Gospel—Phil Fournier
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I was going to read a couple of verses but it seems there's a lot of folks still wandering in. So how about if we sing a hymn first? The 1St 2 verses of hymn #7 in the hymn sheet. God loved the world of sinners lost and ruined by the fall.
Salvation fall at highest cost. He offers free to all. Oh twas love, Twas wondrous love, the love of God to me. It brought my Savior from above to die.
On Calvary somebody started please 1St 2 verses only of #7.
God loves the world.
And break with the land by the world.
Celebration.
For the fire resource.
He offers free to the world.
And what my savior from above?
To the heart of the dream.
And brought my Savior from the blood to God.
So let's read 2 verses before we pray.
The first one in Matthew chapter 22.
Just a part of.
Verse 42.
Matthew, 2242.
What think ye of Christ?
And now let's turn to Luke chapter one.
And we'll read.
31 to 33 of Luke chapter one.
And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shall call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest. And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David, and he shall reign over the House of Jacob Forever, and of his Kingdom there shall be no end. Let's pray.
Blessed go on, our Father, we think of the solemn question that's before us tonight.
What thinking of Christ, Blessed Lord Jesus?
Many of our hearts respond. He is my Savior.
He is the one who went to the cross and there laid down his life, that I might be redeemed and brought to God. And yet we fear that perhaps there are some in the room here.
Who are not possessed to the faith that was described.
Of Timothy that was unfeigned, unpretended.
We fear that there may be some who are pretending blessed had gone. We pray that by Thy Spirit that will touch any heart like that tonight, that they might feel the need of their Savior, the Lord Jesus might come to Him.
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And have their sins washed away, be brought into that family of God.
We ask for help tonight, the power of thy Spirit to touch hearts that we might have ears to hear Thy word as it speaks to us. We ask this in Jesus precious name, Amen.
I want to read one more verse in Psalm 34 and then we will spend.
The balance of our time, I believe just in Luke's gospel.
But I'd like to read this verse from Psalm 34.
And then I want to read you 3 verses of a poem that has been very special to me over a period of years.
Psalm 34 and verse 8.
Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him.
Now I want to look at Luke's gospel. Our brother Bruce went rapidly through John's gospel.
In the context of following the Lord Jesus.
But I want to look at Luke's gospel.
And I want you to taste and see that the Lord is good. I spent the last year.
Delighting in Luke's Gospel and I have our brother Bruce Anstey to thank at least for part of it. I want to read to you first before I read this poem, the title that he has on his his book on Luke's Gospel.
And the operation of heavenly grace among men in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, that's Luke's gospel. My brother Bruce very eloquently LED us through John's gospel that the divine person that came out of heaven, I want to look at him tonight as a man among men down here on this earth.
And I want you to ask your heart this question.
What does Christ mean to me?
And you know, if you say to yourself, well, I don't think anything about him, that is not one of the options.
We read there in Luke chapter one, God's pronouncement as to who that man was.
That verse was on the choice gleaning calendars a couple of days ago. It struck me with its impact of who this man was who came down to this world.
Do you know him?
Brother debut Mark De Beau spoke to the children last, largely in Hemet.
And he spoke about knowing and it made a particular impression on me because the day before I had a little meeting with the brother and down at place in Cuba called Chambas, and we were in the 13th of Acts. And there the apostle Paul said something like this. I can't quote it. I don't want to turn to it right now that our rulers.
They knew him not.
What we're going to read tonight in Luke's gospel, They should have known him. They had opportunity to know him. He made himself known so fully to them. But Paul tells us they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets that are read every day on the on the every Sabbath day. Well, they knew the Scriptures, but they didn't know them.
And they knew the Lord, but they didn't know Him. And I hope you gather what I'm saying here.
Because I want you to taste and see that the Lord is good. I want you to know Him. And so I'm going to read you 2 verse, 3 verses out of this poem. It's got 44 stanzas. I think I counted them one time. It's titled the Man of Sorrows. It was written by Brother Darby.
