according to the abundance of His steadfast love. For He does not afflict from His heart or grieve the children of men." This is the word of the Lord. We are sinners, we deserve grief from the Lord, we deserve wrath, we deserve judgment, and yet He gives mercy, He gives compassion. And it's good for us in our worship of this holy God to remind ourselves of His standard and to admit to ourselves that we don't live up to that standard. We need a Savior. We need His mercy. So this morning, I'm going to read a couple of passages from the New Testament. And in doing this, we need to remember that God's law and obedience to that law does not change. It's not just an Old Testament thing. God's moral law is perpetual. It is universal. It is it is abiding. And we are obligated before our holy creator to live up to this. And yet none of us do. And so God in his grace has given us a savior. He's given us a high priest to bear our sins for us and to give us his righteousness. So I'm going to read from Matthew. We're going to sing a prayer of mercy. I'm going to read from James and we'll repeat that same prayer. of mercy. Hear the word of the Lord. And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law? And he said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. and a second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets. ♪ Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy ♪ James 2 says, if you really fulfill the royal law according to the scriptures, you shall love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law, but fails in one point, has become guilty of all of it. For he who said, do not commit adultery, also said, do not murder. If you do not commit adultery, but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty. For judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy, mercy triumphs over judgment. ♪ Lord have mercy ♪ Christ have mercy ♪ Lord have mercy The scripture tells us to confess our sins to the Lord and as we do, he forgives us and he cleanses us from all unrighteousness. Take a few moments now to confess your particular sins to the Lord. Now listen to these wonderful words from Psalm 25. Scripture says, The friendship of the Lord is for those who fear Him, and He makes known to them His covenant. My eyes are ever toward the Lord, for He will pluck my feet out of the net. God is a God of mercy. We have reason to give him thanks and praise. Let's stand together as we sing the Doxology. ♪ Praise God from whom all blessings flow ♪ Praise him all creatures here below Praise him, all of ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Let's go to our Father in prayer. Our glorious and gracious Heavenly Father, we give you thanks, dear Lord, for this wonderful and glorious Lord's Day that you have given us. Father, I pray that you would just bless our time together, bless our pastor as he preaches your word, and just thank you for your holy word that you give us to read. Father, I pray that it would just touch our hearts, bless our hearts, And we thank you for the forgiveness of our sins and your son, our savior, Christ Jesus. As we collect our tithes and offerings, I pray to bless these offerings to do your work. Father, may we be cheerful givers. And just thank you again for everything. And we love you. We just thank you for loving us. And just prepare our hearts and our minds as we dwell in your word. We pray these things, Father, in your son's precious, holy, redeeming name. Amen. ♪ For the beauty of the earth ♪ ♪ For the beauty of the skies ♪ ♪ For the love which from our birth ♪ ♪ Over and around us lies ♪ ♪ Over and around us lies ♪ ♪ Joyful hymn of praise ♪ ♪ For the beauty of each hour ♪ ♪ Of the day and of the night ♪ ♪ Hill and vale ♪ ♪ Entry and out, entry and out ♪ ♪ Sun and moon and stars of light ♪ ♪ Sun and moon and stars of light ♪ ♪ Lord of all, to thee we raise ♪ ♪ This our joyful hymn of praise ♪ For the joy of human love. Brothers, sisters, parents, children. Great honor that friends abide. For all gentle thoughts abide. For all gentle thoughts abide. This our joyful hymn of praise. ♪ For each perfect gift of thine ♪ ♪ To our grace so freely given ♪ ♪ Graceless, human, and divine ♪ ♪ God of earth and God of heaven ♪ of earth and parts of heaven, Lord of all, to thee we raise this our joyful hymn of praise. Bless our joyful hymn of praise. Well, today we reach the end of our journey through the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5, 6, and 7. If you would please turn with me today to Matthew chapter 7, and we'll be reading verses 24 through 29. And as you get that, would you please stand in honor of God's word with me? Matthew 7, verses 24 through 29. Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it. And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority and not as their scribes. Let's pray together. Father, though we sometimes forget it, it is so true, these words of Jesus when he said that we do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from your mouth. Nothing obligated you to speak to us, to reveal your character to us, or to show us how sinful we are, how much we need saving. Nothing obligated you to give us your word. or the illuminating presence of the Holy Spirit so that we could understand your word. But you have given us all these things and more. How foolish of us then to ever neglect so great a gift. And yet we are often laboring away, building our lives on the sinking sands of wealth and popularity and pleasure and empty, vain, futile things. Forgive us, Lord. and help us to have our perspective realigned this morning to the wisdom that can only come from you. Lord, on our own, we cannot understand or believe or obey the very truths we're pausing now to consider. So help us, Holy Spirit, help us open our eyes to behold wonderful things from your word. Give us long memory so that we don't forget these precious truths tomorrow or next week or next year. and grant us the grace to be not only hearers but doers of your word for your glory and for our eternal joy, I pray in Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. As I was studying this passage this past week, it occurred to me that the message in these verses is so simple that it really doesn't need much explanation at all. It's pretty self-evident. There's no sophisticated philosophy going on. In this text, nothing complicated or unclear. It's pretty straightforward. These verses are telling us that if we want to endure life's storms, including the ultimate storm of Judgment Day, we need to listen to God and obey what he says. Listen to God, do what he says. It's really that simple. A few verses earlier, Jesus made the point that the gate that leads to life is narrow, it's unassuming, it's unimpressive. And now here we are standing at that very gate, and that gate says that the way to life is to listen to God and obey him. And just like Jesus implied, there's nothing very eye-catching or impressive about it. And we think to ourselves, surely the pathway to eternal life is more profound than simply listening and obeying. There must be more to it. Well, the narrow gate is narrow in part because it just doesn't sound plausible. It doesn't strike us as sufficiently dramatic. It's all rather ordinary. I mean, we reach here the grand finale, the last word, the climactic conclusion of this most classic of sermons in all of history, from the lips of the greatest prophet and miracle worker to have ever walked the earth, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, and it all comes down to this, listen to God and do what he says. We want quests, we want adventures, we want pilgrimages and martyrdom, but God simply says, obey me. The simplicity of it reminds me of the way God addressed Elijah the prophet when he was discouraged and ready to die. He went out into the wilderness, stood before the Lord, and 1 Kings 19 says, Behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind, an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake, a fire. But the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, the sound of a low whisper." And it was in that low whisper that Elijah heard the awesome, profound voice of God. Later in the New Testament, we read of another situation in which God spoke to man. Peter found himself on a mountaintop with James and John and Jesus. when suddenly Jesus was transformed in his appearance. His face began to shine like the sun, and inexplicably, Moses and Elijah appeared and began talking with Jesus. Peter was overwhelmed with what he was seeing, and as Peter was prone to do, he just had to say something. So he said, I will make three tabernacles, one for Jesus, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. but then a voice, the voice of God, spoke and said, this is my beloved son with who I am well pleased, listen to him. No need for monuments to be built, no sensational feats to commemorate this event, just a simple listen to Jesus. Finally, there's the story of the rich young ruler who lived a wicked life only to discover after death that he had made a colossal mistake with eternal consequences. So he begged for someone to return from the dead and go and warn his family. But the verdict given was this, if they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead. God saves sinners through the simple means of words heard and obeyed. It's also ordinary. So understated, so explainable, and yet this is the gate that leads to life. This is the foundation upon which we are to build if we are to endure the storms of life. It's simple, it's ordinary, it's easily neglected, but this is the foundation upon which we build an enduring life, listening to God and obeying what he says. So I want to divide our consideration of this text then into two simple parts. First, we'll consider the task of listening to God, and then secondly, we'll consider the task of obeying God. First, we need to listen to God. Verse 24 begins, everyone then who hears these words of mine. It's interesting that both the wise man and the fool have equal access to the word of God. Both of them hear what he says. This implies that God's word is not some secret knowledge that only a select few have access to. No, his word is right there for all to hear and for all to heed. The fact that some fail to heed that word is not any fault of God's ability to communicate, it's the fault of the listener. So this makes us ask, how can we ensure that we are hearing what God says and not missing it? And in order to answer