Tonight I invite you to turn with me in your Bibles once again to the book of Revelation, but this time to chapter one. Revelation chapter one. We'll be reading the first eight verses here together tonight, looking especially at the greeting that the Apostle John sends to the churches as he writes this letter, a greeting you yourselves received not that long ago. We're reading this together and looking at that greeting in connection with the Belgic Confession, Article 8, as it focuses there upon the Trinity. So again, reading from Revelation 1, starting at verse 1, and then reading also from Article 8 of the Belgic Confession, and that's on page 158, 158 in your Forms and Prayers book. Reading first of all from Revelation 1, this is the Word of God. The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near. John, to the seven churches that are in Asia, grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. to Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood, and made us a kingdom, priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him, and all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of Him. Even so, amen. I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord, who is and who was and who is to come. the Almighty. And that ends our reading from God's Word here tonight. Again, we're looking at this in connection with Article 8 of the Ballot Confession, page 158 in the Forms and Prayers book. Page 158, Article 8, concerning the Trinity, where we confess that in keeping with this truth and Word of God, we believe in one God, who is one single essence, in whom there are three Persons, really, truly, and eternally distinct, according to their incommunicable properties, namely Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father is the cause, origin, and source of all things, visible as well as invisible. The Son is the word, the wisdom, and the image of the Father. The Holy Spirit is the eternal power and might, proceeding from the Father and the Son. Nevertheless, this distinction does not divide God into three, since Scripture teaches us that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit each has his own subsistence, distinguished by characteristics, yet in such a way that these three persons are only one God. It is evident then that the Father is not the Son, and that the Son is not the Father, and that likewise the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son. Nevertheless, these persons, thus distinct, are neither divided nor fused or mixed together. For the Father did not take on flesh, nor did the Spirit, but only the Son. The Father was never without His Son, nor without His Holy Spirit, since all these are equal from eternity in one and the same essence. There is neither a first nor a last, for all three are one in truth and power, in goodness and mercy. This ends our reading from the Belgian Confession here tonight. Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, I'm not sure what the general feeling might be here in our church, but it seems to be the case, broadly speaking, that there doesn't seem to be that much excitement among God's people when it comes time for a sermon on the Trinity. Perhaps it is often thought that something like the doctrine of the Trinity is too heady, too intellectual, maybe even too philosophical, and so it's not as valuable, perhaps, or as appreciated as something that is more down-to-earth or practical as it may be thought. Why take the time, some people might say, why take the time to focus on the Trinity when I could be listening to a sermon on marriage? Why have a sermon on the being of God when I could have a sermon on raising children, or on serving God with my gifts, or maybe discovering more of what Christ has done for me by His life and His death? we perhaps think to ourselves that something like this really is not as worth our time as something more practical. If we had to choose between a trinity or five lessons on marriage, I think generally speaking, at least among the church at large, there would be many more votes cast for five lessons on marriage than there would be for the trinity. Maybe it has also something to do then with the fact that we run up against a wall in our minds, don't we, whenever we talk about God? We can't fully understand God. We can't comprehend Him, and so we find little interest in trying to understand what is, in the end, beyond our understanding. Well, whatever the reason may be, we cannot ignore the fact that God has revealed Himself to us in His Word so that we might actually know Him. And you see, it is our joy, it is our true and lasting joy to see more of God, to know more of God, to understand more of God. When loved ones and friends pass away, you'll often hear it said, or before they pass away perhaps, it's often said, it has been a pleasure to know you. And it's been a pleasure to know them because knowing them has made our life better, hasn't it? It's made our life more enjoyable or more bearable. Knowing this person or that person can really make all the difference in our life, can't it? Simply knowing someone can have profound practical effect upon each and every one of our lives. And it is no less true for God. We may have a hard time seeing it, but it is also true that knowing God has one of the most profound effects upon each and every one of our lives. After all, if you think about it for a moment, knowing God, hasn't it made all the difference in your own life? Because in knowing God, haven't you come to know more about yourself, that you're a sinner in need of grace and forgiveness? As you've come to know God more, haven't you discovered more of your need for salvation and the wonders of God's grace and mercy in giving