We read God's Word in the third chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians. The text this evening will be verses 16 through 19, which we will not read a second time, and therefore to which we will pay special attention as we read the chapter. For this cause I, Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you, word, how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery, as I wrote afore in few words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel, whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ. to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him. Wherefore, I desire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you, which is your glory. For this cause, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. And here begins our text. That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God. Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, World without end. Amen. We read God's Word this far. Beloved saints in Jesus Christ, the text that we consider this evening is the content of the apostles' prayer for the saints in Ephesus. For this cause, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," he said in verse 14. And in our text, he sets forth what that prayer is that he makes before the throne of grace. For this cause, he makes the prayer. And if you ask for what cause, then go back all the way into chapter 2 and understand the glorious truth that the Apostle has set forth there of the church being the body of Jesus Christ. Because the church is the body of Christ, because every member of the church is part of the glorious body of Jesus Christ, he prays for the church that the blessings and riches of Jesus Christ might fill the church and fill her members that it be evident we are the body of Jesus Christ. And yet His prayer is not just for the body as a whole, His prayer is for you, which means, especially seeing the King James distinguishes thee and you, distinguishes the singular and the plural, it is for you, plural, for all of us who are saints in the body of Jesus Christ. Evidently, it's a prayer for the saints. Congregations do not have an inner man, which must be strengthened, but saints do. As the apostle makes this prayer as a faithful apostle of Jesus Christ, and the prayer is inspired by the spirit of Jesus Christ, you and I can understand that this prayer is one that Jesus Christ himself prays at the right hand of God on your behalf and on mine." That means that the prayer will be heard by our Heavenly Father, that it will also be answered. Here is a petition for something that we will receive, put in the form of a petition because our need is great, but expressed with confidence. The Father will hear and answer. And therefore it becomes your prayer for each other, my prayer for you, yours for me, and ours for those who this evening made confession of faith, that they be strengthened in the inner man. This is a lofty prayer. The grammar, the sentence flow of the entire chapter and then of the prayer indicates that. It's one sentence. And in fact, throughout the epistle at different points, and especially in chapter 3, it's as if the Apostle is bubbling over so much as he contemplates and adores the mercies of God in Jesus Christ, that he does not put a period and he goes on and on. And so with the prayer, one sentence with various clauses, as one pours out his heart to Jehovah God before the throne of grace, his need is ongoing and is so great. But even the composition of the prayer indicates that it's lofty. The English translation of the prayer, as we have it in our text, uses the word, that, several times. That He would grant you, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. That ye may be able to comprehend with all saints. that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God." And these different that's, one English word, are translations of different words in the Greek or different grammatical constructions that show that the prayer is building, each part of the prayer building on what preceded. So that we have the fundamental petition that you be strengthened in the inner man and that Christ dwell in your hearts by faith. And then we have the desired result that the Apostle seeks, that ye may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ. And then finally we have the ultimate goal, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God. And even though I don't use those phrases, the basic petition, the desired result, the ultimate goal as the divisions of my sermon this evening, yet the sermon is still divided along those lines. I call your attention to the text under the theme, Praying for Strength in the Inner Man. First of all, strengthened by the Spirit. Secondly, apprehending Christ's love. And thirdly, filled with God's fullness. The main petition is twofold. First of all, that He would grant you to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man. And then in 17, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. Let's see the relationship between those two parts of the petition a moment. It isn't that the one follows the other in a temporal way, it does of course follow it in the words. But it isn't that first God fills us with His Spirit and strengthens us in the inner man and then we dwell in Christ by