"The Cripplegate Conference - Law Vs. Gospel" Acts 15 Sunday Morning Worship Service

Well this morning I want to introduce for us uh our uh speaker this weekend.

It's been part of the um triple K conference.

We've had uh Nathan and uh George Lawson and Eric Davison in town.

Eric Davis will be preaching tonight.

He's the pastor of uh church in Jackson, uh Cornerstone Bible Church in um Jackson, Wyoming.

And uh he'll be preaching with us tonight on a warning against legalism, how to avoid uh legalistic life, and we'll be celebrating the Lord's Table together as well.

So I'd encourage you to come back tonight at 515 for a time of communion and uh kind of close out our weekend together.

Those who've been at the conference all weekend, I don't know if you'll survive until 5.15 tonight, but uh you can do all things through Christ who strengthens you.

Uh at 9.30 and 11 in here, George Lawson will be preaching.

He's the pastor of Baltimore Bible Church.

Uh, and you're all welcome to come back.

Uh it's one of those two services, 9:30 and 11 this morning in here.

Uh we'll be singing the same songs that we just did this morning, but uh, I want to sing those all again, so I'm gonna I'm gonna be back.

Um that's for sure.

Well now uh Nathan Business is gonna come up in the word for us.

Nathan and I have been friends for a long time, uh something like, I don't know, 15 years, I'm guessing.

Uh but Nathan and his wife, Beth, were friends with my wife, Deedra, before she was my wife, Deedra, and she was just Deedra.

Um the Lord knew, but uh they've been an encouragement to her through the years and um an encouragement to me as well.

Nathan's on staff at Grace Community Church in Los Angeles, where I was before I came out here.

Uh he shepherds one of their what we call ABFs out there.

Um I've been grateful for his ministry, his ministry through the word.

He often fills John MacArthur's pulpit.

And uh his um sermons on hope had a particular impact in my life.

And uh one of the things I miss most about moving out here is that our kids don't grow up together.

That's sad.

But our kids got to go to the pool and hang out and everything.

Uh last week when we were in Los Angeles, and um I'm thankful for your enduring friendship and for your faithfulness.

Uh, Nathan has a way with words and theological concepts that that bring out hope in the heart.

And uh I trust that he'll do that this morning.

So, Nathan, would you come forward and open the word for us?

It is a joy for me to be here with you at Emmanuel this morning.

I'm so grateful to Jesse and to other members of your pastoral team for their hospitality this weekend at the Cripplegate Conference and for their faithful ministry here.

It is so encouraging to know that there are faithful churches like this one just miles from our nation's capital.

And so thank you for your faithfulness and thank you for the opportunity that I have to be here with you this morning.

I do bring you greetings from Grace Community Church out in Los Angeles.

We are just a few miles from Hollywood.

So as we think of politics, we'll pray for you.

If you think of entertainment, please pray for us.

And together we will represent Christ in places where the gospel is desperately needed.

Our theme for the Cripplegate conference over the last few days has been the theme of law and grace, and it's that theme that I want us to think about this morning.

Law and grace, specifically at the First Church Council, which is recorded in Acts chapter 15, and we'll be getting there eventually.

Acts 15 · chapter mention

In order to introduce our topic this morning, I'd like to begin by recounting a couple of salvation testimonies, dramatic salvation testimonies, both of which you probably have heard before, but both of which I believe vividly illustrate the point that I hope to make this morning, which is to emphasize the beauty of the gospel of grace over against any sort of legalism or self-righteousness.

It was about 500 years ago, a little more than 500 years ago, in July of 1505, that a young man was walking home from law school.

This was in Germany, and as he was walking home from law school, he suddenly found himself caught in a severe thunderstorm.

Lightning was crashing all around, the thunder was overwhelming, and one particular bolt of lightning hit a tree close to where this young man was walking, and as he was there in the German forest, seeing this lightning bolt crash down near him, in that moment he was convinced that he was going to die.

And like a typical 16th-century Roman Catholic, he cried out in panic, Saint Anne, spare me, and I will become a monk.

We know from the literature of that time that there were often these kinds of crisis moments when people prayed to their patron saints and made all sorts of promises that they never kept.

And yet this young man kept his promise, and 15 days later he joined the Augustinian monastery there in Erfurt, Germany.

