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[0:00] So, Leviticus 19 at the beginning.

[0:11] And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel, and say to them, You shall be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy.

[0:22] Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father, and you shall keep my Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God. Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves any gods of cast metal.

[0:36] I am the Lord your God. When you offer a sacrifice of peace offerings to the Lord, you shall offer it so that you may be accepted. It shall be eaten the same day you offer it, or on the day after, and anything left over until the third day shall be burned up with fire.

[0:53] If it is eaten at all on the third day, it is tainted. It will not be accepted, and everyone who eats it shall bear his iniquity, because he has profaned what is holy to the Lord, and that person shall be cut off from his people.

[1:08] When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, neither shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. And you shall not strip your vineyard bare, neither shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard.

[1:23] You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner. I am the Lord your God. You shall not steal. You shall not deal falsely. You shall not lie to one another.

[1:36] You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God. I am the Lord. You shall not oppress your neighbor or rob him. The wages of a hired servant shall not remain with you all night until the morning.

[1:50] You shall not curse the deaf or put a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God. I am the Lord. You shall do no injustice in court.

[2:03] You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness you shall judge your neighbor. You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not stand up against the life of your neighbor.

[2:18] I am the Lord. You shall not hate your brother and your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

[2:37] I am the Lord. And so on, may the Lord once again bless to us our reading of his word. Again, let us praise God this time.

[2:49] Psalm 119. Psalm 119. On page 167. And verses 161 to 168.

[3:01] And the tune this time is Herongate. Psalm 119 at verse 161. Though rulers hound me without cause.

[3:11] My heart fears nothing but your word. For in your promise I rejoice. Like one who finds great spoil. O Lord. Through to the end of that section at verse 168.

[3:22] Though rulers hound me without cause. The rulers hound me without cause.

[3:39] My heart fears nothing but your word. For in your promise I rejoice.

[3:55] Like one who finds great spoil. O Lord.

[4:06] All faults who die, I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. With all my heart.

[4:20] I love you. I pray you seven times a day.

[4:33] For your commands I hold in all. Great peace have those who love your law.

[4:52] They will not stumble in the way. I wait for your salvation, Lord.

[5:09] And your commands I will obey. I will serve your statutes, Lord.

[5:28] My love for them is great and true. Your laws and precepts I obey.

[5:46] For all my ways are known to you. Well, for a short time this evening, we're turning back to 1 Peter.

[6:02] 1 Peter chapter 1. And tonight looking at verses 13 to 17. 1 Peter chapter 1.

[6:14] We'll begin reading at verse 13. 1 Peter chapter 1.

[6:45] How important is grammar to theology? We all, I'm sure, I hope, are able to say theology is important.

[6:59] How important is grammar to theology? Well, the answer to that is actually quite important, if not very important. And certainly it's important to know the difference in theology, in theological terms, between an imperative and an indicative.

[7:16] And you may be saying, well, that leaves me a bit lost. How does that apply to theology and what do they mean in the first place? Well, an indicative is really a grammatical term for something which is set out as a fact.

[7:32] It can be in the form of a question, but taken as a fact. Like, for example, something that has just happened. You describe it as such, and that's an indicative. An imperative is something that you actually wish to do or command someone to do.

[7:47] You can take it very often as a command. You find the commands of Scripture in the imperative. And the reason I'm mentioning that is that what we've been dealing with in verses 1 to 12 so far in 1 Peter are really in terms of the indicative.

[8:05] It's what God has done. It's in terms of what God has accomplished through Jesus Christ, the things that have been done by him in order to procure salvation for his people.

[8:19] The things that he has done in creating hope in the hearts of his people, a hope that reaches forward and will be fulfilled, as we'll see tonight, at the coming of Christ when he comes again at the end of this present age.

[8:35] If you begin with the imperative, with the command to do something, if you begin with God's commands without the indicative going before it, without actually taking account of what God has done, then you have a problem.

[8:51] Because you're very soon up against the problem of your own inability, of your own incapacity to meet these terms of God, to meet these commands of God. So that's why Peter has been dealing with the indicative in all that God has done before he now moves in verse 13 to the imperative.

[9:10] Be holy. It's a command. Live your lives in the light of the indicative in a way that is holy to the Lord. Set your hope fully on the grace that's to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

[9:23] Again, that's an imperative. That's what Luther actually discovered, wasn't it? We've been thinking in the mornings of the Reformation for a number of weeks, and especially at the solas of the Reformation.