faith. Or that we are strengthened in order to dwell in Christ by faith. He who is strengthened in the inner man already has Jesus Christ dwelling in him by faith. So the apostle is setting forth the petition twice, he's repeating it as it were, to make something else emphatic in the second part, and we'll come momentarily to what the emphatic point is, but notice that it's really one petition restated with a different emphasis. Much like the Lord taught us in the sixth petition, which we'll come to soon. A two-fold petition. lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, twofold, with one basic meaning." So the fundamental petition is that the saints be increased in spiritual strength, that ye be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man. Evidently, the apostle has in mind a spiritual strength, a power, that is of a spiritual and not a physical earthly nature. That power that he seeks and prays for is the power for the saints to live as God's children and as members of the body of Christ ought to live. To make evident in our life and our confession that we are God's. And as he'll go on to express it immediately in the next chapter, that we might walk worthy of the vocation wherewith we are called. Evidently this is a spiritual strength. It comes first of all from the Spirit, as the text indicates, that you might be strengthened with might by His Spirit. And secondly, it is a spiritual strength as is evident from the fact that it's put into the inner man and it's exercised by the inner man. Point of application to make for the moment. is that though we may and have been taught to pray for our daily bread and for earthly strength, the spiritual strength that comes from God is far more necessary. What then is that inner man that needs strengthening? The answer is that it is the life of Jesus Christ himself as he has planted it in us by the wonder work of regeneration. The inner man is the regenerated man. The regenerated man or woman is one who has Jesus Christ dwelling in him or her already by a wonder work of the grace of God. What the Apostle calls in our text the inner man, he calls elsewhere the new man. in distinction from the old man. And in other places, again, the inward man in distinction from the outward man. The same reality, but each of those conveying something of a different thought, and the emphasis here in that the Spirit used the word inner man, is that this man is hidden within us. He's deeply planted in our hearts and in our souls. You look at one another, and look at one another merely as humans now, what we see with the eyes, and say, as I look at you, I see a body, and I see a face, and I see a torso, I see everything I would expect a human to have, but I see nothing more to the earthly eyes than a human being. And the Apostle is teaching us that we are more than what meets the eye. By the grace of God, there is a part to our human nature, a reality that's not immediately evident, it must become evident. We must recognize it in each other as we get to know each other more, as we speak to one another about the spiritual things of God, and as we see how each other lives in the midst of the world, it must be evident that there is an inner man that expresses himself, but immediately as you look at one outwardly, you do not see this inner man. It's hidden within. And yet what God hides within. is an amazing, astounding creation. The life of Christ implanted in a dead sinner, so that one who was dead, as we confess we all are and were by nature, lives. One who could have no fellowship with God, one who could not love the law of God or begin to obey that law of God, now does. One who could not will that which is good, now wills what is good as a fruit of the grace of God. We have this inner man. This is part of the confession that each of us makes and that young people made this evening. You are more your body you also are a soul and that a renewed soul you will live in such a way as to show that that soul is renewed that Christ dwells in your heart by faith the sinner man is alive but he needs strength And we can understand that just as a little infant born into the world is alive and yet needs strength, just as a tender plant growing up out of the ground is alive and yet needs strength, so does the inner life of Jesus Christ need continual strengthening. This is not to say or speak of any deficiency in the life of Christ. This is to recognize that that life of Christ has been implanted into human beings, into sinners, and that life needs strength because we still battle against the old man. That life needs strength because not only do we battle against the old man within, but we battle against Satan and the world without. It needs strengthening. And we turn in prayer, as does the Apostle, to Jesus Christ himself, the one whose life it is, who will strengthen his own life. Fundamentally, that's the petition that the Apostle makes, Lord, strengthen us, empower us, cause us to grow. And if we ask what really is the theological grace that especially he has in mind in this first part of the petition, it is the grace of sanctification, cause us to grow in holiness. The second part of the prayer, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, We have explained elements of already, but the emphasis of