that question, I think we have to first ask, how does God speak to us? What is the method by which he speaks? The answer is simple and uncomplicated. God reveals truth to us in the inspired written words that we call the Bible. I suppose that in a Bible-believing, confessionally-reformed church like ours, this is just assumed. Of course, God speaks to us through the Bible. But remember, we have an inherent tendency to always be attracted to the wide gate, to the easy path, to the quick fix of laying a foundation on the sand because it's faster, it's more expedient. So we need to always be on guard to ensure that we're truly listening to God's word. Now, I would assume that every well-meaning, professing Christian here today would say, yes, I listen to God's word. It's important. It's true. It's the foundation of my life. But there are a couple of dangers that we are sometimes willfully oblivious to. I say willfully oblivious because if we were honest with ourselves, we probably know that we're doing doing it wrong, we just don't like to admit that we're not listening oftentimes. One of the dangers is simply failing to listen to God, neglecting his word, not trying to understand it, not paying attention to it. I had a listening problem as a boy. Not a hearing problem, I could hear fine. I had a listening problem. Being the only son in our family, I was often my dad's gopher. He'd be under the car fixing the engine or up in the attic working on some repair, and he'd say, Eugene, go get the Phillips head screwdriver in the green toolbox. It's in the shed there on the bottom shelf at the back of the shed next to the sockets. So I would casually walk out to the shed, and I would look and look and look, but there was no screwdriver. So I'd go back to my dad and say, it's not there. Well, he would moan and climb out from under the car or down from the attic, and somehow, magically, whatever he had sent me to fetch would be right there where he said it was, even though it wasn't there just a few moments earlier. The problem was I was sort of listening, but not really listening. I was absentmindedly listening, which is really just another way of saying I wasn't listening. I wonder how often we approach God's word with that same sort of negligent attention. We know we're supposed to be ordering our lives according to scripture, and so we read it. Maybe we even read it every day, but we read it half-heartedly, mindlessly, negligently. And then when it's time to go fetch the screwdriver, it's not where we thought it was. So we blame God for not making it clear when the real problem is we weren't listening like we should have. Maybe it's because we really don't care what God has to say. Maybe it's because we have a better plan. But whatever our motive, we're hearing but not listening. There's another sort of danger though, and perhaps this is the more subtle danger. I say it's more subtle because it has the appearance of faithfulness and love for God's word, and yet it is actually still neglect of that word. Another childhood failure from my past that illustrates this particular danger. One day my mom dropped me off at the store with a handful of cash and told me to go buy my school supplies for the upcoming year. Now this was quite the privilege because she typically didn't entrust this task to me. But at the top of the school supply list was a three ring binder. When I got to the three ring binder aisle, my eyes landed on the most amazing trapper keeper. You remember those? It had pockets and zippers and bells and whistles and it was covered with NFL logos, who could resist? But it cost about five times more than your basic three ring binder. So I had a little argument with my conscience about the definition of three ring binder. What is a three-ring binder, actually? And I determined that a fancy trapper keeper certainly fit within the parameters of the definition. So technically, I was still obeying my mother's instructions, so I bought the trapper keeper. But when I waltzed out to the car to show my mother how I had spent her money, she was unimpressed. And I did not receive the expected, well done, my good and faithful servant from my mom that day. She had given clear instructions And I knew deep down what those instructions meant, but I wanted to do my own thing. So I reinterpreted the word to fit what I wanted to do, all the while convincing myself that I was still in compliance, that I was still being a submissive, obedient sixth grader. Sometimes our neglect of God's Word is not the direct neglect of not listening to it, but the indirect neglect of reinterpreting it to fit my plan for my life. That way I get to pretend that I'm a faithful Bible-believing Christian, but I'm really just playing the fool. I'm building my life on the sinking sand of self-will and independence, which is really just called disobedience. Well, contrary to these stubborn tendencies that we have, Jesus is calling us in this parable to sincerely hear the Word of God, to be good listeners. The Protestant reformers had a lot to say about the nature of God's Word. They had a lot to say about God's Word because the theological and moral battles of their day were largely battles over the authority of Scripture. The Roman Catholic