1 Corinthians chapter 15. The text for the sermon will be the final verse of the chapter, verse 58. It's a lengthy chapter, but we're going to take the time tonight to read it in its entirety. So let's read together now the Word of God as it's found in 1 Corinthians 15. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand, by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve, After that, he was seen of above 500 brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto the present, but some are fallen asleep. After that, he was seen of James, then of all the apostles. And last of all, he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach, and so ye believed. Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead. But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen. And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised. And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power, for he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death, for he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is accepted, which did put all things under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all. Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for the dead? And why stand we in jeopardy every hour? I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily. If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantage is it me if the dead rise not? Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Be not deceived, evil communications corrupt good manners. Awake to righteousness and sin not, for some have not the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame. But some men will say, how are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die. And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be but bare grain. It may chance of wheat or of some other grain. But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him. and to every seed his own body. All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds. There are also celestial bodies and bodies terrestrial, but the glory of the celestial is one and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun and another glory of the moon and another glory of stars. For one star differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption. It is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power. It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body. and there is a spiritual body and so it is written the first man Adam was made a living soul the last Adam was made a quickening spirit albeit that was not first which is spiritual but that which is natural and afterward that which is spiritual the first man is of the earth earthy the second man is the Lord from heaven as is the earthy such are they also that are earthy and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump for the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible and we shall be changed for this corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality so when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption and this mortal shall have put on immortality then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written death is swallowed up in victory oh death Where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. For as much as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. So far we read the holy and the inspired Word of God. Let's read together one more time that last verse, which is the text for the sermon, where God speaks to us this way, Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, For as much as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, this evening's sermon is an applicatory sermon as you as a congregation partook of communion this morning. You partook of communion to the end that your strength is renewed in the Lord. Your faith is confirmed and strengthened. And therefore, now we ask the question, how do we go forth? The purpose of the applicatory sermon is to guide us as we go forth in this week, as we have partaken of communion this morning. The Word of God that I bring to you this evening is that this is the application. The application is now abound always in the work of the Lord. That's a fitting word for an applicatory sermon. We are strengthened in our faith. We are strengthened in our faith to this end that we want to in this week to come abound always in the Lord's work. And so we call our attention to this text tonight under the theme, Always Abounding in the Work of the Lord. Let's see in the first place the meaning of this. There we explain that basic idea of abounding in the work of the Lord. In the second place, let's consider the basis of our doing this. And that's the word, therefore. And that word, therefore, leads us to see how the truth of the chapter The resurrection speaks to our abounding in the work of the Lord. And then in the third place, the qualifications. And what is meant by there, the spiritual qualifications to do this. And that's the beginning of the text where we are told to be steadfast and immovable. Abounding in the work of the Lord. The meaning, the basis, and the qualifications. In the first point of the sermon, we take up that main idea of the work of the Lord. This is what we are led to see tonight. That there is a work that we are called to go forth in. Whose work is it? It's not ours. It's not a man's. It's the Lord's work. It's the work of Jesus Christ. himself. And so we begin the sermon by expounding upon that idea of the work of the Lord. Now before we get into what this means for you and me as those who are