Turn with me then to Genesis 22. Genesis 22. We want to begin the addresses of this conference with the theme of substitution, because when we look at Jesus as a lamb, he really is substituting. He's taking the place of sinners so that we might go free. And we can look at this theme either through doctrinal texts from the New Testament, for example, where Paul and Peter talk about Christ's substitution, or you can look at it through a story. And I've chosen to look at it through a story. So let's read Genesis 22, 1-14. And it came to pass after these things that God did tempt Abraham and said unto him, Abraham, and he said, Behold, here I am! And he said, Take now thy son, thy only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell thee of. And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering and rose up and went into the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said unto his young men, abide ye here with the ass and I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it upon Isaac, his son, and he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went, both of them, together. And Isaac spake unto Abraham, his father, and said, My father, and he said, Here I am, my son. He said, Behold the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering? And Abraham said, my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went both of them together. And they came to the place which God had told him of. And Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched forth his hand and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham! And he said, Here am I. He said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him. For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram, a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead as a substitute for his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-Jireh. Literally, the Lord provides. As it is said to this day in the mount of the Lord, it shall be seen. Let's pray. Great God of heaven, we ask that thou would be with every speaker in this conference. that in this camp and that thou wouldst do wondrous things through these addresses on this wonderful theme of the Lamb of God. Lord, like a diamond we hope to show various facets of this great jewel of a doctrine, that Jesus is our substitutionary Lamb, our suffering Lamb, our glorious redeeming Lamb. And we pray, fill the hearts of every camper with a hunger and a thirst for this Lamb, and give to each one to embrace the Lamb of God. And those who don't know Him, Lord, may they leave this camp knowing Him, rejoicing in Him as the only substitute, the only way of salvation, the only name given among men under heaven, whereby we must be saved. So bless us now, bless us in speaking, in listening, in learning, and help every young person here to get the very most out of this camp as they possibly can, and to be praying for one another as well as themselves, and the speakers, and the chaperones, and the directors. Lord, let Thy benediction rest upon this camp in a mighty, memorable, eternally memorable way, we pray, so that young people may be saved, and that the saved may be matured, and Thy name may be exalted. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, Genesis 22 speaks about a tremendous trial, the greatest trial Abraham ever had to face in his life, and perhaps one of the greatest trials ever recorded in the Bible. God commands Abraham, in verse 2, to take his son, his only son whom he loves, and to get to the Mount Moriah and offer him for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of. Now that's an awesome thing. I don't think we realize tonight the magnitude of this trial. We're so used to this story. But this is a huge trial, a comprehensive trial for Abraham. Isaac is about 25 years old. Abraham is about 125 years old. Isaac was a child born in their old age, a special child, long after Sarah had entered those years where you couldn't get pregnant anymore. Isaac is not only special that way, but he's the personification of the gospel, of the promises of God. God said through Isaac, seed, your Savior shall come. He promised that the Messiah would be born from the ancestors of Isaac. So every time Abraham looks at Isaac for 25 years, you understand, he sees the faithfulness of God. He sees the gospel. He sees the promises of God. He sees God's goodness to him. Isaac represents to him everything that is good, everything that is God, everything that is covenant, everything that is promise, everything that is faithful, everything that is going to be his salvation in the future, as well as the present. And God says, take this son. This only son, the son you waited decades for, the son of promise, the son of gospel, and go and offer this son. I'm not Mariah. For me, it's amazing. Your only son. What a mysterious trial. God seems to be contradicting himself. Doesn't he? Why would God do this? Give him and then take him away. It's the greatest trial, the greatest mystery Abraham ever experienced. He had to sacrifice everything. It was all a mystery. Take thy son, thy only son, God who seemed to be his friend, Abraham, as the friend of the Father, comes against him, so it seems, as his enemy. You see, God can often deal with us in mysterious ways in your life, in my life, ways we can't understand, ways that seem to make no sense. God can