that second part and the reason why it's added to the first part is the need now for preservation. Sanctification, that we be strengthened in the inner man, and preservation, that Christ dwell in your hearts by faith. Now, to explain that this phrase refers to preservation, we have to realize that the words translated dwell in your hearts, Christ dwelling in us, do not refer to Christ initially taking up His residence in us. We don't pray and it's not the way God works anyway. That first the Spirit works in us and gives us strength and then later Christ comes to take up residence in us. But the prayer and the meaning of the words translated dwell in you is that that residence be an established and a permanent residence. Now we know the doctrine of the preservation of the saints. And we know that Christ, when He takes up residence in a man, when He gives that man or woman new life, will never depart out of that man or woman again. God never takes His grace away and causes one whom He made alive again in Christ to become dead. Yet we wonder sometimes, don't we, in a time of weakness, Maybe because we've been led through a great trial. Our faith is being tried. Maybe because we see in us how great that old man is, how strong he appears to be, and how small the fruits of the obedience of the new man appear to be. Do we not sometimes wonder if Christ has removed himself from us and is no longer within us? A person might. He does not. He will not. And the prayer is that Christ dwell in us, take up permanent residence, especially from the viewpoint now of your and my being confident that He has done so. That's a prayer we might make for each other in addition to the prayer for sanctification that would be strengthened by the Spirit. that each one of us more and more understands that Christ lives in us, more and more understands that the grace we've received is a grace that will never be taken from us so that we can more and more express that life of Christ in all that we think and say and do. Now to put those two parts of the prayer together, for sanctification, for strengthening, for preservation, that Christ dwells in us permanently, we see that the preservation of the saints, that wonderful work of God, is not just merely a matter of God barely letting the saint survive spiritually. It's a matter of God causing the saint to grow and to grow and to grow from a spiritual infant to a mature man and woman. This is the prayer we make this evening on behalf of young people who've made confession of faith, and the prayer we make this evening for each other. God, preserve us and give us to grow. Appropriately then, the apostle makes clear that he addresses this prayer to the God who alone can and will. And I refer now not only to what he said in the context in verse 14, but what he said in the beginning of our text, that He would grant you, that He would give you this grace. The fact is that you and I are unable to grow of ourselves. We're unable to take the Spirit and make Him work within us. We're unable to cause Jesus Christ to dwell in our hearts, established and settled forever. And not only are we unable to, but we are unworthy of this blessing, being sinners. And so we turn to God, who alone can and will. There's a phrase in the text which magnifies, which emphasizes both the ability of God and the willingness of God, that He would grant you according to the riches of His glory. That phrase has far more embedded and implied in it than we can bring out this evening. But first of all, it underscores His ability, for He has riches of these blessings which we seek. We who are poor, pauper spiritually, turn to Him whose storehouse is endless and exhaustless. But it also emphasizes that He can't, not only that He can, but that He will. For He will give us according to the riches of His glory. And what is that glory? That glory is His own grace, His own goodness, that which makes Him glorious. All of His virtues and attributes, He will pour them out on us according to His riches and His storehouse. He will answer this prayer. And then the Apostle directs us to how. That is the one fundamental principle by which God answers the prayer and that is by His Spirit. There isn't a work that God does in which He does not carry it out by His Spirit. The work of creation, of which we read in Genesis 1, He carried out by His Spirit. The work of providence, Psalm 104, reminds us God carries out by His Spirit. And in a far more glorious and deeper way, every aspect of the work of salvation, God carries out by His Spirit. That's because that Spirit is the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Christ, the One who earned our salvation, and who's seated at the right hand of God, bestows that salvation, and therefore who bestows it only through His own agent, the Holy Spirit, that is the Spirit of Sanctification. And now with application to us this evening, the question is, how does the Spirit do that? And the answer is, by pointing us to Jesus Christ Himself. Pointing us back to the Word. You desire to be strengthened in might in your inner man? Look to Christ. You desire that Christ dwell in your heart by faith such that you always experience and consciously enjoy His indwelling? Look to Christ by faith in the power of the Spirit. And then that Christ is made known by the Spirit in the Word, and in the Word as it's written in the Scriptures, as well as in the Word as it's preached, which leads me to this practical point The answer to this prayer is experienced in the way of our use of the means of grace. You can't pray for strength from the Spirit and the assurance of Christ indwelling you and have a casual relationship, if even that, to the Church of Jesus Christ on earth. If you say, I'm a Christian, He lives in me, and I know the preservation of the saints, He lives in me, so He'll always live in me. Therefore, what good is going to church? Why would I go use the sacraments? If you say that, you don't understand what it is to be sanctified by the Spirit and preserved, and you don't mean the prayer the way the apostle means it, and therefore you don't mean it genuinely. This evening, you made confession of faith in this Christian church. And in making confession of faith this evening, you will from now on, unless the elders should bar you, which may God graciously forbid, You will be allowed to partake of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper and if the Lord should give you children to bring your own children for infant baptism. You have said, I desire to use the means of grace to sit under the preaching of Jesus Christ and to use the sacraments which are signs and seals of his saving work. I desire that. You do. The Holy Spirit answers your prayer, the prayer that we have in the text, exactly in that way. The reason why the Holy Spirit bestows this strength in the church is not that the church has some unique or special power to save, as Rome says, but is that Jesus Christ saves. And He saves the church, and the church is His body. He does not save those who are outside of his body, but he saves his body and therefore works in that body through the means of grace. What explains now this prayer, this fundamental petition, is the apostles' desired result That the Church of Christ and the Saints of Christ apprehend the love of Christ. You notice that I changed the word. The King James uses the word comprehend and I use the word apprehend and I'll explain that presently. Let me get to that in due time. But for the moment, we turn to the second part of the prayer, the prayer that expresses the desired result. The first part regarded a prayer for what Christ would do in us by His Spirit. The second part of the prayer, for how that grace would manifest itself in our life. Generally, there is a point of application to be made, we have confessed that Christ works for us, that He died for us on the cross, but if He works for us and died for us, He works also in us and His life in us will become manifest. How? What is that desired result? That we apprehend the love of Christ. What is the love of Christ? It is not now our love for Him of which the Apostle speaks. And that must be evident from the text itself. For He speaks of that love of Christ which passeth knowledge. And in verse 18, it's that love of Christ to which He referred when He spoke of its breadth and length and depth and height. Though my love for Jesus Christ be ever so genuine and true, yet it does not have the breadth and height and length and depth and the surpassing knowledge that the love of Christ for me has, for after all, I love Him only because He first loved me. That we love Him is an amazing reality. We didn't choose to, we aren't prone to. but that He loves us is far more amazing yet. And therefore, the love of Christ refers, first of all, to the desire of Jesus Christ that you and I and the saints of God everywhere share in the blessed life of the triune God. Not just that our sins be forgiven, although that was a necessary component and an essential component of salvation. But not just that our sins be forgiven and therefore that there will be no penalty for sin, but rather that we, created in fellowship with Him and Adam and Eve, fallen from it and plunged into the very depths of the misery of sin, separated from God who is our life, be brought back to live with Him forever and ever and ever. Jesus Christ desired that of us, we who are undeserving and sinners. And therefore the love of Christ refers secondly to the work that Jesus Christ did in making that love and that blessing possible. It includes his work of atonement on the cross in which he satisfied the wrath of God and the justice of God for us. But it also includes everything that preceded that atoning work, His incarnation coming into our flesh, taking on Himself, not just our nature, but our curse and shame. Now think of how amazing it is if there is in us, not just a body, a human nature, but the life of Christ. That's amazing. How much more amazing it was that Jesus Christ, who took on Himself a human nature and so appeared just to the earthly eyes now to be a human like the rest of us, was actually God in the flesh. Not just the life of God, but God Himself in the flesh. This is amazing. The love of Christ moved Him to take our nature on Himself. That love of Christ refers not only to what he did on the cross and everything that led up to the cross, but everything that results from the cross and follows from to the exaltation of Jesus Christ again and is sitting at the right hand of God now directing all of history for the good of