(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Music Turn to page number 261. We're going to be singing Count Your Blessings. Good afternoon and welcome to Shore Foundation Baptist Church. You can find your seats and grab your blue song books. Turn to page number 261. We're going to be singing Count Your Blessings. Music Song 261, let's sing it out together on the first. When upon life's billows you are tempest-tossed. When you are discouraged thinking all is lost. Count your many blessings, name them one by one. And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your blessings, see what God hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. Are you ever burdened with a load of care? Does the cross seem heavy? You are called to bear. Count your many blessings, every doubt will fly. And you will be singing as the days go by. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your blessings, see what God hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. When you look at others with their lands and gold. Think that Christ has promised you his wealth untold. Count your many blessings, money cannot buy. Your reward in heaven or your home on high. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your blessings, see what God hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. So, amid the conflict, whether grey or small. Do not be discouraged, God is over all. Count your many blessings, angels will attend. Helping comes word thank you to your journeys end. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your blessings, see what God hath done. Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your many blessings, see what God hath done. Song number 120 in your blue hymn books, When I See the Blood. Song 120, let's sing it together on the first. Christ, our Redeemer, died on the cross. Died for the sinner, paid all his due. All who receive him need never fear. Yes, he will pass, will pass over you. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. I will pass, I will pass over you. Chiefest of sinners, Jesus can save. As he has promised, so will he do. O sinner, hear him, trust in his word. Then he will pass, will pass over you. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. I will pass, I will pass over you. Judgment is coming, all will be there. Who have rejected, who have refused? O sinner, hasten, let Jesus in. Then God will pass, will pass over you. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. I will pass, I will pass over you. O what compassion, O boundless love. Jesus has power, Jesus is true. All who believe are safe from the storm. O he will pass, will pass over you. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. When I see the blood. I will pass, I will pass over you. It's good to be back. Let's take our bulletins and go through some announcements. If you don't have the bulletins, just lift up your hand. I think we have a few more left. All right. Hope it's back to normal again. Okay, cool. All right, on our front cover we have our verse of the week. It says, but let all those that put their trust in thee rejoice. Let them ever shout for joy, because thou defendest them. Let them also that love thy name be joyful in thee. Psalm chapter 5, verse number 11. Very comforting and great verse there. Our service times, our Sunday morning service is 10.30 a.m. Our Sunday evening service is 3.30 p.m. Our Thursday Bible study is tonight, of course, and that's 6.30 p.m. We're in Hebrews chapter number 5. And then our so many times are listed below. We had so many tonight. Did anybody get saved tonight? Okay. And then the praise report, you can see the salvations and baptism attendance totals there. Thirty-four salvations for January. That's a great number there. I don't know if that's a record for us, but it's definitely higher than it was last year, I'm pretty sure. So anyway, but great job out soul wanting. I know that there's been a lot of extra soul wanting going on, and I do appreciate that. And the Lord appreciates it more importantly than that. So February 7th, we had our men's leadership class. Okay, so the 11th, which is Saturday, we were having our married couple's sweetheart banquet. That's why the back rooms are closed off right now. They're being remodeled into Italy, little Italy right now. So I'm actually glad that it says no peeking because I was going to go peek, but I just sometimes I got to know my place, right, and my place is not peeking. So I'll get a chance to look at it when it's all said and done. So I appreciate all the hard work that's been going into that. I know that me and my wife have been doing a lot of extra things that we normally don't get to do, but then we've had a lot of extra help that we normally don't get. So really thankful for all the people that have stepped up to help with that. And even on the night of, we have some ladies that are going to be helping out wrangle kids and things like that. So appreciate that. And so the start time is wrong. It's my fault. And I reposted it inside the WhatsApp group that it actually starts at 4 o'clock. So I'd already made the order for the food and said I was picking it up at 4.20. So I had to call them back today and redo everything. So it's my fault. I failed as a pastor, so I apologize for that. But so these times are not right, but the events are right. So at 4 o'clock, we're going to get here, get here and get your picture taken. There'll be different places where you can take pictures in there. You'll see what I'm talking about once you get here and it's all said and done. Feel free to dress up if you are going to dress up in some kind of Italian suit or, you know, obviously Italian, real Italian suits are very expensive. But I think the newer ones are kind of faggy. So I don't know. I like the old school ones, you know, so. But anyway, you can wear whatever you want as far as that goes. You could even just come dressed like normal. It's up to you. But it's just a nice night to take your spouse and have a nice dinner and some entertainment and some preaching, right? So the pictures are going to start at 4. And then I think the schedule said 4 to 4.30, but it'll probably be more like 4 to 5. And then the food is going to be at 5, from 5 to 6. And then we'll have an hour or so to eat, and then we'll have some preaching. And then we're going to play the not so newlywed game with all different questions from last year. And so we're trying to write that right now and figure out all the good gotcha questions for you or ones that will definitely cause a fight afterwards, you know. No, I'm just kidding. I really don't want that, but it happens. There's been some beef that's been known to happen from time to time. Anyway, I'm just kidding. But anyway, if you're still, if you're planning on coming, and you haven't signed up, please sign up. And then if you're coming and you're bringing your children, we also need to know that too. So if you're planning on coming, please sign up or let me know that you're coming. I did get plenty of food, but there's also food that we have to plan for the kids that are going to be here. So the best case scenario is that you don't bring your kids. But not everybody has grandchildren close, and I mean grandchildren. I got grandchildren close. Not everybody has grandparents close or, you know, whatever, mom and dad that can help out. So we do understand that. We're a family integrated church. You can still bring your kids. It might be crowded at your table of six, but, you know, especially the Herringtons, but you're