Show Notes
Revelation 2:18-29
Pastor Christopher Chelpka
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Let's pray and ask God to bless us as we turn to the reading and preaching of His Word.
[00:00:14] Our Heavenly Father, we thank youk for the brightness of the Word of God, that it shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overcome it. And it shines in a way that exposes our sins so that we might no longer be enslaved by them, that we might see the chains and turn to you in forgiveness, so that we might be free and no longer covered by shame, no longer covered by pride and disobedience, but instead, Lord, free.
[00:00:57] Free to know ourselves as those who are adopted as your sons and daughters.
[00:01:03] Free to know ourselves as those who belong to your family and will receive an inheritance guarantee of which we already have in the promised Holy Spirit.
[00:01:15] You promised to us that we will be those who are no longer under your condemnation, but are in fact justified, declared righteous through Christ's righteousness imputed to us.
[00:01:33] Lord, all these things and more belong to us because your Word has come to us, because the Son has come to us.
[00:01:44] And we praise your name.
[00:01:46] And we ask that as we hear your Word yet again now, that you would help us to see more of him, that we might throw aside every sin that clings so closely and run this race with endurance. With our eyes fixed on Jesus, who's full of majesty and glory and honor, who is the Lamb of God risen from the dead.
[00:02:12] We pray these things in his name. Amen.
[00:02:17] Let's remain standing and turn to Revelation, chapter 2, Revelation 2, 1829.
[00:02:41] So last week, for those of you who were here or listened online, you heard that we read through chapters two and three and considered them as a whole and thought about the work of the ministry of the Word that God does in his churches, the works that he does here, how he does them, various things.
[00:03:04] Today we're going to focus on one of those letters, Revelation 2. 18 through.
[00:03:12] There we go. 18 through 29. There we go.
[00:03:15] The letter to the church in Thyatira. And so we'll spend a little more time specifically looking at the details of this particular letter.
[00:03:25] Let's hear God's Word and to the angel of the Church in Thyatirite, the words of the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire and whose feet are like burnished bronze.
[00:03:40] I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first.
[00:03:53] But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual Immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols.
[00:04:10] I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality.
[00:04:18] Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed. And those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation unless they repent of her works.
[00:04:28] And I will strike her children dead.
[00:04:31] And all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart.
[00:04:37] And I will give to each of you according to your works.
[00:04:41] But to the rest of you in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not learned what some call the deep things of Satan, to you I say I do not lay on you any other burden. Only hold fast to what you have until I come.
[00:04:58] The One who conquers and who keeps my works until the end. To him I will give authority over the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, even as I myself have received authority from my Father.
[00:05:16] And I will give him the morning star.
[00:05:19] He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
[00:05:26] You may be seated.
[00:05:57] When we hear the Son of God, we hear the Son of God speak to the church in Thyatira, we come to know more of him who speaks.
[00:06:09] We come to understand and see more clearly who he is, what he does, what he's doing, what he promises to do.
[00:06:19] This is not, in other words, a journal entry from the pastor in the church in Thyatira, where he's thinking to himself, where are we doing strong? Where are we weak? What do we need to work on?
[00:06:34] That would be, of course, a very good thing for a pastor to do. But that's not what we have here. This is not the pastor or the church self reflecting and thinking about how it can grow and where its areas of weakness are and these kinds of things. This is the Lord of the Church, the One who searches hearts and minds, speaking directly to his church. And as we see at the end of the letter, to all the churches, including us, right here we have the Lord Jesus Christ speaking to us.
[00:07:11] And he wants us to hear not just our own thoughts and our own reflections as right as they might be, but he wants us to hear him. He wants us to hear his words, take his word as seriously as you should take the word of someone who is the Son of God, the one who is the risen Lamb, the Alpha and the mega. Or as he introduces himself in this letter, the one whose eyes are like a flame of fire and whose feet are like burnished bronze power.
