We'll be in 1 John. Please take your Bible and turn there. 1 John 3. I'll begin reading in verse 11. 1 John 3, verse 11. For this is the message you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. Why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brothers righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. We know that we have passed out of death into life because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us. We ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth. By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our hearts before Him. For whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and He knows everything. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God, and whatever we ask, we receive from Him. because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him. And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as he has commanded us. Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God and God in him. And by this, we know that he abides in us by the spirit whom he has given us. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the truth. Father, we want to be of the truth. And so thank you for this passage of Scripture that speaks directly to that issue. Lord, please open your Word that we might see Christ, we might see the great importance of believing on Jesus Christ, and also the evidence that we have truly believed upon Him. And I do ask, Father, that You would assure our hearts that we are of the truth. I pray, Lord, that You would minister to each one gathered here from Your Word by Your Spirit. Lord, let me speak Your truth, I pray. It's through Jesus I ask this. Amen. So when we, two weeks ago, took a look at verses 11 through 18, In the big picture, we saw that the righteous life is a life of love. The righteous life is a life of love. And then following, we're going to see verses 19 through 24, we'll see biblical assurance. Biblical assurance. How can we know that we are of the truth? How can we know that we are gods? And what ways does God assure his children that they are in the truth? This is very important. Before I go to this verses 19 through 24 section, I'll need to make a few comments. Josiah prayed during our men's prayer time up here. He prayed thanking God for those older and wiser that we might learn from them. And so I I heard him pray that prayer and I thought, Amen, I agree with you brother on that. And so I wanted to thank the Lord for Brother Schofield. He is one such blessing to me. Last week we had to consider what is this difference between Cain and Abel's offering. We saw in that section how Cain was a murderer. And his actions were evil and his brother Abel's actions were righteous before God, therefore approved of by God. And what is the difference? And I turned back to Genesis and I said, well, we see some description here of Abel's offering as being from the first and from the fat portions. And again, thank the Lord for Brother Schofield two weeks ago pointed me to Hebrews 11, verse 4. So let's take a moment, turn to Hebrews 11, verse 4. Because this is the biblical commentary on Genesis, this tells us very clearly what the difference was between Cain and Abel's offering. And I want this to be very clear. It should be to us, for it is a theme of the scriptures. The righteous life is a life of love. Why was Abel's offering received? What was wrong with Cain's offering? Well, we see Hebrews 11, verse 4 says, By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts, And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. And so the offering was offered in faith and a trust and a dependence upon the Lord, looking to him. And we must always, through faith, come to God, trust and dependence upon him. For we see in verse 6, look down, Hebrews 11, 6, and without faith, it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who seek Him." And so faith, a trust and a dependence upon God, looking to Him ultimately in salvation, and that is faith in Christ. The Father has provided His salvation in Christ. So that was the difference. Abel had faith and Cain did not. And so thank you, Brother Schofield, for pointing us in that direction. We're going to see it again. Faith will come up in 1 John 3, verses 19-24. And so let's turn back there to 1 John 3, 19-24. Biblical assurance. I hope each one of you Here has a heart that has some assurance, have some confidence before God. John has written to these readers and he writes that they can have some assurance. See there in verse 19, By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart, assure our heart before Him. For whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart. And He knows everything. So God gives assurance. And I would call it a biblical assurance because we are fortunate to be able to hold the Word of God in our hands. So we need to be assured based upon what Scripture says about those who are a Christian. And this is based on evidence by this. We'll come back, but it's based on evidence. So let me say some introductory comments. We shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our hearts beforehand. This means that John and his readers can know that they know God, of the truth, that they are a child of God. We've already seen in 1 John, they know Him. Or they are saved, we could say. John is reminding his readers of the importance of truth. And he's already told them that he's writing to them, not because they