It was the fear of death that had motivated Martin Luther to become a monk, and it would be the fear of God's wrath that continued to consume him even after he joined the monastery.

In fact, as he read through portions of Scripture and would come across the phrase the righteousness of God in places like Romans 1, 16 and 17 and elsewhere, not yet being truly converted, he only saw in that phrase the righteousness of God, his own judgment.

Because he recognized that if the righteousness of God represents a perfect righteous standard, which of course it does, he recognized he could never reach or attain that standard.

But it didn't stop him from trying.

For ten years in that monastery, Luther did everything within his own power to try and earn God's righteousness.

He would sleep on the cold stone floor of the monastery in the German winter without any blankets, nearly freezing to death, thinking that somehow that earned him favor with God.

He would go long periods of time without eating.

In fact, he damaged his health for the rest of his life.

Again, thinking that somehow he was earning righteousness.

In fact, he would go to the confessor there in the monastery so often that his confessor finally told him to stop coming unless he committed a really serious sin.

And this is a little bit cheesy, but I teach church history and I have to help my students remember some of these kinds of things.

Then the name of the confessor there at the monastery was a guy called Johann von Staubitz.

You can see where I'm going with this, because he kept telling Luther, Staubitz, stop coming so much.

Stop it.

But all of this underscored the deep concern and agony and anguish of a conscience that was consumed with a recognition of its own guilt and the reality of an unattainable standard of perfection, the righteousness of God.

In fact, Luther would later say that at points he came to hate the phrase the righteousness of God, because in it all he saw was his own condemnation.

It wasn't until years later, as he was studying through the book of Psalms, and then studying through the book of Romans, and then studying through the book of Galatians, that the Holy Spirit, through his word, opened the eyes of this lost monk.

And he came to understand that the righteousness of God that's revealed in the gospel, Romans 1, 16 and 17, is not only the perfect standard of God's righteousness, before which all sinners fall short, but it is also the righteous provision of God.

The gracious provision of the righteousness of Christ that is imputed to the believer and is given freely, not on the basis of works, but only through faith in Christ.

And it was in that moment when Luther came to understand that salvation is possible, not because we can meet God's righteous standard, but because Jesus Christ did.

It was in that moment that he discovered grace and he was transformed.

And he says, looking back on his life of that moment, he says, at last.

And again, remember this was about a ten-year period of time.

At last.

At last.

At last, meditating day and night, he says, I came to understand that the righteousness of God is that gift by which the righteousness l by which the righteous live by grace through faith.

Luther, looking back on his time in the monastery, made this comment.

It's actually an old English translation of the German, but I like it because it sticks in my head.

He says, if anyone could have gotten to heaven through monkery, it would have been me.

If anyone could have gotten to heaven by being a monk, of all the monks in the monastery, no one was more fastidious than Luther.

And yet even he recognized that no matter how hard he tried to keep God's law, he could never attain a righteous standard.

It was only by grace through faith he could be saved.

Fifteen centuries earlier, we find another dramatic testimony of God's saving grace.

Another young man, born into a Jewish family living in a Roman province, which meant that although he was a Hebrew, he was also granted Roman citizenship.

Excuse me.

And this young man was equally fastidious.

In an effort to please God, he devoted himself to the rites and traditions of Judaism.

As a young man, probably in the twenties of the first century, he became a Pharisee, being trained under one of the most respected rabbis of the first century, a man named Gamaliel.

And this young man's zeal for the customs and traditions of Judaism meant that he was one of the most fanatical of all of his fellow Pharisees.

In fact, much like Luther, if anyone could have gotten to heaven by being a Pharisee, it would have been this guy.

His goal was to obtain the righteousness necessary to gain heaven by keeping the Old Testament law, and he expended every effort in doing so.

And externally, he seemed so devoted and so righteous.

And yet he was like the other Pharisees whom Jesus condemned in Matthew 23, a whitewashed tomb who looked good on the outside, and yet on the inside was full of dead men's bones.

In his zeal to earn God's favor through his own self-righteous efforts, this man began to persecute those whom he perceived to be a threat to Judaism, specifically the Christians.

He was given authority from the Sanhedrin, the Jewish council, to go and to persecute and prosecute, to arrest and to imprison those who were followers of Jesus.