[00:07:48] Strength, glory, majesty, his power and strength and his glory and his majesty are expressed also in these references at the end of the letter to that refer Back to Psalm 2 Letters, words about the King coming and us with him who ruled with him with a rod of iron smashing to pieces, earthen pots blowing away. As Psalm 2 talks about the wicked like the chaff, the wicked who, like Jezebel here, this, this, this woman that is being called Jezebel, this false prophetess, people who conspire against the Word, conspire against the lord. As Psalm 2 talks about a kind of whispering and dark room muttering where you can kind of hear the plans being made, things being done, where the world conferences and counsels together and decides how will we break apart the bonds between the Lord and His anointed, which is to say both between the Father and the Son. Impossible.
[00:08:59] This is also to say the bonds between the Lord God and the Christ who comes again, impossible because of who he is, but also for the anointed who are in Christ, in other words, the Lord and his people. The world wants to break these things apart, wants to insert poisonous, deceptive practices, teaching, doubt, shame, fear, all kinds of things, insert these into our relationship with the hope of destroying and breaking apart the love that God holds us together with the love in which he works, the power in which he works among us, the Spirit of God himself at work among us. The world would seek to destroy it, and the world will be destroyed.
[00:09:50] Just as a pot cannot stand up to the power of a big heavy piece of iron, the world cannot stand up to the triune God.
[00:10:06] But the world tries, Satan tries.
[00:10:09] Our flesh tries inside of us. The Scriptures say there is a war between the flesh and the Spirit, and and the flesh wages war and tries, but it will not succeed because of the one who speaks this letter, because of the one who's talking, because of the one who's not just talking and speaking, but is acting, is doing things, commending, correcting, training, reproving, teaching.
[00:10:41] The Word of God is active here.
[00:10:44] As the Word comes to the apostle John, as John delivers it, as the angel delivers it to the Church in Thyatira and the Word of God. The Holy Spirit is active among us and all the churches of Christ as he speaks.
[00:11:02] And what does he tell us?
[00:11:05] The first thing he reveals to us about himself are his attributes, as we've touched on already, his power, his majesty, his might, but also seen particularly in his protection of his people and judgment over wickedness, in his patience in giving time for repentance.
[00:11:28] And this is just what's in this letter. I've pulled a little things you may have recognized already from other places in Revelation, in the scripture. If you have your Bibles open, it's okay if you don't at the moment, but you just sort of let your eyes sort of wander around the page. And it's not that hard to find other descriptions of our Savior, of who he is, what he's doing.
[00:11:50] He who walks among the golden lampstands, him who is pure, hair is white like snow, whose voice is like the roar of many waters.
[00:12:02] His power, his glory, his majesty. This is him who speaks.
[00:12:06] It is Jesus, the one who the world tried to kill and who rose from the dead and was victorious over death.
[00:12:19] We hear of God's attributes. We hear. We come to know who he is as he speaks to us.
[00:12:26] We also come to know God's knowledge.
[00:12:29] What does he know?
[00:12:31] He knows everything.
[00:12:34] He knows everything.
[00:12:36] We ever had a boss or a parent or a teacher who was trying to lead but didn't really understand the full situation.
[00:12:46] At best, you can kind of forgive them for their ignorance. At worst, it's crazy frustrating.
[00:12:52] Have you kids, have you ever been caught in the middle of an argument and then your parent gets mad at you when it was really your secret sibling who is causing the problem?
[00:13:04] Really frustrating, right? No, mom, you're getting it all wrong, right? That knowledge is so important. Or at work, sometimes a new boss will come in and just decide, well, we're going to clean house and we're going to make all these decisions and all these changes. And you're like, you haven't been here for the last five years.
[00:13:23] You don't know what you're doing, why you're doing it, the kinds of things that are unraveling because of your rash, ignorant decisions. Even when the best intentions are there, it can cause a lot of problems.
[00:13:36] I'm telling you today that the Lord Jesus Christ does not lead his church in ignorance, intentional, unintentional, otherwise. He knows everything and he speaks to the church in thyatira.
[00:13:50] And as hard as the words that he says are in the middle, don't let them overwhelm what we hear at the beginning, because they're just as true, just as important. These aren't Jesus throwaway words just so we can get to the hard stuff. He means what he says when he says in verse 19, I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first.
[00:14:23] I can't remember off the top of my head and I didn't look it up. But there's a figure of speech where the, where you introduce this conjunction over and over again, right? He could just list it, right? Something comma, something comma, something comma, something comma, and you know, et cetera. But instead he introduces this. And why does he do it that way? Why does he speak in this way? It's a literary device as a way to pile things up.
