All right, the text from which the sermon is based tonight is Hebrews 11 verse 7, but in the light of that verse we'll also read from Genesis chapter 6 and we'll read verses 5 to 22.
So we'll read Genesis 6 first, that's in the Old Testament, and then in the New Testament from Hebrews 11, just one verse there, verse 7.
And there's, if you'd like to have a hard copy of the Bible at any time, there's a bunch on the back table, there's some upstairs, feel free to grab one.
We don't mind at all if you get up any time and grab a Bible, that's great.
If you're here tonight and you don't own a Bible, we'd love for you to take one as well.
We very much would like to have less Bibles tonight than we started with if you would like a Bible and you don't have one, so take one of those with you.
Let's read from God's Word together, Genesis 6 verses 5 to 22, and then Hebrews 11 verse 7.
The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart.
So the Lord said,
But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.
These are the generations of Noah.
Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation.
Noah walked with God.
And Noah had three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence.
And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.
And God said to Noah,
I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them.
Behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
Make yourself an ark of gopher wood.
Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch.
This is how you are to make it.
The length of the ark, 300 cubits.
Its breadth, 50 cubits, and its height, 30 cubits.
Make a roof for the ark, and finish it to a cubit above, and set the door of the ark in its side.
Make it with lower, second, and third decks.
For behold, I will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh,
and which is the breath of life under heaven.
Everything that is on the earth shall die, but I will establish my covenant with you,
and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you.
And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark
to keep them alive with you.
They shall be male and female.
Of the birds, according to their kinds, and of the animals, according to their kinds.
Of every creeping thing of the ground, according to its kind,
two of every sort shall come into you to keep them alive.
Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten, and store it up.
It shall serve as food for you and for them.
And Noah did this.
He did all that God commanded him.
Hebrews chapter 11, verse 7.
By faith, Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen,
in reverent fear, constructed an ark for the saving of his household.
By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
This is God's holy word.
By faith, Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen,
in reverent fear, constructed an ark for the saving of his household.
By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
Well, tonight in our journey through Hebrews 11,
we move from Genesis 5, the story of Enoch,
to Genesis 6 and the story of Noah.
Two men, really, who are said to have walked with God,
both examples of individuals who lived their lives by faith.
And the account of Noah's life of faith is to be found in Genesis chapter 6 through 9,
the backdrop to it being that famous flood that dominates Genesis 6, 7 and 8.
And in the Genesis story, the story of the flood is not presented to us as a kind of myth or a legend.
It is presented as history.
And we know that similar stories of a universal global flood are found in a whole host of different ancient cultures
and a lot of different forms.
I believe there are certainly maybe over 250 different accounts from all over the world.
And in the ancient Near East, there are references in the epics of Gilgamesh and Atrahasis.
And I suppose one of the difficulties that some of us have when we approach the figure of Noah
is we tend to associate his story as being a story really for children rather than adults.
After all, no self-respecting children's Bible would dare to admit the story of Noah and the ark.
And as a consequence, many see it as a kind of childish tale conjuring up images of cute little elephants
and kangaroos or whatever, bears all going into the ark.
But when one actually reads the text of Genesis,
one cannot help but be struck by the fact that this is no warm, cozy story of kind of cute animals and happy times.
It's a story about a world of irredeemable wickedness.
A world spiraling out of moral control.
A world that has placed itself under the wrath and judgment of a holy God.
And indeed, these verses of Genesis tell of a great act of divine decreation
as God returns the earth to a situation of primeval watery chaos.
Genesis 6 through 8 is an unsettling account of where sin ultimately takes us as human beings
and the judgment that inevitably ensues.
Here we read of God judging human wickedness while at the same time preserving a remnant of faith.
In our text tonight, Hebrews 11, 7, selects and highlights four things about Noah and his faith.
There's a lot more in Genesis 6 through 9.
We're not going to expound that.
We're simply going to look at that text through the lens of Hebrews 11, 7.
And I want to mention four things this evening.
The first is this.
Noah in faith received revelation from God.
By faith, Noah being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen.
So the story of Noah begins with God.
It begins with divine revelation.
God speaks and reveals to Noah what will come to pass.
