[0:00] Sorry, Kath, I thought that's rather a long verse, but I thought we'd better start. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to you. Welcome to friends visiting us.
[0:11] And if you're here for the first time as well, we particularly want to welcome you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. I wonder if you're feeling blessed this morning. Well, you are blessed, even if you don't feel like you're blessed.
[0:25] Because if you are Christ's and you know him as your savior, then God's word tells us you are blessed. Here's Ephesians chapter one. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
[0:47] We are to bless God. That means we are to praise him, to adore him, to delight in him, to give him thanks, to stand in awe of his wonderful goodness to us because we have been blessed ourselves by him.
[1:01] Yes, we have a wonderful blessing to come in heaven, but we are already blessed and we are blessed with every spiritual blessing. Every good thing that we need in our Christian life, God has given us and provided for us.
[1:15] So even if you don't feel blessed this morning and you're under the weather in one sense, then let's lift our hearts to bless God. And may he bless us afresh with that sense and that realization of all that we have in the Lord Jesus Christ.
[1:32] We're going to sing a song that's going to come on the screen behind me. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Amen. Bless the Lord, O my soul.
[2:08] Oh, my soul. Jehovah's, my soul. Oh, my soul. Worship our holy name. Heil,ங bei sinners.
[2:35] Let's continue to bless our God as we pray together.
[2:53] Let us all pray. O Lord, our God, our Father in heaven, you are worthy of our praise. And Lord, we delight to bless your name.
[3:04] We love to sing your praises. We long to worship and give you the glory, the honor for all that you are and all that you've done and all that you've promised and all that you will do.
[3:16] We thank you that you are like no other God, the only God, the true God, the one God. We thank you that you are the God of whom we've been singing, a God who is full of grace, good of mercy, full of loving kindness.
[3:29] A God who does not treat us as our sins deserve. For surely if you did that, we would all be utterly lost. We would all be utterly destroyed if you treated us as our sins deserve.
[3:41] And we confess it's not just our past sins. Before we came to know you and trust you, we have to hold our hands up, Lord, and say that we continue to fail, continue to sin, continue to get it wrong.
[3:54] Because, O Lord, we are people who are marred with that sinful nature. But we thank you for your Holy Spirit who's come to dwell within us and make us new creatures.
[4:05] So that, Lord, we thank you that you are sanctifying us and changing us. And, yes, Lord, we do fail in sin. And we thank you that those sins are covered and forgiven through the precious blood of your Son.
[4:17] But, Lord, we long to be more like him in the way we think and speak and act. We long to be holy people, O Lord, that we might truly live for your glory, that we might truly bless your name in all that we do.
[4:30] Whether it's here on a Sunday and in the week at work or at school or in the home or in the shops, wherever we are, we long to be people who show forth the wonder of our blessed God and the blessings that we have in Jesus' Son.
[4:44] O come upon us, we pray. Lord, you know our hearts, you know our joys and our sorrows, you know our struggles and you know our delights. And we come to you again this morning saying, Lord, we need you, we need you, we need you.
[4:59] We thank you that you do not withhold any good blessing from us. And if we will only come and ask, you're more than glad and delighted to give to us, Lord, those good things.
[5:10] And so we pray that we might be receptive to receive from you good things this morning, your blessing and your nearness. Help us, Lord, work in our hearts.
[5:21] Deal with us, we pray. For we ask all these things in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior and King. Amen. 2, verse 42. They devoted themselves.
[5:33] That's who'd come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ through the preaching on the day of Pentecost. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, to fellowship, and to the breaking of bread, and to prayer.
[5:45] All the believers were together and had everything in common. And that's a very important phrase, all the believers. Because as we're aware, and this is why we have membership in this church and many other churches around the world as well, it's because it's wonderful to welcome on a Sunday morning those who are not Christians to worship with us and to hear the gospel, and we trust by God's grace to come to faith in him.
