Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / June 5, 2016 | Timm Collins - Labeled, Part 2

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June 5, 2016 | Timm Collins - Labeled, Part 2 · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning, Topeka Bible Church.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: We are in the second week of a series.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: We started it last week's called Labeled.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: My name's Tim Collins.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm on staff with Trash Mountain Project.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's a local or an international missions organization that has an office here in town.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: And my wife and I attend TBC here, my wife and kids and I.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: So have a chance to fill in for Pastor Jim for a couple weeks.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: So we're kind of working our way through the book of Ephesians, actually the first chapter of Ephesians over these three weeks.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: So if you brought your Bible and you want to turn with me to the book of Ephesians, that's where we're going to be in chapter one.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: If not, you're going to see the verses on the screen behind me.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: The idea behind the sermon series is pretty simple.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it may even be self-explanatory when you see the name of the series that we're labeled by people all the time.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: It starts when we're really young.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: It starts even in elementary school.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: As kids, we get labeled different things.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: And then as we grow up and become teenagers, and sometimes we make good choices and sometimes we make not good choices as teenagers.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, at least I did when I was a teenager.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe the rest of you are perfect, but uh yeah, it was there were some rough years there.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I maybe picked up some labels there, uh, went on through, became an adult, and began to navigate some of those waters, and also picked up some labels there.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Along the way, I also learned, as many of you have, uh, to label myself, which is not fair and often not accurate.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I tend to be really hard on myself.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I give myself a pass, but often I am much too harsh on myself and just don't have a proper context for what I'm saying or the conversation that I have kind of going on in my head.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so those labels sometimes aren't any better than the labels that other people hand me.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um but really the idea behind this series is this that God has said some things about us.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: That if you're a Christian, God has said some things about you and God has said some things about me, and those are the labels we should pay attention to because they are the most important labels for a lot of reasons.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, because God's never wrong.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: So if he says something about us, it's true, right?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: If God says it, then it's absolutely true, but also he's really wise and he sees the entire picture uh and and he's able to know everything all at the same time.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so he knows what to say about us and he knows how to uh set uh put put pop proper labels uh on us.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um and uh as I will share with you, uh sometimes if you're mislabeled, it can actually be pivotal.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: That when you you're when you wear an important label, it is also very important that we get that label uh right.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh when my wife and I were first married, we had been married about six months when we bought our first house together.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I had owned a house prior to that, but she and I bought our first house together.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it was a really exciting uh process that we went through.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we found the right house.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: It was a great house for us.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um it was it didn't really need any work.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it was in the location we wanted to be in.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the price was right, it was within our budget.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so I'll never forget going through that process and being so excited.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: And we went down to the bank and we signed our paper the papers.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, it's pretty shocking when you go and buy a house or buy a piece of property, and you it takes like an hour and a half to sign all the papers, right?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's if you're not reading them, you know.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of scary if you now not that I would do that, but other people sometimes don't read all the papers.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: So we go through this whole process.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: We buy this house, and they say, so we'll send your payment book to you, your coupon book, and then every month, you know, you tear off a coupon, you send it with a check back to us.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: That's cool.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: So uh a couple weeks later we got the uh the payment book, and this was from a big bank, it was from a national bank.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so we get the payment book, and interestingly enough, I didn't notice it because it had my name on it, and so I didn't really think much about it.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: But my wife actually noticed that it was for uh it had the right name, uh, but it was actually for a Collins family that lived in Michigan.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, and even in the cab.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: I can hear you gasping.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that was kind of what we did.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh actually, my first response was yes, because I don't have to pay my mortgage, right?
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: If they sent me the wrong payment book, that's on them, right?
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought that for about a half sack, and then I realized I had a couple of questions.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, the first question is uh, who's paying for my house?
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because somebody needs to be paying for my house.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: You send me the payment book, it's important that you get my identity right.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's important that you get the right label because I need somebody to be paying for my house.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sitting here, I've got the money to make the payment every month.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: This needs to be taken care of.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: And then the second question, which is maybe a more important question, is that what if I had not noticed?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: What if my wife had not noticed, and we had just torn those coupons off every month and slapped them with a check and mailed them in?
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Where's my money going?
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is that guy getting double payments on his house?
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: How does this work?
