Good morning. It is likely that in every assembly of saints there are some who are not. You will always see a mixture of wheat and tares, wise virgins, foolish virgins, good fish, rotten fish, and the morning session of a conference tends to have a gleaning effect. It's nice to be with the wheat this morning. Would you please open your Bible to Acts chapter 17. Acts chapter 17. And while you are going there, permit me to thank Stephen. Thank you for the awesome work that you do. That should be encouraging to all of us. Hundreds of millions of sermons, and they're good ones, being shot all over the globe. Christ is on the march. His church is growing. And that's so encouraging. So thank you, Stephen, for what you do. Thank you, Bob Jones, for letting us be a part of this lovely facility. We thank you for your kindness to us. And I want to thank you for being here because I know the effort that it takes to get to a conference like this. And I know some of you have come from afar, met some folks from Minnesota this morning. Slide right back into that. From Minnesota. So wherever you came from, thank you for being with us. I'm excited to share with you A text that reveals the Apostle Paul's evangelistic and preaching strategy. And I think in studying how it is that Paul went about the business of winning souls, you are going to see the elegance of scripture laid before you. That the Bible is a seamless tapestry that has one image woven into it, and it is the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. So let's take a look at our text this morning, and let's just see the beauty of the Bible revealed in Paul's evangelistic strategy, starting with Acts chapter 17, verses 1 through 4. Paul is on his second missionary journey, just to bring you up to speed. He has just been in Philippi. He's headed through northern Greece. interesting experience. There was a flogging, there was an imprisonment, there was an earthquake, and now he is continuing his journeys undaunted. Now when they had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. And according to Paul's custom, he visited them and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that the Christ, the Messiah, had to suffer and rise from the dead and saying, this Jesus who I am proclaiming to you is the Christ. And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large number of the God-fearing Greeks and a significant number of the leading women. That is our text, and we are going to unpack it in three chapters, starting with the location of Paul's evangelism, the content of his evangelism, and ultimately the results of his evangelistic efforts. Where did Paul do his evangelism? Our text tells us he would enter into a town and he would find the nearest synagogue. If you've ever wanted to see another demonstration of God preparing just the right time for the Savior to be born, we have a tendency to think about Roman roads, the Greek language for the propagation of the gospel. But we also see synagogues. Why? There were hundreds, perhaps thousands, of synagogues with both Jewish and Gentile believers assembling at this little education center scattered throughout the Mediterranean. And when Paul would hit a town, including Thessalonica, he would find it and go there and reason with them from the scriptures. And we see this throughout the book of Acts. In Acts 18.4, Paul was reasoning in the synagogue every Sabbath and trying to persuade Jews and Greeks. In Acts 18.19, they came to Ephesus and Now, he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews. And Paul stuck with this strategy to enter into a town. Now, if they rejected it, he would move on, but he found his starting point in the synagogue. But he didn't stay there to reason with people from the scriptures. In Acts chapter 17, Now, while Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he observed that the city was full of idols. So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be present. In other words, Paul hit the streets and evangelized. Do you remember when we used to do that more regularly? Paul did it constantly. And what did he say to these people? The text tells us. He reasoned with them from the scriptures. If you are an evangelist, I also believe that this is the content and the totality of Paul's preaching. We need to be going. and we need to do what Paul did, reason with them from the scriptures. Whether we are in a religious setting or whether we are in the secular marketplace, Paul reasoned with them from the scriptures. Now, does that mean that we have to do evangelism Paul's way? Well, I don't think that we can possibly follow his strategy meticulously, but couldn't we conclude that we should have a strategy? Paul thought this through. Paul was intentional. Paul had a plan. Paul had a traveling companion. And Paul reached the Mediterranean world because of this evangelistic strategy. May I ask you, do you have a strategy for winning the lost? Have you ever done reconnaissance on your own life or the life of your own church to ask, what could I be doing where I'm at with the gifting that God has granted to me, with the opportunities that are available to me, to reach the lost? Do you have a strategy? I go to the Kennesaw State University regularly. And I witnessed to the students there, and there's always another Christian