deal strangely with us, such that we have to say, as we read in John, What I do now, you don't know, but you will know hereafter. And sometimes it seems like in our trials that God has forgotten to be kind. That God has forgotten the gospel. Forgotten His promises. His ways are past finding out. And especially that is true in His word of promise and His work of providence. seemed to be at cross swords with each other. That's what's going on here, this mystery. The promise was, and Isaac, as he will be called, the providence said, go sacrifice your only son. Now, of course, we know that this trial wasn't only comprehensive and mysterious, but purposeful. We know the end of the story. We know that God was just trying Abraham to mature his faith. That God's purpose was to exercise Abraham. That he wanted to test him. That he wanted to strengthen him in faith. That he wanted to show him the substitutionary character of his salvation through the ram. But Abraham didn't know that. And you see, young people, when you go through trials, big trials in life, like losing a loved one, or like some trial that hits you full force that you weren't anticipating that seems to wipe away your future or your hope. You see, you don't understand what God is doing. God seems to hide his friendly face, as the poet said, behind his frowning providence. What a trial. And the question then is, of course, will we obey God in the midst of trial? Will we surrender to God in the midst of unspeakable trial? By nature, we don't. But Abraham did. It's amazing. Look at verse 3. Abraham rose up early in the morning, saddled his ass, took two of his young men with him. Isaac, his son, claimed the wood for the burnt offering, rose up, went to the place of which God had told him. He doesn't wait. early in the morning. He doesn't delay. He immediately obeys. Astonishing obedience. It's as if he says with Mary in the New Testament, behold the handmaid of the Lord. I'll do whatever the Lord says. And then the next verse, then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place afar off. Wow! Wow! Forty miles in three days with Isaac with all this luggage. He doesn't hesitate a moment. He goes to obey God in sacrificing his son. For three days he's looking at his son as if he were a dead son. For three days his son mentally was lost to him. Imagine his feelings traveling those three days, taking his son. He's going to kill. The father deprived of the son. Like a funeral before the death. Three days. Forty miles. And then we're told in verse 6, he takes the wood. on which Isaac will be stretched out, which his blood will stain, the wood of execution. And Abraham puts that wood on Isaac's shoulders himself. Imagine a dad doing that to a boy. And Isaac carries on his back the wood on which he would be stretched out to die, and Abraham knows it. But you see, this is all a type of the Lord Jesus Christ. carried his cross, his wood, Isaac is here a type of the greater Isaac, his wood on his shoulders to the place of execution as our substitute lamb. And then Abraham takes fire in his hand and a knife. Think of that, the father carries the murder weapon. What sort of a burden was that for a father to bear? To hold in his very hand the knife that he knows when he gets there three days from now will plunge into his son's body. And the other hand, the fire with which he's going to burn his corpse. It's overwhelming. The father carries both of the instruments of punishment and judgment, and he himself will exact the penalty. Abraham's a type of God the Father, and what he will do to his own son. Verse six ends this way. They went, both of them, together, the Father and the Son. God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, the Father put on his Son, His only begotten Son, the perfect Son, the Son of promise, the Son of gospel. The fire of His wrath plunged the sword into His side. And then Isaac speaks. Verse 7, My Father, My Father, One old Puritan by the name of Robert Hall says this, I know not whether that word father did not strike Abraham as deep as the knife of Abraham could strike his own boy. Father, where is the lamb? Father, we've gone to offer sacrifices many times, and you've always brought the fire and the knife and the wood, but you've forgotten the lamb. It's an echo, isn't it? It's an echo of Gethsemane. Oh, my father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. But no, my son, you, you, you have got to be the Lamb. You see, Isaac reminds his father he's forgotten something. It's a powerful question. And Isaac knows, he knows, he's been trained, he knows the principle of the question. The principle of the question is this. Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. Dad, he says to Abraham, I know we cannot approach the living God without a substitute, without a sacrifice. Where is the Lamb? How can we worship God without blood? We deserve to die. You deserve to die, Dad. I deserve to die. I know this much. We need a Lamb. Well, that same experience goes on when God saves our souls still today. And we come and we try. I know many of you have tried that. You've tried to make yourself right with God, right? You try to patch up your life. You try to live holy. You try to convince yourself you're converted. But God has stripped you away of all your righteousness. And he's emptied you. And you've experienced that you cannot work yourself into the favor of God. You need a lamb, you need blood, you need someone else to come and suffer and die for you to take your place. And be it through a sermon, be it through a series of sermons, be it through reading the Bible, be it through conversation with your friends, or reading good books, God has gradually showed you or more suddenly showed you, perhaps. that the only one who can be your Lamb, the only one who can substitute for you, is the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. And you raise that question in your soul, how can I be righteous with God? How can I find peace with God? Without a Lamb, without blood in my place, because I'm a sinner, and I've sinned every day of my life. Actually, when you understand it rightly, You sinned every single second of your life. You know, God says sin is a transgression of the law, right? So when you sin, you transgress His law. Now what does His law demand? His law demands love. First table, love to God above all, right? Have you, by nature, ever loved God above yourself and above anyone else for one second in your life? You never have. By nature, we're just selfish. So that means every single second of your life, you're sinning against God's law in terms of love to God. And what's the second table of the law? You should love your neighbors yourself. You know you've never done that either. That's not natural. We always love ourselves most. We look out for number one, which is me. And so we're sinners, we have a bad heart, we've got a bad record, and we're actually sinning every single second of our life, every tick of the clock, we're disobeying God, disobeying God, disobeying God, either by omitting to love, or by committing acts or thoughts or words or deeds to show that we don't love. And so we're piling up mountains and mountains and mountains of sin that reach to the heavens, mountain ranges of sin. And we can't undo it, and we can't stop sinning. We're sinoholics. And you see the question then becomes when the Holy Spirit shows you that, and you see you can't reform your life, you see it's hopeless, you see that, well, your whole life is a stream of sin. You know then you need a substitute. You need a greater Isaac. You need someone to take your place. And that's how Abraham answers his son now. Verse 8, Abraham said, my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. That's amazing. You would have thought that at this point, Abraham would have said, my son, you have got to be the burnt offering. This time, you will be the lamb. God has commanded me to sacrifice you. But Abraham doesn't tell him that yet. Yet. Is he trying to cover up? No, no. Abraham believes in God's promise. Abraham believes that at the bottom of everything, somehow God will make it well. He trusts God. He trusts the loving character of God. Though the mystery is great, he believes in the promises of God. So when he gets to the bottom of the mount and he looks up, and he knows this is the place, the place, of sacrifice. He says to the men and the servants, you stay here. And then you notice what he says? I and the lad, young man now about 25, calls him a lad, compared to 125, he is a lad. I and the lad will go up and worship and come back to you. Come back to you. And Hebrews 11 says, Abraham believed that God would raise up Isaac from the dead. You see, now we know that Abraham, in the midst of all his grief, in the midst of all his fears, he was grounded in faith. He believed that even though he had to put the knife through his son, that God would raise him up from the dead because the gospel cannot be lost and the promises of God cannot fail. He believed in the reliability of God in his character. That's just such an amazing thing. Hi, and the lad will come back to you. Hebrews 11, 17 through 19, By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac, accounting that God was able to raise him up even from the dead. My son, God will provide himself. a lamb for a burnt offering, a substitutionary lamb, someone that will take your place, how Abraham didn't know, when Abraham didn't know, but he believed it. And the amazing thing is Isaac didn't ask him any questions. You'd think Isaac would say, but dad, I don't see a lamb. What are you talking about, dad? There's no lamb here. But nothing. He rests. He rests in the comfort of his Father's rest, that his Father is trusting in the promises, so he trusts in the promises. What a blessed thing that is, to rest in the promises of God. You know, all of God's promises are for his people. One of the old Puritans said the five to 10,000 promises in the Bible are like golden coins in a huge bag and God comes to his people and he unties the strings and he pours out the whole bag at their feet and he says, take what you will. And yet there can be special promises in the Bible that God seems to apply to your soul at special times. And you know, Both the special promises to your soul, as well as the promises in general, are grounds for which you may stake your soul upon them and you may go forward, no matter how impossible those promises may seem. I was at one point in my young life, a very hopeless situation. There was no future for me. It was just dark, it was impossible. It seemed like there was no end, there's no way out. And God gave me this promise from