his church and working in our hearts at every moment, every split second. the grace we need to live as his children. This is the love of Christ. A love of one who is our high priest and so laid down his life for us, but also intercedes for us yet at God's right hand. A love of one who is our prophet, our chief prophet, and therefore declares to us what he's done so that we know it. And the love of one who is our everlasting and eternal king. And so guides and governs all things with a view to our salvation. This love of Christ is stunning. Absolutely amazing and breathtaking. That's what the Apostle means to convey when he speaks of its breadth and length and depth and height. First of all, of course, he means to say the love cannot be measured It's an infinite love. It cannot be contained in some finite thing. So great is His love towards us. But then in the second place, He means to say that that love is timeless. It fills the entire history of the world because He loved sinners from the moment of Adam and Eve until His own return over a period of six or more thousand years. And then what he did to demonstrate that love is beyond our reckoning. He who was in heaven, enjoying the glory of God in heaven, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation. From above, he came down below, and then didn't just come to earth, but went, as the Apostles' Creed says, descended into hell. the tree of the cross bearing all that hell truly is from the greatest height to the lowest depth and then through his resurrection ascension up to the greatest height again how vast this love of Christ so that the Apostle says also it passes knowledge I know it As do you, but I cannot comprehend it. Not in the real sense of the word comprehend, which means to understand it fully. I can't. Why would He love a sinner like me? What all has He done to show His love for a sinner such as I am? I'll never understand it fully. But I praise God for it. Although we cannot comprehend it, we are able to apprehend it. And so I come to the question of why the change of translation of the word. Not just to make a fine point in the English language that we can't comprehend, but because apprehend is indeed the translation of the Greek word found in our text. Apprehend, that is, to take something, to take possession of something. This is the word used, for instance, to refer to what the Pharisees did to that woman taken in adultery. They didn't comprehend her, but they apprehended her, grabbed her, Don't let her away. Off to Jesus we go with her. She's a prisoner. Yes, prisoners are apprehended, and we are in that blessed sense then, prisoners of the grace of God, a grace that grabs hold of us and will not let it go. This is the same word that the apostle uses elsewhere. with reference to the prize that he expects to obtain. That's how the King James translates it, but the word is apprehend, take possession of at the end of the race. And so the meaning here is that we apprehend the love of Christ. Take possession of, not in some Arminian sense, it's up to me to do it first. The love is there. Christ dwells within us. But once again that I possess and experience it consciously, subjectively, by faith. And the question I put now to two young adults who made confession of faith this evening is, Have you really, have you really apprehended that love? I trust you have, don't get me wrong. The reason I ask the question is not to plant a doubt in your mind, but the reason for asking the question is to underscore that you did not make confession of faith this evening because your parents wanted you to, did you? Not because you realize that if you're going to continue as a member of this church at some point, the elders would expect it of you. You didn't do it for that reason, did you? You did it because you are testifying and have known that that love of Christ is yours. And you are amazed at it. More amazed than if you saw some brilliant mathematician solve a complex math problem in his mind without any other aids in a very short period of time. That would amaze you. But when you contemplate the love of Christ for you, you say, that is far more stunning yet. More amazed. If you saw one of the world's greatest pianists play a very complex piece of music flawlessly, and you would be breathtaking, but not half as much as when you contemplate the love of Christ for you. Have you apprehended this love? Is that not why you made confession of faith this evening? You say yes. You say yes to that question. You really did, in essence, when you made confession of your faith. And in saying yes, in making confession of faith, you said, the gospel is not just head knowledge for me, it's in my heart, it's a saving power in me, and I am unworthy. But then so were the Gentiles, the Ephesians, to whom the Apostle wrote. They had been unbelievers, and they were Gentiles, not descended physically from Abraham, and yet God chose them. And not only the Gentiles, there's somebody else who's testifying in the text of this greatness of the love of Christ. He was a Jew, but he was a self-righteous Jew. One who persecuted the church of Jesus Christ and whom God himself apprehended on the road to Damascus in such a way that Paul now could not do anything but speak and sing the praises of this almighty God. He