representative on the campus. It's an old fellow who's a Roman Catholic, passing out rosary beads. Never see a Baptist, never see a Lutheran. Well, you don't see Lutherans in the South anyway, but. Where are the evangelicals on the campus? So I decided to Google Baptist churches within a 10-mile radius. of the campus. There are about three dozen. Does your church have a strategy? Do you have a campus near you? Do you have a park? Are there festivals? Do people own homes? You know, one of the things that I learned about our fundamentalist brothers and sisters, they are bell ringers And they are school bus, church bus driving folks that go into the inner city to bring kids to their campus to preach the gospel to them. What happened to ringing on people's bells? What happened to going to the street corners to proclaim, Jesus is the one who had to suffer, die, and rise again from the dead? May I ask you, do you have a strategy? Where could you go to preach the gospel? But now we're going to dive into the contents of Paul's evangelism. Our text helps us, of course. According to Paul's custom, he visited them and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures. The Greek word for reasoning is dialegami. And it's a word that has some force to it. You hear the word perhaps logic inside of it, or you hear the word words inside of it. It's to speak. But the word dia, it's a preposition that has some movement. It's to bring somebody through. It's to take a person from point A and bring them to point B. In other words, to dialegami with somebody about the Lord Jesus Christ is not to apologize. It's not to be defensive perpetually. It is not to be on our heels being perpetually rocked by their assaults that they read on the internet. Paul was not a namby-pamby preacher. Paul reasoned with them, and this is not the only time that we hear Paul proclaiming the gospel forcefully. We see this all throughout the book of Acts again. Acts 17 3, this Jesus who I am proclaiming, he was announcing Jesus is the Christ. Acts 17, 18, in Athens, Paul proclaimed, in verse 19, Paul proclaimed in Acts 18, 5, he solemnly testified, affirmed, and what did he affirm, by the way? That Jesus is the Christ. Acts 19, 8, Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God. We live in a postmodern world where forceful speech is often shamed. And yet Paul didn't blanch at being forceful. Are we to be obnoxious? Certainly not. Are we to be unloving and uncharitable? Absolutely not. Condescending? Sarcastic? No. But I do believe Paul lays for us a demonstration that we are not supposed to be speaking as soft contemporary university professors. We are not sharing our story. We are not here to have a conversation. We are here to move you from point A to point B, to dialegami, to reason with you from the scriptures. Please note what Paul's evangelistic contents were not, how he didn't reason with them. Because we hear the English word reason and we go, aha, this is where we get into presuppositionalism. This is when we get into proving teleologically that God exists, and the only answer to all of the big questions is found in Jesus Christ. And all of those things are fine and good, and they have their place. But notice it was not Paul's contents in his evangelistic strategy. Apologetics have a place. in an evangelistic encounter, and even in the proclamation of the word from a pulpit. But please note, apologetics saves no one. No one. Paul understood this, and he reasoned with them from the scriptures. Understanding the noetic effect of the fall, he realized that people's brains are busted. And I'd like to invite you to please turn your Bible. We're gonna take a little bit of an excursus to 1 Corinthians chapter two. 1 Corinthians two, stay in that neighborhood once you arrive. 1 Corinthians two. We're gonna see why Paul reasoned with them from the scriptures. We're also going to see that Paul preached nothing but Christ and him crucified. He didn't use anecdotes, didn't use stories, didn't use movie clips, fog machines, dim lights, mood-inducing music. He reasoned with them from the scriptures because he understood you cannot reason somebody into the kingdom. And Paul's treatise on the worldly wisdom that is such folly is found in 1 Corinthians 1, 1 Corinthians 2, and 1 Corinthians 3. We're looking at 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14. A natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God for they're foolishness to him. And he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned. But the one who is spiritual discerns all things. See the contrast? Yet he himself is discerned by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord? that he will instruct him, but we have the mind of Christ." This makes the world titter to say this, because they think that earthly wisdom is the highest form of thought for man. It is not. It is God's wisdom, and what we see Paul revealing here is people don't get smart about Christian things and become a Christian. They need to become a Christian by the proclamation of the word, the power of the Holy Spirit, then they get the things of God. We have our order reversed regularly. We think that if we can razzle dazzle people with our apologetics, and if you listen to our programs, watch our shows, you know that we use them as a courtesy to simply not ignore