There is Forgiveness with You

Thank you. Prepare our hearts to worship the snoring by climbing. as we come to worship our Lord this morning. It's good to be with you folks today as we worship the Lord. Our call to worship this morning is Psalm 100. And let's listen to this Psalm as it calls us to worship today.

Make a joyful noise. Shout to the Lord, all you lambs. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before his presence with singing. Know that the Lord, he is God. It's he who made us, and not we ourselves. We are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise. Be thankful to him and bless his name.

For the Lord is good, and his mercy is everlasting, and his truth endures to all generations. Let's stand as we sing our opening psalm of praise, Psalm 100B. Psalm 100B. O shout for joy unto the Lord, His people far and near. With gladness come and serve the Lord, and bring him songs of cheer.

Noel, the Lord is God indeed. He made us, we are his. We are his people and the sheep that bear his pasture is. O enter through his gates with thanks, His courts approach with praise, Give thanks to Him with joyfulness, And bless His name always. Because the Lord is good indeed, His mercy never ends. And unto every coming age, His faithfulness extends.

Prayer for Illumination

Let's pray. Lord, we come into your presence today to worship you, to lift up our voices in praise, to hear your word, to bring our requests and petitions before you, to be fed from your truth, We ask and pray that every portion of this service would please you. At the name of Jesus Christ would be praise because it's in that name that we come today. Amen.

Sermon

You may be seated. Let's turn our Old Testament reading or New Testament reading this morning in John, the Gospel of John, chapter eight. See the sermon is on forgiveness, there is forgiveness. And so this is A Woman Was Forgiven, the text. I'll start just a little bit above that. It's kind of a weird break in how things are. So the first verse, or the last verse of chapter seven, and then on through eight through 12, one through 12 in chapter eight. Hear God's word. and everyone went to his own house. But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Now early in the morning, he came again into the temple, and all the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to him a woman caught in adultery, and when they had set her in the midst, they said to him, Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery in the very act. Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. What do you say? This they said, testing him, that they might have something that which to accuse him.

But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with his finger as though he did not hear them. So when they continued asking him, he raised himself up and said to them, He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first. And again, he stooped down and wrote on the ground. Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest, even to the last. And Jesus was left alone and the woman standing in the midst. Then Jesus had raised himself up and saw no one but the woman. He said to her, woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you? She said, no one, Lord. Jesus said to her, neither do I condemn you. Go, sin no more. Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.

This concludes our reading of the New Testament reading. We will turn to a time of prayer. I'll pray. Father, we are grateful that we can come to you in prayer, that there is that way through Jesus to come to you. We love that. We desire to be here to worship you, but not always. And Lord, we ask forgiveness for that.

We pray, Lord, that we would be faithful to you all our days. know in your word and your covenant that you teach us your commandments and Lord we we know we don't keep them. We have a desire because you have worked in our hearts to give us a desire and we pray that you would give us your Holy Spirit to enable us to faithfully keep your word your laws we pray that we would be faithful to you but also be loving to one another we know lord that you have asked us to put no other gods before you and we do that we may not have the uh Primitive ways that we think but we do put other gods before you and we do ask for your forgiveness We pray Lord that we are told not to make any graven images and We do that with maybe not physical, but we put ourselves first And we shouldn't do that at all But you are forgiving We thank you We pray, Lord, that we have taken your name in vain. We call ourselves Christians, but we do not act like Christians in the world, and we blaspheme your name by the people around us when they see us doing wrong, and we ask for forgiveness. Lord, we do not keep your Sabbaths as we should, and we don't consider them a delight as we should. We pray, Lord, that you would work in our hearts that we would have a delight to come to enjoy your day and to worship and to just meditate upon you and your word and commune with you in our hearts.

We thank you for that provision for us and we pray that you would enable us to fully enjoy that. We pray, Lord, that we have not treated our older family members, our parents, well. We have not listened to them. We have rebelled, but then also we have shunned authorities that are over us that you have put in place. We pray, Lord, that you would forgive us for those failures.

Lord, enable us that we may be able to better serve those above us. We pray, Lord, that you would forgive us when we have sinned by, as we looked at our texts this morning, there's adultery. We know, Lord, that we don't, a lot of us don't actively involve with that, but we do in our hearts. And you know that that is just the same as if we actually did the very act. And we ask for forgiveness. We pray, Lord, that you would forgive us for stealing. We have stolen time. We have stolen resources. And we don't think we're a thief, but Lord, your word convicts us.

