a representative for all the priests that would come behind him. In fact, from the time that the tabernacle was first pitched, throughout their time in the wilderness, and even into the early generations of the possession of the land, The priests carried on that ritual and that ceremony inside their tabernacle every single day. And that continued once the temple was built. It was daily, it was yearly, all the way up to the destruction of the temple in the year AD 70. And we're within five years of that. as we read this letter. This letter was written about 65 AD. So within five years, that temple was gonna fall. But, verse 23, here comes the comparison. The heavenly things had to be cleansed with better sacrifices. Now if you're reading with a critical eye, you may pick up on two difficulties that we need to address here in this verse. The first being that we read of the heavenly things needing to be cleansed. Therefore, it was necessary for the copies of these things in the heavens, that would be the earthly tabernacle, it was necessary for them to be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. So that is indicating that the heavenly tabernacle needs to be cleansed. That seems like a difficulty. It makes sense when you consider the earthly tabernacle, of course that would have to be cleansed, but why would the true one in heaven need to be cleansed? Now, the second difficulty that we see is that he addresses sacrifices in the plural when he talks about the heavenly tabernacle. When he's talking about the heavenly realm, why do we see the writer using the plural of sacrifice when it seems like he's referencing Christ. Wasn't the sacrifice of Jesus once for all. So why is it in plural? Well, do these difficulties actually present a problem for us? Thankfully, the answer is a resounding no. Let's just consider what the writer's actually saying here. Verse 23 again. What's he actually referencing in verse 23? Therefore, it was necessary for the copies of these things The copies of the things in heaven, again, is the earthly tabernacle. For the copies of these things in heaven is to be cleansed with these, being the blood of goats and bulls, but the heavenly things themselves, the true tabernacle, with better sacrifices than these. Do you see what the writer's doing there? He's comparing the sacrifices of the old covenant and saying we need better. And so we see, we understand that the plural is actually applied to the sacrifices of the old covenant when we break it down. Christ's one sacrifice is, what he's saying is Christ's one sacrifice is better than all the sacrifices that ever happened under the law, better than all of them combined. Better than every sacrifice of the old covenant. Now regarding the need to cleanse the heavenly tabernacle, it's really not that difficult if we just think of it this way. It's not the tabernacle itself that needs cleansed. Look up in verse 14. What actually needs cleansed? It's us. It's us. The cleansing refers to the sinner that's gonna be entering that holy place. The sinner who will be standing before God. That's what verse 14 tells us, that Jesus Christ's blood cleanses our conscience so that we can serve the living God. We are cleansed by the blood of Christ. So all the writer's saying in these two verses, 22 and 23, all he said is that the blood The Christ blood is required for forgiveness. In the old system, it was the blood of bulls and goats, but that didn't atone. That simply covered. But only the perfect blood of Jesus will accomplish that purpose in heaven. He could not have taken the blood of bulls and goats into that tabernacle. That's all our writer's saying. So let's move on, verse 24. For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us. Nor was it that he would offer himself often as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise, he would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world. But now, once, at the consummation of the ages, he has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Now here, beloved, is where we see that third appearance of Christ. This is where he enters the heavenly tabernacle. And that, hallelujah, is where he is right now. He is right now appearing in the presence of God for you. for me He's there for us He did not enter the earthly tabernacle Did you know that in all of the gospel accounts never once did Jesus enter the earthly tabernacle? Do you know why? He was not qualified He was not qualified to be a priest and under the law. He did not come through the tribe of Levi. He did not come from the line of Aaron. Our Lord, our God, the one who made everything, the one who made the law, the one who decreed it, did not qualify under his own law to serve as a priest on earth. But here's the good news. He is the only one qualified to enter the heavenly tabernacle. And that is exactly what He did, bringing His own blood and obtaining eternal redemption for all who are called. And it was a one-time offering. He does not need to offer his blood often. Now, it's a little confusing when you read verses 25 and 26. It almost seems like they're talking about him, the writer's talking about him dying in both. Because in verse 25 it says, nor was it that he would offer himself often. And