2 Corinthians chapter number 1. I said chapter 2 because I'm looking at chapter 1. We're going to go to the end of chapter 1. Let's begin in verse, if you will, in verse number 20. We'll read down through the end of the chapter here. We're going to pick on verse number 22 today and ask for God to help us. So, for all the promises of God are in him, yea, and in him, amen. and unto the glory of God by us. So the context here is talking about the promises of God are all yea and none of them nay. And you can go back and read that passage. It's a wonderful, it's a great chapter. Now he which establisheth us with you in Christ and hath anointed us is God. So there we have the subject of the next verse is our text, who. So who is he talking about? He's talking about God. God hath or who hath also sealed us and given the earnest of the spirit in our hearts, okay? And then moreover I call God for record upon my soul that to spare you I came not as yet unto Corinth. So he's talking about he had had a desire to go there, but he even said he wanted to go there, was expected and then could not go. And then he's explaining that in this second epistle. In verse 24, not for that we have dominion over your faith, but are helpers of your joy by faith you stand. And so even Paul said, look, I don't control the heart of the individual Christians. He said, I don't have dominion over your faith. Why am I here? To help you be happy. That's literally the truth. My job, wouldn't you like to have that kind of job? My job is the happy guy. Really, you say, Pastor, you don't look very happy sometimes when you're preaching. Well, because what is going to bring you joy? And that is when we bring your life into obedience with Jesus Christ. That's going to bring joy. And that's what's talked about here. That is in our text. Our text we're going to take and talk about this idea of being sealed for eternity, sealed for eternity in verse number 22. And let's have a word of prayer and we'll ask for God's help. Father, I thank you for the blessing of being able to come today to preach, praying for your spirit to guide and direct in this message. Use it in our lives in Jesus' name, amen. All right, so the question has come up at times, what does it mean to be sealed? Are you sealed for eternity? There's an idea out there that being married in a temple makes you sealed. It's not in the Bible. But do you have to go to a temple to be sealed in the way, in the context that the Lord speaks about here? No, there's no real physical temple, but if you'll go back to the first Corinthians and go to chapter three, first Corinthians chapter, just back up a few pages in your Bible. In first Corinthians chapter three, Verse number 16, like we have John 3.16, this is 1 Corinthians 3.16. He says, know ye not that ye are the temple of God? Okay, and he goes on to talk about this and that the Spirit of Christ dwells in you. Look at chapter 6 in verse number 19. What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost? which is in you which you have of God, and you are not your own. You are bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and your spirit, which are God's. So do you have to go to a temple to be sealed? Only in that sense that your body becomes the temple. So we don't have temples today in the New Testament. We live in the church age. And you say, Pastor, then what do you call the building? Well, the word church came from a word that meant house of the Lord. Okay? In the Greek, it would be the word kurios, is the word Lord. And they had this word that they made it a religious word. But when you see the word church in the New Testament, it's from a Greek word called ekklesia, which means a called out body of believers. So what is a church? It's not this brick and mortar. Now we're glad to have this because it provides a very safe and good environment to preach and have a meeting. What is the church? You are. It is the people that are members who have joined together in the fellowship of the believers. And the Christianity of the New Testament is not a place, it's a people. And Christianity is not a ritual, it's a relationship. And so under those kind of concepts, the New Testament gave no command for the building of a temple. And shortly after the New Testament was written and completed, most of it, At 70 AD, the temple that was in Jerusalem was completely destroyed by the armies of Rome. And when Titus, they overran the Temple Mount, just destroyed it. And there is a promise to rebuild the temple, but not for us. It's rebuilt in the time of the Antichrist and the resuming of the sacrifices and so forth. But for today, it was the temple. In this day is you, your heart is the temple. So should you have sin in the temple of God? You ever see people, like, they come together, or, you may not know this, I'll go someplace and somebody will cuss, and then another person will say, that's the preacher, you're not supposed to cuss in front of the preacher. So it's okay to cuss when I'm not around. Okay, I just was curious about that. It's okay if you, but it's kind of funny that way, like what would you do in the house of God that you would not do or vice versa? And I'm not talking about like there are, you know, you wouldn't have a picnic on the platform up here. But the point I'm making is that in purity, we should be the same everywhere because our bodies have become the temple of God. Wherever we are, we're bringing the Spirit of God with