And we ask for forgiveness for that. We pray, Lord, that we don't actively seem like we're murderers, but we, in our hearts, we show hatred for our fellow man that is created in God's, your image. We pray, ask for forgiveness for that and enable us to rejoice in people and to protect life. We pray, Lord, that you would forgive us for not protecting or giving a false witness. We have given false witnesses. And sometimes we do that by just by silence, by not standing up for what is right and truthful. And we ask for forgiveness for that as well.

We pray, Lord, that we do covet things, that we should not covet. You, Lord, are the provider and you give things to people as you desire. And we think in our hearts that we know better that we should deserve those things. But you know our frame and you know who we are and you give us good things. And we should be thankful for that, that we should not covet those things of others.

We thank you, Lord, there is forgiveness. Because, Lord, you have released us from that bondage, that bondage that the law has put upon us that we cannot live up to that. But Jesus did. Jesus is our Redeemer. He gives us His righteousness. He takes upon the sin that we've had and takes that punishment.

And you accepted that, Lord, and we still do not fully understand and comprehend how great that is for us, that we can come to be with you eternally, that we can enjoy you. We pray, Lord, that you would forgive us as we have gone through many sins that we have committed, and we know we do daily.

We think of the Topeka congregation in our presbytery. We think of Larry and Wayne and Jonathan, Brad, Bill, and Kyle as they work on the session and they lead this congregation in Topeka, a capital city, a city of great influence. We pray that your word would go forth, that they would be faithful in their duties as elders, that the congregation would grow under their leadership, that the congregation would be faithful in proclaiming your word in that community.

Just thank you for them. We also thank you, Lord, for your care of the Midwest Presbyterian students, and we do pray that you will be with them as they continue to juggle the many activities that they have as family and as work and as studies. And we pray that in this past Presidetary meeting and the examinations that happened, that those would be a help for them, that they would be a better, more faithful servant of yours and work their way, if you will, to be a proclaimer of your word week in and week out in a congregation. So we thank you for them and we just uphold them to you.

We thank you for the new work in Thailand. We did get to meet Leila this summer in Vacation Bible School, and this was her desire to serve on the field there, and it has happened. And we do pray you'll be with her as her final preparations to go, that that would work out well, that you would bless that congregation, they'd be faithful to you, that you bless this church there. We also think of South Asia and the work going on there.

We do pray that you would be with those who minister to them and are providing helps. We do pray that this retreat that's coming up on the fruits of the spirit that would be very helpful to this young church. that they would be edified, that they would grow in you.

We thank you for those that are teaching them and give them wisdom and best way to cross-culturally teach these truths from your word. We thank you, Lord, for your care of this congregation here. We do uphold the Titus Two group, this group of young women and older women.

We pray that they would be a help to each other and an encouragement to each other, that they would enjoy each other, that they would be given a heart of love for the other young people and older people in their that are not part of their group, that they may be a blessing to them as well. So we just pray for them that they would learn well and live well in you. We also thank you for the trail life, young men, and their learning of skills in the woods and in the life. We pray that they would be a group that is a great service to this community. that they would grow in you, but also they would grow in the community of being faithful servants and stewards of the things that are entrusted to them, that they may be of service.

We thank you for these two groups of ministry here at Sharon. We thank you for Dr. Weir's being here, and we pray you'll be with him as he continues to open your word to us. We pray that we would listen. We would heed and we would live your word in the communities we live in. Thank you, Lord, for this day, for this time of worship. And we thank you in Jesus' name, our Redeemer and Savior and Lord.

Amen. You You Psalm 130 this morning. Psalm 130. A psalm that focuses on forgiveness. Let's hear a word of God. Psalm 130. Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. O Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy. If you, O Lord, should mark iniquity, O Lord, we should stand. But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared.

I wait for the Lord. My soul waits. And in his hope, in his word, I hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchman for the morning, more than watchman for the morning. O Israel, hope in the Lord. For him is a plentiful redemption, and he will redeem Israel.

