[0:00] Well, if we could, with the Lord's help and the Lord's enabling this evening, if we could turn back to that portion of Scripture that we read in the book of Genesis, in Genesis chapter 1.
[0:15] Genesis chapter 1, and if we read again just from the beginning. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
[0:25] The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light.
[0:39] And there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness he called night.
[0:50] And there was evening, and there was morning. The first day. Now, as you know, last Lord's Day we began a study on the Apostles' Creed.
[1:03] And as we said, the Apostles' Creed has been read and recited and reaffirmed by Christians throughout the world for centuries. And that's because the Apostles' Creed is a summary statement of faith.
[1:16] It's a belief statement. It's a mission statement which has asserted and affirmed down throughout the centuries the who, what, and why of the Church of Jesus Christ.
[1:29] But of course, like all creeds, confessions, and catechisms, the Apostles' Creed is not exhaustive. But it is encouraging. It's an encouraging statement of faith which we are called to believe in our heart and to confess with our mouth.
[1:46] In fact, that's why we saw last week that it's referred to as a creed. Because the word creed comes from the Latin credo, meaning I believe. Therefore, the Apostles' Creed is to be believed in our heart and also confessed with our mouth.
[2:02] We're to believe it in our heart. We're to confess it with our mouth. And I know you're all waiting for this moment. Because I said last week that as we look through the study of the Apostles' Creed together, I'd like us to believe it in our heart but also confess it with our mouth, either silently or audibly.
[2:20] So, please say it with me. Say the Apostles' Creed with me. I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried.
[2:42] He descended into hell. The third day He rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty.
[2:52] From thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.
[3:09] Amen. Now, I want to be clear. You're not saved simply by reading, reciting, and reaffirming the Apostles' Creed.
[3:21] That has to be clearly presented to you. Because the call of the gospel, as we said last Lord's Day when we looked at the opening statement, I believe, the call of the gospel is to believe in Jesus Christ, to receive Jesus Christ, and to rest upon Jesus Christ alone for salvation.
[3:41] So the call of the gospel is to believe, receive, and rest upon Jesus Christ alone. You are not saved by reading, reciting, or reaffirming the Apostles' Creed.
[3:52] But as we continue studying the Apostles' Creed this evening, we come to the second statement of faith, which as you can see there, it says, I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.
[4:06] I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth. And I'd like us to consider this statement under three headings. And the headings this evening, they might shock you.
[4:17] They'll certainly shock a certain gentleman who's in the congregation this evening, because there's no alliteration this evening. It's God the Father Almighty is the Father of creation. He's the Father of providence.
[4:30] And He's the Father of salvation. God the Father Almighty is the Father of creation, the Father of providence, and the Father of salvation.
[4:41] So first of all, we see that God the Father Almighty is the Father of creation. He's the Father of creation. Look again at the opening words of our Bible.
[4:53] It says, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
[5:04] And God said, Let there be light. And there was light. Now, the Heidelberg Catechism, it's a document which was compiled in 1563 in Heidelberg, as the name of it suggests.
[5:22] It was in Heidelberg, Germany. And it was written in order to express the Reformed doctrines of the Christian church. And it was written in the form of questions and answers, much like our Westminster Shorter Catechism.
[5:35] But the Heidelberg Catechism, you could say it's much more pastoral than the Westminster Shorter Catechism. And the reason it's pastoral, and the fact that it's pastoral, is why the Heidelberg Catechism was set out into 52 sections called Lord's Days.
[5:53] And these 52 sections, they were all designed to be taught on the 52 Lord's Days in any given year. But, you know, what's fascinating about the Heidelberg Catechism is that when it asks the question, What must a Christian believe?
[6:12] What must a Christian believe? The Heidelberg Catechism answers that question by using all the statements that are found in the Apostles' Creed. And so the Heidelberg Catechism, it's actually very helpful when trying to understand some of the statements here in the Apostles' Creed.
[6:30] Now, as I mentioned to you last Lord's Day, if you have an iPad or an iPhone, and you like using apps, then I'd encourage you to get the iReformed app. The iReformed app.
[6:40] It's free to download, and it has all the Reformed creeds. It has the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed. It has all the confessions, the Belgian Confession, the Westminster Confession. It has all these different confessions, and it also has the catechisms, the Westminster Shorter Catechism, Larger Catechism, and the Heidelberg Catechism.