us. And we'll get to an important verse that talks about grieving the Holy Spirit of God. But He's there in your heart if you're saved. If you're not saved, He's not there yet. You say, but God has done some incredible things for me. Yeah, but don't mistake the mercy of God for salvation and sealing of a soul. There's a difference. God is merciful. So here's part of it, like the instance of prayer. God would hear the prayers of an unsaved person. You say, how do you know that? Well, go to Acts sometimes chapter number 10 and listen to the story of Cornelius. The Lord says even his giving was recognized by God. He said his alms and his prayers, he said it has ascended into heaven. In other words, God saw and really he saw the heart of Cornelius that he was truly seeking after God. And then God sent Peter. He said, told him at the time, Cornelius, go to this place and send down for Joppa for Peter to come. And Peter then had a vision, go with these guys, and they went up. And Cornelius is the first non-Jew to come to know Christ as his Savior in the New Testament. Very important passage because almost all of us are not Jews. that are here today, right? So we are, almost all of us are not Jews. And so we have really a gratitude for what happened in Acts chapter number 10, okay? But one of the significant things is he was praying, and he was even giving, and God saw that. Now the difference is, once you're saved, God has obligated himself by his promises, because he can't break his promises, and he's obligated himself that when one of his children, one of those that are saved or sealed, when you pray, God has obligated himself to answer, if we meet his conditions. Right? That's a complicated issue we can talk about sometime, and you're welcome to come and see me. We can talk about what does it take to get your prayers answered. But the difference is like this. The neighbor kids can come over the house, and I'll feed them, but I'm not obligated to feed them. My kids are there at my house, and I'm obligated to feed them. All right, and so God has obligated himself to hear the prayers of his people. So don't mistake the fact, say, well, God has heard, I prayed and God heard me, I must be saved. Listen, you're saved because God has saved you. You're not saved because you had a good experience, or because of religious things, or because even some one or two very good things that God has done for you, but you get saved because you meet God's conditions for salvation. And God says once you are, you're sealed for eternity. Sealing, what does it mean? Let's find out. Go back to 2 Corinthians 2, to our verse, who hath also sealed us and given the earnest of the Spirit, where? In our hearts. Again, it is not an outward, Christianity is not an outward religion. It's not one where you can come down here and I can like, I don't know, put a halo on your head or something and make you like zap you, like ooh, have a ceremony, right? or just call some kind of witness together like, we're going to just get together and do some kind of ceremony. Who decides what the ceremony looks like? I mean, we go out to the bush country and they're taking the blood of pigeons still and cutting off their heads and smearing it on your children's forehead because they have a fever. The witch doctor has all sorts of incantations. Who decides what has to be done to see a soul come to Jesus Christ? The answer to that is God did. Not the preacher. So it doesn't matter the format of the preacher or my decisions, it matters what the Bible says about salvation. And being sealed is a permanent issue. Things are not sealed and then unsealed and sealed and unsealed. This is sealed, as my title of the sermon said, sealed for eternity. Those things we want to have last for eternity, one of them is not these bodies. Right? And I'll be 50 this year. I was saying 50 next year, now I can say this year. I'll be 50 this year. I don't want this body to last. I don't want to be stuck in this body. I want God to give me a new body. And he promises that to us that are saved. Amen. We need that. These old bodies get old, all right? And they get hurting sometimes. And often, maybe every moment. Anyway, but you and I, we are, having something that is eternal, and that is what Jesus did individually to you the day you got saved. If you don't have a time in your life when you have been saved, that you know that you have met God's criteria for salvation, and you say, I prayed and asked the Lord to be my Savior, then you're not sealed for eternity. It's not a very complicated issue. The Bible doesn't make it complicated. I'm going to point out, we're going to go to a few other passages of Scripture because This word is only found about three or four times in the New Testament, and so it's gonna be easy to get a real complete view of what it means, but I'll start with saying our first point is the power for this security. There are people that believe that salvation is temporary. They think, well, you get saved, and then if you make a mistake, you sin again. I don't know what certain sins. The Bible doesn't tell us this, so he doesn't have a list. When somebody comes to Christ, he receives the righteousness of God upon his record. When God looks at us now, he's not looking at me, he's looking at Jesus' blood applied to the doorposts. It was never dependent upon my conduct because my conduct could never earn salvation. Nothing was good enough. And so because it's not depending