Romans 16:21,27 -For His Glory- Pastor Rick Beaudry 2024-01-07

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For His Glory, we're gonna finish up the Book of Romans today. If you'll please stand with me, Romans 16, 21 through 27. Next week, I don't know where I'm gonna go.

I need to check with Rick Warren and get a sermon from him, a sermon series, because over 450,000 pastors go to pastors.com to get their themes over the last decade or two from Rick Warren. So I guess I'm gonna have to go there. Maybe we'll do a Daniel diet for 21 days, okay? Something like that, it's the new year, right? Somehow we'll go into dieting this for the rest of January, okay? I'm gonna eat more ribeyes, all right.

Verse 21, Timothy is my work fellow, and Lucius and Jason, and Sosipater, my kinsmen, salute you. I, Tertius, who wrote this epistle, salute you in the Lord. Gaius, mine host and of the whole church, salutes you.

Erastus, the chamberlain of the city, salutes you. And Cordus, a brother. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all, amen.

Now to him that is a power to establish, and according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith. To God only wise be glory, through Jesus Christ forever, amen. Father, thank you for this little group that we can meet here.

Thank you for the Seventh-day Adventist Church that lets us use their facility. Thank you, Lord, for the freedom, the joy, the blessing of being those who have abandoned the cares of this life, and the deceitfulness of riches. And Lord, we embrace you.

You're our everything, Lord Jesus, everything. And Lord, we worship you, we praise you, praise your name, and Lord, we entrust you, we trust you that you're sovereign, you're in control. In the time when Paul is riding the sled of the Church of Rome, people look to Nero, they look to the Roman emperors as being in control, but over and over again, we see your Lord Jesus, your Lord of heaven and earth.

You're the creator of the universe, your almighty God. And Lord, to you belongs the glory, both now and forever, amen. So Lord, bless as we study here.

Be our teacher, open our hearts and minds, and instruct and teach us in the way we should go, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Would you please be seated? So in summary, Paul reminds us that salvation is the work of God.

Notice, first of all, the greeting. Verse 21, Timotheus, my workfellow, and Lucius and Jason and Sosipater, my kinsmen, salute you. Verse 22, Aetertius, who wrote this epistle, salute you in the Lord.

Gaius, my host and of the whole church, salute you. Erastus, the chamberlain of the city, salute you. And Cortus, a brother, salute you.

So Timothy, starting out with his name, bunch of different names listed here. Paul's in Corinth writing a letter to the church in Rome. He didn't plant this church in Rome, but he is writing a letter to them and wanting to encourage them, and he's showing them his gospel.

And so one of the guys who wound up being the closest like-minded person in Paul's life, his son in the face is that of Timothy. So Paul's workfellow, his right-hand man, his son in the faith, and he was with Paul in Corinth, and so he's sending a salute to the church in Rome. Hey, Timothy salutes you.

Timothy wants to say hi to you. You know, he's been praying for you, you know. And so Timothy's mother, Eunice, and his grandmother, Lois, they were devout, and second Timothy, Paul reminds Timothy that he learned the scriptures in a very early age through his mother, Eunice, and his grandmother, Lois.

Are you mothers, are you grandmothers teaching your children the scriptures, teaching them the word of God? Is it up to the school, the public school, to teach your children the word of God, to teach your children how to pray? Can we get the kids to Sunday school? Can we have family devotions? Can we shut the TV off and all the electronic devices and open the scriptures and raise our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord? Timothy enjoyed a home where not only his mother, Eunice, but his grandmother, Lois, who were Jewesses, Eunice was married to a Gentile, Timothy's father was a Gentile, but the scriptures were paramount. The scriptures, the word of God is sown in the heart of Timothy, and as Timothy gets a little bit older, he meets the Apostle Paul, he becomes Paul's companion on missionary journeys and such, and then later, the church in Ephesus is handed off to Timothy. Timothy becomes the pastor.

Many times, Paul would get a work started and Timothy would fill in while Paul leaves to go plant another church. Well, eventually, Timothy is the pastor of the church of Ephesus for a time, and then tradition tells us that Timothy, who was so timid, God hasn't given us the spirit of fear, but a power of love and a sound mind, Timothy. There was a time there where he was shaken by what was happening, and Paul reminds him, be courageous, fight the good fight.

He's using pictures and words of athletes and soldiers and stuff, and soldier as a Christian. Be faithful unto the Lord and all, and then it came a point where Timothy had great courage and he told the Ephesians that their Mardi Gras, their greatest Diana, the Ephesians, that their celebration was against God, just like John the Baptist. This is against God's law, and they beat him to death.

They always wanna beat up the messenger, you know? I not only know that Epstein's alive, I know that Elvis is still alive and Michael Jackson's still alive, you know? See, that's how crazy it gets. You just try to say one little thing, man, that stuff goes off in your head, you know? But it doesn't really matter, does it? Doesn't matter if they're alive or not. But Timothy's mother, Eunice, and Lois, they were devout Jews who taught him the scriptures.

That's what matters. His father, a Gentile. In Acts 16.3, Paul circumcised Timothy because people were spying out their liberty when they're on these missionary trips, and so Paul says, you know what, you are a Jew.

You're half a Jew from the point of your mother and grandmother, so doors will open to a greater extent as we seek to minister unto Jews. It behooves, it helps, it's expedient that you would be circumcised. Paul's not advocating that any of the Gentiles be circumcised, but it is an opportunity.

It opens doors rather than shut doors because the Jews hated Gentiles and wouldn't listen to them at all. So here you have Timothy. Imagine that, being a grown man, being circumcised.

You gotta trust that guy, you gotta trust somebody pretty well to do something like that to you, you know? That is not something I'd wanna go through. Faithful man, Paul's last recorded letter in 2 Timothy was to Timothy, and in Philippians he's described as a like-minded man, and Paul said, I don't have very many like-minded men. I don't have very many like-minded people.

Maybe that's what I'm feeling like, kinda gaslit, like hey, he's crazy, Paul's crazy, you know? And he's got a different gospel, and Paul's, you know, he's not a true prophet of God, he's not an apostle, and you know, even the church of Corinth that he founded, you know, 18 months there, they began to, you know, off him because the false prophets come in there and they degrade Paul, and Paul has to correct them and say, hey, you're my epistle. They were chiding Paul that you don't have any official documents to prove that you're a doctor, that you're Dr. Paul, you know? We've got these false prophets coming here and they're showing us letters, they're showing us their degrees that they got online, you know, and boy, they're slick dressers, and you know, we give them a lot of money because they beg for money quite a bit, and you're off working a job, and you never ask for money, you know? So Paul says, the more I love you, the less you love me in return. You don't respect me, you know? You're my epistle written in your heart, you know, through my ministry, you got saved, so why are you turning on me now, you know? And so very difficult for Paul at many points, but he persevered, and so Timothy got it.