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: See, this is the idea that we're going to use this morning.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: When a label's really important, then it's really important that we get it right.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: And you would think with something that important that they would have gone to greater lengths to verify my identity, uh, which may sound like I'm being a little bit picky, but you know, really, step one for that could have been uh here's the coupon book with their name and the address, and here's the address we're mailing it to.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: You know, do they match?
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's really important sometimes that we ask some questions when there's a lot writing on the label or a lot writing on the identity.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: So, using that as a jumping-off place, I want to ask you this question, and I want you for just a second to take a breath and assume with me that the answer's not as obvious as you might think it is.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: I want us to think through some things today that maybe sometimes we take for granted.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so here's really the question that I want to pose to you.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: How do you tell if someone's a Christian?
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: How do you know?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what's the proof?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: What's the evidence?
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: Now, think back to my payment book.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: In light of eternity, this is a pretty important question.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: How do you know if someone's a Christian?
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I was a pastor for over a decade in Florida before my wife and I moved here a few years ago.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so I heard this uh response a lot.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: It seemed that the most common response that you would get from people, and these were from people who meant well, uh, their response would be something like, Well, you know, you know, if I were to ask, how do you know that you're a Christian, they would say something like, Well, I go to church.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm glad that you do, and I hope that you're here every chance that you get.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: But I think you and I, it doesn't take very long before we realize, yeah, that's not really the best litmus test.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: That's an important thing, but that's not what makes you a Christian.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Going to church doesn't make you a Christian.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: So what if you kind of go to church but then you do some extra stuff?
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like maybe when the plate comes by, you put money in the plate, right?
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe you uh serve.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um you work in kids' ministry, you're you work in a wana, uh, you play in the band, or you work in uh tech arts, or maybe you teach something, or or you're in the security team.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: So it's you know, it's not just that you show up, but that you show up and you actually participate.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: You put money in the plate, you serve.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, does does that make you a Christian?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: Are Christians just the ones who, you know, when when we're worshiping, when we're singing, uh, and the bands leading us, whether it's in the cab or whether it's here in Mulvane, uh, and the bands leading us, and and the ones who like raise their hands when they're worshiping, are those the Christians?
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because some sometimes I do that if it hits me just right, and I think that's a great thing to do.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Is that what it means to be a Christian?
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: So is it a Bible thing?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: Does reading the Bible make you a Christian?
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe if you're really serious about reading the Bible, if you read it a certain number of days per week?
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: What about if you memorize it?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's gotta be it, right?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: If you memorize scripture, that makes you a Christian.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's how you know that you know that you're a Christian.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: The litmus test is I ask you, can you quote scripture?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: How much can you quote?
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'm gonna keep score.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure you don't miss any verses, right?
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: And yet I was exposed to something that kind of was on the periphery until I moved to Topeka.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and I'm not gonna call the name, but there's a group uh here in town uh who claims to be Christian and they can quote the Bible really well, and yet they're pretty hateful.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: So that's not right.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's not it.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just being able to quote the Bible or the fact that we read the Bible.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Is it that you have membership in a church?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is that it?
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: So when when when you and I die or we pat, when we step into eternity, is God gonna kind of meet us at the gate of heaven and say, Did you bring your membership card with you?
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: And if you did, as long as it's current and everything's good, then you're in, right?
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of strange.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: That can't be it.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: Is it baptism?
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Is it baptism?
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna be celebrating baptism.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: You heard in the announcements this morning, gonna be celebrating baptisms again soon.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: And those are so huge.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: They're so important, and it's so much fun, and it's a great celebration, but is that it?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: And if that's the case, what about people who don't get the chance to be baptized?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: What about people who die before they have the chance to be baptized?
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: What about somebody who has a genuine what you and I would maybe call a deathbed conversion?
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: What about a thief on the cross?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: When Jesus said to him today, you'll be with me in paradise.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: Was there a part that we left out where Jesus said, You got to get down off this cross and be baptized?
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because you can't really get in unless that's happened?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: No?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: See, this is a pretty pivotal question.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: And it's pivotal, not just because it's an interesting discussion for you and I to have, it's pivotal because we believe that everybody lives forever somewhere.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: And if everybody lives forever somewhere, then where is my somewhere?
