Let us open our Bibles this New Year's Eve to the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah and read chapter 14, the first nine verses. Jeremiah chapter 14, the first nine verses. The word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah concerning the dearth. Judah mourneth and the gates thereof languish. They are black unto the ground, and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up. And their nobles have sent their little ones to the waters. They came to the pits and found no water. They returned with their vessels empty. They were ashamed and confounded and covered their heads. Because the ground is chapped, for there was no rain in the earth, the plowmen were ashamed they covered their heads. Yea, the hind also calved in the field and forsook it because there was no grass. And the wild asses did stand in the high places. They snuffed up the wind like dragons. Their eyes did fail because there was no grass. O Lord, though our iniquities testify against us, do thou it for thy name's sake for our backslidings are many, we have sinned against thee. Oh, the hope of Israel, the Savior thereof in time of trouble, why shouldst thou be as a stranger in the land and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night? Why shouldst thou be as a man astonied, as a mighty man that cannot save? Yet thou, O Lord, art in the midst of us, and we are called by thy name, leave us not. The text for this New Year's Eve service is taken from this chapter, Jeremiah 14, the verses seven to nine. Let me read especially verse eight. Oh, the hope of Israel, the savior thereof in time of trouble. Why shouldest thou be as a stranger in the land? and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night. Dear congregation, how do you get to know someone? How do you turn a stranger into a friend? I realize that we teach our children not to talk to strangers and to keep their distance from strangers, But there are times when, because of who they are or what they've done, we want to get to know a stranger. We want to learn from them. We want to meet them. Now, we might all be different in how we interact with strangers. Some of us might engage strangers. Others of us might distance ourselves from strangers, but what are we to do if that stranger is the Lord? What if we don't know Him? Or what should we do if we have come to know Him, but the relationship with Him is not what it once was, and we have become more estranged from Him? Do you want it to continue that way? And then on this last day of the year 2018, our text tells us what to do if the Lord is a stranger. That's what you can write over the sermon, what to do if the Lord is a stranger. And then we're taught to confess our sin, first of all, to pray for grace, secondly, and to confide in his faithfulness, thirdly. if the Lord is a stranger. First of all, we are to confess our sin. Secondly, to pray for grace and thoroughly to confide in his faithfulness. In Jeremiah 14, dear congregation, adversity has come upon the people of Judah and we see the prophet Jeremiah turning to the Lord in prayer. Yes, adversity has come upon them, great adversity throughout the land in the form of a dearth, a drought, a bad drought, a prolonged drought, and it's vividly described in the opening six verses with the children of nobles going to the wells to draw water, but they return with their buckets empty and their faces blushing. The springs have dried up, the wells are empty, and the ground is parched and cracked and the cattle is drying and is dying and starving, and there's no grass. And when we read this, this isn't just some information that tells us that there was a famine in the land of Judah, but it's telling us that the judgment of God was upon Judah. After all, the Lord had made a covenant with Israel, and He had given covenant promises that if they serve Him, He will bless them. And if they don't, He'll punish them and make the heavens like brass. And now what do God's people do? Feeling the judgment of God, they turn to pray. And what's the trouble? It's this, that the Lord has become a stranger to them, a stranger to His own people. And that's a dreadful feeling, you understand, to become a stranger in your own country, You don't recognize where you once lived, or to become a stranger in your own home. Maybe you felt that before. Maybe because of some trouble in your family, or trouble in your home, you're ignored. And you're pushed aside, and family members don't greet you, and don't seem to value you, and don't seem to recognize you, and you become a stranger in your own home. Now Jeremiah realizes that's what the Lord has become, a stranger. And Jeremiah sees the Lord about to turn away from his people. And when this chapter describes it, this is a real thing. Not only that people can be estranged from each other, and hostile toward each other, parents estranged from children, children from parents, friends estranged from each other, but we can be estranged from God, our Maker. Yes, by nature that's how it is with all of us, because we've turned away from Him in the fall in sin, and we've become estranged from God. That's what Psalm 58 says of us by nature. The wicked are estranged from the womb. It's what God said