Then Lucius, Lucius of Cyrene. So we see his name mentioned in Acts 13, one, where the apostles were gathered at Antioch and they were praying, fasting and praying, and verse one, this guy's described there, Lucius was there, he was one of the teachers there, a prophet and a teacher at the church at Antioch, and he, along with the others, laid hands upon Barnabas and Saul when the Holy Spirit said, separate unto me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereof I've called them unto. And so the first missionary journey that the apostle Paul ventured on, Lucius was part of those that heard from the Lord, and they didn't cast dice like Peter did in Acts one to determine, you know, who should take the place of Judas.

At this point in time, after Acts two, the Holy Spirit came upon them and they were able to listen to the Holy Spirit through fasting and prayer and hear from the Lord about what direction to take, you know, as a church. I hope and pray that you and I have ears to hear what the Lord is wanting to communicate to us in these last days. Jesus to the seven churches would say, he that has an ear to hear, let him hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches.

I don't wanna follow men, I don't wanna follow trends, I don't wanna get my marching orders from somebody else, I wanna hear the Lord speak to us through the teaching of his word. As we study his word, as we pray, as we wait upon the Lord, I wanna hear the Lord lead and guide us and move in a direction that's consistent with his already revealed will, you know, here in his word. And so then he says that of Jason, Jason of Thessalonica, in Acts chapter 17, riots break out when Paul's there in Thessalonica.

And in verse five of chapter 17, Paul is staying at the home of Jason. And verse six describes Jason and Paul and the rest of them as those that have turned the world upside down. So from chapter 13 on to 17, you got Paul and Barnabas on their missionary journey.

They reached the place of Thessalonica. Thessalonica, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, it was in a three-week period of time. And what I love about Thessalonians is it's eschatological, meaning last days, prophecy.

And so the church of Thessalonica was concerned about those who had already died during the church age, friends of theirs that recently died, that somehow were they gonna miss the rapture? Were they gonna miss the resurrection or what happens? Are we already in the tribulation period? You know, what's going on? So Paul lays out in a three-week period of time in 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, he lays out eschatology. He lays out the rapture in chapter four of 1st Thessalonians. And then in chapter two of 2nd Thessalonians, he lays out that of the apostasy, the falling away from the faith, and how you and I are the resistors.

We resist this world system. We resist the occult. We resist the demons.

And because of that, the Antichrist can't be revealed in our generation in these last of the last days. Antichrist cannot be revealed until you, the restrainer, the Holy Spirit working through you is removed. Now, imagine that.

Churches today say prophecy is too hard to understand and it's too negative. I don't want the people to get sad. And so I want them to feel good.

So I'm gonna give them feel good therapeutic messages because after all, the end of America and the return of Jesus Christ, that's doom and gloom. You see what they're saying? It's doom and gloom, man. I got plans.

I'm buying another house, man. Get that economy cranking. And it's just, it's mind boggling to me, but here's Thessalonica, this little church of three weeks, and they get two letters.

And they're able to comprehend. They're able to understand. Take those letters and read these letters.

And Paul even saying, you know, in chapter five, you know, 1 Thessalonians that, you know, the pronouns that we studied, you're children of light, not of the day that that day, the day of the Lord would overtake you unaware. You know, so we see the beast system coming and we're children of light knowing that all that Klaus Schwab and Bill Gates and all them are doing is leading toward the beast system, the time of Jacob's trouble, the last seven year tribulation period of Daniel 9, 25 through 27. We're able to connect the dots and see that it's not doom and gloom to us because the Bible has taught us, the word of God's teaching us in Matthew 24 and so many other places of what would take place.

On May 14th, 1948, Israel became a nation according to Isaiah or Ezekiel, excuse me, 36 and 37. And so unprecedented, a nation born again, born again in unbelief. So then as we're studying the book of Romans, we see Israel in chapter 9, 10, 11, Paul's saying there's no replacement theology.

You're not gonna replace Israel, you Gentile Christians. You're not gonna replace them. The church is not gonna replace them.

God has a plan. God has in chapter nine, their election. Chapter 10, their present rejection.

Chapter 11, their future restoration, eschatology. We know as we look at the nation of Israel today, they're regathered in unbelief. They sin, they do things wrong, they lie.

There's no way that thing happened by surprise. On October 7th, no way. They even admit it now, even admit it.

So we don't follow them because they're so moral. We don't follow them at all. What we do is we follow the Lord and he's going to bring them to a place where a one third remnant's going to say, blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord.

And the nation, the true Israel of God are those who believe. And Isaac shall they see be called. Not those in unbelief.

They have to come the same way as you and I came. That's through belief. Because he's elected us.

Because he chose us. Because he drew us. Because he gave us that measure of faith.

And so we see the world turned upside down is how they're described. Wouldn't you love that to be the description that you are those who turned the world upside down for Jesus? Or as some evangelists say, you turned the world backside up. It was already upside down, you brought it back.

So build back better? You'd build it back to make it right, right? And so these guys are, they're rioters. They're revolutionaries. They're what the communists want.

They're people that are only living to serve Jesus. They're only living to fulfill their mission. To get the gospel out.

And to turn the world upside down for Jesus. To bring people to Christ. And they don't care the cost.

They don't care what happens. And you can't stop people like that. You can whip them.

You can beat them. You can throw them into prison. And what, the religious leaders will find them back at the temple early in the morning, continuing to share the gospel.

What? We beat them. We put them in prison. We forbid them to speak in his name anymore.

Whether that's right or wrong, you guys decide. But we're gonna obey God rather than men. So they don't count their lives dear.

Not so much of saving their lives, loving their lives. Their life is over. They're living for Christ.

And then we come to Sosipater. He was a Berea. Remember the Bereans were more noble than those in Thessalonica? Those in Thessalonica, they heard.

They were quick to believe like the Trumpsters. The Bereans were more noble because they searched the scriptures to see whether those things were so. They knew their Bible.

And they looked to the Old Testament to see what Paul was saying. Is this true? And then you got Lucius and Jason who were kinsmen, Jewish bros, brothers. Then you got Tertius.

Tertius is the writer of this epistle to the Church of Rome. So why? Because Paul is oratory or he's speaking. And as he's speaking, Tertius is writing down.