[6:59] So I'd encourage you to get it. Because the Heidelberg Catechism, it expresses and explains the Apostles' Creed. And what it says is that the Apostles' Creed has been divided into three parts because it is a distinctly Trinitarian creed.
[7:17] The Apostles' Creed is a distinctly Trinitarian creed because we are exhorted, as you'll see, you can see in the sections, we're exhorted to confess, I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.
[7:31] And then secondly, I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. And then the third section is, I believe in the Holy Ghost. So the Apostles' Creed is a distinctly Trinitarian creed which expresses and explains to us that there are three passions in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
[7:52] And these three, as we've been brought up to know, these three are one God, and they are the same in substance, they are equal in power and glory. It's not a hierarchy of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, they are the same in substance, they are equal in power and glory.
[8:11] But what we see is that the Apostles' Creed describes God the Father Almighty as the maker of heaven and earth. He is God the Father Almighty, the maker of heaven and earth.
[8:24] He's the father of creation. He's the father of creation. And you know, that's what we were singing about in Psalm 19, that the heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim His handiwork.
[8:38] Or if you're into modern hymn music, Keith and Kirsten Getty, they have one of their hymns, and it's called, The Creation Sings the Father's Song. The Creation Sings the Father's Song.
[8:51] And that's actually what we were reading about in Genesis chapter 1. Where our Bible, it begins with that statement, in the beginning, God. In the beginning, God.
[9:03] And don't you find it interesting that from the very outset, the Bible, it asserts and affirms to us the existence of God. The Bible never argues for the existence of God.
[9:15] It just says that God is there, God is real, God is fact, and God is true. And the Bible later says to us, well, the fool, it's the fool who says in his heart that there is no God.
[9:28] Because God is there. In the beginning, God, he created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void. The darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
[9:41] And God said, let there be light. And there was light. But you know, what we need to remember is that although the Apostles' Creed says that God, the Father Almighty, is the maker of heaven and earth, we need to remember that the work of creation was a Trinitarian act.
[10:01] The work of creation was a Trinitarian act. We see that even from the opening statement of our Bible. It says, in the beginning, God. And that word, God, in Hebrew, is Elohim.
[10:14] It's a plural, meaning it's emphasizing a plurality. Not more gods, but three Persians in one God. And so we see that this creation is a distinctly Trinitarian creation.
[10:29] And what we're being emphasized to us here is that this is the work of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. We see that also at the end of the chapter.
[10:41] It's a distinctly Trinitarian statement at the end of the chapter where God says, let us make man in our image and after our likeness.
[10:53] It's all plural because God is three in one. And so although the Apostles' Creed, although it says that God the Father Almighty is the maker of heaven and earth, we need to remember that the work of creation was a Trinitarian act.
[11:10] Because God the Father was there, God the Son was there, and God the Holy Spirit was there. And we know that God the Holy Spirit was there because we're told in verse 2 that the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
[11:27] And we may well ask, well, why is the Spirit hovering? The Spirit is hovering because He's waiting. Well, why is He waiting? What's He waiting for? He's waiting for an instruction.
[11:39] He's waiting for God the Father to speak. Because as soon as God the Father speaks, He will speak through the Son. God the Father will speak through the Son, and when He speaks, what He says will be energized and effected by God the Holy Spirit.
[11:58] It's a Trinitarian act. And you know, that's what happened in the work of creation. God the Father spoke through God the Son, and it was enabled by the work of the Holy Spirit.
[12:11] God the Father spoke through the Son. You know, that's how John describes it in his gospel. John begins his gospel echoing these words in Genesis 1-1, where he says, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
[12:29] The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him, without the Word, without the Son, nothing was made that was made.
[12:41] My friend, in the work of creation, God the Father spoke, and He spoke through the Son. So, you go to verse 3. He spoke, Let there be light.
[12:54] And by the energizing, you could say, and the effectual power of the Holy Spirit, the end of verse 3, and there was light. It was a Trinitarian act where God brought form and fullness into the formlessness and emptiness of creation.
[13:14] And that's what we see throughout the opening chapter of our Bible. The world is brought into being because God the Father is speaking through the Son by the enabling and the energizing and the effectual power of God the Holy Spirit.
