Jehovah M’Kaddesh – The LORD Who Sanctifies You

[0:00] Would you turn with me this evening to the book of Leviticus? The book of Leviticus in chapter 20. Leviticus chapter 20.

[0:21] If you're using the Pew Bible, I think it's page 118. Leviticus chapter 20. And if you read two verses there.

[0:32] Verses 7 and 8. Leviticus 20 verse 7. Where the Lord says, Consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy.

[0:43] For I am the Lord your God. Keep my statutes and do them. I am the Lord who sanctifies you. Or as we're looking in our study in the names of God.

[0:58] Verse 8 says, Keep my statutes and do them. I am Jehovah Mekadesh. The Lord who sanctifies you.

[1:11] The name Jehovah Mekadesh is not in the English Bible. But it's in the Hebrew Bible. And that's literally what it means. I am Jehovah Mekadesh.

[1:22] I am Jehovah Mekadesh. The Lord who sanctifies you. This morning, during the morning service, for those of you who weren't here, I took a massive road sign in with me this morning to show the children.

[1:43] And it was a road sign which had been sitting at the end of my driveway for the past few months. And it had probably been dumped there because it was broken. And there were some people obviously working on the road and they'd left it behind.

[1:57] Anyway, this road sign had on it a picture of traffic lights. And when I was speaking to the children, I was explaining that the traffic lights were important.

[2:08] That if the light was green, as you know, it's safe to go. And if the light was red, we have to stop because it isn't safe to go. Because other cars would be moving or people would be crossing the road.

[2:22] And so very simply, from traffic lights, we know that the purpose of traffic lights is that they're for our benefit. Their purpose is to keep us safe.

[2:34] We might not always want to stop for the red light and have to wait until it turns green. But we do know that if we don't wait and if we don't obey the command of the lights, we'll be putting ourselves and others in some danger.

[2:49] And as I was saying to the children, it's important for us to follow the rules and the regulations of the roads. Because their purpose is to keep us safe.

[3:00] And that's the purpose of all rules and regulations. It's so that there is order. So that there is safety. So that there isn't chaos.

[3:11] Because without rules and regulations, there would be chaos. There would be a free-for-all where we could do what we like and do it how we like.

[3:22] And so we need order or else there will be chaos. And as we were saying to the children, the Bible is no different. Because the Bible sets out for us rules and regulations to follow.

[3:34] And without them, we wouldn't know who God is and who we are. We wouldn't know that we were created to worship God. We wouldn't know how to worship God.

[3:45] We wouldn't know how to live the way that God had created us to live. And so God gives us these rules and regulations in his word, the Bible.

[3:56] Not only so that we know what to do, but also to prevent us from doing as we please. And for the children of Israel, here at the beginning of their wilderness journey towards the promised land, that's what the book of Leviticus was all about.

[4:15] Because the book of Leviticus is what you could probably call a handbook on how to worship a holy God and how to live a holy life. It's a handbook on how to worship a holy God and how to live a holy life.

[4:32] Because the command which is repeated again and again in this little handbook of Leviticus is the command, Be holy, for I am holy.

[4:43] Be holy, for I am holy. And in these verses which we're looking at this evening from the book of Leviticus, we see that the Lord reveals his name.

[4:56] And it's a name which is holy. And a name which he calls his people to be holy. He says, I am Jehovah Mekadesh, the Lord who sanctifies you.

[5:10] I am Jehovah Mekadesh, the Lord who makes you holy. And as we've said before in our study of the names of God, when God reveals his name, he's revealing his character.

[5:24] He's telling us who he is and what he is like. And as we've progressed through the Bible, the Lord has progressively revealed his character to us.

[5:36] That's what we call progressive revelation. Where God progressively reveals himself throughout scripture until he is finally revealed as in the person of Jesus Christ.

[5:49] But over the past few weeks, while we've been looking at the names of God, the Lord has progressively revealed his character to us. And we saw in the book of Genesis that the Lord revealed himself as Jehovah Jireh.

[6:03] The Lord will provide. Where he will provide salvation and provide a savior for his people. And then in the book of Exodus, as we progressed in Revelation, the Lord revealed himself as Jehovah Nisi.

[6:17] The Lord is my banner. Because he is the Lord who wins the victory. And last week we looked at Jehovah Rapha. Jehovah the Lord who heals you.