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: And how do I know, or is it possible even to know?
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because I know that I have good days and bad days.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes I feel like a Christian, and sometimes I don't feel very much like a Christian.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: That can revolve around a couple of things.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, it can revolve around failures.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mess up, I make mistakes.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: As Christians, we call that sin.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: I do things that I shouldn't do, I say things that I shouldn't say, I have attitudes that I shouldn't have, I have thoughts that I shouldn't have.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: And when I have those, if I have enough of those, and if it catches me just right, I can think to myself, or I can have kind of this whisper in my head that goes, maybe you're not even a Christian.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're not even saved.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: There's another side of this, which is not just failures, it's also feelings.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I've found that my feelings can go haywire, and it's because someone says something to me and it kind of lodges in the back of my head.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: I don't notice it consciously, but it just changes my my uh attitude, it changes the way I present myself, it changes this conversation that I have going on in my head.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: This happens to me.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure it probably happens to you.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes our feelings get the best of us, and let's be honest, sometimes our feelings get the best of us because we ate bad pizza the night before.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's how feelings work.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: So, do we listen to those feelings?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: Or should we listen to them sometimes or not listen to them sometimes?
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know for some people, in fact, for many of us in here, we would say, Well, I know I'm a Christian.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: So here's the question that I would ask you back.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And by the way, that's great if you know that.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's phenomenal.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: How do you know?
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: How do you know?
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: Could you explain it to me in such a way that it makes sense?
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: Could you point back to things in Scripture?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: Could you point back to principles or truth or even just stories in Scripture that lead you to believe that you know that you know?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's important to know, but it's even more important to know why we know.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: Why is it possible?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: And is it possible?
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: 1 John 5 13, the apostle John said this: I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may say it with me, know that you have eternal life.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: So that you may know that you have eternal life.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, listen, God does not want us to avoid this issue.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: He wants us to hit it head on, and that it's actually possible to know that you have eternal life.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually possible to know that you're a Christian, no matter what kind of failures you have, no matter what kind of feelings you have, it's possible to know, it's possible to be sure.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, in light of what we talked about last week and this incredibly high price that the God of the universe paid to be able for you and I to have relationship with him, he paid this incredible price and sent his son to die for our sins so that for those of us who put our faith in Jesus, we get the chance to be God's, to be God's children, to have this incredible inheritance that we talked about last week.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: Wouldn't it make sense that a God who went to that length to secure your salvation and my salvation, that he would also want to make it possible for us to know?
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: Wouldn't it make sense that a good and loving God who paid such a high price for us would also want us to know that he's called us his and that it's secure and that nothing's gonna happen to it.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we're gonna talk about this morning.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, as I mentioned, we're gonna be in the book of Ephesians, chapter one.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh mentioned this last week.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, Paul wrote the book of Ephesians while he was under house arrest in Rome.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, he wasn't in prison, but he was a prisoner.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, he had some freedoms, and yet his freedom had been curtailed greatly.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, he so he writes this letter back to the church at Ephesus about a decade earlier, more or less, he had helped establish that church.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: So he writes this letter to them.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and you know, it wasn't divided up in chapters and verses when he wrote it, it was just a letter.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: We've kind of done that since then so that we can refer to it uh well.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: But here's what I said last week because I find this fascinating.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: Paul kind of writes this theological textbook, if you will, uh, to the church at Ephesus.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: And for the first half of it, he didn't tell them to do anything.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: I find this fascinating because if you're anything like me, I think when I think about my relationship with God, often I think in terms of what am I supposed to do?
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: If you were to ask me, Am I a Christian?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes my mind thinks in terms of, well, what do Christians do?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: How do Christians act?
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: What do Christians say?