Oh, ever a homeless stranger thus dearest friend to me, an outcast in a Manger, that thou mightest with us be.
Come now and view that Manger, the Lord of glory. See a houseless, homeless stranger in this poor world for thee.
Oh, strange, yet fit, beginning of all that life of woe. These last two lines are what I want you to think about tonight. In which thy grace was winning. Poor man is God to know.
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Do you know? Go on.
He has made himself known in the Lord Jesus. So let's turn to Luke's gospel and we'll read a few scriptures there. We'll have to do it very superficially. I'm aware that our brother Bruce had trouble keeping within his time limit.
And I probably will have the same problem if I'm not careful. Let's go to Luke chapter 5. So you'll forgive me if we read these things superficially. I hope that you will not.
Take them superficially.
Because they're not superficial.
But we have but 30 minutes to cover this entire gospel, and obviously we can't be very deep here.
Verse 27 of Luke chapter 5. And after these things he went forth, and saw a publican named Levi sitting at the receipt of custom. And he said On him, Follow me. And he left. All rose up and followed him. And Levi made him a great feast in his own house. And there was a great company of publicans and of others that sat down with them. But their scribes and Pharisees murmured against his disciples, saying, Why do you eat and drink with publicans and sinners?
And Jesus answering, said unto them, They that are whole need not a position, but they that are sick.
I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.
This portion here lays out before us Luke's Gospel because we have two groups and you can follow this through the gospel, those that are worthy and those that are not worthy.
Praise God I was not worthy because that's the group.
That receives a blessing, those that do not deserve it and those who take the place of the righteous like these Pharisees and scribes here, they miss out on the blessing and Paul has to say about them, they didn't know Him.
That is a great sadness and a tragedy to be in that position, to have been so close and yet so far. They did not know this man who came down so that poor man might know his God. Oh, I hope you know him tonight in that way. Not superficially. A Brother Mark asked us if we knew Brother Ben Clawson's birthday. None of us did.
But if you ask the world if they know a Jesus birthday, they'll say December 25th.
But that's not what I want you to know tonight. I want you to know his person, this lovely man. So come with me and let's look at him here in this gospel. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. This man, Levi was in the business of making money. He was a public and he collected taxes for the Romans and he made a lot of money.
But he left it all behind to follow Jesus and what happened to him.
Well, I took some of that money and he made a great feast. I don't know that he had done that before. And he invited everyone to come in. And who came? Publicans and sinners, those who were not worthy. And there were those who pointed out, well, these folks are not worthy in the Lord Jesus said, that's right, Those are the ones I came to to call. Those are the ones I came to heal.
They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick, these ones are sick, and I came for them.
That's why I'm here. Let's go down to verse 37. And no man putteth new wine into old bottles, else the new wine will burst the bottles and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish. I read that verse purposely.
It's different in the other gospels.
Because there it seems to imply at least that the wine is is lost. But I submit to you, and I may have got this from Bruce, I couldn't find it, but I think it was in there.
In Luke's gospel, we have grace in the person of the Lord Jesus, the new wine, and it bursts the bottles, but it's not lost.
It pours out and it's available to all. The author of this gospel was a Gentile. Maybe it was one of the two from John 12. That would be a wild supposition on my part. But his name was Luke, and we find him included in the group of Gentiles and we see coming through in this gospel as he looks back because we believe he wrote it.
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At least afterwards, perhaps after the Book of Acts, which of which he's also the author.
But we see he had perfect understanding of all things and I just enjoyed going through this gospel to think of this Gentile.
He was unworthy. He fell in Ephesians chapter 2 without Christ, aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel's, strangers from the covenant promise.
Having no hope and without God in this world, all but he had been brought to know Jesus.
And he writes that gospel, his soul overflowing with joy about this lovely man, Son of man, dispensing grace that could not be restrained. You know, they tried to restrain him. They tried to tie him up with the law and with the commandments, but they couldn't do it. It would flow out and there would be blessing beyond that broken bottle of Judaism.
