Hebrews 1:1-3 - The Supremacy & Sufficiency of Christ (Part 2)

Let me read out just verse three of Hebrews one, here God's Word. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. This is God's Word. Let's pray. Father, please help us now. Help us to climb this massive mountain where we see the glorious majesty of Christ. Let us taste and see that you are good. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. So we have these descriptions of Christ's supremacy in light of the dangers of drifting. There is a great and real danger of drifting away from the core of our salvation, from the flags of our faith, from being at the beach and being caught in a rip and drifting away slowly to damnation. You're not drifting away to a better beach, you're drifting away to eternal destruction, and so we need to come back to the flags of our faith. And in verse three, we have two particular descriptions to begin with. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature. This is all describing the deity of Christ, which is to say the Godness of Christ, the fact that Jesus is God and that he has divine status. So to show this, the writer says, he is the radiance of God's glory to radiate something is to say that that thing is connected to the source of the thing that it's radiating. Now that's important because Jesus is not some radiation of something disconnected from the source. The point of this is saying that Jesus radiates the glory of God because he is the glory of God being revealed. Just as the rays of sunlight are necessarily connected to the source, that is the sun. So Jesus radiates the glory of God because he shares and possesses that glory. Hello Chester. So you cannot have true rays of sunlight without the sun, and you cannot have the sun without the rays of light, they're connected. So Jesus radiates the glory of God because he is the source. He is connected to the source. Jesus is of that essence of God. See, there's a distinction here. We may do things that glorify God, but we cannot radiate the glory of God. We can glorify God in anything that we do by faith in Him, but we cannot radiate the glory because we are not of the essence. We are not connected to the source in such a way that we can radiate the glory of the eternal God. Only Jesus radiates that glory because he shares that glory. He is of the essence of that glory. Recall in John 17 verse 5 where Jesus prays and is high priestly prayer. And he says, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. I had that glory. You and I, Father, had that glory. We possess that glory and Jesus in his incarnation in his human state is saying, show that glory now because we have that glory, but I veiled it by taking on human flesh. But the writer of Hebrews is saying Jesus radiates that glory. He's always had it. He is the Son of God who eternally is glorious. So in the incarnation God has spoken to us by showing his glory in Christ. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. And what does John say? And we have seen his glory. We ve held his glory. As Jesus radiates the glory, he is radiating that which our souls were made to be captivated by. It's the greatest thing in the world for Jesus to radiate that glory not to keep it to himself. It's essential for our souls being nourished that we see that glory. That is what we were made for. We were made to be captivated by that glory. His glory, which is God's nature, when we speak of glory, we're trying to come up with language that is describing God's goddess. That's what we're trying to do. Glory is like bright heaviness, but really what we're trying to say is how God like God is. Now how can we with finite language, finite minds articulate that we can only come up with analogies and examples that fall short, but in some way capture it. Now that's what the writer of Hebrews is trying to do here. As we think about the dangers of drifting, the glory of God is that which is meant to keep us planted before him rather than drifting away because we become distracted by other bright shiny things. Our souls are made to be captivated by Christ. That's what we were made for. Some of us here have lived in Adelaide. Many of us moved over with the church, but we used to live in Adelaide for those who didn't know. And in Adelaide, I would say you have terrible beaches in the sense of them being flat. There's no waves at all. It's nothing like the East Coast. But one thing that Adelaide does have and Perth has as well is the beaches are Western facing. And so you get beautiful sunsets over the ocean. And I remember one particular day where we were driving and we were by a beach and it was sunset and there was this massive sun. You know how sometimes the Lord just displays the sun and it looks bigger than the earth. It's just massive. And cars were just stopped in the middle of the road. And everyone was out there taking photos and it was so glorious that no one cared. No one was beeping their horn. Like cars just literally stopped on the road. It was utterly glorious. Everyone needed to take a photo. Everyone needed to behold that sight. Now this is what glory is meant to do. It's meant to captivate us. It's meant to have us, it's meant to have us stop everything and say, I must behold this when God spoke to the world in sun by that high supreme authority. He was communicating his glory because in God communicating in his sun, he is giving the sun who radiates that glory. He is giving that which is meant to captivate our souls. Now of course we know that God has set his glory in heavens. So we have beautiful sunsets that give a little crumb of God's glory and it's beautiful, even