So this comes back to what we feel in 2 Corinthians chapter 12 where Paul is praying to the Lord to heal him that a great tent stake was drilling him in the head. A messenger of Satan was buffeting him. And he prayed three times that the Lord would remove that tent stake.

Now, isn't that interesting? As we're gonna go into the 1 Corinthians, we're gonna see the gifts, plural of healing. And what we're gonna discover is that you don't just turn that on anytime you want to heal somebody. It's always according to God's will.

Nevertheless, not as I will, but God's will be done. And so Paul's praying three times. He could pray for other people to be healed.

But in this case, he's praying for himself and he's not healed. And, but the Lord says my grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength's perfected and weakness. So Paul learned through an infirmity of the flesh, through a sickness, through a crippling, possibly ophthalmalia, which is a part of getting malaria.

And with the malaria, that intense headaches, and I don't want malaria, I don't want it. And I don't want to lose my eyesight with an ophthalmalia. I'm told like in Africa and some of these places for pennies on the dollar, you can put this salve in children's eyes who are going blind and heal them of blindness.

Well, they didn't have that there for Paul. So the oozing, they said his appearance was hard to look at. And so many feel the oozing of pus from his eyes and it greatly hindered his ability to see.

And so maybe what we would call legally blind. And so Tertius is the secretary that's at the word processor typing this out and getting all the illustrations down right and fact checking it and spell checking, getting it all ready. Now we know the Holy Spirit does that, right? And so he says, Paul's secretary, writing as Paul would dictate.

So Tertius sends greeting. And then you have Gaius, Paul's host home in Corinth, his home fellowship. In 1 Corinthians 1 verse 14, he says, one of two that he baptized.

So Paul said he baptized a couple of people. Hey, I'm of Paul, I'm of Paulos, I'm of Cephas and he's like thankful that he didn't baptize a whole group of people because the church became sectarian. And so kind of like when I go to pastors conferences or meet with pastors and they say, did you know Pastor Chuck? Oh yeah, yeah, I know Pastor Chuck.

Pastor Chuck baptized me. No, he didn't. I didn't get baptized by him.

I got baptized by Randy Ziegler who was a good Saturday night guy where I got saved. And so I got baptized in the swimming pool. But at Pirate's Cove, everybody wants to be baptized at Pirate's Cove because the recent Jesus Revolution movie, my wife and my two daughters are baptized there.

So that's a blessing. So hey, did you go over to Pastor Chuck's house? Did you know him that well? No, I never ate dinner with him there, but I ate dinner with him and Kay in Israel. So everybody's trying to name drop and figure out where you fit in the whole scheme of things.

And hey, but I did fly in the jet. I'm jet man. I flew with Pastor Chuck in the jet and none of them, none of them can reach that one.

So as soon as I say I'm jet man there, it's over. He's really in tight, man. He got to ride in the jet.

So everybody wants to get sectarian. They want to say, well, I'm from Calvary, Costa Mesa. I'm Calvary Chapel.

Well, I'm Baptist. Well, I'm AOG or I'm whatever. And it's the body of Christ.

Is Christ divided? You know, Christ isn't divided. So we're all a part of the body of Christ. And there was a problem there with Gaius.

Paul was thankful that he only baptized a couple guys because people were getting sectarian. I'm a Paul. I'm of Apollos.

I'm of Cephas. Is Christ divided? No, he's not divided. Quit getting in these little groups and fighting against each other and divide and conquer the tactic of the wicked one.

And then he says, Erastus. Erastus was a city official. And then Quartus.

Quartus, what that means is he's number four. Tertius, the secretary, his name means he's number three. They were slaves of Rome.

And the slaves of Rome had no names. They went by numbers just as the beast in Revelation 13, 16 through 18 is gonna give a number. His number is 666.

He's gonna give a digitalization, a digital number that's gonna be those in the tribulation, their identity, their global identity for their money, for their food, for their medical. Everything's gonna be digitized and people are gonna take a number of the beast. And his number, the Bible lays out, is 666.

And so men whom the Holy Spirit wanted to record by name. Now, Paul could have finished up this letter to the church of Rome and left out all the names of all these people. Just, hey, this is me, Paul.

It's all about me. You don't need to know that Tertius, number three wrote this thing. He's a nobody.

He's a slave. But Paul's saying, no, that isn't the spirit of the God that we serve. There's no unnamed people.

Everybody's significant. Nobody falls through the cracks. And anybody that's called number four or number three, I'm gonna find out what his real name is and I'm gonna name him by name.

I'm gonna call him by name. So I'm calling him Cordus. I'm calling him Tertius, even though they were slaves.

So men whom the Holy Spirit wanted to record by name. Jesus knows each of us by name. You're not a number to Jesus.

And at Calvary Bremerton, you're not a number here. We don't number. We don't have a roll call of, hey, there's number 43 over there.

We don't have a whole list of membership of, hey, we've got this many members, this many people now. We're signing them up. No, in order to be in the body of Christ, you gotta be born again.

And you can go to any church you want. It doesn't matter. Because you're part of the body of Christ.

This is just one little flock, you know, of many flocks. And he's the chief shepherd. He's the great shepherd.

And each and every person, I encourage you to continue to learn each other's names. Fellowship, learn about each other. Go out to lunch.

You guys are going out to lunch. You're going everywhere. You're hanging out.

You're at each other's houses playing games and stuff. You're gamers, man. You're gamers.

Bored gamers. Whatever. But get to know each other.

So we may be just a number to some, but to God, we are known intimately. In his work of salvation, God greeted each of us by name. Our lives at times may appear insignificant.

Our lives may appear purposeless. There's no purpose. I'm insignificant.

I'm a nobody. I'm just a number. But the God of the universe, the God of all creation, he knew you before you even formed in your mother's womb.

He named you. When John the Baptist was in his mother Elizabeth's womb, the angel said, call him John. That's the name God chose for him, John.

And when he was born, they tried to call him Zachariah. No, Zachariah was mute because he didn't believe. John.

And Elizabeth, John. And Jesus, the announcement of Jesus. Call him Jesus.

Call him Joshua in the Hebrew. God is salvation. Call him Emmanuel, God with us.

Names matter. God chose you. He knew you before he formed you, Jeremiah, in your mother's womb.

He sanctified you and ordained you a prophet unto the nations. God calls us by name. Do you know in Psalm 147, it says that God calls the stars all by name? How many stars are out there? Numbered more than all the grains of sand, right? Innumerable.

So you go to the beach, and I love doing that because God's good thoughts, his thoughts concerning you, God's good thoughts concerning you are numbered more than all the grains of sand. Don't you just love the beach? Put your hands in there and just lift up the sand and watch it go down. And as night comes, you look up at the stars where there isn't light pollution, and you see those stars out there, the constellations, just amazing.