the ridiculous accusations that people bring against Jesus Christ. But that is not where we find the power of the proclamation of the gospel. It is in preaching the word, reasoning with people from the scriptures. And in that, God receives great glory, doesn't he? Because when we think that we're going to persuade somebody into the kingdom, there's a danger that we could take credit. There's also a danger that the individual who becomes a Christian could take credit too. I figured this out. No, you didn't. You were dead, and the Holy Spirit made you alive and illuminated your mind. Take a look at 1 Corinthians 1.21, just back a little bit. Chapter 1, verse 21, for since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not come to know God. Could this be any more clear? They did not come to know God through wisdom. God was pleased. through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. And if you scoot down to verse 29, so that no human may boast before God, it is due to him we boast in the Lord. And that is why Paul reasoned with them from the scriptures. Because using reason as we understand it today, meaning logic or philosophy, it's not going to get the job done. Pull it out of your arsenal when needed. But our assault is by proclaiming the word of God. We are not in an academic battle of wits with Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, or any other unbeliever. This is spiritual warfare, and we need spiritual tools. And the one that the Holy Spirit has provided for us is his word. We reason with people from the scriptures, preaching nothing but Christ. The spirit regenerates. Not logic. The word of God converts, not our cleverness. And by the way, 1 Peter 1. Peter agrees with this. For you have been born again, not of seed, which is perishable, but imperishable. That is, through the living, enduring word of God. This is the word which was preached to you. Paul and Peter are on the exact same page. Peter understood there's a more sure witness. There are so many people these days that hit the streets pretending to do miracles, as if somehow that's going to persuade people. It's not. It might, if people had that gift today. It supports and undergirds, but a miracle wouldn't save anybody. It is the preaching of the Word of God. Isn't that how Timothy got saved? From childhood you heard the scriptures. What are we talking about here? We're talking about the Old Testament saved Timothy and his mother. He heard the Word of God. Faith comes from hearing, and hearing from the Word of God. Why? Because Hebrews 4 tells us the Word has power. I got to tell you, Stephen, you alluded to this this morning, that the world, the foolishness is just staggering. You cannot sit and concoct a dopier idea than what the world just continues to churn out these days. And we're going to approach those darkened minds, hoping to penetrate it with razzle-dazzle, with apologetics, with cleverness, with wits, with storytelling, even, dare I say, with testimonies. Paul reasoned with them. Now let's go back to our text, and we're going to get into the content of what he said. We know how he said it. We know what his tools were. But now let's take a close look. at the contents of Paul's evangelism. And I also believe his preaching too, because remember 1 Corinthians 2, I came to you proclaiming nothing but Christ and him crucified. And we're going to see that unpacked for us in the book of Acts. Paul reasoned with them, this is verse 3 of Acts 17, from the scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. Well, that's interesting. Even in the marketplace, Paul would reason with them from the scriptures, giving evidence that Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. How do you suppose he did that? Well, thankfully, there are still a few of us who don't unhitch the Old Testament. Instead, we run to it the way that the Apostle Paul did, and Acts chapter 28 shares with us just exactly how he did that. Acts 28, 23, I can hear your pages flipping. When they had set a day for Paul, people came to him at his lodging in large numbers, and he was explaining to them by solemnly testifying, feel the strength, about the kingdom of God and trying to persuade them concerning Jesus from the law of Moses and the prophets from morning until evening. Let's imagine how Paul might have done that. How might he have used the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament, to persuade people that the Messiah had to suffer, die, and rise again? Can we do that from the book of Genesis? We most certainly can. I can't imagine that Paul would overlook the effects of the fall and that sin is a wage that purchases death. And he could have pointed them to the scriptures, starting in Genesis, to show the fall of man and the effects and the consequences of sin. Death, thorns, thistles, shame for their nudity. And what do we see when we visit Jesus Christ, starting in the garden, marching toward the cross? What do we see? We see a Savior, our representative, who sweat drops of blood as it were, who had thorns smashed onto his head and was stripped naked for the world to mock. What was he doing? He was saving us from the effect of our sin as laid out in the garden. He took our shame. He took our pain. Why? Because the consequences of sin, they are grave and dire. And this was demonstrated