like got the whole row there, so that's cool. But anyway, so that's what we got going on for Saturday. Pastor Mahi is going to be here to preach. He's bringing his whole family. And we also have him preaching for us both services on Sunday, so I got a chance to talk to him on the phone, and I'm very excited about the sermons he's going to be preaching. We're going to have a homeschool activity February 15th. That's at Oaks Amusement Park. Oh, yeah, by the way, if you did the Bible reading challenge and I didn't get you a gift card, or some people probably just aren't here, but if I didn't get you a gift card and you did the challenge, then I will give you a gift card, okay? So feel free to come up and ask me for it if you didn't get one. So, and then, yeah, like I said, the homeschool activity is at Oaks Park, Oaks Skating Park rink at 1145, and it is skating. It's for skating. We're not riding rides. The rides aren't open right now. So anyway, you're welcome to go to that. Please make sure Miss Rachel knows you're coming. And the sewing class is going to be on February 21st, and that'll be starting at 4 p.m. See Mrs. Harrington for any questions with that. March 5th through 9th, we're driving down to Verity Baptist Church with some teens. Now, I definitely need you to make sure that I know that you're riding with me, because months ago I already did all the reservations with that within the van, and do you think that I actually remember who all is coming? I don't. So if I, just remind me that you're going. If you're not going and you planned on going, I need to know that also in case someone else wants to go, okay? And it's the Next Generation Youth Rally at Verity Baptist Church. The days of that are the 7th through the 8th, and I got fags trying to call me right now, so go to hell. Anyway, also, I'm not joking on either thing I said. So anyway, you guys want to talk to them? All right, I need to figure out how to turn this thing off. All right. Just put it away. Sorry. Sorry for the distractions. Where was I at? The Youth Rally. So the actual days for that are the 7th and 8th. If you want to go down yourself, you're more than welcome to do that. Please make sure you're signing up on the website for that event, and it's Verity Baptist, I think it's veritybaptistchurch.com or something like that, but you can just type in Verity Baptist Church and you'll get that Youth Rally. So I think I put the sign-up link inside the group, so if you need that, just look it up inside our WhatsApp group. And the 13th through 17th is the Detroit Sewing Trip, and then the King James Conference is May 25th through 28th, and after we get through one event, we'll move on to the next one, all right? And all this other stuff you all know, all the... Oh, yeah, so please do not go back there in that room right there. We're probably going to have it closed off Sunday, too, unless we break it down before then, which I highly doubt. So we'll probably be kind of crippled to having to use the upstairs room for anybody that brings their lunch on the weekend. So anyway, that's just kind of what's going on, and I want to say congratulations to the Dinsmore family for the birth of Ava Wilhelmina. Is that how you say it? That's a tongue twister there, and then Dinsmore. So she weighed in at 6 pounds and 5 ounces, and she was 19 inches long, so congratulations to the Dinsmore family, and I think I heard us sing Happy Birthday to Madison and Bobby, and then did we do the anniversary for Eli and Amy? Let's sing Happy Anniversary. Do you guys want to sit next to each other, or are you still mad at each other from this morning? I'm just kidding. Let's sing Happy Anniversary. Happy anniversary to you. Happy anniversary to you. Happy anniversary to you. Happy anniversary to you. How many years? Seven years. Congratulations. So that's all I have for announcements. Let's go ahead and sing another song, and we'll receive the offering. All right, our next song will be song number 239 in your blue hymn books, What a Friend We Have in Jesus. Song number 239 in your blue hymn books, What a Friend We Have in Jesus. Song 239, let's sing it together on the first. What a friend we have in Jesus. All our sins and griefs to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer. Oh, a peace we often forfeit. Oh, what needless pain we bear. All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer. Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere? We should never be discouraged. Take it to the Lord in prayer. Can we find a friend so faithful? Who will all our sorrows share? Jesus knows our every weakness. Take it to the Lord in prayer. Are we weak and heavy laden? Cumbered with a load of care. Precious Savior, still our refuge. Take it to the Lord in prayer. Do thy friends despise, forsake thee? Take it to the Lord in prayer. In his arms he'll take and shield thee. Thou wilt find us all this there. Amen. Good singing. Brother Sean, could you bless the offering for us? Lord, thank you so much for this day. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, good evening. Would you turn with me to the book of Hebrews, chapter five. The book of Hebrews and chapter five. And as is our custom, we're going to read the whole chapter, starting in verse 1, Hebrews chapter 5, and in Hebrews chapter 5 the Bible reads, For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. Who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way? For that he himself also is compassed with infirmity, and by reason hereof he ought, as for the people, so also for himself, to offer for sins. And no man taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron. So also Christ glorified not himself to be made an high priest, but he that said unto him, Thou art my son, today have I begotten thee. As he saith also in another place, Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications, with strong crying and tears, unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard and that he feared, though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered. And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him, called of God and high priest, after the order of Melchizedek, of whom we have many things to say, and hard to be uttered, seeing ye are dull of hearing. For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God, and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. For everyone that useth milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil." Brother Sean, will you pray for us? Amen, alright, we're in Hebrews chapter 5, and it's been a couple weeks since we've been in here, but we left off in chapter 4, so we're in chapter 5 now. You guys need to wake up. Or I need to get more funny, one of the two, so probably the latter there. But kind of left off talking about how the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, fierce and even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit of the joints of marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. The word of God is very powerful, and it is a discerner even of our own thoughts, which people are like, well, you guys worship this book or whatever. It's like this book can discern the thoughts and intents of your heart. What other book can do that? Other books can make you sad, but other books can't read your mind and tell you what's inside of your heart and teach you how to go out and how you should come back in and how you should live your life and how you should raise your children, how you should run your marriage, how you should run your