a crumb is beautiful. But the point of God displaying his glory in the heavens is so that we would follow those rays and eventually come to the source. God is not content to just say, enjoy my world. That's pantheism where you just treat the world and all things as God. Again, the atheist loves sunsets. That's not a distinct Christian thing. We look at that and we follow the rays of it to the source. Jesus is the source. He is the one who radiates the glory of God. And when we come to Christ, we are able to say and I hope you're able to say this as well, that we would take decades of darkness with the most bleak scenery, nothing that captivates your souls, but to have the presence of Christ rather than a lifetime of the greatest thrills, the greatest sites, the greatest treasures this world could offer and not have Christ. We would say give me Christ or else I die. Give me Christ in a dungeon rather than the treasures of this world and no Christ. We're meant to follow the rays of whatever glory God shows in the world and come to the source and Jesus takes us to the source for he is the God of glory. Now, what is even more glorious about this glory being radiated to us is the effect that it has upon us. When we behold that glory, as David says in Psalm 34 5, those who look to Him are radiant. When Jesus radiates the glory of God and we look to Him, we become radiant ourselves. Paul says it a different way in 2 Corinthians 3, 18, where he says we all with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of God, contrasting Moses who had to walk down and have the veil of his face, but he's saying whenever someone's born of God, the veil is lifted off and we see the glory of God. And so Paul says we're beholding the glory of the Lord. And as we behold, we are being transformed into His image from one degree of glory to another. To behold the glory of God that Jesus radiates is to then become radiant yourself. As we look to Christ in His Word, as we seek Him in prayer, as we tomorrow take of the Lord's Supper and we see the clearest picture of salvation in the body and blood of Christ. As we do these things, as we have fellowship in Christ, we are becoming radiant with that glory. Now the scary thing is that the reverse is true. If you are not being captivated by the glory of God, if you are not having that set before you day after day, you will become like that which you set before you. You will become like cheap entertainment if that is what you set before you. You will become like garbage if that is what you set before you. If your minds are occupied by hours of social media, then your life will be shallow and superficial. Whereas if you behold the glory of Christ, this supreme and majestic God, you yourself don't become like a God, but you are radiant in that sense. You're actually becoming the most alive you can be because that is what you were made for. Now connected to this idea of Jesus radiating the glory of God, he goes on to say, and this is connected by the end, he is also the exact imprint of his nature. Now there are two important words here. The exact imprint and then nature. The word for exact imprint is a word where in the Greek it's "character", where you can understand where we get another English word from "character". So the exact imprint is character or representation. When it's used outside of the Bible, it was used for a stamp on a wax seal and then when you stamp on the page, the the character, the exact imprint is the mark that's left on the page, there's meant to be identical to the actual stamp. So it would be unusual if you had a stamp and you put it on the page and suddenly it comes out with something different. There's something, whatever the mark is, there's not the same as the source. This is saying, Jesus is the exact imprint of God. When God puts his stamp, it's Jesus. That's how he is chosen to reveal himself to humanity. That's the exact imprint. Now the other word, which is hippostasis, which is an important theological word, one word that you should understand, which is basically the essential nature of something, the essence, the substance. So as an example, the essential in very simplistic ways, the essential nature of a unicycle is that it has one wheel. Now if you add another wheel to it, it's lost its essence. It's not a unicycle anymore, it's just a bike. A unicycle has one wheel. So if you take that wheel away, it's no longer a unicycle. So at its essence, the unicycle has to have that one wheel. If you add another wheel, if you take it away, it's lost its essence. So the writer is saying that Jesus is the exact character and representation of God, of God's essence, because he is God. That's what it's saying. He's the mark of God because he shares that essence. He is of the same substance, of the essence as God. Now angels do not have this. Moses did not have this. We being made in God's image, do not have this. We're not of that essence. We're different. We're creatures. Only Christ is of the essence of God. Now as we come to Christmas time, this is what is utterly astounding about the incarnation. What is utterly astounding is that the fullness of God, the God who created everything, the fullness of God, as Paul says in Colossians, dwells in bodily form, in Jesus. Wrap your heads around that. The fullness of God dwells bodily in Jesus. The God who created the world entered into his own creation. This is what the writer is getting at in Hebrews and DC, probably that the strain that he would be going through to try to articulate the godness of God in human language. Jesus is God. He's not simply a prophet. He's not simply an angel. He