And it's a revelation of divine judgment.
This is not, you know, some Noah having some vague intuition.
It's not his human speculation.
It's divine revelation, clear and unambiguous.
God speaks.
Noah listens.
Faith begins with revelation.
With a word from God.
It is not a leap in the dark, as some would have us believe.
But really a step into the light of God's revealed truth.
And in fact, that is where the letter of Hebrews itself begins.
The very first verses of the book.
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets.
But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son.
Apart from God's word, Noah had no evidence of a coming flood.
He didn't have a meteorologist's report.
He didn't have, he didn't see rising rivers.
There wasn't, he didn't have a flood warning system.
There were no storm clouds on the horizon.
These events were as yet unseen.
And yet for Noah, God's revelatory word was enough.
And we read about the content of that revelation in Genesis 6 from verse 11.
The earth was corrupt in God's sight, filled with violence.
God saw the earth.
Behold, it was corrupt.
For all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.
And God said to Noah, I have determined to make an end of all flesh.
For the earth is filled with violence through them.
Behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
Make yourself an ark of gopher wood.
Make rooms in the ark and cover it inside and out with pitch.
God looks on his creation and he sees a landscape dominated by violence and corruption.
The world of Noah's day had become rotten to the core.
Sin had worked its way into the lifeblood of humanity with devastating results.
Catastrophic moral and spiritual decline has ensued.
And the divine response to this is stated bluntly and categorically.
Genesis 6-7.
The Lord said, I will wipe mankind whom I have created from the face of the earth.
And then in verse 13 of Genesis 6, God said to Noah, I am going to put an end to all people.
God will erase humanity.
Universal wickedness results in universal judgment.
After all, the wages of sin is death.
And so this message, this revelation is one of bad news.
It's a message of impending judgment.
And that, of course, makes many people today somewhat embarrassed.
It's often as if judgment is a sort of some dark skeleton in God's cupboard that's best forgotten and not spoken about.
But, of course, friends, the only God the Bible knows and speaks of is a God of justice and holiness and judgment.
And, in fact, I would suggest to you that it's only that kind of God who makes any sense in a world like ours.
Those who promote the idea that God is some sort of kindly old geriatric who wouldn't hurt a fly do nothing but disservice to Christ and to the gospel.
Because those sentimental kind of cuddly notions of God are utterly discredited in the face of the evil and the suffering and the injustice of this world.
How can you believe in a God of love in the midst of all the suffering and injustice?
That's what people say, isn't it?
But the Bible doesn't ask us to believe in that kind of God.
He's a fantasy thing.
We don't admire people who smile benignly in the face of all kinds of misery and evil and injustice.
We consider such people to be, in some way, morally handicapped.
Because we know there are times when we should be angry.
There are things that happen and go on in our world that it's right and good that we're angry about.
We call it righteous anger.
There's much on our TV screens that's beamed into or on our phones and we read about these news reports and we see things that are terrible, horrendous.
And we feel angry.
We get a sense of injustice about these things.
And if we, who are imperfect, fallen creatures, have a sense of that, then what must that be like for a God who is morally perfect and holy and utterly righteous?
It's in the sense that the flood is used in the New Testament as a model of what will happen at the end of the world.
To Peter, chapter 3, from verse 5.
Christ will return as judge of the earth, Peter writes.
Long ago, by God's word, the heavens existed.
And the earth was formed out of water and by water.
By these waters also, the world of that time was deluged and destroyed.
By the same word, the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment.
And destruction.
It's a biblical pattern.
The soul that sins shall die.
And this is where the world of Noah's time found itself, under God's righteous judgment.
And actually, that's where our world finds itself.
Even today, we live in a world that is on the wrong side of God.
And one day, God's judgment will fall on all human sin and rebellion.
Man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment.
Hebrews 9.27.
And according to Scripture, God's judgment is an inescapable truth and an undeniable reality.
Many years ago, when I was a young minister in my first charge, and I had a lady come to me.
Maybe after a few months preaching in the church.
And she asked me, she said to me, David, you know, you talk about salvation and you talk about being saved.
She was a lovely lady.
