Amazing Grace

[0:00] Well, if you could, this evening, with the Lord's help, turn back to that portion of Scripture that we read. Paul's letter to the Ephesians in chapter 2.

[0:15] Ephesians chapter 2, and if you read again at verse 8. Ephesians 2 at verse 8. For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves.

[0:30] It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. For by grace are you saved through faith.

[0:41] Amen. Whenever we hear the words, amazing grace, is it not the case that we are immediately reminded of that well-known and much-loved hymn, which was famously written by John Newton.

[1:01] And for many of us, we've heard about the history and the testimony of John Newton's life. That he truly was a trophy of God's amazing grace.

[1:14] John Newton had spent much of his life as an African slave trader. And he had carried maybe hundreds of ill-treated and abused African slaves from the coasts of Africa to the sugarcane fields in the Caribbean.

[1:32] And as a slave trader, he lived this rebellious lifestyle and this hardened lifestyle of drinking and blaspheming, where he would even make up songs on his ship in order to blaspheme the name of God, the God his mother had so dearly loved.

[1:54] But Newton was a man who lived without hope and without God in his life. But that was until John Newton was faced with death.

[2:05] That's what changed everything for him. When one night his ship entered into a violent storm and the ship began filling with water. And the story is told that as John Newton ran up the steps towards the deck of the ship, the captain stopped him and called him back to go and fetch him a knife.

[2:27] But the man who went up onto the deck behind him, he was immediately swept away into the sea. He was washed overboard. But in the storm, Newton was assigned to the pumps to try and pump out some of the water.

[2:42] And as he said himself, he said then, he said, If this will not do, the Lord have mercy upon us. And it was that moment in his life that John Newton knew that he needed the mercy of God to come into his experience.

[2:58] That night, as well, John Newton, he worked the pumps on the ship from three in the morning till noon the following day. Then he slept an hour. Then he took the helm and steered the ship until midnight.

[3:11] But all that time that he spent, it wasn't wasted. Because Newton spent his time thinking back over his life. And how much time he had wasted.

[3:24] And the darkness that had enveloped his own soul. And when John Newton recorded his thoughts of that night, later on, he said, I stood in need of an almighty saviour.

[3:38] And such a one I found described in the New Testament. The Lord wrought a marvellous thing. I was no longer an infidel. I heartily renounced my former profanities.

[3:51] I was sorry for my misspent life. I sought immediate reformation. I was freed from my habit of swearing. And to all appearance, I was a new man.

[4:05] And having spent most of his life dealing with slaves, John Newton came to realise that he was more of a slave than all those whom he had ferried across the Atlantic.

[4:18] Because John Newton had come to see that he was in bondage and slave to his own sin. But what broke this hardened man was that he came to discover an even greater redeemer.

[4:35] A redeemer who would deliver him from his bondage by his blood. And set him free from his sin. And from that life-changing moment, John Newton sought to never lose sight of what it means to be saved by God's undeserved favour.

[4:55] And it's no wonder to us then, that in 1779, at the age of 54, now a pastor of a church, having been a slave trader, now a preacher of the gospel.

[5:11] And he was looking back over his life. And it's no wonder that John Newton could say, Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.

[5:23] I once was lost, but now I'm found. Was blind, but now I see. And my friend, the work of God in the salvation of sinners, in bringing those who are without hope, and in complete darkness.

[5:41] And for sinners to be brought from that darkness, into God's most marvellous light, it truly is. Amazing grace. And it's something which we should never tire of hearing about.

[5:54] We should never tire of being reminded of how amazing God's grace is. Well, this evening, as we resume our study of the Westminster Shorter Catechism at question 20, I'd like us to see that our theme this evening is the theme of God's amazing grace.

[6:19] His amazing grace. And it was in 1987, the well-established author, Philip Yancey, he wrote a book with the attention-grabbing title, What's So Amazing About Grace?