Father, we come as people under the authority of your word, your word, not ours. We just read this psalm that speaks of forgiveness. We ask and pray that each of us will hear what you have to say to us today. Those of us who need comfort will be comforted. Those of us who need to be challenged will be challenged. And that, above all, it would be your word that we hear today. And that I would be the instrument that would be your word that would be Christ's word.

The late evangelical Anglican he had on forgiveness quoted from the head of a large British mental institution. And this man said that he could have dismissed about half of his patients if they could be assured of forgiveness. Now, that man was a secular psychiatrist. He wasn't necessarily a Christian believer. But he said half of his patients struggled I think that's astounding to think about that.

How it's pervasive out in the world, in spite of all of the talk about secularism going out there, that half of these patients in a mental health institution, the head of that institution said he could dismiss those patients and say, stop it. All of us need a choice. And it goes even to great theologians. Many of you have probably heard the name John Owen, a great purist and theologian. He once went through a period of depression and despair about his own salvation. Yes, a great theologian like John Owen went through a time of depression and despair. And it was working through this psalm that brought him out of that. Working through this psalm, it brought him back get out of his despair. Forgiveness is essentially having the charge that's against us being dismissed. It's knowing that the one that we have rightly offended is no longer holding this against us.

Psalm 130 is one of the seven psalms that we call penitentiary psalms. And it's also a pilgrim song. You'll notice it says a song of consent. The pilgrims sang these songs as they were going, marching up the hill to Jerusalem during the time of the consul. That's a pilgrim song, not a song of consent.

We're going to focus on this song this morning. And it's teaching to us about assurance of forgiveness. And there are four truths we're going to talk and look at this morning about the assurance of forgiveness that can help us just as much as it can help the original author, human author of the poem, and a great theologian such as John Owen. And the reason why I'm here today is to speak with you about the role in Martin Luther's thought throughout his Reformation. The pagan world has gone crazy over Halloween. Those of us in the Christian tradition, in the Reformation tradition, know that October 31st is the day when Martin Luther got that hammer out and nailed those 95 feces on the church door in Wittenberg. and look at this psalm in the fourth proof. The first proof we're gonna look at is that forgiveness is one of, if not the most basic need that we have.

The psalmist says, out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord, O Lord, hear my voice. Now, what was his depth of despair? We don't know. The author of this psalm doesn't say. He just says he was overwhelmed with despair. Maybe it was like John Owen, who found so much help in this country, that he went through a time of knowing that he had the assurance of a superior. We just don't know.

But we do know he was in a time of despair, because he says, out of the depths, I'm in rock bottom. I've hit the bottom of the pit, he says, in my despair. He compares it to being in the depths of the sea. I'm heading to the bottom. I'm in the depths of the swamp.

In that, he cries to the Lord. He says, oh, Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive. He recognizes that if he can have assurance that God forgives him, go a long way to dispelling this despair that he has. There's an incredible realism in this reply that he has. He says, let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy. If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, who could stand? Mark iniquities. Lord, you're keeping tally. I know that you're an all-seeing, all-knowing, omniscience, sovereign God. He said, you've got the power.

What hope do I have? Other translations have different variations, but I'm going to flush this out. One says, if you kept an account, if you're keeping an account, Lord, what hope do I have? One translation translates as, you're keeping an account of guilty deeds. You're keeping an account of guilty deeds, Lord, what hope do I have?

He's telling us here, no, our sins are not, God is not just passing them by automatically. He's not just saying, oh, don't worry about it, just let that little one, I'm not worried about that. He's saying, Lord, you've got the whole picture in front of you. You know every little sin. I'm not sure how, in general, did the question of things like Washington, Arcee's, and all the other research that we've done, I don't know. of our sins and what the depth of our sins are. And that Jesus says that if you just have less death for women than your parents, you've committed adultery. He pointed out that we've stolen the time from the Lord. The commandments go deep. And they point out to us our lives are not yet complete.

What is the first in the great commandment? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And what's the second? Love your neighbor as yourself. Every time we somehow start to think, oh, I'm doing reasonably well with the commandment of God, pull out those two great commandments. Compare yourself of loving the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Compare yourself with loving your neighbor as yourself, instead of looking out for your number one.