And her question was this, well, what on earth do I, a very moral, respectable, church-going lady,
she said, what on earth do I need to be saved from?
A lot of people think like that.
This is what we need to be saved from.
It's from God's judgment.
That's our great need, if we could but see it.
And so, friends, we too have received the revelation from God.
But how are we responding to that?
We ignore it at our peril.
Noah's faith rested on God's revealed word.
Noah, in faith, received revelation from God.
Brings me to the second thing here.
Noah, in faith and holy fear, constructed an ark of salvation.
In reverent fear, he constructed an ark for the saving of his household.
So Noah received not just this revelation of coming judgment.
He also receives a revelation of salvation.
He is instructed to build an ark of salvation for himself and his family.
God tells Noah, Genesis 6, 17,
Behold, I will bring a flood of waters on the earth to destroy all flesh,
in which is the breath of life under heaven.
Everything that is on the earth shall die.
But I will establish my covenant with you,
and you shall come into the ark,
you, your sons, your wife, your sons' wives, with you.
So the writer of Hebrews tells us that Noah constructed this ark in reverent fear.
He responds, Noah responds to God's word with both faith and godly fear.
Those two are not mutually exclusive.
This reverent fear is not a sort of craven terror.
However, we might describe it as a kind of holy awe,
a deep respect for the God who speaks.
Noah knew that God was not to be trifled with.
And he knew that the one who created the heavens and earth
could unmake them with a word.
And so there's nothing shallow, nothing glib about Noah's response.
He's gripped with a sense of awe and wonder.
Here is a trembling trust, if I can put it that way,
that acknowledges God's holiness and power.
Here is the posture of a man or a woman of God
who knows that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
In reverent fear, he constructed an ark.
It's actually, again, one of the features of the letter to the Hebrews,
how it combines these two things,
this great confidence and assurance about being accepted by a holy God
and being able to draw near to the throne of grace
with a sense of awe and reverence
in worshipping the God who is a consuming fire.
There's intimacy and awe.
There's resting faith and reverent fear.
And you'll notice that Noah's faith
wasn't a kind of private feeling tucked away,
hidden away in his heart.
It actually issued in public work
that took decades of sweat and toil.
Here he was constructing this enormous boat,
hundreds of miles from the sea,
no water in sight.
He must have looked an absolute idiot to his contemporaries,
an utter fool, wasting his time, his talents,
his energies on a ludicrous project.
For friends, faith is not merely believing that God exists.
It means and involves acting on what God says.
James reminds us.
In James 2.26,
faith without works is dead.
Noah's faith was alive.
Pounding nails into wood, shaping beams,
sealing the ark with pitch.
You can picture him.
Hammer in hand,
building this massive vessel
vessel in the middle of dry land,
the neighbors around,
jeering,
the cynics scoffing,
the children laughing.
Noah, you old fool.
Where is this flood?
Where is this rain?
And yet all the time,
Noah keeps building,
his hammer keeps swinging
because his faith was anchored
in God's word of promise.
And of course,
this is exactly what the recipients of this letter
were being called to do.
They were being called to endure the shame,
the mockery of the world around,
to keep on in the way of faith.
They were struggling.
They were suffering.
Finding things hard.
And like Noah of old,
they needed to stand firm
and hold on to the promises of God's word.
And that may well be true of us today,
if you're a believer.
It can be hard to march,
march to the beat of a different drum.
It can be hard to live in a way
that seeks to honor God above all else.
Living for God in this fallen world
sometimes looks ridiculous,
looks ludicrous.
And it can feel very lonely.
Perhaps in a family where no one else believes.
Or in a place of work or study
where different values and standards pertain.
In company where Christianity
is routinely ridiculed and dismissed.
It can be difficult.
And yet we're called to stand on the promises of God
because they alone are solid ground,
as we were thinking this morning.
They are our firm place to stand.
Faith lives knowing there is nothing as solid as God's word.
Faith builds.
Faith perseveres.
Faith endures.
It doesn't shrink back.
There's an old story, I think,
from 19th century Canada.
I know we have some Canadians amongst us tonight,
so they'll no doubt correct me if I'm wrong.
But the story tells of a man
who got lost in the woods during the winter
and surrounded by snow and ice
and extreme temperatures.