[6:37] What's So Amazing About Grace? And I have to confess that I've never actually read the book, but I've always been attracted just by the title. Because every time I think about that title, it causes me to ask, Well, what is so amazing about grace?

[6:57] What's so amazing about God's grace shown towards sinners? What's so amazing about the grace of God in salvation? And that's what I want us to ask ourselves this evening.

[7:08] What's so amazing about grace? What's so amazing about salvation? And by looking at this passage in Ephesians 2, there are four things that I would like us to ask the Apostle Paul.

[7:24] I want us to ask him four questions about this amazing salvation. And I want us to ask Paul, How bad? How good?

[7:36] How amazing? How wonderful? How bad? How good? How amazing? How wonderful? So we look firstly at how bad?

[7:48] How bad? We read again at verse 1. Paul says, And what we can see here is that the Apostle Paul begins this chapter by telling us how bad it really is.

[8:31] Because before Paul reaches the amazing part about God's grace intervening in the lives of sinners, before Paul can tell us how good God is and how amazing God's grace is and how wonderful God's work is, Paul has to tell us how bad our condition is.

[8:52] Because in Paul's mind, we will never truly understand what we are saved to, unless we first of all understand what we are saved from.

[9:02] We will never understand how good God is, unless we understand how bad we are. We'll never understand how amazing God's grace is, unless we first of all understand how awful our condition is.

[9:17] We'll never fully understand the wonder of God's work of salvation, unless we know the alternative. And my friend, the alternative to salvation is destruction.

[9:31] The alternative is bondage. The alternative is condemnation. The alternative is hell. The alternative is hell.

[9:44] And so Paul seeks to spell out for us in these opening verses the effect which sin has had upon each and every one of us. And I suppose we could ask Paul and say, Paul, how bad is it?

[10:01] Really, how bad is it? How bad has sin affected us? And Paul would turn to us and he would say to us, oh, it has brought death.

[10:16] Sin has brought death. The wages of sin is death. Without the grace of God in your life, says Paul, you are dead. You are dead.

[10:27] Dead in your trespasses and sins. You're just a corpse. Sin has made you a lifeless corpse. There is no life in you.

[10:39] And because there is no life in you, you can't respond to the call of the gospel and you can't see the beauty and the glory of God's grace. Instead, says Paul, your mind has been blinded and you have been left to walk in darkness according to the course of this world.

[10:57] And the darkness of your own soul has caused you to make your allegiance with the prince of the power of the air who is the devil. And without the grace of God in your life, you're under the wrath of God.

[11:10] You are heirs of Satan. You are sons of disobedience. And the depth of the darkness and the blindness has caused you to spend your life gratifying the desires of your flesh and gratifying the desires of your mind.

[11:26] And the outcome of your sin is that you are a child of hell. Child of hell and not a child of heaven. That's how bad it is.

[11:37] That's how bad it is. And you know, that's the same approach the catechism takes. Because as we've seen already, when we did all our crime scene investigations and our courtroom scene, we saw that the catechism asked seven questions.

[12:02] Seven questions which addressed the subject of sin. And the questions which were raised were questions like, why is there sin in the world?

[12:12] What is sin? Does everyone sin? What is the extent of sin? And with every question which the catechism asked, it was bringing us closer and closer to see the misery that sin has brought upon all mankind.

[12:29] Because the last question about sin in question 19, the catechism asks, what is the misery of that estate where into man fell? In other words, how bad was it?

[12:45] How bad was it? The catechism says, all mankind, by their fall, lost communion with God and are under his wrath and curse, so made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself and to the pains of hell forever.

[13:06] That's how bad it is. That's how bad it is. My friend, the fall of Adam has left us condemned spiritually, physically and eternally.

[13:19] The fall of Adam has left us dead, spiritually dead, liable to physical death and eternal death. The fall of Adam has left us dead, dead, dead, completely dead.

[13:42] And this method that Paul uses, and ultimately the method of the catechism, by telling us how bad our sin is, this method, of course, is with the purpose and the intention of telling us how good our God is.