Church was asserting that the Church and not the Bible had the final say. That's the error of directly denying Scripture's authority, like I did when I didn't listen to my dad's instruction growing up. At the other end of the spectrum, certain extremists were claiming to have special revelation, what they would refer to as an inner light into the real meaning of Scripture. This was the error of indirectly denying Scripture's authority by reinterpreting it according to one's own wishes, like when I exegeted my school supply list to justify a trapper keeper. Against these extremes then, the Reformers articulated a list of qualities that they ascribed to Scripture. Qualities that if we affirm and take to heart, will make us better listeners when it comes to God's Word. In fact, there were five qualities that they identified, and I want to just briefly highlight them. First is the inspiration of Scripture. which is to say that scripture has been breathed out by God. In other words, he's the source of it. He's where this comes from. 2 Timothy 3.16 makes this explicitly clear. All scripture is given by the inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness. So God is the source. And if God is the source, then the next quality of Scripture is obviously the consequence. The second quality is that Scripture is authoritative. If it comes from God, and God as Creator is the supreme authority of the universe, then there is no word or truth or revelation that outranks Scripture. All of creation is subject to the word of God. Christians and non-Christians, the church and the state, men and women, children and adults, the physical world and the spiritual world, every sphere, every entity, every category of thing is under the authority of the word of God. And without that word, everything falls apart. This speaks to the third quality that the reformers ascribed to scripture, which is the necessity of God's word. Jesus Christ, scripture says, is the logos of God, the living word of God. And in him, Colossians 117, in Christ, all things hold together. God's word is necessary because without it, the universe ceases to exist. Fourthly, the Reformers asserted the clarity or the clearness of scripture. It means what it says and it says what it means. There's no secret code you need to unravel its true meaning. Its meaning is accessible to all by virtue of the fact that God created us to know and use words with which to communicate thoughts and feelings and desires and motives. And then God himself also used words to communicate his truth and his will. and the gospel to us. It's clear, it's accessible, and so there's no excuse not to listen to it. Lastly, there is the quality of sufficiency. The Word of God is sufficient. In other words, we don't need more information than what God in Scripture has revealed. To quote the Apostle Paul, we have everything we need to be thoroughly equipped for every good work in this inspired, authoritative, necessary, clear, and sufficient book that we call the Bible. It is the only foundation we need. It is the only foundation we have. It is the only foundation that works, and it's accessible to all, wise man and fool alike. Are you listening to God? The best way to know if you're listening is to pay attention to how you behave in the storms of life. In Christ's parable here, both the wise man and the fool heard the word of God. Both the wise man and the fool suffered the raging storm, but only the wise man endured through the storm. The storms of life have a way of making it obvious who is really listening to God and who is not. And if you're really listening to God, it will manifest itself in obedience to God, especially during those storms. And so we come to the second point of emphasis here in Christ's parable. Not only are we to listen to God, we're also to obey God. Verse 24, everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them, and does them. will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And like the dangers we considered with regard to how we listen to God, there are a couple of dangers related to our obedience to God. Ironically, both of these dangers can feel and look like obedience, but they're not. Let's call the first danger faith without holiness, and the second danger faith in our holiness. First, there is faith without holiness. It's the danger of thinking that faith in Christ without repentance from sin is all that matters. It's the belief that faith without faithfulness can save. It's the idea that faith without works is a real and living faith. The Bible calls it licentiousness, which is just a big word for license to sin. It's really just a Christianized disobedience. It's the sin of presuming upon the grace of God while tolerating sinful behaviors and attitudes. The rationale goes something like this. God is a gracious God. His grace is free and unconditional. Therefore, it doesn't matter whether or not I sin. God will forgive me, so I'll just keep on sinning. Romans 6.1, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? And the licentious person says, yes, absolutely. Grace will cover it. Obedience doesn't matter. This is faith without holiness, without repentance, without obedience. And it's building the house of my life on