home, how you should work at your job, how you should treat other people. The word of God is very powerful, and so we should always have a, I think that this is the year of the Bible. We're going to have a big conference. We just, Pastor Shelley made that movie, the Pure Words Baptist Church and Steadfast, made that great movie, and it was really good. Who's watched it more than once? Yeah, it's worth watching again. So it's really good. We kind of left off where I was talking about in chapter four, about seeing that we have such a great high priest who's passed in the heaven of Jesus, the Son of God in verse 14 in chapter four, excuse me. And as Jesus, the Son of God, and so it kind of, chapter five kind of continues on this thought about the high priest, and so let's actually go back to verse 14 in chapter number four. So let's read 14, 15, and 16, and we'll kind of then jump into the rest of the sermon here. So it says, seeing that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, who let us hold fast our profession, for we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in the time of need. Which is, we just got done doing our prayer request, and we go to the throne of grace asking God for mercy, that we may obtain mercy and grace and find help. Because, you know, why do we pray about certain things? Because we have needs, don't we? So that's why we pray, and sometimes we have sin that we need to confess to God, and we obtain mercy through going boldly to the throne. And Jesus, you know, Jesus Christ is the Son of God, but we are also sons and daughters of God ourselves. And so when God is our Father, we can come boldly unto Him, can't we? We can come boldly unto Him just like you would never stop your kid from coming in. Like Pastor Jimenez does this, I think it was a, I can't remember what sermon it was, but he kind of talked about how, you know, he could be doing anything, busy with anything, maybe even in an appointment in his office, and his daughter will sometimes just run in and burst into the office, and, you know, he doesn't stop her, you know, obviously she's little so she can't, you know, she couldn't understand that that wasn't appropriate to bust into a counseling session, or like if you're just in a meeting or whatever. But the point was is that, you know, she boldly would go into his office and, you know, ask things of her dad. And if you think of it that way, we have that same power with God, and obviously, you know, He is God, we gotta understand where our place is, we're the sheep of His pasture, but, you know, we can still go boldly unto the throne of grace because we are His sons and daughters. And so your kids will come up and say, Dad, I'm hungry, don't they? I mean, what kid doesn't go to their parent and say, Dad, I'm hungry? Or Mom, I'm hungry, can I have something to eat? Usually when they're little, they don't know how to ask for things right either, it's like, HUNGRY! Or something like that, that's what Emmy does. But you know, they don't know until they're like overcome with hunger or whatever. But we can come boldly to the throne of grace because Jesus Christ is our high priest. That's the point I'm trying to make. And basically the first portion of this sermon is going to be talking about how Jesus was chosen to be the high priest by God. And so we got this contrast in the first verse, the first few verses here, between Jesus Christ and Aaron. And Aaron was the first high priest of the Hebrews, and he was the brother of Moses, and it says in verse 1, it says, For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sin. So he's talking about the duty of the high priest. The high priest under the Old Testament, under the Old Covenant, was the high priest and he is ordained, an ordained man of God, so that means he's chosen as that person. And how are the high priests chosen? Does it ever say why God chose Aaron to be the high priest? I mean I don't think it actually does, it's just God just said, you're the high priest. And then his sons in hereditary form would be the next high priest. So that's kind of how that worked and there was supposed to be, after the death of the high priest that a new one would come from the same family. So you have Aaron being picked and he was ordained and it says that they're ordained for men in things pertaining to God. So the things that they were supposed to be doing were in service of God, but not everybody could be the high priest. It only was the sons of Aaron. And so obviously it passed on to his sons, passed on to his sons and their sons and so on and so forth. But it was also not just for, it was pertaining to the things, the works of God, but also that he would offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. If you remember on the Day of Atonement, basically he had to clean himself up and do all these ritualistic ceremonies that represent something. Washing your flesh, putting on clean clothes, putting on the right garments. The high priest had a certain specific outfit that he had to wear and it's very detailed in the Bible about the high priest outfit. And it couldn't have sweat. It was supposed to be made out of certain items so that it wouldn't produce sweat. And so all these different things, a mitre and a bonnet for beauty and just all this different stuff. And what was that for? Well, it was so, because it pictures something. Because Jesus Christ was not a sinner. So as a high priest, he's different than the human high priest, yet he was human. Because Jesus Christ is the mediator between God and men. The man Christ Jesus is what it says. So that high priest had to be a man, but Jesus Christ is also God. So he is the mediator between God and man. When we pray to God the Father, we pray to God the Father through who? Through Jesus the Son, right? We pray to God through the Son, we pray to the Father through the Son. That's what we're supposed to do. And so when we go boldly under the throne of grace, yeah, we can go boldly in the name of Jesus Christ, the Savior and the high priest. So it says in verse 2, who can have compassion on the ignorant? And on them that are out of the way, for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity. So he's basically saying that the high priest, when they offer those sacrifices that they're doing at once in the year of atonement, or the day of atonement, excuse me, they'd go in after taking the bath, washing their clothes, putting all their stuff on, washing their hands again or whatever. And then they would sacrifice animals and then put that blood on I think the right thumb, the right big toe and like their ear or something like that. I mean I didn't look at all that stuff before, I'm probably not getting it all right. But all that stuff is a picture for us to see what was to come later on. But the high priest's job is to have compassion on the ignorant. Doesn't God, if you're saved, doesn't God forgive the sins you do in ignorance? He does, he forgives all of your sins. And it says those that are out of the way, what does that mean? Well it means that those people that are probably saved but they're out of the way, they're not following the path, they're not following God. And it says and for he himself also is compassed with infirmity. So the human high priest, before Jesus became the high priest, was also a sinful person. And so they had their own sins that they brought in with them. But that's why they did that ritualistic thing where he's washing, he's putting the blood on there. And that blood, he would go one time a year into