[14:01] Because both Paul and the catechism, they're stressing to us and they're diagnosing for us our ruin before indicating to us the remedy.

[14:13] They're presenting to us the problem prior to giving to us the provision. They emphasize our sinful, how sinful our sin is before impressing upon us how sufficient our Savior is.

[14:27] And that's the wonder of salvation, that sinners such as we are would be shown the grace and mercy of God. My friend, are you listening?

[14:41] Are you listening to this? Are you seeing the extent of your sin and your need of a Savior? Are you seeing how amazing this salvation is?

[14:55] What's so amazing about grace? What's so amazing about salvation? How bad we are. How bad.

[15:06] But secondly, we see how good. How good. Paul says in verse 4, but God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love for with he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ.

[15:25] By grace are you saved. And he hath raised us up together and made us to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come we might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus.

[15:42] And having stressed to us the extent and the depravity and the awfulness of our sin and misery, Paul now turns the whole thing on its head with just two words, but God.

[15:58] But God. And you know, my friend, these two words may seem so insignificant in a sentence which mentions the richness of God's mercy and the fullness of God's love and the blessedness of being made alive in Christ.

[16:15] But without these two words, the richness and the fullness and the blessedness, they would not be ours. Without that, but God, we would remain dead in our trespasses and sins.

[16:29] Without that, but God, we would be walking in darkness according to the course of this world. Without that, but God, we would still be trying to fulfil the desires of our flesh and of our mind.

[16:43] We ought to cling to these words, but God. But God. Because our amazing salvation can be summed up in these two words, but God.

[16:58] But God never left us in our sin and misery. But God didn't abandon us. But God didn't leave us in our bondage. But God, but God, but God.

[17:11] And my friend, if you were ever brought to the place where you are doubting your own salvation, cling to these words, but God. And if you're ever anxious about a trial that you may be going through in life, but God.

[17:27] For were it not for him, we would never cope. But he is your walk. And his mercy is rich. And his grace is amazing. And his love is overflowing.

[17:40] And so when Paul says, but God who is rich in mercy for his great love, wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins. And have made us to, he has quickened us together with Christ.

[17:54] When Paul says that, I believe he is using covenantal language. He is using the language of covenant. And what's so interesting is that, that's also what the catechism indicates to us in question 20.

[18:12] Because the catechism asks, did God leave all mankind to perish in the estate of sin and misery? And according to Paul, the simple answer to that question is, no, but God.

[18:27] But God. And according to the catechism, the answer which it gives is that God, in the richness of his mercy, and the fullness of his love, and the goodness of his grace, he entered into a covenant.

[18:45] He entered into a covenant. Now this isn't the first time we've come across the time covenant. Because when we were looking at the fall of Adam and the reason for the fall of Adam, we saw that the cause of sin entering into the world was because Adam failed to uphold a covenant.

[19:08] And we said that the covenant which God made with Adam was called the covenant of works. The covenant of works. And like all covenants, the covenant which God made with Adam, it was similar to a contract.

[19:23] Where there were terms and conditions on the contract. And in the covenant of works, there was only one term and condition. It was the term and condition of perfect obedience.

[19:35] Perfect obedience to the law. Adam was to uphold the covenant of works by perfect obedience to the commands of God. God. And as we know by now, Adam failed.

[19:49] And he broke the covenant of works. And the result was that through his disobedience, everything was lost. The contract was nullified. The covenant was breached.

[20:00] God's relationship with Adam was ruined. The judgment of death was pronounced. But God. But God.

[20:11] Out of his own good pleasure. From all eternity. Elected some to everlasting life. And had entered into a covenant of grace.

[20:24] And with the covenant of works made with Adam, now null and void, God entered into a covenant of grace. And just like the covenant of works, the covenant of grace was a contract.

[20:37] It was a legally binding contract with terms and conditions. And like the covenant of works, the covenant of grace, it also had one term and one condition.