Even held the coats for the men who executed Stephen.

And you know the story, and you know who I'm talking about.

And it wasn't until he was on his way to Damascus to again persecute Christians that he was intercepted.

Much like a lightning bolt in a German forest as he traveled to Damascus.

And I love how the accounts in Acts, in Acts 9 and in Acts 22, and in Acts 26, where this man's testimony is recounted, it says that this took place around noon.

The brightest point of the day when the sun is shining at its highest apex.

A light that eclipsed the sun overtook this man.

And he fell to the ground.

And he heard this voice say to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

And in that moment, Saul met Jesus, and everything changed.

And he was suddenly confronted with the bankruptcy of his own self-righteous efforts, the emptiness of a legalistic system.

And he came to recognize that his attempts to keep the law were nothing, as he would later say in Philippians, but rubbish.

And that the only righteousness that could save was the righteousness that comes from God through faith in Christ.

I share both of those testimonies this morning, that of Martin Luther and that of the Apostle Paul, because in both cases these men were desperately trying to earn God's favor through some form of law-keeping and self-righteousness.

And it was only when God showed them the bankruptcy of their self-righteous efforts that they came to understand the gospel of grace.

That salvation cannot be earned through your own goodness or through the works of the law, but it is only received as a gift of his grace and kindness.

Mercy that is extended on account of the finished work of Christ.

Paul's conversion story is first recorded in Acts chapter 9, and that's an event that likely took place around the year A.D.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

32 or maybe A.D.

33.

It was more than a decade later that Paul would come to Antioch.

That's recorded in Acts chapter 11.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

It was there in Antioch where Gentile believers started to join the church.

We know that Cornelius was the first of the Gentile believers in Acts chapter 10, and in Acts chapter 11, in Antioch of Syria, we have Gentiles who are coming to Christ and they're joining the church there.

Acts 10 · chapter mention Acts 11 · chapter mention

And the apostles hearing that there's a group of Gentiles who need a pastor, send Barnabas.

And Barnabas there in Antioch pastors this group of people, and it's going so well that he needs help.

And who does he ask to come be his co-pastor but Saul of Tarsus, Paul?

And Paul comes and co-pastors that church.

I actually think it's quite interesting that in Acts chapter 7 and 8, and even the first part of chapter 9, we see Saul persecuting the church, and it's a result of that persecution that causes Christians to flee throughout Asia Minor.

Acts 7 · chapter mention

And some of those Christians go to Antioch of Syria, where they proclaim the gospel, and Gentiles begin to be converted.

So it was Saul persecuting the church that causes these Christians in God's providence to come to saving faith in Antioch.

And here we are just a decade later, and who does God in his providence call to be the pastor of that church, but the guy who was persecuting those Christians to begin with?

How strange it must have been for some of the people in that church.

Like, hey, pastor, I remember when you put me in jail.

But here's Saul, and just one footnote here.

Saul is not his pre-conversion name.

Saul is his Jewish name.

Paul is his Greek name.

You can use both names interchangeably throughout all of Paul's life.

But here we have Paul the Apostle who himself has been dramatically converted to pastoring the church in Antioch in Acts chapter 11.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

This is in the mid-40s of the first century.

Things go so well that by God's grace, Paul and Barnabas are able to raise up a group of leaders there in that church in Antioch.

And so they determine, through the leading of the Holy Spirit, that they need to go and plant similar churches throughout other parts of the Roman Empire.

And it's here then that we're going to jump into the story of the book of Acts.

Starting in Acts chapter 13, just a couple chapters before Acts chapter 15, we will get to Acts chapter 15, but starting in Acts chapter 13, and our goal this morning is to see Paul's declaration and defense of the true gospel of grace against the backdrop of his own testimony, his own background as a legalistic Pharisee.

Acts 13 · chapter mention Acts 15 · chapter mention Acts 15 · chapter mention Acts 13 · chapter mention

Because to really appreciate what's going to take place in this narrative, we need to understand it against the backdrop of Paul's own conversion, as someone who is saved out of a life of self-righteousness and legalism, where he looked very good externally and yet was completely lost.

In order to organize our thoughts from these chapters, Acts 13, a little bit in Acts 14 and Acts 15 this morning, we're going to consider three points.