[6:28] Because he is the Lord who will teach us and shape us throughout our wilderness journey here on earth. But this evening the Lord once again reveals his character to us in these verses by telling us his name.

[6:42] And he says, I am Jehovah Mekaddish, the Lord who sanctifies you. I am Jehovah Mekaddish, the Lord who sanctifies you.

[6:52] And from this name which the Lord reveals, I'd like us to see that these verses emphasize the need for holiness. They emphasize the need for holiness.

[7:04] And I'd like us to look at these two verses under three headings. Three headings. The call to holiness. The command of holiness. And the commitment to holiness.

[7:18] The call to holiness. The command of holiness. And the commitment to holiness. So we look firstly at the call to holiness.

[7:31] If we read again in verse 7. The Lord says, Consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy. For I am the Lord your God. Keep my statutes and do them.

[7:42] For I am Jehovah Mekaddish, the Lord who sanctifies you. And let me consider the book of Leviticus.

[7:52] For many of us, I suppose, the book of Leviticus is a closed book. And it's a closed book simply because its world of animal sacrifices and religious purity laws and rituals, they seem very remote to us and so far removed from our experience of church in the 21st century.

[8:15] And so when we come to this handbook on how to worship a holy God and how to live a holy life, it's hard for us to try and imagine what church life for the children of Israel would have been like.

[8:30] Because it was primarily made up of various kinds of sacrifices to God. Where their form of worship didn't just consist of singing and reading the Bible and preaching of a sermon, a key part of their worship was sacrifice, which always involved the death of an animal.

[8:51] And as the children of Israel followed these rules and regulations for worship, they all knew and they were all taught from a young age that without the shedding of blood there would be no forgiveness of sins.

[9:05] Without the shedding of blood there will be no forgiveness of sin. And it's been said that if you understand the book of Leviticus, you understand the work of Christ. If you understand the book of Leviticus, you'll understand the work of Christ.

[9:19] Because every offering and every sacrifice and every detail on how to worship a holy God and how to live a holy life, it's all pointing us forward to the perfect offering and to the greatest sacrifice and to the faithful obedience of Jesus Christ at Calvary.

[9:37] everything in the book of Leviticus is pointing us to the life and to the work of Jesus Christ. Because Jesus is, as the writer to the Hebrews describes him, he is the more excellent sacrifice.

[9:54] The more excellent sacrifice. But as we said, the purpose of the book of Leviticus, it was to teach the children of Israel how to worship a holy God and how to live a holy life.

[10:06] And the reason God sets out for the children of Israel these regulations and rules to follow was because he is holy. He is holy and because he is holy, he is not to be worshipped in any way that we please and because he is holy, we are not to live our lives in any way that we please.

[10:29] And so God issued these rules and regulations for the children of Israel to follow. God issued this handbook for the children of Israel and he issued it as we went when they were at Mount Sinai which we were reading earlier in Exodus 19 that he issued it all at the foot of Mount Sinai when God came down and spoke through his servant Moses.

[10:56] But as we saw last week when we were looking at Exodus 15 a few chapters before what we read we saw that the children of Israel they were only three days into their 40 year journey.

[11:11] They had just left bondage and slavery in Egypt under the rule of King Pharaoh and they had crossed the Red Sea and they had begun their journey on towards the promised land a land that was said to flow with milk and honey and yet only three days into their journey the children of Israel were complaining.

[11:33] But on that occasion the Lord taught the children of Israel that there would be many lessons along the way. There were going to be many times that the Lord was going to teach them and that their journey to the promised land was going to be a journey where they were going to be taught more about the Lord and more about themselves.

[11:51] And that's what the Lord did. Because as we read earlier in Exodus 19, after only three months in the wilderness the children of Israel arrive at the foot of Mount Sinai.

[12:04] And there at Mount Sinai the children of Israel were going to learn that God is holy and that he is to be called holy and that his people are called to be holy.

[12:18] Because when the Lord called Moses up to the top of Mount Sinai to speak to him the Lord commanded Moses to speak to the children of Israel and say to them, you have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I bore you an eagle's wings and how I brought you to myself.

[12:38] Now therefore if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant then you shall be a special treasure to me above all people for all the earth is mine and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

[12:54] And in that initial speech when the children of Israel arrived at Mount Sinai the Lord reminded his people of where they had come from. He reminded them that they had come from slavery and bondage in Egypt.

[13:07] He reminded them that in Egypt they were under oppression they were in shackles and they were being ruled by Pharaoh. But the Lord says to them you saw what I did to the Egyptians.