by God himself as they were naked in the garden. They tried to cover themselves with leaves. God shed blood. The first time anything died was God killing an animal. Why? because he had to cover their shame. It was the shedding of blood that covers their shame, and God must provide it. And God has provided that sacrifice on your behalf. You have a propitiation in the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul would take them to the garden, and no doubt, he would also use the scarlet thread of the Old Testament. Theme there are many in the bible, but this rather bloody theme that had a lot to do with lambs What do we see besides the shedding of blood in the garden? Was it a lamb? I don't know But it was definitely an animal who shed its blood for the covering of the shame of the sinners who had rebelled against god But what do we see with? Isaac This is a I would love to visit a jewish temple and hear a rabbi preach on this subject I I don't know what he does with the sacrifice of isaac at the hands of Abraham. Because if we don't understand that it was a mere pointer, that it was a type of a better fulfillment, it's a rather perplexing story where a father who loved his only beloved son takes him up a hill forcing the son to carry his own wood to go to a sacrifice. The son asked father, where is the lamb? And Abraham says, the Lord will provide. And just as the father is about to slay his beloved son, God stops him. Does he provide a lamb? No, he provided a ram. as if to suspend the tension. And while this is a bit speculative, many scholars agree the hill on which we see a father almost sacrifice his son is the very same hill on which Jesus Christ was crushed by the father. Could Paul have used that to point to Jesus Christ? Of course he could. Furthermore, he could talk about Yom Kippur. He could talk about the day of atonement, the shedding of blood, so that death would pass over. Yom Kippur, a day of atonement so that sin's not forgiven, but merely covered. Why? Because there's no forgiveness of sins without the shedding of blood. And Jesus Christ, the Son of God, shed his blood on your behalf if you will repent and trust Him. Paul reasoned with them from the scriptures. Perhaps he jumped to the book of Exodus, where we see the Jewish people in the wilderness in Exodus chapter 17 complaining again. Complaining in Acts chapter 15, there is no water. Acts chapter 17, there is no water. This time Moses caught on and he understood, hey, you're not grumbling against me, you're grumbling against God. And so we see God set up a courtroom setting. The language in Hebrew is clear. Here's the picture. The people who were accusing God of sinning were to assemble. And then the judges, including Moses, would stand with his staff of authority, and there was a rock in between the people who were accusing God of sinning and the judges. God's presence falls on the rock, and Moses strikes the rock. God the innocent, the one being accused of sin, takes the punishment on behalf of the very ones who are accusing him of sinning. And who is that rock, said Paul in 1 Corinthians 11? It is Christ. He is your rock. Flee to the rock of salvation, Jesus Christ. Perhaps he used the bronze serpent in the book of Numbers. The bronze serpent, again, is a story where the people are sinning, so God sends poisonous snakes to bite them, but they fashioned a serpent. that was a representative for the sting of death to be foisted up on a pole. So if you would look, you got bit by the snake, you would look up and you would live. And what did Jesus say to Nicodemus in John 3, 14? Just as Moses had to lift up the pole in the wilderness, so too must the Son of Man be lifted up. Why? Because the bronze serpent, it was a picture of Jesus Christ. The one who takes the sting of death. Why? Did the Messiah had to suffer? Because sin is exceedingly sinful. No doubt Paul used the laws of God. Why? Because he understood that the law silences the mouth. It brings the whole world guilty before God. It kills the self-righteous sinner. We see Jesus using this, by the way, on the rich young ruler by asking him if he's kept the commandments. But Paul used this strategy too in Romans chapter 2. You who say you should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? Paul would open up the law to bring about the knowledge of sin because he was circumventing the intellect to get directly to the conscience. The most intuitive thing in the universe is that God exists. Perhaps the second most intuitive thing is we're in big trouble. Those things are self-evident and yet Paul Went around trying to prove it, trying to use the teleological arguments and the arguments about proving the existence of God through presuppositionalism and demonstrating you can't judge whether anything is evil because you don't have an objective standard of morality, a line I've used a thousand times. But it is not going to get the person saved. We need to direct our preaching and our evangelism toward the conscience. And Paul most certainly did that by using the law, perhaps. He brought people to Deuteronomy 28, where we see blessings and curses. The Jewish people had promises. Obey God, you will have abundant blessing. You disobey God, you will get whacked. You will pay a price for your disobedience. He could have petitioned the Jewish people who