I'll read them and then we'll work through them.

We're going to see the declaration of the true gospel and then the distortion of the gospel, and finally we will see the defense of the gospel.

The declaration, the distortion, and the defense.

We'll begin in Acts chapter 13 with the declaration of the true gospel.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

This Acts chapter 13 recounts the first missionary journey.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

It's here that, again, verses 1 through 5 recount the fact that here in Antioch they've raised up leaders, Paul and Barnabas, and they're now ready to embark and plant churches throughout the Roman Empire.

And of course, if you have maps in the back of your Bible, this is probably one of those maps.

I remember as a kid sitting in church, sometimes I would go back and look at the maps.

I didn't really know what they meant when I was a kid.

But the map of Paul's first missionary journey shows the route that he and Barnabas took, starting in Cyprus and then eventually making their way to a place called Antioch of Pisidia.

And then from there to places like Lystra and Derby and Iconium.

And when they get to Antioch of Pisidia, they enter the synagogue as was Paul's custom.

And Paul preaches a great evangelistic message to the Jews who were there.

And Paul's sermon is recorded for us in Acts chapter 13, verses 16 to 41.

Acts 13:16–41

And in keeping with his audience, it centers on the fact that Jesus Christ is the Messiah whom the Old Testament prophets foretold.

And Paul recounts stories.

And of course, Luke records for us an abbreviated version of Paul's sermon, but Paul recounts the Old Testament evidence that Jesus is who he claimed to be.

And then from there he transitions into the historical truths of the gospel, that he was crucified according to the scriptures and buried and rose again the third day according to the scriptures.

But I want you to notice in particular here in Acts chapter 13, verses 38 and 39, because you have to understand that Paul is speaking to a group of people there in the synagogue of Poseidon Antioch.

Acts 13:38

He's speaking to a group of people who, like him in his pre-conversion state, assumed that the way to be made right with God was through keeping the law.

And in verse 38, Paul says this based on the fact that Jesus is the Messiah, and based on his sacrificial atoning death, and based on his victorious resurrection, therefore, let it be known to you, brethren, that through him, through Jesus Christ, forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, and through him everyone who believes is freed from all things from which you could not be freed through the law of Moses.

These two verses summarize the essence of Paul's understanding of the gospel.

That through faith in Christ, you have been given two realities.

One is negative and one is positive.

Negatively, your sins are removed.

Through faith in him, you have the forgiveness of sins.

And positively, you are given his righteousness.

You say, Well, Nate, I don't see anything about righteousness here in these verses.

Where are you getting that particular point?

Well, whether you're using the ESV or the NAS or maybe a different Bible translation, you're probably not going to see it because the translators, in my opinion, didn't translate this verse as precisely as they could have.

The King James and the New King James actually do a better job on this.

If you see the word freed, shows up twice there in verse 39.

That word in Greek is actually the word dikea'o or dikeasune, which means to justify.

And in fact, the New King James says it this way: that in Christ or through Christ you can be justified in all things from which you could not be justified through the law of Moses.

So negatively your sins are removed, and positively you are justified.

Which means to be declared righteous.

That through faith in Christ, you can be declared righteous in all aspects.

And in a way that you could never be declared righteous through your attempts to keep the law of Moses.

Through faith in him, you have forgiveness and you have righteousness.

Faith in Christ can do what keeping the law of Moses could never do.

This is Paul's gospel, and again, it was a revolutionary concept for this Jewish audience because Judaism at that time was very legalistic, and it would have been shocking to hear that sinners can be made right before God.

They can be declared righteous, not through their own efforts, but apart from keeping the works of the law, only through faith in Christ.

This was a gospel of salvation by grace through faith alone, apart from works, faith in Christ, and faith in his work on the cross.

Now, eventually, if you were to read on in chapter 13 and into chapter 14, the Jews, some of them believe, but many in that congregation ultimately reject Paul's message.

And Paul says, Okay, well then I'm going to take this gospel to the Gentiles.

And he goes from there to places like Iconium and to Lystra and to Derby.

In fact, it's in Lystra where Paul is actually stoned outside the city and left for dead.

And I love the way that Acts 14 recounts this because Paul is such a bold evangelist that when he regains consciousness, he just gets up and goes right back into the city.