And then you tell your kids, your grandkids, God's named each one. Each and every one of them, God's named them. And then you try your best to show them the Milky Way galaxy.

You try to show them the belt of Orion and the Betelgeuse, the second brightest star on the shoulder of Orion. It's a red star in the Arabic. What's it mean? It's something about on the shoulder, a giant shoulder.

And then you've got the constellations of the Dipper, Orion, and the Pleiades. On the book of Job, that's what the Lord asked them. Can you explain? Can you tell me about these constellations? They got billions of stars out there.

We know the name of Arcturus. And as I said, Betelgeuse is an Arabic name, but the shoulder of Orion. You can see Betelgeuse with the naked eye.

And so God names each and every star by name. And how much more significant, how much more valuable you are than these stars out there. Jesus is the star of Bethlehem.

God chose to cause his son to take on the form of a man, the son of man, the babe of Bethlehem, to become a human being. He being God thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but took on the form of a man, humbled himself and took on the form of a man, not of an angel, which is above a man, but a man, the last Adam, a babe, the babe of Bethlehem, to come forth from the womb of a woman. His favorite phrase to describe himself was the son of man.

He wanted to identify with you and me. And he has a name for each of us, a name given. Paul said, God separated me from my mother's womb.

It's no accident raised to the feet of Gamaliel. No accident, he's an intellectual from the college town of Tarsus. Saul of Tarsus was his name.

When Jesus met him, when Jesus arrested him on the road to Damascus, Jesus knew where Saul of Tarsus was all along and waiting for the point in Acts chapter nine to arrest him, a bright shining star, the Shekinah glory of God shining brighter than the sun and a voice coming out, Saul, Saul. Jesus knew where Saul was. Jesus knew Saul's name.

Jesus changed his name to Paul, right? Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Who art thou, Lord? I'm Jesus whom you're persecuting. God knew all along. God knew that day, that point in time that he'd reveal himself to you, that he'd introduce himself by name to you.

God knows your name. You're not just a insignificant number. He died for you.

In Isaiah 49, one, the Lord has called me from the womb, from the bowels of my mother has he made mention of my name, speaking of Jesus. As we said in Matthew 121, his birth announcement, his name shall be Jesus. In the Hebrew, Joshua, God is salvation.

In Revelation 2, 17, God says God has a new name and he knows for those who overcome, for those who believe in him. And so for the overcomers, those who believe in him, the Lord says, I have a new name for you. Now I could write a book because I know each of your new names.

No, only God knows that name. Why do these jokers do stuff like that, you know? They say, oh, I know the time of the rapture. You know, I'm gonna write a book.

Makes a lot of money. Everybody, oh, he's coming, you know. They're jokers.

I've heard guys say with all sincerity that the Lord has revealed unto them their new name and you know, maybe he has. Maybe he has. But I don't know my new name.

I know Kathy calls me dumbass, but you know. I hope it gets better than that. What kind of pet names your wife have for you? I don't know.

I kind of answer to anything, but. The Lord knows my name. I don't think he's gonna call me dumbass for all eternity, you know.

Jesus may be revealing himself to you right now. You came in here and you didn't feel so significant. You didn't feel, you know, so loved.

You don't, you haven't conquered. You're not the overcomer. You don't know what your purpose is in life or maybe you have achieved great things, but there's still an emptiness in your heart and life.

And the greatest thing missing in your life is intimacy. Intimacy with the true and living God. And he has a name for you and he wants you to know him.

And it may be that he's revealing himself to you even now. He's calling you by name. He's greeting you right where you are.

He knows how sin is destroying your life and yet he's calling you by name. He wants to save you. He wants to save you right now, right here in the sinful condition you find yourself in.

He's the great physician. He's the savior of the world. He can change your heart.

He can change everything about you. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things are passed away.

All things are become new. Maybe when you were younger, you were overweight and people called you fat boy. Fat girl, fatty.

Names that characterized how they saw you, belittled you. I spent a summer and when I was 13, one of the biggest mistakes of my life. Should have never done it, but I was deceived.

I left the beach for my summer and went to Oklahoma and I went on a thousand head dairy farm and had to take bath. They had a drought, so I had to take a bath and a half inch of water with this guy once a week. My friend from school and I'm just not into taking baths with guys, you know, it just still hurts, still hurts.

And they took me to church and I never heard about Jesus. But you got a soda pop and played a lot of baseball, some golf and a lot of cow patties out there. And it was presented to me that I get to ride horses.

And the kid from the city, man, riding horses sounded really cool, you know, get to go fishing. They had these ponds out there and stuff and we did go fishing and get some snapping turtles and things like that. But a summer is a long time.

I wrote so many letters to my mom. I wrote letter after letter after letter. And they would eat around two in the afternoon and you'd all come in there and they didn't call me Rick.

And also they made me cut my hair. I had to get a butch to go, so I went. And after about two, three months, you know, you're gonna be going to school in September and this vacation, whatever you call it's winding down.

And I need some hair on my head to get back to school. You know, there's lots of girls that miss me, you know. And they made me cut my hair.

So I went out and sat in the tall grass and the chiggers began to eat on me. And they'd call me for dinner and they'd say, hey, where's Fat Boy? Where's Fat Boy? That was my name, Fat Boy. Nobody ever called me Fat Boy.

But I had that thing you get around 13, 14 years, they call it your baby fat. And I'll tell you what, it actually worked for me because, because, you know, I just worked harder. I just worked harder to build muscle and run and be active and play sports.

I was always playing sports, but it really wasn't anything I did. It's just my body changed. Once your body changes, you go through puberty, all that stuff comes off you, you know.

And so in any event, that's not who I wanted to be. I didn't want the girls to say, hey, hey, there's Fat Boy. I wonder if he'll ask me out.

I don't want to be known as Fat Boy around school, you know. So God doesn't do that, does he? Doesn't take a negative approach in that way and remind us of our faults. Peter, when he would go into different villages, different cities, the tradition says that people would cock-a-doodle-doo.

So they're mocking him as the great fishermen's coming into town, hey, there's Peter, the one that denied the Lord three times, you know, on that one night. Before the cock crows, Peter, you're gonna deny me thrice. So the people would mock him.

They'd cock-a-doodle-doo, cock-a-doodle-doo. So Peter had to live with, when you go to the holidays, you have to live with family and friends that are reminded of who you maybe once were. If you're here this morning, God wants to transform and change you.

He's got a new name for you. He's got a new character, the character of Christ. He's not gonna reform your old.