understood the concept of blessings and curses to say, there is one who became a curse for us. It is Jesus Christ. You and I are cursed people. We're disobedient rebels, but there is one who is pure and perfect and holy. It's the divine son of God, Jesus Christ. Flee to him. Paul, no doubt, used the law, the Mosaic covenant. Look at your history, Jewish people. We can't do it. We need a new and better Adam. He wrote about that, didn't he? in Romans chapter 5, there is a better Adam in the Lord Jesus Christ. But if you recall from our text, he didn't just reason with them from the scriptures by using the laws of Moses, the first five books of the Bible. Notice it says, and from the prophets. How would Paul have demonstrated from the prophets, the remaining books of the Bible, that the Messiah had to suffer, die, and rise again? Do we really question that he might have used Isaiah 53? Have you ever seen that video, by the way, of that fellow who walks throughout Jerusalem and he presents to Jewish people in Hebrew? He has them read Isaiah 53 without them knowing the address. And then he asks them, where do you think that comes from? Oh, that comes from the Christian Bible. No. It comes from Isaiah chapter 53. He was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our wrongdoings. Jesus Christ was crushed by the Father on your behalf. No doubt he used Psalm 22. I'm a worm and not a person, a disgrace of mankind despised by the people. This is the verse that Jesus was calling on to represent what was happening before them. Jesus Christ was treated disgracefully, despised by the people. His bones are out of joint, heart heavy like mack, and you lay me in the dust of death. This one is the Messiah. He had to suffer. He had to die, because we are lawbreakers, and Paul reasoned with them from the scriptures. How else might he have done that? Let's turn back to our text again, Acts chapter 17, verse 3. We study the contents of his evangelism. Paul reasoned with them from the scriptures, the law of Moses, the prophets. Verse 3, explaining and giving evidence that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. Well, how might Paul have done that? That the Messiah would die and yet live? Perhaps Psalm 1610, for you will not abandon my soul to Sheol. You will not allow your Holy One to undergo decay. That verse is pointing to Jesus Christ, Isaiah 53, again. This is the one, he will see his offspring, the one who was so disfigured you couldn't tell that he was a human being. He will prolong his days, and the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in his hand. By this knowledge, the righteous one. My servant will justify many, for he will bear their wrongdoings. And he will allot to him a portion of the great." Isaiah 53 makes it clear. This Messiah is going to get crushed and bruised. He is going to die. He had to suffer if our sins were going to be paid for, but he didn't stay dead. He rose again. Daniel 12. This is an address you should remember. Daniel 12, 2 and 3. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake. These to everlasting life, but others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. And those who have insight will shine like the glow of the expanse of heaven. And those who lead the many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever. Is there a resurrection? Daniel was quite clear on it. The Sadducees weren't, but Daniel certainly got it. And didn't Paul even go a step further in 1 Corinthians 15 when he said, not only did the Messiah have to die, rise again, but he gave us the calendar. What was the timeline? He had to rise again in three days. How would you do that from the Old Testament? Let's take a look. How's about he might have gone to Jonah chapter 2. when Jesus said, just like Jonah was in the belly of the whale, so too must the Son of Man be in the belly of the earth. Jonah was a picture of Jesus Christ. Furthermore, he might have used Hosea 6. Jonah was in the belly for three days. Jesus was dead for three days. Hosea 6, fascinating prophetic book, because in Matthew chapter 2, we see Matthew equating the children of Israel being a picture of Jesus Christ, because they both came out of Egypt. And so, in the mind of the prophet and Matthew, the children of Israel being redeemed, coming out of Egypt, that's a picture of Jesus Christ, who, of course, came out of Egypt after they had fled. Here's the text, Hosea 6, 1 through 2. For he has torn us, that he may heal us. He has struck us down, and he will bind us up. After two days, he will revive us. On the third day, he will raise them up, that we may live before him." This was talking about Jesus Christ, the one who came out of Egypt, just like the nation of Israel came out of Egypt. And he rose, he was killed by God, and yet he was raised by God Three days. Question, where do you suppose Paul got this evangelistic strategy? Matthew chapter 16. From that time, Jesus began to point out to his disciples that it was necessary for him to go to Jerusalem and to suffer many things from the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and to be killed, and to be raised up on the third day. Are you seeing the harmony of God's Word? The Old Testament relentlessly pointing to the fulfillment of everything that is accurately understood as a type or a shadow fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ? And that Jesus Christ, he was the one who shared, the Messiah has to suffer, die, rise again in three days. And that is precisely what we see Paul doing. That is why Paul evangelized the way that he did. He took his cues from Jesus and he proclaimed nothing but Christ and him crucified, reasoning with them from the scriptures, the Messiah had to die, suffer, and rise again. Do you see the elegance of the Bible? Our Bible does not need to be defended. Our Bible needs to be proclaimed. We don't need to apologize for scripture. We don't need to be embarrassed about the story of Jonah in the well. That's ridiculous. No, this is the word that is the power of God unto salvation. This is our message. If we're going to be like Paul, we reason with them from the scriptures. The Messiah had to die, suffer, and rise again. And what were the results of this evangelistic strategy of Paul's? Take a look at Acts chapter 17, verse four. Acts chapter 17, verse 4. And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large number of the God-fearing Greeks, Gentiles. Isn't this an interesting detail? And a significant number of the leading women. Well, that's fascinating that that detail is included. Who got saved when people heard that Jesus Christ had to die, suffer, and rise again? Everybody. Every tribe. Every tongue. Every nation. Do we want to see racial divisions and reason with people from the scriptures? It brings Jew and Gentile together. And if you think black and white is a challenge today, it ain't nothing compared to Jew and Gentile. And yet in Christ, they are going to be praising him for eternity because Jesus is the only one who is ever going to solve the racial divide. We try hard, but we're not going to succeed, but Jesus does. And we see every tribe, every tongue, every language represented in the kingdom. Would we like to see racial divide go away? We don't need critical race theory. We don't need anti-critical race theory. We need to reason with people from the scriptures, because anti-CRT doesn't save any more than presuppositionalism or apologetics save. It is the word of God that saves. Do you want to see class warfare ended? Reason with people from the scriptures. It cuts rich, poor. It makes no difference. Reason with them that the Messiah had to suffer, had to die, had to rise again. Do you want to see the radical feminist movement stop with their bizarre proposals that you can just identify as anything that you want to? Let's not get annoyed, let's reason with them from the scriptures. Do you want to see the bickering in your church stop? Reason with them from the scriptures because as they get saved together, they come together and they don't war against one another because we're in the Messiah who had to suffer, die, and rise again. Do you want to see the world fixed? Are you tired of turning on your newsfeed and seeing yet another ridiculous expression of the fallenness of man and the foolishness of darkened thinking? Reason with them from the scriptures. Christ, Christ, Christ, and Him crucified. That is our message. We reason with people from the Scriptures and we leave Jesus Christ ringing in their ears. That was Paul's strategy. I would like to propose to you today, this must be our strategy if we want to see the power of God move on the face of the earth. It will be done through his ordained instrument and means, reasoning with people from the scriptures. The Messiah had to suffer, die, and rise again. And I would be remiss if at this moment, even in a Christian conference, I jested in the beginning about wheat and tares. But there is a distinct possibility that even at a conference like this, you perhaps have not surrendered to the Lord Jesus Christ. I have not done you a favor this morning, because if you reject what is so clear, what is so obvious, that you need a savior, your pornography needs to be forgiven, your adulterous thinking needs to be cleansed, your hateful attitude, it needs washing, and there is only one who will do it, the Lord Jesus Christ, and you have heard every reason this morning to repent and put your trust in him. You have every reason to put your full confidence, to stake your claim, to plant your flag on the word of God because it is elegant and it is undeniable that it is a tapestry that has imprinted on it one word, Jesus Christ. Today is the day of salvation for you. Let's pray. Father, your word is indeed living. It is powerful. And we repent for neglecting it. We repent for not being confident that it is the word of God that cuts and converts. It condemns. It convicts. It is the power that we need. And we are sorry that we have not wielded your sword as boldly as we should have. Grant us boldness. Grant us power. Grant us courage. Help us to not just share and chat, but to dialegami, to move people from darkness into light intentionally, politely, but forcefully. Help us do that, Lord. And Lord, we will rejoice one day when we get together before your throne and we look around and we see every tribe, every socioeconomic strata, boy, girl, man, woman, rich, poor, slave, free, Jew, Gentile, all gather together to praise your glorious name because you sent a Messiah who suffered and died and rose again in three days. Thank you for that hope. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.