God's children, we need to see that it's the Lord's work and that the Lord himself has A work. And that work which is the Lord's, which He does, is very much related to what we will see when we come to us. What our work is relative to the Lord. Well, the great work of the Lord Jesus Christ that He came to this earth to accomplish is the work of salvation. The work of salvation in order to bring God's people to the final end of that salvation in the new heaven and new earth at which time He will raise the bodies of His church so that in body and soul the church of all ages lives and dwells with God in that new creation in the face of Jesus Christ. The Lord's work is to the glory of God to redeem and save His covenant people. That's what Jesus came to this earth to do. That is what He is doing right now. And that is what it will come to in its final end when He returns. And we have that described for us in 1 Corinthians 15. The focus, of course, is on the resurrection of the body. But look at what we read in the middle of the chapter in verses 22-24. You get to the heart and to the essence of that work of the Lord. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order. Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. Then cometh the end, or the goal, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power." That's the goal. The deliverance of the entire kingdom to God the Father with the church which has been raised and is brought into that new creation. At which time, as the end of verse 28 says, God may be all in all. That is, at which time it will be all to the glory of God in heaven. That is the Lord's work. And now comes the text to us that we are to abound always in the work of the Lord. And there's a relationship between that work of the Lord just described and what we do in the work that we are called to abound always in. Now there's a fundamental difference between those two. Let's be very clear about that. That as we talk about the Lord's work in the way that I just described, He is the one who redeems His church. He is the one who saves His church. He is the one who perfects His church. He is the one whose power it will be that will raise the bodies of His church. And so that as we talk about the Lord's work that we do, it's none of that. That is to say, salvation for the entire church. My salvation. It's all the work of Jesus by His Spirit. So we make that very clear. That when we talk about doing the Lord's work, it's not that. But there is the work of the Lord that we do. That is very much related to this work of Christ of which we just spoke. And that's because the Lord is pleased. to work in and through His people to accomplish His purposes. We have the Lord's work to do. We do it by the power of the Lord. We do it to the glory of the Lord's name. We do it in the church, in the kingdom, in the covenant of God through which Christ will work to accomplish His purposes in God's plan for all things. there's the work of the Lord to do as the church. It's church work. It's kingdom work. It's covenant work. It's work that Jesus Christ is pleased to work in and through to accomplish this grand purpose of which we just spoke. What that means is that to do the work of the Lord of which we read in the text, one must be in the Lord. Only those who belong to the Lord do the Lord's work. Only those who are united to the Lord are given the strength by the Lord and the Spirit of the Lord and aim things at the glory of the Lord that is part of the work of the Lord. And that's implied, at the very least, in the text itself when Paul says, therefore, my beloved brethren, My beloved brethren. Paul writes to the Corinthian church and says, you're beloved by me and you're my brethren. Well, to be the brother of Jesus, to be the brother of Paul, means that they have an elder brother who is Jesus Christ. When Paul says to the church, you're my brethren, that means that he is with them, united to their elder brother, Christ. The text itself at least implies, of course, that we're dealing here with those who are in the Lord Jesus Christ. And to do the Lord's work is to be one who is in Christ. One who lives out of the power of Christ. and therefore labors on behalf of Christ in the church and in his kingdom through which Christ accomplishes his purposes in God's church. As we think about this work of the Lord, we can call attention to a couple of, for example, specific activities that are the work of the Lord that we are to engage in. For example, number one, the work of the Lord is the work of office bearers in the church of Jesus Christ. As office bearers who belong to Jesus and who are called by Jesus carry out their work in the church, that is, The work of the Lord in the body of Christ. Something very much on your mind this evening as a congregation. In light of after this worship service, a congregational meeting in which a man will be called to serve as your pastor. That's the work of the Lord. when office bearers carry out their work in the body of Christ. A second example, specifically, which is the work of the Lord, is the work of parents to raise, to nurture, and to guide their children in the truth of the gospel. The first time I actually preached this sermon was on an evening during the morning of which we had the sacrament of baptism, and so that was very much on our mind as a congregation when I preached this. I didn't preach this originally as an applicatory sermon, although it very much applies, as you can see. But you had communion this morning, and that does call our attention to the