sand. It will eventually crumble because it's not real saving faith. When Christ gave his disciples the Great Commission in Matthew 28, how did he tell them to go about the process of making disciples? You remember, he said, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them and teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. A gospel that doesn't lead to holiness, that doesn't lead to obedience to what Christ has commanded, is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's faith without holiness. The other danger then is faith in my holiness. This is that old false gospel that we call legalism. It's trusting in my obedience as the grounds of God's acceptance of me. and this is an easy error to fall into. We think to ourselves, well, God says for me to obey him and I will be saved, therefore I will obey God and he will owe me the rescue that he has promised. The problem with that rationale is that not a single one of us have obeyed perfectly. All of us have at some point built our house on the sands of disobedience. And so while in theory we could earn salvation through perfect obedience, the fact of the matter is none of us has succeeded at perfect obedience. No one can obey their way into heaven because no one has obeyed perfectly. Faith in an imperfect holiness is faith in unholiness, and that sort of faith cannot save. So if neither faith without holiness nor faith in our holiness can save, where does that leave us? Well, it leaves us desperate for a rescue, desperate for a rescuer. It leaves us helpless, waiting for someone to save us in spite of ourselves. It leaves us standing in the ruins of a crumbling house on sinking sand, looking and hoping for a rock to stand on, a rock that won't sink, that won't cave in, that won't shift underneath the weight of the mess we've made of our lives. Beloved, do you know who that rock is? That rock is Jesus Christ, the cornerstone, the anchor of our souls, the rescuer of sinners. Jesus Christ listened to God the Father and obeyed his law perfectly. And now he credits his obedience to anyone and everyone who will rely on that obedience rather than on their own obedience. This is the gospel. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. It's not a faith without holiness because there is no such thing. It's not a faith in my holiness because that will not save. It is a faith in the holiness of another, in the holiness of Christ. It's a faith that's initiated and established and sustained for all eternity by the holiness of Jesus Christ. Now this faith in Christ is so real and so effective that it actually changes the sinner into something he wasn't before. In other words, this saving faith not only forgives the sinner, it also washes and cleanses the sinner. So that holiness rather than sinfulness becomes more and more the defining trait of the person who is trusting Christ for salvation. And so while our obedience is not the grounds or the cause of our salvation, it certainly is the result, the consequence of our salvation. Increasing obedience will always accompany true faith in Christ. What all of this means then is this. Listening to God and obeying what he says is not a matter of merely conforming my life to the ethical demands of the Bible. It results in that, but it begins with a full and unreserved acknowledgement that I am at my core unholy and a helpless fool whose only hope of salvation lies in the perfect righteousness and loving sacrifice of Christ. You remember how the Sermon on the Mount begins? It doesn't begin with the Ten Commandments. It begins with spiritual bankruptcy, poverty of spirit. It begins with sorrow and mourning over that spiritual poverty. And it begins with an insatiable hunger and thirst for righteousness to replace my wicked black heart. And from that place of helplessness and brokenness over my own sin, then it moves to Christ, the only one who fulfills the demands of the law and gives me a righteousness that supersedes the righteousness of the Pharisees. And only then does this gospel-saturated sermon begin to articulate the specifics of obedience to God's law. Hearing and doing the words of Christ, then, means hearing and doing all of the words of Christ, the words that call for brokenness over sin and faith in Christ, as well as the words that demand obedience to Christ. If we just started obedience to the law of God, we're hearing and doing part of what he says, but not all that he says, and that foundation will fail. If we just heed the part about saving faith and never heed the part about the subsequent fruit of righteousness working itself out visibly, objectively in our lives, we're hearing and doing part of what he says, but not all that he says, and that foundation will fail. No matter how Christian-y we may look on the outside, our life is either built on the foundation of all that Christ says, or it is not built on Christ at all. I don't know where you are spiritually or how this sobering parable of Christ finds you. Maybe it strikes terror in your heart at the possibility that you've spent your life building on a foundation of sinking sand and here you are facing the imminent threat of ruin. If that's you today, you need to recognize that the gospel is instantly available and