It's amazing.

And in fact, if you were to look at that map in the back of your Bible of the first missionary journey, you would notice that it stops in Derby.

It stops in Derby and does not continue around through Tarsus to make a loop back to Antioch, where Paul was from.

And the reason why is because after Paul got to Derby, in spite of the fact that he had gotten incredibly sick, we know that from Galatians.

He had been abandoned by John Mark.

We know that as well from the book of Acts.

He's been stoned and left for dead.

He's been highly persecuted.

And yet when he gets to Derby, he turns right around and goes back through those same cities in order to strengthen the churches and in order to make sure that they had elders who were there to provide leadership.

When we get to the end of chapter 14, Paul finally makes it back home, and by all accounts, his mission trip has been incredibly successful.

Churches have been planted throughout the region of southern Galatia.

The gospel has been preached.

People have come to saving faith.

And in spite of the severe difficulties that Paul has encountered, Paul and Barnabas rejoice with their fellow brothers back in Antioch of Syria, because God has blessed the work.

That brings us then to the second point in our outline this morning, and that is the distortion of the true gospel.

Because in spite of the fact that this mission trip was so successful, controversy was about to erupt.

The distortion of the true gospel.

We find this in the first five verses of Acts chapter 15.

Acts 15 · chapter mention

Acts chapter 15, verse 1.

Acts 15:1

Some men came down from Judea and began teaching the brethren, unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.

And when Paul and Barnabas had great dissension and debate with them, the brethren determined that Paul and Barnabas and some of the others should go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and elders concerning this issue.

I think Luke understates what happened there.

We have false teachers show up in Antioch, and they began to insist that faith in Christ is not enough.

For these Gentiles to be Christians, they need to actually become Jewish.

That's their argument.

And Paul and Barnabas, who have sacrificed their lives bringing the gospel to these Gentile believers in southern Galatia, they have none of this.

They're not willing to put up with any of it.

And so they travel to Jerusalem.

And if you look at verse 5, when they get to Jerusalem, they encounter more of the same thing.

Some of the sect of the Pharisees who had believed stood up, saying, It is necessary to circumcise them and to direct them to observe the law of Moses.

This is a direct contradiction to what Paul has just preached in Acts 13, that salvation is through faith in Christ, forgiveness of sins, and justification comes through him and not through the law of Moses.

Here we have these former Pharisees insisting that salvation requires circumcision and following the Mosaic law.

And I just think it's so amazing that in God's providence, what we have here is former Pharisees insisting that you must be a legalist in order to be a Christian, and then Paul, a former Pharisee, saying, No, the true gospel is by grace alone, through faith alone, based on the finished work of Christ alone, and in him we have what the law of Moses can never accomplish.

It's interesting that in the book of Galatians, chapter 2, the Apostle Paul gives more insight into what was happening behind the scenes.

Galatians 2 · chapter mention

Paul wrote Galatians shortly after these events recorded in Acts chapter 15.

Acts 15 · chapter mention

In Galatians chapter 2, verse 1, Paul says, I went up to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus also, and it was because of a revelation that I went up and I submitted to them the gospel, which I was preaching among the Gentiles.

Galatians 2:1

He says, I did so in private to those who were of reputation.

So Galatians 2 is talking about some of the private meetings that took place before the public council.

And then verses 8 and 9 of that same chapter, we learn that he presented this to James, the brother of Jesus, and also to Peter and to John.

Verse 4 of Galatians chapter 2, Paul says, It was because of the false brethren secretly brought in, who had sneaked in to spy out our liberty which we have in Jesus in order to bring us into bondage.

Galatians 2 · chapter mention

And then he says, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

Paul understood what was at stake.

To insist that Gentiles had to keep the law of Moses in order to be saved was to go back into the bondage of legalism.

And so he tells the Galatians, shortly after these events, that he contended because the truth of the gospel itself was at stake.

The distortion of the gospel was to add works to the gospel of grace.

And I know that you know this, but the reality is every false religion in the world attempts to earn salvation through human effort.

So the heresy of the Judaizers as these false teachers become known is really just an illustration of the same kind of heretical approach that all false religion takes, which is an effort to add human self-effort to the gospel of grace.

But as Paul will tell the Romans in Romans 11:6, if salvation is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works.