[20:50] The term and condition of perfect obedience. But this covenant, the covenant of grace, it wasn't made with mankind. That mankind was now in a state of sin and misery because of Adam.

[21:06] And so mankind couldn't enter into a covenant with God. Not only because God knew that sinful mankind could now never uphold the covenant. But also because a covenant was usually made between two parties who were on the same standing.

[21:24] But what's interesting is that the Shorter Catechism and even the Westminster Confession, they don't actually say who entered into the covenant of grace with God.

[21:37] But when we look at the larger catechism, it's a great document to study. Question 31 asks, with whom was the covenant of grace made?

[21:49] And the answer which the larger catechism gives is the covenant of grace was made with Christ as the second Adam and in him with all the elect as his seed.

[22:03] The covenant of grace was made with Christ who was an equal party to God and it was made with Christ as the second Adam and it was to be upheld by his perfect obedience.

[22:18] But what may seem confusing is that the covenant of grace was established from all eternity. And it was established with the second Adam before the first Adam was even formed.

[22:37] It was established with the second Adam before the first Adam was even formed. and that's all because God always knew that Adam would fall.

[22:51] It didn't take God by surprise. It wasn't a shock what took place in the garden of Eden when Adam failed to uphold the covenant of works. But what always undergirded every dealing God had with mankind was the covenant of grace where it was like a safety net that was implemented in the councils of eternity.

[23:16] And of course this concept is beyond our understanding and it's quite difficult for us to get our heads around. But it's key for us to understand in order for us to understand the amazing nature of our salvation.

[23:32] And the illustration which is often given in order for us to understand the eternal nature of the covenant of grace is this illustration of a meeting between the trinity.

[23:45] And in this meeting you have God the father and God the son and God the holy spirit and they're all present together. And in their meeting the plan and purpose of salvation has been discussed and revealed.

[24:01] Where the covenant of grace is rolled out. It's like they have this large board room and the covenant of grace is rolled out. the contract between them is rolled out and it's conferred between all three members of the trinity.

[24:17] And in this discussion the names of the elect are mentioned. And they are those whom the father will give to the son. But they will only experience the beauty and the wonder of salvation if the terms and conditions of the covenant of grace are upheld.

[24:33] And these terms and conditions will only be upheld if Jesus Christ remains obedient. And in that illustration you have the father presenting to the son the covenant of grace.

[24:50] And the father asks the son, will you die for them? Will you die for them? And the son responds, I will die.

[25:03] I will die. And this wonderful illustration of God's plan of salvation is what Paul is expressing to us when he says, but God who is rich and mushy for his great love wherewith he loved us.

[25:25] But God who is rich and mushy for his unchanging, never failing, everlasting, covenant love in which he entered into that covenant of grace.

[25:38] Even, says Paul, even when we were dead in trespasses and sins, even when we were without hope and without God in the world, even when we were strangers to grace and to God, we were loved with an everlasting love.

[25:55] We were chosen in him before the foundation of the world to be made alive with Christ through the Holy Spirit. All the beauty of our salvation, says Paul, is that this covenant of grace not only ensured that you receive the richness of God's mercy and the fullness of God's love and the blessedness of being made alive in Christ, but the marvel of God's covenant of grace is that you are no longer dead.

[26:24] because when the Holy Spirit breathed life into you, he made you a living soul and God raised you up and resurrected you and he made us, says Paul, to sit in heavenly places in Christ and our union with Christ, in our union we were given this position of exaltation that in the ages to come when this world passes away and time is no more, this covenant God of all grace will show to us the exceeding riches of his glory and he will show to us the wonder of our salvation which has been achieved through our blessed redeemer Jesus Christ.

[27:12] Oh, what's so amazing about grace? What's so amazing about salvation? It's far beyond our asking or our thinking far beyond us.

[27:33] How bad? How bad are we? How good? How good is God? Thirdly, we see how amazing, how amazing.