[00:14:46] And, and, and, and, and this is one of the nice and lovely ways that we see the Lord's intentionality in what he's doing. He's meant for them to feel the way of his pleasure, his approbation, his joy in what they are doing. They are walking in the works that he has called them to walk in. Love, faith, service, patience, endurance, and that. It's getting better.
[00:15:15] The latter works exceeding the first. They're growing, right?
[00:15:23] If a friend told you you move to a new city and a friend tells you there's this great church, the Lord Jesus Christ has commended them directly for their love, for their service, for their patient endurance, and for their growth, you'd be like, well, I'm going to go to that church.
[00:15:44] That's a good church.
[00:15:46] Those are good things. And the Lord commends them for that. And as we see in all these letters, as we hold ourselves up to them and say, you know, in what way? Where are we at? Where are we in these things? Wherever we see these things in ourselves, we ought to be encouraged and thankful to the Lord. These are his words of encouragement to them and to all his churches who do these kinds of things.
[00:16:12] There are things he wants, they're things he desires, and there are things that we can be happy about when we see them among us.
[00:16:22] So God knows this, but he also knows that it's not perfect. In fact, the church is far from perfect, as is true of us and all Christ churches.
[00:16:35] In fact, there's a particular area that they are struggling in in a very significant way.
[00:16:41] It doesn't take away what's true about the first, but it does give us a fuller picture.
[00:16:47] There is something else that he knows, and it is this that he has against them.
[00:16:54] They are failing to do something he has called them to do.
[00:16:58] What is it he has called them to do?
[00:17:01] It is to exercise church discipline.
[00:17:04] It is to turn out those who are unrepentant.
[00:17:08] To not tolerate. That's the particular thing that is a problem here, to not tolerate what is happening in the church, particularly here. The thing that's happening is that there is a woman Called Jezebel.
[00:17:24] Maybe that was her actual name.
[00:17:27] More likely, it is probably the Lord's way of describing her because she's doing. Seeing things similar similar that Jezebel did in the Old Testament. These Old Testament references are very common in Revelation.
[00:17:42] And without getting into all the history there, we don't have to in this particular moment because Jesus tells us of what's happening.
[00:17:51] This woman calls herself a prophetess, which means she claims to speak the word of God. She came to be able to deliver to people the divine word what God says, what God wants.
[00:18:06] But instead of delivering the word of God to the people, she is teaching and seducing my servants. He says, these do not belong to her. They are not hers, they are his.
[00:18:20] She is teaching and seducing my servants. To do what? Practice sexual immorality and to eat food. Food sacrificed to idols.
[00:18:30] There's a broader discussion about both of these topics in the New Testament. Sexual immorality, food sacrifice to idols.
[00:18:40] To simplify things, sexual immorality covers a wide variety of practices.
[00:18:46] Eating food sacrifice to idols, while at certain times is not sinful in itself, is certainly sinful when it's participating in idolatry and when it's giving belief to other people and it's hampering our witness when they look and they think that we are participating in idolatry.
[00:19:05] And these things often went together in the ancient world.
[00:19:09] Still today, in certain places, in different ways, the rejection of the Lord is often done because we want to pursue our own pleasures, we want to pursue our own desires, we want to go our own way. As we heard in Jude a while back, he said that there were those who perverted the grace of God and turned it into. Well, I'll read it exactly. It's one page over, verse four. Who pervert the grace of God into sensuality and deny our Master, our only Master and Lord Jesus Christ. That's Jude, verse four.
[00:19:50] There's something about when we want to do what we want to do that makes us reject the Lord.
[00:19:59] And it's kind of obvious why. Isn't it because he's telling us not to do it?
[00:20:06] Because he's saying, don't do this. And we say, but I want to do this. And he says, well, you can't do this. And we say, well, then I'm just going to do my own thing.
[00:20:19] The thing is, you can't walk away from the Lord.
[00:20:23] He's present everywhere. He knows all things. He knows whole hearts. He knows all minds.
[00:20:31] We are not equals with Him.
[00:20:34] He is our King, our ruler, our master.
[00:20:41] And so walking away is a very tepid way to describe what happens when we give ourselves over to our flesh and say, well, this is just what I want to do.