[13:18] you saw all the plagues. You saw the blood the boils the hail the locusts the darkness you saw the angel of death you saw that the Egyptians received the curse of God.

[13:33] And you saw Pharaoh's army drown in the Red Sea. You saw how I bore you on eagles wings and how I carried you how I saved you how I brought you up out of Egypt.

[13:45] You saw how I brought you to myself. And in this initial speech as their saviour the Lord makes it clear to the children of Israel that he is the one who has acted on their behalf.

[13:58] He is the one who saved them. He is the one who redeemed them. He is the one who set them free. He is the one who brought them salvation. And the phrase which the Lord often used when he describes his actions towards the children of Israel he often said to them out of Egypt I called my son.

[14:21] Out of Egypt I called my son. And in this initial speech on Mount Sinai the Lord not only reminds the children of Israel that he called them out of Egypt but he reminds them that as his people they have been called to holiness.

[14:40] because at Mount Sinai when the children of Israel affirm that they will serve the Lord and they will remain obedient and they'll listen to his commands the Lord then called the people to consecrate themselves to him.

[14:56] He called them to consecrate themselves to him. And that's what the Lord reminds the children of Israel here in the book of Leviticus when he says in verse 7 consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy for I am the Lord your God keep my statutes and do them I am Jehovah the Lord who sanctifies you.

[15:24] My friend the call to consecrate themselves was a call to holiness because that's what the word consecrate means.

[15:36] It means to be holy to be sanctified to be set apart to be distinct and so when the children of Israel were called out of Egypt and called to consecrate themselves they were called to set themselves apart to serve the Lord and only the Lord they were called to a life of holiness a life that was distinct a life that was different a life that was separate from the bondage and slavery they had been experiencing in Egypt they were to be set apart as God's holy people and that's what the Lord said to the children of Israel you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy and in those words the Lord assured his people that they're no longer under the rule of Pharaoh and the governance of Egypt because his promise to them now as his holy nation is I will be your God and you shall be my people

[16:38] I will be your God and you shall be my people and my friend this call to holiness this call to holiness it's the call of the gospel it's the call to come out from bondage and slavery of sin and to come to salvation it's the call to renounce your own self righteousness and claim Jesus as your savior it's the call to a life which is consecrated and committed and dedicated to God it's the call to a life of holiness and you know that's what the apostle Peter was referring to when he quoted those words from Exodus 19 because when Peter described the Christian he said you are a chosen generation a royal priesthood a holy nation and a peculiar people but why why are you called these things he says that you should show forth the praises of him who hath called you from darkness into his marvelous light you've been called says Peter you've been called out of darkness out of slavery of sin into the marvelous light of the gospel but then

[18:03] Peter goes on he goes on and says for you were once not a people but you are now the people of God and there's the promise there's the promise the covenant promise you were once not a people but you're now the people of God I will be your God you shall be my people but more than that more than that says Peter the Christian is someone who had not obtained mercy but now has obtained mercy that's the Christian says Peter that's the Christian the Christian is someone who responds to the call of the gospel the Christian is someone who responds to the call of holiness to come out from bondage and slavery to sin that's the Christian so the question is my friend do you want to be a Christian do you want to be a Christian if you do then you need to respond to the call of the gospel if you want to be a

[19:15] Christian you need to respond and come out and follow this call to holiness if you want to be a Christian my friend you need to take up your cross and follow Jesus you need to take up that cross and for some of you it's about time you did it's about time you did the call to holiness but what we see is that it's very closely related to the command of holiness so let's look secondly at the command of holiness he says consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy for I am the Lord your God keep my statutes and do them I am

[20:16] Jehovah Makadesh the Lord who sanctifies you and what we're beginning to see in these verses as the Lord reveals his character as he reveals more of who he is and what he is like what we're beginning to see is that when the Lord called the children of Israel to a life of holiness he issued to them the command or a command of holiness he commanded them that they were to actively seek to live out a life of holiness where they were to live as holy people people who were separate and distinct and set apart from the world and in the book of Leviticus we have as we said a handbook on how to worship a holy God and how to live a holy life it's a handbook for holiness because the word holiness it's repeated over 150 times in the book of