on my conduct to get saved, it's not depending on my conduct to actually stay saved. Jesus came and gave me his righteousness, and his righteousness can never be tarnished. And so when I prayed and asked the Lord to save me, he gave me himself, and in doing so, he said, I'm sealing you for eternity, and I'm gonna give you something called the Holy Spirit, my presence in your very heart. And it's connected in several passage to this word being sealed for eternity. But what sins do you have to do to lose your salvation? Some people that believe that in Christianity, there are people, sincere people who believe that you can get saved and then you could lose your salvation. And then what happens? You have to get saved again. So then do you have to get baptized again? It's a real trouble. Because the Bible isn't clear that somebody, we don't have an example anywhere where somebody lost their salvation, then got their salvation, then lost their salvation, got their, and what sins, is there a list someplace in the Bible, there isn't, of these sins, if you do this, then you're gonna lose your salvation. No, it's not there. So is it little sins? Is it just, are we to believe like those that are following the ways of Arminian theology that mean the ways, the real, real, real followers of that that say, man, if you think a dirty thought or you have a proud heart, so you're saved in your devotions in the morning and by lunch you need to get saved again. Or do you have to do something kind of real bad to lose your salvation? And that's what some people have told me. Well, we're not afraid of losing our salvation for the little things. We're afraid of losing it for the big things. So we don't want to do the big things. Assuming that that's the only thing keeping them from doing those big things. In other words, charging somebody who believes in internal security by saying, well, you guys are just got, you got saved and you can do whatever you want. What's the real answer to that? You've heard it probably, people have said it to you. Well, those people, if you believe in eternal salvation, then that means you can get saved and do whatever you want. What's the real answer to that? I think you know. The answer is that's right. But when you get saved, God makes you want him and not sin. You say, are you perfect? Of course not. Of course not, but my heart doesn't want those things. And so the motivation of these people say the only thing keeping them from what drugs or alcohol or what they would consider very addictive types of sins is because if they do them, they're going to go to hell. Is that the only motivation out there? I will tell you this, I'm not going to go to hell, and it doesn't matter what I do, it is not based on my conduct, I got saved. I'm going to heaven when I die, and nothing in this world, or in my heart, and the Bible even describes it in the book of Romans, that things in heaven, or things in earth, or things under the earth, cannot separate me from the love that is in Christ Jesus. Nothing can now separate us. because I'm saved, you're saved. If you've been saved, you're eternally sealed. And your motivation for serving God and living a right kind of life is because Jesus lives inside. That's what, put that in your heart. So if you will, why don't we go to Ephesians chapter one, we're gonna find this word again. Ephesians chapter one, and you'll see in verse number 13 and 14, Ephesians, so it's first and second Corinthians, then Galatians and Ephesians. So we're only going over a few pages. But in verse number 13 of chapter one of Ephesians, In whom he also trusted, how many of you have been saved? And you know how you did that, you trusted in Christ. How did you trust in Christ? Because you heard the message of salvation. And that's what he says, in whom he trusted, in verse 13, after that you heard the word of truth, so you heard the gospel, then you trusted. The gospel of your salvation, in whom also after ye believed, look at all those time words, right? It's not hard to understand. I trusted after I heard. And after I trusted, what does he promise you? He says, in whom after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise. Look at the next verse. which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession unto the praise of his glory. So you go down to buy a house, and I know you understand what an earnest money is, but this is exactly the same thing that's meant. You go to buy a house and you say, if today you're going to have a price battle, people are bidding wars, and they accept your bid, and you say, but I'm going to put a down payment, meaning it doesn't matter if somebody comes and offers more money, I've put a down payment on it, that's mine, waiting for what? Waiting for the rest of the money to come over, right? And it is an earnest, they used to call that, sometimes they do today, an earnest payment. that this is a preparation, this is some identification that you have something, though you don't have everything. Right, you have some of the money, so you might put down 5% or 3% or whatever. Sometimes it's $10,000 on a house, just a dollar amount. And it's the earnest payment. And the Lord just told us that after you're saved, he said, I gave you the Holy Spirit to seal you. Where? Well, the other passage said in your heart. Right? It's in your heart. Who did this? Did we do this? So is salvation something like some, we go and purchase salvation? Like you purchased a