[9:35] And what led Luther to near despair was his inability to actually have satisfaction of conscience, peace of conscience, by doing things that were commanded by God.

[9:49] By going to the law of God firstly, and trying to keep that law himself. And trying to meet the terms of that law led him to near despair.

[9:59] And what joy and what relief it gave him when he discovered that actually what he needed to do was, first of all, go to the indicatives. Go to what Christ had done.

[10:11] Go to the way that God was now offering the result of what Christ had done as a gift. To be received. Not to be earned by a rigid adherence to trying to keep the law of God.

[10:24] If we try and create hope by our own doings, which is what Luther was doing, was trying to do, trying to create hope, we find ourselves on a treadmill that leads to crushing despair.

[10:45] But then if you begin with the indicative of God creating hope, that's what we saw in verse 3. Remember, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

[10:56] According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible, imperishable, and so on.

[11:07] That's what God has done. That's what you actually, first of all, go to when you see your need as a sinner of God's salvation. When you realize that we need a life that is approved of by God, you don't try and manufacture it and create it by your own efforts at keeping the law of God, or going to the Ten Commandments and say, now that's the basis of my righteousness before God, and my own doing and keeping of that law is what's going to give me a place in the presence of God, acceptable and approved of by him.

[11:36] No, says Paul. No, says the Bible. No, said Luther. No, said Luther. No, said Luther. You go to the indicative. You go to God's salvation as a gift to be freely received. And then you come to the imperative.

[11:49] And all the way through the Bible, that's what you find. You find the same in Paul's letters. He goes, first of all, to doctrine, especially to those things that God has done, the salvation that God has actually accomplished in Jesus Christ.

[12:03] Then he comes to its application by way of the imperatives. Do this. Do that. Don't do this. Don't do that. Because you're living in the light of the indicative. Therefore, the enabling grace of God is what you take with you into the imperative.

[12:19] That's the gospel. That's how important it is to have some sort of idea of that theological grammar and where one thing is before the other.

[12:30] So tonight, that's what we're looking at in verses 13 to 17, as Peter begins to apply the things that he's mentioned in the previous verses.

[12:41] And there are two things we're going to look at in relation to each other. We're calling the study Hope and Holiness. Because that's really what it is. He's speaking here about setting your hope fully on the grace that's going to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

[12:56] We mentioned the hope. We saw it in verse 3, how that hope is created by God, how it is something that God produces in the heart and the soul of his people, how it is related to faith in Christ and all of that.

[13:10] We don't want to go over that again, but go back and refer to it if you like. You can check it out yourselves online or whatever. But what he's doing now is actually following on from that, saying, Now set your hope fully.

[13:25] Let that hope that God has created in you, and by his grace, let that hope now be exercised by you as you look forward to the return of Christ. At the first coming of Christ, and through his death and resurrection especially, he has created that hope.

[13:41] He has produced a hope. He has given us the basis of hope, and our hope is based on that. But now he's saying, set that hope fully as you look towards the next arrival of Christ, the second coming of Christ.

[13:57] Set your hope fully on the grace that is to be brought to you at that revelation of Jesus Christ. And in relation to that and connection with that too, do it as obedient children.

[14:09] Be holy as you exercise that hope. As you look forward to his coming, you do so in the exercise and the practice of holiness of life.

[14:20] These are the real, these are the two issues and some of the main contours of it. Let's look at it in more detail. First of all, hope that's set on Christ's return. Therefore, preparing your minds for action.

[14:35] Now that's important because before he actually comes to specify the setting of our hopes fully on what is going to come at the revelation of Jesus Christ when he comes, he's now saying, set your hope, set your minds for action.

[14:50] Be prepared in your minds for action. Prepare your minds for action and be sober-minded and set your hope. In other words, the setting of our hope on the coming of Christ and all that that's going to include is something that has to involve the preparing of our minds.

[15:09] Now, the older translation has what you have literally in the Greek text of 1 Peter here, girding up the loins of your mind. It's an Old Testament style reference or phrase because, and it goes back to these days when, although still in some places you find it, people wearing long gowns or garments reaching right down to their ankles, males or females.

[15:36] And when you find the likes of Elijah, for example, running in front of the chariot, going back from his time in the wilderness, he girded up his loins.