is God in the flesh who has walked on this very earth. Now children, I've got another question for you. My children should know this and be listening, coming up to Christmas time. What does Emmanuel mean? What does the word Emmanuel mean? Does anyone Lewis, do you want to yell it out? He's either asleep or not listening. Emmanuel, God with us. God is with us. Now why can we say this? Do we just say because we hear it repeated at Christmas time? We say because God actually entered into this world, took on human flesh, lived as a man and died a sacrificial death. God is with us. That was the promise of Emmanuel and Isaiah that God would send his son to be born of a virgin. See, God could have just communicated this idea of Emmanuel, of his love for us from a distance, sort of like when someone offers like a cheap word of comfort to you, like when you're going through something really difficult and they're living in a different city and they say, I'm with you in spirit or my thoughts are with you. What does that mean? It means absolutely nothing. That's like even the best intentions. It's like, what do intentions do? They need, they need to be seen. Well, God didn't just have intentions when he said Emmanuel, God is with us. He showed that by wrapping himself in human flesh, the fullness of God dwelling in human flesh. Now it is a right understanding of the incarnation that actually helps us to avoid two dangerous extremes in understanding God. Many people can fall off these two clips. One is to think of God as so holy and distant that he is not relatable and not personable. He's too transcendent, too holy that he isn't near. And the other cliff to fall off is to say that God is so near and so relatable that he's not a holy God who demands my allegiance. And you can fall off either of those clips. Now, a true understanding of Jesus deity that he is God, radiating the glory of God. And yet he entered into the realm of the flesh. He took on human flesh, understanding this rightly is what keeps us from falling off those two clips. Because if you understand it rightly, you cannot claim that God is not personal and relatable because this God literally took on flesh and he was tried and tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin. And he is our great high priest who is the writer of Hebrews who goes on to say he can sympathize with us. He knows what it is like. So you cannot say God is too distant. No, he's shown how very near he is willing to come. But you also cannot claim that God is so near to you that he's more like your best friend who allows you to do whatever you want because the God who wrapped himself in human flesh is the holy God who cannot tolerate sin near him and who demands allegiance to him. So Christ radiates God's glory because he possesses that glory and he is the exact imprint of his nature because he is of the essence of God, which is to say he is God. And this God has spoken to us. Now the fact that God has decided to finally speak in the Son shows that we must come to know God only through Christ. We do not come to truly know God through nature. Nature can tell us parts, various things about God, how glorious he is. We cannot know God through nature or an emotional experience that we have. Now God may use various means, but ultimately we come to know God through His Son. He's the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me, Jesus says. So whoever you think you know, if you haven't come to Jesus, you haven't come to God. And when we come to Jesus, we have the full assurance that we are truly coming to God. We're not coming to a part of God. Now I know it might sound a little bit silly, but I think subconsciously sometimes we feel like Jesus is like the nice son who smooths over the angry Father. And so we come to Jesus and the Father is really angry, but because we're in with the Son, he's okay with us. The reality is when we come to Christ, we are coming to the full God. It's why Jesus could say in John 148, Philip, and they say, show us the Father and Jesus says to Philip, Philip, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. We're of the same essence. You're not getting anything else when you get to heaven after you've seen me. No, no, no. The fullness of God is here. We may be different persons, but we are the one God. Jesus is the same character, the same essence. So when Jesus says, come to me for I am gentle and lowly in heart. That is God. God is gentle and lowly in heart. Or when Psalm 103 says Yahweh is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, that's why we see in Christ's earthly ministry him being moved with compassion and love for those who were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. And it's why when we read in Psalm 5 of God who is not pleased at all with wickedness and who hates all evil doers, that's why we see Jesus furious with those who corrupted his temple and furious with stubborn unbelief that would not trust him, because it is the fullness of God in flesh. When you have come to Christ, you have come to the fullness of God. Now, to continue displaying the supremacy of Christ, the writer goes on to say, he upholds, how could you get, well, we've already gone over, it's like you can't top it, but then he adds in, and by the way, he upholds the universe by the word of his power. Now, this is where again we have the translation universe and that captures it. Literally, the language is just all things. Now again, here's a very simple language lesson. All means all. Everything, there's nothing that is not upholding. There's nothing outside of the scope of this, both visible and invisible. He's