Let's go on now to my favorite chapter in Luke, Chapter 7.
And we're only going to read a little bit. Please read this whole chapter.
And if it doesn't fill you with joy, ask yourself, do I really know?
The Lord Jesus.
It is unparalleled in its expression of grace that flows out without limit to a needy world.
Let's read verse 4. Now. This is about the centurion that Bruce read to us about, and it's the same story, but it's a little bit different.
Let's read verse 3 and when he heard of Jesus. This is a Gentile. He's a Roman, a Roman official with 100 soldiers under him. We understand a military man.
And when he had heard of Jesus, he sent unto him the elders of the Jews, beseeching him that he would come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they besought him instantly, saying that He was worthy for whom he should do this. For He loveth our nation, and hath built us. A synagogue has stopped there a minute. He's worthy. That's what they said. But the Lord didn't come to call worthy people, but sinners to repentance. So let's see what this man.
Answers himself. This is a testimony of the Jews.
Who thought that those that are worthy should get the blessing? And they said, This man is worthy. Verse 6 Then Jesus went with them, and when he was now not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to him, saying unto him, Lord, trouble not thyself, for I am not worthy.
Was this man going to miss out on the blessing? He came just exactly as he had to come. I am not worthy. The elders of the Jews had a different opinion, but he knew that he had no place in the Commonwealth of Israel.
I am not worthy.
He didn't miss out on the blessing. And this is the two groups that we have throughout this gospel, those that are worthy and those that are not worthy.
Will you take your place tonight as those among those who are not worthy and receive the Lord Jesus as your Savior? Oh, He has blessing for you if you do. O taste and see that the Lord is good. What think ye of Christ?
There is no more important question than you can have tonight than that question. Let's go to the end of the chapter. I would love to read the center of the chapter before we find a woman who was manifestly.
Without anything to offer, a widow with a son who had died, an only son, and the Lord meets her need. Let's go to the end of the chapter though. Verse 36. And one of the Pharisees desired him, that he would eat with him. We see this over and over again in Luke's gospel. The Lord Jesus sitting down and eating in a Pharisees house more than once, and in the House of Levi and in others houses.
This is a lovely man that we have before us here.
He went under their Pharisee's house and sat down to meet verse 37. And behold a woman in the city, which was a Sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisees house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, and stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee which had bitten him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet.
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Would have known who and what manner of woman this is, that toucheth them, for she is a Sinner. Jesus answering, said on him, Simon, I have somewhat to say unto thee. And he saith, Master Sayon, there was a certain creditor which had two debtors, the one owed 500 pence and the other fifty, and when they had nothing to pay.
He frankly forgave them both in the middle of chapter where I didn't read.
When they saw the Lord Jesus raised from the dead this widow's son, they said a great prophet.
Is risen up among us.
And perhaps Simon had heard about that, and so he invites Jesus to his house.
And he watches him, and he sees this woman come in, and she sits at his feet behind him. They didn't sit in chairs, so his feet were not under the table, but rather out behind him. They they leaned on their elbow at a low table.
And and ate that way in the custom of the day. And so she could come in there behind and wash his feet with her tears and wipe them with the hairs of her head.
And anoint his feet.
She was a 500 pence debtor.
She was a Sinner.
And what happened to her?
She had nothing to pay and she knew it.
And you don't have anything to pay either. And neither did I Nothing at all. Oh, but what does it say? He frankly forgave them both. And you know, it doesn't tell us here, but we learn if we read on in the Bible that there was something to pay. There was a price to be paid for your sins and mine. This lovely man.
This holy man, this sinless man.
Went to a cross and there was nailed and hung between heaven and earth.
To pay the price.
For your sins. For my sins.
For the sins of the world.
But it will be of no value to you unless you put your trust in him.
Unless you come in this way that this woman came with nothing to pay.
And she found in the Lord Jesus what we have in verse 48. And he said unto her, Thy sins are forgiven.
And when and they that sat at me with him began to say within themselves, Who is this that forgive us sins also? And he said to the woman, Thy faith hast save thee, Go in peace.