loaf of bread, and before you get home, did you ever leave the groceries in the car? Do you forget? Oh, I forgot it. Hopefully not on a hot day and it was ice cream. Amen? And so, you know, but salvation's not like, you're not purchasing salvation. You are the purchased. That's what that verse says. Redemption means to purchase twice. And the passage here says, hey, I've put a down payment for what? What am I? Am I the one getting salvation? I'm going and I'm obtained salvation for myself. And if I obtain something and I'm holding it, it's gonna be depending on my possessing it. That can't be the power of the security of the believer is not wrapped up in our abilities or our conduct, it's wrapped up in the power of God. He's the one that has done this. Who has sealed us? God sealed us. Who gave the earnest? And what is being purchased? You are the object that's being purchased. Salvation is you as a soul lost on your way to hell. Jesus has already paid the price and you have accepted that price at salvation. And he says, now you're mine. And when you live that way and you know there's a permanence to it because of this, you understand that the reason you won't go and live like the devil is because I belong to Jesus. And there's a change in here that happened. Where you used to just like go to sin and you'd say, well, this is what I feel like doing. I don't have any conscience against it. Some people say it's wrong, but I'm having a good time. And the only thing you're concerned with, how can I have more fun? Then you get saved and you're sealed. And if you go out and sin, what happens? Man, it doesn't seem right. I don't feel comfortable here. I don't like it. In fact, I'm not going to walk that way. God, help me, because you need God's help to overcome sin. God, help me to live a pure life worthy of the Spirit of God in your heart. So if this is true, we should be able to see a place in the Bible where somebody is sealed and yet disobedient. Not sealed and then losing it and then getting it back. but sealed and then God isn't happy with you. Now watch, go to chapter four of Ephesians. Go to chapter four. Verse number 30, go to 30, 430. You can read all verses. It's an incredible, Ephesians is a great book. The theme is the local church, the assembly. But verse number 30, and grieve not the Holy Spirit of God. Ooh, who would ever do that? Read the rest, whereby ye are sealed until you sin again. No, sealed when? Until the day of redemption. When's the day? Well, in the New Testament, the day begins at the time when the Lord returns in the beginning of the tribulation period, but it's a reference to what begins there and goes for eternity. It is the beginning of the judgment of God when he first comes, and the Bible says in Philippians, for example, chapter one, verse six, being confident on this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you at salvation, right, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. His judgment, it's just a general reference that his judgment is coming, and you are sealed through that. You are sealed until eternity. He is yours. This is a New Testament promise to those who come to know the Lord Jesus Christ. And the power is not rested up in me to hold on to salvation. Salvation is getting into the ark and the door shutting. It's not coming up to the ark when it starts to rain and you see this little ledge and you're hanging on to it. Your knuckles are white and the storm and the flood is coming and it says everything that hath breath outside the ark died. Right? so that salvation might be like, I've got it, I've got it! Oops, I lost it. No, no, I've got it! Maybe the waves threw you back up on top of the ark. I've got it again! Actually, no, salvation, Jesus is the ark, it's a picture of him. And when Jesus had the ark built and you walk into it, it says that He shut the door. There comes a time when it's over with and your choices are no longer able to be made. I'm talking about that day you breathe your last breath. It's over. There's no chance to come back and accept it again. You've got to know Christ today and get sealed for eternity. This is the only way the Bible talks about the word sealed. The power for security is not in me. So if you have a pen and a piece of paper, if you're writing, if you're the kind that likes to take notes, John chapter 10 tells us this. John 10, verse number 27. I give unto them eternal life. How did you get eternal life? Bible says that's salvation. When you pray and ask the Lord to save you, he gives you eternal life. I give unto them eternal life, now listen, and they shall never perish. Now if you could lose your salvation, Right? Then you would perish. In other words, you would have eternal life given to you and then taken away. And the words I just quoted from the Bible, from the words of Jesus Christ, would be a lie. It has to be never. You will never perish or the Lord has lied. And the Bible, several places, but like Titus chapter 1 verse 2, in hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie promised before the world began. So the words of God, Jesus said, hey, I'm preserving, that's why these are so important, I talked about in Sunday school. These words are preserved by the Lord, preserved to be extant for you, they are preserved perfectly because he said he would do so. And by doing so, he said, I'm giving you eternal life and they shall never perish. And then he says, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My