It was a treacherous situation.
He had to make his way home.
He had to get home or he would die.
And as he stumbled through the snow,
he came to the banks of what he recognized
to be the St. Lawrence River.
He knew that his home lay on the other side,
but also that there was no bridge
or crossing for many miles.
What was he to do?
Well, the river was frozen.
And he realized that his only hope
was to try and make his way across the ice.
Seemed dangerous route to take,
but he had no option.
Would the ice be thick enough to carry his weight
or would it crack
and he'd be drowned in the freezing waters?
And so he resolved to make his way slowly,
tentatively across the river.
He decided to spread out his weight
as best he could
and crawl in a sort of spread eagle fashion,
inching his way across,
fearful and afraid,
all the time listening out
for that terrible sound of cracking ice
that would have spelt his certain death.
And he moved so slowly and deliberately,
hardly daring to breathe,
lest he sink through the ice
and into the dark waters of the river.
When he was about halfway across,
lying, spread-eagled on the ice,
he heard a strange sound.
He thought, I can hear the sound of bells ringing.
And they got closer and closer.
And as he looked around,
as he heard these bells getting louder and louder,
he saw what was to his eyes
a most surprising sight.
Two horses pulling a man on a sled,
careering across the ice.
And the horses and sled shot past him
towards the far bank of the river,
disappeared into the distance.
And it transpired that the ice on the river
was thick enough,
strong enough to bear the weight of horses and a sled.
What a fool the man felt.
He said to himself,
if only I'd known how thick the ice was,
I needn't have been so afraid.
I could have walked,
I could have run,
I could have jumped across the river
and been quite safe and secure.
And friends,
there are many Christians who live their lives
rather like that man,
inching his way across the ice
towards his destination.
They're fearful,
they're anxious,
they're uncertain
because they don't appreciate
their true position.
They think the foundation on which they live
is something frail and fragile
and thin and ready to break.
And in truth,
it's quite the reverse.
It's something immeasurably strong
and powerful and robust.
And friends,
the gospel of God
and the word of God
and the promises of God
can bear all your weight.
It can bear the weight of your joys
and your sorrows,
the weight of your fears and anxieties,
the weight of your sins
and your failures.
Indeed,
the weight of your whole existence.
So where are you building your life?
Are you building on the solid rock
of the gospel?
Are you constructing
an ark of obedience
in a world that
mocks and disdains?
Noah in faith received revelation from God.
Noah in faith and holy fear
constructed an ark of salvation.
Thirdly,
Noah in faith bore testimony
to the world.
You'll notice that
in these words,
by this,
says the writer to the Hebrews,
he condemned the world.
Now,
what is the writer driving at
when he includes this statement?
How did Noah condemn the world?
Was he a kind of horrible,
judgmental man
who went around
condemning everyone
and pointing out their sins?
No,
I don't think that's
what's being said here.
And that's certainly not
what we as Christians
are called to do.
The point,
I think,
that is being made here
is that Noah
left the world
without excuse.
He bore testimony
to God's judgment
and salvation
in both word
and deed.
In one sense,
Noah's obedience
was a kind of
silent sermon,
a living rebuke
to that generation
that had rejected God.
Every plank he laid,
every nail he hammered,
declared to the world
around him
that God's word is true,
judgment is coming.
The very construction
of the ark
proclaimed
that there was
a way of escape.
Peter,
for example,
in his first epistle
speaks of how
God's patience
waited in the days of Noah
when the ark
was being prepared.
1 Peter 3.20.
There was life preached,
so too with us.
When we live by faith,
when we trust God's word
over the world's wisdom,
we bear witness
to the truth.
We live for him,
not for ourselves.
When we love him
and seek to love
our neighbor as ourselves,
when we turn the other cheek,
when we go the extra mile,
it's then that our lives
commend the good news,
the gospel to others.
But if there's the testimony
of Noah's life
and obedience to God's word,
so there is also
the testimony of his words.
It stands to reason,
I think,
that Noah's conduct
and behavior
at least must have
attracted some questions.
What are you doing, Noah?
Why are you building this ark?
What on earth
are you playing at?