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: What do Christians, you know, what are the actions and the habits that they take?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: And those are great questions to ask, but they're not the starting point.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: They weren't the starting point for Paul.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: Paul spent the first half of this letter not telling them to do anything.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: He spent the first half of this letter explaining to them who they were, more specifically, who they were in Christ, who Christ had created them to be, and all the things that had been made available to them, not just because they had been born, but because they had been born again.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: That when they had been recreated, made new in Christ, that they had all these things available to them.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I also mentioned this last week.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Paul kind of writes in run-on sentences if you read some of his stuff.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, uh, we started a sentence last week that he starts in Ephesians chapter 1, about verse 3.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and that sentence just goes on and on and on and on.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: So what we're gonna do this morning is jump in the second half of that, and I'm gonna go ahead, I don't normally like to do this, but I'm gonna go ahead and tell you uh we're gonna jump right in the middle of a sentence because in this case you have no choice but to jump in the middle of a sentence because it's just this big long thing.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: So, Ephesians chapter 1, we're gonna close out this initial sentence that Paul wrote uh in this opening of this letter to the church at Ephesus.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: He's talking about Christ in verse 11 is where we're gonna pick up today.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: Paul talking about Christ in verse 11 says, In him we have obtained an inheritance.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: We talked about that last week, that we've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the, say it with me, purpose, now say it with me, purpose, there you go, of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: So we're favored, we talked about this last week.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: The first label that God puts on us is that we're favored, that we're his children, that he chose to make us his children, and then kind of coming out of that, that he also has a purpose, and his purpose is to work all things after the counsel of his will, but that's a really good thing.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because God is a loving and gracious heavenly Father.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's why we embrace his will, even when we don't understand his will, because we know ultimately he has our best interest at heart, that he's designing things in such a way that his children ultimately uh experience good because of that.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that's Romans 8, and we can, you know, explain that.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of a different uh subject for a different sermon.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: We keep reading.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 12.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: All this is done, the purpose is so that we who were the first to hope in Christ, hang on to that, might be to the praise of his glory.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: We who were the first to hope in Christ.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is Paul writing uh always, always, always in scripture, context is king.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: That was one of the first things my Greek professor taught me.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: Context is king, context is king.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: So who's writing and who is it written to?
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: This is Paul writing to a group of believers, but Paul not only was a believer, Paul was a Jew.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so when he uses this phrase in verse 12, we who were the first to hope in Christ, he's talking about the Jews.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: That the Jews, and there were messianic Jews, and there were Jews who, you know, may have missed the thing about Jesus being the Messiah, but either way, they had this hope that a Messiah was coming.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: We who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, the Jews who got it, the Jews who recognized, the Jews who understood that Jesus was the Messiah, that somehow God got this special praise because they connected the dots.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: So that's verse 12.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: We who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then verse 13, in him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and what's the word?
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Believed in him.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: So you also, he's now saying it's not just us as Jews, we were the first to hope in Christ, but you also, in other words, Gentiles, which is most of us, you also, when you heard the word of truth and believed in him, here we go, we're sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: When you heard and believed, listen to me, simultaneously, instantaneously, not two separate things, when you heard and believed, you were immediately sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: You were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: Believing and sealing happen at the same time.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you're a Christian and you put your faith in Christ, you have been sealed.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: You may not know that you've been sealed, but you've been sealed.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: And this really involves two things.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: It involves, first of all, authenticity.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, God has stamped you that you are his.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't matter how you feel, doesn't matter what kind of thoughts.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now we can talk about fellowship, which is a separate thing, but you are his for all eternity.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_00: If it's real, it's always going to be real.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: You are authentic, he has put his seal on you.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: We don't use seals very much anymore, but seals are important.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: They still have some importance in our context.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: If you've ever had a paper notarized, if you had to sign a paper that was notarized, you remember uh when you go to have a paper notarized, maybe you're signing something for a child or you're signing a legal document of some kind.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: You find a notary, find someone who's a notary, and you show them your identity, don't you?
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: You show them your ID, I should say.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: You show them your card, you show them your driver's license or whatever, and they look at, if they don't know you, then they look at your picture and they go, okay, that's you, that's who you say you are, and the name matches the form that you're signing.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: So then you sign it, they watch you sign it, and then what do they do?
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: They put their seal on it, they stamp it.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: So that when you take that piece of paper and you give it to the coach or to the youth minister or to the teacher or whoever you have to turn it into, they don't have to go, did you really sign this?
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, when they see the seal, it's authentic.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: But there's another aspect, there's actually a lot of aspects to these seals, but the other one that I want to bring to your attention is not just authenticity, but it's also security.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: What does that mean?