the holiest place and they would sprinkle the blood and all that stuff. And that was a picture of how when Christ died, he took his sinless blood up to the real mercy seat that's in heaven and placed that blood as a sacrifice for all mankind's sins from the beginning to the end. And that blood is enough to cleanse the whole world from all their sins. But Paul's kind of helping us to understand that something's changed here and we're going to go deeper into that later on in other chapters but it is talking about it here so I wanted to cover it. It says, and by reason hereof he ought as for the people so also for himself to offer for sins. So he had to offer for himself also it says, and no man taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron. So see, he was called of God, Aaron. Doesn't say why, he just was, alright. And it says, no man taketh this honor unto himself. It's not like they voted to see who the next high priest was. They didn't go on a game show or something to figure out who was going to challenge to be the next high priest. It wasn't survivor high priest version or anything like that. It was God picked who was going to be the first high priest and then it was automatically picked by the next son becoming the high priest. So there was a succession of priests in the Old Testament that were the high priest. There's all kinds of different priests, all different kinds of Levites that served in different capacities. So some were the people that carried all the stuff, all the stuff for the tabernacle, certain tribes would do, everybody had their own kind of lot that they were picked to do, but the priesthood went through Aaron. So it says, so also Christ glorified not himself to be made in high priest, but that he said unto him, thou art my son, today have I begotten thee. So Aaron was called and it says, so also Christ. So in the same way, God called Christ and glorified, you know Christ didn't glorify himself and say, I know, you know like the Mormons, they say that the plan was between Jesus' plan and Satan's plan to see who would save the world or whatever, right? But that's not what the Bible says. There is no plan put forth by Jesus, there's no plan put forth, and they're not brothers by the way. They're not equal in power by the way, but it says, he had said unto them, because he said unto him, thou art my son, today have I begotten thee. So God is the one that picked Christ to be the high priest, but obviously God the Father knew that he would be successful in that plan. See we kind of talked about this last time about, you know, that Jesus was the lamb slain from the foundation of the earth, and that God knew who would be saved when the foundation of the earth was made. He already knew all that stuff. So he also knew that that plan of redemption was going to work before the foundation of the earth. So God the Father called Christ to be the high priest, just like God ordained and called Aaron, and again, Aaron didn't declare himself to be the high priest, I'm Moses' brother, I'm the high priest. That's not how it worked, he just picked him. And you know, people would often probably ask, well why Aaron? But the Bible says the gifts and calling of God are without repentance. Sometimes God just picks certain people, and we don't always know his wisdom and why he does things or why he picks certain people, he just does. So and doesn't he have that right to do that? I think he does. Chapter 6, as he saith also in another place, thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. So now it's going to give us, you know, a little bit of, it's kind of going to give us a little bit of foreshadowing, because in chapter 7, it really nails and starts talking about Melchizedek. But we're not going to talk about him too much today, but this, he is, Christ is a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. He wasn't a Levite, he wasn't in a Levitical priesthood, and remember the book of Hebrews is trying to help us transition from the Old Testament laws and helping us understand what was fulfilled and what's been changed. And so one of the things that are changed is the Levitical priesthood. So now it's the order of Melchizedek, and like I said, we're going to get into that later on in chapter 7. Let's look at verse 7. And in the days of his flesh when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death and was heard in that he feared. So I mean, just kind of skimming over that, it's like, okay, but it says in the days of his flesh when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death. What do you think that this is talking about? Well, I mean, I personally think it's talking about when Jesus prayed that he wouldn't have to do this. He wouldn't have to sacrifice himself. He prayed in the garden of Gethsemane. He prayed in the garden that God would allow that cup to pass from him. That's what I think it's talking about. Someone's going to come up and say I'm wrong at the end of the service, but that's alright. That's what I feel like it's saying because if you go to the next verse you'll see that it's talking about Jesus here. But let's look at some verses and see kind of what it's talking about. Look at Matthew chapter 26. Now none of these verses are going to say that Jesus was shedding tears. It says strong crying and tears. Now we know that crying, you know, when we think of the word crying we always think that someone's weeping, right? But that's not always the case. Crying is also speaking loudly, crying out. But obviously we know what tears are. So tears are when you are, you know, modern day saying crying. But I believe that this is talking about the time when Jesus was saying please let this pass over me because, you know, what he was about to go through was really terrible. Look at Matthew 26 verse 36. It says, Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Say ye here, while I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. And I will carry ye here, and watch with me. And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me, nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt. So, you know, obviously Jesus is going through agony here because he knows what he's about to go through. See, we don't know what's about to happen to us in most cases. You know, if you get, you know, tied to like a wooden post and they start putting firewood around you, and then you see somebody with a can of gasoline, and then there's a rope that's about to get tied around your neck, I mean, the people that were martyred in like the middle ages, they came up with some pretty gruesome ways to kill people. But you probably know you're about to go through something, you're going to start freaking out. You're going to start having death anxiety, and death anxiety is a real thing, it's very powerful, and it's very upsetting to see someone going through it. But this is what he's going through. See, because he already knows, he hasn't even been arrested yet, but he already knows what's going to happen, doesn't he? And now turn to Luke chapter 22, Luke chapter 22, because didn't he offer up prayers in the garden? He did. And supplications, strong crying in tears, I mean, again, it doesn't say tears, but when you're very sorrowful, what do you do? Do you cry? When you're like, very sad? I mean, I know women do, for sure, they don't even have to be sad, it could just be the wind blowing, no, I'm just joking. Depends on when that is, or whatever, but anyway, alright, I don't want to get myself in trouble. Luke chapter 22 verse 41, it