[21:16] Leviticus and the command which is repeated again and again is the command be holy for I am holy be holy for I am holy and so the reason the children of Israel were issued this command of holiness was because the God who they were called to love and serve and follow and worship he was a holy God be holy for I am holy and therefore the children of Israel were to be a holy nation they were to be the holy nation that they were called to be but being a holy nation involved being separate it involved being distinct and set apart from the world and in the book of Leviticus this handbook for worshipping a holy God and living a holy life in the book of Leviticus the children of Israel were commanded to be holy by not worshipping other idols or bowing down to them they were commanded to be holy by performing ritual washings and upholding purity laws they were commanded to be holy by abstaining from unclean foods by separating themselves from the dying and those who were unwell by refusing to intermarry with people from other nations my friend the children of

[22:43] Israel commanded to be holy by following all the rules and regulations the Lord set down for them but what we must always understand with the rules and regulations of the Bible is that they were never given to hinder them or to harm them or to cause them obstruction or destruction to the Lord's people they were given because the Lord loved them and the Lord wanted to protect them as his own people it was for their own good because without these commands they wouldn't know that the Lord is holy they wouldn't know that they were created to worship the Lord without these commands they wouldn't know how to worship the Lord and they wouldn't know how to live the way they were created to live and so the issue the Lord issues this command of holiness not only so that they know what to do but also to prevent them from doing as they pleased therefore the command of holiness is a command of obedience to the Lord and not to do as we please and that's what we see when we look at this command here in verse 7 consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy for

[24:06] I am the Lord your God and what we see is that when the Lord issues the command of holiness the command to be holy the Lord then describes himself as the Lord your God consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy for I am the Lord your God and the reason this title is used is because the Lord is drawing our attention to what Adam did in the garden of Eden where Adam was the Lord's first created man first human being created without sin in all perfection in all holiness and yet Adam failed to listen to the commandment of the Lord he failed to listen to the rules and regulations you shall not eat of the fruit of the tree of the garden and because Adam failed to listen to the Lord's command he failed to remain separate from sin he failed to remain in his state of perfection and holiness and the result was devastating because when Adam fell from the estate wherein he was first created he fell from the estate of perfection and holiness he fell from the estate of perfect obedience and sinlessness and when Adam fell sin entered chaos entered disobedience entered disease entered death entered and the result was ruin ruin the result was a world of sin and so when the Lord issues this command of holiness to his now redeemed people who have been brought up out of bondage and slavery which is an image of

[25:58] Adam's ruin and destruction they've been brought out and the Lord is commanding the children of Israel to live a life that is separate and distinct from the world that Adam plunged mankind into he's commanding them to live a life of holiness and not to live as they please like Adam did therefore in the command of holiness the Lord was commanding his people to be separate from the world and come out from among them and my friend that command of holiness and the need for holiness it's still being issued by the Lord because the command to be holy and to be separate from the world and come out from among them they're the words of the apostle Paul in the New Testament to the church in Corinth and again in his letter the apostle Peter he picks up on the importance of living a holy life where he stresses that being a Christian is not about doing as we please no Peter stresses that being a

[27:15] Christian it's about being holy it's about being separate it's about being distinct it's about being Christ like and Peter says as he which has called you is holy so be holy in all your conduct because it is written be holy for I am holy my Christian friend the Lord has issued the command of holiness where we are to be separate from the world and come out from a man we are to live distinctly from the way the world lives we are to live differently in the way we think in the way we act in the way we speak in the way we live out our lives where we go what we do how we conduct ourselves we are to live distinctly from the way the world lives but the problem we have in the church today it's an age old problem is that far too often the Christian is in the world and the world is in the Christian the Christian is in the world and the world is in the Christian but the command for holiness is clear the Christian is to be separate from the world but as I've mentioned to you before separation is not isolation it's contact without contamination separation is not isolation it's contact without contamination my friend the

[28:54] Christians call and command to a life of holiness it's not to live in isolation holiness is not living a life as a monk or a nun holiness is not staying away from everything and calling everything bad and evil and sinful no there are many things that Christians should enjoy and Christians should be involved in Christians should be part of in their community and in their families and yet remain separate from the world it's a fine line it's a difficult line separation is not isolation it's contact without contamination it's holiness holiness holiness is as J.C.