you that salvation? Knowing God has opened your eyes to see Jesus. the one who obtained forgiveness for you at the cross. You see, knowing God has already had a profound influence upon your life. It has had a great practical influence on your life, I trust, for those at least who truly know God and His Son, Jesus Christ. Knowing God has already made a huge difference in your life, and I trust that as you embark on this journey of ever knowing God more, you will continue to have your life vastly changed and affected by your knowledge of God. And I hope that the same will be true even for us tonight, as we would see how the church is blessed from heaven by Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The church is blessed from heaven by Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, our triune God. And as we seek to know this God, then we want to look, first of all, tonight at the idea that there is distinction in God, second, no division, and then third, no confusion. So there's distinction in God, no division, and no confusion. One of the central teachings of the Old Testament, as we start to look at John's passage here to keep in mind, one of the central teachings of the Old Testament is that God's people are to be blessed by the use of his own name. In other words, if you're talking about priests or Levites, or even if you were talking about your fellow man, when it came time to giving a blessing, pronouncing a blessing on someone else, the Old Testament taught, the word of God revealed, that you are only to bless people in the name of God himself. He is, of course, the only God. Right? The one true God. And therefore, you were only to invoke His name as you pronounced a blessing upon your fellow man. And so you have in number six, right? The Lord, or in the Hebrew, Yahweh bless you. and keep you. Yahweh make His face shine upon you and be gracious unto you. Yahweh lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace. Blessing in the name of God, the name of the only God. Only His name was ever to be used. And I stress that here tonight because we are looking here at this passage in Revelation where John brings this opening greeting like you find in many other letters of the New Testament. And the whole idea is that this is a blessing that is being pronounced by an apostle upon the church in God's name. And that is significant, of course, because we see that this blessing, this greeting, is said to come from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come, from the seven spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness." See, the Word of God reveals blessing only in God's name because He is the only God, and yet here, this word from an apostle, and he speaks of not one, but he speaks of three. Three are mentioned. There is the One who is and who was and who is to come. It's a description of God the Father, the eternal and everlasting Father. It's an echo of Exodus 3 where God gives His name and He says, I am who I am. John is evoking that passage and speaking there of the Father. So we have the mention, first of all, of the Father, but then the mention of the seven spirits before His throne. And it might seem weird to speak of seven spirits who are before His throne, but even as we saw earlier this morning, seven is a symbol of fullness and completeness and perfection. And it's a symbol speaking of the perfect Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, another person of the Trinity. So you have the Father and the Spirit, and this reference to seven spirits is pointing back to Zechariah 4, where he sees this vision of a great lampstand that has seven lamps and seven lips on that lamp. It's an old prophetic picture of the Holy Spirit, and John is using that in speaking of the seven spirits before God's throne, Father and Spirit. And then after that, of course, lastly, we have Jesus Christ, the faithful witness. And so even though the apostle John is bringing this greeting, and he's only to use God's name, the only God, he speaks of three distinct persons, Father, Spirit, Son. And what's interesting to note about that as well is that each of those names has Old Testament ties, right? The father, John, is pointing back to Exodus 3. The spirit, he's pointing back to Zechariah 4. And Christ, of course, the faithful witness, you can find references to throughout the Old Testament. and which is to say that this is the one God who always is and who always has been and always will be. It's not as if John is introducing a new God, but he's making clear this is the same God you find in the Old Testament, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The one revealed there is the one whom I now greet you with. There's only one God, not three gods, but one God in three persons. Now, that's hard to understand, isn't it, children? I know that your minds, too, struggle to understand that. How can we talk about Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but say there's one God? Our minds tell us one plus one plus one equals three. But no, the Bible says one Father, one Son, one Holy Spirit equals one God. And I know that's hard to understand, but you see, that's why we use this different language. Three persons, one God. We don't say three gods and one God. No, we say three persons and one God. We distinguish. Within the one God, there are these three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And we help understand. Our understanding is held by realizing that they're different or distinguished by their relationships. The Father, we say, as the article 7 puts it, is the cause, origin, and source of all things, visible and invisible. The Father, we distinguish Him from the others because the Father begets the Son, and