He's gonna cause you to be born again. You're a new creation in Christ Jesus. You're gonna take on the mind of Christ.

You're gonna be able to love people that call you a fat boy. You're gonna be able to love people that posture themselves as enemies and are jealous and angry or for whatever reason. He's gonna give you a capacity to forgive people, to be kind to people.

Barnabas, his name, he was called the son of encouragement. His moniker, his character was such that he would encourage people. When nobody wanted Saul of Tarsus, when nobody would greet him and take him under their wing, it was Barnabas that went and sought out Saul of Tarsus.

That's the kind of guy he is. Dorcas, she's known for sewing blankets for people. Mary and Martha, Jesus would come hang out with Lazarus and meals done and all.

And Mary Magdalene, whom seven demons left her body and she being a worshiper of the Lord. And so God transforms, he changes us. He gives us a new name and he has a new name for us on into the future that only he apparently knows.

But maybe right here, right now, the Lord is calling you. The Holy Spirit's tugging on your heart and all you need to do is respond. Respond to his love.

He's not calling you a dumb ass. And that's not a negative name for me. Kathy does it tongue in cheek.

She does it as an endearing term. I laugh when she calls me that. I don't get angry.

It's kind of funny, right? And you know what, guys? You can never pick any kind of name even close like that for them. It doesn't work. You can't do that.

And don't ever use the F word with your wife. You know that one, that three letter one? Don't ever do that. They can call you fat boy, but you cannot call her fat girl.

You're done, you're over, it's over. So be careful. Names mean, names are important.

And I deserve the name she's given me. Believe me, I deserve it. Maybe that's why I don't get angry.

I've done some real stupid things, but in spite of my mistakes, my sin, my failures, the Lord still has terms of endearment, terms of love, a name that expresses his love for me in spite of my failures. And so too with you. Jesus said in John 10, verse three, the sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep by name.

Can you imagine a shepherd with a flock? How big a flock? He knows each one by name. And he calls them by name. Isn't that amazing? Isn't that just amazing? To spend that much time with a flock of sheep and to know each one.

I know how much we love our dogs and our cats and our pets, but a whole flock and they know their name and they follow him and he leads them out. And when he puts forth his own sheep, he goes before them and the sheep follow him for they know his voice, not just their name, but his voice. Voice recognition.

Sometimes you go back and you see people you haven't seen for 40 years and nobody looks the same, but somehow the voice, they respond to your voice. They remember that sound of your voice. Can you hear him calling you? In Genesis 17, five, Abram has his name changed.

His name is Abram as he left Ur of the Chaldees, which means exalted father. And he's trudging along with Sarah and God's given him a promise in chapter 12 and 15 of how through him all nations of the earth would be blessed that in your seed, your seed singular through the Messiah, the Messiah is gonna come forth from your loins. He's gonna be a Jew.

A nation's gonna come forth from you and all nations of the earth are gonna be blessed. And Sarah can't get pregnant, but he's an exalted father with no children, a wife who's past menopause. And so they go down into Egypt and when they come out of Egypt, they've got a handmaid named Hagar.

And Hagar, this Egyptian is a symbol of the flesh and hey, let's help God out. Go into my handmaiden. So now they have Ishmael, but God doesn't recognize Ishmael as the seed of promise.

Oh, that Ishmael might live before you. And then in Genesis 17, verse five, God changes Abraham's name to Abraham. Not exalted father, but father of many, father of many nations eventually.

And yet he's trudging along and he's got no kids. Hey, what's your name? Abraham, where's your kids? Oh, we don't have any. Well, your name doesn't fit.

It doesn't fit who you are. God looking up ahead. God's looking up ahead where through the impossibility of he being 99 and Sarah 89, God's gonna demonstrate his power.

God sees the potential in you. He sees who he's making you. He's not finished with you.

And the name he has for you expresses who he is making you. Abraham, father of many. And God came back this time the next year and Sarah had a child and they named him Isaac and the tent was filled with laughter.

And Isaac shall they see be called. Then even later after Sarah died, he has Keturah and even more children from Keturah. But Isaac is the significant one.

Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Jesus stemming from them. Can you hear him calling you? My sheep hear my voice and I know them, they follow me. And I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

I am the good shepherd, the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Jesus is calling you. Is your name in the Lamb's book of life? Has Jesus called you by name? There's rejoicing in heaven among the angels when just one sinner repents.

What's it mean to repent? They turn from their sin, they turn unto God. Who art thou, Lord? I'm Jesus whom you're persecuting. God, be merciful to me, a sinner.

The publican exclaimed, the Philippian jailer, what must I do to be saved? Believe, believe, trust in Jesus and you'll be saved. So we see the greeting. Paul reminds us that salvation is the work of God.

The greeting, secondly, the grace. Verse 24, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all, amen. Again, when God greets you, it's because of his grace.

It's because of his unmerited favor. The night that the Lord introduced himself to me, he greeted me, introduced himself because of his grace, not because I was living such a holy life, such a upright, good life. He didn't choose me because I was a good person.

He didn't choose me because he saw good in me. In me, that is in my flesh, dwells no good thing. If any man thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall.

Oh, wretched man that I am, Paul exclaimed. Who shall deliver me, not what, who shall deliver me from this body of death? It's God's grace. Paul was a blasphemer.

He was a chiefest of sinners. He was a persecutor of the church. He wasted the church.

Why would Jesus introduce himself to Saul of Tarsus? Grace, unmerited favor. Do you know what unmerited favor means? You don't merit it. You didn't deserve it.

You didn't earn it. You didn't work for it. Freely we've received, freely we give.

Ephesians 2, 8, 9, for by grace are ye saved, through faith. Oh, I had the faith, no? And that not of yourselves? It's a gift of God. The faith that you have to respond when he reveals himself to you comes from him.

You are dead in your sins and trespasses. Dead people don't respond. But in election and predestination, there comes a point in time where the Lord reveals himself to you by name.

I'm Jesus whom you're persecuting. And then he gives you a measure of faith. He gives you a measure of faith that delivers you from the power of Satan, that delivers you from the blindness that Satan has encompassed you with.

Your eyes become open. Your ears are hearing for the first time. When I got saved, Kathy didn't get saved for nine months.

And I used to try and call her and share with her. And we broke up, and I was the Jesus freak. And she and her friends were the ones that would call and make fun of me because I'd answer the phone, praise the Lord.

And they're doing their alcohol, and they're partying and all that, and they'd get a little drunk or whatever. And, hey, watch this, and they'd call. And I'd try so hard to get her saved.