[6:10] But it's essential that those who seek to lead the church, in other words, those who are called together, are believers. So the members' meeting is not simply me or the elders telling the church what they're going to do, or telling them about what we've done.
[6:28] It's about the church members together seeking God's will for his church. And therefore it's vital that everyone who is there is a believer. Now, saying that, it doesn't mean that membership is only for those who are really, really good Christians, because nobody would be in membership then.
[6:47] Certainly not in this church, I know that for sure. But, it's not like that in your church, of course. I'm sure they'd never say that. But it is for those who love the Lord Jesus Christ and want to live for him.
[7:00] So even if you say, well, I can't be a member because I can't get to every meeting, doesn't matter. That's not the vital thing. It's the commitment of the heart to God's people to serve him together in this community.
[7:11] And if you are a believer, and if this is your home church, if I put it that way, and you are seeking to serve him here, and you love God's people here, then you should be in membership.
[7:23] I believe it's scriptural from what we've just seen. They all, believers, had everything in common. There was a commitment together. Now, I appreciate that. You may have reasons, personal reasons, and I know I've spoken with many of you before.
[7:34] But I just want to, we've had lots of new folk, which is great. I really want you to think seriously about it. Fresh, if you haven't done for some time, about being in membership. You don't get any special discounts, okay?
[7:47] You don't have to put less in the offering because you're a member, or any of those sort of things. But I'll do your funeral for free. How's that for an offer if you're in membership, okay? So I'll do your funeral for free.
[8:00] But you'll have to join the list because there's a rather long list at the moment. Okay, all joking aside, please pray and think about that in membership. Just while you're turning there, can I just say again, well, Richard, reiterate, this election briefing, we're going to pray in a moment about the coming general election for our nation.
[8:23] But as Christians, we need to be mindful of what we're voting for. And as Christians, we are not, our priority is not Brexit.
[8:36] Our priority is not the financial future of our nation. Our priority is the moral and spiritual state of our nation. And this will give you a really good insight into what a lot of the parties stand for.
[8:49] And if you are voting and have a look on, you know, the website, you can find out about what your MP or those who are standing for election in your area are, what their stand is on, euthanasia, abortion, LGBT, and other things.
[9:07] These are the things that matter. And these are the things, dear friends, I would encourage you to think and pray seriously about when you vote. And one of the, one of the, I came across a thing, one of the parties, I won't name which it is, they have, in part of their manifesto, decided to decriminalize abortion.
[9:27] In other words, you can have abortion on demand at any time. And they are working towards abortion being up to birth. Okay? And already as a nation, already as a nation, we are out of line with the rest of Europe.
[9:43] I know we mock and we ridicule Europe, but in Europe, abortion, most countries, is up to 12 weeks. In this country at the moment, it's up to 24 weeks. And babies survive from 22 weeks, many of them.
[9:55] So this isn't the platform for that, but it is something as Christians we should really seriously be concerned about. And so I'd encourage that and urge you to take one of those and to think and pray seriously about who you vote for.
[10:09] We're back in the word of God, and that's where we are always going to find truth. And so Genesis 18, we're going to read from verse 1 through to verse 15, and then we're just going to jump one page into chapter 21, that'll become clear.
[10:26] So page 17 of your Bibles, if you've got a red Bible, Genesis 18. The Lord appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre, while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day.
[10:40] Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby. When he saw them, he hurried from the entrance of his tent to meet them and bowed low to the ground. He said, Very well, they answered.
[11:09] Do as you say. So Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah. Quick, he said, get three sayers of the finest flour. Knead it and bake some bread.
[11:21] Then he ran to the herd and selected a choice tender calf and gave it to a servant who hurried to prepare it. He then brought some curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared and set these before them.
[11:33] While they ate, he stood near them under a tree. Where is your wife Sarah, they asked. There in the tent, he said. Then one of them said, I will surely return to you about this time next year and Sarah, your wife, will have a son.
[11:50] Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. Abraham and Sarah were already very old and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought.