Peter,
in his second epistle,
2 Peter 2.5,
describes Noah
as a herald,
some translations,
a preacher of righteousness.
He made known to others
how they could be rightly
related to God
by faith.
He was a preacher
of good news,
warning others
of the judgment to come,
bearing witness
to the salvation
that God had provided.
His words and deeds
urged others
to prepare
for a new world.
And in many ways,
that is our calling
as Christians too.
Our lives should prompt
questions from others.
Why are you living like that?
Why do you do that?
I wonder if our lives
are preaching.
We're to be heralds
of righteousness
in a world
that hasn't seen
or heard
God's weather forecast.
We're to live
on the basis
of God's revelation
in Scripture.
We're to live
pointing to others
to Jesus,
the Savior.
I wonder,
are you doing that?
Or will people
be left
with an excuse?
I didn't know.
I've never heard that.
No one told me.
Friends,
God has called you
to speak of Jesus Christ
even amid a world
that demands
our silence.
Because the door
of the ark
is open still.
And final judgment
has not yet arrived.
And Christ is still
welcoming sinners.
Part of our calling
as individuals,
indeed as a congregation,
our lives
bear testimony
to God's grace,
pointing people
to Jesus.
The missiologist
Leslie Newbig
wrote,
how is it possible
that people
should come
to believe
that the power
which has the last
word in human affairs
is represented
by a man
hanging on a cross?
The only answer,
the only hermeneutic
of the gospel
is a congregation
of men and women
who believe it
and live
by it.
Noah,
in faith,
received revelation
from God.
Noah,
in faith,
and holy fear
constructed an ark
of salvation.
Noah,
in faith,
bore testimony
to the world
around.
And finally here,
Noah,
in faith,
became an heir
of righteousness
and became
an heir
of the righteousness
that comes
by faith.
Genesis,
chapter 6,
verse 9,
tells us this.
Noah was a righteous man,
blameless among
the people of his time,
and he walked
with God.
And it would be easy
to conclude
that as God
looked upon the world,
saw that everyone
was corrupt and evil,
they were all a bunch
of wasters,
except this guy Noah.
Noah was a good guy.
He was the best
of a bad bunch
and so God chose him
and favoured him.
And indeed,
that's how many people
read that text.
But it is to seriously
misread it
and seriously
misunderstand it.
because in this reading
of the text,
Noah's deliverance
becomes a kind of reward
for a righteous
and good life.
And by this way
of thinking,
salvation is by good works,
something that we
contribute towards.
But the key verse here
is verse 8
of chapter 6.
Noah found favour
in the eyes
of the Lord.
And to find favour
or grace
is a formal expression.
It's used many times
in the Old Testament,
I think around 40 times.
And it refers either
to the request
of an inferior
to a superior
or when someone
in authority
helps someone
without status
or position.
It relates then
to someone being shown
favour,
grace.
Lord showed
grace
and favour
to Noah.
And the clear
pattern here
is that righteousness
and good works
follow grace.
They don't precede it.
The Old Testament
and New Testament
are not different
on this point.
They both sing
from the same hymn sheet.
It's simply
not the case.
Some people,
you know,
want to think
in the Old Testament
people were saved
by their good works.
In the New Testament
people are saved
by faith.
Many people
think like that.
Somehow our good works,
righteous lives
will commend us
to God.
You'll notice
in these verses
there's a little phrase
actually in the
Genesis account
that comes between
Noah finding
grace and favour,
Genesis 6-8,
and the statement
that he was a righteous
man who walked
with God,
Genesis 6-9.
And that phrase is
this is the account
of Noah.
That is again
another formula
used right throughout
the book of Genesis.
I think it's 11
or 12 times.
It's a major
internal division
of the book.
Maybe a bit like
a chapter heading.
I think in the AV
it's translated
this is the generation
of.
That word conveys
the sense of being
generated,
reflects the reality
that this has come
out of that,
refers to an ensuing
event or events.
And so when we read
this phrase
between the statement
that Noah found grace
and the statement
that he was a righteous
man who walked
with God,
what is being highlighted
for us,
is that Noah's
righteousness
was not the reason
for him finding grace
but a result
of him finding grace.
