This Gospel Which I Preached to You

Good morning. It is a joy to get to be here, and I do want to start by saying thank you. Those of you who are in the Sunday school class, I said thank you, but I want to say it again. in the presence of everybody, you are very much a part of the work that we do in Bloomington. And we do see it that way. We see those of you who pray for us and support the work that we do as being partners in ministry with us and being an essential part of bringing the gospel to our mission field, which is Indiana University down in Bloomington. So thank you very much for your support. We're very grateful. And it's a joy to get to come and serve you today as well.

Just to point out a bit of the way that you are a part of our ministry and that hopefully goes both ways, there are a number of people in this room who were students and benefited from the ministry. Allison Carrillo and my wife Danny and I were all freshmen at the same time. We all went to IU in 2007 to be freshmen down in Bloomington. And we've gotten to even go on mission trips together and do lots of work together. There's other students out there. And so it's neat and encouraging to get to see the work get to go both ways. It's not just you helping us and supporting us, but hopefully the work we're doing is an encouragement to you as well. So this morning, it's my joy in particular to get to preach the gospel to you. I know that you guys are going into a season of moving into a new place. And with that, my understanding is you're putting a focus and an emphasis on reaching out with the gospel to the place that God has put you in, the city, the neighborhoods where God has put you. And I want to encourage you in that work. I'm excited for

you all and the opportunities that God is giving you and will give you through this move and through your desire to grow in him and being faithful and taking his truth to the world around you and being lights in your communities. And so I'm going to remind you of the gospel this morning as you go into that work. Before I get to our passage, I'm going to tell... a little story that some of you may know. It's the story behind the hymn, It Is Well With My Soul. So this is one of our favorite hymns that we sing at bedtime with our children. We usually call it When Peace Like a River. But it's a hymn that was written by a man named Horatio Spafford, who was a 19th century lawyer in Chicago, and he was an elder in the Presbyterian Church.

He was a supporter and close friend of Evangelist D.L. Moody, who was based in the Chicago area, if you know who Moody was. In 1861, Horatio Spafford married his Norwegian-born wife, Anna, and they had a large family. They had two daughters, and then a son, and then two more daughters. Okay, so they started with five children. In 1873, two years after losing their son, to scarlet fever at the tender age of four, the Spaffords planned a vacation to England to get away, to go across the Atlantic. Now, Horatio, the father was detained with business, particularly real estate business in Chicago, but he sent his wife, Anna, and his four daughters over to England ahead of him. They were in a French steamship called the Ville du Havre.

And on that trip crossing the Atlantic, that ship, the Ville du Havre, was struck by another vessel and sank in 12 minutes, killing most of the ship's crew and passengers, including all four of the Spafford's daughters. 11-year-old Annie, 9-year-old Maggie, 5-year-old Bessie, and 2-year-old Tanetta were all killed. Anna, their mother, was rescued unconscious, floating on a wood plank. She was transported safely to Wales and telegraphed her husband from there to break the news that they were now childless. Horatio immediately left to bring her home, sailing across the Atlantic to be with her. And it was on this voyage across the Atlantic in the midst of intense grief and pain that Spafford wrote, It Is Well With My Soul. I'm actually going to read all of the words to it.

Just knowing that context, hearing the words of the hymn means a lot more. And it's been a helpful hymn to us in the midst of some of our grief to sing this song. And this is what he wrote while crossing the Atlantic where his children had died. It says, When peace like a river attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll, Whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well with my soul. Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, let this blessed assurance control that Christ has regarded my helpless estate and has shed his own blood for my soul. My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought. My sin, not in part, but the whole, is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight.

The clouds be rolled back as a scroll. The trump shall resound, the Lord shall descend. Even so, it is well with my soul. So for Horatio Spafford, the gospel of Jesus Christ was a lifeline, even in the midst of life's stormiest grief and sadness of losing all of his children in one fell swoop. Now, I'm preaching to you a passage from near the end of the book of 1 Corinthians, from 1 Corinthians 15. And like I said, this is a point in Paul's letter to the Corinthians that he is reminding them of the gospel. So if you have a Bible, you can turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 15, and we're going to read the first eight verses of this. And it's on the screen behind me too, if you'd like to follow along there. This is what the Apostle Paul says.