He generates the Holy Spirit with the Son. So the Father is different because He's the one who begets and who generates with the Son, the Holy Spirit. That's what sets Him apart. The Son is distinguished from the rest because He's the one who is begotten. He doesn't beget anyone. He is the begotten, and He generates the Holy Spirit with the Father. And the Holy Spirit is distinguished because He proceeds from the Father and Son. Notice all the different kind of language there. And so within the one God, there are these three persons, and we distinguish them on the basis, you might say, of their relations with each other, their relationships. And it's really quite amazing, isn't it? And I draw your attention to it because it speaks there of the glory of our God. that our God is this God who in Himself, again, is a God of love and fellowship. Our God is a God of love because within Himself there are these relations between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, these relations of love and harmony, even as Jesus, too, reveals in John 17, His high priestly prayer. That the Son resides with the Father and the Spirit and there is this love that enfolds them within and so forth, each other. See, that's the glory of our God, this fullness. Our God isn't just this bland singularity, but this God who is singular, but triune. He knows love. He experiences love within himself. And the glory of the gospel is that this God who has perfect love and fellowship within himself chooses to create. And He chooses to save, and He chooses to bring you and me into that love and that unity and that fellowship. Right? The glory of the gospel is that through faith in Christ we become sons. And the same love that the Father has for the Son within the Trinity is the same love that we receive. Isn't that marvelous? You know, sometimes you kids might say, well, I have my friends, I don't need anymore, right? Or maybe people in the church can say as well, you know, I have my family, what do I need these other people at church for, right? And how easy it would be for God to do the same thing. I have all the love I need in myself. I have perfect love, I have perfect harmony, I have perfect fellowship. God has the perfection of all that in himself. God doesn't need anything else and yet God in his grace, God in his mercy has yet chosen to create man and to save man and still to bring him into fellowship with himself. That's the marvel of knowing the triune God, the marvel of understanding one God in three persons. The marvel of seeing what His own existence is like and realizing again in that way the wonder of having fellowship ourselves with this God. He didn't have to, He doesn't need it. And yet God desires it, he wants it, and he brings us into fellowship with himself through the Lord Jesus Christ that we may know and experience that love and harmony and unity that exists within God himself. And so there is one God in whom we distinguish three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And that even as we say that, we have to be very careful not to make any mistakes or errors. And in a second place, that means we cannot say there's any division in God. There is no separation in God. As Article 7 puts it, this distinction does not divide God into three, since Scripture teaches us that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit each has his own subsistence, yet in such a way that these three persons are only one God. Now, that kind of language may be difficult to understand, but the point is very simply this. Distinction never means separation. We make distinctions, we distinguish the persons from each other, but that never means and can never mean separation or division. No matter the distinctions that exist in God, it is always, He is always one God. And so it's not as if the Father is part God, and the Spirit is part God, and the Son is part God, as if each and every one of them is a third God. No. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each fully God. They all possess the full divine essence, so that there is neither a first nor a last, but all three are one. And that's exactly what we see here in our passage again when we look at this greeting from John. Right? John invokes the one God and he mentions Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And in doing so, he stresses God's unity. Right? The unity of their being and the unity of their work. Right? And we especially see the second part of that, the unity in their work. And again, see here something of the awesomeness of our God, the glory of our God, and just how practical our knowledge of God is. In his greeting, what does John say? He says, Grace to you and peace from Father, Spirit, and Son. Now, it's a common greeting. Paul uses basically the same kind of greeting in his own letters. But this isn't just any ordinary greeting. This isn't some empty greeting, some empty words that he shares or brings. But this is a wholehearted, rich, deep declaration of blessing. upon the church." In other words, the idea is that as this greeting comes to the church, as this greeting is read and pronounced, that the blessings of grace and peace are actually conveyed to the church, to God's people, by the triune God. that there is real blessing given in the reading and the declaration of this blessing just at the beginning of our worship service. The idea is that it's not just me saying these words and giving some empty greeting, but that God is, as it were, truly Himself greeting us, and as the greeting is proclaimed, grace and peace are being brought down to us from heaven by the Lord our God to be given to us from the Lord our God. That's what John is saying here. He's doing that very same