1 Peter 3, 9-11. Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless. For to this you are called, that you may obtain a blessing. For whoever desires to love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. Let him turn away from evil and do good. Let him seek peace and pursue it. My tongue easily gets carried away. I need to restrain that thing, that fire. But I do desire good life and length of days. So I need to seek peace and pursue it. But thanks, Jack. Good reminder this morning. The peace of Christ that can dwell within us by faith, by the grace and mercy of God. Let's stand together. I think we see the hand of God In the light of creation's grand design In the lives of those who prove His faithfulness And saved our fathers from the earth With the power of His promise in their hearts A holy city built by God's own hand A place where peace and justice reign We will stand as children of the promise He will fix our eyes on Him, our souls rejoin Till the race is finished and the work is done We'll walk by faith and not by sight By faith the prophets saw Him When the longed-for Messiah would appear With the power to break the chains of sin and death And rise triumphant from the grave I think the church was called to know It's the power of the Spirit to love River captains and debris should move To every corner of you We will stand as children of the promise We will fix our eyes on Him our soul Till the race is finished and the work is done by faith shall we In Christ all things are possible For all who call upon His name He will stand as children of the promise The Lord is my strength and my song. He has given me victory. This is my God, and I will praise Him. My Father's God, and I will exalt Him. The Lord is a warrior. Yahweh is His name. Exodus 15, 2 through 3. By the name of Jesus, of Jesus our King. Make known the power of His grace, the beauty of His peace. Remember how His mercy reached when we cried out to Him. He lifted us to solid ground, to freedoms from our sin. So sing, my soul, and tell of His love, Till the earth and heaven top with His glory. With I the name of Jesus, of Jesus our Lord. His power in us is greater than, is greater than this world. To share the reason for our hope, to serve with love and praise. Let all who see Him shine through us, and bring the Father praise. O sing, my soul, and tell of His love, till the earth and heavens are filled with His glory. No other name on earth can sing and raise us up to life. He opens up our eyes to sing the hardest He has known. We waver in His fields of grace, as He leads sinners home. O sing, my soul, and tell all His love, till the earth and heavens are full of His glory. O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth! O Lord, we praise Your Name! O Lord, we magnify Your Name! Prince of peace, mighty God! O Lord God Almighty! O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your Name in all the earth! We magnify your name, Prince of Peace, Mighty God, O Lord God Almighty. Let's pray. Almighty God, we thank You that we get to continue to worship You. We worship You with singing and hearing Your Word preached and opening our hearts to the truth of Your Word, Lord, and continue to worship by giving You just a portion of what You have blessed us with. And Lord, may You use this, may we be faithful. We just thank You and praise You in Jesus' name. stand together and sing Christ Be All. O to thee, empty and lowly, we can have our rest. and unknown, and to God a vessel holy, filled with Christ and Christ alone. How great is God, His render and blessing, How frail I come before His throne! I am lost in love relentless, And then Christ is all, and I His own. When Christ is gone, I need nothing. His glory shines in a vessel's wing. May Christ be all, and I be nothing. This is my hope, not other Christ in me. This is my hope, not other Christ in me. I am poor and I have nothing All my things cannot afford Christ endured the Father's crushing He bowed his heads, mercy bled, peace to prevail. He bowed his heads, mercy bled, peace to prevail. May Christ be all, and I be nothing. His glory shines in vessels clean May Christ be all and I be nothing This is my hope, not a heart like Christ's in me This is my hope, not a heart like Christ's in me ♪ Bring me, Lord, my heart closer ♪ ♪ That your grace my pride may be ♪ ♪ May these words of mine be heard ♪ We bow our heads to every child and tongue he hears. Bring me, Lord, my heart, Lord, that Your grace my life redeems. May these words be sound loud and true, every strife and tongue And I need nothing. His glory shines in vessels weep. May Christ be all. And I need nothing. His is my hope. is my Once your salvation's come, I will run to meet my King. Free from shame and all accusation, in Him himself, nothing I will bring. Give them, sir, nothing I bring. That in whom I leave behind me All the pleasures I have known, To pursue surpassing treasures At the throne of God the Son. Worthy of our ending worship, love and lovingness is he. Highest precious death for millions, from the jaws of death sent free. Gladly would I give to Jesus all affection, every faith, for the washing of His mercy, Makes my ransomed heart to sing. Holy, holy, is the chorus rising up from those who sleep. Christ exalted, bright and burning, full of power and purity. Where else can I go? Jesus, you're the one I was made to know What else can I do? Jesus, you're my all I gladly unto you Gladly would I flee temptation, for