He says, and that he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that, he appeared to more than 500 brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared to me also. So first, before Paul actually gets into summarizing the gospel itself, He talks about the importance of the gospel, the significance of it by way of introduction. If I had to put what Paul says here in slightly different words, here's what the Apostle Paul is saying in writing at this point in the letter. He's saying, now I'm about to remind you what the gospel is. It's the same gospel that I preached to you before when I was with you in person. It's the gospel which you received, that you believed, in which you stand in right now.

The gospel that saves you. You did receive the gospel, right? You are continuing to stand in the gospel, aren't you? Paul is admonishing them to remember the gospel. But notice how central and preeminent the gospel, the good news, the message of Jesus Christ is to the life of a Christian. Paul is writing to Christians, right? He's writing a letter to a church, to those who have believed the gospel, but they need to be reminded of the gospel. He had previously preached the gospel to them and yet it's necessary now for him to make it known to them again. And why is that necessary? Why does he feel the need to do this, to remind them of the gospel? Well, if you've read the book of 1 Corinthians, you know that there were some pretty gnarly things going on in the church in Corinth.

There were divisions in the church based on who their favorite preachers and teachers were, was one of the things that was going on. They'd say, well, I am of Paul. Paul is the best preacher. Or some would say, well, I am of Apollos. Apollos is a better preacher than Paul is. Or some would say, I am of John Piper. That's my guy. Or I am of Tim Keller. He's the best preacher and teacher. Or I am of Dave Abusara, not David Pryor. Or I am of David Pryor. He's better. I like his teaching better. The Corinthian Christians were divided along those lines. They were also engaging in civil lawsuits against each other without ever even seeking help from Christian brothers and sisters in resolving their disputes. They didn't even go to each other for help. And can you help us figure out this?

disagreement they were having. They went straight to court, took suits against each other in order to get their pound of flesh. And this divided spirit within the church even made it into their worship services. In their celebration of the Lord's Supper, for example, the rich would get drunk and fill their bellies while the poor would go hungry. And they were even divided. They were even divided in the meal that was supposed to be a picture of their unity and their communion together. One of the only things that the church had unity about was that they refused to discipline a man who was living in open sexual sin in their midst. In other words, the Corinthians were not living in accordance with the gospel. Their lives weren't reflecting the glorious truth of what the gospel is. They were not bearing the fruit that should come from those who know and love Jesus Christ. They were not bearing the fruit of the Holy Spirit in their lives.

in some very particular ways. So what does the Apostle Paul do in order to correct the situation? Well, he does a few things in the letter of 1 Corinthians, if you've read it. He does rebuke them. He gives them instruction, practical instruction in godly living. But then when he gets to the end of the letter, he seals everything up by reminding them of the gospel. This is something that the apostles had to do frequently. The Apostle Peter, for instance, Writing in 2 Peter, in the first chapter, he's encouraging the brethren to walk in godliness. And this is what the Apostle Peter says. He says that whoever lacks moral excellence, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love, if there's anyone who lacks those things, who doesn't love his brother, who isn't living in self-control, that person has forgotten his purification from his former sins. That's what the Apostle Peter ties the problem to. Those who weren't living in brotherly love, lacking the qualities of godliness, their problem was that they had forgotten their purification from their former sins. They had forgotten the gospel. And this led to them turning against one another. As Christians, we never get to graduate from the gospel.