do not know the truth, but because they know it. And no lie is of the truth. A Christian is a person of truth and it is, of course, the only absolute truth that comes from we have the Word of God. John wants those that he's writing to to become confident about knowing the Lord. And he wants them actually to be persuaded in the heart, to be persuaded. They can have this measure of assurance to reassure their heart, to have their heart assured. This is a persuaded heart. It's persuaded that they know him. What about their heart? Well, Jameson, Fawcett and Brown helps us with heart. It's the seat of the feelings. It is our inward judge. So this is the conscience as a witness to acts either as our justifying advocate, the heart, the conscience will either help us and understand that we are right before God or it will condemn us. The conscience can be a condemning accuser before God even now. John's writing, can address those that are already have that confidence, but yet have confidence that they are of the truth, know the Lord for the wrong reason. Because here he says, by this, we're going to have to come back. But but by this. I am thankful the Lord has given us a heart. He's given us a conscience. This afternoon, there are probably people sitting in this room that are very confident that they know the Lord. And sometimes those that have great confidence, they say they have confidence they know the Lord. Again, they're based on the wrong reasons. They might be actually living in a habitually sinful way. We saw earlier in chapter 3 verse 4, everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practice lawlessness. Sin is lawlessness. And ultimately, the one who makes a practice of sinning, we saw, Verse 8 of chapter 3, "...whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil." Some people might have very much confidence, but yet there's not evidence, according to what Scripture says, the right evidence for a person to know Him. There also could be people here sitting in the congregation that might feel guilty before God, Their heart might be condemning them, but yet there's no actual sin, active sin against Him that they're going on in rebellion against Him. And so this passage will be helpful so that we might have the proper assurance of the heart or the clean conscience before Him based upon the truth. We have seen through 1 John several marks of the Christian. Here we're going to see a summary of the mark of a Christian. We're going to see a summary of the marks of a Christian. I would say verse 23 is an excellent summary. I'll just read it, but we'll come back to it. This is His commandment that we believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another just as He has commanded us. There is no greater knowledge, no greater experience than to have a proper assurance of salvation. That our heart, our conscience is not condemning us. We don't feel guilty before God. We have a heart that has some confidence before God and it's based upon the biblical evidence, the biblical means of assurance. And so, verse 20 brings out this truth that God knows more about us than we know about ourselves. I've read it, I will read it again. For whenever our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and He knows everything. There are times when our heart will condemn us and we feel guilty before God. Again, you should be thankful that God gives us such a heart that causes us to feel guilty before Him. This is good if we are truly living in sin and rebelling against Him. And it says right there in verse 20, God is greater than our hearts. So if our heart is condemning us for sin against God, how much more does God know all the details of our sin against Him? Barnes says, we cannot hope to have peace by hiding anything from His view. He knows all the sins of which we are conscious and sees all their guilt and aggravation as clearly as we do. He knows more than this. He knows all the sins that we have forgotten. God is greater than our heart. This is a core. If our conscience is properly condemning us, then you should know, and the Scripture says that God knows even more reasons that you are guilty before Him. But there is forgiveness and there is grace and there is a peace with God that is possible through the Lord Jesus Christ. And so as we think about this text, there is the possibility of feeling condemned before God when we have already been forgiven. There is a possibility. This could be some self-condemnation, we could say. What should we do when our heart condemns us? If you are in either case this afternoon, if you are being condemned for your sin and you know you're in sin at this moment, or you're a person who feels guilty before God, but you actually can't point your finger to the way that you're currently rebelling against Him, what should we do? The answer is given by letting us know that God is greater than our heart. He knows everything. Go to God because He knows the truth about you. Go to God because He is the only one who can reassure your heart. Go to God, because He is the only One who can eternally remove the guilt from you, again through Christ. And that's what we're going to do as we go through this Scripture. We're coming to God, the One who is greater than our heart. We come to God, we hear His Word, and we have hearts that need to be reassured. And I have mentioned a couple of situations there. I don't want to forget that there could be those gathered