of Israel in Ezekiel 14 verse 5. They are all estranged from Me through their idols. Or as Paul says, we have been alienated from the life of God. And I wonder if you've ever felt that this past year. Maybe for the first time. I don't know Him. I don't know the Lord. Estranged from your Creator and Lord because of your sin and evil. And then the next question can be, can that be changed? And then the Bible tells us, yes, because he's the revealing God. And he seeks a sinful people in order to be in fellowship with them, like he was with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. And Abram knew the Lord in a special way and could call him a friend. Yes, the Lord comes to reveal Himself and seeks a relationship in order to have a saving bond with sinners like you and me, so that we can say on our way to eternity, in the words of Psalm 48, this God is not just the God, but this God is our God. He will be our guide even unto death. A relationship can be had with the Lord. Have you ever sought that? Not just to be religious, but a relationship with Him. And that relationship can grow, that relationship can flourish with him, but it can also regress, and that relationship can also decline. Job felt that. For instance, in Job 29 verse 3, we hear his complaint, Oh, that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me, when His candle shined upon my head, and when by His light I walked. Or as the Lord says of the church in Ephesus in Revelation 2, when he has something against them because they had left their first love. That's a real thing for the believer. Maybe you felt that this past year, dear child of God. With William Cooper, who put it, a poet who suffered with depression, struggled with great darkness, what was his great desire? He puts it in the words of that hymn, Oh, for a closer walk with God. And he says in that poem, where is the blessedness I knew when first I saw the Lord? Where is the soul-refreshing view of Jesus and his word? What peaceful hours I once enjoyed, how sweet their memory still, but they have left an aching void the world can never fill. Return, oh holy dove, return. Is that maybe something that you're feeling? at the end of this year, that there has come a distance. Maybe you felt it for the first time, or maybe you've experienced it for some time, a distance between you and the Lord. And you might be asking, where is the blessedness that I once knew? Or maybe you have to be honest and say, I've never really known it, but I wish I did. And what should we do in that condition? Well then, Jeremiah shows us the way. Then we need to have dealings with the Lord. We need to ask, what's the cause of this strain and alienation in the relationship? What's the reason for this separation? Is it him or is it me? Is it the Lord's fault that He has become a stranger to us? Or is it our fault? And Jeremiah says, it's our fault. And he begins to make confession. Yes, that's what we need. We need dealings with the Lord. And why not tonight? Why not tonight? Why not here? Why not with Jeremiah? As he says in verse 7, O Lord, though our iniquities testify against us, do Thou it for Thy name's sake. For our backslidings are many, we have sinned against thee." And then we hear Jeremiah's confession. And then it's a Godward confession because he is, yes, before God. He's addressed his confession to God. He's not talking to himself. He's not just talking to a therapist. He's talking to the Lord. It's a God word confession and it's a communal confession. He doesn't say the people of Judah by and large have left thee and have forsaken thee. No, he includes himself. We have our backslidings, our iniquities. We have sinned against thee. But the third thing you can say about this confession, not only it's a God word confession and it's a communal confession, but it's an honest confession. Yes, it's our fault. It's because of our sin. And then there's this threefold confession of sin. Let's look at that. You may want to have your Bible open to follow along, to see the words before you. Verse 7, our iniquities testify against us, he says, first of all. Our iniquities. The prophet here uses a word that paints quite the picture. It's a picture of something that's twisted. and crooked. It's the picture of a car that one day came off the lot and it was in fine and perfect condition, but something happened in which there was an accident. The car is total loss. The metal is all twisted. And Jeremiah is saying, that's us. Our hearts are twisted and dark places and by our sin we live crooked and twisted lives. Have you never felt that? Do you not feel that this past year, your conscience spoke to you and said, that wasn't right. That was wrong what you did. That was all wrong. And you may be trying to smooth it out in your own twisted way, but we can't untwist our hearts and our lives. We can only confess it and say, Lord, it's true, our iniquities at the end of this year, as young people, as boys and girls, as older ones, It testifies against us. Secondly, he says, our backslidings are many. Backsliding. That is to turn away from the Lord. To turn away from His Word. To turn away from His ways. It's a real spiritual disease. No, it's not what God's people would have expected at