[13:29] It's a Trinitarian act. And you know, even when we come to the apex of creation, right at the very end of the chapter that we read earlier, God says, the Trinity says, let us make man in our image after our likeness.
[13:45] And when God said that, when they said that as a Trinity, they brought form and fullness into the formlessness and emptiness of mankind.
[13:57] Because as you know, Adam, he was formed and fashioned from the dust of the ground. He was molded and shaped like clay in the hands of a potter. And he was made into the image and likeness of his creator, God.
[14:11] And God, as a Trinity, brought form into formlessness. He brought fullness into emptiness. He brought order out of chaos. He brought light into darkness.
[14:24] My friend, he's the father of creation. And what this creed is calling us to, we're being called to believe in him. He's the father of creation and we're being called to believe in him.
[14:38] Why? Because the reality is we are without excuse. We are without excuse. You know, the fool says in his heart, there is no God.
[14:51] And the fool who lives his life as if there is no God is without excuse. Without excuse. Romans chapter 1 tells us that God has made himself known.
[15:04] He has revealed himself through the creation so that we are without excuse. We are without excuse because since the beginning, since Genesis 1, verse 1, the heavens, as we were singing in Psalm 19, the heavens have been declaring the glory of God.
[15:23] The skies have been proclaiming his handiwork. Day after day, the creation has been speaking. God has been speaking to us through sunrises and sunsets, through storms and through stillness, through sleet and through snow.
[15:40] Even the crying of a little baby ought to remind and reaffirm to us that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. My friend, the creation, that's what I find amazing about Psalm 19, the creation is the longest sermon ever preached.
[15:58] It's the longest sermon ever preached. It has been preached since the beginning of time itself. And it's still being preached. The benediction has not taken place yet.
[16:10] The creation is the longest sermon ever preached, and it has been preached to every corner of this world. Why? So that everyone, everywhere, is without excuse.
[16:25] Everyone, everywhere, is without excuse. No one can say God has not spoken to them because He has.
[16:38] God has spoken. And so, my unconverted friend, here this evening or at home, you are without excuse. You are without excuse. And the creed is calling you to believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Maker of heaven and earth.
[16:55] So, do you believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Maker of heaven and earth? Because He's the Father of creation, but He's also the Father of providence.
[17:09] And that's what I'd like us to see secondly. He's the Father of providence. So, He's the Father of creation, and then He's the Father of providence. The Father of providence.
[17:20] Look at verse 3. And God said, let there be light, and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. And God called the light day, and the darkness He called night.
[17:35] And there was evening, and there was morning, the first day. Now, we mentioned earlier that the Heidelberg Catechism, it helpfully expresses and explains the statements that are found in the Apostles' Creed.
[17:49] And it does so in the form of questions and answers. And when you look at the Heidelberg Catechism, if you go to question 26, the Catechism asks, what do you believe when you say, I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth?
[18:07] And the answer that's given is, I believe that the eternal Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who out of nothing created heaven and earth and all that is in them, and who still upholds and governs them by His eternal counsel and providence, is for the sake of Christ His Son, my God and my Father.
[18:29] In Him I trust so completely as to have no doubt that He will provide me with all things necessary for body and soul, and will also turn to my good whatever adversity He sends me in this life of sorrow.
[18:45] He is able to do so as Almighty God and willing also as a faithful Father. And so what the Heidelberg Catechism teaches us is that God the Father Almighty is not only the Father of creation, He's also the Father of Providence.
[19:05] And as you know, the word Providence, it means seen beforehand. Providence means seen beforehand. where God, He is one who is sovereign.
[19:17] He is supreme. He's enthroned on high. He rules and He reigns over heaven and earth. And He has seen beforehand all that is to take place in our lives.
[19:27] He has seen everything before that first day which we just read about in Genesis 1. He has seen it all take place which means that nothing takes Him by surprise because our times are in His hands.
[19:42] And He has appointed every day for us. And as our sovereign God, He executes and establishes His decrees in the works of creation as well as in the works of Providence.
[19:54] As our sovereign God, He assigns and He appoints everything in our lives and whatsoever He decrees it will come to pass according to His sovereign will.
[20:08] Therefore, my friend, as you know, nothing in your life and my life happens by chance. It's not by luck. It's not because of fate or even fortune.
[20:20] No, every Providence, every meeting and every parting, every delight and every difficulty, every sickness and every sorrow, it all takes place in our lives right down to the smallest, smallest detail.