We see these two sad groups, the one who knew who he was.
A 500 pence debtor with nothing to pay the other. A man perhaps upstanding in his community.
He was a 50 pence debtor, but he didn't have anything to pay either. And that's the problem, you see, we were bankrupt. We cannot pay. We have to beg.
Who received the blessing? You know, I'd like to think, and I don't know if it's a supposition.
Stretching scripture too far.
But, you know, he said he frankly forgave them both. And so I would love to think that, Simon.
Would be found among those who believed in the Lord Jesus. I don't know that and perhaps I'm sure we won't know it till the glory but for now it's as I thought that I enjoy because he frankly forgave them both and that's would have to have been that he recognized that he wasn't among the righteous but that he was a Sinner and he repented of his sins and came to the Lord Jesus Let's go on now to.
Chapter 13.
And you know, something very sad here.
Because these ones that Paul said, they knew him not, they knew him enough that they came to him here with a very sad thing to say. And I'm going to take it well. I don't know that it's out of context, but verse 31 of Luke 13.
The same day there came to him certain of the Pharisees saying On him, Get thee, get thee out, and depart. Hence I don't know why, but it struck me much more strongly in Spanish Sal ivette Aqui.
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Go and get out of here. Now they had a pretext. They said Herod will kill thee. But essentially they were saying we do not want you here. And so we see from Luke 9 and on.
The man who was rejected, they said we do not want him. Let's go down and read verse 34.
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which kill us the prophets, and stone us them that are sent unto thee.
How often would I have gathered thy children together as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings? And ye would not. Have you ever seen this? I'm a city boy, raised in the city. But my dad bought us a chicken. I don't know why he bought a chicken, but he bought us a chicken. Any penny. And I love that chicken. I was a little boy.
There's a few photos that remain of me holding that chicken. I was perhaps five years old.
And then my dad bought, or maybe my mom bought some fertilized eggs and put them out there in that chicken, sat on those eggs and hatched some little chickens.
And I don't remember much. If you ask my wife, she'll confirm this from when I was little.
But I remember that chicken.
Strutting around the grass, pecking here and there and the little chicks following her close by. And then she would make a little clucking sound and she would lift up those wings. And it was a beautiful sight to see those little chicks and they all nestled there under her wings. Oh, you know, the Lord uses illustrations of these animals to draw pictures in our minds. And to me that is a lovely picture.
That's what the Lord Jesus wanted to do.
To those children of that nation, and what do they say?
Salivate de Daquis, go and get out of here. We don't want you here.
All the blessed Lord Jesus, are you going to say that to him?
Or maybe just say, well, no, I'm not going to say anything. No, that's not one of the options.
What thinking of Christ? You have to answer that question. You cannot ignore it, pretend that it doesn't exist. It is vital that you answer that question. Can you say, Oh yes, I know him as my savior? Bless God, I know Him, He's mine. He's my savior.
I hope you can say that. I hope you've tasted and seen that the Lord is good.
I hope that as we read these verses, they touch your heart.
And they enter into your soul and you are enjoying this blessed man that we're reading about here that would have gathered Israel's children like that mother hen, Penny. Penny gathered those little chicks under her wings was a lovely thing that I enjoyed as a boy. Let's go to Chapter 15. And you know, we could spend the whole evening in chapter 15, but we're not going to. I just want to make one point. And I, and I owe this to Bruce.
But I enjoyed it.
Luke 15 in verse one then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners.
For to hear him those who were not worthy. And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners.
And eateth with them all. They spoke the truth. They meant it as an insult. Ah, but it was true. And you know the Lord tells three stories here and says, I won't tell you something better.
I know it not only receive them, I go looking for them and that's what we have here in Luke 15.
Three stories of God seeking the Sinner, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, all three of them illustrated by these three different illustrations.
He not only received sinners, he seeks them.
He's seeking you tonight.
What are you going to say?