the time when His love was first poured out into their hearts. left to ourselves, we're prone to halt and stumble, we're prone to leave the God we love. And Hosea 11 verse 7, we're bent on backsliding from the Lord. And it may be, let's be honest tonight, maybe you've neglected secret prayer. Prayer used to be a delight to you, but it's lost its life. Dear child of God, and that spreads to other means of grace, our Bible reading, our church going, maybe we don't neglect it, but our heart isn't in it as it should be, and maybe then a double life begins to manifest itself with worldliness, and self-examination becomes less, and our love wanes, our love for the Lord wanes, our love for other wanes. Have you seen that? Our backslidings are many. And the Hebrew word used for backsliding is the word defector. Traitor. It's what people do who betray a friend. It's what people do who pretend to belong to one country when in fact you're actually working for the enemy country. Have you seen that? That you've been a traitor. unfaithful to the Lord. And we have to say with Jeremiah, our backslidings are many. And thirdly, we've sinned against thee. When Jeremiah uses this word, sin, young people, he takes us to a target range where there's target practice. And he shows someone shooting at the target and he misses completely. He misses the target completely by a mile, we would say. He's falling short, and that's what we've done. We've fallen short of the glory of God. Maybe we haven't even tried to aim for the glory of God, but even if we have tried, we still haven't lived for God's glory, and that would explain why He would leave us, and why He would distance Himself from us, and why He would become a stranger, and just pass by. And is that a grief to us at the end of this year, friends? Does this pain us? It pains me that we have reason to confess our sins to the Lord, not excuse our sin, not to say, well, at least we were a little better than others. No, not justifying ourselves, not shrugging it off, but acknowledging it to the Lord and asking, oh, for a closer walk with Thee, a calm and heavenly frame. O return, O holy dove, return, sweet messenger of rest. I hate the sins that made thee mourn and drove thee from my breast. If the Lord's a stranger to you, if you don't know Him, I mean, you don't really know Him, shall we not begin by confessing our sins and saying, Lord, that's us. That's me. We sinned against thee. Our backslidings are many, and our iniquities testify against us. But he's not just confessing. No, he also, we find him praying. We find him not only confessing things, but asking for things. He's confessing sin, but he's praying for grace. That's our second point. He's praying for grace. And if you have your Bible open, I wonder if you caught his prayers, his two petitions. They're very short petitions. You might actually even miss them if you're not looking carefully. In verse 7, it's one word in the original. Do. That's really all that it asks in verse 7. Do. Though our iniquities testify against us, do. And then our authorized version adds in italics, thou it. That's the first petition. It's a two-letter word in English. Do. He's not specific of what he's wanting. the Lord to do. But he's asking God to do something. It's a request for God to act. It's a request for God to perform, to do something. Maybe it's a prayer that the Lord will give repentance. That's something to ask for. Maybe it's a prayer that the Lord would send rain upon the dry and cracked land. Maybe it's a prayer that the Lord would deliver But it's clear whatever he's asking for, Jeremiah realizes he can't give it himself. He can't effect it himself. He's asking God to do for them what they can't do for themselves. And isn't that a fitting prayer for you and me? Sometimes we don't even know what to ask for. And we don't even know how to express our needs and what we should be praying for. But Lord do. Maybe it's repentance we need. Maybe it's help we need. Maybe it's instruction we need. But that he would grant us what we need. That he would do for us what we can't do for ourselves. And then there's the second petition at the end of this text. Another short request. It's the last three words of verse nine. Maybe you see it in front of you. Leave us not. He's asking the Lord not to forsake them. He's asking the Lord not to cast them off. He's asking the Lord not to put them aside. For what if He would abandon them? What if He would forsake them? What if He would not reveal Himself but would remain a stranger to them and pass by and leave them? Then they would go alone through life and not have a guide. and how many in this world are not exactly in that predicament. They go alone through life, the joys and the sorrows, the adversity and the prosperity, and they don't have the Lord with them. And if you don't have the Lord with them, no matter if you have crowds of people around you at times, you're alone in this world. So if the Lord were to leave them, yes, then they would have no guide. I mean, remember when the people of Israel wandered through the wilderness? At least they had a guide in the Lord. The pillar of cloud by day, the pillar of fire by night. The Lord was their guide. He promised to lead them. But if the Lord were now to leave them and distance himself from them, then we would be without a faithful guide going into the new year. Then he would not hold us by his right hand. then He wouldn't guide us with His counsel and afterward receive us to glory. If He were to leave us, then how would we live? Because we depend on the Lord not only to be our guide, we depend on Him for provisions. If He would leave us, how then would He supply all our need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus? If He were to leave us, how would He give us food, crumbs from Master's table, spiritually and physically? And if He were to leave us, how would we then experience His protection? Because we depend on the Lord to be our protector, to be our defender, just like the people of Judah. We depend on Him to be our shield and buckler. But if He leaves us, then we'll be open to all kinds of dangers. If He leaves us, we'll be without a guide, without provisions, we'll be without protection, We'll be without forgiveness. Yeah, how would we be forgiven? We need the Lord in our midst. Judah needed the Lord in their midst in order to forgive their sins and to remember them no more. But what if He's not there to forgive? And what if He's not there to show the way of forgiveness? And if He leaves, how will we experience rest? Exodus 33 verse 14, the Lord said, My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest. If He removes His presence, then Judah will not experience any rest. If the Lord leaves Judah, if the Lord leaves us, then what comfort do we have? For His presence ensures comfort in trials. When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee. Isaiah 43. Yes, His presence ensures comfort, but if He forsakes them, how will they be comforted? How will He reveal Himself to them? How will He teach them? If He leaves them, if He leaves us, what future do we have? Then Hebrews 10 verse 27 says, Then can only await a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries. And Judah is meant to feel the need of God's abiding presence, of His continued presence. And don't we need to feel that too? Don't we feel that even? As we're on the threshold of a new year, we're about to leave one year and enter into another year. Our sins are many. Our iniquities testify against us. Our backslidings are many. We don't want the Lord to leave us. We want Him to stay with us. We don't want to go alone through life. We need Him as a faithful companion. We need Him as a faithful guide. We need His grace. We need His provisions. We need rest. We need a future. And it's only with Him and Him holding our hands and Him being with us. Is this your prayer? Have your eyes been opened to your need by the uncovering work of the Holy Spirit, that the Lord would not be a stranger to us, but that he would stay with us and reveal himself to us and speak to us and protect us? But what hope do we have? I mean, our backslidings are many, our iniquities too, our sins. What hope do we have that He will not leave us? Do we hope in who we are? Do we hope that next year we'll do better? We'll try harder? Do we hope that we will lead a more consistent life? Faithful? That's not my hope. It isn't any real hope. In fact, if it's right, we lose all hope from our side. Our hope must be in the Lord. And we hear that in Jeremiah's prayer. We hear His address in prayer yet and the arguments in prayer. His address in prayer is to the Lord. Do you see how He is called, though, in verse 8? Oh, the hope of Israel, the Savior thereof in time of trouble. He has to be our hope. The hope of Israel. It's one of the names that he has. In Joel 3, verse 16, he's called the hope of his people. According to Romans 15, verse 13, he's called the God of hope. And now when we hear of hope, we think of it as something that is a faint thing. Something like wishing, boys and girls, young people, and your wishes, well, they may come true or they may not come true. Maybe you're hoping for lots of snow this winter. Or maybe you're hoping for warmer weather. But whatever your wishes may be or hopes may be, there's no guarantee. But that's not what the Bible means with hope. When the Bible speaks of hope, then it's something that is a reason for a certain expectation and confidence. Yes, a guarantee because of His promises. And we may plead His promises, even if everything else is dark, even if everything is hopeless, because no matter what happens in our world, in our circumstances, in our trials, He is still the God of hope. There's with Him ground for hope. There's reason for hope, because His Word gives hope. That's why the psalmist can say in Psalm 130, Hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is mercy and plenty is redemption. How else would Israel have been delivered from Egypt? There they were, pining away in their bondage. But the Lord was the hope of His people. Have we found the Lord to be a God of hope? The hope of a needy people who have no hope of themselves, whose sins testify against them, who deserve... God would leave us, but He gives hope in the midst of our dismal circumstances. You don't want him to be a stranger in your life then, do you? You don't want him to stay just for a night, do you? If he is the hope of