children of the church, because having had communion this morning, That is the goal toward which you are working as parents. God gives us covenant children, baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, believing them to be God's children according to His covenant promise. You raise them, you nurture them in the fear of the Lord. That's the Lord's work. That's Jesus Christ through the instrument of parents, using them. for the good of His covenant seed, so that they come to the mature faith that God works in them, such that they confess that faith, and through that become partakers of the Lord's Supper. That doesn't mean that parents save their children. That's Christ's work alone. But most definitely do we say, of course, that that's the Lord's work. that you as parents, united to Jesus Christ, aimed at the glory of Jesus Christ, by the power of Jesus Christ, go forth in the covenant community, nurturing and raising God's covenant seed in the fear of His name and in the truth of the Gospel. The Lord's work that you as parents are engaging in. And so we can see two specific examples. And those are good examples. And there are others like that. But at this point, let's broaden our perspective. And ask the question, is there anything? Is there anything that you do as a believer, and that I do as a believer, that is not characterized as being the Lord's work? And the answer to that question is really no. And to put it positively, everything that we go forth and do as Christians, by the power of Jesus Christ aimed at the glory of God, is part of, we can say, the Lord's work. And that is true because the Lord is pleased to work through all things. among His people in order to accomplish His grand purposes in this world and in the salvation of His church. That's important for us to understand. That no matter what we are doing as Christians, we're going forth and doing the Lord's work in that which we do. Yes, there are those specific things where we can see very directly how that is part of Jesus' work for the salvation of His church. But the perspective that we must have is that the whole of our life is that which we live out of our faith in Jesus Christ by the power of the Spirit and aimed at God's glory for the good of God's people. And from that perspective, there's nothing we do as Christians, as it is done in Jesus Christ, that is not the Lord's work. So that yes, for example, when you wake up tomorrow morning and you go to work in this world, as you engage in that work, you are doing the Lord's work. You're doing it by the power of Christ. You're doing it for Christ. And you're trusting that the Lord will work through that to accomplish His purposes, all of which is driving to that goal of which we spoke from 1 Corinthians chapter 15. That's why you're going to get up tomorrow morning. That's why you're going to go to work. You do it as a Christian. You do it out of your union to Jesus Christ. You do it out of love for God, and you trust that the Lord is pleased to work through that. And beloved, when you look through that lens, even something like work, you see very much how that's connected to the purposes of Jesus Christ with all things as we spoke of them earlier. You're going to work tomorrow morning as a believer, part of which work has as its purpose to receive the means through that work so that you can provide for your family, provide for your wife, provide for your children, provide for the general fund which promotes the preaching of the gospel, the most important thing in this world, provide for the benevolent fund to care for those who have needs in the body of Christ. That going to work, in the end, is part of the Lord's work. That going to work as a father, for example, in and of itself, is used by God for the good of your children. They see Dad. Wake up. Every morning, regularly and consistently, day after day, going to work, working hard, doing so not in order to indulge himself in all of the pleasures of this world, but doing so for all of those reasons just mentioned. And that's a powerful example used by Jesus for the good of the covenant seed in your own home. You go to work tomorrow morning. as a Christian, letting your light shine before men, so that this world in which you live knows, when I do business with that company, it's different. There's something about it that's different. Altogether upright. Altogether honest. Kind. Good to work with. There's something different about that. And when you're part of a crew that has a very difficult boss, and you're one of the members of that crew that never complains about that boss when he's not in your presence, and the other members of that crew see that, why don't you ever talk badly about him? He's terrible, unfair, unjust. Well, let me tell you why. I'm a follower of Jesus Christ. To be a follower of Jesus Christ and to believe in the Word of God means that I don't speak that way. Because this is what He's done for me. You let your light shine. And you don't know how the Lord may use that to accomplish His purposes in this world. The point with this, beloved, is that we are always engaging in the Lord's work as we live the whole of our life out of our union to Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit. That leads us to a consideration of that which modifies this phrase concerning the Lord's work. It says in the text, always abounding in the work of the Lord. That part of the text is very important. Because it guards against two dangers by each of those words. On the one hand, it guards against the danger of