Instead of saying, how can I get an advantage out of this situation? Rather, how can you show your love to your neighbor? That's what the psalmist is saying. Lord, I understand. You've got the big picture. You've got the record keeping. But boy, he's saying, that frightens me. Who could stand? Who could stand? That's a huge question. It's a huge question. If I compare myself to that record you have up there, who could stand?

And each one of us needs to come to grips with this sobering truth that Romans 3.23, that scripture text that we learn in Sunday school classes and evangelism classes. The question for each of us today is this, has that really sunk in?

Or somehow, have you assumed that if you do the best you can, God's grace, God's merciful character will somehow make up for the rest? You know, it's amazing how many people who claim to be Christians really operate with that idea. It's sad, but it's not the Christian faith. It's not the Christian gospel. The idea that, well, I do my pretty hard, and I guess the little ones God will take care of. God's grace will take care of the little ones. Isn't that what we're tempted to think?

I'm okay on the big ones. I haven't pulled the trigger. I haven't shot anybody dead. I haven't done any of these big surface-level readings, by the way, of what it is. Surface-level reading of the commandments. I haven't done those. Going through and saying, let's look at these commandments again.

Let's understand. Besides minimizing our shortcomings, such an attitude overlooks the awesome holiness of God and assumes that He really isn't bothered by our sins. But the Bible makes clear that when we come face-to-face with a holy God, how do we respond? It should be like Isaiah the prophet. He comes in face-to-face with the Holy God. How does he respond?

Woe is me. I am undone. I'm a man of unclean lips. I've got a dirty mouth. And I live amongst a bunch of people that have got dirty mouths. Woe is me. I'm destroyed. It's like Isaiah is saying, I'm psychologically ripped to shreds. I'm psychologically ripped to shreds, but I come face-to-face with a holy God.

He says, guilt is the gift that keeps on giving and giving. Guilt is the gift that keeps giving and giving. He says, a lot of people don't have a lot of guilt today. He says, they just got psychology. He says, they got a nutritional problem or something. They go into some sort of therapy, and maybe it'll fix their nutritional problem, and all of their guilt will go away. Guilt. There's real guilt. The psalmist says here, you can keep a record of wrong, Lord. How do we relate? Respond like the psalmist. You kept a record of against me, Lord. What hope do I have? You can stand.

Your fundamental problem is not your job, that you have issues there. It's not that maybe you have some struggles in your marriage. It's not that maybe your bank account is a little on the low side, and you don't know how you're going to pay your bills. It's not that you have bad self-esteem. It's not that you need some therapy or anything. It's not that there's a community who might not be treating you as you hope. It's none of those. It's your family.

How can he say that? How can he say, with you, there is forgiveness? He doesn't understand the character of God. There is hope in the Lord, but with the Lord there is steadfast love. Within him is plenty of redemption. Now, I know that when you think James, I think most of you have, because within him there is mercy.

This particular word can be translated mercy, but most modern English translations translate it to something like the ESV, steadfast love. I had a professor at seminary that said God's covenant loyal love for us. Faithful love, some translations translate, unfailing love. And there was an old Scottish hymn that went, love that will not let me go. That is really what we need to translate this word. With you is the essence, actually the Hebrew word, You, there is a love that will not let us go. Now, there's a merciful aspect to that. And this is the faithful character of that love.

Because he pleads on the basis of that mercy. Listen to the voice of my pleas for mercy. In other words, the psalmist is saying, I'm crying out to you, Lord, on the basis of that steadfast covenant, He's saying, I know a God like the kind of God you are.

If you're keeping records, I know no God. The record is there, but I know your steadfast, loyal love. There's absolutely no claiming here of a white man to stand before you, no attempt at self-justification, no attempts to go before God and say, Lord, I guess you know I've done pretty well.

Can't you just give me a break, Lord? I said, Lord, if you're keeping records, I don't have a thing to stand upon. I can only plead on my please for mercy or on my supplication. I like that word. Supplication means, Lord, I'm just helpless here. Help me, Lord. Help me. I cry for help. He's saying, Lord, what else am I going to do but cry out to you on the basis of your steadfast, loyal love?