father which gave them me is greater than all. No man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand. And then he says, I and my father are one. John chapter 10, about verse 27, about verse number 30. These are important things that we're not keeping our salvation because you couldn't. We are trusted at salvation. The Lord did something that he called being sealed, and he says you are sealed until the end. It's permanent. Have you been saved? If a person believes that you can have salvation and then lose it, there's a problem, and sometimes they look up a passage of scripture, and they maybe just read a verse, and doesn't this look like you can lose your salvation? Wait a minute. when it talks about losing something in that verse, or when it talks about saving, you gotta understand that not every time the Bible uses the word save, is it talking about eternal soul salvation. You know, the Bible says in the book of Matthew, chapter number 24, it says that he that shall endure to the end shall be saved, but he's not talking about eternal life, he's talking about the tribulation period, and the person that endures that tribulation will be brought through that tribulation. He's not talking about there, and it would be like every time I use the word, I saved $5, does that mean I took my coins and I gave them eternal life? Every time I use the word saved, I'm not talking about eternal life, and the Bible uses it that way. And so we have to use the context. There's an idea that we lose salvation, but you do lose when you go into sin. You understand that? The Bible teaches in 1 John chapter number one, you could read the context of it. It talks about our relationship with Christ. It deals with our position in Christ. We're sealed for eternity. And then our fellowship with Christ, right? And our fellowship is, that can be messed up. while you can never lose your position in Christ. It'd be like this. We have my son here, and he likes to get picked on, because he's, never mind, he sits right up front here, it's easy to pick on him. I got a daughter over here. So, he became my son because he was born in my family, right? And so then, later, he made some mistakes, so he's not my son anymore. What did sonship have to do with his conduct? But let me ask you this, let's say, I'm trying to think of something you got in trouble for, but I don't remember. Did you ever get in trouble? Okay. Your sister's over here, she could tell me. And she was perfect, so. But anyway, I'm just teasing, trying to make it light. And I have to hurry, because I'm talking too much today. And I want, yeah, amen, thank you. But Zeke, when he did wrong as a boy, okay, And I came out there to see what he was doing, and I was displeased, and he was doing wrong. Boy, our fellowship wasn't real good. And he was quite a cute kid. He was, you know, he's a little tiny boy, big head, we called him, takes after his dad, right? And he's just a really, really wonderful, all three of the kids, I had such a fun time raising my kids. Okay, we were loving and caring. I spent the first, I think their entire elementary years I spent on the floor, right, rolling around and playing and doing all that. Okay, so we have a warm relationship, even today, we have a warm relationship, all three of the kids. Okay, but when he was doing wrong, was I happy? Did I ever get stern? Oh yeah. Was there ever chastening like discipline? Of course, right? And then you knew you did wrong and you asked for forgiveness, right? And then when you got forgiveness, was I still stern? No. Are you understanding what I'm saying? You become a child of God the day you are sealed by getting saved, that's salvation. You enter then into the family of God. Before then, the Bible says you were children of disobedience, children of wrath. You were never called the children of God that way. But you get saved, you become a child of God, and you're his for eternity, sealed unto the day. How you enter into sin and your fellowship with God is not going real good. Does that mean you lost your salvation? Look, this fella, he'll be 23 next month. He's been my son for 23 years. He will be my son as long as eternity goes forward. He's still going to call me dad, right? This is what the relationship was because of being born in my family. But his fellowship has kind of gone in and out. So sometimes people pull up passages of scripture and say, this looks like you're losing your, wait a minute, what is lost? Identify, what are they talking about in the passage? Try to find the context of it, because the Bible talks about salvation being kept by the power of God. I'll try to wrap this up. Let me tell you what 1 Peter tells you. In chapter number one, now listen to what it says in 1 Peter 1, verse four. To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you." How? Next verse, verse 5. "...who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed." You've already got eternal life, but you're waiting for the rest of it to come. Right? You're waiting. You have the earnest of the Spirit, but the rest of it's going to be revealed. Have you been to heaven yet? Do you have your glorified body? Do you have the completion? Actually, your soul has been saved, your spirit. You have two-thirds of it, but we're still waiting for that manifestation when it will finally be revealed. And for us that are saved, it'll be the day we stop living in this world and go to heaven. That's why the Lord says