[12:03] After I'm worn out and my Lord is old, will I now have this pleasure? Then the Lord said to Abraham, why did Sarah laugh and say, will I really have a child now that I'm old?
[12:15] Is anything too hard for the Lord? I'll return to you at the appointed time next year and Sarah will have a son. Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, I did not laugh.
[12:28] But he said, yes, you did laugh. Then just turn over two pages to chapter 21, on page 21, just the first seven verses of chapter 21.
[12:41] Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age at the very time God had promised him.
[12:55] Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son Sarah bore him. When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him as God commanded him. Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.
[13:10] Sarah said, God has brought me laughter and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me. And she added, who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children?
[13:22] Yet I have borne him a son in his old age. If you have your Bibles and have them open at Genesis 21, that will probably be one of the best places to turn to at this moment.
[13:44] It probably hasn't escaped your notice, but today is December the 1st, the very first Sunday of Advent.
[13:59] Advent means the coming, the arrival. And we are looking and lifting up our minds to think about the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Savior of the world.
[14:12] As he came in that form of a babe, a child. And of course we know, and this is why as Christians we hold strongly to the preciousness of the life of every child.
[14:32] Because we know that every child from the moment of conception is an image bearer of God.
[14:43] We made in his image, created in his image. Every child in the womb is an amazing work of God's power to give life and is very precious in his sight.
[14:58] And indeed, if we are parents ourselves or grandparents, then we ourselves have experienced the wonder and the glory and the awesomeness of a babe born, a child created.
[15:19] And the Bible makes that clear over and over again, the preciousness and the importance and the specialness of human life and whatever stage of life that is, from conception to death.
[15:35] But as we draw near to the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, or rather remembering and celebrating the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, we recognize as well that there were other extra special babies born throughout the Old Testament.
[15:52] Special children that were born at particular times, according to God's miraculous working. Not children that were born naturally, we might say, because the Bible makes it very clear that God intervened to bring children into being.
[16:10] We think of people like Isaac, maybe Isaac, Jacob, Esau, Samson, Samuel, John the Baptist. But each one of these children in the Old Testament that is born in this supernatural way, this special way, is in one sense a signpost pointing to the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[16:28] That one true miracle child born to Mary while she was still a virgin, born without any husband's involvement. The very Son of God uniting with human nature.
[16:46] And so over the next few weeks leading up to Christmas in the mornings, we're going to be thinking about some of these miraculous births and babes in the Old Testament. And see what they tell us about how they point to, how they link to the birth of Christ, the unique Son of God.
[17:05] And so that's why we're here in Genesis 21. And the very first, as we might call it, miracle child, Isaac, born to Abraham and Sarah. And the birth of him is recorded here in 21.
[17:19] And there's a remarkable statement which I want to pick up on for the rest of our time this morning. It's verse 2.
[17:30] Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age. This is the phrase. At the very time God had promised him. At the very time God had promised him.
[17:43] Now, we know Abraham was 100 years old and Sarah was at least 90 years old when Isaac was born.
[17:53] We know that because a year earlier, when God gave the promise to Abraham, before he gave it to Sarah, we're told that Abraham questioned God and said, Will a son be born to a man 100 years old?
[18:08] Will Sarah bear a child at the age of 90? So we know their age. We also know as well that Abraham had been able to father a son when he was 87.
[18:21] It was his son, Ishmael. But Sarah had never had any children. She had not had children while she was younger.
[18:33] And all through her life, she had been infertile. So, infertility is a cause of great grief to many couples and even today as well.
[18:48] It is a great blessing to have children. And those of us who are parents should, dear friends, even when they are making us pull our hair out, thank God for our children that he has blessed us and privileged us with this responsibility.
[19:03] But for those who have not children, it's a hardship. But it was even, I think, more of a hardship for somebody like Sarah in the society in which she was living at the time. It was almost counted as a shameful thing for a woman not to be able to bear children.