[27:46] It says in verse 8, by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, nor of works, lest any man should boast.

[27:58] God. And in these verses, Paul proceeds to explain that the covenant through which God sought to demonstrate the richness of his mercy and the fullness of his love and the blessedness of being alive in Christ, Paul sought to emphasize there was all a unique act of grace.

[28:18] because he says, by grace are you saved through faith. And what Paul is saying is that salvation is all of grace from beginning to end.

[28:32] It's all of grace, all of it, because it's all bound up in the covenant of grace which God made in and through our second Adam, Jesus Christ.

[28:44] But the trouble some people have when considering the covenant of grace is that some people have used the term the covenant of redemption. And some people come to the conclusion that there are three covenants.

[29:00] The covenant of works with Adam, the covenant of redemption with Jesus and the covenant of grace made with Abraham in Genesis 15.

[29:11] I no doubt this has added confusion but not because of the covenant of works made with Adam. That seems to be very straightforward. But there is confusion regarding the covenant of redemption and the covenant of grace.

[29:26] Where the covenant of redemption is reviewed as the eternal plan of God's redemptive purposes in the salvation of sinners. And the covenant of grace is the covenant God graciously made with Abraham that through him all nations of the earth would be blessed.

[29:46] But personally my opinion just in a sense to tidy it all up is that the terms covenant of redemption and the covenant of grace they are synonymous.

[29:58] They are one and the same covenant. Where the covenant was initially agreed with the second Adam Jesus Christ in the councils of eternity which was always a sovereign act of God's grace.

[30:14] And then God graciously revealed this covenant to Abraham and to all his descendants in the realms of time. And for that reason I think that the terms covenant of redemption and covenant of grace are synonymous.

[30:29] And I know that it might not seem like a major issue for debate. But if we understand these concepts we are enabled to see the bigger picture of our salvation.

[30:42] and see that our salvation in every era of God's redemptive history has been an act of God's grace and God's grace alone.

[30:54] And so if we were to ask Paul tonight how amazing is God's grace? Paul would say by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves.

[31:09] It is the gift of God. grace is the gift of God. And that's what the word grace means. It means a gift.

[31:20] It's a gift. And we all know what a gift is. We all know what it is to receive a gift. It's something which you didn't buy, you didn't earn, you didn't work for.

[31:32] It's a gift. And it's only a gift because you have freely received it. And that's the contrast which Paul makes in Romans 6.

[31:44] The wages of sin is death. But the gift of God, the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. But in this case in Ephesians 2, Paul is reminding us that the gift of God is the richness of his mercy and the fullness of his love and the blessedness of being made alive in Jesus Christ.

[32:06] the gift is the goodness of God's grace. And you know, I am so thankful tonight that when I was only six or seven, my Sunday school teacher taught me what grace is.

[32:23] And I know I've probably told you this before, but I've always been so thankful for it. To have been told what the acronym for grace means. G-R-A-C-E God's riches at Christ's expense.

[32:40] God's riches at Christ's expense. My friend, the gift of God's riches is eternal life. And it's freely offered to us because of what Jesus Christ has accomplished at Calvary.

[32:56] And that is the marvel of salvation. But what is more is that God was under no obligation whatsoever to provide us a redemption.

[33:10] He didn't need to provide a redemption. There was nothing in us that suggested that we were ever worthy of being saved. There is so much evil in us that he had every right never to save us.

[33:27] But God who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us. And out of his own good pleasure he spared not his own son but gave him up for us all.

[33:42] And our Redeemer provided that redemption when he entered into the covenant of grace and the fullness of God's covenant promises towards his people are based all upon the faithfulness and the obedience of Jesus Christ.

[34:01] He was obedient unto death even the death of the cross. And the faithfulness of Christ and the gracious nature of this covenant is that upholding this covenant is not dependent upon me or you.

[34:21] It's not dependent upon us. Yes I'm called to be obedient and to be committed as one who loves and follows the Lord. But my disobedience doesn't nullify the covenant like it did with Adam and the covenant of works.