so you think of him dying on the cross. And then in verse 26, it says, otherwise, he would have needed to suffer often. And so, well, they're talking about him dying in two different verses, but that's actually not the case. Look at the word offer in verse 25, and let's understand the difference between the sacrifice and the offering. So the sacrifice was made outside the tabernacle. The sacrifice, the animal itself was slaughtered in the outer courtyard. That did not have anything to do with the offering. It was the blood that was offered. It was the blood that the priest would take in. When the blood was brought into the holy place, which was the daily occurrence. They would take the blood of the slain animal and they would take it into the holy place, the priests would. It was offered there to God. So, what we see here in verse 25, and it points back to verse 12, was that through his own blood, he entered into that holy place once for all. It was in his blood. It wasn't with the blood of bulls and goats, but it was with his blood. The high priest of the law had to enter every year. He had to go in there every single year. And he had to bring the blood of two sacrifices. Why? Why two sacrifices? Well, he had to atone for his own self and for his family before he could atone for the people. If he had made the offering for the people first, he surely would have died. He had to atone for His own sin before He could atone for the sin of the nation. But He took the blood of animals, and that was only a symbol of the true blood of our Savior. So then we come to the first part of verse 26, and we see something that's actually rather interesting. Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often. Now, in verse 25, we're talking about him taking the blood, the offering. In verse 26, we are talking about him dying. Otherwise, he would have had needed to suffer or to die often, actually since the foundation of the world. Can you imagine a world where Jesus Christ has to die often, where his one sacrifice is not enough? Can you imagine living in a world when priests would have to continue to call him down to earth in order to die over and over again, to suffer without end? Can you imagine that world? Well, sadly, we don't have to imagine very hard. It happens every single week at the local Catholic Church. Every single week Christ is required by the priest to come down and to sacrifice himself again. They call it the perpetual offering of Christ. Their mass is what they call a sacrificium. Sacrificium is a Latin word and it means sacrifice. The Catholic priest calls on Jesus to come down and to be sacrificed every single time Mass is performed. And so if you have a large church and they have three Masses a day, Christ has to sacrifice himself three times that day. It's a sad truth and it's one that most Catholics are oblivious to. They have no idea. I talk to my Catholic friends from time to time about it, and almost every time I bring it up, they say, no way. There's no way that's what the priest is doing. No. They have no idea. They have no idea. So then I encourage them to go and ask their priest for the definition of sanctification. Sacrificium. I ask them, go ask your priest what sacrificium means. That's typically where the conversation ends because it's pretty clear. Now listen, we love our Catholic friends and we pray for them. We pray for them to come to an understanding of just exactly what it is they're participating in because it's not Christian. It's not Christian. But of course, Jesus doesn't have to die over and over. His death was once for all, and His blood covers our sin forever. It is a perpetual cleansing, and it makes our conscience perfect, and it occurred at the consummation of the ages. See, here we're talking about the first appearance of Christ. His incarnation, His sinless life, His atoning death. This is when He first appeared to us, before He entered through the veil into the heavenly tabernacle, before bearing His own blood, before appearing before the majesty on high with His perfect blood. And we read that it occurred at the consummation of the ages. The word translates centelia, which means end. or close, or completion. And so the sense of this is to bring something to completion, to bring something to an end, to fruition. And so what we're talking about here is the end of that time where the Jews were waiting for their Messiah. That was the consummation of the ages. The Messiah had come. Everything that the Old Testament prophesied about. was now here. God had sent his savior at the consummation of the ages. The apostle John tells us in 1 John that this is the last hour. And that was 2,000 years ago. It's the last hour. Peter says the end of all things is at hand. 2,000 years ago. What's going on? Well, it's true that the consummation of the ages was Christ at Calvary. That is very true. Indeed, the apostles, all of them, expected Jesus to appear to come again very, very soon and to establish his kingdom. There was nothing left to do after all. I mean, God had saved his people. The time was at hand. We were at the end of the age. But little did they know that God had something much more marvelous in mind. and we're speaking of the great mystery that Paul