Proverbs 23, in a powerful way one day, there shall surely come an end, and thy expectation shall not be cut off. Well, that end did not come for 14 more years. And I pleaded that promise. I laid that promise before God. Sometimes five times a day, sometimes 100 times a day. Sometimes it was just going through my mind all day long. And as I was about to doubt, I was about to succumb underneath my unbelief, I just repeated over and over and over and over and over again. But it was absolutely impossible. But God fulfilled it. His time, His way. You trust on God's promises. You will never, ever be disappointed in the end. And you'll learn to walk by faith in the process before the promise is fulfilled, which is good for you as well. And so that's what has to happen to Isaac and Abraham, you see. They get to the top of the mount. Isaac has trusted in the promises his father told him about. But when he gets to the top of the mount, there's no lamb there again. No lamb appears. Abraham puts the wood on top of the heap of stones, on top of the altar, and Isaac sees no lamb. Again, you see, the question is real for him. Where is the lamb? Isaac and Abraham both have to die. Die to everything but God. Isaac has to die because he has to be the lamb. Abraham has to die because he has to give up his own son. He had to sacrifice the personification of the promise upon which he also relied himself unto salvation. They both have to die. They both have to die to themselves and in themselves and by themselves. They both saw nothing but death before them. I know it's interesting. The Bible doesn't tell us about Abraham's conversation with Isaac. But there on top of the mount, Abraham had to tell his son, Son, you're a lot stronger than me. You can run away from me. You can beat me up. But son, my God is telling me that you need to stretch yourself out. This time you are the lamb. And I need to sacrifice you. Imagine the interview. Imagine this old man telling his strong young son. Imagine the tears. Imagine the embraces. Imagine their arms around each other, and Abraham is saying, I know, my son, I know, but I can't do it any other way. It's God's command. I must obey the Lord. And then Isaac is saying, Father, I trust You. I trust God. I'm willing to stretch out myself. I'm willing to die. I'm willing to be tied down by You. I'm willing to give up my life at Your hand. Do you understand what's going on? This is a picture of the Father from eternity saying to His Son, My Son, I want to save sinners. And the only way to save them is by Your hand, only by You stretching Yourself out on the cross. And My Son, I need to plunge the spear into Your side. You need to die for hell-deserving rebels and enemies and wicked people who rebel against You. but whom I have loved from an everlasting love. My son, are you willing to give your life?" And Jesus says, My Father, it is My will to do Your good pleasure. It is My meat and drink to obey You. From eternity, Psalm 47 and 8, My ear hast Thou opened. I was bored with it all. I am Thy willing servant for the rest of Eternity, and throughout my life, and to eternity, I come to do Thy will, O my God, and Thy law is within my heart. I'll be the greater Isaac. I'll stretch myself out." And the father would not and could not hold back. He had to do it. And Jesus cried out, My God, my God, Why hast Thou forsaken me in the fullness of time on Mount Calvary?" The top of the mountain where there was no other ram, there was no other lamb. It was Jesus and He had to go through with it. And He couldn't come down like the earthly Isaac. The Father could not hold back. He had to plunge the sword into His only begotten beloved Son. to be your substitute, to cover for your sins, my sins. You want to know how bad sin is? Go to Calvary and view your sin, as Thomas Watson said, in the red glass of the blood of Christ's sufferings, and you will begin to understand how bad sin is. This is the greater Isaac and the greater Abraham, the father and the son. And you see, when a sinner experiences that still today, and he bows under God's judgments, when he becomes Isaac before God and says, I'm worthy to perish, I'm worthy to die. I'm worthy that thou would put the sword through me. God intervenes. And God says, Abraham, Abraham, lay not thy hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything to him. For now I know that you fear me. since you haven't withheld your only son from me." You see, God had reached his goal. God had reached his goal. It had been revealed that Abraham loved God more than his son. It had been revealed that Abraham believed the promise, although the promise appeared to be contradicted by the dark providences of God. Abraham confirmed. that he believed in God's promises and thereby God was glorified. And astonishingly, Isaac's life is preserved, spared. But how is that possible? Isaac is a sinner. Isaac does deserve to die. He's a descendant of Adam. How could God spare him? Verse 13. Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son." And right there, young people, is the heart of the entire gospel, in the stead of his son, as a substitute for his son. There lies your hope, your salvation, your future, your promise. God gives his son to take your place, to pay for your sin, to go through the death you deserve to die through his death, and to live the life that you cannot live but should have lived so that you can live forever. And so Abraham turns, and there's a ram caught in a thicket. Actually, my wife and I were in Israel, and we were going up the side of a hill hiking in Israel, and we came around a corner, And there was a little scrubly little bush there. Israel's very barren. And there was, it's almost picture perfect, but there was a ram. His thorn wasn't caught in the thicket, but he was right there eating off that little bush. I was astonished. This is exactly what Abraham experienced. Only God caused the ram's horns to be caught in the thicket, caught in the bush. And God said, there is a substitute. There is a substitute. And see, through the whole Old Testament economy, through those 4,000 years, God used animals as a substitute. Not because they could take away our sin, but they were pointing, they were pointing to the Lamb of God. Only this Lamb, the substitute Lamb, the New Testament Lamb, Jesus, there was no substitute for Him. The creator Isaac had to go through it all. You see, that's the point. That's the whole gospel point here. He had said from eternity, Lo, I come to do Thy will, O my Father. Thy law is within my heart. And he had to go through with it. And so like Isaac, he went up on the mountain with the wood upon his shoulders, the wood of the altar. So Jesus went up to Calvary with a cross on His shoulders. But for Christ, there's no ram to take His place. Abraham's son was spared so that God would not spare his own son. The son of God could not be spared. No one could take his place. He could not be spared so that you could be spared. That's the gospel. That's the substitute. That's the amazing truth of the Word of God. Christ had to do a work that no one else could do. He had to bear and bear away the eternal wrath of God against sin, so that when you as a poor sinner throw yourself at His feet, cast all your sins before Him, hide nothing from Him, tell Him how bad you are, how hell worthy you are, He says to you, just believe in Me, and for the sake of My Son, you will have life eternal. And He gives Himself away. He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. He tried the winepress of God's wrath alone, and none of the nations was with Him. He had to be forsaken of God, forsaken of hell, forsaken of earth, forsaken of His own disciples, forsaken of everything, even forsaken by nature. Even the sun won't shine upon Him. And there in the midst of darkness, when everything is eerily silent, and the burden of all your sins and my sins are resting upon him. In the midst of that darkness, he cries out with a loud voice, my God, my God, why has thou forsaken me? And the answer is the sword comes down upon him and he dies so that you, And I would never have to be forsaken of God. So verse 14 concludes, in the mount of the Lord it shall be seen Jehovah Jireh, the Lord intervenes. And we see Isaac and Abraham coming down the mountain together. What an awesome thing, coming down the mountain together. Isaac is walking up the mount with his father three times. It says they went together, but they came back together. And the only reason they could come back together is because Jesus went to Mount Calvary alone and died alone, forsaken of all. You see, this is a miracle. This is a wonder. Behold the wonder. The ram remains on the top of the mountain. The ram has been reduced to ashes. Isaac knows why he's still alive. A substitute has been found. Isaac will never forget this for the rest of his life. God let a ram take his place, pointing him to the Messiah to come. And you see, when we are delivered from the hell we know we deserve, we will never forget, whether it happens suddenly or gradually, we will never forget what we deserve. Isaac was a grateful man when he came down from that mount. He didn't deserve to walk. He didn't deserve to breathe. He didn't deserve to live. And neither do you and I. Every breath is a gift of Almighty God. I see when God delivers His people, they know why they're delivered. It's only because of the Lamb of God who remained on top of Mount Calvary. The Lamb that was slain. In terms of God's prophetical decree from the stillness of eternity, says Revelation 13 verse 8, in the decree of God, he was willing to give himself so that his bonds become your freedom, his death becomes your life, his curse becomes your peace, his shame becomes your crown and glory. Dear young person, this Savior is presented to you again at this camp, and again in this first talk of this camp. He's available for you. He's willing to be your Savior. There is now therefore no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. Realize you're a sinner. Don't try to make yourself better with God. Humble yourself, repent, confess your sin, and believe in the Son of God. Cast yourself at His feet and trust Him. And then, when you've tasted the sweetness of His salvation at Mount Calvary, come down from the mount and go out and live for Him and serve Him all the days of your life. serve him completely, be like Caleb, serve him fully with all your heart, and you'll never, ever, ever, ever, ever regret that. His service is a delight. He's a wonderful God. I've met many, many people in my lifetime, hundreds of thousands of people, I've talked with tens of thousands of people about their soul. Many, many thousands of older