Yes, Lord Jesus, I want you as my Savior. I'm not worthy, and that's OK because neither am I or anybody else in this room. We have nothing to pay. We're bankrupt before God.
But bless the truth, I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Let's go on there to chapter 18.
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Luke 18 and verse 9.
And he spake this parable on a certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others. Are we seeing a pattern here?
There's just two groups here, those that are righteous and those that are unrighteous, those that are worthy and those that are not worthy.
I trust you take your place with those who are not worthy.
Now let's listen to the prayer of these two men.
The two men verse 10 Two men went up to the temple to pray, the 1A Pharisee and the other Republican.
The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself. God, I thank thee that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust adulterers, or even as this publican I fast twice in the week, I'll give ties of all that I possess. And the publican standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying.
God be merciful to me, a Sinner.
God be propitious to me, and says in the Spanish.
You know, Plato was quoted 500 years before Christ as saying it may be that the deity can forgive sins, but I do not see how. I was very interesting, but that was recorded of him saying that because he could not see that God could sweep sins under the rug. But you know, the Lord Jesus has made propitiation on the cross.
That means that he paid for sins, not his own.
And God was propitiated, that is, He was.
Brother now with the Lord didn't like me using this word, but I don't know what else word to use. He was happy, he was satisfied. Seems insufficient. And I know that's the word we typically use, but God was completely and fully vindicated as far as sin was concerned by the work of the Lord Jesus on the cross. And so this man says God.
Propitious. Be merciful to me.
It just says in Spanish Sinner.
He was not worthy. And what happened? We got to finish it, don't we?
Verse 14 I tell you this man went down to his house justified rather than the other.
Well I don't want to talk about the other. I think it's self-evident that his prayer was just telling God what a good person he was and how righteous he was.
And the publican just said a few words, but they were the right ones. God be merciful.
To me Sinner.
So he went down to his house justified. What does that mean?
Well, I'm going to borrow from our brother Albert Hajo that was mentioned earlier. He told this story and it it struck me as being so forceful. You know, we had a president back from 1968 to 1974. His name was Richard Nixon. And in his second round of election, he did some unethical things and some illegal things. And his shame was so great that he had to resign.
President. And so the man that took his place had been appointed vice president and his name was Gerald Ford. And so he was the only president we ever had that was never elected to that office. So it was an interesting chain of events.
And Gerald Ford decided that he would pardon Richard Nixon.
And so Richard Dixon, in spite of the offenses that he had committed, he was pardoned and he didn't have to face the consequences of what he had done. And there was a lot of noise about that in two directions, positive and negative. In any case, the president's word passed, and there was nothing anybody could do about it. And so Richard Nixon could not be prosecuted for what he had done.
And her brother Albert Hagel told us that story. And then he told us about a picture he had seen.
Of Richard Nixon sitting in a wheelchair in a hospital waiting room.
And he drew a word picture, which I don't think I can duplicate, but it came through very clearly to me. And my brother passed away in 1981, so this is a long time back, but I remember how he spoke of how this picture showed this sad, decrepit looking man sitting there in a wheelchair, shamed.
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By what he had done. And yet he'd been pardoned.
Didn't have to face the consequences of his wrongdoing.
But he wasn't justified.
All the world knew that he was guilty.
But he didn't have to pay for the consequence of what he had done. But you know, that's not what it says about this Sinner here. He went down to his house, justified. And dear one, if you don't know the Lord Jesus here tonight, I want to tell you that he offers pardon, and you will not have to face the consequences of your sin, as I will not because the Lord Jesus.
Bore my sins on Calvary's cross.
But it's more than that, isn't it? Justified, brought into the family of God?
You know, if Richard Nixon had been justified, I suppose he could have gone on being president. But no, he was pardoned, but he wasn't justified. But the Lord Jesus says that this publican went down to his house justified.
Oh, that is a wonderful thing. Would you like to be justified? Put your trust in the Lord Jesus.
And you will be justified.
By him all the believe are justified from all things.
That's what Paul said in the 13th of Acts. Do you know what it is to be justified?