speaks of, especially in Galatians and in Colossians, and that is the mystery of the Gentiles. Can you imagine being one of the apostles, standing there with Jesus just before he ascends into heaven, and you're expecting to hear some marvelous instruction or some marvelous encouragement from him? And He says to you, go into all the world and make disciples. Can you imagine their shock? Can you imagine their surprise when all of a sudden Gentiles started being accepted into the church? And their utter amazement when the Holy Spirit filled the Gentile believers in the house of Cornelius the very same way that He had filled the Jewish disciples on the day of Pentecost. signifying that God had accepted them as well. That's how they took it. Remember, Peter was at the house of Cornelius. He had been called there, and there was a gathering of Gentiles, and as Peter's preaching, the Holy Spirit fell upon those Gentiles, all of them that were in the room. And Peter was so excited about this that he rushed back to Jerusalem and he reported it to the brethren. The Jewish brethren, the Bible tells us, became silent. They became silent. They were shocked by this. They could not believe it. But then they said afterward, they glorify God, and they say God has granted to the Gentiles also the repentance that leads to life. And so we find ourselves living at the end of the age. What does that mean for us? Christ will return at any moment, and we should anticipate it the same way John did, the same way Peter did, the same way Paul did. We should anticipate it to be at any moment. There is no sign that we are to look for. We will be taken up and we will meet Jesus in the sky. The fullness of the time is now. He will come at any moment. He will come soon. We live at the consummation of the ages. Now, when we get to the end of verse 26, we see something else rather important. Very important. In fact, we see that Jesus came to put away sin. This is very strong language in the original. Very strong language. You know, in Colossians chapter 3, Paul tells us to put away our sin. To put it away. And he uses a particular word. Apotheme. And what that means is take off your sin the way that you would take off your clothes at the end of the day. So just like at the end of every day we go home and we take off our clothes, that same attitude should be applied to our sin so that at the end of every day we should take off our sin at the end of every day. What does that tell us? That tells us that it never ends. For us, it's a never-ending cycle of removing sin, of dying to sin, of running from sin. And that's apotheme. Daily taking it off. Daily fighting it. Daily running from it. But here in verse 26, though we see the same exact English words put away. Oh, what a difference in meaning. Here, put away translates atithesis. And that is the Greek word for annul. Annul. And that is the act of officially and legally canceling a contract. But more than that, when you annul something, you make it as though officially and legally it never existed. When two people get married and they decide to not be together anymore, they can have their marriage annulled if they did not consummate the marriage. If they did not have relations, they can make it as though it never occurred. It just gets wiped off the books. And they can go around saying they had never been married. That's the idea of annulment. At the fullness of time, at the end of the age, Christ came to annul our sin, to cancel it, to make it as though it was never there. Praise be to God for His love toward us. Beloved, we started this evening by asking if our salvation was permanent. Are we eternally secure? What do we see in our text right here? Verse 24, Christ is right now appearing before God for you. His intercession is on your behalf. And it's on behalf of every believer of every age of all time. But more than that, if there could be more than that, When Jesus appeared first to us, it was to cancel our sin. To put it away as though it was never there. Could you be more secure than that? To God, you are righteous. To God, you lived the life of Jesus. Could you be more secure than that? Our sin is gone. And Jesus is standing for us in heaven. Do you have any reason to believe that your salvation is in jeopardy? I should think not. He appeared once to us for his death. And then he went through the veil and he appeared to the Father to intercede for us. And now we're gonna look at his third appearance. We know it as the second coming. Verse 27, and inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once, and after this comes judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin to those who eagerly await him. We all look for him to come soon, don't we? We all want him to come soon. Yeah, there's some things we'd like to get done. There's some things we'd like to accomplish. I'd like to see my little ones grow up. But I promise you this, I would rather see Christ. I would rather see Christ, because then I get to see them all grown up in an instant. Paul says that we are awaiting eagerly the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so this takes us back to that day of atonement. Remember when we were talking about the Jews? When the Jews were eagerly waiting