It's something that stays with us and carries us through life. And the Apostle Paul uses two pictures to communicate this reality to us in this passage. He communicates this to the Corinthian Christians by telling them, one, in the first verse, that they stand in the gospel. That's one thing. And then he also tells them that they are to hold fast the gospel. You see that in verse 2. If you hold fast the word which I preach to you. So I want to talk about that first one for a little bit, what it means to stand in the gospel. What does the Apostle Paul mean when he's telling the Corinthian Christians that they are standing in the gospel? One of the things he's communicating is that not only did the Corinthians, past tense, receive the gospel and believe it, but Paul is telling them that they also, present tense, stand currently in the gospel.

as in they were continuing to stand in the gospel. And this standing in the gospel is an ongoing reality for us as well. I want you to imagine the gospel of Jesus Christ as a boat or a ship that carries you safely out on the ocean. Imagine yourself on a voyage across the Atlantic Ocean needing to get from New York to England, which is where the Spaffords were going. And the gospel is a boat that carries you safely across the dangerous waves of the ocean from one side to another. As long as you are standing in the boat, you are safe. The wind and the waves and the storms may come, but God promises you in the gospel of Jesus Christ that you will make it safely from one shore to the other.

The Ville du Havre could not guarantee the safety of Horatio Spafford's family from New York to England. After all, no man-made ship is 100% seaworthy. I just reread about the Titanic last night as I was getting into shipwrecks and stuff. And no ship can guarantee your safe passage. No airplane can 100% guarantee your safe passage, right? But the gospel of Jesus Christ is totally seaworthy. and reliable. It comes with a guarantee from the Lord of heaven who is full of power and grace that you will be kept safe until the day you die, until you reach that far shore. If you put your faith, your trust in Christ Jesus, you are brought on board and for the entirety of your voyage, you stand securely in the gospel.

Right. You never stop standing in that secure vessel until you reach the other side. And in fact, that is the only way to survive. If you do not believe the gospel, you are lost at sea. If you are a Christian, if you've trusted in Christ, you may forget that you're on a ship. It may not always feel like you're safe, especially in the midst of a storm, right? You may even begin to behave as if you're lost at sea. You may get seasick. And so you'll need to be reminded that it is in the gospel that you stand. That you are safe. That God will protect you and carry you in the gospel through all trials and suffering.

There's a little bit of what the Apostle Paul is talking about when he says that it's in the gospel that you stand. And this is true not just for the Corinthians, but it's true for each one of you who has trusted in Christ that you continue to stand in the gospel, that it continues to be your hope and your grounding and your foundation. The other image that the Apostle gives of our relationship to the gospel is that of holding fast. He says, if you hold fast the word which I preach to you. Anna Spafford, Horatio's wife, was rescued unconscious and floating on a plank of wood. Without that plank of wood, she was dead in the water. Without the preaching of the word of God, you are dead in the water. It is your lifesaver, your life preserver that you hang on to. It's your salvation.

It is the gospel by which you are saved, is what Paul reminds the Corinthians. Unless you hold fast and put your trust in the message of the gospel, you will not be saved. You must trust in that life preserver as you hold fast to it. And so the apostle gives us those two images of standing in the gospel, being kept safe in the gospel, and also holding fast to it and not letting go. and trusting God for our salvation. After going through that, reiterating for the Corinthians why the gospel is important, it's when the Apostle Paul gets into talking about what it actually is. He says, for I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received. And the Apostle Paul is talking about here the nature of the gospel, that it's a message that gets passed along.

And it's a message that is from God and it is passed on from person to person, from generation to generation. The Apostle Paul didn't invent the gospel. This wasn't something that he had made up. It was delivered to him by God and he delivered it to others. He delivered it to the Corinthians when he personally traveled there and he made it known to them again when he wrote this letter to them. And he didn't change it up. He didn't change his tune, didn't change the nature of the message. He didn't change the details. He delivered to them the same historical and spiritual truths each time he made known the gospel. And we have that same gospel that the apostle Paul preached, the same gospel that the apostles John and Peter and James preached. Now, normally with news, the message can get distorted when it gets passed from person to person, right?

You hear things about something that happened from this person who wasn't really there, but they heard from this person who knows the person who was there. If you're hearing a story like that, usually it's going to be a less reliable story, right? Because it's past. The game of telephone gets played and it gets past. Maybe even among your children you hear about what happened and you're like, I have no idea what you're talking about. That's the nature of man-made news and deliverance of messages. The further you are in time and distance from where it happened, the less you can trust the validity of the news that you're getting. But that is not the case with the gospel. And the reason is that Jesus Christ himself, the Lord of the gospel, has a vested interest in the good news of the gospel getting faithfully passed along without corruption.