[15:48] You had to actually gather up those loose garments and tie them round with your belt or a special belt, or certainly gather them so they wouldn't actually trip you up when you started running.

[15:59] And when you were in a hurry and when you were going places, when you really had to up your pace, as it were, you had to gird up these loins. You had to gird up the garments round your loins, round your middle, and make sure they were secure so that you could actually run effectively.

[16:14] You've got something like the same idea in Hebrews 12, chapter 12 and verse 1, which speaks about running the race that is set before us, where he talks about getting rid of all the encumbrances, all the things that would be a weight, the things that would keep us back.

[16:31] And you remember too, in Exodus chapter 12 and verse 11, that the Lord actually gave specific direction to Moses and to Israel as to how they were to prepare for leaving Egypt.

[16:46] And in chapter 12 and at verse 11, Moses was to say to the people that, in this manner you shall eat the Passover with your belt fastened, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand, and you shall eat it in haste.

[17:05] It is the Lord's Passover. And when he says there, your belt fastened, he means your loins girded, ready for action, ready to set off.

[17:16] To go through the door and into the wilderness to follow the Lord's direction and follow him there. Well, Peter is using that terminology, that imagery of girding up the loins of the mind.

[17:29] He's talking here of the mind. It's not literally clothes, of course. But the mind has to be girded up. The mind has to be prepared for action. And if you look all the way through the New Testament letters especially, and probably Paul more than anybody else, you'll find that the mind is of significant importance in the way that Paul sets out what we are to be as Christians.

[17:53] Don't be conformed to this world, he says, but be transformed in the renewing of your mind. The mind is that part of the soul where you have the thought processes that form the attitude, or from which your attitude comes.

[18:12] The mind, as it is really the central, if you like, the control room of the person, the mind has to be prepared for action. And what Peter is really saying is, remove whatever clogs your mind.

[18:28] Remove the things that will actually prevent you thinking sharply as a Christian. And he's going on to speak about, later on he's going to speak about how we are to live in holiness and self-control, being sober-minded.

[18:45] The word is really, literally, sober. And that involves, as we'll see in a minute, we'll look at that itself. But it's related to what he's saying about girding up the loins of your mind, just as it is with strong drink or intoxication of any kind, whether it's drink or drugs or whatever, what it does is actually clog your mind up.

[19:06] When you are actually inebriated, you're not thinking straight. You're not able to have a mind that's really geared up for proper action. You're all over the place. You just can't do it.

[19:17] Because your mind is not geared up. It's not clear. It's not prepared for action. And in a spiritual and moral sense, that is what Peter is saying. He's saying, prepare your minds for action.

[19:33] In the exercise of your hope, make sure, as a Christian, that you're not letting your mind get clogged up with those things that will actually be a hindrance to your progress spiritually and in grace.

[19:48] Set your mind for action, he's saying. And tonight that's important for us. We've come here tonight to think, to give our mind to the truth of God.

[20:00] We've come here tonight to really take in what God is saying to us in his word. And to do that, we need to apply our mind and prepare it for action. We need to actually think through the things that God is saying to us.

[20:13] We need to let them sink deeply into our mind and contemplate it there. One of the things that we really don't have much time for now as a generation, and maybe haven't had for some few generations, is the practice of meditation.

[20:28] What I mean by that is not to go into meditation in the sort of Far Eastern sort of thing, but meditation simply from this point of view, that you just take time out to think things through.

[20:45] Even as you're reading your Bible, that you don't just close it, even if you pray before and after or one or other, you don't just close it and then move on to something else.

[20:57] You close it and then you think, now what did I read? How do I apply that to my life? Where do I actually take this further? How does it impact upon other aspects of my life?

[21:10] Prepare your mind for action. Let your mind be free from the encumbrances that would prevent your advance spiritually and morally.

[21:22] And then he's saying, be self-controlled, be sober-minded. Really means self-controlled or sober. As we mentioned, it can be literally soberness in terms of not being drunk.

[21:34] But Peter is using it in a much wider sense than that. Being self-controlled, just as Paul is saying in his letters very frequently, the Christian is someone who has come by the grace of God to have self-control in their lives.

[21:49] They are no longer led away by all the kinds of previous practices they used to be engaged in. That's what he's saying here in verse 14. Don't be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance.