[20:37] and it all takes place according to God's sovereign will. My friend, with the Father of Providence, the amazing thing is there are no chance meetings, there are no random events, there are no mishaps, no accidents, no errors and no mistakes.
[20:54] Everything in our lives takes place according to His perfect plan, path and purpose because He is the Father of Providence.
[21:04] everything that takes place in our lives, it happens according to His perfect plan, path and purpose because He is the Father of Providence.
[21:19] And you know, as someone once said, even our disappointments are God's appointments. Even our disappointments are God's appointments. And as I've said to you before, when sin or stress or sickness or suffering or sadness or even sorrow, when it all comes into our lives, it's not there to make us run away from the Lord.
[21:43] It's always there to make us run to the Lord. It's to make us run to Jesus, to cling to Him and to confess before Him that we love Him and we're looking to Him and we want to learn from Him and lean upon Him in our time of need.
[21:58] Everything in our lives, my friend, it's there for us not to run away from Him but to run to Him. And you know, I love those words in Psalm 107 that we were singing earlier, where we were reminded and reassured that the God we are singing about is not only the Father of creation, He's also the Father of Providence.
[22:19] We sang the words, the storm has changed into a calm, at His command and will, so that the waves which raged before now quiet are and still.
[22:30] And as you know, the transformation from storm to stillness, it's not only true of creation, it's also true of providence. Because there are times, as you know, there are times in our lives when there's a storm of sin or stress or sickness or suffering or sorrow.
[22:49] There's this storm in our life where the storm is raging and it's raging as we know at His command and will. But with the same token, the storm has changed into a calm at His command and will.
[23:04] And it's changed into a command and will so that the waves which raged before now quiet are and still. Do you know, my friend, when you have a difficult week or when you receive devastating news, you know, your greatest comfort and your greatest consolation in the midst of what may seem like chaos and confusion, your greatest comfort and consolation is that God the Father Almighty is in it with you.
[23:36] He's not distant. He's not detached. No, He has assigned and He has appointed all that's going on in your life. And you know, as you know, sometimes that's the hardest thing to get your head around.
[23:50] That He's in it there. He's in it with you and He has appointed it and assigned it for your life. You know, our greatest assurance is that the Father of Providence, He is working all things together by His grace for our good and to His glory.
[24:09] The Father of Providence is working all things together by His grace for our good and to His glory. As you know, my friend, there are things that have taken place in our lives and probably will take place in our lives.
[24:26] I mean, we may wonder why and we may never know the answer to these questions. Maybe not until we leave this world. But the wonder of wonders is that the Father of Providence, He calls us to believe in Him and to trust Him and to rest in Him and to receive Him as our heavenly Father.
[24:46] Father. And you know, whenever I think about the providence of God, I'm always brought back to that poem, The Divine Weaver.
[24:56] I just can't get away from it. And I'm sure you know it well, maybe you know it off by heart, like you have to know the Apostles Creed, where it says, My life is but a weaving between my Lord and me.
[25:10] I cannot choose the colors. He weaveth steadily. Sometimes he weaveth sorrow. And I in foolish pride. Forget that he sees the upper, and I the underside.
[25:22] And not till the loom is silent, or the shuttle cease to fly, shall God unroll the canvas and explain the reason why the dark threads are as needful in the weaver's skillful hand as the threads of gold and silver in the pattern he has planned.
[25:42] My friend, the Father of Providence calls us in the gospel to believe in him and to receive him and to rest in him as our heavenly father.
[25:54] We are to rest in him as our heavenly father. But just before I move on, I want to read to you two of the questions in the Heidelberg Catechism, which actually helpfully express and explain to us who the Father of Providence really is.
[26:11] So I want you to go home and look up the Heidelberg Catechism. That's why I'm reading all these catechisms to you. Question 27 in the Heidelberg Catechism asks, what do you understand by the providence of God?
[26:23] What do you understand by the providence of God? And it says, God's providence is his almighty and ever present power, whereby as with his hand, he still upholds heaven and earth and all creatures, and so governs them that leaf and blade, rain and drought, fruitful and barren years, food and drink, health and sickness, riches and poverty, indeed all things come to us not by chance, but by his fatherly hand.