their troubles fill my life. Turn and seek thy God and Savior, for His goodness satisfies. Earthly treasure of our blessing, He's written and crushed his choice. Awesome spending, love and energy. Where else can I go? Jesus, You're the one I was made to know. What else can I do? Jesus, You're my all. I gladly run to You. Lord, I give to Jesus confession everything. For the washing of His mercy makes my ransomed heart to sing. Can we put the chorus of that? Where else can I go? Back up? So the reading Rob has for this morning includes a reference to a passage that we had in seminary. Dr. McCune taught us there are various views on God's ultimate purpose. And McCune gave us his view of God's ultimate purpose. And one of the verses is from Jeremiah 31, and I will be their God and they will be my people. And that song, all the songs, really, but that song, Where Else Can I Go? Jesus, You're the One that I was made to know. God's ultimate purpose is in our scripture reading this morning. The passage is talking about the Old Covenant and now the New Covenant. It's Hebrews chapter 8, 8-12. But showing its fault, the Old Covenant, God says to them, The days are coming, says the Lord, when I will complete a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt. Because they did not continue in my covenant and I had no regard for them, says the Lord, For this is the covenant that I will establish with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds, and I will inscribe them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they will be my people. And there will be no need at all for each one to teach his countryman, or each one to teach his brother, saying, Know the Lord, since they will all know me from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful toward their evil deeds, and their sins I will remember no longer." Let that sink in for a moment. I will remember their sins no longer. Never, ever will you ever remember our sins. look at that today. We're going to look into the fact that our sins are covered by our High Priest, Jesus Christ. He is our Messiah, a priestly Messiah. We've talked in the past about His kingship, His royalty, His prophet, Him being the prophet, the prophet Messiah who declares and speaks Now today we're going to look into the priestly ministry of the Messiah as we exalt Him and remember Him for who He is, our God. Let's pray. Father in Heaven, we are grateful for the reading of Your Word. We're thankful for these passages that reflect the absolute mercy that you have in saving us from our sin and that you remember our sin no more. What a promise that is, Lord. We thank you for that. Thank you, Lord, that you brought us together today to look into your word. May your word speak to our hearts. May we remember you for who you are and see you with greater light through the light of the word. We pray in Christ's precious name. Amen. I am going to be in Zechariah chapter 3 today. I know we read from Hebrews chapter three, but there was that verse that I wanted to emphasize, for I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more. Who does that? Who does that? Who is it that is merciful toward sin, merciful toward our iniquities, our rebellion against God, and then remembers our sin no more? Who does that? Well we know who does that, we know that God does that. It's the work of God and it's been the message throughout the whole scriptures that He is a very merciful God who redeems us from ourselves. And today as we look into this particular passage we're going to be looking about the vision, this is a vision given to Zechariah We're joining in, in the middle of this vision, actually the vision goes from chapter one all the way through chapter six, and there's a series of visions. Some people call these dream visions. And they say, when I was looking at them, they said, well, they're kind of like our dreams. No, no, no, no, no, no. These are not like our dreams. I don't dream this way. I hope you don't either. This is special. These are not dreams. These are visions. These are something that God actually made known to the prophet. He could actually see what was going on. And I don't, I don't know how to explain that. I can't give a full explanation, but I don't believe that Zechariah was asleep. And this is something he remembered from his dreams and then wrote this down. I think this is something he actually saw. And we're gonna join in in chapter three, Zechariah chapter three, from all of these series of visions that leads us up to this particular vision about the vision of Joshua the high priest. You've heard the story about Joshua the high priest. He was the one who is considered to be the representative of the whole nation of Israel. And as they came out of captivity from Babylon, well, they built the temple, and the temple was ready, and what do they need? They need a priest. They need a high priest, one who could actually go into the temple and approach God. And so thus, Joshua was the high priest of that day. Joshua, I think you look pretty good. You're ready to go in. I mean, you're okay. Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, ready to go in there, and you know, you don't need to wear your priestly garb, your high priestly garb on this particular day, you just go in with a linen robe, a clean, fresh, ironed, washed linen robe, perfect. So, you got the pure linen robe on? Yes, check. Did you go in the mitvah? Did you go and do your cleansing, your ritual cleansing in the mitvah, in the bath to make sure that you're symbolically covered from your iniquity, that they're washed away? Yep. Did you sacrifice a lamb for yourself? Yep, that's done, check mark. Did you sacrifice a lamb for the people? Yes, I did that, check. Okay, you should be ready to go in. And so he does. Joshua goes into the temple, the very temple, into the Holy of Holies, and with him he brings a bowl, and he stands there, and then all of a sudden, he's standing there ready to sprinkle the blood on the Ark of the Covenant. All of a sudden, the veil's lifted, and he's no longer in the Holy of Holies. He's before the Holy of Holies. And all of a sudden, the scene changes. Let's read Joshua chapter 3. Then he showed me Joshua. This is Zechariah saying this in this vision from the angel of the Lord. He showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord. Now remember, the angel of the Lord, this is a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ. This is Jesus. of the Old Testament. He's standing. Joshua the high priest is standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan is standing at his right hand to accuse him. The veil is lifted. Joshua looks. He looks to his right, and here's Satan. He just knows it's an angelic being. He's not sure exactly who it is. But if he's on the right, all of a sudden he realizes, I'm in a courtroom. I'm standing before a judge and the whole council is there watching and I'm standing here with this bowl of blood in my white garment and he looks at Satan and Satan says, what's with you? What did you roll in a pigsty? You're filled with excrement all over you. Joshua looks down and is like, how can it be like this? How can I be covered so dirtily? And Satan's just railing at him, saying, you don't deserve to be here. And then from the throne, the angel of the Lord says, silence, Satan. Satan shuts up. Satan is standing on the right hand to accuse him. And the Lord said to Satan, The Lord rebuke you. So the angel of the Lord says that the Lord rebukes you. There's some difficulty in trying to understand who's talking here, and the emphasis is on the fact that the angel of the Lord is the Lord. He's the one speaking. He's basically saying, I rebuke you, Satan. I have the right to rebuke you. You have no business accusing him. The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebukes you. He repeats it again. I have chosen this nation. This is my people. Is this not this a brand plucked from the fire? And this brand that was plucked from the fire, what is that? I take that to mean that it's the nation of Israel that was under the judgment of God, who had been taken to Babylon, who are now brought back as a brand plucked from the fire. eternal judgment, but they come back. God calls them back. They rebuild the temple. They're in the temple. They're serving God. Joshua goes to the altar and all of a sudden he's in the court. Now Joshua was standing before the angel clothed in filthy garments. Clothed in filthy garments. That's a strong word, that word filthy there. It does mean excrement. It means that it carries the idea of dung. And he's covered with it. Satan, you've been rolling in the pigsty? And the angel, that's the angel of the Lord, said to those who were standing before him, the attendants, his attendants, angelic, spiritual beings, before him, and he said, Remove the filthy garments from him. And to him he said, Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you. I will clothe you with pure vestments. I will clothe you with pure vestments." Take off those filthy, dirty robes. You've got to remember, there's some symbolism going on here. And I don't know if you're getting the symbolism when you think about what Jesus did as our Messiah, as the priest who went before God, who went before Him. And actually, when I think of this verse, I think that when Christ went before the Father, He went there bearing filthy garments. But they weren't His. They were ours. And the angel of the Lord says, take them off. Take them off. Have mercy on him. We're going to have mercy on him. And the angel said to those who were standing before him, remove the filthy garments. And to him I said, he said, behold, I have taken your iniquity away. from you and will clothe you with pure vestments. This is the high priest. This is the high priest who is the representative of all the nation of God. How dare he go before the throne? And you know, what's really going on here is the fact that he spent all week preparing for this time to go into the temple, washing, making sure he was clean, ritually clean, He goes in there, but guess what? There's something underneath that is filthy. His moral uncleanness that he cannot wash away. That only takes God. Only God can wash away our moral filth. Yeah, he was prepared. He went in there. Everybody in the whole crowd said, yeah, okay, look at Joshua. He's all fine. Well, let's send him in there. He's ready to go. And he goes in there and he's not fine. Ritually, yes, but not morally speaking. He had iniquity inside of him that needed to be dealt with. Joshua was engaged in his priestly functions of the temple when he found himself to be the object of accusation of Satan. We just sang a song about there's no more accusation against us. As believers, we are no longer condemned. We are uncondemnable by Satan. Nobody can point their fingers at us, not because of something within ourselves, not because of something that we can do. One of