says, And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast and kneeled down and prayed, saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done. And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him, and being in agony, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. So, you know, he's in agony, you know, because when the body knows something is going to happen that's really bad, it begins to stress. When people have, like, anxiety, they have this great fear that comes upon them that makes their body do things that it wouldn't normally do, but the stress of death or torture is probably, you know, your body's going to start doing things that it normally doesn't do. Probably sweating profusely, this is what he was doing, right? He was sweating so bad that it was almost like blood was just pouring out of his face. Like, if you've got a head wound, you're bleeding, that's what it was like, he was sweating so bad. It wasn't blood, it doesn't say that it was blood that he was sweating, it said as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground. Now look at Mark chapter 14 verse 32, so I mean that's some serious agony though. And you think about this, when you know you're about to get a shot at the doctor, do you start stressing out? Maybe not some of you grown men, you tough guys, but you know what's funny is every time I go get my blood drawn or something by a phlebotomist, they're always like, are you okay? You know? And I'm like, why do you ask me that? They're like, because more men faint getting their blood drawn than anybody else. Big old burly tough guys will go on there like, it's the anxiety of knowing that they're going to stick a needle in your arm. Like my anxiety about it is that I have to see it being done. I don't want to be surprised. Some people look away and they don't want to look. But then you never know what's going to happen, you're like, I don't know, I have to look. That's just my thing. But I remember one time when I was 14 I got some kind of shot, my grandpa took me into the doctor and like I had an unreasonable fear, I'm 14, I'm like a young man. And for some reason that needle, I mean it was like that long. And some of those needles look more intimidating than the others, don't they? When you know they're going to draw blood, those needles are pretty thick and scary. But I don't know, I don't know why I just had this weird fear about it, but I mean obviously that's nothing compared to what Jesus is going through, but I'm just trying to help you understand your mind. Like I'm sure there's been things that you just know are going to be painful and yet you know you have to go through it. But this is like times a million when it comes to Jesus. Not only having all the sins of the world placed upon him, but also the actual torture, the actual mocking, the actual physical pain, the actual starvation, the actual thirst. When Jesus said I thirst, he hadn't had anything to drink. I mean, and then they give him vinegar to drink. That's torture. When you're like, oh yeah, finally, because vinegar looks like water, doesn't it? Like if you've ever seen white vinegar, looks like water, don't taste like water, that's it. It's like, you instantly spit it out. So did I have you turn to Mark 14? Look at verse 32, it says, and they came to a place which is called Gethsemane, and he saith to his disciples, sit ye here while I shall pray, and he taketh with him Peter and James and John, and began to be sore, amazed, and to be very heavy. And saith unto them, my soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death, tarry ye here and pray. And he went forward a little and fell on the ground and prayed that if it were possible the hour might pass from him. And he said, Abba Father, all things are possible unto thee, take away this cup from me, nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt. See Jesus is a obedient son, and part of his, you know, part of the gospel is the fact that Jesus was sinless, and Jesus bore the sins of many. And I don't, I mean obviously in the Old Testament it talks about him being in the order of Melchizedek and being the high priest. But John chapter 17, the whole chapter is basically his prayer to God the Father, not only for himself, but also for the people that he had under his care, talking about how he prayed that they wouldn't, you know, not to take him out of the world, but that they should be in the world, but still sanctified and holy and, you know, just, you know, he pours his soul out to God, and it's kind of like a high priestly prayer that he does. And so like I showed you the three gospels where it specifically talks about this crying and tears and agony and, you know, saying that he, unto him that was able to save him from death, was God able to save him from the death? He was, but see, Jesus said, not my will, but thy will be done. So he was a vessel, he was a willing vessel that poured himself out in the service of his Father. And so it talks about in Hebrews 5, 7, that's what I think he's talking about. I mean, that's my opinion, but I think that he's talking about that particular thing. The high priest is asked to be a propitiation and an appeasement to God for the people. And again, that picture for us with Aaron and other human high priests is that they're set apart, their clothes are different, they smell different, they take baths, they wash more, and, you know, they sacrifice, they take the atonement, on the day of atonement the high priest goes in and, you know, does this, these specific things. But it's, again, a picture to show us a sinless high priest and the blood being placed on the mercy seat every year represents the fact that the blood atonement was for all time. Because, you know, it's a perpetual atonement. But how do we picture that without being able to live forever on earth? Well, that every year you would just do it. So, but once Christ did it, it's done forever. We don't need any more atonement after that. And that will be covered later on in other chapters, but, you know, it says in verse 8, though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered. So he was born without sin, Christ Jesus, and yet surrounded by sinners. Kind of talked about that before, how weird it would be to be sinless and then to be around a bunch of sinful people, being able to read their thoughts and minds all the time. I mean, that would be very vexing. And knowing that people have agendas, you know, how weird would that be and still be nice to them? You know, that's what would be hard because you know what someone's intentions are towards you, or why they're saying something to you, or why they're being nice to you, and all the whole time you just perceive and know everything that they're doing, that'd be tough. But he was tempted at all points, like we are, yet without sin. He was tempted by the devil for 40 days in the wilderness, fasting. He was offered absolute power over the whole world by the devil himself if he would just bow down and worship them. He was hated, ridiculed, lied about, didn't they say he was a glutton and a wine-bibber? You know, and actually he was sinless. So all the things that he was accused of doing were just false witnesses, just lies. He suffered knowing beforehand that he was going to have to endure and went through a gruesome and torturous death. So we do learn things through suffering. We learn, as human beings, we learn things through making mistakes. You know, we make mistakes and then that helps us get better. But Jesus Christ didn't make mistakes. He