[26:55] And then the following question, question 28, it asks, what does it benefit us to know that God has created all things and still upholds them by his providence? So that we can be patient in adversity, thankful in prosperity, and with a view to the future, we can have a firm confidence in our faithful God and Father that no creature can be separated from his love.
[27:26] My friend, it ought to be a wonderful reminder and reassurance to us that everything in our lives is in the care of our heavenly father, because he is the father of providence.
[27:37] He is the father of providence. And so we see in the statement that God the father almighty is the father of creation. He's the father of providence.
[27:49] And then lastly we see that he's the father of salvation. He's the father of salvation. salvation. So look with me at verse 31 of Genesis 1.
[28:03] It says, And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning, the sixth day.
[28:15] You know, when the father of creation and the father of providence, when he saw that this world he had formed and fashioned, when he saw that it was all very good, he knew that it was a perfect world.
[28:29] It was a perfect world with a perfect man and a perfect woman. They possessed perfect knowledge, perfect righteousness, and perfect holiness. It was a perfect world without sin, without stress, without sickness, without suffering, without sadness, and without sorrow.
[28:48] It was a perfect world. But as we all know, my friend, and we don't need to look further than ourselves, or our own home, or even our own families. We don't need to look far in order to see that the perfect world that was created in Genesis 1 is not the world we live in today.
[29:08] Yes, there are glimpses of that former glory, but for the most part, this world has been marred and ruined by the curse of sin and the fall of Adam.
[29:22] All mankind by their fall lost communion with God and are under his wrath and curse and so made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell forever.
[29:37] My friends, sin is an awful curse and death is an awful enemy and it has left us in ruin and in need of a remedy.
[29:50] It has left us in ruin and in need of a remedy. And the wonderful thing is the Father of salvation has provided that remedy for our ruin and he has provided it in his only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
[30:08] And you know, I love how our catechism, the Westminster Catechism, we'll call it, we'll call that one hour catechism. The Westminster Catechism, it describes and depicts the work of salvation as a special act of providence.
[30:21] A special act of providence where before the foundation of the world, before Genesis 1, 1, God saw beforehand that this world would be plunged into the darkness of sin and death.
[30:35] Which is why the Father of lights, the Father of mercies, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of salvation, He declared and He decreed. He planned and He prepared a way of salvation through the sacrifice of His own Son.
[30:51] And what's remarkable is that, as Isaiah 53 will tell us, it pleased the Father to bruise Him. It pleased the Father to crush Him.
[31:02] It pleased the Father that He would be wounded for our transgressions. It pleased the Father that He would be bruised for our iniquities. It pleased the Father of salvation that His only begotten Son would bear our griefs and carry our sorrows.
[31:20] Why? Why did He do it? Well, it all goes back to that verse we learnt as a child, doesn't it? John 3 16.
[31:34] God so loved. He so loved this sin-sick world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but have eternal life.
[31:55] And, you know, I go back to that question which the 19th century preacher Octavius Winslow asked. He asked the question, who delivered Jesus up to die? Who delivered Jesus up to die?
[32:07] And He says, it wasn't Judas for money. It wasn't Pilate for fear. It wasn't the Jews for envy or even the Romans for the hardness of their heart. No. He says, it was the Father for love.
[32:21] Who delivered Jesus up to die? It was the Father for love. My friend, the Father of salvation, He has demonstrated and He has declared His love for you. His love for you in that whilst you are yet a sinner, Christ died for you.
[32:39] The Father of salvation so loved you. Let's make this personal. He so loved you that He sent His Son for you. He sacrificed His Son for you.
[32:50] He made His Son to be sin for you. Though He knew no sin, and it was all so that you could be made righteous before a holy God.
[33:02] And you know, my friend, the Apostle John, when he surveyed the wondrous cross upon which the Prince of Glory died, do you know what he said? He looked at the cross, and all he could say was, God is love.
[33:15] Herein is love. This is what love is. Not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sin.
[33:26] behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, upon you, that you should be called a child of God.
[33:39] And through the death of His Son, by the enabling of the Holy Spirit, we're brought into the family of God. We receive all the rights, we're promised all the privileges of the children of our heavenly Father.
[33:52] And you know, one of the greatest privileges, and this is something we should cling to, one of the greatest privileges as those who have received that spirit of adoption is that when we come to God in prayer, when we bow our head, close our eyes, and clasp our hands, we are able to address the God of heaven as our Father which art in heaven.