the commentaries says this, the most remarkable feature in this entire transaction is the basis upon which God brings to naught the accusations of Satan. He brings them to nothing. It is not because of the righteousness of God's people. Oh, they're not righteous. We're not righteous in and of ourselves. We have no righteousness. It's not because of the baselessness of Satan's claim. Was Satan's claim true? Yes. It was true. He was filthy. And it wasn't because they'd already suffered enough. Oh, you've suffered enough. I'm going to bring you back. It's not because of that. Because of their sins. And it's not because of a promise to do better in the future. Oh, we're going to do better this time. Just give us a chance, God. Just give us a chance. No. It's not a chance anymore. Chance. Because God knows better that we're not going to do better in the future. The sole plea for God's people lies in God's sovereign choice and grace. Let that sink in. The sole plea for God's people lies in God's sovereign choice and His grace. It is basically and fundamentally a matter of God's infinite choice. He asserts His right to do so as He pleases with the objects of His boundless mercy. And we rejoice in the fact of that certainty and assurance that we can stand and come before Him eternally, forever. with certainty and assurance as a brand plucked from the fire. That's us. We are God's people, a brand plucked from the fire, the eternal fires of hell. How does that happen? On what basis? On the basis of God's mercy and grace through a priest who went and gave his life for us. who died. Joshua is just a mirror, an image of the high priesthood of Christ as we read in Hebrews chapter 8. Let's look at that passage one more time. Hebrews chapter 8. Again, this is the promise that was given to the nation of Israel, now made application to those who belong to Christ. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord. This quote is a quote from Jeremiah chapter 31, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them out by hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, remembering back to God's grace and mercy and pulling them out of their captivity. And they did not continue in my covenant. God made a promise. People made a promise. God kept his promise. But the people didn't keep their promise. So I showed no concern for them, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord. I will put my law into their minds. We're going to know the difference between right and wrong. We're going to know the difference of how we ought to live. We're going to know the difference of what it means to be a good person, a godly person. I will put my law into their minds, and I will write it on their hearts. It is going to be etched with a stylus onto our hearts, our stony hearts made flesh with the law written on our hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. God calls us by mercy and His grace, and they shall not teach one another or his neighbor, or each of his brothers, saying, Know the Lord. At that time, all will know me from the least to the greatest. For, as an explanation, how does this happen? I will be merciful towards their iniquities. I will remember their sins no more. Zero. No more remembrance of our sins. Joshua, helpless, incapable of cleansing his own self and purification, and the angel of the Lord sovereignly commands his attending angels to remove the filthy garments from the high priest. It is clearly God's work without help from man. It's through Christ alone. May Christ be all and I be something? I be nothing. He just sang that song. Hopefully you thought about that as you're saying, and I be nothing. May Christ be all. And he orders the polluted garments to be removed. And he puts on what the commentator says, a clothing with festive apparel. reinstated into the priestly office so that he could represent the people in a proper kind of way. He is the priest who has made us priests. Revelation chapter 5. Nine, I'll keep it as context. And they sang a new song saying, worthy are you to take the scroll and open up its seal. For you were slain and by your blood as our priest you ransomed people for God from every tribe, language, and people, and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests. to our God, and they shall reign on the earth." We're priests! You know, there's this idea of the priesthood of the believers, which means we have freedom and access to the very throne of God, where we will not be accused by Satan like Joshua was, and we can go because of the mercy and grace that has been poured onto us through the blood shed by Jesus Christ. Joshua was engaged in his priestly functions in the temple. He was the object of accusations, but the angel of the Lord stepped in. And that's Jesus. Jesus steps in to our life. As I was preparing for this message and to think about it, I started last Monday. I went home and That Monday morning, I thought, you know what, I'm gonna just start studying for this week. And I started reading about Jesus and his high priestly work. And I started thinking, what better passage to go to talk about a high priest than Zechariah chapter three. And so I've been studying it through the week. And then, I don't know about you, I don't know if any of you have ever listened to this podcast from Sinclair Ferguson. It's called Unseen Things. Anybody ever look at it? Have you ever listened to it? That's okay, because you're going to hear about it today. He spoke about