[0:00] We welcome you to the media ministry of Bethel Community Church. Knowing Jesus, making Jesus known. We find ourselves here on the final Sunday of the year.
[0:14] 2018 has gone by quickly. At least it feels like in my life. I don't know if the same holds true for you. Maybe it feels like you're ready to turn the page. But it seems like every year I get older, the time goes a little quicker.
[0:27] This is the, I don't know if it's the, it's either the fourth or fifth time that I've spoken on New Year's Eve or just post New Year's.
[0:38] And so, you know, after a certain time you start to run out of things that you want to teach on. It's easier for me personally if I just get a text and say, hey, you have to speak on this. The parameters are there and some people don't like that.
[0:50] I tend to do better with that. And so, pray that you'd be patient with me if this doesn't hit home for you. But I think we've got some good words here from the scripture today.
[1:00] I will say it's hard to prepare for a message when, you know, you come from such a busy week. Hopefully you all had a good Christmas. I know we did in our family, but a lot of running around, a lot of things to do.
[1:12] You know, yesterday, you know, there's, there's Clemson and Notre Dame at 3 o'clock. There's Oklahoma and Alabama at 7 o'clock.
[1:23] There's Iowa State at 11 o'clock, John, right? Did Iowa State? Oh, they didn't. I'm sorry about that, John. There were some good games on yesterday.
[1:33] So, it makes it a little tough to focus, but we'll see how that comes out. So, like I said, this morning is the final of the 52 Sundays that we meet together here at Bethel.
[1:44] Obviously, one week at Pinecrest. And, Lord willing, we'll gather together next week under a new format with a new year. But today, we're going to look back a little bit on the year and look forward to the year ahead.
[1:57] You know, as I said, it's a bit of a challenge because every year when I find myself preparing for a message like this, I ask myself, what can I share that would be the most beneficial with the body here and the most beneficial, honestly, for myself?
[2:12] And I'm not big on resolutions, per se. I think I've shared with you in the past that resolutions tend to fail. The rate of success is something along the lines of 5 to 10 percent.
[2:23] So, I don't want to set us up for failure. I know I fail quite frequently. So, resolutions aren't something that I really, really felt would be beneficial for us. And so, I thought it might be an opportune time for us to consider what we might look forward to in the next year.
[2:38] What might be something that we would want to see in our lives, something that the Lord would like to see us grow in? And so, I thought that was an opportune time to consider a text that comes at the end of 2 Peter.
[2:49] And if you turn with your Bibles to 2 Peter chapter 3, you won't be flipping forward and backwards much this morning. I'll reference a handful of verses, but you don't need to go back and forth between those. But I will be looking at just one verse at the very end of 2 Peter in chapter 3.
[3:05] You know, these are the last words that Peter wrote, probably some of the last words or exhortations that he had given. History or tradition will tell us that Peter was put to death on a cross, upside down.
[3:18] That's not specifically documented in Scripture, but these are some of the last words that Peter would have given. And so, if we look at the book of 2 Peter, there's some major themes.
[3:31] We see Peter talking about the denunciation of heresy and doctrine, teaching about the inspired authenticity of prophecy. We see him talking about the coming of the Lord.
[3:43] And then finally, here at the end of the book, which is what we're going to look at this morning, we hear him, or we read him, exhort of spiritual diligence and steadfastness. And that's what we're going to look at this morning.
[3:55] So let's go ahead and open up in a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, I thank you for this morning. For each one that's here, Lord, I thank you as we turn the page on another year, Lord, while this Sunday is essentially the same as any other Sunday, and that it just happens to fall at the end of the calendar year, and we come here, Lord, to remember what you've done for us, Lord.
[4:13] We come here to remember just the great blessings that you have bestowed upon us to remember what you did for us. And yet, Lord, this particular Sunday, because on the calendar it does fall just prior to January, we take a time out to pause to look forward and say, Lord, what would you have for us for the upcoming year?
[4:30] Lord, we ask that you would bless this time together. We pray this in your name. Amen. So, 1 Peter chapter 3, we're going to be looking at verse 18, but for context, I'm going to read verse 17 as well.
[4:42] It says, You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked. In verse 18, but grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to him be the glory both now and forever.
[5:01] Amen. Amen. So, but grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to him be the glory both now and forever. Amen. Now, as I was thinking about this text, particularly yesterday and a bit more this morning, I thought it might have been more appropriate to have a text on shrinkage rather than growth, right?