having a part-time mentality concerning doing the Lord's work. Very similar to what I just said a moment ago. That's always a danger as a Christian. The danger as a Christian is that we compartmentalize our life as believers. So that over here, when I'm doing this, I'm doing the Lord's work. But over here, when I'm doing this, it's something other than the Lord's work. It's my time to do what I please with independent of the Lord. The text doesn't allow for that. Because it says, always. doing the work of the Lord. When I'm doing church work. When I'm engaged in the life of the congregation. When I'm at work during the week, as we just spoke about a moment ago. When I'm in the home with my children. When I am engaged in pleasure and entertainment. When I'm on vacation. We as Christians don't take the mentality of the world. Vacation is all me. Me. Do what I want, even then, out of my faith in Christ, to the glory of God, so that this vacation time is part of my service of God, because I need this vacation to the end that I can work in the home, in the church, with my family, in a revigorated way to the glory of God. We look at everything from the perspective of walking out of our relationship to the Lord, used by God to accomplish His purposes in the church. So what guards against that danger? Number one, of part-time with respect to doing the Lord's work. The text says, always abounding in the work of the Lord. And it guards against, in the second place, having a half-hearted motivation and zeal for doing the Lord's work. And that's guarded against by what the text says when it says, abounding in the work of the Lord. That calls attention to that idea that the nature of our doing the Lord's work is not a half-hearted, but it is a zealous giving of ourselves to do the Lord's work. And when you hear that, don't think, It's something extraordinary that we go forth and do in this week. We're talking about the ordinary life of the Christian. In our ordinary relationships, in our ordinary callings, the point is we do it with zeal. We do it with a certain passion for the Lord, by the Lord, trusting that He will use it to accomplish His purposes. We know what that looks like. We see these things in the world all around us. Always abounding in a work. A man is motivated by the pleasures of this world and so he's always abounding to his job in order to grow the business, make more money, and enjoy the things of this earth. You can see in that, always abounding in a work. A man's motivated by glory and fame and sports, and so he's always abounding in training to the end to get to the top and receive that glory and fame. You can see always abounding in a work. And God says to us, not that, not that, all vain and earthly, but this, the Lord's work. An all-encompassing life of a believer lived out of Jesus Christ to His glory for the good of the covenant kingdom and church through which Christ accomplishes His purposes. And what does it take to have this always abounding attitude? It's what you had this morning. It's understanding the gospel. It's knowing that I am a wretched sinner, worthy of eternal damnation. But God is the God of grace in Jesus. And that in that Jesus, His broken body and His shed blood, I have life and I have everlasting life. And the nature of that life is described in 1 Corinthians 15. A resurrection life that is eternal to the ages to come. You have the Gospel. You set your heart on that Gospel. You know that Gospel. In the fullness of what it is, that's what you need. To hear the text, always abounding, and say in response to that, Amen. Always abounding in the work of the Lord. The text goes on, to describe for us the basis of this abounding always in the work of the Lord. And the basis is wrapped up in the opening word of the text. The opening word of the text is therefore. What the word therefore does in the verse is say, on the basis of what I just wrote, now this. on the basis of what just came before, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. And so when we hear that, therefore, we look back. And when we look back, we see what the apostle taught in the verses prior. It's clear that when you read the last verse of 1 Corinthians 15, it's the conclusion not just to a sentence or two that came before it, but really this is the conclusion to the entire truth of the chapter. And that's one of the reasons I wanted to read the entire chapter before the sermon. Because when you read the chapter in its entirety, you see one main word of the chapter. We all know 1 Corinthians 15 for one reason. Resurrection. The point of the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 15 is to teach about the future bodily resurrection from the dead. And the Apostle is saying when he comes to verse 58, on the basis of what I taught in this entire chapter, now this. Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. And so let's take just a couple of minutes to summarize some of the main things that the Apostle teaches in 1 Corinthians 15. 1 Corinthians 15 teaches in the first place, as I stated a moment ago, this grand truth of the future bodily resurrection from the dead. We don't get tired of hearing the truth expressed in 1 Corinthians 15 because it's so beautiful. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, verse 50. Verse 51, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, for the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible and we shall be changed. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15 says this, victory in Jesus. Victory in Jesus on that final day when our bodies will be raised from the dead. It teaches in the first place the future bodily resurrection. It teaches in the second place that it is entirely through the work of Christ. The victory, which is a summarizing statement right before our text, the victory is through Jesus Christ. We don't have time to go into all of the details of the chapter, but that's the burden of the apostles' argument in 1 Corinthians 15. The burden of the argument is to connect your resurrection to the resurrection of Jesus. If you do not arise from the dead, that means that Jesus did not arise from the dead because Jesus' resurrection from the dead is your resurrection from the dead. It's entirely because of the work of Jesus that we have this future bodily resurrection to come. He merited in its entirety our salvation on the cross. His perfect obedience to the law, His perfect atonement of our sins. That's our righteousness. And He went to the grave, and He conquered death in that grave. He's the living Christ in heaven, pouring out His Spirit, which unites us to Christ, through which we receive that righteousness. And He says to us, I have gained the victory over all of sin, And because over sin, over that which is the consequence of sin, death itself. And my resurrection life is your resurrection life. And your body, therefore, will be raised like unto my glorious body in the age to come. The whole burden of the argument is to say, through Christ, We have this future bodily resurrection. And then in the third place, as to what is taught, and this especially gets us back to our text, is the absolute certainty of that future bodily resurrection in the age to come. The apostle is at pains to make clear that this is not in any way what we must doubt. But instead, this is that which we believe with every confidence, exactly because of what we just stated. Exactly because we serve a living Christ. If Christ was dead in the grave, there would be no hope. Our faith would be vain. We would be in our sin. Death would be coming for us. Eternal damnation would be our end. But we don't serve a dead Christ. He's a living Christ. And therein lies the absolute certainty that your body, and my body, and the bodies of all of God's people will be raised like Jesus' body. And at that moment, God will be all in all when we are brought into the new heaven and new earth. 1 Corinthians 15 says, future bodily resurrection in Christ, absolutely certain. Therefore, the apostle writes, therefore, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, because you must know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. The point of the apostle is this. Imagine if we didn't know this was to come for us. Imagine if you sat here this evening and had doubt concerning what we just described in the second point at its beginning. If you had to sit here tonight and say, okay, I know this body is dying. I know this body is going to go to the grave. I'm just not sure if it's actually going to rise from the dead. I know this world is filled with sin. and that we have this idea of a new heaven and a new earth where God will be all in all, but I'm just not sure that it's really going to happen. If that's the way that you thought tonight, why in the world would you wake up in the morning tomorrow and say, I need to abound in the work of the Lord? The work of the Lord which has this as its end. a future bodily resurrection, a new heaven and a new earth that all things are driving towards in time and in history. If we doubted it and didn't know it, we would have no reason to hear the first point of the sermon and say to it, Amen, and to wake up tomorrow morning out of the Lord's Supper and say, now we labor in the Lord's work to the glory of His name. There would be no reason to do that. The Apostle says, that's not the way we think. Of course not. That's not the Gospel. That's not the Word of God. The Word of God is truth. And this is truth. It's certain. All things are driving to that end. Jesus will accomplish that which we read in this text. And so Paul says to us, therefore, we have every reason with confidence to wake up in the morning and say, now I do. The Lord's work. Believing that my Lord is working in and through His church to accomplish these purposes. Is it vain, beloved, for the office bearers of this congregation to press on in their labors in service to Jesus Christ? Is it vain for you as a congregation to meet after this service and have a congregational meeting to vote for a man to serve as your under-shepherd? Is it vain, pointless to do all of that? No. Why? Because Christ is at work. And these things are certain. And He will carry out His purposes. Is it vain for you as parents Day after day? To lay before your children the Word of God? To strive to be good examples? To lead them day after day to their Savior Jesus Christ? No. Why not? Because Christ is at work and He will accomplish His purposes. Is it vain for us to look at the whole of our life and say, I live it out of Christ. Trusting that Jesus is carrying out His will leading to that end. And we say in response to that, of course not. The Gospel and the certainty of the Gospel is the reason that we hear this Word and we strive always to abound in the work of the Lord. We do so as God grants it to us with certain qualifications. And that's the first part of the text. When Paul writes, therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Those who abound always in the work of the Lord are those who are steadfast, immovable. The idea of steadfast is that one is