It's a message that God himself carries from generation to generation in his people. And we have Christ's assurance that our distance in time and location from where the events of the gospel took place are not a detriment to our accepting it. We're not at a disadvantage because we're 2,000 years away from Christ. And one place we see this in scripture is John chapter 17. In this chapter, if you've read it, Jesus is praying to God in the presence of his disciples. And he's asking the father, his father in heaven to sanctify his disciples, to set them apart, to unify them in the spirit and to glorify them and to be with them powerfully as they go out into the world with the message of the gospel. But Jesus goes beyond just praying for those 12 disciples who are there with him.

He actually prays for us. He prays for you in John chapter 17. Let me read this. This is what Jesus says in the midst of his prayer. He's asking God and he says, I do not ask on behalf of these alone. In other words, I'm not just asking for the sake of these disciples, not just for Peter and James and John and Andrew, but I also pray for those who believe in me through their word that they may all be one. Even as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they may also be in us so that the world may believe that you sent me. Jesus prays for you in John chapter 17. He says those who will believe through their word, through the word of the apostles, which is what we have right here. This is the word of the apostles of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And this is strengthened by the fact that it has survived.

For 2,000 years, this message, uncorrupted, it has been carried and confirmed over and over and over and over again in the lives of our fathers in the faith. And Jesus actually had us in mind when he was praying in the presence of his disciples. He didn't just have a local vision for the gospel, for what his disciples would do. He had a vision for what would happen through the preaching of their word. And so Paul... delivers this message that he received to the Corinthians and to us. And what is it that Paul delivered as of first importance? What are these most important truths of the gospel? Well, it's the simple, objective realities of what Christ came and did. Look at this. Starting in verse 3, I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.

that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day, according to the scriptures. Then he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that, he appeared to more than 500 brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared to me. So, Christ died for our sins, he was buried, he raised from the dead, and he proved it. Right? And before I get to breaking down these parts of the gospel that Paul lays out, I want to say that the Apostle Paul's summary of the gospel here surprises me for a couple of reasons. One is because it's simple. It's so simple. There's nothing sophisticated about this message. Right? It's a simple delivery of simple historic truths.

of what God did through his son, Jesus Christ. You don't have to have a big brain to tell people about the gospel, to tell people that these things happened. And this is very much in line with Paul and other things he says in this letter in particular. He starts the letter of 1 Corinthians by saying that the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved, it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever I will set aside. Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? You don't have to be a great debater to deliver the word of the cross. It's really not more complicated than telling someone to get on the boat so that they can be saved from the wind and the waves. And it's as simple as pointing to the boat.

Here it is. It's right here. Christ died. He was buried. He died for our sins and he rose from the dead. And the other thing is related of why it surprises me is how objective this is. These aren't just subjective truths about how we feel and what I've felt that God has done for me. These are things that God has really done. These are objective historical truths. In the heart of the gospel is the objective historical realities of Christ's death, burial, and resurrection. Now let's take a look at what the Apostle Paul lines out as the gospel, these things. The first one being, if you jump back, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. The gospel starts with Christ died for our sins. So for you personally, If you are delivering that message, that means that the gospel starts with Christ died for your sins. Or if you're speaking in the first person, Christ died for my sins. And notice that the apostle Paul says he includes himself in that message. It's our sins. And the delivery of the gospel has to start with you, yourself, believing that Christ died for your sins. And so the first question I have for you is, do you believe that?

Do you believe what the Apostle Paul says to be true for yourself? Are you willing to let Christ bear the weight of your sins? He says that he will. And second, following up on that, will you confess that to be true? Will you open up with your story, with where you feel pain, with where you've hurt and been hurt by others? Will you name the reality of sin, not just in some abstract way, but will you name its presence in your own life with particularity? Naming your sin, confessing your sin is one of the most evangelistic things that you can do. What if you said to your neighbor, your coworker, your boss, I came to God as a liar. I came to God as an adulterer. I came to God as a fornicator. I came to him greedy. I came to him impure.