in here who are not Christians. You, too, must go to God. And you're going to be brought to God through the Word of God to hear the good news of salvation for sinners that is possible through Jesus. We want to have biblical assurance. How can we know that we really know Him? How can we have this persuaded heart that we are actually of the truth? This passage tells us, may we all know that Jesus Christ is the only Lord and the only Savior of sinners. May then we begin to live first and foremost for the glory of God. gives assurance based upon evidence. That's one way that we can know we know Him. God gives assurance based upon evidence. And so as we take a step back and look at verse 19, it says, by this, by what? By this we shall know that we are of the truth. What is it? It's the preceding passage. What did we see in that preceding passage? We saw that the Christian, the one who is of the truth, begins to live a life of love. We saw in that previous passage even what love is. He says, you ought to love one another. You heard this at the beginning. And so then the question comes, well, what is love? And the negative example is Cain did not display love to his brother. But the positive example, verse 16, by this we know love, that He, Jesus, laid down His life for us. There's how we might know love. What's the measure? Have we begun to live a life of love? By this, if you've begun to live a life of love, then you'll know that you're of the truth. So what is love? It is the love of Christ towards his people. He is the good shepherd that lays down his life for his sheep. You see, that is love. He laid down his life for us. And so then what is our display of love to others? We ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. It says there in verse 16. And that sounds great, to hear this general lay down our life for the brothers, but we tried to get a hold a little bit of that. And we can see from the passage that it says, if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth. And how convicting is that scripture? We say, I'm willing to help you in any way you want. But the scripture doesn't say that they have to tell us, this is the way I want you to help me. It says that we see the need. And then the commentator said last time that just a sight of the need is like knocking on the heart. of the Christian, they want to meet this need. This is evidence that you have been born of God, that you have been born again, that you now have a life of the Spirit. You begin to live a life of love, and love is not just talk. Love involves action. By this, we shall know that we are of the truth. So we begin to live a life of love, for the righteous life is a life of love. This goes over and over and over again. I hope this will be helpful to you. to remember this simple statement. Love, Pastor Mark talked about it. Jesus is the one who summarized all the law in this way. Pastor Mark reminded us of it this morning. Love to God and love to neighbor. This is the Christian life. Love to God and love to neighbor. Your heart can be reassured. Your heart can be persuaded that you are of the truth as you begin to live this life of love. So biblical assurance, what can we say? It's based upon evidence. What evidence? From the preceding verses that we're loving the brethren. That we're loving the brethren. And our heart can condemn us, and Barnes says, a true Christian does not attempt to conceal the fact that there is much for which his own heart and conscience might justly accuse him." Oh, how many thoughts cross our mind that would accuse us that are sinful. We're tempted to go in sinful ways, for sure. And we even let those thoughts linger. But, he says, he finds, notwithstanding all this struggle, he's saying the struggle against the flesh, the flesh and the spirit within the believer having this struggle, not saying that there's not a struggle within the believer, but there is evidence that he is a child of God. There's this possibility to be persuaded that you do know Him, that you are of the truth. And that is because, again, you've begun to live a life of love. Biblical assurance. Well, from this passage, we're going to see other things about biblical assurance, who it comes to. Verses 21 and 22. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God. Whatever we ask, we receive from Him. because we keep His commandments and do what pleases Him. It is a blessing to have heartfelt assurance of salvation. It is a blessing if our heart does not condemn us. Again, we have to qualify this, if our heart does not condemn us. If we are living in such a way that God approves of, you see, you can't, again, act like it, Oh, I'm okay with God as long as I don't feel any condemnation in my heart. This is a way that you're living. If you don't allow the secret sin to go on, you know, the Christian is not making a practice of sin. Rather, we are living in a way that pleases God. It says there at the end of verse 2, keep His commandments and do what pleases to Him. And then also, Barnes points out that it's helpful also to think about our submission to the Lord in the sense of our heart doesn't condemn us because we are submitting to all the allotments of divine providence. As we go through this life, many things can come into our life we don't want to be found fighting against the Lord. So Jameson, Fawcett, and Brown say, John does not mean that all those whose heart do not condemn them are therefore