people. And I want to tell you something. I've never met a person in my entire life that was sorry they found the gospel and spent their life in the service of the living God. Never once. But I've met a lot of people who wept in front of me, bitter tears, that they didn't seek the Lord when they were young and didn't surrender to the gospel when they were young and feared now they were too old, it was too late. Young people, there's only one way to live. It's Jesus. For me to live, said Paul, is Christ. And there's only one way to die. It's in Christ. And then it says, Paul, death will be your gain. I want to close tonight by just giving you a story. Many of you have heard it. Many of you have heard me tell it more than one time. But I want to tell it once more. There was once an English nobleman in the 1850s. He went to California. made millions more, California Gold Rush, was coming back home through New Orleans, and he did what many tourists did in those days. He went to see the African, the infamous African slave trading block, came around the corner. Beautiful young African girl was being sold as a slave. Two men were in the back of the crowd trying to out-vie each other to get her. And they were outbidding each other. And they were whispering to each other what they'd do to her if they got her. And the nobleman was incensed. It wasn't good. And he got the auctioneer's attention. He said, I'll give twice the price anyone would give for this slave. And the auctioneer stopped in his tracks. And he said, do you really have the money? No one's ever paid that much for a slave. And he took some bills out of his pocket, waved them. The auctioneer said, sold. The nobleman came up to the stand, took the young lady down. And she spit him in the face. And she said, I hate you. And he wiped the spit away. He took her by the hand, took her into a downtown office, argued with the man behind the desk. He finally got out some papers. He signed the papers, handed them to the young lady, and said, here are your manumission papers. And the young lady spit him in the face and said, I hate you. And he wiped the spit away. And he said, don't you understand? You are free. You are free. And she just stared at him. She couldn't comprehend it for a moment. Then suddenly she fell at his feet. She began to weep and weep and weep. She clung to his feet and she finally looked up at him and she said, Sir, do you really mean to tell me that you paid twice the amount anyone has ever paid for the price of a slave just to set me free? He said, Yes. And she started weeping again. And finally she looked up at him and she said, sir, I have just one favor to ask of you. Can I be your slave forever? See, that's how a Christian feels. I've spit him in the face, I've hated him with my sins, I've shown my hatred, my rebellion, but he keeps offering me the gospel. He keeps coming with his love. How can I resist him? He's so good to me. He hasn't paid just twice the amount anyone paid for the price of a slave. He gave his only begotten Son, whom he loved from eternity, for me, for sinful, unworthy, hell-worthy you. How could you stand before Him on the great day and say, Lord Jesus, I heard a thousand times in my life that You came for sinners just like me, and I rebuffed them all. I went to that camp in 2017, and I heard message after message about the Lamb of God, that He did everything for a sinner. This is the only way to live, the only way to die, the only way to be reconciled with God. And I pushed it all away. Don't do that this week. Because then Jesus will say to you, my patience has come to an end. I've never known you. Bind this sinner hand and foot and cast him away into the everlasting pit where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth forever. And you deserve every bit of it. Have you ever, ever tried to love someone who would not receive your love? It's one of the most painful experiences of life. You try to show the person. You say to the person, I love you. The person says, I don't believe it. God is coming with every gospel offer to you. He came even when you were baptized as a baby. And he said, I'm putting my triune name on your forehead. I'm willing to be your God. Stop going on without him then. Bend the knee. Just give it all up. and throw your sins at his feet and say, Lord, if you'd pay that kind of price for a sinner like me, I want to be your slave forever, serve you forever. You will never be sorry. Let's pray. Great God of heaven, We bow before thee in these moments. We are so ashamed, Lord, of every sin of our lives, that we would dare to sin against such a good God, even after grace has been received. Lord, we are so sorry that we could ever sin against such love. But we also rejoice with joy unspeakable that thy love is not dependent upon our perfect track record, but only upon the perfect record of thy Son, because thou didst view poor sinners who believe in thee through thy Son. Thou art just and the justifier of him who believes in Jesus. Help every young person who knows thee to renew their vows right now. and help every young person that doesn't know Thee to confess their sin and embrace the promise right now. Oh God, don't, don't, don't let us go our own way to self-destruction. Please, Lord, be our substitute Lamb. every one of us, every one of us, we pray, in Jesus' name, amen.