[22:02] You've moved, you've been taken from that by the grace of God. You've been taken out of that lifestyle. And now he's saying, be self-controlled, be sober-minded.

[22:15] Because you see, there is, in human life, and in our own life, naturally as well, there is an intoxication of a moral kind.

[22:27] You don't need to be drunk, literally on alcohol, or have the influence or drugs in your system to be intoxicated. There are millions of people in the world who never go near these things, and they're intoxicated by other things.

[22:43] They're intoxicated by greed, by spite, by vengeance, by taking it out on other people, by pride, by sexual lust. These are all things which the Bible denounces as the kind of lifestyle that God redeems us from.

[23:02] And Peter is saying, be sober-minded. Don't go back to the things that you once were characterized by. Because that's what really the world today lives for, by and large.

[23:17] When we, just over a year ago, it was very interesting to, for a day, visit the ruins of Pompey. And amongst the murals that you find still remaining as you go through the various streets that have been unearthed there in Pompey, you'll find amongst these murals depictions of the lifestyle of the Romans, of the lifestyle of that area when the Roman Empire was in charge of things.

[23:48] And the kind of what you would now call immorality and sexual deviancy that was practiced in those times. They're there depicted on the murals for you.

[24:01] But unfortunately, that's not confined to history. You don't have to watch your television for a short time to realize that our adverts really set forth very much what human beings live for.

[24:19] The porn industry, as it's called, is one of the most influential and, in terms of money, one of the most successful industries in existence.

[24:35] movements. Why is that? What makes it to be so? What makes it to be so is that people are not sober-minded.

[24:46] They're not actually self-controlled. Instead, they're intoxicated with the things of sin, with a sinful lifestyle and the elements of a sinful lifestyle.

[24:58] and, that, of course, is carried out now by technology as well so easily. You can see it if you, not suggesting you do that, of course, but people watch things on their phones.

[25:16] You don't have to go outside of not only your house but your own room or your bedroom to actually see the kind of things that Peter is saying here. You should not actually be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance of your sinful lifestyle.

[25:33] Television, internet, all sorts of ways in which filth comes into the minds of people simply because that's the kind of thing that they want to have and to live by and to live for.

[25:50] Let me just mention something that was brought to our attention and just came across it the week it was away there. on a blog by a local young woman. The fairground that was in Stornoway a number of weeks ago and you could drive past and of course there's all the noise of the music and I drove past it a few times but didn't really think to look very closely at it because I was just driving by in any case.

[26:16] but she noticed that the words the lyrics of many of the songs that were being blared out at that fairground were absolutely horrendous.

[26:29] Full of not just sexual innuendo but graphic sexual explicit sexual references and actually accompanying that were murals on the side of the fairground which were overtly pornographic or getting very near to it in what they expressed.

[26:51] That's what we're that's what we're facing. That's what's current amongst us.

[27:03] That's what Peter was facing. That's what these Christians were facing. That's what God's grace is designed to overcome. And our prayer is that not only have we overcome those tendencies those those lusts in our own lives but we're praying that by the grace of the gospel others will come to have their lives cleaned up too and that Jesus will become their all prevailing passion and not the things of darkness and of sin and of satanic temptation.

[27:42] We have to stand up for those issues however we do it. We have to show our disagreement that such a thing is actually just planted on our streets and remember that the likes of our fairground is very attractive to our young people.

[28:00] It's designed specially for young people to come and enjoy themselves there but then they're subjected to this during the time that they're doing it when you might imagine that this is just innocent fun it's anything but at least in this instance.

[28:14] So please be aware of that and please counter that even if you have to write to the organizers where or whatever tell them this is not acceptable to young people for our young people for the young people of our society here to be subjected to that gross and filthy environment.

[28:38] So it's be self-controlled prepare your minds for action be self-controlled sober minded and set your hope fully on the grace that is to be brought unto you.

[28:51] You might be saying well that's all very well we well we certainly have to of course apply all of that to ourselves but then perhaps we might think that those sort of things are just for those who apply these things excessively to their lives and really for us who are under the gospel that we wouldn't possibly allow ourselves to be taken and to be to be to be involved in such things that would be a serious mistake of course.

[29:24] let me just say that being self-controlled and sober minded and preparing minds for action is for every age group for every Christian young and old for everybody that wants to please God and live for Him.