safe before God. Let's not make that conclusion from scripture. The assurance should be based upon evidence. We saw part of that evidence is loving the brethren. We're going to see more evidence here shortly. But he says, for some have a conscience seared. Others are ignorant of the truth. It is not only sincerity, but it's sincerity in the truth which can save men. Sincerity in the truth. And the truth, of course, is that only Christ can remove our guilt. Because He was cursed as He hung on the tree. The curse might be removed from us. The condemnation might be removed. Now we can have peace with God. Christians are those who know the teaching of Christ and they test themselves by it. So it is a blessing to have confidence before God, assurance. And if our heart doesn't condemn us, we're living in a way that pleases the Lord and according to His commandments. This is a blessing that our heart, if it is not condemning us. One aspect of this confidence before God is confidence in prayer. Certainly we'll say something of it now, but we'll say more of it in chapter 5. But confidence in prayer, one aspect here, whatever we ask beginning of verse 22, Whatever we ask, we receive from Him. And so we all quickly have to remind ourselves the Bible does not teach that God gives a Christian confidence in prayer to receive whatever the mind can think up. Isn't that right? We have some so-called Christians that anything they think up, they believe that God is obligated to answer these prayers. Many people can abuse or twist these scriptures and they talk about believing prayer. They talk about if you believe, then you will receive. And this is talking about things that God hasn't necessarily promised us. And so what kind of prayer is this confident prayer when our heart's not condemning us? We lift up these prayers and we believe that we will receive them. Look to chapter 5, verse 1 John, chapter 5. Let me just read verses 14 and 15. This is the confidence that we have toward Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the request that we have asked of Him. And so there it is, our prayers must be will-of-God prayers, not our own will prayers. We'll spend more time on that in chapter 5. So proper understanding of prayer should cause us to pray God-centered prayers, Christ-exalting prayers, not self-centered prayers. But how can we have a heart that does not condemn us? How can we have this confidence before God? That's the focus. Again, the second half of verse 22 tells us the reason why a Christian can have assurance of salvation. Second half of verse 22, back in chapter 3, Because we keep His commandments and do what pleases Him. So Christians can only have assurance of salvation if their life is characterized by keeping God's commandments and doing what pleases Him. Some who hear this will immediately begin to make the list of the commandments of God. They want to have a checklist so that they can do just like a person who makes a checklist, for instance, at work. If we make a checklist, if you have a job that you go and you got many things to do, so you make this checklist, all the things to do, then my focus is I'm just gonna work the list, check off the list, get done with the list, and then I get a paycheck for accomplishing that list, right? That's the way it works at work. So whatever it takes, I don't care about so much, just accomplish the list. So we work for pay, but we do not work for grace. And so, because we keep His commandments and do what pleases Him, These are evidences. These are evidences that we have been given His grace, that we are of the truth. The Apostle is not saying that we should have confidence before God as if our obedience to the commands were building up some merit, some of our own goodness, so that we might go before God and be right in His sight. Look at my obedience, God, I'm right before you. No, rather this is evidence. God, You have given me Your grace. You have placed me in the truth. Now, as a result of seeing Jesus Christ as my only hope, and Your great love displayed toward me in Christ, now I begin to obey You. I'm motivated to obey Your commandments from Your love toward me. The Christian should not look at the commandments of God in the same way we look at the checklist at work. The Christian is not keeping the commandments of God just to get the paycheck of getting to go to heaven. No, the Christian has a desire to do what pleases Him. You see that there? There's a change of desire when you become a Christian. It is that you do what pleases Him. You have this desire to please the Lord. I hope we can see the difference between having a heart for God and having a selfish heart. I'm working just to get something for me, or I am living this righteous life in order to please the God who has made me righteous by the righteousness of Christ. We keep hearing this. We keep bumping up against this over and over again through 1 John. So we don't keep the commandments of God to save ourselves, Once we have been saved, we do keep the commandments of God. You don't even keep the commandments of God in order to keep yourself saved. He saves us, He keeps us saved, but the evidence, we have been saved. So what does it mean to obey the commandments of God? Well, first and foremost, we could say, again, verse 23 is a very helpful summary. Verse 23 says, this is His commandment, that we believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another just