This steadfast, loyal love is so great. You can cry out to him for mercy when he says, you, there is plentiful redemption, or abundant redemption. Redemption in abundance is translated a variety of ways. All getting at the point that The mercy of God is so great that He not only forgives each and every one of our sins that come to Him, but He has promised to deal with the sin itself, root it out, and thus every one of His people. He is preparing a new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. So the question comes back to each of us. Do we need forgiveness? Do we seek it on the basis of the mercy of God alone? The only basis on which we are going to find it.

The wonderful news of the gospel is that Christ lived, I rose again and ascended into heaven and one day will come back so that you can have that abundant redemption that the psalmist was talking about. This is what Luther discovered, rediscovered in the Reformation. Medieval Roman Catholic Church had lost an experience. You know the story. Martin Luther, a Palestinian monk, understood the record of sin against him.

He would spend hours in the confessional. The records we have that he would spend literally hours in the confessional trying to work within the system. It said you had to have confessed He got every sin out in the open, brought it before the Lord, and got the assurance. Well, he believed the system.

So he's in there trying to confess his sins. And his confessor, Salfitz, finally one time looked at him and he was bringing up sins like, you know, I envied Brother Ulrich's texture. He had a piece of, he had I think one more scoop of porridge in his bowl than I did. I was jealous of Brother Ulrich. Real sins to confess. Real sins to confess. I didn't love Brother O'Rourke as I should. I coveted his extra one spoonful of porridge. I didn't love God. Stolfitz told him, don't you love God? He said, I don't love God, I hate God. He said, you hate God? He said, that's my big sin. Why? He says, how can I love a God who's keeping record of my sins?

That we live by faith in the mercy of God in Jesus Christ. When Jesus said it is finished, it meant that every one of our sins was dealt with. And we can have assurance of pardon. And we can have assurance of pardon, not on the installment plan, but assurance of pardon for all of our sins right now.

We challenge any of you. If you think God gives out salvation on the installment plan, so that he makes me a little bit better, so then maybe he'll accept me tomorrow because I'm a little bit better than I was today, you've missed the whole point of the Christian gospel. God doesn't give us salvation on the installment plan. You either have it or you don't.

The psalmist understood that. He said, there's forgiveness with you. There's plentiful redemption. Luther came to grips with that and said his sins were forgiven because he was justified, declared righteous in the sight of God because of what Jesus Christ had done. And we seek his mercy in full recognition that there's absolutely nothing in any of us that's glorious. Nothing can separate us, none of us at all.

Some of you may be familiar with the termination voice, but the voice of one of the founders of the conference on reform theology, a good friend of Archie Pohl's and others. But the voice died at age 62, after he passed away. He passed away at the age of 31. He served two years in the House of Representatives.

He wrote a hymn that says, based on Romans 8, that nothing in the course of the hallelujah and the end of it is just of the course. Who can separate us from the love of God? Nothing. He was just in his last days, he was ready. We were working on it, and we said, when God has given us the love of Jesus, nothing, nothing, nothing can separate us. It's grasping that unfailing love, that transcendent love.

Third Point

The third truth is that it becomes the foundation of genuine godliness. In verse four it says, there's forgiveness with you that you may be pure. Forgiveness leads to genuine pure. I thought, first John said, fear has to do with punishment. Perfect love casts out fear.

Now, are you talking to me about that forgiveness leads to the fear of God? Well, there's two ways of looking at fear in this case. I know you guys are looking here. If you haven't done Dr. Michael Reed's one on fear of God, Dr. Reed, have you ever taken this in there? This is a beautiful series on the fear of God. Dr. Reeves puts it this way.

Typical fear is a happy and healthy fear that controls our other fears reigning in our anxiety. This forgiveness here drives us to the true fear of God. Luther put it this way, the fear of the Lord drives us to hate sin. The fear of the Lord drives us to worship our God. Tholmas is saying that fear in the sense fear, that awe and genuine reverence for worship of God can only come after we have been forgiven. When we know that God's genuine anger against us has been felt, That is why 1 John says perfect love casts out fear, casts out that fear of punishment. God is on our side. God is for us. God is with us. We have been reconciled to him. We've been declared righteous in his sight.

So that shows us that those who presume on the mercies of God are strangers to forgiveness. Are there people that presume on the notion that you better believe in God? There's a famous French priest who supposedly said this one time. He said, you know, he said, I understand God loves to forgive.