thing, pronouncing this blessing from our triune God, grace and peace. Now, grace is, of course, God's undeserved favor, His favor towards us, where He provides us all that we need. He loves us like we do not deserve. He redeems us from our sins, where He preserves us and keeps us from destruction. God's grace, undeserved favor. And peace, you can kind of think of as the result of God's grace. Because of God's grace, we know peace. We know peace with God himself, right? We've been forgiven of our sins. We've had our guilt washed away. We know peace with God. And to a certain extent as well, we have peace with fellow man. We are reconciled with God and with each other through Christ. And one day, by God's grace, we'll know perfect peace as we're brought into a new creation. But the beautiful point we see in this, as this blessing, this greeting of grace and peace is brought to us, the beautiful thing is here is that it comes from the one God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Our God is one. He's united in all his work. And so Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all given to and committed to the pouring out of grace and peace upon us. God is not like three people who decide to form a little group and establish disagreement to act a certain way. You know, that's an error. That's actually heresy. God is not like three people who make up a group and decide to work this way or do these sorts of things. It doesn't take long, does it, for a group to come to disagreement. You can even think of your own home. How long does it take for a husband and a wife to argue about one thing or another? It's easy, easy to come up with disagreements and arguments when you're more than one person together. And yet our God is not like that, is he? Three persons, one God. You know, the ancient world was very aware of the disharmony and the disunity that belief in many gods would bring, right? Their whole religion, the ancient world, you know, the pagan religion and so forth, they very clearly understood that it is gods at war with each other. at least if you reject the only true God, that was what they believed. There are tons of gods and they're always at war with each other, right? This god's doing this thing, this god's doing that thing, and they're fighting for each other and they're trying to defeat each other and accomplish their own works and their purposes. And so the ancient world, in the ancient world, the unbelievers, well, had no security, did he? He didn't have any security, he didn't have any peace, and why? Because in his mind, well, today this God is in control, but tomorrow that God could be in control, and he's gonna do something else. And so you're having to play off against all these other gods, and, well, I give this God this thing, and that God that thing, and somehow or other, you know, I'll get by as these gods war with each other. But the beautiful thing of seeing three persons, one God, is that our God is perfect in unity and in harmony and so on and so forth. He's not at war with Himself. He's not at cross-purposes with Himself. But Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are united in their being and in their work. The Father gives us grace. We look to the Father and He gives us grace and peace. We go to the Father in prayer and He gives grace and peace. You go to the Son, it's the exact same thing. Grace and peace, grace and peace. You turn to the Holy Spirit, same exact thing. Grace and peace, grace and peace. Our God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit works grace and peace, and John's saying, I'm bringing you this greeting, I'm bringing to you grace and peace, and it's what comes from Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There is perfection, there is unity, there is harmony, and you see for the believer then, there's stability, there's security. Right, we're not in the shoes of the ancient world unbeliever, where we have no security, where we think, well, tomorrow the Father's this way, and the Son's over there trying to do something else, and the Holy Spirit's over there saying, no, no, no, let's do a third thing. But no, we have one God, united in all His ways and all His works, because He's united in His very being. Do you see the kind of stability we can have? We don't have to think of the Father as someone who hates us and wants nothing to do with us until the Son finally convinces the Father to love us. Why? Because God is one. The Father loves us just as much and in the same way as the Son does and as the Holy Spirit does. They are one God. You turn to the Spirit and you find from the Spirit the exact same thing the Father has for you or the Son has for you. If Christ loves you, the Father loves you and the Spirit loves you. If the Spirit blesses you, the Father blesses you and the Son blesses you. If the Spirit dwells in you, so the Father dwells in you and Christ dwells in you. Because this God, whom is three persons, is one God, our one triune God. Again, united in his being and in all his ways. And the glory of that for us as his people. To know, to know that our one God again is united in all his works and ways. Never have to wonder if this person's against us, well that one's for us, no. Because our God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit love us perfectly, wholly, completely, and are devoted to the exact same thing, to pour out grace and peace upon us, to give us all that we stand in need of, and to see us brought into everlasting fellowship with Him. and the new heavens and the new earth where we will live with him forever. The glory of knowing God, one God in three persons. But there's one other danger we must yet be careful to always avoid. And that danger is