experienced that grace. You and I are sinners yet. Sin dwells in us. We will battle the old man, but rest assured that knowing that Christ dwells in you by faith and that you will be strengthened by the spirit of the inner man means No sin that you have or will yet commit is too great for the love of Christ to shine forth through it and after it and to say, it's cancelled out, it's covered in the scarlet blood of the Lamb. We can apprehend this love, not in our strength, but His. For after all, not only has He strengthened us, but the Apostle says He has rooted and grounded us in love. Why can a tree bear fruit? To the glory of its maker. Because it's rooted deeply. Why can a building shine forth in all its splendor? A much more inferior example than the previous because the building is a testimony to its earthly creator, its builder, I understand. But why can a building shine forth or stand forth as an example of workmanship? Because it's founded on a foundation. And those are the two examples, the two ideas that the Spirit brings forth here. You are rooted, that is, your roots grow deep in Christ and you are grounded. Your foundation is in Him, in love. You know love, and you know love not only because you know His love, but because His love has caused you to know and love Him, and you love Him and one another. You know love. And therefore, you will be amazed at and apprehend this love of Christ. The ultimate goal of the prayer is that we be filled with God's fullness. The fullness of God refers to all of the attributes or virtues of God, to His wisdom and knowledge, to His power and His love, His grace, His mercy, His justice, His holiness, and there are more, to be filled with all the fullness of God is so to understand Jehovah God and know Him and know His love in Christ that we not only know about all His attributes, but that we experience them. and we see them planted in us, filled with God's fullness. Do you know what the opposite is? The opposite of being filled with God's fullness is being empty with man's emptiness. Man is empty. That's our need again. Empty because of sin, empty because we're creatures. That's our need to make this petition. And yet empty man, natural man, thinks he's full. Thinks he's full if he has all of the world's goods. Thinks he's full if he has all of the world's experiences and enjoyments. But thinks he's full because knowing in his heart that he's empty, he tries to fill that empty void with everything he can get a hold of. And the end result is, he remains as empty as he ever first was. And if he'll never admit that in life to anyone else, there comes a point when he has to admit it to himself and it scares him. And that point is his deathbed. To be empty with the emptiness of man is to be empty forever. Unless God fills us with His goodness. And one who is filled with the goodness of God dies, lives now, and dies in hope. Because being filled with the fullness of God and experiencing in this life that I am filled with the fullness of God, knowing that that is what God began to do at regeneration when He planted the life of Christ in me, that it is what His sanctification and work of preservation really is, to fill me yet more full. to the point of overflowing with the fullness of God. To know that that's what He does now in life is to look forward in faith and to say that in a single instant, He will do it yet more. If I could put it this way, He fills us full already in this life, but we're such a small container. And when we die and our soul goes to heaven in that moment, He not only makes us a larger container but fills that container to its fullness, to its brim. And then again later when Jesus Christ comes again on the clouds of heaven and reunites our soul and our body, gives us to enjoy the fullness of salvation, He makes us yet a greater vessel of His grace and glory and instantaneously fills that vessel full and we are filled with the fullness of God. And the question is, Put that way then, so explain, death does not scare you, does it? I think most of us know that brothers and sisters in Christ in the Qom a week ago lost a teenage son. It can happen. God takes us when he is ready. when he's ready to make us as a container as large as he determined it will be to all eternity and fill it full. And we're not scared of that. We're not, because we know the love of Christ. Knowing the love of Christ, we live for Christ. And living for Christ, our death is gain. That's the ultimate goal. God accomplishes that. He brings us to the goal. As a child of God makes the prayer of this text and longs for the day when that prayer is finally and fully fulfilled in heaven, the child of God does two things. In and with the church of Jesus Christ and never apart from that church. The child prays, fill me with thy spirit. And he worships and adores this God. May God fill us so full. Amen. Heavenly Father, we are filled now with the fullness of thy grace because of thy word. We've heard it, we love it, we receive it with joy and gratitude. And our prayer is, strengthen us always by thy Spirit in the inner man. Cause Jesus Christ to dwell in us now and forever. And may we, as members of the Church of Jesus Christ, until our Lord comes for us, worship and adore thee, the only true God, for Jesus' sake, amen.