upholding everything by the word of his power. The word refers to the spoken word, it's the rama, the word which was uttered in the very beginning when there was nothing and then there was something. That word which spoke light and there was light, that same word in the flesh that when Lazarus was dead for four days, no one was bringing him back to life and all Jesus has to do is say Lazarus, come forth and he brought him to life. That's how he upholds the universe. Now, what a word of comfort this is. If we allow it to take deep root in our hearts, what a word of comfort this is. How often we are burdened by things that are outside of our control and things that we want to control, but we grow anxious and frustrate it because they're not within our control and so we succumb to despondency. We succumb to discouragement and frustration. The family situation that is not going the way we wanted to, the job that we do not have or the job that we do have that's terrible and wish we didn't have it. The potential for disunity and discord in the church, resources, food on the table, all sorts of things that are often outside of our control and these situations fill us with anxiety when we do not apply this truth to our lives, but remember very carefully brothers and sisters. Christ upholds the entire universe by the word of His power. The reason why the sun isn't just falling from the sky and killing us all is because Christ is upholding it. As I was considering this passage and remember I said I did some googling on the weight and matter of the mass of the universe and those who are more into science can correct me later in private if you feel a need to do so. I'm a beginner at this, but I was researching the estimated weight of the universe and scientists say that the majority of weight is actually this invisible mass like dark matter. There's a significant portion of the universe which is this dark matter. They don't really know about it and here is the technical definition from NASA. Here's how NASA describes dark matter. Dark matter is the mysterious invisible glue that holds the universe together. That's the scientific definition of dark matter. You know why they have to say like that because they don't actually know what it is. They just know that there's something in the universe keeping stars in various galaxies from falling out of the sky. They know there's something there that is holding everything together and the very best definition they can come up with is a mysterious invisible glue that holds the universe together. Well the mystery is solved. It's Christ. Not that Christ is the dark matter, but that the Christ who created the universe, who put the universe together according to his Word, has ensured that it will remain perfectly intact. And that's why stars are not falling out of the sky to destroy the earth because God promised that the earth would not be destroyed, at least until he brings about the new heavens and new earth. So the reason we are not being destroyed and the reason our climate is not going to descend into chaos where there is a mass extinction is because Jesus upholds the universe. That's why it's really very simple when you think about it. It's much harder to apply it to your life when you're in a situation that causes you to just have your stomach churn with anxiety. And then to actually force yourself to think, hang on. If God can create an infinitely large universe with billions of massive stars and gigantic balls of gas and fire and have them stay precisely where he wants them to, so that we don't all die, then I think he can uphold me in whatever situation I'm in. I don't think I've found the only situation that God says, oh no, I didn't think of that one. I thought of how to keep the sun exactly where it is, but not the situation for that guy. No, no, no, everything is in perfect control. And where we have this mindset, difficult situations no longer become things that we need to control and change, but rather they are things that we endure by trust in our sovereign God, knowing that he's working it together for good. He's upholding the universe, so he's upholding my life and every circumstance in it. Now what is even more astonishing is at one point the Son of God who was a tiny helpless baby. As he was a tiny helpless baby feeding at his mother's breast, he was making sure that the laws of gravity remain as they are so that things don't descend into outer chaos. He was still upholding the universe by the word of his power. Jesus didn't cease to be God when he entered into the flesh. R.C. Sproul has a famous statement on this on God's providence. He says, what is the chance that chance can do anything? Not a chance. There is no such thing as chance. It's by God's sovereign hand. He's upholding every single thing. And then finally, the last thing we will look at, after making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. Now what is entailed in the sins here? Which sins did Jesus make purification for? If he made purification for everyone sins, everyone should be saved. Who did Jesus die for? That's really what we are asking and it's an important question because we either have to say that the sacrifice of Jesus is able to provide purification for any who want to accept it but unless they accept it, no purification has happened. And that's the logical conclusion. Or we say that the act which made purification, namely Jesus dying on the cross and then rising again, literally made purification and guaranteed purification for all whom Christ died for. He's secured it. So he didn't simply make people savable. He saved people. He saved his elect. He