confusing the persons of the Trinity. Now, children, I'm sure that you've probably seen a clock at one time or another, and a clock that has a little ball swinging underneath it, right? Or a pendulum, it's called. Right? You see the clock, and it's got this thing swinging back and forth, right? And it goes from this side to that side and this side and that side, and it just goes back and forth all the time. And one thing is, you grow up, you'll find out, you'll find out that it's easy to be that way ourselves. We can swing back and forth between one extreme and another. And it's the same in our theology. It's the same thing for our beliefs, right? We can see there's an error over here, and it's easy for us to swing and go way to the other side. But when we do that, we fall into another error, right? And so we can say, okay, three persons, one God, and we can stress the unity so much that we swing the pendulum way over here and we confuse the persons of the Trinity, that we destroy the diversity, you might say, of God. And what do I mean by that? Well, I remember one time listening to a person pray. It was, I think, something of a group setting. And there was a person praying, and as they were praying, there was this great big confusion about who they were praying to. It was just a jumble, you know, where one second they're speaking of the Father, and then suddenly they're speaking of Jesus, and then suddenly they're speaking of the Holy Spirit, and there was no transition into a new topic or subject or anything like that, but it was like they were using the names Father, Son, and Holy Spirit interchangeably. Right? And after the prayer was over, I made some kind of comment. I don't remember what it was anymore, but I remember what their response was. I made some kind of comment about the confusion in their prayer, and the response that I received was, well, it's all just the same anyway, right? It's all just the same. What does it matter if I use God's names interchangeably? It's all just the same. In other words, they were arguing that it doesn't matter if we call Jesus the Holy Spirit or if we call the Father the Son, because they're all the same, as if God simply wears three different masks, or that he wears three different hats. You know, sometimes that's the way people try to explain the trinity. Well, you know, here I am, I'm wearing the hat of a pastor right now, but I go home and now I put on the hat of a father to my children, and after that I put on a hat and now I'm husband to my wife. But that's an error. That's actually heresy. That's heresy. It's not all the same. Look at what Article 7 tells us. The Father is not the Son. The Son is not the Father. And likewise, the Spirit is not the Father or the Son. These persons, thus distinct, are neither divided nor fused or mixed together. We cannot divide the three persons and so make three gods, but neither, neither can we do away with the three persons and sort of dissolve them all down into this generic idea of God who puts on different hats or wears different masks. The Father did not take on flesh, nor did the Spirit, but only the Son." It is not all the same. Prayer to the Father is not prayer to the Son. Prayer to the Son is not prayer to the Holy Spirit. They are distinct. They are one God, but three distinct persons. Now I say that, I say that not just to make a big fuss about things, but to encourage us to be a little more intentional in the way that we pray. And I say this because I think we're missing out, we're missing out when we ignore or we fail to appreciate the three persons of the Trinity. What do I mean by that? Well, there was a theologian a long time ago, a couple hundred years ago in England named John Owen. And he wrote a number of books, and one of those little books that he wrote was very helpful, and it was called Communion with God. And in this book, Communion with God, he made the argument that when it comes to communion with God, we shouldn't simply think of communion with God in terms of just this generic one God, but we should think of communion with God in terms of communion with each individual person of the Trinity. In other words, he was saying that as Christians, we shouldn't simply approach fellowship with God in that generic kind of way, but intentionally pursue fellowship with each of the three persons. And you see, there's great blessing in that, and I believe the scriptures call us to that. The scriptures call us to communion, not with just this idea of the one God, but call us to communion with Father, with Son, and with Holy Spirit. And you see, our encouragement as Christians, and our strength, and our peace, and our joy will only grow deeper as we intentionally pursue communion with each person of the Trinity. There's something wonderful, isn't there? There's something very wonderful seeking fellowship specifically with the Father. The Father is the one who created us. He's the one who formed us and fashioned us in our mother's womb. He's the one that knew us before the foundations of the earth were laid and who chose us to be saved in Jesus Christ, and the Father's the one who providentially governed and guarded and protected and preserved us our whole life long. And He's the one who daily cares for us, giving us life, meeting our physical needs, and driving us to His Son to draw out of Him life everlasting, the Father. There's something glorious, isn't there, in just singing about the Father and how the Father Himself specifically loves us, treats us, cares for us. and to spend time specifically praying to the Father, praying and asking for the Father to treat us as a loving and a faithful Father, pouring out to Him our cares and our concerns, our worries and our fears. And