as He commanded us. Is John really saying that all a person has to do is to believe in Jesus and love people? And is that all that I need to do or you need to do in order to have an assurance of salvation? I would say the answer must be yes. Because these are no small things. It's not that this is just all or merely these things, but rather this is the Christian life. You know, the person who is spiritually dead does not have the ability to believe in Jesus. And the person who is spiritually dead does not have the ability to love, as the Bible says, people ought to love. For we are even to love our enemies. how far love goes for the Christian. So assurance comes to those who are believing on Jesus and loving one another. The Bible says the person becomes a Christian, they have passed out of death into life. If we believe in the Son, And whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him." That was John 3, 36. So everyone was dead in their sins and trespasses, but then it says that God, being rich in mercy because of his great love toward us, even when we're dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace, you have been saved. This is this great question of how can we keep the commands of God listed here to believe upon His Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another. And these will give you evidence that you actually are in right relationship with Him. You're of the truth. You're believing. You're trusting. You're depending upon Christ. And then you begin to live a life of love. How's that possible? All glory to God, says the Scripture. All glory to God. What does it mean to believe in the name of his son, Jesus Christ? One thing it means is that you quit believing in yourself. You quit believing in yourself. You stop believing that you're a good person. You start believing that you're sinful and you're rebellious against God. You stop believing that you're good enough to go to heaven, and you start believing that you deserve to go to hell as punishment for your sins against God. Those are some things that happen. when we begin to believe upon the name of His Son, Jesus Christ. And it can't stop there. You can't just think of your own sinfulness, and then that automatically means you're saved because you're thinking about your sin all the time. You need to think about your sin, but then also you must begin to think about the Savior. Then you start believing. You think about your sin, then you start believing that Jesus is the only savior of sinners. You believe that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. You believe that God so loved the world that he gave his only son. Whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. This is this believing in the name of the Son of God. You begin to believe this truth, this gospel good news truth. that God actually so loved the world that He gave His only Son. Sometimes we pass over that verse because of some misplaced emphasis that people put on it many times. But God has displayed His love to the world. And that scripture does say, and it's very clear, and it is true, whoever believes in Him shall not perish. Oh, trust Him. Come to Him. Call upon Him. Obey the commandments of God. And oh, don't just get a big list of rules in your mind here. Start with chapter 3 verse 23. This is His commandment that we believe in the name of His Son Jesus Christ. And of course, it also says a second characteristic of those who God gives assurance to is those who love one another. And again, that was all of 11 through 18, this emphasis. We talked about loving the brother. We talked about providing for physical needs that we see. We talked about praying for one another, caring enough to take time to get to know one another, for us to lay down our lives for one another. So we should all ask ourselves, am I believing on Jesus? And am I loving the brethren? If you are believing on Jesus as your only hope for the forgiveness of your sins or reconciliation with God, if you are loving one another as a pattern of your life, then you should have some measure of biblical assurance of salvation. Your heart can be assured that you are of the truth and that you abide in Him. Look there in verse 24 of chapter 3. Abiding in God and the Holy Spirit are other great ways that we are assured. Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God and God in him. Some of your translations would say, the translation I have is changed, it put in God, but it says abide in Him and He in Him. And so by this we know that He abides in us by the Spirit whom He has given us. Whoever keeps the commandments of God. Again. Hopefully every person sitting here, almost every person, there's some pretty young, and at least one asleep, almost every person should be able to give the, what is the obedience to the commandments of God, right? We can give that answer, we can say that it's believing in Jesus, and we can say that it's loving one another. Whoever believes in Jesus and loves one another should know this, that they abide in God, and God in him. This is the way to abide in God, for God to abide in you. That is that good relationship with God. Everybody has a relationship with God. You know, a bad, everyone has a good or a bad relationship. Everyone has a good, everyone has a relationship. It's either good or bad. A bad relationship can be characterized when one person in the relationship wants to leave the other. A good relationship