[00:20:59] We're going to war against God.
[00:21:05] We're going to war against the One. When we say, no, this is what I'm going to do. We're going to war against the One who promises to come in judgment against those who wage war against him and break them to pieces like a piece of iron breaking earthen vessels.
[00:21:30] This is not a small deal.
[00:21:34] This is a huge deal. And eternal consequences are on the line now.
[00:21:41] That's what we are engaging in. When we decide to deny our Lord and Savior as master and just go our own way, it's even worse.
[00:21:51] As if that weren't bad enough, it's even worse when we decide to teach others to do the same, to promote that kind of thing, to encourage it and call them to it. And as this woman is doing, not only teaching, but also seducing Christians, the Lord's servants, to practice sexual immorality and to engage in idolatry, eating food, sacrificed to idols.
[00:22:22] So there's multiple problems going on here. There's the sin, particularly of this woman, this false prophetess. There's the sin of those who are listening to her and following, following along.
[00:22:33] There's the sin of those who described here, as likely described as her children, who are repeating and teaching these things.
[00:22:41] Often people like this have other people around them that are promoting all of this.
[00:22:47] And then finally you have the sin of the church as a whole.
[00:22:52] Even those who aren't, like, actively participating and falling into this, but the church as a whole, that's tolerating that. And that's the primary word that God speaks when he speaks to the church in thyatira or this highest level, I guess you could call it, they're tolerating this. They're not dealing with it. They're letting it go on.
[00:23:13] Now, there is a kind of toleration that's good. We see God doing that himself.
[00:23:18] He is giving time to repent, right? If toleration is kindness, if tolerance is patience, if tolerance is waiting and helping and urging, that is what God does and what he calls us to do. But there's a difference between that kind of tolerance, which we could call love, and the kind of tolerance that just says, I'm not going to worry about it.
[00:23:43] It's not important.
[00:23:45] It's not a big deal.
[00:23:47] It's a difference between that kind of tolerance that says, I'm not going to worry about it.
[00:23:51] I'm not going to deal with it. And that kind of tolerance, even that goes another step further and supports it, encourages it.
[00:24:01] These are things we have to be very careful about in our own situation, as all the churches must be.
[00:24:11] God knows all this.
[00:24:13] He knows their situation, he knows their works, and he knows the sin that is being tolerated in the church.
[00:24:23] So that's God's actions or his attributes rather, and his knowledge. What about his actions? What do we see him doing here?
[00:24:31] Well, as I mentioned, he's giving time for repentance.
[00:24:35] That's one of the things that he's doing here. Praise God.
[00:24:38] Can you imagine?
[00:24:40] You probably can't. I can't really, but I'll say it anyway. Can you imagine what the world would be like if God punished us fairly every single time we sinned?
[00:24:53] Yeah, we wouldn't be here to talk about this.
[00:24:58] God is patient and forbearant. And he does that because he wants us to repent. He calls us to repent. He says, hey, here, I'm giving them time to repent. He threatens to do things unless they repent of her works.
[00:25:15] This is one of the things that God is doing. One of his actions is he's giving time, he's giving space, he's giving opportunity, and he's working in the midst of that, doing all these various kinds of things, including speaking to them, talking to them, telling them, even strong hard words like we see in this and the other letters.
[00:25:37] What else is God doing? He's giving time for repentance. He's also recognizing the refusal to repent.
[00:25:44] He's not foolish, he's not blind.
[00:25:48] He sees the difference between a church that is being patient and kind and loving and a church that is not.
[00:25:59] We also see God bringing tribulation as judgment and as warning the word tribulation. There in verse 22, he says, Behold, I will throw her Jezebel onto a sickbed. And those who commit adultery with her, I will throw into great tribulation unless they repent of her works. And I will strike her children dead.
[00:26:21] There's a judgment that comes when the Lord Jesus comes. And he talks about that in verse 20:27. But there are anticipations of that judgment that happen in this life.
[00:26:32] He is going to do things to her body, to her life, in which instead of the bed that she has been on, she will find herself on a. On a sick bed, an illness.
[00:26:46] This kind of judgment, it functions as a warning.
[00:26:51] And this happens sometimes in our lives. God brings situations and experiences. And in his providence he acts as a way to wake us up.