I'd try so hard, and it didn't work. So the Lord helped me to focus just on him, that I'd fall in love with him, that he would be my first love, not Kathy. And once I surrendered unto Jesus and began to follow Jesus as my first love and knowing that I'd be okay without Kathy, hey, I even started dating another girl.

I tried to like her. I tried to love her. I tried to, all right, did the best I could.

I couldn't sort this stuff out, you know? But God knew I still loved Kathy. And then there came a day where she called, and she hung the phone up. And I knew in my spirit it was her.

That was Kathy. And I went to work, and I came home, and my friend Glenn said, hey, Kathy called. She wants you to call her.

All right, we were broken up. And I began to share the gospel with her. And her ears were open.

It was her time. God's grace was poured out upon her, and she came to believe in Jesus Christ. And I'm so thankful for the first nine months because a lot of us follow Christ just to get what we want.

But the Lord, the Lord caused me to truly be saved and truly surrender unto him because he wants to be loved supremely, not second fiddle. He's gotta be our first love. For by grace are you saved through faith in that not of yourselves.

It's a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. There's no boasting. He gets all the glory, all the glory in saving us.

The Romans road, I know you wrote it down on the first leaf of your Bible so that when you go to share with people as we went through the book of Romans, when we came to Romans 3.23, as we worked our way through chapter one, chapter two, chapter three, Paul's bringing every group. He's bringing the homosexuals, the lesbians. He's bringing the self-righteous Jews.

He's bringing everybody to verse 23, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace. There's none righteous, no, not one. That's where we start.

We start there. God be merciful to me, a sinner. Until you see that you're a sinner, until you see your need of a savior, you won't be saved.

You've got to come in your brokenness and your abject poverty. Then you go to Romans five, verse eight. I see my sinful condition, nothing I can do about it.

And then one of the but gods, one of the many but gods in the Bible, but God in my simple condition, and Paul in Ephesians will say, while in chapter two, while I was dead in my sins and trespasses, dead people don't make decisions, dead people don't respond. You're dead spiritually. And then Paul goes on to say, but God quickened me, he raised me from the dead.

But God commendeth or demonstrated his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly, right? Christ died for us. So he didn't wait for me to become good. He didn't wait for me to be worthy because grace is unmerited favor.

And so in that condition, Jesus has died for me. The wages of sin, Romans 6, 23, the wages of sin is death. What is death? Death is eternal separation from God.

What do I deserve as a sinner, as a human being, an unregenerate human being, as a sinner, a debt that I can't pay. The wages of sin is death. So I'm not gonna appeal to God based upon what I think I deserve.

Give me justice, give me what I deserve. You don't wanna come that way because the wages of sin, one sin is death. As James would say, there's 613.

You can do right and sin in one point and be guilty of all. The wages of sin is death, but the gift, salvation is a gift, but the gift of God's eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord. So Romans 3, 23, Romans 5, verse eight, because some of you weren't here and you're writing this down again because you wanna share the gospel, the glorious gospel with people that you come in touch with.

Romans 6, 23, then we come to Romans 10, 13. Whosoever, Jew, Gentile, male, female, black, white, brown, yellow, whosoever, barbarian, Scythian, bond or free, whosoever will, He's the Savior of the whole world, of every tribe, tongue, people, and nation, right? Everyone, whosoever will, let him call upon the name of the Lord. Do you know his name? He knows your name.

He knows where you're seated, where you are, where he's brought you from, what he's brought you through. Whosoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Paul reminds us that salvation is the work of God, the greeting, the grace, and notice the gospel, verse 25.

Now to him that is a power to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began. So the theme of the letter. You guys know this too by way of summary.

You know the theme of this letter. You know the theme of the book of Romans is Romans 1, 16 and 17. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes.

The priority to the Jew first and then to the Greek. For therein, where? Within the gospel. For therein the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith.

The just shall live by faith. Changed Martin Luther's life. Emphasis upon justification by grace through faith alone, right? That's the theme.

And then he presents, he develops that gospel, that gospel theme for eight chapters. Then he deals with the nation of Israel, 9, 10 and 11. When the fullness of the Gentiles be come in.

Blindness and part is happening unto Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in. His eschatology of Romans 11, 25. The rapture of the church.

Then he comes to the application. So what's this mean, the gospel? What's this mean about Israel? How might us respond? I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable unto him, which is your reasonable service, your reasonable response of worship is that you offer yourself as a living sacrifice. And be not conformed to this world.

Resist this world. Resist the woke-ism and whatever-ism is in play at the time you're living. Communism, socialism, capitalism, whatever-ism.

Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed. These transgender guys, they have no idea what tranny is. Transformation, transform.

God's the originator, Satan's the counterfeit. He's the one that transforms us by the renewing of our minds that we may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. These children are being preyed upon.

These three and four and five-year-olds are being preyed upon by their parents and policies of giving them hormones and operations that change their gender. They don't need their gender changed. And you and I aren't able to go and do the conversion therapy on them, preach Christ to them, because they might commit suicide when the truth is these kids as they grow older are committing suicide.

From the confusion that the devil brings, he's the author of confusion. He's a destroyer. He's destroying these little minds of these people, these children.

But God wants to transform us by the renewing of our minds that we may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. So Paul has spent the entire letter developing the theme, explaining the gospel. Now he reminds them of his intent.

His intent was in chapter one, verse 11. Why did he bring this forth to them? It's not the church that he planted, but he had something for them. And he says in verse 11, I long to see you that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift to the end you may be established.

He wants them to be established. It's the same Greek word that we see here in verse 25, establish you. It means to make firm, to stand strong.

We don't want to be those who build their life upon sand and trials come, storms come and everything, our whole profession of faith is wiped out. We don't want to be those whose lives are built upon the rock, upon Jesus Christ. He said, upon this rock, I'll build my church and the gates of hell not prevail against it.

They're gonna pressure you. They're gonna come against you. You will experience tribulation.

You're gonna experience affliction and trial, but I want you to be established. I want you to be rooted and grounded in Christ. So when the difficult times come, you're operating by faith, not by sight.

You're operating by faith, not feelings and emotions. I want you to learn to trust me and depend upon me in the fire, through the fire, through the storm. I don't want you to be a shallow Christian, a Christianette.

Who loves sermonettes. That's no sermonette. And notice it's not a program.

It's not a program. I don't have a program for you. He's gonna establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began.

So the gospel was once hidden, that salvation is by grace through faith alone in the person of Jesus Christ. There were types and shadows, the Old Testament saints, they came to faith the same way as you and I, in that they believed that Jesus would one day come. Illustrated in Genesis 22, God the Father and Abraham offering Isaac, his only begotten son, upon Mount Moriah, which is Calvary.