is when both people abide with one another. This good relationship is when people remain together. This is one thing for a person to abide in God. Praise the Lord, we abide in God. It's even better that God abides with a person. We know from Romans 8 that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. We know from John 10 that nothing can snatch Jesus' sheep out of His hand, nothing can snatch them out of His Father's hand. In Hebrews 13, we see that the Lord says, I'll never leave you nor forsake you. By this we know that He abides in us by the Spirit whom He has given us. And so there's this other way that God works this assurance in us, I mean, by the work of the Spirit. We've seen the information you need to know in order to have this assurance. Okay, am I loving the brethren? Am I trusting in Christ? Am I believing upon His name? Yes, I should be assured that I know Him. John then tells us how God works within the Christian, this enabling belief, enabling faith, and enabling us to live a life of love. It's God who gives this Holy Spirit to each believer. The believer empowers us and assures us. The Spirit is a guarantee. of our inheritance until we fully acquire a possession of it. We've already entered into relationship with God, but we don't fully know Him as we will one day. And it is the Holy Spirit that God gives us. This Spirit that Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Romans 8. Turn there with me. Romans 8 verse 16. Romans 8 verse 16. It's good to see it on the page. Romans 8, 16. The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. The heart can be reassured, be persuaded that you know Him. You say, well, I'm a little uneasy in my heart at this moment. And I say, look to Christ. Believe in the name of the Son of God. Trust Him. The uneasiness of heart should be based upon the fact that we have sinned against the Holy God. The God that has been so gracious and merciful to us to make us and to continue to sustain us and give us life. We ought to live for His glory. And so our unsure heart should be based upon disobedience to Him. I mean, we can feel guilty about a lot of things, but that's the guilt that matters, right? Being guilty before God, rebelling against Him, sinning against Him. But your heart can be reassured. It's based upon evidence. Have I begun to love the brethren? And first, have I trusted in Christ? Have I believed upon His name? Oh, praise the Lord that He gives the Spirit to work within us. We know that he abides in us by the spirit whom he's given us. It is that spirit that bears witness with our spirit that we're children of God. So this is God given. Assurance of salvation is God given. It's based upon the truth of the word of God, but it's God given. It's not self assurance. It's not just a minister trying to convince you you are saved. We want the biblical assurance. How can I know that I'm of the truth? This scripture points us in that direction. That assurance is to those who obey Him and do what pleases Him. So there is a change of life. There is a conformity to the commands of God. There is this pleasing Him, a new desire to live for His glory and to please Him. And what is it that pleases the Father? It's believing in His Son. Believing in this way of salvation, believing in this good gift, this display of the love of God to the world that He gave His only Son. Believe Him. Believe in Christ. Whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. This is, to those that John is writing to, this must Be of central importance. He wants them to have this persuaded, assured, reassured heart. Because sometimes assurance wanes. Sometimes we feel as though we know Him. And then other times there are doubts that rise up. What should we do? Go back to the Scriptures, to the description of the Christian. And once again, trust in Christ. Once again, call upon Him to enable you to live this life of love, the righteous life. And praise the Lord that He does that for His children. It's by the power of the Holy Spirit that He works in us. And it's by the power of the Spirit that He gives us assurance of salvation. Oh, the great faith, faith in Christ is the beginning point. And then a righteous life follows those that continue to trust, believe and depend upon Christ. They begin to live the righteous life, the life of love. Let us pray. Father, I ask that you would give us confidence before you. We are thankful that you do even give a confidence in prayer. I pray, Lord, that you would first and foremost. Give us confidence that we know you. Lord, I do thank you for the simple gospel truth. That all that call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Thank you, Lord, that you enable us to repent of our sins. And believe on Christ. Lord, would you help us to? Not make a list of rules to try to be right in your sight. May we obey your commandments? First and foremost, I would believe upon your son. And after that, certainly. May there be a great evidence. May obedience to all of your commands be a great evidence that you have indeed given us your grace. We have indeed trusted in Christ. Lord, clear up confusion. I pray this evening. I pray that you would work in hearts. May the conscience not condemn But may we be assured before you that we know you. Lord, thank you for such a blessing of assurance of salvation. Would you grant it even now? It's through Christ that that's possible. So it's through Christ that I pray. Amen.