[19:20] In fact, it was more than that. People would have assumed that to not be able to have children was God's curse upon her. That God was somehow unhappy with her or unhappy with some sin in her life.
[19:34] It was a huge weight to bear. However, we read here at the age of 90, she is holding and nursing her own son. When other women would have been holding their grandchildren or their great-grandchildren.
[19:50] But this wonderful reality comes out at the very time God had promised. Sarah and Abraham knew that the birth of Isaac was no freak of nature.
[20:05] There's no particular strange thing that had happened just naturally. They knew that God had given them this child. It was solely by the power of God, the desire of God.
[20:17] This child had been given to them and to the world. And God had been promised a son 25 years earlier, in fact, back in Genesis 12, when he was just a youngster of 75.
[20:31] Okay? Just a youngster of 75. He'd been given the promise by God that he would have children and a great nation would come from him. That he would have a family. But it's not that promise, I think, that is in mind here.
[20:44] When it says at the very time God had promised. It's not that promise back in chapter 12 that's in mind here. Neither is it the promise later on in chapter 15. When God again said to Abraham, you shall have a countless number of children.
[20:59] And God took him outside the tent and showed him the skies and the stars. And he said, as many as the stars will be, so shall your children be. And Abraham believed the Lord, believed the promise then.
[21:12] And it was accredited to him as righteousness. But it wasn't that promise. I think that's in mind here as well. See, Abraham was in a bit of a hurry to get a son.
[21:24] He thought time was running out. He thought that it was never going to happen. And so after, as I say, around about 15 or so years after his first promise from God, he decides to take matters into his own hands.
[21:38] And he sleeps with the maid of his wife. And she produces a son, Ishmael.
[21:49] But that wasn't the son that God had promised. That wasn't the one that God would give. The promise was given not just to Abraham, but also to his wife, Sarah.
[22:00] And it's that promise, particularly that we read in Genesis 18, that I think is in mind here when we get to chapter 21. Because part of the promise included a time scale.
[22:11] The Lord, as he appears with two angels, that's who we know they are, by the tent of Abraham, gives this promise.
[22:22] And he says, I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah, your wife, will have a son. And so that makes sense when we read at the very time God had promised him he had this son a year later on.
[22:36] And of course we know how Sarah responded to that first promise given by the Lord to her particularly. She laughed. Now Abraham had actually laughed before that as well, when he'd been told.
[22:50] And yet, of course, the promise was precise. A year from now you will have a son. And at that very time God promised. God is a God who works in time.
[23:09] But he is not a God who lives in time. In other words, God is not bound by time like you and I are. We cannot go back. We cannot go forward.
[23:21] No matter whether we've got a DeLorean car or a time machine or anything else, we are bound in this moment of time. And we can go nowhere outside of that.
[23:32] But God is outside of time. Outside of the power of time. The influence of time. Because he's the creator of time. He's not limited by time as we are.
[23:44] He never has too much time on his hands. He never runs out of time. Time is not his enemy. And he never wishes he had more time.
[23:56] Yet as the creator of time, God works in time. That is, he is very careful in the way that he times all things within history and within time.
[24:07] Everything he does follows a very precise timing, a plan for us who live in time. Now, of course, we do know some people, and we won't mention anybody's name.
[24:23] But they aren't renowned for keeping time, are they? I won't ask you to put your hands up if you happen to be one of those people, because that would go for most of us. But there are some people who sort of got a reputation that no matter what the occasion, whether it's Sunday morning worship, whether it's a social gathering, a wedding, whatever it may be, you can be sure that they won't be the people who will arrive on time or early.
[24:48] But, of course, before we get too critical of folk who are late, remember that you and I, I'm sure, at least more than once in our lives has been late for something or forgotten something or not even turned up at all.
[25:02] But God is not late. And God is never early. He is always on time. And just as his timing was perfect in the giving to Abraham and Sarah this son, so he is perfect and was perfect when he sent his only begotten son into this world, at the most perfect time, the right time.