[5:23] I mean, this last week, I feel like I've been eating everything in sight. There's cookies everywhere. There's appetizers everywhere. There's food everywhere. There's food everywhere. But rather than talk about that, like I say, those resolutions, they fail.
[5:34] So we're going to talk about growth this morning. And we see here Peter is speaking about spiritual growth. And as we come to the end of the year, you know, there's something almost artificial about what we're doing at the end of the year and that we tend to, again, reflect on the year that's gone by.
[5:48] And perhaps we make some resolutions to resolve certain things that would come in the year ahead. And all of these things have their place. And it seems to me this morning that it may just be the right time for us to consider this particular admonition and exhortation from the Apostle Peter to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
[6:12] Now, I think growth is something that is important and something that's in the forefront of the mind, particularly so for Peter. If we remember back to his first epistle, chapter 2, he speaks about Christians being like newborn infants.
[6:31] In chapter 2, verse 2, he says, like newborn infants long for the pure spiritual milk that by it you may grow up into salvation. And so it seems that Peter, and you wonder perhaps whether it was because he had these certain experiences, these lapses that he had experienced in his own walk with the Savior, that growing or desiring sincere milk of the word, in other words, that you might grow, that this was something that was particularly important to him.
[7:01] And that's how he ends his second letter here. And you'll notice here, as we look at verse 18 here, there's two things that we're going to look at briefly this morning. Number one, that we are to grow in grace.
[7:15] And secondly, that we're to grow in knowledge. And what I want to do is I want to consider these in the opposite sequence in which Peter puts them here in verse 18. And I'll try to explain why I'm doing that.
[7:27] I want us to see the emphasis that he puts on grace before knowledge. And in order for us to do that, and perhaps for that to ring home, I want to end with the emphasis on grace rather than to begin with it.
[7:42] So this morning, what I'd like to do is I'd like to begin with what he says about growing in the knowledge of the Lord, and then we'll finish with what he says or what he might mean by growing in the grace of our Lord.
[7:53] So first, let's look at growing in knowledge. You know, I think this morning we need to ask ourselves, here, what kind of knowledge does Peter have in mind?
[8:03] There's a lot of different kinds of knowledge, right? And what does Peter have for us here? Is he talking about objective knowledge? Is he talking about factual knowledge? Things about Christ, the life of Christ, certain doctrines about Christ?
[8:18] Or does it mean a more subjective knowledge? You know, it's one thing to know about Christ. It's another thing to know him and to know him personally and to know him relationally.
[8:30] And I think that Peter undoubtedly here means both. That we are to grow in knowledge about Christ and we are to grow in knowledge that is relational to Christ.
[8:41] So we're going to look at those separately. You know, let's think about that for a minute. We need to grow in our objective knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We need to remind ourselves again and again, I think on a daily basis, of the basic truths about Jesus, about his incarnation, about his life, his ministry, his death on a cross, his resurrection, his ascension into glory, his position at the right hand of God.
[9:09] Those are things that we need to grow in knowledge of. We need to remind ourselves daily of these doctrines, of these truths that are contained in his word. I am, she's not here right now, so lest I forget on Saturday, you can tell her that I didn't forget.
[9:28] But my wife and I, come Saturday, it will be 17 years since we've been married. Which is hard for me to believe. I was looking at a picture. I didn't look much younger.
[9:40] Kevin looked much younger in the picture. He married us and, you know, 17 years has gone on. I look pretty much the same. But 17 years ago, Nicole and I got married.
[9:50] I always, I think about it in terms of 20 years ago we met. So, at this point in my life, for over 50% of my life, just last year, over 50% of my life, I have known Nicole.
[10:03] So, as time goes on, that percentage obviously is going to go up. And, you know, as much time as I've spent with her over the last 20 years between the time that we've been dating and our marriage, it probably wouldn't surprise you to know that I'm still learning new things about my wife on a regular basis.
[10:24] And that's really something that's amazing, isn't it? That we, what's more amazing is that I do know not only more things about her, but the things that are great about her become magnified more and more each year.
[10:37] And I'm reminded of those. Especially those qualities that make her so great. And I think that's the way it is with the Lord. You know, you may have been saved when you were five or when you were 25.
[10:48] Yet, daily, we are reminded about the qualities and the characters of the Lord. And it's important for us as that builds that relationship. You know, we can't be content.