when somebody dies that you know they're saved, He said, we sorrow, but not as those that have no hope. because we know if they're saved, that they're in a greater place, a better place. They are better looking down upon us, rooting us on. Amen, who are kept by the power of God. And so it says to an inheritance incorruptible, that means I didn't have anything to do with it, because if I had something to do with it, it'd be corruptible, right? I mean, you might build the perfect house, but it's not going to last forever. incorruptible, undefiled, and fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, not reserved in heaven by you, who are kept by the power of God, not kept by a good conduct, kept by the power of God, not kept by the power of you. If we had this fluctuating salvation, where you come into salvation and leave salvation, then you would find that in the Scriptures. But you don't find that in the Scriptures. You find the opposite. Promises that when you have the salvation, and when people come to you and say, well, you can lose your salvation, the problem is that they're using passages out of context, or number two, now listen, they don't really understand salvation. If salvation is only forgiveness of sins, then I can comprehend that. But he tells Christians to pray for forgiveness of sins, like in 1 John 1, verse 9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just. That's speaking to the Christian community, saying if you are living with your broken fellowship, to get it right, ask God for forgiveness. But he doesn't tell that to unsaved people. You need more than forgiveness. Forgiveness is a byproduct of salvation. But salvation, you might say, is a reconciling of a sinner to God. That needs more than forgiveness. You need more than forgiveness to go to heaven. You need the blood of Christ. You need to be sealed. You need Christ to save you. And that's not just asking forgiveness. Now, the power for this security is in God. Secondly, the people is us. He's speaking to us. He doesn't speak to those who have not been saved. And I'm talking about the text, if you go back to 2 Corinthians 1, verse 22, it says, who, he says, who has sealed us. He didn't talk about people that were baptized, because baptism isn't part of salvation. He's not discussing this issue of baptism, or church membership, or giving, or going, or serving, or being charitable. None of that comes into play. What is the recipient is a people who have repented, turned from a false belief, put their faith only in Jesus, and ask Jesus to be their Savior, because that's all that He said salvation is made up of. You can be saved simply because in your heart, you turn to Christ and ask Him. But if you're turning to Christ asking Him for help to get saved, Did you hear what I said? Help to get saved. Like, I'm gonna do my part and I'm gonna let God do what I can't do. In salvation, there is no part for you. Salvation is minus, you're not asking for God, please help me get to heaven. It's God, I can't get there, anything I can do. I need to become a child of God, I need to be saved. That's salvation. And then the process of that security, we've already talked about, and I won't go back to it, but I got ahead of myself earlier, so we'll finish this up. So the process is just what we said. You believed because you heard. You got saved, and God says, at that moment, I gave you the earnest of your inheritance. So what do you have? You have the promise of Christ in your heart, Christ in you, the hope of glory. You say, is it Christ in you? Well, it's Jesus in the person of the Holy Spirit, because the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Salvation is wrapped up in the Trinity. Because Christ says, I will be with you, but yet, where is he? Said, I'll never leave you, nor forsake you. Where is he? Oh, it's figurative. No, it's not figurative. It's the earnest of the Spirit indwelling your heart permanently that makes you the temple of the Holy Spirit. It is a relation, that's why everything about Christianity comes down to you and God. Now, the purpose of a church is to bring you closer and closer in that relationship to God, and he commands you to be part of a church. Now, I don't wanna, the Lord said he died for the church, right? So it's very important to him. But for salvation and eternal life, everything about this is really you in a relationship with God, not you in a relationship with me and me in a relationship. That would make me a priest, a go-between. I am not a mediator. 1 Timothy 2 verse 4, there is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. So there's only one person between. And when Jesus died on the cross in Matthew chapter 27, along about verse 55, the Bible says when he died, the veil that separated what was the picture of the presence of God and man, it rent from top to bottom, like a foot thick, this curtain. It just rented half, why? Because it was showing that man has an ability to go straight to God. through the blood of Jesus Christ, no longer needing a temple or a priest, and so forever, the Bible says, you are called as an individual priest after Jesus Christ. And the Aaronic priesthood has finished. The Old Testament, it's done, and it's put away in the book of Hebrews, and there was a change, and we're made in the likeness of Jesus, who was called in the book of Psalms, that the Messiah would be called forever the high priest after the order of Melchizedek. as a picture that