this particular passage. I was like, no way, not today. It was on Friday. And it was so good. I'm going to share with you some of the things he said. I'm going to share with you some of the things he says. The one thing that God promises to forget in his people is what? What's the one thing God promises to forget? Our sins. for iniquity, he has blotted it out with the blood of his son. St. Clair says, I'm very tempted to remind you that these past few days we've been thinking about things we tend to forget. That's what all week was, things we tend to forget about the Lord. But I think it's a good idea to round out the week by thinking about something that we actually need to forget. Yesterday we were thinking about remembering God's covenant with us because he remembers that covenant with us. We're talking about the new covenant and he promises that he will never forget it. God will never forget his covenant just like the nation of Israel had forgotten their covenant. We have that tendency to forget the covenant. He actually promises in his covenant, in the New Covenant, that there's something he will forget. Willingly forget. You remember the promise of the New Covenant made in Jeremiah 31 and cited in the New Testament, Hebrews chapter 8, which was our reading today. and I will remember their sins no more. And then actually in Isaiah 43, 25, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake and I will not remember your sins. Isaiah gets into the act. This is not new news. This is good news. that God is the one who will not remember our sins. You can think about it this way. The only thing that God says He will forget is your sins. He has blotted them out with the blood of His Son, Jesus Christ, and He chose not to bring them to mind. He forgets in the sense that He chooses not to remember them. It's not like, you know, I think I'm forgetting things. Or, I'm really confused on this. Several months ago, my dad, when he was living, when he was able to communicate with us, probably in the summer of last year, I happened to be over at their apartment and I think he was sitting at the table and he said, I'm confused. I'm not remembering things. And I said to him, Dad, are you a boy or a girl? He said, I'm a boy. And I said, then you're not confused. You remember exactly who you are. You know, I said that kind of tongue in cheek based on what's going on in the world today, everything, and he understood what I meant. And so, He understood exactly who he was. The point is, we have that tendency to start losing things and forgetting things. God doesn't forget anything. He chooses to forget things. And I'm glad he chooses to forget and not remember our sins. And it's not because we still have them, but they're covered. Our sins have been covered by the blood of Christ. And that's what St. Clair says. You can think about it this way. The only thing that God says He forgets is your sins. He has blotted them out with the blood of His Son, Jesus Christ. That's a very important promise to remember because some of us, and I suspect more of us, may be prepared to admit, certainly in public, not in public, many of us are haunted by the memories of our past sins. We're haunted because we remember who we were. Do you remember who you were before you knew Christ? Do you remember the sin in your life before you knew Christ? Hopefully it's not there still. Hopefully your sins have been covered by Christ. He says many of us are haunted by the memory of our past sins. Remember how that was of King David, and he explains this about a time when King David, he wrote, he wrote, you remember that his sins were ever before him? and obviously he could be paralyzed by the memory of them? Perhaps there were days when he didn't reflect and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, his memory of sins were like a fiery dart in his mind and paralyzed his sense of fellowship with God. Our past sins have that tendency to come and just penetrate in us. And we think about, oh, I'm filthy. I've got dirty goggles on. He goes on to say, so we need to know day by day that his sins, that's David, and our sins were blotted out and that the Lord remembered them no more. And he gave an illustration, and I thought I'd share it with you. In the United Kingdom, people sometimes invest in what is usually called gilts. G-I-L-T-S. You've seen gilts. Actually, if you have a Bible, some of you may even have a Bible, where the edge of that Bible is gold-covered, that's called gilting. It's a stain that they put on, and it's either gold or silver, and then they highlight it with a little bit of red or whatever, and it's on the edge! He says that gilt-edged securities are very high-grade government-issued stock. If you've understood that, anything about the stock market, there are things called gilt-edged securities. And I think they're called that because originally the paper in which they were printed was actually gilt-edged, like some of the old Bibles. And I sometimes think that the devil, who is described as the accuser of the brethren, a la Zechariah chapter three, I think the devil is also an investor in gilt-edged stock, G-U-I-L-T. Not G-I-L-T, G-U-I-L-T. When he tempts us to sin, it says, eh, that's not a big deal. It's not a big deal. But when we fail and fall, He, that is Satan, capitalizes on our sin. He emphasizes our guilt. He comes to us and almost seems to screw into us a deep incapacity. John Calvin said once, it drives us to despair, our sin. We