[00:27:02] Sometimes, you know, sometimes we say this thing about, you know, God hit me over the head with a two by four, right? Or I wish God would have hit me over the head ever I said that one. Like I wish that God would have woken me up sooner. There's this sense of love in which this pounding, right, being awake, being sober minded.
[00:27:25] We express this in this way that we recognize that the discipline of the Lord sometimes is very hard and uncomfortable and painful, but so important.
[00:27:36] And we see him doing that here, not only in the individual lives of the people, but in the church as a whole. God is active.
[00:27:45] And behind all that activity is the work of Jesus on the cross is the promise that he has already gone to the cross to die for our sins so that we might be forgiven.
[00:28:03] He's already in time and in space, entered into the world, the Word of God coming into the Word are coming into the world, taking on humanity so that he would represent us and die for us.
[00:28:23] Repentance is possible because God has provided a way through Jesus Christ, the only way, the truth and the life. That's how we have life, that's how we have forgiveness is through him.
[00:28:37] Jesus, remember, speaks to them as the risen Lamb.
[00:28:41] He speaks to the One as the One who has been crucified. When he calls them to repentance and calls to and promises to forgive them and us behind that is his work on the cross for us.
[00:28:57] Which means these are not empty promises.
[00:29:00] This is not a shell game with God. It's not sort of promising one thing and then doing another. He's already given the life of His Son. Jesus has given his own life for us, has undergone a tribulation so great that he endured God's wrath in our place.
[00:29:24] That's why we repent and it's why we don't just try to live better lives and try to not sin more. But we run to Jesus, throw ourselves in his arms, entrust ourselves to him and say, lord, save me.
[00:29:39] That's what he promises to do.
[00:29:42] That's what he has done and is actively bringing to bear in the church, in Thyatira and in our church as well.
[00:29:50] Why does God do these things?
[00:29:53] God's reasons to make it clear to Covenant, OPC and to all the churches that he is the One who searches hearts and minds and to those who continue in their sin, he will give according to their works.
[00:30:10] We could say it this way. He tells us these things so that we would stop being tricked. By the deceitfulness of our flesh and our eyes would be opened to God as He is and give ourselves to Him.
[00:30:26] He is doing this because he wants to warn us against teaching against that would destroy us.
[00:30:34] These kinds of stumbling blocks that are going on in Thyatira go on in our churches today are dangerous.
[00:30:43] It's not just, well, we don't like it, it's dangerous.
[00:30:49] James Durham, in one of his books on church discipline, lists a number of reasons in which stumbling blocks cause problems.
[00:30:59] I'll go through these quickly just to give you an impression of this. He says they're intrinsically hateful, which is true. There's inside of them pride and self conceit, disgust and dis and abuse and disregard for others. When sin is taught and promoted, it brings dreadful consequences. We saw this when we looked at Jude. Strife was caused because of this kind of thing going on, the destruction of souls.
[00:31:29] What happens when sin just continues and increases in the church and we tolerate it and we let it go? We find also that we are hardened in our sin.
[00:31:39] One thing leads to another, leads to another, leads to another.
[00:31:44] There's a spreading effect, an infection, a leavening, a danger.
[00:31:50] The Scriptures tell us that it harms the reputation of the Gospel. We are called to adorn the gospel with good works.
[00:32:01] It's like you have a beautiful birthday cake and you adorn it, right with sprinkles and candles, little items and things.
[00:32:14] When we just decide that we're going to allow ourselves and give ourselves over to sin, deny Jesus as master and Lord, but then continue to profess our faith in Christ and teach others to do the same, we're adorning that cake with something else.
[00:32:34] Not with good things, not with good works, but with poison and pollution and rottenness that would make people look at the cake and go, I don't want to eat that.
[00:32:46] It hurts our witness, it hurts the Gospel, our profession of the gospel, and it saps Christian fellowship.
[00:32:58] It pulls life out of us and brings us all kinds of harm. These are serious things. And so why is the Lord speaking these things? He's speaking them to help us because he loves us. And he is not going to tolerate his sheep being destroyed.
[00:33:20] He is not going to tolerate this woman proclaiming to speak on his behalf, when of course she is not.