guaranteed the salvation of all those who belong to him. Now that purification may not be experienced or applied in our lives experientially until we trust in the Lord, but I think we can wholeheartedly assert that when Jesus died upon the cross according to John 10 where he says the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep and he knows who his sheep are. He calls them by name. That's whom Jesus has died for and he secured redemption for those sheep. This is wonderfully comforting. Jesus didn't leave it into the hands of us because you know what would happen if he died and left it into our hands. We would continue to shake our fist in rebellion at him and not actually choose to follow him. Jesus secured that redemption. Now this is meant to be of great comfort because it is telling us that purification is not in our hands. It is in Christ's hands. We don't make ourselves pure. Christ makes us us pure and he guarantees this and let us not gloss over the details of this purification as we finish by looking at this. Consider the extent of that which needed to be purified. Consider the extent of this purification. All of the sins of God's elect over all time. Now a single person who has lived 80 years and who has managed to live a very good life where they only sin once a day. They have racked up in their life 30,000 sins. Now that's a pretty good life. And then you make it say the population of Australia, then you would say well there's just shy of one trillion sins. And then if you make it the population of the world which perhaps all believers of all time over thousands of thousands of years could be the same population of the world now we don't know. But if there was that many sins to make purification for you would have almost a quadrillion sins more than a trillion. In simple terms there's a lot of sin to deal with. And that's only for sinning once a day. That's pretty good. Now consider that if out of all of those people no one sinned except for one person who sinned once in their life. Because of the holiness of God and his perfect standard that one sin by one person is still enough to bring the fullness of God's wrath upon that person. One tiny red dot is enough to spoil a perfectly white wedding dress. And yet in one act of righteousness by one man Christ made purification for all the sins of God's elect. Now consider the weightiness of this brothers and sisters. What sacrifice could possibly be offered to counteract the sins of God's elect over all time day after day, minute after minute, sinning against him, not offering up the love that he deserves, not loving him with all our hearts, our mind and strength, living in sin where we love ourselves. What could possibly offset the wrath of that holy God? Imagine someone breaking into your house and brutally murdering your whole family and making sure that you watched every bit of blood splattering over the floor, watching their heads chopped off and then making sure you lived so that you would live with that memory. What could possibly restrain your fury in that moment? What could possibly stop you from killing those people or trying to or consider owing a financial debt that was greater than the world's currency could handle. If you somehow managed to do that, there is nothing by worldly standards that could be offered to offset what is owed. Now that's the reality of our sin. There's nothing that we could come up with. There's no currency that we have to pay the penalty for that sin. Our sin is simply too great in comparison to the holiness of God. Again, if we measure this by human standards, sure we all sin against each other and you're a sinner. So my sin against you is not that bad, but it's not it's the level of authority and holiness of the one sin against. And God is immeasurably and infinitely holy such that one sin would bring his wrath. And yet Christ makes purification. Again, look very closely at the word after making purification for sins. That is a completed event. It's not as though he's initiated the purification and when we get better at living, he'll finally make us pure. No, no, it's a completed past tense event. He made purification. Christ makes purification that satisfies the wrath of God and cleanses sinners from all their guilty stain. The righteousness of Christ is that which is of immense value, immeasurable value to atone for the worst of sinners and to guarantee their place before the throne of God. He has infinite worth to take the fullness of God's wrath upon himself and not be crushed beyond the potential of resurrection, but rather to be brought to life, to show that he has conquered death, to show that the price has been paid, to show that God's wrath is fully satisfied and Christ has therefore seeded right back where he belongs at the right hand of the Father in that place of all authority. He has perfectly purified God's elect. Now, we must daily apply this to our lives, brothers and sisters. We must daily apply this to our lives to ensure that we do not go back to sin like a dog returns to its vomit and to ensure that we do not allow the shame of sin to rob us of the joy we have in knowing Christ as cleansed us from sin. Those who are wrestling with sin and experiencing shame read the words very carefully. He made purification for sins. It is done. It is finished. It is intentionally a completed tense to without a doubt, show that in the heavenly courtroom your sentence before God of sin, after sin, after sin, after sin of act of rebellion, after act of rebellion, all of it in that heavenly courtroom when Jesus made purification, it is as though God hands down the verdict and