[25:29] That's what the apostle Paul tells us in Galatians 4. He says this, In other words, the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ was exactly at the right time that God had planned and that everything up till his birth was part of God's preparation for his coming.
[26:03] And so we have, at the exact, sorry, so we have, at the set time had fully come. So God was not out of kilter in that sense.
[26:14] It wasn't a last minute idea to send his son into the world. It wasn't the sort of the plan B of history from the very beginning of creation. God had planned that his son would come into the world, that he would take on our human nature, that he would come to redeem us, to rescue us, to save us from sin.
[26:35] And so even before the world was made, Jesus, God's son, was planned to be revealed. Peter writes this in 1 Peter chapter 1. He, that's Jesus, was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.
[26:52] sake. So when we are celebrating the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ and his coming into the world, what are we doing? We are celebrating the fulfillment of God's wonderful plan, of God's perfect plan to send his son to save.
[27:12] It's not simply some accident or something that just happened at a particular time. It was God's time. And so when we go back, we see again through scripture that everything that is happening in this world is part of the plan and purpose of God.
[27:30] According, says Paul in Ephesians 1, according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will. God had promised a savior, a savior who would come at the very moment when the world needed him.
[27:51] Right back when Adam and Eve sinned, there at the very beginning, there is the seed, as it were, of the promise of the savior. For in Genesis 3, as God speaks to Satan, who had taken that form of a snake, he will crush your head and you will strike his heel.
[28:12] Speaking about a descendant of Eve. He will crush your head, destroy you, but you will strike his heel. Pointing to the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross, but the defeat of Satan and sin and death.
[28:29] And so from that very start, that seed of a start in Genesis 3, we go all the way through the Old Testament again and again, finding in the pages of scripture the need for this savior, the need for this special one to come.
[28:44] And time and time again, you would say, well, surely now he must come. There were saviors who were raised up. People who were raised up to rescue God's people just for a little while.
[28:55] The judges and the kings, some of the prophets as well. But they were imperfect as saviors. They could only save for as long as they lived. We've been going through the book of Judges in our Wednesday Bible studies and seeing that they were very imperfect men, Gideon and Samson and so on.
[29:11] And they could only save for a little while and only save from very real physical enemies. They could only save in part. A real, lasting, eternal savior had to be born.
[29:27] But nobody came. Nobody came. Clues were given pointing to and promising this savior what he would be like, where he would be born particularly, and how he would come into this world.
[29:42] We'll be thinking about these verses, no doubt, as we come to Christmas. Isaiah chapter 7, Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son.
[29:56] We're told where he would be born and where he would come from. Micah chapter 5, For you, Bethlehem, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.
[30:10] We're told where he would grow up and be nurtured as a young person. In Galilee, Isaiah chapter 9, In the future, God will honor Galilee, for to us a child is born, and he will be called Mighty God.
[30:24] Though these promises kept coming, and these hints kept being given, yet the people of God were still waiting, waiting, waiting, for centuries, in fact, for this Messiah, this Savior, to be born at the right time.
[30:41] And no doubt, through those long, dark periods, some of them gave up hope. Some of them stopped believing, looking forward to, that the Savior would come.
[30:52] And yet God, sent his son into the world, at exactly the right time, just as he had promised. See, he didn't come, the moment Adam and Eve sinned, and the floodgates of evil, and sin came into the world.
[31:10] He didn't come, when humanity was so wicked, that God regretted making man, and sent the floods, to destroy all, apart from the family of Noah.
[31:21] He didn't come, when the Israelites disobeyed God, and sunk to such a wicked level, that God had to raise up, the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, to come, and take them, into captivity.
[31:35] He didn't come, in all the dark periods, though he was there. He didn't come, until the exact time, God had promised. He didn't come, until the time, had fully, been revealed.
[31:57] Why does God wait? Why does God wait? Why is it, that those promises of God, seen in, the perfection, of the giving of his son, why do those promises of God, seem so slow, in being fulfilled?