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: Listen when God seals something, then no one can unseal it but God Himself.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I know there are times when you may feel like spiritually you're under attack, and you may be spiritually under attack.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: I've got some good news for you today.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: All the demons in hell can't unseal you.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: You've been sealed by this promised Holy Spirit.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: And if you really are a Christian, then that's the end of the discussion.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: You've been sealed by God.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: This authenticity and its security.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: In Romans 8, Paul makes this statement.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's a statement that maybe you've heard.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: I memorized this years ago.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: God's Spirit testifies, gives a testimony to my spirit that we are the children of God, that I am a child of God.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: So then we jump into verse 14, which is kind of where we're going to camp out for just a minute.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: This was really, this is the end of this crazy sentence that Paul writes.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: And it's this, this is really the point of where we're driving to this morning.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 14.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: We've been sealed by this promised Holy Spirit.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: Listen to this.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: Who is the, what's the word?
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: Say it like you mean it.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: Guarantee.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: You have no idea how pivotal that word is.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: He's the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: To the praise of his glory.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: This promised Holy Spirit not only seals us, but he is our guarantee.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, if you're reading a different version of Scripture, your Bible may say something like, He's the deposit, he's the down payment.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: And it really is that idea, but it's a little bit stronger than that.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to tell you just a real quick story that I think illustrates what Paul meant when he wrote this and what the church at Ephesus understood when they read it, the context that they read it in.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: Several years ago, my wife and I had a yard sale, and um I hate yard sales.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: Can I just confess I hate them?
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to go to them.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to host them.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: I don't, you know, I just don't like them.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: My wife loves them and she's good at it.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: She's good at getting stuff for, you know, she'll come home with stuff.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: How much do you pay for that?
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: I paid a nickel and she's got a trunk load of stuff, you know.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: So it's fine.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: She's good at it.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: But so we had this yard sale.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: We had a bunch of stuff we wanted to get rid of.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: She wanted to have a yard sale.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: So then it becomes this big thing where, like, you're my like our mother-in-law was bringing over stuff.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: So our mother-in-law brings over, she had my mother-in-law, not ours.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh my mother-in-law, some of you caught it, um, she brings over this big TV uh stand entertainment center thing.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: This that I just dated, I just told you how old this was, right?
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: This was but it was still in great shape, and there was nothing wrong with it.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: So in Florida, I don't know how things are here in Kansas, but in Florida, where we're from, yard sales are a big deal.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like you have all your stuff out on the lawn the night before, and maybe you cover it over, but if you do that, then you better be out there at 6 a.m.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you're not, people are gonna be knocking on your door.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, I found something I want to buy.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: And they don't care if you were asleep or if you had a sleeping baby.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: They just so this was a big deal.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_00: So we have this big yard, so we have all our stuff out on the front lawn.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: We have this thing.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: So this lady shows up.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: One of the first people who showed up wanted to buy this entertainment center.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I think we had it priced for like$50 or something like that.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: So she asks my wife, listen, I didn't bring enough cash with me to pay for this.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: So could I give you a deposit and you'll hold it for me?
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: I'll go get the rest of the cash and then I'll come back and pick it up and pay you the rest.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: And my wife said, That's fine.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's my husband over there, the bald guy.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh go talk to him.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: I was bald even then.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh go talk to him and he'll work it out with you.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: Little did this lady know.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's not my thing, okay?
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: So she comes and talks to me and she says, So my wife said I could give you a deposit.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, this TV stand is$50.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: How much do you want for a deposit?
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I said,$50.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: Think with me.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you exactly why.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: Because she was the first lady that showed up.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: And if I know anything, I know I'm gonna have 10 chances to sell this thing after you leave, and then you're not gonna come back and get it.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then I've got to cart it around or haul it off, or the point, the to me, the point of a yard sale is get rid of all your junk, right?