instantly effective. You don't have to clean up your life or make yourself somehow worthy of coming to Christ. All you have to do is believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. If these verses strike fear in your heart, let me encourage you to get alone this afternoon or maybe with a Christian friend and spend some time talking to God. Tell him that you are a wretched sinner who deserves to be punished for your rebellion against his law and for your negligent disregard of his goodness and mercy to you. When you talk to God, you don't have to pretend you're something you're not. He already knows who you are. He already knows what you are. But he wants you to know what you are and to admit what you are. And from that place of honest recognition of your own sinfulness, ask God to forgive your sin and replace that sin with the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Ask for his saving grace and he promises to give it to you. Seek for this salvation and God promises that you will find it. Knock on God's door and mercy will come pouring out. Maybe some of you read these verses and you're flooded with relief that though you once were lost and headed for the very destruction that Christ describes here, you've been saved through the undeserved and overwhelming love of Christ crucified for you. If that's you, Christian, then take the time to stop and thank God for the salvation that he's extended to you. You who deserve death and ruin have instead been given life and freedom and joy and peace. Don't let a day go by that you don't stop and say to the Lord, thank you for this indescribable gift. And finally, I wonder if some of you Hear these verses today, these verses of stern warning and of incredible promise, blessing, but you're unmoved, untouched, unchanged by them. I'm afraid that all I can offer to you is pity and a heartfelt plea to wake up to the reality that you are in imminent danger, danger of being lost forever. The rains and floods and winds of God's judgment day will come. And all whose lives are built on anything other than the rock of Christ's righteousness will crumble. So listen to him and obey him. Christ is the word. Christ is the foundation. Christ is our obedience. Christ is our sanctifier. So live your life, all of your life, in such a way as to be able to say on that last day, on Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground. My feelings, my intellect, my self-righteousness, my comparing myself to other people, my self-confidence and ego, my self-sacrifice and self-pity, all other ground, anything that makes me think God owes me something is sinking sand. But Christ his forgiveness and his cleansing, his justifying me and his sanctifying me, his words of pardon and his words of instruction. In fact, everything Christ says that he is and will do for me is solid and immovable and worth staking my eternal soul upon. If that's the case, and it is, then listen to him and obey him. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we have nothing to bring to you that will impress you or catch your eye. In fact, all that we have, all that we are, is repulsive to you because you're too holy to look upon sin. Yet somehow, miraculously, you have provided a way for sinners to come home, for sons and daughters of Adam to return to the Garden of Eden. and feast with you and your Son and your Holy Spirit for all eternity. Lord, may every one of us in this room this morning find their way to the rock of salvation, the only foundation that can withstand the fierce winds of your righteous judgment. Save us, Lord, for the sake of your glory and for the sake of our everlasting joy, I pray in Jesus' name. our rock, and our Redeemer. Amen. Would you please stand with me as we close prayerfully with the hymn, We Rest on Thee, Our Shield and Our Defender. We rest on thee, our shield and our defender. We go not forth alone against the foe. Strong in thy strength, safe in thy keeping, ♪ We rest on thee and in thy name we go ♪ ♪ Strong in thy strength, safe in thy keeping tender ♪ ♪ We rest on thee and in thy name we go ♪ above. Jesus, our righteousness, our sure foundation, our Prince of glory and our King of Jesus, our righteousness, our sure foundation, our Prince of glory and our King of love, we rest on Thee. ♪ Passing through the gates of pearly splendor ♪ ♪ Exhorts me, rest with me through endless days ♪ ♪ When passing through the gates of pearly splendor ♪ Amen. Thank you, church, for being here this morning. I wanna encourage you to come back tonight as Brother Ben Ressler will be preaching again, a guest from Providence PCA, another church in our presbytery. And then there's a ice cream fellowship immediately following the service. It should be a great night to bring some friends, bring some family with you, your neighbors, invite them to come worship with us and then enjoy a time of fellowship tonight. So I encourage you to do that. As we close, would you receive now the Lord's benediction. This is from 1 Peter 2. God himself says, Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious. In church, Jesus Christ is that cornerstone. And scripture says, And whoever believes in him will not be put to shame. And all God's people said, Motion, motion, motion.