[32:13] Perhaps you're in that situation, this morning, and you're thinking, I know that God is with me, I know that he's promised, to bless me, I know that he has a purpose, in all that's going on, in my life, but I cannot, understand why, it's taking so long, for this to be, fulfilled.
[32:35] Why it's taking so long, for me to get through, this dark time, of waiting. It's the hardest thing, isn't it? Waiting. Waiting for something, that we've longed for.
[32:45] Waiting for something, that we're hoping in. Waiting. And yet, dear friends, surely, what we see here, is in the case, of both Abraham, and Sarah, and in the case, particularly, of the coming, of our Lord Jesus Christ, that God, never, is, too, late.
[33:05] Not for, his purposes, in salvation, not for his purposes, for his people. And for many of us, as Christians, we're praying, and trusting God, that he might save, perhaps, a member of our family.
[33:19] Perhaps we're praying, that a situation, and circumstance, which is so difficult, and seems to have no way out, would come to a conclusion, that we would find the way, we'd understand, that the light, at the end of the tunnel, would appear, and we're waiting.
[33:35] Dear friends, let me give you, great comfort, I hope, from this truth, that at exactly, the right time, God will, bring that answer.
[33:46] God will fulfill, that promise. God will accomplish, his will. And that the time, that you are waiting, as difficult, as it may be, is a time, that you must not, give up hope, in the faithfulness, of God.
[34:00] You must not, give up hope, in the goodness of God, in the promises of God. And though it is hard, and though it is difficult, God will come through, for you.
[34:13] Because he always has done, and he always will do. Dear friends, at the right time, God sent his son. But I want to say, something else as well.
[34:25] Just as that child, Sarah, born to Sarah, and Abraham, was born, at the exact time, God had purposed. And even the coming, of the Lord Jesus Christ, as we see there, particularly, we came, at that right time, as God has purposed.
[34:42] I want you to grasp, this dear friends, that you are alive today, and you were born, because God planned, that you would be born, at this time, and live in this particular, period of history.
[34:54] You are not, in any sense, out of time, or a mistake. Here's what Paul, was preaching, on the day, that he went, to Athens.
[35:05] He said this, from one man, God made all the nations, that they should inhabit, the whole earth. And listen to this, he marked out, their appointed times, in history, God did this, so that they would, seek him, and perhaps reach out, for him, and find him.
[35:26] You, dear friend, and I, have been born, and were born, at exactly the time, that God had purposed, and planned, for you. You're not an accident.
[35:37] You're just, you're not, an unwanted child, even if you were told, that when you were younger. Even if you felt, that way. You are here, because God purposed, and planned, that you should live.
[35:48] And that you should live, in this day, in society. But more than that, dear friends, he planned, and purposed, that you should, not only live now, but that you should, also be saved. That you should, also be brought, into the fullness, of the salvation, which is in Christ.
[36:04] You may think, that it's only by chance, that you're here today, by some decision, that you've made, or somebody else. You may think, that it's luck, that you just happen, to be listening, to the gospel, of Jesus Christ, God's son.
[36:17] You may think, that it's just, an insignificant matter, but today, is not an insignificant matter. This moment in time, is not insignificant. God has brought you, to this time, and to this day, that you might hear, of his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and that you might, and that you might, now, be saved.
[36:36] It's because of God's, great love, because of his, great goodness, because of his, great faithfulness. It's his desire, that today, you should be saved.
[36:50] Everything, occurs, because of the timing, and purpose, of God. Hear these words, from Paul, in Romans. At just the right time, when we were still, powerless, Christ died, for the ungodly.
[37:09] Very rarely, will anyone die, for a righteous person, though for a good person, someone might possibly, dare to die, but God demonstrates, his own love for us, in this way, while we were still sinners, Christ died, for us.