[11:01] Surely, hopefully, we can't be content to have a half-hour sermon here on a Sunday morning. Or a gathering in a small group once a week or once every other week.
[11:12] Or an occasional few minutes listening to the message of the radio while we're in the car. That surely can't be enough. That can't be adequate to grow us or to build us in our relationship with the Lord.
[11:24] We live in an age, I think, incidentally, where we have more access to sermons, more access to Christian commentaries, more access to text, to periodicals, to ways of studying the Word than anyone that has ever gone before us.
[11:38] And yet, I think it's probably safe to say that we are among the poorest educated in the history of Christendom. That we ourselves have not taken the time to get to know the Lord.
[11:49] And I don't want to exaggerate or browbeat this morning because much of this is implied upon myself. I simply want to exhort us. And if I didn't spend time trying to get to know my wife better, what happens?
[12:04] If I don't spend time with my wife, our marriage suffers. And I can tell you that from experience. When we don't spend time together, when I don't connect with her, my relationship with her suffers.
[12:17] What happens when you and I don't spend the time that's necessary to get to know our Savior better? What happens when we don't keep the truths, the great truths about His character and what He's done for us in the forefront of our mind?
[12:32] Just like with my wife, our relationship, my relationship with the Lord, it suffers. It's not on His account, it's on my account. You know, Nicole will still be my wife, even if I don't put the time in to get to know her or to spend time with her.
[12:46] But our relationship will suffer, and that's the same with the Lord. He's still going to be our Savior. If you've placed your faith in Him, but your relationship is going to suffer. So we need to grow in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
[13:01] You know, we need to read. We need to study. We need to commune with Him. We need to equip ourselves so that in the evil day we might be ready to stand. We need to read for the sake of our children.
[13:14] We need to grow in our knowledge for the sake of our teenage children and our college-age children and our adult children who have questions and more questions, and we need to provide them as good parents with answers to these questions that are based in the truth, that are based in His Word.
[13:29] We need to keep on growing. We don't want to reach a plateau. We don't want to grow stagnant. We need to keep on assimilating all the facts and all the truths that God has revealed.
[13:42] You know, I think if I could do my first 38 years over again, you know, I was talking to my brother-in-law about this. You look back on your life and you say, what things would I do differently? And I think if I was going to do my first 38 years over again, one thing or one of the big things that I think I would want to know is I'd want to know what the Lord says more in depth.
[14:00] I'd want to know my Bible better. I'd want to know His Word better. You know, if there's one thing above everything else that I would dearly love, it's a better knowledge of Scripture.
[14:11] It's a better knowledge of what He has for me. And that takes time. A better knowledge that I can't get enough of the Bible that you can get, you know, this time of year, you can get enough turkey.
[14:24] You probably already have. You can get enough ham. You can get enough fruits or vegetables. And, you know, believe it or not, I'm going to say it, you can probably get enough chocolate. Right? But what you can't get enough of is God's Word.
[14:37] You can't get enough of His truth, of His promises, of His character. Fresh reminders daily of who He is and what He's done. The personal knowledge of Christ.
[14:48] So knowledge. But I think Peter has more in mind than just that. I think he has that in mind. That's why he's writing this letter. You know, God gave us the Bible, His Word. He gave us 66 books, every single word in here.
[15:01] But there's more. There's more than just a knowledge of the Word. I think he's saying grow. Grow not just in knowledge about Jesus, but grow to know Him.
[15:13] Grow to know Him personally. You remember what Paul said when he wrote to the Philippians? He said this. I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings.
[15:27] Sometimes, and yes, we want to be careful. Be careful what you ask for here. Because be careful what you promise. Because if you want to know Jesus more personally, He's going to take you through the valley of suffering.
[15:42] Because it's in that valley. In the loss of a loved one. In the loss of a job. In the struggle of a relationship. In the pain that we're sometimes asked to undergo with members of our family.
[15:56] In the disappointments and the heartaches that we see that come up in our lives. It's there that we learn more and more about what it has meant for Jesus to forsake His place in heaven.
[16:07] And to come into this world and to humble Himself. And to fashion Himself in the form of a lowly servant. I want to know Him so. I want to know Him as a prophet.
[16:18] I want to know what does Jesus say to me in this situation? What does He teach me? I want to know Him as my King and who rules over me.
[16:30] I want to know Him in every situation. That He is Lord. That He governs and He rules over my enemies. And His enemies. And He subdues them. In tense situations.