Israel, you want the hope of Israel to be with you every moment of your life, every time, every day, every hour. Secondly, the address in prayer is not only that he is the hope of Israel, but He's the Savior in time of trouble. That's why you want Him with you too, don't you? Because He's the Savior in the time of trouble. That's who He is. That's what He is. That's why He delivered Israel out of Egypt. He saves His people in distress. He's the Savior God who saves from the greatest evil, brings to the highest good. And how many times do we not get ourselves and we need a fresh deliverance, and we need to be rescued. When we see the guilt of our sin, we need a Savior. When we see the power of sin in our life, and we wonder, who can deliver me from this power of sin in my life? Or we see a son or a daughter struggling with sin, or struggling with depression. Don't we want this Savior? That the one who was born in Bethlehem, and the angels could announce it to the shepherds, Unto you is born this day the city of David, a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. You don't want Him to be a stranger to you? Just passing by for a night, you want Him to stay? That you pray, don't leave us. But now what arguments can you bring? What arguments? Listen to Jeremiah, verse 8b and 9a. Why shouldst thou be as a stranger in the land and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night? Why shouldst thou be as a man astonied, as a mighty man that cannot save? And it seems that Jeremiah's argument here is a twofold argument, asking God if he is unwilling to act and asking God if he's unable to act. He's asking if God is unwilling to act like a stranger in the land who appear to have no relationships with him and as a stranger might not show any concern. A relative shows concern. A family member, if it's right, shows concern. A stranger who's just passing through just shrugs his shoulders and says, well, I'm not staying here anyways. It's not my problem. But you don't want him to be a stranger in the land, a wayfaring man, a traveler who just stays for a night, who wasn't planning to stay, who was going to leave again and leave them in their distress with their hopelessness and their difficulty. Will he remain a stranger who stays just for one night, unwilling to help? And then the argument of asking God If he's unable to help, unable to act, verse 9a, why shouldst thou be as a man astonied, as a mighty man that cannot save? Art thou unable to act like a man astonished, bewildered, surprised, shocked, dismayed? Some of us are like that. We come across trials, difficulties, and we just don't know what to do. We're completely at a loss. We're unable to think, we're unable to act, we're unable to help. Is that how the Lord is? Is he unable to act? Does he have limited powers? I mean, we do. But he doesn't. That's how Jeremiah is pleading. That's the arguments that he's bringing in prayer. And is that not how we should pray, too, in our troubling circumstances? And we don't know what to do when we think of our families, when we think of our needs, when we think of the congregation, when we think of our world. Why shouldst thou be a stranger in the land, Lord? Leave us not. Don't be a stranger to us in our homes. Don't be as a wayfaring man that stays only for a night But abide with us, Lord. Reveal thyself, Lord. Shall we not pray that? Whoever you may be, however young or old you may be, as we stand on the threshold of a new year, let's pray with Jeremiah. Do, and don't leave us. Act for us. and don't leave us. But now, do we have any hope and expectation? Do we have any confidence? Yes, and that's our third point. Not only do we see this confession of our sin and this praying for grace, we also hear His confidence in God's faithfulness, our third point. It's verse 9b. We hear Jeremiah's confidence. Yet thou, O Lord, art in the midst of us, and we are called by thy name. That's his confidence. And when he says thou art in the midst of us, is he then meaning that he believes in the omnipresence of God? No doubt Jeremiah believes in the doctrine of God's omnipresence, that He is everywhere present in a general sense. But I don't believe that Jeremiah means the Lord is present in a general sense. I believe Jeremiah means the Lord is present with His people in a special sense. He's present still with His Word. He's present still with His promises. He's present still with His Spirit who's striving with them. He hasn't taken away His candlestick out of their midst. And He's speaking to them. He's speaking to them in providence. He's speaking to them in the gospel. He's speaking to them by His Word. And He has pledged to be their God. We're called by Thy name, He says. His name is on them. He's made a covenant with them, a covenant with sinners like them and us. And He has all power in heaven and on earth. And He's able to save, and He's willing to save, and He's promised to save. No, Jeremiah is not presumptive and says, well, then everything will turn out okay. That's how some people think, and that's how some people take the Scriptures, but not Jeremiah. And no, that's why he's turned to the Lord in prayer. but he ends in confiding in Him. He wants the Lord to abide with them, and he