didn't have any sin. So how did he learn his obedience? Well it says that though he were a son, yet learned his obedience by the things which he suffered. So he was taught another way, wasn't he? Because obedience was already something that he had down. He learned that obedience by the things which he suffered, but he didn't do anything wrong. He didn't deserve any ill will or any grief that anybody ever gave him, any way that they talked bad about him, any way that they hurt him. He didn't deserve any of that. But yet he learned through the suffering. That's what it says, right? So Jesus had no sin of his own to suffer for. We suffer for our sins, don't we? But Jesus suffered for not being a sinner. So like he suffered for no reason, what we would perceive as no reason. But the reason was that that's what it took to buy our salvation. He literally had the weight of the world on his shoulders. You ever hear that saying? He's just got the, you know, you got a lot going on, you got the weight of the world on your shoulders, you're going through a lot of problems. But he literally had the weight of the sins of the whole world from the beginning to the end. I mean, how many sins have you committed in your lifetime? If you're a child, probably few. But the older you get, the more you commit. And then times that by the billions of people that have been born on this world and the billions of people that are on the earth right now, and who knows how long that's going to be, but he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. Isn't it suffering to have everybody's sins put upon you when you didn't even do anything wrong? I mean, turn to Acts chapter 1 verse 3. So we're still talking about Jesus being the high priest. So Jesus Christ, the high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, and we saw the contrast between Aaron, the human, and the position of the high priest, ordained by God, called by God, but then Jesus Christ perfectly fulfills the needs of the high priest by doing, you know, a lot of the things that he did were basically, it just proved that God picked the right person, right? So anyway, you're in Acts 1, look at verse 3, it says, to whom also he showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. So when it says that word where it says after his passion, it's talking about, it's not like passion, like a love type passion that we would think of that's the modern day kind of word, but really, passion is like an old English word, kind of translated from the Latin, and basically it's chiefly a term in Christian theology, and what's the term for? Well, it's to suffer. That's what it means. So passion means to suffer. So when Jesus Christ said after his passion, after he suffered, he showed himself alive. So I've talked about this before, but part of the gospel is the resurrection. As a matter of fact, it's a big part of the gospel. So it says, to whom he showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. So that's basically the first point, but the second point, well I only have two points for the sermon, but the second point is that Jesus Christ completed the mission, when Jesus Christ completed the mission, it made him the originator of salvation. The originator of salvation, you're like, well people were saved before Jesus came. Yeah, but they're saved because Jesus came. So whether that's, you know, we're all living in the future, Jesus died two thousand years ago, but we still have that salvation through something that happened before. Well the people that got saved before he came were saved the same way we are, right? Hebrews 5-9 says, and being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him. Now I'm going to break this verse down a little bit here for you, because there's a lot to unpack here, but it says, you know, that he became the author of eternal salvation. So when we think of author, what do you think of, what's the first thing you think of? Someone that writes a book, right? So, but actually, and it does mean that, but it does come from like the Middle English, and I'm not sitting here trying to, you know, etymology is a real thing, folks. I mean, where words came from is legitimate, okay? I'm not saying that we have to go back to some other language, I'm just saying where it came from is Middle English, and it means, in a sense, a person who invents or causes something. When it says that Jesus Christ is the author of eternal salvation, it's not like he just wrote the book. He's the one that caused it to come into being. He's the one that invented salvation. So salvation came through Jesus Christ, but yet it was still already known about in the Old Testament. See, the blood of bulls and goats could never save anybody. A human high priest was not really worthy. These are things that were done to picture salvation for us, and to atone for people's sin, but like if the blood of bulls and goats could not wash away sin, then those people were doing an act that God asked them to do, but did the blood wash away their sins? It didn't, because the blood that actually was going, that actually does wash away their sins, or did wash away their sins, was the future blood of Christ on the mercy seat. But anyway, an author, he became the author of salvation, and so it also, it can mean the originate, the original person that came up with it. And yes, he did write the book too. He built the house. He wrote the book. He spoke the world into existence. So he's the one that authored and made salvation possible. Now that's pretty cool in itself, but it also says that he's the author of eternal salvation, not conditional probation, which is what a lot of people believe in. I would say most Christians believe in not eternal salvation, they believe in conditional probation. Yeah, I'll still be saved as long as I keep repenting of my sins. I'll be saved as long as I keep praying to God every night. I'll be saved as long as I keep walking after Jesus. I'll be saved as long as I keep the Ten Commandments. I'll be saved as long as I keep going to church. I'll be saved as long as I continue to do good works. That's not what the Bible says it takes to be saved. It's not conditional probation, it's eternal salvation. That's what he's the author of. He didn't author, oh, you could lose your... The author of, you could lose your salvation. Is that what it says? No, eternal salvation. Turn to John chapter 10, verse 27. John chapter 10, verse 27. And this is such an important point here that I'm going to spend just a little bit of time on it here. John chapter 10, verse 27 says, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. Yes, that's true. And I give unto them eternal life. Does it say you earn it? No, I give it. How come he can give it? Because he's the author of it. He paid for it. He did everything it took for it. It says, I give unto them eternal life, and they shall perish when they don't keep my commandments. Is that what it says? No, what's it say? It says, and they shall never perish. Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. You can't even pluck yourself out of God's hand. So Jesus Christ is the author of eternal salvation, not that you could lose your salvation. So what is missing in Christianity is the fact that if you believe that you have salvation, you also have to believe that it's eternal salvation. And if you don't believe that, then you're not saved. You're not saved. Because you're not trusting in the record that God gave of his son. And this is the record, eternal life. And that life is in his son. If you don't believe the record, you're calling God a liar. Is God capable of lying? No he's not. So if you are saying you're saved, but you think you can lose it for any reason, then you are calling God a liar. You are saying that someone could pluck you out of God's hand. You're saying that your salvation is conditional upon your probation. Because what is probation? As long as you keep doing things right, then you don't have to go back to jail. You don't have to go to hell. That's what most churches teach, is that you are on probation. And you never know if you're going to be saved until the very end. Good luck. If you get hit by a car, you better hope a priest shows up to give you your last rites before you take your last breath, or you're going to go to hell. How is God fair? If he was to do that, how would that be fair? Is there a Catholic priest at every place that you go to that's just ready to give you the last rites? You know why you don't have to do that? Because that's garbage. It doesn't take some Catholic priest to pray you out of purgatory and into heaven. It's ridiculous. We don't believe in original sin at this church, or that if a little baby dies, that they go to hell unless they were baptized. We don't believe that trash. Jesus Christ died for that baby, and when that baby dies, they're going to go straight to heaven. But then you might ask the question at the end of that verse, that he gives eternal salvation unto all them that obey him. You're like, aha, pastor, you see, you have to obey him, or you're not going to go to heaven. Well, let's turn to a couple of verses, and let me show you what the Bible actually says about that. Turn to 1 John chapter 3 verse 23. And I do get fired up about this topic because I'm so sick of all these work salvation heretics out there leading people to hell with their false religion and their false Christianity and their false prophets, and then they get mad at us when we actually say something against them. It's like you're defending a pervert. You're defending a pedophile pervert priest. Matt Walsh, you clown, who doesn't even really believe in, he doesn't even believe in salvation. But yeah, look at all the evangelicals that are just, oh, Matt Walsh, he's so great, let's follow his blog. He's an idiot. He's not saved. He's leading people to hell. He's a talking head for the Catholic Church. But of course, I'm a Jesuit, but yeah, I'm going to talk about the Catholic Church. People are just stupid. Anyway, somebody not too long ago commented that I was a Jesuit or something, I'm just like, do you realize I despise the Catholic Church? Anyway, so look at 1 John chapter 3 verse 23, it says, and so if you keep a commandment, what do you consider that? Obeying the commandment, right? Look what the Bible says, and this is his commandment, that we should believe on the name of the son, of his son, Jesus Christ. What's the commandment to believe? What is believing? To have faith. So God commands people to be saved. But people break God's commandments all the time, don't they? But if you break this commandment to not get saved, you're going to go to hell. The unbelieving, they go to hell. So Jesus Christ does command us to be saved, it says that we should believe on the name of the son of God, or excuse me, son Jesus Christ, of his son Jesus Christ, and love one another as he gave us commandment. So we got to believe on the name of the son, Jesus Christ, right? Now turn to Acts chapter 17 verse 30, Acts chapter 17 verse 30. God commands us to be saved, but just because he commands us to do things doesn't mean people are going to do it. The command is to have faith, but some people just won't have it. They don't want it. They want to believe anything else but God. That's why these scientists and gatheists and phagnostics, they get together and just try to disprove God all the time. With their debates and their silly hypotheses where they just say like, well it wasn't a swirling dot that blew up and created everything. It was a singularity. What's the singularity? It's a swirling dot. As small as the period on the end of this page. That's what they say. We don't believe that we came from a rock. It rained on the rocks for billions of years and then out of that primordial soup crawled the first amoeba, or slug, or whatever it is that they say. Isn't that teaching that if rain goes onto a rock, turns into a pond, out of that pond comes some little creature, then they believe that they came from a rock. Their rock is not as our rock. Our rock is the Lord Jesus Christ and I trust in his eternal salvation. So Acts chapter 17 verse 30 it says, in the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent. Because he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained. Who's that man? When the man comes around, right? He's going to come back and he's going to come back to receive his people, but what's going to happen to the rest of the people? They're going to get nuked. I mean not literally nuked, well maybe nuked, maybe literally, but not by him. His wrath is going to be poured out upon this world and for a lot of people it's going to be too late. That's why he says he commands all men everywhere to repent. And when it's saying repent, it's not saying repent of your sins. Because didn't I just get done showing you that the commandment is that we should believe on the name of the son of God and if you believe on something, if you trust on something, that means that you have faith. So how could you sit there and say that repent means works in this verse, but belief is faith. You can't have it both ways. It's either salvation by faith alone or it's salvation by faith and works, which is what most people believe. But that's not what the Bible teaches. So repent means to change your mind. And so it's saying you need it. And like Paul's addressing these people in Athens or whatever and he's saying, hey, this God that you ignorantly worship, the unknown God, there actually is a God that's unknown to you and let me tell you about him, his name's Jesus. So Paul is telling them they need to stop believing in all these gods that they believe in, this pantheon of gods and to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. He's on Mars Hill. That's the place, it was like the town square of the time where they would go and learn all their new stuff and they had all these graven images to worship and stuff. But it says that the world's gonna be judged in righteousness and that he commands all men everywhere to repent. So going back to the point is that when it says that he's the author of eternal salvation unto all of them that obey him, what do you have to obey? The commandment to be saved, the commandment to believe and then you receive the gift of eternal life. It's a gift. It means you didn't pay for it. You don't have to do anything to pay for it. God paid for it. Jesus paid for it. It's tied closely to the resurrection because it always seems to tie it here. Look at what it says in verse 32. Actually let's read verse 31 again. It says, because he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world of righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. And yeah, some people are going to mock when we go and tell them that Jesus rose from the dead. But it says, and others said, we will hear thee again of this matter. Some people are going to believe and they're going to get saved or they're going to want to hear it again or they're going to put that in the back of their mind and they're going to hear it again and they're going to get saved. So it is tied to the resurrection. So all these people are like, it is finished on the cross. You know, and I'm not trying to mock God by saying that. I'm just saying that when they say that all of salvation is finished, he rose from the dead three days after that. And then they're tying it. How do we know that there's a resurrection from the dead? Because Jesus rose from the dead. That's how we know. And he was seen of many witnesses. So what's our hope in? The resurrection of Christ. If he's resurrected and he's still alive, then that means if he promises to give us eternal life, that means we're going to get the same thing that he does. Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 15, that's the last place I'll have you turn, we'll be done. 1 Corinthians chapter 15, because there's people going around like, you know, basically I mean, they have this mentality that, you know, we're only saved during this life or something. Paul addresses it in 1 Corinthians 15. This whole chapter is about the resurrection. I'm not going to go through the whole chapter, obviously, but I'm going to go through several verses here. In verse 12, it says, Now if Christ is be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection from the dead? You know, it's like, these Sadducees are probably influencing some of these people. And he's like, how are some of you saying that there is no resurrection from the dead? Like, what are you talking about? It says in verse 13, But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen? And if Christ is not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain? So if Christ didn't rise, there is no resurrection, there is no eternal life. It says, Yea, we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised. And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, your yet and your sins. If Jesus Christ is a fairy tale, then we have no hope of eternal life. We have no hope and a resurrection. And many people will be like, yeah, because there isn't one. The Sky Daddy, you know, is just a made up thing to control people. Well, how many people are controlled in here tonight? How many people in this city are controlled by my religion right now? How many people do you actually think are in church right now in this city right now? It's just a control mechanism to make people, who? Who's controlling you? I'll say this again. I say this every once in a while. I don't have cameras in your houses. I don't have like a speaker that calls you to come, you know, like the Muslims have the speaker that, or whatever, at like six o'clock in the morning when you're trying to sleep in on Saturday. It's like, you know, but they believe that they have to pray a certain amount of times a day. What is it, three times or five times a day or something like that? Or they won't go to heaven. Baptists be sleeping in sometimes, right? But I mean, do you see without the resurrection of Christ that it's hard to believe in eternal life? There's only one person that has risen from the dead and has a resurrected body. That's the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the hope of the resurrection. That one day these vile bodies will be rid of and will have a body that cannot be hurt, cannot suffer pain, can't get, you know, stub your toe or, you know, you can but it's not going to hurt. You know, we're going to be immortal. That's a great thing for us to have. But it says if you don't believe these things, you're yet in your sins. If you don't believe in eternal life, I would say this, you're yet in your sins. Because the resurrection is tied to the eternal life. That's the point that it's made over and over again. Because then they also which are fallen asleep, the people that are dead in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. It's kind of like what's the point? If we actually, if there was no hope of the resurrection, we got nothing. And you know what? And I believe in eternal life. And I believe in the author of eternal life, the Lord Jesus Christ. It says, So anybody that's dead in Christ is going to be made alive again. And how long are they alive for? Until they sin? No, they're alive forever. Eternal life. But every man in his own order, Christ the first fruits, like I said, Christ the first fruits, afterward they that are Christ at his coming. So we're waiting for the redemption of the body. We're saved right now. We're waiting for the redemption. Just like people were waiting for Christ to come, he came. Now we're looking back on the cross and trusting in the fact that Christ did these things. We are probably born into a better position. Things were a lot less clear back then, a lot less opportunities to be saved back then I would say. But now we have every opportunity. But I mean this belief out there that you can lose your salvation is complete trash. It's complete garbage. And this is something that we have to convince people of when we're preaching the gospel to them. It's so important that they understand because if they believe, if you go to pray with them and they still believe that they can lose their salvation, you've done nothing for them. You've done nothing for them. They are yet in their sins when you walk away. Obviously people can snow you and I get that and sometimes people just want to tell you what you want to hear so that you'll pray with them and leave or whatever. But you can tell when someone is willing to listen. Take the extra time to make sure that they understand that God cannot lie. He promised eternal life and that this life is in his son and that all you have to do to be saved is to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. It's faith alone and it's eternal and don't let anybody ever tell you anything different. Let's pray. Lord, thank you so much for the scriptures, for the clear scriptures, for the clear, crystal clear doctrine of salvation and the crystal clear scriptures about eternal life, Lord. You promised that you'll give it to us and Lord, all we have to do is believe and such a great gift that everybody can receive if they would only just obey you and believe on your son Jesus Christ. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, our last song is a song number 322. He leadeth me. Song number 322, He leadeth me. Song 322, let's sing that together on the first. He leadeth me, O blessed thought, O words with heavenly comfort from, what e'er I knew, where e'er I be, still tis God's hand that leadeth me. He leadeth me, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me, his faithful follower I would be, for by his hand he leadeth me. Sometimes it seems a deep mist booms, sometimes where Eden's power flows, my water still o'er troubled sea, still tis his hand that leadeth me. He leadeth me, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me, his faithful follower I would be, for by his hand he leadeth me. Lord, I would clasp my hand in mine, or ever murmur, or reply, content whatever lot I see, since tis my God that leadeth me. He leadeth me, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me, his faithful follower I would be, for by his hand he leadeth me. And when my task on earth is done, when by thy grace the victory's won, and death's reign is won, I will not be, since God through Jordan leadeth me, he leadeth me, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me. His faithful follower I would be, for by his hand he leadeth me. He leadeth me, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me by his own hand, he leadeth me by his own hand, he