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: And see if somebody can pay you for it.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I want this thing to be gone.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's my number one goal.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're not gonna come back, it's not even just about the money, it's about you come back and get this thing.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because when you pay the full price at the beginning, the deposit becomes a guarantee.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: And that was the imagery that Paul used here.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: That this is not just a guarantee or a deposit, but that God paid such a high price for us up front.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: And when he sent his Holy Spirit, this wasn't just, well, I'll promise that.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: No, this was a big, big deal.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: This is God saying to us, you are incredibly valuable.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: Your value is so high that I'm gonna put a deposit on you.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna put a guarantee on you that's so high that there's no chance that this thing isn't gonna work out.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: If you have the Holy Spirit inside of you, the deposit is a guarantee.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: He uses the same language in 2 Corinthians 1.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: This is Paul writing here.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: He says, it is God who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us, and who has also put his, what's the word, seal, same imagery, on us and given us his spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_00: Please listen to me.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: If you're really a Christian, and God's given you his Holy Spirit, he views your relationship with him as too important to leave it up to you.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you don't take that as an insult.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: I know you're just like me, and we're a mess, aren't we?
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: We have good days and we have bad days, and sometimes the bad days greatly outnumber the good days.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: And when I think about this, just give me a second.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: When I think about the fact that my Heavenly Father valued me so much that he wanted to be sure that my relationship with him wasn't left up to me, the first words that come out of my mouth are thank you.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for sealing me.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for making me secure.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for giving me a deposit, for paying a price, for giving me a guarantee that's so high that I have no question, I have no question that this thing's gonna work out.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: See, the label that we talked about last week is that God's labeled you favored.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: But God also calls you sealed, He calls you secure, He calls you His.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: If you're really a Christian, nothing will change that.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: As proof, He offers His Holy Spirit.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the next question.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: If the Holy Spirit really is the evidence of how we know we're a Christian, how do we know we have the Holy Spirit?
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: That is actually a huge question.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna give you really quickly four.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just all I'm I promise you, this is like a drive-by.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: We really need this, it would be like a whole sermon series.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: How do you know this?
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Really quickly, here's four things I want to give you.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: This is what the Holy Spirit gives to us, what the Holy Spirit provides for us.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: This is evidence, this is proof that we can look for in our lives.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: So just listen in on this.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: The first one.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus speaking in John 16, speaking about the comforter, speaking about the Holy Spirit, said, When he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and concerning righteousness and concerning judgment.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit convicts you of sin.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: Please look at me.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: This is very important.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Often, the Holy Spirit convicts you with a nudge.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit convicts you with a whisper.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: I used to say it this way.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: Often, when the Holy Spirit wants to convict you of sin, the Holy Spirit does something like, You sure you want to do that?
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: Why am I saying this?
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: Because sometimes it's easy to ignore the Holy Spirit.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: And we get good at ignoring the Holy Spirit.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, we develop it as a habit, which is a whole nother sermon.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: But the fact that you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you, the Holy Spirit is going to convict you of sin.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: Here's number next.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: Not only does the Holy Spirit convict us of sin, the Holy Spirit leads us to believe in Jesus.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: I love this in 1 John 4.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: The apostle John says, Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: By this you know the Spirit of God.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: If the spirit that lives inside of you confesses that Jesus has come in the flesh, it is God's Spirit.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's the Holy Spirit.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: And every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, we don't have time to do this, but just really quickly, listen.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought about the fact that you and I believe that 2,000 years ago on the other side of a planet, a baby was born, and that baby was perfect?
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: And the baby was perfect because the baby was God-made man.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: And you say to me, Tim, can you explain that?
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: No, I can't explain it.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's the kenosis, it's a mystery.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: We've been trying to explain it for 2,000 years, and we can't get there.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: God became flesh, God became a man, that man lived a perfect, sinless life, and then died a horrible, brutal death.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: And he died, we're going to celebrate communion in just a minute.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: He died so that his blood could cleanse me.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't for his sin because he didn't have any sin.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: His blood was shed for my sin 2,000 years ago.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'm on the opposite side of the planet.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that was for me.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: And when he died, that wasn't the end of the story.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: See, we don't just believe, oh, this is so huge.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: We don't just believe in theology.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: We believe something happened.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: We believe in an event that Jesus came out of the tomb, never to die again.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought about how crazy this is?