[16:41] In difficult situations. I want to know Him. I want to know His kingship. I want to know His sovereignty. Excuse me. I want to know what it means to trust Him.
[16:53] When all the lights go out. That He is King. That He holds the power in His own hands. I want to know Him as my priest who forgives my sins. Every transgression.
[17:04] Every blemish. Every taint. Every past sin that I've committed. Every sin that I've committed today. Every sin that I will commit in the future. That which He died for. That which He shed His blood for. I want to know what that means.
[17:17] That He would give Himself. And that He would be prepared to say yes. When the Father says, Will you go for these people? I want to know Him as my friend. One who sticks closer than a brother.
[17:29] Who knows my innermost thoughts. Who knows my frame. Who knows how feeble I am. Who knows that I'm made of dust. He knows my weakness. Someone that I can talk to every moment of the day.
[17:41] Someone I can reach out to when I'm in the car. Someone I can reach out to when I'm frustrated at work. Someone that I know even better than my wife or my children. Closer to me than anyone else. I want to know Him.
[17:53] And I want to grow in my knowledge of Him. And I would pray that that would be our desire. In the upcoming year. That we would yearn to know Him more. What else does Peter say?
[18:05] Not only should we yearn to know Him. But we should yearn to know His grace. But grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
[18:15] So not only grow in knowledge. But grow in grace. Grow in grace.
[18:28] You know, grow, yes, in the knowledge of grace. In the understanding of grace. In the implications of grace. You know, I want to grow in my appreciation of the gospel. Of what it means that He died for me.
[18:40] Those are simple words, aren't they? He died for me. Think about that. He died for me. And you could write a litany of books and commentaries and literature and periodicals and essays about what that means.
[18:57] That He died for me. I want to grow in my appreciation of my faith alone. In Christ alone. I want to grow in what grace really means. You know, I think sometimes we often think that we have been saved by grace.
[19:13] And then from that point going forward, it's on us. Right? That the Lord did the work. That He saved us. But that we walk through this life on our own accord.
[19:23] That we are to make our choices. And we are the ones responsible. And that we are to do it on our own effort. And I would suggest to you this morning that never, ever, ever do we stop preaching the gospel to ourselves.
[19:35] No matter how long ago you were saved, if it was 30 years ago, if it was 3 years ago, if it was 3 months ago, no matter how long ago you were saved, never stop preaching the gospel to yourself.
[19:47] Because it is by grace alone. All of the way. Every day. Every step you make. It's by God's grace. There's a story I read about a gentleman.
[20:03] Some of you may know this. But Cardinal Robert Bellarmine. And he was a Roman Catholic cardinal back in the 1600s. And he was held in very high regard. He was referred to as some as the chief theologian, so to speak, in his day.
[20:17] And he was the personal counsel at that particular time to Pope Clement VIII. And most figures, he was one of the most notable figures in the counter-reformation movement in the 16th century Roman Catholic Church.
[20:33] And on one occasion, Bellarmine, during that time period, he wrote this. He said, the greatest of all Protestant heresies is blank. He didn't say blank, but I put the blank there.
[20:45] So if I were to put that on a piece of paper and I were to give it to you and I were to say, hey, fill in. What do you think he said? The greatest of all Protestant heresies is blank.
[20:57] What would you say? Some of you, you know, we might say perhaps justification by faith. Some might say faith aside from works. Some might say scripture alone.
[21:09] You know, those answers make logical sense. But you know what? None of those answers are what Bellarmine had said. What he wrote was this. The greatest of all Protestant heresies is assurance.
[21:25] The greatest of all Protestant heresies is assurance. Assurance. Because for Cardinal Bellarmine, if there was such a thing as assurance, if you can be fully assured, then his whole system comes tumbling down.
[21:40] You see, because for Cardinal Bellarmine, in the theology he represents, you get to heaven by efforts. By lots of efforts. By continual efforts. By continual obedience.
[21:51] For a sacramental treadmill. So for him, the greatest of all Protestant heresies was assurance. Assurance. And do you understand? I think sometimes I forget the implication of assurance.
[22:04] That I can be assured. That I can have an absolute assurance. That if I died here today, if I were to be standing at this pulpit here, and I were to pass away. If I were to be sitting in that chair in 15 minutes, and I were to pass away.