[29:41] I came across this as I was reading in preparing for the sermon tonight it's about a man called Yehiel Dinur he was a survivor of the concentration camp in Auschwitz during the Second World War he was a Polish Jew he had survived that camp and he was present at the trial of the main Nazi leaders at Nuremberg and one of these of course was Adolf Eichmann who was the person in charge of the Holocaust of transporting millions of Jews to their death in the gas chambers of the likes of Auschwitz and apparently when Yehiel Dinur walked into the courtroom where Adolf Eichmann was set for his trial to come face to face with Adolf Eichmann he collapsed to the floor in a heap he began to weep as he collapsed onto the floor and many people wonder well why what's happened is it just the way in which the thoughts of what had happened have come back to him and are so fresh in his memory well he explained afterwards himself it wasn't actually that at all that caused him to collapse in a heap and to weep this is what he said it's because

[31:05] I realized that Eichmann was not a demigod or superhuman but an ordinary man I was afraid he said about myself I saw that I am capable to do this I am exactly like him and that's what your Bible teaches you you have in your heart as I have in my heart the capacity to do all kinds of evil that's why we need the grace of the gospel however advanced we may be in our Christian life we need that grace of the gospel as Peter is saying therefore going from the indicative to the imperative preparing your minds for action and being sober minded set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ notice the language used he's not just saying set your hope fully on the appearing of Christ he is saying that but the appearing of Christ means the grace that will be brought to you then and I think he means by that the completion of your hope of this salvation as it will be brought to its final completion in your experience at the return of Christ when the crowning will take place of those who come to be with him in glory after the resurrection all of that is built into it but this he's saying is the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ it doesn't just say at the coming of Christ it means at the revelation of Christ and by that of course it's included if we time we could go into it more fully but it means the unveiling of Christ we know him already to an extent he's described in the Bible we know something of his features from what the Bible tells us about him about his character about his work about all that he has done but this will be his unveiling you know what it's like when you see a statue or a monument that's been worked on for many years and whoever it is that's going to unveil it usually there's a large shroud over it you can see something of the features of it you know whose statue it is you know something of the appearance but not until that moment when the shroud is pulled away do you actually see the reality of what's behind it at the unveiling of Christ think about that the glory the majesty the presence the sheer magnificence of the exalted glorified saviour and he's saying set your hope fully on the grace that is to be brought to you at the unveiling of Jesus Christ set your hope fully now towards that glorious completion of your salvation let it be your focal point every day

[34:13] Peter is really saying because whatever things happen in our experience they're all bringing us towards this final day when the Lord will be unveiled when we'll come to see him as he is and when his glory and his majesty will hit us as never before set your hope fully or really again translated literally it's hope to the end for the grace that will be brought to you what he's really meaning is something like let your hope reach its completion don't stop hoping until hope has reached its final point at the coming of Christ so easy to lose hope isn't it or to lose some elements of hope when life gets tough and life gets difficult and life is tough and life is a struggle and it does get difficult and we know ourselves what what difficulties can be in a week never mind a year of our experience and Peter is saying move from the indicative to the imperative go from what Christ has already accomplished to what's going to happen when he comes set your hope fully on the revelation on the unveiling of Jesus Christ hope set on Christ's return briefly holy children of our holy father as obedient children do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance but as he who called you is holy you also be holy in all your conduct since it is written be holy for I am holy and we read from

[36:12] Leviticus chapter 19 which seems to be the passage especially that Peter is going back to as he quotes there you shall be holy for I am holy the holiness of our father sometimes we perhaps tend to forget that because he is indeed a father to his children a loving father a kind father a gracious father a committed father we sometimes perhaps just drops out of our thinking a wee bit that he is also our holy father that the lord's holiness the holiness of god as it's all through the bible is something that is so immense so awesome so packed full of so packed as far as our thoughts of god are concerned which is really why our lifestyle has to be in accordance with the holiness of our father that's the whole point of what he's saying here as obedient children it's as such that you're setting your hope on the return of christ for this is what god has said be holy for i am holy and you as my children are also to be holy in all your conduct it all fits together doesn't it because our father is holy there's no imperfection whatever in our father holiness the perfection of holiness the pure white holiness of god is something that applies to all his attributes his power is holy his love is holy his mercy is holy everything you think about in terms of what god has revealed of himself is marked by holiness and all the way through the old testament that's why the book of leviticus is so important that we cannot leave it out of our readings or our study of god's word because it is really in many ways the book of holiness in the old testament it brought before the people of israel how they were to be a holy people because they were the children of a holy god a god who was incomparable in holiness to every other being now he's saying to them peter is saying as he who called you is holy be holy in all your conduct as obedient children in other words as children no longer conformed to to a sinful past be holy for the one who called you is holy and also holiness means instead of being conformed to your sinful past you are actually conformed to your father himself what a great challenge that is isn't it that people would say of it whatever they think of