Romans 11:6

Otherwise, grace is no longer grace.

The moment you add works to the gospel of grace, you frustrate and undermine grace, and you destroy the gospel.

So we have the declaration of the true gospel in Acts 13 and the distortion of the true gospel in Acts 15, verses 1 to 5.

Acts 15:1–5

And then I want to show you just quickly here the defense of the true gospel in verses 6 to 11 of Acts 15.

These verses record for us what is called the Jerusalem Council, which I like to call the first church council in church history.

And it is at this first church council that we have the gospel itself defended.

And what could be more important?

Because if you get the gospel wrong, then as Paul will also tell the Galatians, in Galatians 1, 6, and 7, if we preach to you a different gospel, it's no gospel at all.

We are to be accursed.

Look at verse 6 of Acts 15.

The apostles and the elders came together to look into the matter.

And then the first part of verse 7, there was much debate.

But then I love how Peter stands up.

And here God uses Peter to defend not only Paul's gospel, but the true gospel.

Look at Acts 15, verse 7.

Acts 15:7

Peter says, Brethren, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you that by my mouth the Gentiles would hear the word of the gospel and believe.

And God, who knows the heart, testified to them, giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he also did us.

And he made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith.

Now therefore, why do you put God to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?

But we believe that we are saved through the grace of our Lord Jesus in the same way as they are also.

In verse 9, he emphasizes that God has cleansed their hearts by faith alone.

In verse 10, he notes that the Mosaic law is a burden that is not necessary for salvation.

And in verse 11, he reiterates the fact that all believers, whether Jew or Gentile, are saved by grace alone through faith in Christ.

What a clear affirmation of the gospel of grace here at the first church council.

And in verses 12 and following, we have James, the brother of Jesus, affirming this as well.

James does request that Gentile Christians would be sensitive to their Jewish brothers because the Jews had more strict consciences based on some of the things from their upbringing.

But the affirmation of the gospel of grace permeates this passage here at this first church council.

And so we see with Paul, a man who experienced this in his own life, now defending it here at this church council, we see the gospel of grace so clearly shine forth against the contrasting backdrop of the Judaizing heresy that would seek to take grace and distort it and destroy it by adding works.

And we think back to Paul's words in Acts 13, 38, and 39 that through faith in Christ we have forgiveness of sins, so that those who believe in him are justified in a way in which they could not be declared righteous by keeping the law of Moses.

For Paul, this theme of the gospel of grace will continue to characterize his ministry all the way to the end.

And you see it in his letters like Galatians, places like Ephesians chapter 2 and Philippians chapter 3 and Titus chapter 3 and many other places, a gospel of grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

Ephesians 2 · chapter mention Philippians 3 · chapter mention Titus 3 · chapter mention

The true gospel declared, the true gospel distorted by false teaching, and then the true gospel defended at the first church council.

If we fast forward back to the Reformation, the Reformers summarized the main points of their doctrine in five Latin phrases.

I know you're familiar with these: sola scriptura, sola fide, sola gratia, solus cristis, and solideo gloria.

That scripture alone is our authority, and if scripture alone is our authority, then the gospel that's found on the pages of Scripture is the true gospel.

And it is a gospel of grace alone, that's sola gratia, which means we don't work for it.

Christ accomplished it all.

We receive it through faith alone, sola fide, based on the finished work of Christ alone, solus Christus.

And if he did everything and we do nothing in terms of our right standing before God, then that must mean that all of the glory goes to him.

We get none of the credit, solideo gloria, all glory to God alone.

Heavenly Father, thank you for the opportunity this morning to look at the gospel of grace and to see it contrasted with the false teaching that was promoted by the Judaizers.

In our own hearts, Lord, I pray that this would result in a wonder and in worship because we see what an incredible gift the gospel is.

Thank you for your word, which reveals the truth of salvation so clearly.

May we walk according to your word in honor of your son.

We pray this in his name.

Amen.

You have been listening to Emmanuel with Pastor Jesse Johnson.

You can find more resources like this at IBCBA.com.

Here is a parting word from Pastor Jesse.

If you have any questions about what you heard today, or if you want to learn more about what it means to follow Christ, please visit our church website, iBCBA.com.

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Now may God bless you, sweet.