something has been done away, and the only transaction is in your heart, is you going straight to God, to His presence, without going through a priest. I am not a priest. I am a proclaimer, a preacher, an overseer. That's the word bishop. They're all ascribed to the person who leads the congregation in what? Into a better, closer relationship with Jesus. But I can't give you Jesus. You have to come to Him on His terms. So the question after talking about all this, have you been sure that you're saved? I'm not trying to talk you out of being saved. I'm just telling you, if you are saved, you ought to rejoice. Wow, look what Christ has done for me. He didn't just save me for this week or save me today until I do wrong. He saved me for eternity. The day you prayed and said, Lord, I put my faith, you say, but I didn't understand all that. It doesn't matter. It wasn't you. He purchased you and gave you the earnest of His presence. So rejoice, Christian. You say, boy, I've been frustrated with the problems of life. You know what? Jesus is there with you in the person of the Holy Spirit. Why don't you ask him for help? That's why he says, come boldly. And if you want a great verse, Hebrews chapter four, verse 15, come boldly. He says, I'm telling you to come boldly to the throne of grace to ask for mercy and to find help in time of need. He said, I don't know what to do. God says, I'll give you wisdom, John James chapter one, verse five. If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God. He says, the presence of God is everything in our Christian life. It is everything from top to bottom of our Christianity. You're never alone, so rejoice. Like that poem you see sometimes on walls, the footprints in the sand, about the difficult times in life. I don't know if you've read that. And the only change I would make is that I'm not being carried only in the times when it's difficult, but rather the Lord is carrying me, so there's only one footprints in the sand for my entire life because he's carrying me the whole way. It is exactly that fact that makes our understanding of our relationship with Christ very real. So rejoice, Christian, God has given you exceeding abundantly above all that you can ask or think. Ephesians chapter three, verse 20. You have more than you can comprehend in Jesus. Now he also says you should live right so you don't grieve that Holy Spirit that's always with you. But you're not doing right and wrong because you want the approval of a preacher or because of some kind of list of do's and don'ts. You want to do right because you have a relationship within your heart with the Spirit of God. And by the way, if you're listening and you're in tune to the Spirit of God, He'll tell you when you're wrong. You just know it. Something doesn't seem right. This fellowship is broken. So Christian, be encouraged in your relationship. But if you're here and you don't know Christ as your Savior, the greatest thing we can explain to you is how you can have this for yourself. Christianity is not in the New Testament, none of it, the old New Testament anywhere. It's not ever explained as if only the leadership of religion has a market corner on the market. It is always explained that you have to take personal ownership of this relationship. If you died right now, do you know if you're going to heaven? And if you don't, we want you to know that today. Bow your heads and close your eyes with me. I'll wrap this up in just a moment, but I want to ask that question of our people. I appreciate your kindness and paying attention as I've overstayed my welcome a little bit. But I want you to think, if you don't know for sure that you've been saved, That's the most important thing. It doesn't matter anything in life. It doesn't matter if you have money or don't have money, education or not educated. It doesn't matter anything else. Because if you die without Christ, you don't go to heaven. If you die with Christ, then you go to heaven. It's just that simple. But if you don't know Christ as your savior, we want to explain it to you. I first just want you to know that I'll pray for you. And I'm not coming out there, I want you to raise your hand if you don't know Christ as your Savior, but I'm not gonna come over there and say, and get your attention or embarrass you. This is between you and God. But if you say, Pastor, I am not sure that I'm going to heaven when I die, please, would you pray for me? Would you please lift your hand up? Nobody looking but me. Pastor, pray for me. Anybody like that today? I'm not sure if I'm saved. Anybody here like that? Okay. So maybe you're struggling with being able to raise your hand or maybe everybody here is saved. Praise God for you. But we are here to explain salvation to you at any time. But Christian, I want to ask and encourage you today. Look what the Lord has given to you. You have his presence everywhere. Maybe you felt discouraged about some things. Maybe some things aren't going right. The Lord says, don't worry, I had it all planned out. I've not gone anywhere, I'm right here. And in the example of my son and me and that relationship, I am so limited. You know, I can't do everything for my kids, but you know, we have an unlimited God. He says to come to the unsearchable riches of Christ and you'll find everything you need. Are you encouraged today? Father, I pray that you bless this invitation to have your will in what needs to be done. In Jesus' name I pray, amen.