[29:44] Ryle put it in his book on holiness I recommend it to you if you haven't read it if you get a chance read it because holiness says Ryle holiness is the habit of agreeing with God's judgment by hating what he hates by loving what he loves and measuring everything in this world by the standard of his word holiness is the habit of agreeing with God's judgment hating what he hates loving what he loves and measuring everything in this world by the standard of his word my friend you want to know how to live as a Christian live a life that imitates the word of God live a life that is full of the word of God live a life that reflects the word of God because the command of the Lord to his people is be holy for I am holy and so we've considered this revelation of who God is and what God is like we've seen that the name

[31:01] Jehovah Makadesh emphasizes the need for holiness and in these verses we've seen the call to holiness we've been issued the command of holiness but lastly I'd like us to consider the commitment to holiness the commitment to holiness holiness the Lord says consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy for I am the Lord your God keep my statutes and do them I am the Lord who sanctifies you I'm Jehovah Makadesh the Lord who sanctifies you as the Lord reveals his name to us he reveals more about his character and as we've learned already the Lord is holy he's set apart he is distinct he's completely unlike us for the Bible reminds us that the Lord dwells in holiness the psalmist says the Lord's house is adorned with holiness the psalmist also says he sits upon his throne of holiness he's robed in holiness he speaks with holiness the angels of heaven veil their faces and cry holy holy holy and more than that the

[32:17] Lord calls us to worship him in the beauty of holiness but what we see here as the Lord reveals himself to us is that he not only reveals his character to us but he also reveals his conduct towards us where the Lord reveals how he works in us and through us because what the Lord reveals here in verse 8 is his commitment to holiness and my friend what we ought to see in this revelation of God's character is his commitment to making God's people holy he says I am Jehovah Makadosh the Lord who sanctifies you and like the other two words in verse 7 the words consecrate and holy the words sanctify holy it also finds its root meaning in the word holy he's always saying holy holy holy holy but when the Lord speaks here in these verses each of these three words are being used in a different tense where consecrate is active because we are being called to do the work the phrase be holy is an imperative where we are being commanded to do the work but the word sanctify is passive which means that the work of sanctification in that work the

[33:48] Lord is active and we are passive the Lord is working we are being worked on the Lord is sanctifying and he is sanctifying those who are being sanctified the Lord is holy and we are those who are being made like him my friend this is the wonder of what the Lord is saying here I am Jehovah Makadesh the Lord who sanctifies you I am the Lord who is holy and I am committed to making you holy I am the Lord who is holy and I am committed to making you like me what a wonderful thought the Lord is committed to making us like him to making his people holy like himself but how does the Lord do it how does Jehovah Makadesh how does he sanctify us how does he make us holy well I think in these verses they highlight to us that the way in which the

[34:57] Lord sanctifies us it's twofold it's twofold because in order to sanctify us the Lord not only shows us our privileges but he also presses upon us our responsibilities he not only shows us our privileges but he also presses upon us our responsibilities because that's what he did with the children of Israel when the Lord called the children of Israel when he called them out of Egypt he told them at Mount Sinai how privileged they were to be his people because they were a chosen generation they were God's elect people they were to be a royal priesthood who were given special privileges and the access to worship a holy God they were to be a holy nation a nation which had been set apart and consecrated to the Lord not because they were a large nation not because they were better than any of the other nations in the world but the

[36:00] Lord says he chose them all because he loved them all because he loved them and so when the Lord reminded his people that they were a privileged people he told them that they were a chosen generation a royal priesthood a holy nation and a peculiar people they were God's special treasure who had been given all the privileges of the covenant and all the promises of covenant blessing but the Lord he didn't just give them that he gave them even more than that because he provided food and water for them in the wilderness journey he made every provision for their need he gave them his word to direct them he gave them access to worship him he gave them sacrifices for their sins to be forgiven he gave them the promise of their blessing the promise of blessing and the promise of his presence to be with them each and every day the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night my friend the Lord provided everything that they needed in order to be made holy he gave them every privilege in order to sanctify them but the

[37:17] Lord not only showed them every privilege he pressed upon them their responsibility because their responsibility was to remain obedient to the Lord and that's what the Lord said to his people at Mount Sinai if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant then you will be my special people and that's also what we see here in verse 8 the Lord issues the responsibility keep my statutes and do them for I am Jehovah Makadish the Lord who sanctifies you in order to sanctify his people the Lord not only showed them all their privileges but he pressed upon them their responsibilities and my friend the same is true for us tonight the same is true for all of the Lord's people but what are our privileges what has the Lord given to us he has given Jesus to us he has given