[22:16] If I were to be driving home, or laying in my bed this afternoon, taking a nap. That if I were to pass away, that I have the absolute assurance that I would leave this place and I would enter into heaven with my Savior.
[22:29] Now for Cardinal Bellarmine, that's the height of arrogance. To say that. But for me, it's all about grace. Because it's the basis upon which I get to heaven.
[22:45] Not by my doing. It's not by how good of a person I've been. It's not by how good of a husband I am. It's not by how good of a father I am.
[22:55] Not how good this sermon is. Not how much I read my Bible or go to church. I'm not going to heaven if that's the basis. Because you know what? I fall short on all accounts. The basis on which I get to heaven is that He died for me.
[23:10] He gave Himself for me. He paid the price. He did it all. And that is the message of the Gospel. That is the message of grace. He died that I might have access to a relationship with Him.
[23:21] That I might be able to approach Him and live with Him in eternity. He did it all. Lock, stock, and barrel. And we're called to grow in that grace. You know, I'm going to say something here that's going to sound strange, so bear with me on this as far as the statement that I'm going to read here.
[23:43] But Martin Luther, he said something one time that he got into a lot of trouble for. And I think he still now, when you read it, gets into a lot of trouble for it. And he was writing this friend, Philip Melanchthon, Melanchthon, Melanchthon, and he said this.
[24:02] He said to him, sin boldly. Sin boldly. And I'm going to clarify that here in a moment. You know, C.S. Lewis, others, they didn't like that. They thought it was an improper sentiment. But let me try to explain for a second what I think Martin Luther was saying.
[24:15] He's writing to Melanchthon, and Melanchthon always is a pessimist. And he's always down because he never thinks that he has done it correctly. He never thinks that he has done enough. He's always unsure.
[24:26] And I'm going to ask you, do you know Christians like that? Do you feel like that at times? Like, you know, Lord, I just don't know. I don't know if I've, I can't rest. I don't know that I have, that I'm doing what's right.
[24:37] They never seem to have assurance. They never seem to enter into that rest. And they never seem to know the peace that comes with the gospel. Well, in this letter, he goes on to say, he says, Phil, the trouble you have is you don't sin enough.
[24:52] You don't have enough. You don't understand your sin. And I think what we can take away from this is many things, and many things that are wrong in what he said. But here's what I think he was trying to say, is that what he's inferring is that when you realize that all of it has been paid, that death has been fully canceled, that it has been washed away by the blood of Jesus, that no matter what you do, no matter what you do, that you are safe in the arms of Jesus.
[25:25] And that's what he meant. He wasn't encouraging him to go out and sin. He wasn't encouraging him to do more and more that was wrong. What he was implying was that no matter what you do, his blood has covered it.
[25:41] So let me be clear. This is not saying that we ignore Romans 6.1. You know, it's not saying that we should go on to sin and that grace will abound. But what we do need to understand is that when we do fail, when we do fall short, when we do not hold to the perfect standard that God has called us to, that God has set forth, that by God, there is an outpouring of grace.
[26:05] And in understanding this, we then have that worst of all Protestant heresies, we have assurance.
[26:16] We have assurance. You know, while I fail him, he will never fail me.
[26:28] While I can assure you that you will fail him, the Lord will never fail you. And we can have an assurance that comes from being deeply, deeply rooted in the theology of grace.
[26:40] And I want to grow in my appreciation of grace. You know, we find this difficult, at least I find this difficult. I have to confess. I find this difficult because my default is to head in the opposite direction.
[26:55] My default is a performance-based mentality. My default is that I know my sins better than I know grace. And some of you may be like that.
[27:06] Some of you are like that because you're imprinting your own experience in your life. I love the song that we sang just before we came up here, Good, Good Father. Father, a lot of us have great dads here, but I can assure you that none of us have a father that is nearly as great as the one that we have in heaven.
[27:26] And so I think what we do is we imprint our own experiences of a father, someone who might be cranky or cantankerous or crotchety and moody and we imprint that on our Heavenly Father and we can't fathom it, you see, that God would be so gracious.
[27:40] Why would he look down on me? Why would he offer me the grace that he does someone who's a sinner like me? You remember what Paul said?
[27:52] What did he say about sin? He said many things, but he said this. He said, sin abounds. And we know that sin abounds. We could have a field day with that, right? Name half a dozen sins around our body here.