[39:26] God whether they're fully accepting of him or not if they know anything at all of what the Bible says about God what a great challenge it is for you and for me that they would have to say about us well they're certainly very like their father that's one of the great challenges of your life and my life to be more and more like God and his holiness and if we don't like holiness tonight then we're not the children of God if anything other than holiness is to mark our lives we're not going to be the children of our father a Christian essentially as someone God has redeemed so as to be like himself and in all your conduct that's what he says that means the young folks here tonight are to be holy as God is holy in your school in your home life in how you relate to your parents to other people of your own age how you go about your studies how you go about the task of what your parents give you remember what we read in

[40:50] Leviticus chapter 19 God speaking about his own holiness and then saying to them you shall be holy for I the Lord your God am holy every one of you shall revere his mother and his father you see holiness comes into all our relationships even at our youngest age age and obedient children is what Peter is talking about and obedient children means children literally in age are not exempt from holiness they come under God's imperative as much as the oldest person here and however advanced we are as Christians we're never outside of this imperative we never graduate beyond this imperative to be holy as God is holy in all your conduct in church at home in our relationships at work in our recreations everything

[41:50] Peter is saying be holy in all your conduct now you see how you would despair if that was the first thing you went to and if we were to preach the gospel and begin with saying be holy because God is holy and because that's what he commands and you went from here and you tried in your own strength to be holy to keep the commandments of God we would be sending you out to near despair but what we're doing hopefully is this we're saying look God has actually prepared salvation for us in Jesus and in preparing and completing that salvation in Christ in accomplishing it for us he is in the gospel extending that to us as a gift and as part of that gift comes the gift of the Holy Spirit and as the Holy Spirit comes to live in the lives and the hearts of God's people through being born again to a living hope the

[42:55] Spirit of God now comes to live in their hearts and who is the Spirit of God the Spirit of holiness the Spirit who conducts us and enables us and empowers us to live a holy life if you says Paul by the Spirit to mortify or put to death the deeds of the body you shall live you can never do it on your own but you don't have to even try to do it on your own you do it by the grace of God in Christ you take the indicative of God's salvation in Christ you take it with you to the imperative and you say Lord you command me to be holy and by your grace help me to achieve it day by day let me finish with a quote from Thomas Watson if you don't have this little book called the godly man's picture it's a small paperback by the banner of truth the godly man's picture he calls it a sketch of godliness but it's absolutely packed still available the godly man's picture by

[44:09] Thomas Watson here's what he says about holiness fitting us for communion with God in his own words holiness fits us for communion with God not everyone who hangs about the court speaks with the king we may approach God in duties and as it were hang about the court of heaven yet not have communion with God that which keeps up the interaction with God is holiness the holy the holy the holy heart and heart comforting in an ordinance of God and where God sees his likeness there he gives his love isn't that a wonderful final sentence where God sees his likeness there he gives his love be holy for

[45:13] I the Lord am holy let's pray Lord we thank you for all that your grace provides us with in Jesus Christ and we thank you that you equip your people to live a holy life even though we come to you every time we come to you to explain our shortcoming and our failure to match your standard we pray that you would continue to fill us with your spirit so that we may increase in holiness and so glorify our father who is in heaven here as we pray for your glory sake amen

[46:23] F bueno thanks You are my Savior, my God.

[46:55] All day I hope in you alone. Remember, Lord, your love and grace, which from past ages you have shown.

[47:23] Do not recall my sins of youth on my rebellion, evil day.

[47:41] Remember me in your great love. For you, O Lord, are good always.

[47:59] Because the Lord is just and good, He shows His path to all who stray.

[48:19] He guides the meek in what is right, and teaches them His holy way.

[48:39] To those who keep His covenant laws, He shows His love consistently.

[48:57] For your name's sake, O Lord, my God, forgive me great iniquity.

[49:17] I'll go to this side door here after the benediction. Now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you now and always.

[49:30]  Amen. Amen.