strong, sure, firm. And when one is strong, sure, and firm, the result of that is that they are unmovable. Think, for example, of a strong oak tree. A strong oak tree is steadfast. It's got its big root system underneath the ground. It has its solid trunk. It's firm. It's not going anywhere. And therefore, it's immovable. Against all of the winds that beat against it, that oak tree stands strong. Paul says in the text, be steadfast. Be immovable. always abounding in the Lord's work. And the reason that there needs to be that steadfastness and that being unmovable is partly because of the nature of the work of the Lord. It's work. It's labor. And the idea of that word work is it's intense. It's hard. It's difficult. There's all sorts of things that make it difficult, and we all understand this from our lives as Christians. Part of it, very simply, is that we are always to abound in the work of the Lord. That, in and of itself, makes it difficult. That I can't, as a Christian, compartmentalize my life and say, okay, most of it's for the Lord, but I'm going to adopt the philosophy of the world just for a little bit and say, now it's about me. And I don't have to think about the Lord and my life in Christ and living out of Christ and to Christ. That's not the life of the Christian. It's always, when I'm at church, when I'm in the home, when I'm at work, When I'm out on a Friday night, when I'm on vacation, always the work of the Lord. That makes it hard. And then you add to that the reality of our own sin. The reality of our own sinful natures. Our own weaknesses. That loves what I just described there. Don't need to think about the Lord, just think about me. And then you add to that the onslaughts of the world, and the devil, and all of the enemies against the Church of Christ that seek to hinder and frustrate the Lord's work in our lives and in the lives of the Church. And you realize very quickly why the Apostle says at the beginning, Church of Christ be steadfast, be immovable, be like that oak tree, that's strong, that's firm, against those pressures, stands strong, so that in standing strong, always abound in the work of the Lord in the whole of your life. And you hear that and you quickly say, the strength of that oak tree is not me. These qualifications, steadfast and unmovable, are not in me. In me, I'm like that little sapling out there, tossed to and fro and would be uprooted in a moment. But united to Christ, and my faith in Christ, therein lies the strength to be steadfast, and therein lies the strength to be immovable. Be steadfast and immovable, that is, Look to Christ. Be steadfast and immovable, that is, strong in your faith. Faith from the point of view of what you believe. Don't doubt the Word of the Gospel in 1 Corinthians 15. This is truth. Gospel truth. Christ has finished the work. Christ will bring it to its accomplishment. Be strong in that, people of God. Be strong in that. And know, therefore, none of your labor is ever in vain. And as you go forward in that, do not look to yourself. This day has a singular purpose to lead you as a congregation to look to Christ. That was this morning. And now when you hear the Word of God, always abound in the work of the Lord. The Word isn't, look to yourself for that strength and that being immovable. But the Word of God to you is, look to Christ. And when you wake up the morning after this one, you look to Him. You find your strength in Him alone. So that against all of those pressures, all of those enemies, Finding your strength in Christ, you go forth abounding always in the work of the Lord. That, beloved, is the application of having communion as a congregation this morning. May God have strengthened your faith this morning through the sacrament and through the preaching. And now may this word be a word that encourages you and guides you in this week to come. A life of gratitude. A life of gratitude in which you live the whole of your life for the Lord, by the strength of the Lord, knowing that the Lord is accomplishing His work to this great end, when God will be all in all, through the work of His Savior and Son, Jesus Christ. May God so help us to go forth in this week in that way. Amen. Our Father in Heaven, we're thankful for the Word of the Gospel, which is the Word of Jesus Christ and His perfect and finished work. so that we can have, through faith in Him, the certainty of what is to come, and therefore strive in all things to abound always in the work of Thee, our God. Help this congregation to do this in this week to come. We pray, Lord, that Thou will bless us and keep us as we go forth in our lives in this week. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Let's sing together now number 246. 246. O teach thou us to count our days and set our hearts on wisdom's ways. Let's sing the three stanzas of 246. He shall watch throughout our days, and set our hearts at wisdom's ways, us. Let mercies of this world arise. Let all our day with joy be bright. Let all our day with joy be bright. Let our sorrows die. With us let God be glorified. With us let God be glorified. So have mercy on us, we sow, the beauty of the Lord our God. The work of love, blest by our help, thus can this vow ever be fulfilled. Give us our home, O Lake Ruby, The samplest ever born by thee, The samplest Praise ye the Lord, ye hosts of old, in yonder heav'nly light, and bless the Lord, ye saints below, who in his praise delight. The Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious to thee. The Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. Amen.