[37:26] Just as Christ's birth, was in God's, perfect time and plan, Christ's death, and suffering, were part of his, perfect plan as well, to demonstrate, that his love for you, who are powerless, and helpless, just as you are, powerless and helpless, to bring yourself, into this world, you are powerless, and helpless, to save yourself.
[37:48] You're powerless, and helpless, to make yourself, right with God. You're powerless, and helpless, to remove the sin, that corrupts, and poisons, your life, and places you, under God's, wrath and anger.
[38:04] But you're here today. What are you going to do, about it? You're here today, but you're not promised tomorrow. You're here for a time, and God has in his loving kindness, allowed you, to hear the gospel.
[38:19] He's allowed you, to come under the sound, of the good news, that there is forgiveness, of sins, and life everlasting, in Jesus. He's brought you, to this time, in your life. And you are not guaranteed, that you will have tomorrow, or another day.
[38:34] Because this is the day, of his salvation, and grace. This is a time, that you can receive, that new birth, he promises. This is a time, that you can become, a child, of God.
[38:48] Remember, what we read there, about the coming, of Jesus. When the set time, had fully come, God sent his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those, under the law, that we might receive, adoption to sonship.
[39:06] The greatest event, in the time, of your life, is to know, that you've become, a child, of God. God. The greatest event, is to receive, that newness of life, which makes you, a child, of God.
[39:22] This time, God's done it, so, he is, so his loving kindness, may be demonstrated, and known. Jesus came into the world, at that time.
[39:35] It was God's perfect time. It was the right time. And it's God's, perfect time, if I can put it that way. It's the right time, for you, to trust Christ, and to believe on him.
[39:51] Let me urge you, let me encourage you, let me seriously, lay before you, this matter, that you cannot, control time. You cannot be sure, that you will have, another day.
[40:03] It must be, that this day, of salvation, this time, of God's grace, you act upon, with faith, and repentance. Let's pray together, shall we?
[40:15] O Lord, our God, you are so amazing, beyond our comprehension, and understanding.
[40:30] You are the God, who dwells, and lives, outside of time, not the God, who is bound, up in time, the God, who works, all things, according to your time, and purpose, and plan.
[40:44] And Lord, we find that hard at times, because Lord, we long for you to do something, in our particular situation, we long for you to fulfill your promises to us, and to answer our prayers.
[40:56] And Lord, at times we feel as if, wrongly, we feel as if, Lord, you've forgotten us, or you've forgotten the time, or you're late.
[41:07] Lord, we pray that you would grant to us, that faith, that trust, that we might not be like Abraham, as it were, trying to get things sorted, in our own strength, without trusting you, trying to do things wrongly, sinfully, in some way, to sort out, our need.
[41:27] Help us, Lord, to trust you, that in your time, you will do all things, as you have promised to. We thank you that in your goodness, and in your time, Lord, you sent your son.
[41:40] You sent him for us, who live in this time, in this period. You sent him for us, that through him, we might be blessed, and saved, and become children of God.
[41:51] And we pray again, oh Lord, for any of us here this morning, who have never, who have never acted upon it, but have always thought, I've got more time. I've got more time. I can put it off to another time.
[42:03] Lord, arrest us, we pray, as it were. Take hold of us, we pray, by your spirit. Show us, Lord, that this is the time now, that we must repent, and we must turn, because, oh Lord, now is the day of your salvation.
[42:18] Today, Lord, is the day of your grace. We are not guaranteed, another day, another time. Thank you that you are so good to us, to give us this time, give us this opportunity, we pray that we might act upon it.
[42:34] And again, we do pray, oh Lord, for ourselves, as believers. We long, Lord, that you would give to us, a sense of urgency, as we share the gospel. Give us a sense of, that wonderful, need, as it were, that terrible need, in one sense, for men and women, to be saved, that those we meet with, may not have, any more time.
[42:54] Help us, oh Lord, this Christmas time, particularly, to proclaim, the coming of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. We ask it in his name, and for his glory. Amen.
[43:05] Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.