[34:17] There is no greater privilege in this world than to speak to God and to address Him as our Father. More than that, Paul says we're able to come to Him crying, saying, Abba, Father.
[34:36] We're able to pour out our heart before Him and cast every care upon Him because our heavenly Father cares for us.
[34:47] And you know, what we'll see as we continue studying the Apostles' Creed, and you know, this is what I find amazing about this creed. As we continue studying the Apostles' Creed, we'll see that in the humiliation and in the exaltation of Jesus Christ, it's all for the Father.
[35:06] Jesus humbled Himself, and we'll see this God willing next Lord's Day. He humbled Himself from the crown of glory down to the cradle in Bethlehem, all the way down to the cross of Calvary. He was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
[35:20] He humbled Himself down, down, down, from the crown to the cradle to the cross, from glory to Golgotha to the grave. But Jesus, He was not only humiliated, He was also highly exalted, given a name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow in heaven and on earth and in hell, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of who?
[35:52] The glory of God the Father. It's all to the glory of God the Father. He is the Father of salvation, because the work of salvation is all back to the glory of God the Father.
[36:10] And you know, my friend, as we continue studying the Apostles' Creed, we'll see that the humiliation and the exaltation of Jesus, it's all about the glory of God the Father.
[36:21] Because God the Father Almighty, He is the Father of creation. He is the Father of our providence. And He is the Father of our salvation.
[36:32] He is God the Father Almighty. And He calls us in the gospel to believe in Him, to trust in Him, to rest in Him, and to receive Him as our, our, your heavenly Father.
[36:53] He is God the Father Almighty. Can you say with me this evening, I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.
[37:07] Well, may the Lord bless these thoughts to us. Let us pray. our heavenly Father, we give thanks to Thee for even the great privilege of being able to call Thee our Father, to be able to address the Creator and the sustainer of this world, the one in whose hand our very breath is, that we are able to call Thee our Father and know that Thou art one who is in heaven.
[37:37] and although that we are on earth and heaven is Thy throne and the earth is Thy footstool, that we are able to come to Thee as little children and cast every care upon Thee, being assured that thou art one who cares for us.
[37:54] Oh Lord, help us to understand the great privilege that we have received in and through Thy Son, Jesus. And Lord, help us, we pray day by day, to keep coming, to keep confessing, to keep clinging to our wonderful Saviour, who has done in us and for us exceedingly abundantly above all, more than we could ask or even think.
[38:17] Bless us, Lord, in that week that lies before us. We do not know what a day nor an hour will bring in our lives. We have been reminded of that time and time again.
[38:28] And for that reason, we commit and we commend ourselves into the care of our heavenly Father, knowing that thou art the one who knows the way that we take and that when thou hast tried us, we will come forth as gold.
[38:43] Bless us then, we pray, as thy people. Keep us in the hollow of thine own hand and encourage us to keep looking to Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith.
[38:55] Cleanse us, we pray, for Jesus' sake. Amen. Amen. We're going to bring our service to a conclusion this evening by singing in Psalm 103.
[39:08] Psalm 103, it's on page 370 in the Scottish Psalter. We're singing from verse 13 down to the verse marked 18.
[39:20] Psalm 103, it's a psalm that reminds us that the God we worship is a gracious God, and particularly in these verses, he's a gracious heavenly father.
[39:32] Such pity as a father hath unto his children dear, like pity shows the Lord to such as worship him in fear. For he remembers we are dust, and he our frame well knows.
[39:44] Frail man, his days are like the grass, as flower in field he grows. And we'll sing down to the verse marked 18 of Psalm 103, to God's praise.
[39:56] Such pity as a father hath unto his children dear, like in the chosen Lord to such as worship him in fear.
[40:24] For he remembers we are dust, and he our frame well knows.
[40:41] Frail man, his days are like the grass, as far in him he grows.
[40:56] For over in the wind a past, and in the way it's gone, and long the place where once it was, it shall no more be known.
[41:25] God's mercy never ends. But unto them, not do him fear, God's mercy never ends.
[41:40] And to their children's children still, his righteousness next extend.
[41:52] To such as keep his covenant, and mightful are all way. God's mercy never ends. And mightful are all way.
[42:08] God's mercy never ends. Of his most just commandments, that they may him obey.
[42:22] The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all now and forevermore.
[42:34] Amen.