Well, I like to sin. So what a great arrangement. He actually said that. I love to sin. God loves to forgive. What a great arrangement. That man is an absolute stranger to God's physical forgiveness. Biblical forgiveness drives you to a fear of God, that sense of awe and reverence. And God will forgive someone who has a record that's, you know, in some cases, a record that's 70,000 years old. And I think that's just awe and reverence. Isaiah 6, again, is our example. Isaiah 6. Rise out, woe is me, I am undone. I'm going to die with a dirty mouth. Let us not do it. Brings a cold on the tongue. Places it on his lip. Brings a cold on the tongue. Places it on his lip. Places it on his lip.

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Places it on And then what does Isaiah say, Lord, what am I supposed to do? And he's given a task to go speak. And he gets to touch that. He confessed, I got the dirty mouth. God says, oh, shh, cleanse the dirty mouth. No, I'm sending you out to talk. You just confessed you had the dirty mouth. I cleansed that mouth. Now I got a task to go preach. I said, you understand who I am. You understood your dirty mouth. I've changed that. I've changed that.

And I was so struck by the grace of God. When we understand forgiveness, that's when we are responsible. Dear my Lord, you understand me. When we recognize the enormity of the forgiveness and the cost of what it was to purchase us, we should fall down in adoration and humble submission to the never-ending grace of God. When a thought doesn't come to you, it's not a thought. It's not a thought. It's not a thought. It's not a thought. It's not a thought.

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It's in Romans 8, that the grace of God is there, in Romans 5, it talks about the grace of God is there to work through our situation. Our fear of God is still incomplete in this realm. And we need, of course, repentance and forgiveness for our lack of fear of God, our ongoing relationship with God. However, Understanding the good news of the gospel. How do you want to have the right spirit of God at the beginning of wisdom, as the book of Proverbs tells us, over and over again?

Come to grips with the need for forgiveness. Find forgiveness through the gospel of Jesus Christ. Know that Jesus Christ lived, died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, and is interceding for you at the right hand of the Father. Sling them at mercy. Lord, I ask you to forgive me.

There's this beautiful phrase in here, my soul waits for the Lord. My soul waits, in this word I hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchman for the morning, more than watchman for the morning. He talks about hope. Typical hope. use the word hope in a little different way than the Bible does. When somebody says, are you going to be there tomorrow, and you say, I hope so, what does that mean? I'm like, sure. I got some other plans that might interfere. A car might not work. Cars have gone on the fritz a little bit lately.

I hope so. Biblical hope is not that. It's a different meaning of the word hope in the Scripture. Biblical hope is this. I know it's going to happen. I just don't see it. It's there. God has promised it for me. This slide reminds us that our suffering is ultimately used by God to produce He's telling us here that this loyal, covenant love of the Lord and our assurance of forgiveness is because God, as 1 John 1 says, is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins no matter what we struggle with. And that's what, as the psalmist says, there is full and plentiful redemption. And we think he talks about that as well as Romans 5. And he uses the image here of a watchman. What's a watchman's job? He takes care of things. He looks out for things. And a night watchman, when is his job over? When the sun comes up. The night watchman's job is over when the sun comes up.

And he gets to be on time with his training. He's got the extra hour of sleep. He's got to stay up late and watch the World Series. He can't go on and on forever. And when the night watchman's job is done, then the sun comes up. And the time is almost done, and he's waiting for the sun to come up. And he's waiting for the Lord. Just like that watchman is waiting for the sun to come up so he knows his job is done. So he says, Thomas says here, I'm waiting for the Lord, waiting for the Lord, just like the watchman waits for the morning. More, he says, than the watchman. He says, my waiting is even more than We are waiting. Waiting for that day.

We will forever be with the Lord. There'll be a new heaven and a new earth, and God will wipe away every tear. We don't wait for the sun to rise in the sky every morning. We don't grieve as those with no hope, but we are people of hope. The last man waits for the morning with hope. He knows that sun's gonna come up in the eastern sky.

With the assurance of our faith, of God, that assurance that Luther struggled and struggled and struggled with and found it in the gospel. Jesus Christ lived, died, and rose again, and because of that, I have hope, and I have plentiful hope to know that God is a God of plentiful and abundant mercy. I think that's a great hope. The cross of Christ is where the attributes of holiness and mercy meet.