says not guilty. Innocent, not only that, receive the status of a son, receive the righteousness of Christ, take off those filthy robes, be clothed with a robe of righteousness. And there is the gospel. Not that one day we will be justified if we persevere. This is in saying that we'll be justified. Sure, we're waiting for salvation, but this is a completed tense as Paul says in Romans, he justifies the ungodly. This is the gospel that we are justified, that Christ one sacrifice by one man is perfectly able to cleanse us from our sin and to satisfy the wrath of a holy God. And to stay in a place of wallowing over your sin, to stay in that place of shame over that sin is actually to suggest that Christ's work of purification was not enough. It was not enough for my sin, somehow you found the sin that Jesus couldn't be, couldn't purify. It is to reduce the power of Christ's sacrifice. What we must see here is both Christ's supremacy, but his sufficiency to atone, his sufficiency to make clean. This language here is old covenant language. The idea of covering the shame of impurity is what lies behind the language here. Purification is connected with those who under the old covenant were deemed unclean, whether because of sin or a situation that you were in that rendered you unclean and you had to stay outside of the camp into that place of shame where you had to go through the purification procedures to then be brought back into the camp. Now under the old covenant that was only temporary, but our need for purification, man's need for purification is far greater than simply the mosaic law. Our need for purification is because we have inherited the sin of Adam where we are infected with sin. We're not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners. We've received that in our natural state. We are cast out of God's presence just as Adam was to a place of permanent shame and impurity, but more than that to a place of wrath where God's displeasure and his anger is upon us, but Christ has made purification. In Christ's work of purification he has taken off those unclean, filthy garments he has taken us from outside of God's presence, outside of the camp to bring us back into Christ's presence where the fullness of his favour is upon us. And in this sense we are spiritually brought back into the garden. We are longing for the physical restoration, but spiritually we are in a far better place than Adam was when he was cast out. We are as Hebrews 5, we'll go on to say, brought to the very throne room of grace. So when you are struggling with sin, when you're struggling with shame, you must remind yourself of this purification and remember that you are not outside of the garden anymore. You're not outside, you're not in that place of shame. You who have trusted in Christ, spiritually you are able to draw near to the very throne room of grace. And then his last phrase here, after making purification for sins, the weightiness, that one act, bringing righteousness to all, he sat down just like we might sit down after a hard day of work when our job is finally finished. Christ sits down after he completes the work of redemption. He is seated at the right hand of the Father to show that the sacrificial offering has been fully completed. There is nothing more that must be done. Just as there is no further revelation beyond this word of Christ that we have in the scriptures, there is no further need for purification. There is no need. There may be a need for you to realize the purification that you have in Christ, but there is no need for him to be offered up again. That's why when we take the Lord's Supper, Christ is not being physically offered in the Supper. He has already completed that act. We are spiritually feasting upon Christ. We're not bringing him down, rather he is lifting us up to remind our place, seated at the right hand of the Father in that throne room of grace, because we are united to Christ. Now this is what we must not drift away from, with all of the important things that we as a church must understand. We must not drift away from this. There is an infinite supply of bright, shiny things in this world that will take our attention away from this. And we must resist that. Their way may seem innocent, but they lead to death. They cause us to drift from this glorious reality, so we must pay much closer attention to the supremacy and sufficiency of Christ, less we drift away by these cheap pleasures at the world office. And my last question. Particularly to those who may not know Jesus Christ or those who think you do, but perhaps you're wondering whether you actually do. Do you know this God? Do you know this supreme Christ? Is that where your trust is entirely placed? Not in your ability to merit God's faith, but in your ability to work your way to God, but in God's ability in Christ to satisfy his wrath against your sin and to make you wider than snow. Are you drifting away? Again, not to a path of just a less than adequate life, but to eternal conscious torment, to hell and fire. The free offer of the gospel is available to anyone who would say yes, that's me. That's I am a dirty rotten sinner. The only hope I have for purification is Christ, and he holds that offer open to any who would turn to him. Let's pray and let this sink in into our hearts. Father, we thank you for this glorious reality. We ask that you would help it to penetrate deeply into our hearts and we pray that you would guide us for the remainder of this weekend so that our conversation will be sweet. Our fellowship would be rich and you would be glorified in all things. We ask this in Jesus' name, Amen.