at the same time, I trust you also know that there's something very wonderful in seeking communion with Christ Himself personally and individually. Right? We turn our minds and our hearts to Christ and we see the One who took on flesh for us. We see the extent to which He was willing to go to save us from our sins. That He was willing to go all the way to the cross for us. That He was willing to bear the Father's wrath that was ours, that we deserve in order to bring us salvation. And we can think about how He sits at the Father's right hand and He prays for us every moment of every day, praying that the Father would bless us, praying that we would be sustained and given all that we stand in need of, pouring out His Spirit upon us to give us increasing strength. Isn't it marvelous, you think specifically of Christ and all that he does, and then you pray specifically to Christ, and Lord Jesus, continue to care for me, send your word and spirit to me, grow me and make me more like yourself. Right, there's something marvelous in that, isn't there? And then you take the time to think specifically of the spirit, to meditate upon the spirit in his work. Right, the one who's opened her eyes to see. The One who's revealed the beauty and the glory of Christ to us, the One who came into our hearts and smashed that heart of stone to bits, and who gave us a new heart, a soft heart, a heart that loves God, a heart that wants to obey God, a heart that wants to give ourselves more fully to His work and His service. How He's the one, He's the one that's given us understanding. He's the one that helped us to know what God's Word actually says. He's been the one living inside of us and giving us strength to resist temptation. He's the one that's kept us from falling. and then to pray to Him and to fellowship the Spirit in prayer and call upon Him and ask Him to further His work inside of us, to dwell within us more powerfully, to break down all our resistance and continue to pour out upon us all the blessings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you see, brothers and sisters, do you see the kind of comfort and joy and encouragement you can find as you recognize, as you recognize the distinctions within God, the distinctions between the three persons. and you don't lose them, but you keep them in mind and now you enjoy communion with each and every one of them individually. Do you see what kind of food for the soul is there? Do you see what kind of strength you can find as you turn to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? Do you see what kind of joy and happiness you are robbing yourself of because you fail to truly appreciate and to recognize? One God, three persons. Again, the doctrine of the Trinity is very, very practical. Very practical. It's not just this intellectual exercise, but it is something that is to speak to our minds and our hearts and our souls. And you know what's interesting? What is the glory of heaven? What is the glory of heaven? What is heaven all about? It's fellowship with the living God, right? And what do you see at the beginning of Revelation? What do you see here in this greeting? Grace to you and peace from Father, Spirit, Son. And you turn to the end of Revelation. What do you find at the end of Revelation? Revelation 22, you get a vision of the New Jerusalem. And what do you see? The river of life. a symbol of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit who brings life from the throne of God and the Lamb. You get to the very end of Revelation, and what do you see? The picture of glory, and what is that glory? To dwell with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit together. To dwell with our triune God forever. To know the three persons of the blessed, holy, and undivided Trinity for all eternity. to enjoy fellowship and communion with Father, with Son, with Holy Spirit, the one true God. These are glorious truths, brothers and sisters, glorious truths, truth to encourage our hearts and to feed our souls. Our God is the triune God, one God, three persons, and our great everlasting delight is to know this God more, and to fellowship with him. And so I hope and I pray that as we, again, look at this together and as we consider this word from God and this reminder of one God, three persons, that you are drawn into ever closer fellowship with him and that you pursue sweet communion with this God. That you pursue sweet communion with our triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, both now here in this life. and that you may enjoy it evermore in the life of the world to come. That is the blessing that you have through Christ, communion with God, and so may you seek it always. Amen. Let's pray. O Lord, our God, triune. Thank You for, again, revealing Yourself to us, making Yourself known, that we may worship You, that we may know You, that we may enjoy fellowship with You, that we may know that You, our Triune God, are always with us, for us, blessing us, preserving us, and bringing us to that great day when we behold You face to face. O Lord our God, help us to worship you truly. Help us to think of you rightly. Help us in all ways as well to seek your full blessing. The blessing of you, our God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. May we defend this truth, may we rejoice in it, and may it continue to guide us in all our lives, that we may truly experience the fullness of the blessing that you have for us through Jesus Christ, your Son. So we look to you here tonight, pray that you would go with us, pray that our minds and hearts would always be mindful of you and looking to you always to enjoy sweet fellowship. So bless us, O Lord, we pray, and hear us in these things. Amen.