What think ye of Christ?
Is His grace winning your heart?
To know you're gone.
That's what the gospel message is.
Let's carry on here to Luke 23.
And in this chapter we have the crucifixion.
The men who had said go get out of here.
They hadn't been able to convince him to leave, and so they come about with a plan to put out the light to get rid of him entirely, and they falsely accuse him before the Roman governor. They had their own accusation ahead of time, and then because they were under the Roman authority, they had to bring him to the Roman.
To condemn him to death, and Pilate didn't want to do that.
He knew he was an innocent man and he said so I find no fault in this man. And yet he said I'll chastise him and let him go. Well, you don't chastise an innocent man. But he was trying to satisfy their their anger and their blood lost and they said no, no, no, away with him. Crucify him. We will not have this man to reign over us.
They rejected their Messiah, they said we don't want him.
So they nailed them to that cross. And what did the Lord Jesus do? Verse.
34.
Then said Jesus.
Father forgive them, for they know not.
What they do?
Didn't they know?
Well, the Lord gave him this out.
They don't know what they're doing.
And you know.
Peter says in Acts chapter 2.
That that man who ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain.
Was available to them as their savior and 3000 souls said yes Lord Jesus, you know, maybe it was some of the ones that were here. I don't we don't know that, but it could have been he said you deny the holy one and the just and desire to murder to be granted unto you and killed the Prince of life.
He didn't mince any words about what they were guilty of, and yet he offered them forgiveness if they would come in repentance and receive the Lord Jesus. In that case, it was as their Messiah.
Tonight I'm not offering you the Lord Jesus Messiah, but as Savior.
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The gospel went out to the Gentile because the Jew took the man that was a messenger, and they said we don't want him either, and they stoned him. And as Stephen died there in the 7th of Acts, he said Lord lay not this sin to their charge, but he no longer said that they didn't know what they were doing.
Where do you stand tonight?
What do you think of Christ?
Is he your Savior? Does your soul delight to hear about Him?
Is your heart singing tonight as you think about this lovely man that we see in Luke's gospel? Grace flowing out without limit, bursting out of the bounds of Judaism and reaching beyond the bounds of Judah to all the world, right here. Burbank Marriott Hotel, December 24th, 2022.
There was a man there that was crucified. Two of them actually.
Verse 32. There were also two others malefactors LED with him to be put to death.
We read in other gospels that they mocked him too. They cast the same in his teeth. That is, they said the same things that the rest of the crowd, but at some point in this.
Terrible scene, this man.
We don't know which side he was on, but he looked up there and he heard those words of grace from the lips of the Lord Jesus. Father, forgive them.
For they know not what they do.
And in his heart a work went on and he said I am not worthy. And he didn't say it quietly. He said it out loud. Let's read about it.
Verse 39 in one of the malefactors which were hand railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation?
And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds.
But this man hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord, Remember Me when thou comest into thy Kingdom. And Jesus said unto him.
Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise. What happened with this man? He said, I am not worthy.
We receive the due reward of our deeds. I'm getting just what I deserve. But this man had done nothing amiss. He knew who Jesus was. And he turns to Jesus and he says, Lord, Remember Me when thou comest into thy Kingdom. And what a blessed response today shalt thou be with me in paradise. Will you come tonight?
Like this thief did say Lord, I'm not worthy.
But I want you to be my Savior. Let's sing the last verse of #7.
And from my Savior.
From the heart to God.
Of glory let's pray. Bless the God Our Father all, we thank thee tonight for the Lord Jesus.
We know that He is precious to most souls in the room tonight, but perhaps not all. Lord Jesus, we pray that by Thy Spirit Thou art such the heart of any.
Who do not know thee in that personal way, and that they might come having nothing to pay.
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But owning that thou hast borne it all, blessed Savior, thereon Calvary's cross thou to shed thy precious blood, that our sins might be washed away, that we might be justified. We thank Thee for this blessed truth. Thank thee for thy precious word. We pray in thy precious name, Lord Jesus, Amen.