I came to him vile and corrupted by sin, and he forgave the guilt of my sin. Will you confess that Christ died for your sins, your actual sins? And third, will you believe that to be true for someone else? Will you believe that Christ really does love sinners and that there's no sinner too dirty for the kindness and mercy of God? You've believed it to be true for yourself. Will you believe it to be true for your neighbor? You have to believe it to be true for your neighbor almost before they will, right? Otherwise, they won't receive the message unless you believe that it would be true for them as well, that Christ will forgive their sins too. And this is where the gospel starts, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. Number two is that he was buried. Another simple fact of the gospel that I think we often skip over. We talk about Christ's death a lot. We talk about his resurrection a lot. Sometimes we just skip over the he was buried part. But what is the significance of the fact that Christ was buried? I think there's at least two things. One is that him being buried just shows that he really was dead, right? This wasn't, there wasn't any doubt about this. It wasn't like Eutychus in Acts 20, I think.

Paul is preaching late into the night and Eutychus falls out of a third story window down onto the ground. It's kind of a weird passage. Paul goes down there and lays on him or something and says, well, his life is still in him. And Eutychus is back. And if you were there, it's like, wait, was he dead? Did he just get knocked out when he fell from that window? And now we're back up here in this room and there's preaching going. That was weird. And Paul continues his message after Eutychus is dead. This isn't, you know, Jesus coming and raising, I think it's Jairus' daughter from the dead and saying she's just asleep and people laughing and saying, what? Just asleep? You know, she's dead. There was no confusion about this one. Jesus was in the ground for three days. He was dead. And the other thing about Christ's burial, that I think is significant to us is that he shares with us in even the most humbling and earthly aspects of our humanity. Do you ever feel a moral conflict inside of you when you're at a funeral and a burial and this person is getting put into the ground and we throw dirt on them and you know what is going to happen to their body after you leave and it's gross and somewhat disturbing?

that reality of us returning to dust after we die. Jesus subjected himself even to being buried in the ground, just like we have to be because of our sin and our corruption. He took on the most humbling, the most earthy aspects of our existence for our sake. He entered into our suffering to the greatest degree, even to the point of being buried as we are buried. The gospel is not just some uplifting story that gives a temporary peace and comfort, you know, like a superhero story or something. It gives strength, peace, and comfort even to the very grave. It carries us even to death because we know that Jesus went all the way to the grave for us. He didn't stop short.

And say, you know, I send you good blessings on your way to death. He went all the way to death, to the grave. Which means there is no aspect of life, even the most painful and traumatic and humiliating aspects of life, which Jesus does not understand and sympathize with you in. Because he himself endured our shame and our suffering so that we might overcome those things through him. Philippians 2. It says, it glorifies Jesus saying, being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient, even to the point of death. He went all the way to death for our sakes. He didn't stop short, but he finished the work that he came to do. And we see that in the fact that everything was finalized. He was put in the tomb and the tomb was sealed, which for us, all of us is the end, right? But thanks be to God for Christ Jesus, it wasn't the end.

He was raised on the third day according to the scriptures. Jesus didn't stay in the ground. He doesn't just come and wallow with us in our shameful suffering. He overcomes it and conquers it. He conquered death, our enemy. And in that, he conquered death. He gives us hope and victory over death. Amen. And that's what the rest of this chapter, if you keep reading in 1 Corinthians 15, this is what Really, the Apostle Paul is getting to talking about, is talking to the Corinthians about the resurrection of the dead and that since Christ rose from the dead, we have assurance that we too will be raised from the dead just as he was. And Christ's resurrection testifies more than anything else to the fact that he is who he says he is. God the Father vindicated Christ and his testimony and his message by raising him from the dead.

Nothing like that had ever happened before. And it's through faith in his resurrection, through standing in his resurrection, through holding fast his resurrection that we are saved too. Romans 10 says, if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. If you believe in your heart that God raised his son Christ Jesus from the dead, you have a promise from God that you will be saved. You are in the boat. and you will make it safely even to death. This is the second time in this passage he said it would die for our sins, but then Paul says, according to the scriptures again. The scriptures are sufficient for us to believe this message of the gospel. Jesus actually reprimanded the Jews of his time because they failed to believe in him on the basis of the prophet Jonah's testimony.