[34:39] My lack of commitment doesn't make me an outcast like it did with Adam. No my friend that's the amazing and the most encouraging thing about salvation that when we understand it in relation to the covenant of grace we see how wonderful it is.

[34:55] grace because to be saved by grace through faith it is to be in a covenant relationship with God. We are brought in.

[35:07] Where there is a covenant there is this contract between me and God. Between you and God. Contract.

[35:18] In which God is irreversibly committed to you. He is committed to you forever. And whether you may be weak in your faith or immature in your walk with the Lord or even backslidden and no one may know about it.

[35:35] Yet what this amazing salvation is reminding us this evening is that the covenant of grace is not dependent upon you and your faithfulness to the covenant.

[35:46] It's solely dependent upon the finished work of Jesus Christ. Christ. Therefore your covenant with God, your marriage with God, your contract with God, it's 100% secure.

[36:02] Because our God is 100% committed to his people. And you know this covenant of grace is the greatest assurance of our salvation.

[36:16] That there is nothing we can do to make God love us anymore. And there is nothing we can do to make God love us any less. My friend, Paul was right.

[36:28] We have nothing to boast. We have nothing to boast. Because it's all of grace. It's all of grace. And the marvel of God's salvation is that it is still offered to us simply because it's a gift.

[36:45] it's a gift. Which means, my unconverted friend, this amazing salvation is offered to you. And it's there for the taking.

[36:59] And it's yours if you want it. You don't have to pay for it. You don't have to work for it. You don't have to earn it. In fact, you can't pay for it. And you can't work for it.

[37:09] And you can't earn it because that's what Jesus has done. So the only thing which is left for you to do in order to be saved is to have faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

[37:22] And if you are asking tonight, how do I enter into this covenant of grace? How do I experience this amazing salvation for myself? How can I be saved?

[37:36] Well, my friend, if this amazing salvation is a gift which has been freely offered to you, and it is being offered to you, and you want it for yourself, Jesus says, you do not have because you do not ask.

[37:56] You do not have because you do not ask. And so all I can say to you is, you ask. You ask.

[38:07] And if you're asking, keep asking. because that's God's promise. Ask and you shall receive. Seek and you shall find.

[38:18] Knock and it shall be opened to you. What's so amazing about salvation? We've considered how bad, how bad we are.

[38:31] How good, how good God is. How amazing, how amazing grace is. But the last question which we want to ask Paul about salvation is, how wonderful.

[38:44] How wonderful. He says in verse 10, we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto every good work, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

[38:58] and having explained how bad it is for us. Without God's amazing salvation that we are dead in trespasses and sins.

[39:09] And by emphasizing how good God is because of the richness of his mercy and the fullness of his love and the blessedness of being in Jesus Christ. And then going on to describe how amazing grace is in the fact that out of his own good pleasure, God has gifted us eternal life through Jesus Christ.

[39:29] Now we want to ask Paul, how wonderful. How wonderful is God's work of salvation? How wonderful is it? And Paul says to us, we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus.

[39:49] Isn't that beautiful? We are his workmanship. And what's so wonderful about this statement from Paul is that he he has told us our original state of sin and misery.

[40:03] He's told us about God's eternal plan of salvation. He's told us how God has saved us by grace through faith and how he began that good work in us.

[40:14] But now Paul wants to tell us how God is going to bring that work on to completion. To completion because for Paul he could see that Jesus is not only our redeemer.

[40:30] He's also our carpenter. And you know I sometimes wonder if that's why Jesus became a carpenter. These years over which the word of God is silent.

[40:45] When he was growing and in his maturity before he was set apart for the particular work of our redemption, what was he doing?

[40:56] He was learning a particular trade and a particular skill. And he was learning the workmanship as a young man growing up in Nazareth.

[41:11] And it was all for a particular purpose. For when people came and met with Jesus they asked, is not this the carpenter. And you know my friend the wonder of our salvation is that this Jesus is still a carpenter.