And the Lord Jesus Christ took our sins, took our sins, and bore the burden. In this psalm, our Lord Jesus Christ says he's buried them in the sea as far as the east is from the west. You can try to get your head around that sometimes, but you can't because the global earth can never get as far away as the east is from the west. That's how far he buried our sins. In this psalm, it says, I know I have sinned against you, O God.

When you understand that, You understand that Jesus Christ says, you are forgiven. You've got to hope that one day, when the trumpet blows, you're going to be among those who are the dead in Christ who rise. I'm not sure one of those here says until that last generation. Some generation. Maybe it'll be ours. Maybe it'll be one 500 years from now. We don't know. That last generation, there will be some who won't die. But they will rise and meet those coming back in the year who have died.

All of God's people know God's forgiveness. The same God who forgives is the same God who says, I give you final victory as a promise. We need this long haul of hope. We've experienced God's forgiveness. It assures us that he really is for us. For us. He's given us Christ, and as Romans 8, in that great crescendo at the end, says, who can separate us from the love of God and Christ Jesus, and like Jim Boyce, nothing.

We had to rediscover that. We had to discover that it wasn't the long hours in the confessional that got him agonizing over those sins that got him. Yes, we needed that. There was something right about the agony. We understood it probably more than most of us did, what our sins were in sight of the Holy Spirit. And man came to understand that Word, pardoned, forgiven, justified. We are now in right standing with God.

Every sin has been forgiven. You don't spend your hours in the confessional trying to grudge up things like, I have one more, I felt I am jealous of Brother Lewis, and there's one more thing for it. That, too, is forgiven. I told you that. We are experiencing God's goodness. We need to see the biblical assurance that God forgives us, that He is faithful and just to do this means that our hope. You are a believer in Jesus Christ today. I can assure you on the basis of the word of God, you have the promise of a good, glorious future. God bless you.

All things new. Whatever, all things in your life need to be made new, He will make them new. And the forgiveness of sins is that down payment assurance that He is going to make all things new for you. Whenever you find yourself struggling in this bent and broken world, and I tell you, the more you go on in your life at my age, the more you begin to struggle. Every time we struggle with things in this bent and broken world, the gospel of Jesus Christ should remind us, you are forgiven.

You are declared righteous in the sight of God. Because of that, all things will run with you. You've come in genuine repentance and faith, calling upon his mercy. Believing in this God of covenant love, this loyal love that will not let you go, will not only certainly will forgive you, but will remind you of all things. All things will work together for good.

Romans 8.28 is in the midst of a passage in Romans 8 there where Paul is saying, who can separate us from the love of God? It's Jesus Christ. He came and he asked his fellow colleagues to sing this psalm in four parts to spite the devil. First thing to make sure we sing this in four parts, get all the harmony in there, so we can bum our nose at the devil.

And saying, God is a God of mercy and forgiveness. He regularly seeks to rob us of our assurance of forgiveness, but it's really trusting in repentant faith. Based on the abundantly merciful character of God, the foundation of true godliness Goodness is used as a means of God-making fear, and it's one of the greatest stimuli to genuine hope in our lives. Come to Christ for the first time or the end of time, 100 times, whatever, and you will see that Jesus is coming to Christ. I mean it, you will see it.

Just like a great theologian said, Luther and John Owens find hope in listening to Jesus. find that mercy in the heart of the King. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for the ministry. Thank you that great theologians such as Martin Luther and John Owen moved by the Psalms to find their forgiveness in you.

And they moved each one of us to recognize that if you kept the record of sins, Lord, you could stand. None of us. Let's stand then and sing a metrical version of that psalm, Psalm 137. you you. ♪ Come out with me ♪ ♪ How I will praise the name of my God ♪ ♪ Who sent him free ♪ ♪ Come out with me ♪ Countenance upon you, give you peace. O God, show mercy to us and bless us with your grace. ♪ That serveth your salvation ♪ ♪ All nations see his praise ♪ ♪ O God, thy people praise you ♪ ♪ Let all thy people praise you ♪ ♪ Let angels of rejoicing ♪ O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? ♪ The earth of his founding ♪ ♪ Throughout his father's days ♪ ♪ It's not our job to bless us ♪ ♪ Just by the blood he's shed ♪ ♪ Let all the earth give thanks to him ♪