can think of no other reason than God's own signature that says, I will do it because I've promised. Do we want that too? that the Lord would not remain a stranger, that the distance would be bridged, that He would come over and help us, that He wouldn't just be a stranger who stays for a night. Don't we want Him to be one who comes and takes up His abode and stays and works and meets and speaks and reveals himself who stays to save as the hope of Israel and the Savior in the time of trouble. Don't we wish for that? Can we pray for that? Lord, I don't know Thee maybe. Maybe that's what You have to say. But Lord, I want to know Thee. I need to know Thee. Or maybe, Lord, I have become estranged by my own sin and I've been distracted. But Lord, don't stay a stranger. Come and save. But how is that possible? Not because of us. but only because of Him who came into this world, Jesus. I know He remained a stranger to many. That's a reality when we read the Gospels. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. They closed the door. They left Him outside. He went, he grew up in Nazareth, but when he came and revealed himself to the people he had grown up with, he didn't stay. And he could do no miracle among them because of their unbelief, and he left. And he withdrew himself from Capernaum because they wanted miracles, but not mercy. They wanted riches, but not repentance. They wanted food from him, but not faith in him. And he remained a stranger and a wayfaring man who had no place to lay his head. Oh, it's a wonder that he came even to be a stranger. I mean, if He passed through our country, that would be a great privilege, even if He stayed for one night, if He came into our sin-sick world just to stay for one night. And in that night, He was born in Bethlehem. And He came in a world that had no room for Him. And in that night, He went to suffer. and Golgotha rejected of men and acquainted with grief as a stranger, who was rejected even of his father, as if a stranger to his own father, bearing the sins of a people like you and me, so that sinners like you and me might not stay strangers to God and to grace, but might be welcomed as citizens in heaven, and might belong to his kingdom, and might know him in saving way. I remember he met the Emmaus travelers on Resurrection Day. They were troubled. They were distressed. He asked them, why? And then they answered him, art thou the only stranger in Jerusalem? But they kept listening to him. And as they kept listening to him, their hearts began to burn with him. And then they prayed what Jeremiah prayed hereto. Lord, abide with us. Fast falls the even tide. The darkness deepens. Lord, with us abide. When other helpers fail and comforts flee, Help of the helpless, oh abide with me. And he came into those Emmaus travelers and he showed himself and they recognized him. And he was no stranger to them after all, but he was their Savior and he was their Lord who answers the prayer of his needy people. And he says, I will come and sup with you. I will come and reveal myself to you. And though the darkness in our lives may be great and your troubles may be many, maybe you sit here with heavy hearts, I may tell you that He is Emmanuel and He has said, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. That's how I want to go into the new year. How about you? With this prayer, leave us not. And His promise, I will never leave nor forsake. Amen. Let us give thanks and pray. Most gracious Lord, we would bow our knees next to Jeremiah, confessing our sin. They are many. And we can understand why Thou wouldst leave us and forsake us. But since Thou art the hope of Israel and the Savior of Thy people, wilt Thou do for us what we can do for ourselves? And wilt Thou not leave us, but reveal Thyself? And instead of being a stranger, Be that friend that sticketh closer than a brother who reveals himself day in and day out. Although take reasons out of thyself to so grant this as we leave 2018 and enter into a new year. And maybe if we sit here, we may have to say, Lord, I need Thee more than I can imagine and than I even understand. But make it so, Lord, that we would come to know Thee from the youngest to the oldest. There's not one for whom we would ask that Thou wouldst remain a stranger to them, but that Thou wouldst come to reveal Thyself to young and old so that they may say, I once was a stranger to grace and to God. I knew not my danger and felt not my load. And Jehovah said, Kenu, was nothing to me. But when free grace awoke, that thou would show thyself as the Jehovah said, Kenu, whom my Savior must be, and Jehovah said, Kenu, who is all things to me, as the one who we need to stay with us in life and in death, holding us by thy right hand, guiding us with thy counsel. and afterward receiving to glory and that to thy great praise and the unending song of thy church unto him that loved us and washed us in his blood. And as the shepherd who goes before thy sheep in all eternity, never any distance to come in between anymore. Make us homesick for that day. Spare us, not so that we would continue to reject Thee, but spare us so that we may know Thee, serve Thee, love Thee, and follow Thee, out of free and sovereign grace, for Jesus' sake. Amen.