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: No, we don't think about it.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: We just kind of take it for granted.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, that's okay.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's evidence of the Holy Spirit living inside of us.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit leads us to go, yeah, I'm in.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: I believe that.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_00: I buy into that.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: I believe that happened.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: Number next, the Holy Spirit leads us to obey Jesus.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: 1 John, the chapter before in 1 John 3.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_00: Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God and God in him.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: And by this we know that he abides in us.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_00: By the Spirit whom he has given us.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, the litmus test is that we are obedient.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_00: And if we're obedient, then we have the Holy Spirit living inside of us.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: The Spirit and obedience go hand in hand.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, it doesn't mean that you don't make mistakes.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: What it does mean is that you not just that you obey, but that you want to obey, that you have a desire inside of you to obey.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then the last thing I want to say the Spirit leads us to love like Jesus.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: The Spirit leads us to love like Jesus.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: You develop more and more an ability to love people who are unlovable.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: I love this verse, Romans 5.5.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who's been given to us.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: I love this.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: Listen.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: The idea is this it's not that you reason, it's not that you read something in the scripture and go, oh, I just learned that I got this, and that kind of thing happens.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's not what is being explained here.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: What Paul's saying here is that the Holy Spirit has been poured into you, and when you have something poured into you, all you can do is sit and receive it.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's not that you work hard to love people, although there's a time and place for that, and that's something you and I should be doing, responding to the love that God's put inside of us.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: But ultimately, we have a supernatural ability to love as Jesus loves.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: If you're a Christian, you've been labeled favored.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're a Christian, you've been labeled as sealed.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: I want to say this.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_00: When you start to uh, you know, faith or um uh struggles, failures, or feelings.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: If you have either of those things come up this week, you can think about this.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: For some of you, though, I may have created more questions than I answered.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I gotta be honest with you, that's kind of by design.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: God wants us to examine ourselves, God wants us to work these things out.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is what I want to say to you.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_00: Later on this summer, we don't have exact dates yet, but later on this summer, uh, one of our elders, Sheldon Hocculi, is actually gonna be doing a whole class on what it means to have assurance.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so I've got his information down front here at Mulvane.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you're in the College Avenue building, Doug Will is gonna lead you in communion in just a second.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: He has that information as well.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we would love to share it with you, and and Sheldon knows I'm doing this, by the way.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he he he just we thought this would be a great opportunity because we don't have enough time to do this today.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have enough time to do all of this, but we can point you to a place where you can get some more information.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: I would highly encourage you to take hold of that.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: So for just a second, I want you to bow your heads and close your eyes.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: Before I pray with you, I just want to ask you a couple questions.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of as evidence, kind of in light of this subject.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how you would answer the question.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: Are you a Christian?
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_00: Do you do you know that you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you?
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm gonna ask you some questions that I think are important, even for those of us who would say, and I'm with you on this, that I know that I know.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's great.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: But I just want to ask you this.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: In the midst of your selfish longings, and I know you have them, because I have them, and we all do, in the midst of your selfish longings, do you also find a longing for the things of Christ?
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: Do you find that these things are competing?
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_00: And it's easy to be distracted by life.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: I know that.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: But even when we're distracted by life, do we really care about eternity?
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: Do we make decisions and make choices based on an eternal perspective?
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do you find yourself taking steps toward God and caring more about God's kingdom than you used to?
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe not as much as you should, but are you making progress?
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_00: Are you growing?
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: Do you experience the conviction of the Holy Spirit?
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: Do you experience the nudges and the whispers?
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe one of the most famous passages in the New Testament about the Spirit.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: Paul wrote in Galatians 5, the fruit of the Spirit is love and joy and peace, patience, and kindness, goodness, and faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: Do you see fruit?
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_00: If you have the Spirit, that's the fruit that he produces.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: God, thank you so much for giving us the guarantee.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for giving us your Holy Spirit.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for giving us this down payment, this seal.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: God, I pray that you would help us to steward that well.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_00: Help us to listen to the nudging and the whispers of the Holy Spirit.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: Help us to pay attention and not ignore what you're up to in our lives.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: God, help us to cooperate with your spirit as you want to make us more like you and help us experience life the way that you intended it to be lived.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_00: God, I pray for those who are in the room, those who are watching in the cab, those who may be watching online, that you would help us to do business with you.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: Give us the courage to ask these questions and to work hard and to seek answers.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it's very likely that the enemy is going to try to distract us from this.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_00: Help us to be laser focused on knowing that we know.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if we know that it's not true for us, if we're not sure, help us to do what it takes to be assured of our salvation, of our relationship with you, because it is worth it.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you that you made it possible for us to know.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it's in Jesus' name that we pray.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.