[00:33:34] The last thing I'll mention is that in what God is doing or the reasons behind it he's doing is because he is demonstrating his love and he wants to bring us to final victory.
[00:33:45] Notice how the letter ends, the encouragement. He says the One who conquers and who keeps my works until the end. To him I will give a great authority over the nations.
[00:33:56] He will rule them, as we've read, with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces. Even as myself have received authority from my father, I will give him the morning star, the one of the great temptations.
[00:34:16] We don't see it here, but it will become very clear throughout the book of Revelation. Or one of the motivations behind the temptation that is faced here is earthly power.
[00:34:30] People get involved in these kinds of things partly out of a desire for our own flesh, but partly out of fear of the world.
[00:34:38] We want to be part of things, we want to gain wealth, we want to be a part of society, we want to be respected or whatever. And these kinds of motivations towards worldliness are very powerful in the ancient world.
[00:34:55] In this time, in the early church, sexual immorality and idolatry were very much. They weren't just like this thing you did on the side. They were a part of civic life.
[00:35:07] They're part of how you made money, part of how you networked, part of how you gained status, part of how you might earn your freedom. All kinds of things were often wrapped up in participants participating in these things.
[00:35:19] And so we prioritize the things of this world. We aren't willing to sacrifice for the Lord. And we say, I'm going to sacrifice for these things or for my desires, whatever else. And it brings us all down and it's all false and hurtful.
[00:35:36] And so this is one of the reasons that Jesus speaks to them in this way and says, keep your eyes on the prize.
[00:35:43] The temptations of the flesh, they're fleeting.
[00:35:47] The promises of the world, they're fleeting. The threats of violence that we see in the other letters, they're fleeting.
[00:35:55] Hold on to me and you will have victory over everything.
[00:35:59] You don't need to be afraid, you don't need to worry. You don't need to go down these dark paths. You can hold on to me, and if you do, you will find success, victory, love, and all the things that we want.
[00:36:20] So the Lord speaks in these ways as an act of love.
[00:36:23] He speaks in these ways to bring us to repentance. And he speaks in these ways so that we and Thyatira and all the churches throughout all the world might give glory and honor and put our faith in him who searches minds and hearts.
[00:36:42] Hebrews 12:5 says, have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons, My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by Him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son whom he receives.
[00:37:03] Continuing on. It is for discipline that you have to endure, God that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom the Father does not discipline?
[00:37:15] If you are left without discipline in which you have all participated, then you are illegitimate children and are not sons.
[00:37:22] And then he concludes this section in verse 11 by saying, for the moment all discipline seems. Seems painful rather than pleasant.
[00:37:29] But later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
[00:37:35] These are the words of our Lord who loves us.
[00:37:40] Let's put our faith in him and in him alone, against ourselves and our fleshly nature and against the world that would seek to deceive us.
[00:37:51] May the Lord be merciful.
[00:37:53] Let's pray.
[00:37:54] Our Heavenly Father, we ask that you would forgive us in all the ways in which we need forgiveness, first and foremost, Lord, for the ways in which we tolerate sin in our own lives.
[00:38:08] Lord, help us not to tolerate sin in our own lives, but to discipline ourselves, to experience the discomfort and pain that comes with saying no sometimes to unrighteousness, so that we might say yes to the things of God.
[00:38:27] This is hard to do.
[00:38:30] But you tell us, Lord, that your spirit is at work within us. And so we pray to you and we ask for your help.
[00:38:37] We ask for your strength.
[00:38:39] That we would not give ourselves over to sexual immorality, that we would not give ourselves over to idolatry, that we would not give ourselves over to fearing this world or putting our hope in this world, but that we would give ourselves over to you, and that we would be willing to give up everything for you.
[00:39:02] You, whose eyes are like a flame of fire, whose feet are like burnished bronze, you, who searches minds and hearts and walks among the lampstands of your churches, including us, Lord, continue to show us that love of the Father care for us in correction, in reproof, in teaching and training, in righteousness, that we might be equipped for every good work, that the peaceful fruit of righteousness would be manifested in us, and that the whole world, but especially our neighbors and our friends and even our enemies, would see the work of the gospel in us and believe that many, many souls would find repentance and salvation in the life that you offer to us in Christ. And it's in his name that we pray. Amen.