But that's in types and similitudes. So it's sort of a mystery to a lot of people. But the New Testament brings it into color, real clear here.

He that has seen me has seen the Father. So it's not a program. It's not a Daniel diet.

It's not counseling. It's not therapy. I mean, what happened? Why didn't the early church where six million Christians died in the first two centuries, why didn't they have therapy? You need therapy.

You need to go over that cave over there. There's a therapist with a degree and they're gonna lead you through this behavioral science called psychology. Don't you think God knows your brain better than you know your brain? Than any person could know your brain.

He wants to transform you, not fix you, not fix the old you, not reform the old you. He wants to transform you by the renewing of your mind. If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation.

You must be born again, Nick. You gotta be born again. You gotta be born of the Spirit.

It's a work of God's Spirit. It's not a program. It's not a diet.

It's not counseling. It's not therapy. It's not medications.

It's not 12 steps. It's not positive confession. I grew up watching a guy in Garden Grove, Robert Shuler, and his whole positive confession in the Crystal Cathedral with Norman Vincent Peale.

Don't say a negative word. If you say a negative word, it's gonna happen to you. Be positive.

Name it and claim it. Blab it and grab it. Contemplative prayer, meditation, yoga, dreams, visions.

No, it's God's work of salvation found in a person, in the person of Jesus Christ. Now, to him that is of power to establish you, Jesus will establish you. Jesus will strengthen your home.

Many homes, many marriages hanging by a thread, but Jesus will establish your home. Your home will be built upon him. Your value system, the way you treat each other will be a work of his spirit as he establishes you in the faith.

Jesus establishes us. He makes us to stand. The good news is Jesus, not Trump, not Biden, or any other pretender they're gonna bring forth.

It's Jesus. He's the one. Jesus builds.

He establishes his church. The mystery now revealed through the gospel, Jew and Gentile. Before, they didn't realize, the Jews didn't realize that God was gonna save the Gentiles.

Although in Isaiah, the Lord laid it out, but the Jews didn't see it. They would thank God each day that they weren't born a Jew or born a woman. Verse 26, but now is made manifest and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations.

Notice it says, for the obedience of faith. Obedience, according to J. Vernon McGee, obedience is the fruit of faith. James says, faith without works is dead.

Paul says in Romans 1 there, the obedience of faith. John says, if you say you know God, you say, you say, you say, you profess, you're a professor. If you say you know God, yeah, I'm a Christian, I'm a Christian, and keep not his commandments, so you're living a life in a disobedience to the revealed will of God in your life, but you think you're the exception, and you think grace, a sloppy agape, or a grace that's turned into lasciviousness means that you can sleep together outside of marriage, or you can smoke the reefer, you can get drunk, you can be covetous, you could be whatever, apart from Christ, that's not Christ-like.

You could be unloving and still go to heaven. John says, no, if you say you know God and keep not his commandments, you're a liar and the truth isn't in you. A pattern of life, a pattern of life of that of the unbeliever, the same pattern of life that you lived in, commiteth, commiteth, continues in a sinful lifestyle.

Not that we sin, if we say we have no sin, we lie and the truth isn't in us, but it's that practicing of sin, that lifestyle of sin, not resisting sin, not repenting of sin, and coming to Christ and asking him by the power of the Spirit, as we saw in Romans 6, sin shall not have dominion over you. Gaining victory over sin because you live in the life of the Spirit. If we walk in the Spirit, we don't fulfill the lusts of the flesh in Galatians 5. So salvation, the work of God, the greeting, the grace, the gospel, fourthly and finally, the glory, verse 27, to God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ forever, amen.

Why did God save me? Why did God save you? Says right here, for his glory. How does God get any glory in saving you and I? Where's the glory come? What benefit am I to him? What did he gain in saving me? He's glorified in that, as Satan rebelled and one third of the stars fell with Lucifer. Finitely perfect beings.

Adam and Eve started out good, didn't they? But taking on the form of a man, being the last Adam, being the son of man, his willingness to go to the cross and die, to be tortured, his beard pulled out, furrows, deep furrows in his back, crucified upon the tree, becoming a curse, being spit upon, buried, raised from the dead, 40 days upon the planet, meeting with eyewitness accounts and then ascending to the right hand of his father. Promise, he's coming again, he's glorified because the whole universe gets a picture of his love. He's able to love you, he's able to love me.

God revealed his love in being willing to die in your place. Don't ever, ever, ever think that God doesn't love you. The cross demonstrates his love for God so loved, L-O-V-E-D in the past tense.

How do I know God loves me? I'm reminded of the cross. In the present tense, present circumstances, it may not appear that he loves me. I may not feel like he loves me.

I may not feel like anybody loves me, but by faith, I can look to John 3, 16. I look all through the Bible, God's demonstrating, proving his love for me because he went to Calvary and he quickened me. He raised me from the dead.

He gave me the gift of salvation and he's given me a new name. He's written my name in the Lamb's Book of Life. Salvation is of God.

Salvation is the work of God. Only God can save. First Corinthians 3, 7, neither is he that plants anything, so you plant the gospel, neither he that waters, you come along with the gospel, but God that gives the increase.

He's the only one that can save. Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing. In Isaiah 42, verse eight, he says, I am the Lord, that is my name, and my glory will I not give to another.

I love this week. I was listening to Pastor Chuck teaching and he was taking the pressure off of all of us in that it doesn't matter how many people have gotten saved through your ministry. Doesn't matter how big the church is.

Doesn't matter, none of that matters because you can't save anybody. You share the gospel. You go in obedience to the Great Commission and you share the good news with people who are perishing in Kitsap County.

Another guy comes along, and gal, and waters. Only God can bring the increase for his glory. We've done our job.

We're not ready to kick the dust off our feet and move on. We're still here. We're still laboring.

We're still doing the best we can to be witnesses, right? But the onus is in their camp. They've heard we did our job. He's gonna say, well done, you good and faithful servants.

You endured, you persevered. You're faithful unto me. Enter into the joy of the Lord.

Well, Lord, only 50 people got saved. Well, Calvary Bremerton, I don't care about that. You can't save anybody.

I chose to save 50. And those 50 I saved. And their names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life.

And there's rejoicing in heaven among the angels when just one sinner repents. And that's a work of my spirit, for my kingdom, for my glory. Those 50 are precious.

Those 50, it came hard. It didn't come easy. They didn't just jump in the boat.

You guys labored, and I saved them. Only God can save. Give God the glory, do His name, believe in His Son.