[38:25] Jesus to us and in Jesus says Peter we're a chosen generation a royal priesthood a holy nation a peculiar people in Jesus we've been called from darkness to his marvelous light in Jesus we were once not a people but we are now the people of God in Jesus we have his word to direct us in Jesus we have his truth to sanctify us in Jesus we have access to worship him in Jesus we have a throne of grace whereby we can pray and cry Abba Father in Jesus we are able to confess our sin knowing that he is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness in Jesus we have the promise that he will never leave us and never forsake us in Jesus we have the comforter the Holy Spirit in Jesus we have the greatest love in Jesus we have inexpressible joy in Jesus we have peace with

[39:27] God in Jesus we have the spirit of adoption in Jesus we are justified by faith in Jesus we are being sanctified my friend in Jesus Christ we have every privilege to make us like him every privilege it's all ours in and through Jesus Christ but even though he's given us all these privileges and even though he is committed to working in us and through us and to make us more and more like him he also presses upon us our responsibility to be committed to him because we have a responsibility to be committed to the Lord and his cause we have a responsibility to be reading our Bible we have a responsibility to be spending time in prayer we have the responsibility to seek the fellowship of the Lord's people we have the responsibility of being in church of being present at the prayer meeting we've got the responsibility of being obedient to the

[40:35] Lord we have the responsibility to be separate from the world and come out from among them we have the responsibility to grow in love and in knowledge of our saviour we have many privileges but with every privilege comes a great responsibility and sometimes I wonder even about myself do I take these responsibilities too lightly but it's our responsibility and it doesn't matter how many times someone will encourage you or challenge you about your privileges and remind you of where you should be and how you should be and what you should be doing you will never change unless you take your responsibility of your own sanctification seriously you will never change unless you take responsibility for your own sanctification of course the lord is the one who works in us and he works through us but it's our responsibility to reach out for all the privileges to lay hold of all the promises and yet regardless of our failures and our weaknesses and our neglect it's the lord who remains committed to us he's committed to making his people holy he's committed to working in us and through us he's committed to making us like

[42:12] Jesus because he has revealed himself to us I am Jehovah McAdish the lord who sanctifies you and he's the lord who not only shows us our privileges but he presses upon us our responsibilities and my unconverted friend you have all the privileges in the gospel and you are offered all the privileges in Jesus Christ you're offered them they're there for the taking everything in Jesus it's all there for you but it's your responsibility to lay hold of the privileges it's your responsibility to respond to the call of the gospel it's your responsibility to respond to the command of holiness and I hope it's not if you respond but when you respond when you respond and I wish you would respond

[43:32] I really do I wish you would respond to the gospel and lay hold of all your privileges because when you do the Lord takes over and it becomes the Lord's responsibility to remain committed to you throughout your wilderness journey he will remain committed to you and make you holy just like him he'll make you just like Jesus because he is Jehovah Makadash the Lord who sanctifies you may the Lord bless these thoughts to us let us pray O Lord how we echo with the hymn writer how great thou art we marvel that there is none likened unto thee among the gods for all the other gods are but idols done which blinded nations fear but our

[44:48] God is the Lord by whom the heavens created were help us O Lord we plead to see how wonderful thou art how glorious thou art how blessed we are to have all these privileges help us then to lay hold upon them help us to love thee more for them help us Lord to grow in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Lord remember us then we pray bless us and bind us together in the fellowship of the gospel that we O Lord would keep going and keep pressing on towards the mark of the high call of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord do us good O Lord we pray thee bless us in our fellowship after the service that thou wouldst go before us then and do us good for Jesus sake Amen we shall conclude by singing in Psalm 99a 99a that's in the sing psalms version on page 130 99a singing from the beginning down to the verse marked 5 the Lord reigns the Lord reigns from the Lord the Lord the Lord on Zion hill exalted over all upon his great and holy name let all the nations call the king loves truth and equity established by his might and Jacob you have done for us all that is just and right exalt the

[46:36] Lord of God with us let all the world abroad before his foodstool worship him for holy is the Lord these verses of Psalm 99 to God's praise the Lord rings from his throne on high let all the nations quake he sits between the cherubim so let the whole earth shake great is the Lord on Zion hill exalted over all upon his great and holy he slept all the nations born the king of through the death which he established by his might in in

[48:12] Jacob you have done for us all life is just and right exalt the Lord our God with us us let us let all the world abroad be full his food to worship him for holy is the Lord the grace of the Lord Jesus the love of the Holy Spirit be with you all now and forever more amen