He was chosen
by grace alone.
What happened
to him
was because of
God's grace
and unmerited
favor towards him.
That is the
biblical pattern.
What the Lord does
precedes what
the Lord demands.
God does something
for us
before he asks
something of us.
Really important
to understand that.
I often,
you know,
hear people
or meet people
who think
and they say this,
I'm not good enough
to be a Christian.
I'm not moral enough.
I'm not righteous enough.
I'm not religious enough.
And, you know,
in one sense,
they're right.
But the mistake
is to think
that we can ever
be good enough.
We can ever
be righteous enough.
We can ever
be moral enough.
There's only one way
into the Christian life
and that is by grace
and through faith.
Through what God
does for us,
not what we do
or think we do
for him.
That righteous
and blameless life
of Noah's
flowed out of
God's grace
towards him.
That life of
fellowship with God,
walking with God,
was the result of
God breaking
into Noah's life.
That really is
at the heart
of the gospel message.
Noah was not
righteous because
he built an ark.
He built an ark
because he was
counted righteous
by faith.
Like Abraham
and indeed like
all the saints
in this chapter,
Noah's righteousness
was not his own.
It was a gift
of God
received through faith.
And friends,
that is the righteousness
that Jesus Christ
secured for us
at the cross
of Calvary
where he took
our sin
and gave us
his perfect obedience.
Noah looked forward
to the Savior.
We look back.
But the principle
is the same.
We are justified
and made right
with God,
not by our works,
but by trusting
in his promise.
many of you
will know
of the film
Schindler's List,
the Spielberg film,
Oscar-winning film,
harrowing story
of how
some Jews
were saved
from the Holocaust
by the actions
of one
Oscar Schindler.
But of course,
Schindler's List
wasn't the original,
wasn't the title
of Thomas Keneally's book.
They changed it
for the film.
Originally,
Keneally's book
was called
Schindler's Ark
because the Ark
is a biblical
symbol of salvation,
deliverance,
rescue.
And just as
Noah's Ark
was the place
of safety
and refuge
from the flood
of God's judgment,
just as Oscar Schindler
in a sense
was an ark
for those
he saved
from the gas chambers.
So Jesus Christ
is God's Ark
for a fallen,
sinful humanity.
He's the Ark
of our salvation.
He's big enough
for the world,
strong enough
to withstand
the winds
of adversity
and the rising
waters of death
and judgment.
There is safety
in the Son of God.
He's the shelter.
He's the Savior.
We all need.
He is our Ark
and safe passage
into the new world
that God has planned.
For from that Ark
his people will emerge
to inherit
a new heavens
and earth
because the end
of God's plan
and purpose
is not destruction
but renewal.
Our only hope
is in the grace
of God
and in the Ark
of deliverance
that he has provided
for us.
Our only hope
is in Jesus
who alone
saves us
from the coming wrath.
For on the cross
Jesus experienced
the flood
of God's wrath
and anger
against sin.
The fury
of God's wrath
was unleashed
upon him.
He was submerged
in all our sin
and guilt,
engulfed
in the cascading
waters
of God's wrath.
God's wrath
and the cross
is where we see
that his death
was for us,
for sinners like us.
It's where we see
that his love
is towards us,
his mercy
is towards us.
It's at the cross
that we're delivered
and saved
and rescued
from all
that we rightly deserve
which is God's judgment.
that's what this table
spread with bread
and wine
proclaims to us.
It proclaims
Jesus Christ
as our place
of safety
and our ark
of deliverance.
It's only
in him
that any of us
can become
an heir
of the righteousness
that is
by faith.
Let's pray together.
Amen.
Lord, we thank you
for your provision
of a great saviour
in Jesus Christ.
We recognise
that we
by nature
stand under
your just judgement
and yet by grace
by your mercy
you call us
to yourself
to trust
in Jesus Christ
and to know
forgiveness
and to know
righteousness
and to know
a new life
and indeed
an eternal life.
Lord, help us
tonight
whoever we are
whatever our situation
and circumstance
to rest our faith
not in ourselves
or our good works
or whatever it might be
but in Jesus Christ
and him crucified.
We pray these things
in his name.
Amen.