can be paralyzed with the shame. Joshua, standing before the angel of the Lord in the court, the divine courthouse, standing there filthy, dirty, shamed. There we are before God, clothed in filthy garments, and Satan is standing at our side, accusing us. It's then we need to remember what happens next. What happened next? Do you remember what happened next? What did the angel lord do? What did he do? Take them off. Take those garments off. He's not suitable to be here. Put on clean garments. And then Zechariah says, you need to put a turban on too. Finish them, clean them up all the way from foot to head. And they do. And he becomes clean and he's welcomed before the very throne of God. because his sins have been covered by Christ, by the angel Lord, by God. Behold, I have taken away your iniquity from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments. What a picture that is of the believer clothed in the filthy garments of sin. But now through Jesus Christ, in whom Joshua is the image of, having the iniquity removed from the clothing, our sins removed, through Jesus Christ clothed in pure vestments from head to toe. Sinclair says, I wonder if you can see yourself standing before the throne of God and hearing God say, I don't see any sin. I see only purity. I've covered your sin with the blood of Christ. I've clothed you with Christ's righteousness. Does God really forget your sin? Does God really forget your sin? Yes, if we trust Him. It all goes back to faith. It all goes back to our faith in trusting Him. Now, it's not our faith that caused us to sin. Our faith is a response to the work of God in our life, transforming us and taking away our sin, removing our iniquity, and we respond by faith in trust and love and dependence and loyalty to Him. Yes indeed, he tells us, for he removes our sin as far as, how far? How far? East to the west. How far is that? How far is the east to the west? It just goes on and on and on and on. No matter where you're at on that plane, you just keep going on and around and around. How far is the east? I don't know, it just keeps going on and on. Pole to pole, there's a point. But not east to west. The emphasis is on the fact that our sins are gone forever. So perhaps the thing we need to remember most of all is the one thing the Lord tells us he remembers no more. Let's say that again. Perhaps the thing we need to remember most of all is the one thing the Lord tells us he remembers no more. There's nothing more glorious than to be living a paralysis-free Christian life in the presence of our Heavenly Father, knowing that your sins are covered. Your sins are covered. You wear the righteousness of Christ. He says, I remember your sins no more. And at the end of it he says, I do hope you know the peace that that brings. Tied right into what Jack has said this morning. He let us out. I do hope you know the shalom that that brings. Free from sin. Forgiven by the grace of God and mercy. By his love. by His sovereign will, and by His sovereign grace. Trust in Him. Believe in Him. He is our priest. He is our High King. And if we were to go to chapter 6, we would see a continuation of this on, where the High Priest, Joshua, and Zerubbabel, who was the king at the time, and the vision tells him that those two offices are going to be merged into one. The king. the priest and the prophet all together as one. Three offices in one person from the three persons in one God. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our Messiah, our God and King, our High Priest who tells us Follow Him all the days of your life because your sins are gone. Let's pray. Lord, I'm so thankful that our sins have been forgiven, that we have received mercy, that we have received Your grace. Lord, as we close this service, as we think about it, Lord, we think of this song that we're going to sing. His mercy is more. Our sins, they are many. His mercy is more. As we sing these words, may they come from our hearts as a response to the greatness of your mercy to us and the remembrance of who we were, and the fact that our sins are covered, and we are no longer guilty, and we can no longer be accused, and we are no longer to go back to those, but just to keep pressing on and looking to you, day in and day out, remembering who you are, looking to your word, being encouraged by the truth that you presented to us, knowing that you are our God from beginning to end, on into eternity forever and ever and ever, and that our sins are gone. Thank you, Lord, for the song of grace sent to our hearts and our minds. The words that come from our lips, may they reflect the truth of who you are. Each and every day as we love you and serve you with joy and gladness as a response to the fact that our sins are no longer before your throne. where they've been covered by Christ. Lord, we ask that you would speak to us and that your grace would be poured out into our lives and that we would live our lives every day, every moment for you, for your sake and for your glory, for our good. In Christ's name we pray, amen. Just stand with me as we sing His mercy. No, we remember no wrongs we have done On this shall knowing becomes not their sum Thrown into a sea without bottom or shore Our sins they are many, His mercy is more! Praise the Lord! His mercy is more! stronger than he Stronger than What's the cost? If it should be the death we could never afford Our sins, they are many, His mercy is more Praise the Lord! His mercy is more! Oh Oh