for their high priest to come back out of that most holy place, do you remember that? They would all be around and they'd be praying. The priest would appear to them and then he would go into the most holy place and then, is he coming back out? Do you hear the bells? Do you hear the bells? Is he coming, is he coming? And then he would come and they would celebrate. They waited, and they waited, and they waited. If he did come, then their sacrifice had been accepted, and their sin was covered for the next year. The high priest had done everything right, and God was satisfied. And what our writer is saying, he's pointing to that event, and he's saying that when Jesus Christ appears again to us, the second coming, It will be one more confirmation that He did everything right. That His Father is satisfied with Him. And because the Father is satisfied with Him, my friends, He is satisfied with us. Why? Because we are in Christ. And when He comes again, it will not be to deal with sin. Why? Because sin only needs to be dealt with once. And Jesus did that on the cross. He put it away. He canceled it as though it was never there. No, when Jesus comes again, it will be for a much more glorious purpose. It will be for our final salvation. It will be for the fulfillment of our salvation. That's what it means that we will be saved. Talked about the three tenses of salvation. Well, there's three stages to salvation, isn't there? There's the moment that you're regenerated, the moment that you are saved, and that is called justification. That's when you're justified before God. You're justified and you're given the life of Christ. And at that moment, when God looks at you, he looks at you through Christ, and if he sees you in Christ, then you are justified with him. His justice has been satisfied on your account. So we are saved. And then there's the rest of your life. There's the rest of your life of getting it right, of learning, of growing, of becoming a better Christian, of becoming a better soldier for Christ, of going through the ropes, getting knocked down and standing back up, getting laughed at, getting stronger. And that is how we are being saved. And that is called sanctification. And then we come to our last two verses and we look at the end. We look at the glorification. We look at when Christ returns and we are given our resurrection bodies. And we will spend eternity with him in heaven. That is when we will be saved. Should that day be long from now, should the Lord tarry, it's possible that everyone in this room shall die. It is appointed that each one of us will one day pass from this life. It is appointed that every man die once. The judgment will come after that. Now, the judgment here is speaking of in two senses, okay? There's the judgment at your death, okay? Either you receive reward at your death, or you receive judgment at your death unto eternal death. That's the immediate judgment. But then there's the great day of judgment. There's two thrones. On that day, we're not gonna stand trial for a decision on our eternal fate. That's already been decided. But we will stand trial for our faithfulness while we were here on earth. In every misspoken word, and every misacted deed will be brought to your attention. And I pray that you will hear on that day, well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the rest of your Lord. Others, they're going to stand before the terrible seat of eternal damnation. where they will make a final plea for their souls. Lord, didn't we do this in your name? And Lord, didn't we do that in your name? Lord, Lord, didn't we do this in your name? But alas, it'll be too late. They will be told to depart into the lake of fire because the Lord never knew them. If you don't know which seat of judgment you will stand before on that day, if you don't know, you have business to do with God. You need to pray for his saving grace. You need to pray with eagerness that he would blow upon you in the Holy Spirit and he would change your heart. And if you need to speak with me about that, you know I'm always available for that. I will tell you this, as general counsel, if you truly desire Him, Jesus tells us He will not turn you away. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you are so good. All what we learned this evening about your wonderful and grand plan for redemption of your chosen, of those who you've called. How glorious, how powerful, how unsearchable are your ways. Father, thank you for the security of knowing that once we are your children, We will always be your children. There's no going back. We do not have to fear of falling again. Because our great high priest Jesus Christ is before you right now, and he intercedes on our behalf. And he holds his hands, and he shows you the scars. And he says, I paid for them. I bought them. They are mine. Father, we thank you for that promise. We thank you for the preservation with which you work in our lives. We thank you that you will finish what you started. Father, make us strong, make us wise, make us courageous, and make us bold. Allow this church to reach the lost in this community and receive all the glory for it. We want you to have it all. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.