[41:29] He's still shaping his people, still working in their lives, still cutting away all the things that are of no use as far as his design is concerned.

[41:40] He's still cutting, still hammering, still smoothing out all our rough edges because all the time he has this plan and this design in his mind's eye.

[41:52] And what our carpenter is making and what he is creating is something that is going to be so magnificent, so beautiful that only he can make it.

[42:04] I don't know if there were homes with pieces of furniture in Nazareth that were designed and made by this carpenter. But I know tonight there are lives in here which have been handled and shaped by this carpenter.

[42:22] And I know that you wouldn't wish your life to be in any other hands other than the hands of this carpenter. Because he's still in the business of doing something wonderful that will emerge from his hand.

[42:35] And you know tonight, you know it, that he's not finished with you. He's not done working with you. He's not done working in your life. But at the end of his wonderful workmanship, his promise is that we will appear and we will be like him.

[42:53] What a project he has undertaken. He's taken us from all our estrangement and our misery of sin and found us very far away from himself and very unlike him.

[43:05] But from the moment he began to work in our lives through all our providences, through all our experiences, this was our path, this was our difficulty, these were our tears, this was his plan for us.

[43:19] But when he is finished, when he is finished, he will produce in us something so remarkable, something that we could have never done ourselves.

[43:33] And as a child of God tonight, nothing could bring greater comfort than to know that in God's sovereign purpose, we are his workmanship.

[43:46] We are his workmanship. And when we look at what the Lord has done in our lives, yes, we can say with a hymn writer, amazing grace.

[43:59] But can we not say with a psalmist, this is the doing of the Lord and wonderful, wonderful in our eyes.

[44:12] salvation, what's so amazing about salvation? How bad, how bad we are, how good, how good God is, how amazing, how amazing his grace is, how wonderful, how wonderful his work is, his workmanship is just wonderful.

[44:36] and is it any wonder to us then that John Newton wrote in his famous hymn, through many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come, tis grace that brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.

[44:57] what's so amazing about grace? That it's able to save sinners, wretched sinners, like you and me.

[45:12] May the Lord bless these thoughts to us. Let us pray. O Lord, our gracious God, what shall we render unto thee for all thy gifts to us?

[45:26] And O Lord, help us to truly render thanks for the grace that thou hast bestowed upon us, the gift that has been made available in Jesus Christ.

[45:38] Help us to see how wonderful it is, and help us, Lord, to realise that we are in the hands of our great potter. For even as Isaiah could say, thou art our father, and we are the clay, thou art potter, that we are the work of thine own hand.

[45:56] O keep us in the hollow of thine own hand. Bless us in the week that lies ahead, that by word, O Lord, on the Lord's day, may it have been a feast to us, to keep us fed for the week that lies before us, unknown to any of us, but no one to thee.

[46:15] Keep us then and do us good, for Jesus sake. Amen. We shall conclude by singing in Psalm 84.

[46:27] Psalm 84 in the Scottish Psalter, page 339.

[46:41] Psalm 84, singing from verse 7 down to the end of the psalm. Psalm 84, to God's praise.

[47:10] psalm 84, psalm 84, prayer. So psalm 84, do not sprinkle every, or filled the apple of live and Secondly, so the sprint, faire�ly, clear, пока the ensuring through through the Wednesday, through the south, and came to the Lord's face.

[47:37] day appear before the Lord has led. Lord God of hosts, my prayer hear. O Jacob's God, O Jacob's God, O Jacob's God.

[48:35] excels a thousand brother in my cost as well I keep adore and dwell in death of sin for God the Lord is a sun and shield in great and glory give and dwell with hope no good from them that uprightly do live oh thou that art the

[49:52] Lord of hosts that man is truly blessed who by a sure red confidence on thee alone the rest 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 forever more amen the together

[50:54] God that Is Ein Weihn Ershelf that a of