[28:04] I mean, I could raise up my hand and give you all six. You wouldn't even have to say anything. I could fill in the blanks for you for myself. Sin abounds in our family, in our personal life, in our relationship.
[28:17] Sin abounds, but you remember what Paul says? Sin abounds, grace much more abounds. Sin abounds, grace much more abounds. Now, I find that difficult.
[28:29] You see, because, okay, I'm prepared to accept that sin abounds. And grace is up to the task. You know, there's this much sin, and well, there's this much grace to meet it, but that's not what Paul says.
[28:43] He said, sin abounds, and grace much more abounds. I think, I think we have to work really hard to get at what Paul's saying here.
[28:56] And when Peter says, this is what I want you to do, I want you to grow in the grace of the Lord and your Savior. I want you to be saturated in grace. I want you to be drowning in grace.
[29:10] In the letter, the second half of, the latter half, I'm sorry, of Romans chapter 7, you know, Paul is speaking about himself as a believer in a certain way, and he uses this phrase, he says, oh, wretched man that I am.
[29:25] Oh, wretched man that I am. That's true. Right? That's true. That's a part of us. That's a part of our humanity. That's a part of our own current state.
[29:36] Even with the Holy Spirit, I continue to sin, and it's unimaginable. It's unthinkable. It ought not to be. But there it is. That's the reality.
[29:48] Oh, wretched man that I am. But you know what Paul wrote immediately upon those words? In our Bible, breaking up chapters is good, but sometimes it's good to read those continuously, because that's not how Paul wrote the letter.
[30:02] Oh, wretched man that I am. But look at the next verse in chapter 8. You don't have to turn to it. There is now, therefore, now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus who walk, how?
[30:17] Not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. But according to the Spirit. Yes, there's a wretchedness, and that's the sin.
[30:29] The good that I would not do, the good that I would, I do not, the evil that I would not, that which I find, I do. But there's a grace, and there's a forgiveness, and there's a peace with God, and there's assurance of everlasting life.
[30:45] And that's all because of Jesus. I want you to grow in that. I want you this year, I want myself this year, in 2019, to be a year which grace abounds in our life.
[31:03] Where knowing Him abounds in our lives and in our affections. There was a story, if the musicians want to come on up.
[31:16] There's a little story I came across this week that I thought was good. It said, Charles Spurgeon and Joseph Parker both had churches in London in the 19th century. On one occasion, Parker commented on the poor condition of the children admitted to Spurgeon's orphanage.
[31:32] It was reported to Spurgeon, however, that Parker had criticized the orphanage itself, and Spurgeon blasted Parker the next week from the pulpit. The attack was printed in the newspapers and it became the talk of the town.
[31:45] People flocked to Parker's church the next Sunday to hear his rebuttal. Quote, I understand Dr. Spurgeon is not in his pulpit today and this is the Sunday they used to take an offering for the orphanage.
[31:59] I suggest that we take a love offering here instead. The crowd was delighted. The ushers had to empty the collection plates three times later that week there was a knock at Parker's study.
[32:10] It was Spurgeon. You know, Parker, you have practiced grace on me. You have given me not what I deserved, but you have given me what I needed. You know, as we grow in the knowledge of him, as we grow in grace, I pray that we daily realize that he has given not what you deserve, not what I deserve, but rather he has given us what we've needed.
[32:41] I pray that we would take heed and we would hold fast to those last words. Grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To him be the glory forever.
[32:54] Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for our time this morning, Lord, as we make our way into the remembrance meeting here, Lord, of what you did on the cross, Lord. Lord, so often we come here, we remember what you did, Lord, we see it as a necessity for salvation, Lord, but we don't see the grace that you are pouring out daily, Lord, that we might walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit.
[33:17] Lord, the key is that we do that by the power that you have given us through your Holy Spirit, Lord. Lord, you are so good. You are greater and you are kinder and you are gentler and you are more gracious than any father that we could ever imagine.
[33:33] Lord, I thank you as we head into 2019 that, Lord, we just remember that, that we keep the gospel on the forefront of our mind, Lord, that we understand daily that you came to this world, Lord, that you gave your life for us, Lord, and we just say thank you, Lord, that we would commune with you, that we would grow to love you more, that we would grow to know you more, and that we would grow to, Lord, walk in your spirit.
[33:57] Lord, we ask this and we pray for our next half hour or so, 45 minutes as we remember what you did for us. We thank you for that, Lord. We ask this in your name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.
[34:07] Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.