Don't hold back. Give God the glory. You as a Christian that's responded, you've given God the glory.

You say, all I know is I was blind, and now I see. That's all I know. I was a sinner in bondage to sin.

And this Jesus, they're trying to slam Jesus in John 9. And the man born blind says, all I know is I was blind, and now I see. Give God the glory. Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, honor, and power, for Thou has created all things.

And why are they created? For His glory. For Thy pleasure they are and were created. Don't deny Him.

In Revelation 16, verse eight, the vile judgments, the bull judgments are coming out. And notice it says, and the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun. These people are so concerned about the sun.

Bill Gates wants to dim the sun. So concerned about climate change from Al Gore to global warming, or global warming Al Gore, climate change, polar bears. Oh, we're gonna play God.

We're gonna mess around with a perfect system. We think it's too many eaters. We think we need to depopulate the planet.

We think the Georgia Guidestones laid out that there should be half a billion people. We think, we think, we think. And the irony is the Lord says, all right, you wanna mess with the sun? You wanna spray people for years and years and years and dim the sun and mess around with the ecosystem and call yourselves environmentalists? Guess what? I'm gonna mess with the sun.

And he says to the fourth angel, poured out his vial upon the sun and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire. There you go. There's no cream that can stop this.

There's no sunscreen. You better go deep in your bunkers, but you're not gonna be able to hide from even there. The wrath of the Lamb's gonna get you in Revelation six.

You're gonna be shaking in your boots like Belteshazzar. And men scorched with great heat and blaspheme. There's their response.

But in the heart, the mouth speaks. People get what they want. Oh, they praise the Lord.

One of the best ways you know is just simply try telling somebody no. Try telling somebody no and see what happens. Oh man, you can't tell me no.

No, I don't think God's leaving me there. No, no, no. What do you mean no? God spoke to me.

He didn't speak to me. These guys are being told no. You're not gonna have your utopia.

You're not gonna have your world devoid of Jesus Christ. This is his planet. Klaus Schwab, all you guys, no, no, no.

Not gonna happen. Not my desire. They blaspheme the name of God which has power over these plagues.

And they repented not to give him glory. Just repent, just repent. Give God the glory.

Give God the glory. The unbeliever refuses to give God the glory that is due his name. Won't do it now, but in the future he will.

In the future, we're told that every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Says in Philippians 2.10, at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow of things in heaven, things in the earth, things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Surrender now.

You're gonna give God the glory. Whether in salvation or in judgment, he's gonna get the glory. Surrender now.

Obey the gospel. Believe. Give God the glory.

In Jude 24, now unto him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless. God's able to keep you from falling. You've fallen away.

He's able to hold on to you. And not only that, but to complete that work he's begun in you, being confident in this very thing that he that has begun a good work in you, that he will perform it. You're gonna give God the glory.

He's gonna present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy to the only wise God, our Savior. Be glory and majesty, dominion and power both now and forever. Amen.

So shall it be. It's all, it's all for his glory. Not for men, not the goat, the greatest of all time.

Men are always trying to posture themselves to receive their glory now. In the Olympic games, or when we get into the book of 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, they had what's called the Ithman games. And they were like the Olympics.

And these athletes would come and they'd stand on the podium having won the game. And they get a laurel wreath. Laurel wreath is like plant, like you weave it.

You weave it and maybe like in Hawaii where you have beautiful flowers and all that, you know. How long do those things last? That crown, Jesus wore a crown of thorns so that you would have a crown of glory. Not a fading crown, an incorruptible crown, incorruptible that fades not away.

A crown of righteousness, a crown of life, a crown of glory, a crown, not a clown, a crown of rejoicing, incorruptible that fades not away. God wants you to reflect his glory for all eternity. He knows your name and he's written it in the Lamb's Book of Life.

And the devil's coming along and bringing charges against you, indictments, accusations. And Jesus says, Father, he's one of mine, she's one of mine, whom I died for. For your kingdom and your glory, Father.

Let's pray, Father, we come before you and Lord, we thank you as we finish up the Book of Romans that Lord, we can never exhaust the truths of your word, Lord. But we thank you for that which you've revealed unto us. We pray that we could hide these truths within our heart and that we'd be able to share the glorious good news, the gospel with those we come in contact with, with those you send into our lives, these divine appointments.

And Lord, we pray, however simple, however in-depth you want us to go, we pray, Lord, that we'd be equipped, that we'd be established, that we'd be ready to give an answer to every man of the hope that lies within us, the hope that fills our hearts. Our hope is in Jesus. So Father, let our love for you never fade, cause it to always grow, cause our faith to continue to grow, cause our countenance to radiate, to reflect your glory, to be the light of the world, a city set on a hill, to not be grumpy and bummed out and depressed.

But Lord, the joy of the Lord's our strength, the joy of knowing how very much you value us. That you'd send your son to die for us, that his blood would be shed, that he'd wash and cleanse us of all of our sins, that he'd pay that price. As he said, it is finished to tell us I paid in full.

He'd pay that debt that we couldn't pay, that he'd give us the earnest of the Holy Spirit to seal us, to mark us, to let us know that his intention is to come and grab hold of that purchase possession that he purchased with his blood. That Lord, we would have our new glorified bodies, that we'd live with you in the splendor of your kingdom. Let that be our hope as we watch, as we look for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

We wanna take a moment now to make one last appeal in this service. Is there anyone here this morning that God is speaking to you? He knows your name. He's knocking on the door of your heart.

He's illumined your heart and mind. He's revealing himself to you. The scales of your eyes are coming off.

You know the truth. You know what he's asking of you. He paid the debt.

He paid it all. He did all the work. All he asks of you is to respond in faith that you'd surrender your heart and your life unto him as you cry out, God, be merciful to me, a sinner.

When he hears that cry of your heart, he comes into your heart and life and he transforms and he makes you new. He writes your name in the Lamb's Book of Life. And then he begins to show you how he chose you before the foundation of the earth.

And I'm sure that this was his plan all along to save you for his glory. Anyone here this morning? Give God the glory. Give him the glory.

Be saved. Anyone here, just lift your hand up. I wanna pray with you.

Give God the glory. Father, thank you so much. Thank you for saving us.

Thank you, Lord, that we aren't compelled to glorify any man, to worship any man, but to worship and serve and glorify only you. It's so simple. So many in the early church refused to say Caesar was Lord.

They were willing to die before they would ever do that, to deify a man. And then they're so ready to proclaim Jesus is Lord. So to we, Lord, in these last days, we cry out to those who are perishing.

We cry out to those filled with pride that Jesus is Lord. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

In Jesus' name we pray, amen.