They wanted Jesus to show some additional sign or miracle so that they could really believe in him. We'll really believe who you say you are, Jesus, if you give us some even more miraculous thing than you've done so far. But Jesus responded and said that the testimony of the prophets should have been enough for them. They should have looked at Jonah and believed in God, believed in the promise of the Messiah to come. And if they did, then they would believe in him. So Jesus rebukes them for not believing the testimony of the scriptures, of God's testimony that he had given to them. He rebukes them and at the same time, God in his great kindness did give a sign that was fuller and greater and more authoritative than anything the prophets said or did. He sent his own son to die for our sins and raised him from the dead three days later.

And that's the testimony that we have. If we look at what Jesus said to the people of his time, if the message of the Old Testament scriptures was enough for the people of Jesus' day to believe in him, how much more the message of the New Testament scriptures for us. Of not the promise of who Christ is in types and shadows, but in the reality of him coming and walking on the earth and dying and being buried and being raised from the dead. which is what Paul goes on to talk about. And this is, it seems like his big goal here is to confirm the Corinthians and their belief in the resurrection because of what he does here. Then he appeared to Cephas. That's another name for the apostle Peter. Then to the 12, the close disciples. After that, he appeared to more than 500 brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep. In other words, Paul is saying, you can go ask these people.

They're still around. 500 people didn't make up this story. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared to me too. What an encouragement these verses are to me. My faith is weak, and it doesn't take much suggestion from Satan for me to go, did Jesus really rise from the dead? It doesn't take much for us to be thrown off of believing in that. Of course Christ rose from the dead. And that's what the apostles went around telling people. That's what Paul told the pagans in Athens. That God had furnished proof of his intent to judge the world through Jesus Christ by raising him from the dead. That's in Acts 17. You have received the evidence. You don't have to wait for more.

God's given you enough. In fact, he's given us more than enough evidence actually. Jesus didn't have to show himself to more than 500 brethren at one time, but he did because he really desires that you and many others be saved. God is not stingy. He has confirmed and added to the testimony of the Old Testament prophets. He has made his way of salvation more clear, and he continues to make it clearer every day as the gospel continues to be preached day in and day out. And that's all I'm here to do, is remind you of these truths. And so I'm going to, yeah, I'm going to preach to you this passage, okay? And you think that's what I've been doing the whole time, right? Preaching to you this passage.

But I'm going to preach it to you, what Paul actually says. Now, I make known to you, brothers and sisters, Clear Note Church, Indianapolis, and anybody visiting, the gospel which has been preached to you. I make known to you the gospel which you received and in which you stand, the gospel that saves you. Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. Christ was buried. Christ was raised from the dead on the third day, according to the scriptures. After rising from the dead, he appeared to one of his best friends, Peter, and then to all of his closest disciples who knew him and spent time with him. And then after that, he showed himself in his resurrected body to more than 500 people at one time. And they went around telling people and confirming each other's stories that this had happened.

Then Jesus appeared, as if that wasn't enough, he appeared to his disciple James, and then to all of his apostles again. And then he appeared to the apostle Paul, miraculously, who was dead set against him. All of those witnesses have since died, but we have their testimony preserved for us in the scriptures. And we have the testimony of millions. of sons and daughters of Christ Jesus since this time, confirming this testimony over and over and over again. And Jesus hasn't stopped making his presence known. He lives among his people in the power of his spirit. He's not absent, but he's present wherever two or more are gathered in his name. He is with us now as we worship him and gather in his name now. As we sing his praises, he promises to be with us in power.

in love, in discipline, and we have his presence. And so I pray that this will, this church, as you guys go through these transitions, will be a place of God's presence that people can come into the presence of God. You do have the gospel. It's not a complicated message. We're just messengers on the boat saying, get in the boat, come with us, make it safely to the other side. Let's pray together.