Genesis: Dark Clouds & Bright Hope

If you have your Bibles, open them up to the book of Genesis this morning. Well, I'll just wait for you to get there because I'm going to hear something here in a second. Genesis chapter 5, the very first book in the Bible. And once you turn there, you immediately see that it's a genealogy. And I can hear your hearts start to beat with anticipation. Oh, good. A genealogy. I mean, who the heck doesn't love a good genealogy?

I don't know if you've ever traced your family history. Hopefully, you have. Hopefully, you've traced it as far as back as you could go. My mom has been on this work for I don't know it feels like forever. she will kind of keep me updated about new discoveries in the family tree. and uh she's traced her dad's side of the family um back to my seventh generation grandfather, a man by the name of Casper Codddle who was born in northwest Germany and uh I think he had 14 kids and then his son John was the one who immigrated to the United States settling in Detroit and married, you know, married of course and uh his first wife and he also produced 14 kids, cold Detroit nights

and then his wife passed away and he married again and uh his second wife and he only produced seven kids. So we refer to her as a slacker and no I'm kidding uh as the as the slacker in in the family. But you know, you trace your family line and it's interesting because it makes so much sense of your present circumstances, why you live where you live, why your family came from, where they came from. It makes so much sense of the way your parents uh speak, why they speak a certain way, the games that they play. When you were growing up, you're like, why why in the world are we playing this game? This doesn't make any sense. It was an old German game that they had brought over. um the way they speak, the way the way they do certain things, it explains so much. And what you find as you explore your family's history is that within every family, there are scoundrels, people who did some really horrible things, people who made decisions that had devastating effects on the family tree, the family line. So there's scoundrels in every family and we like to pass over those guys. When you're going through the genealogy, you just pass over those people really, really quickly. But then there's also people within every family tree who are kind of saints. Not in the theological term, but you look at their life and they did remarkable things. So you got scoundrels and you got saints. People who some who when you get to their line, you get to their place in the family history, you pause over it. You linger over their life story because it's got something good to tell you. Um, you pause, you linger over it because you want to highlight their life. You want to highlight their accomplishments. And what's true of your family of origins, if you've traced your family line at all, is also true of your spiritual family of origins. And in Genesis 5, Moses traces the family line from Adam and Eve. He's tracing the line from Adam and Eve. And what he shows us after the sin of Adam and Eve, the spread of sin comes really, really quickly. It goes right down to the next generation and it has devastating consequences as their firstborn son Cain murdered his younger brother Abel. And so what he does is Moses traces, we looked at this a little bit last week, Moses traces the line of Cain down to the seventh generation. And what he shows us is in that line in that line of the family tree uh paradoxically it brought great great cultural development. We saw the founders of agrous of music and the arts. We saw um of craftsmanship. So great cultural development but also great cultural depravity because the culture was was godless and it was marked by violence and oppression. But then in the end of the chapter, what Moses does is he he starts to focus in on the line of Seth. And we're told that it's through that line that through Seth's line um that people began to call upon the name of the Lord. And Moses is very intentionally what he's doing is he's contrasting the two lines. The line of Adam through Cain and what it brought and the line of Adam through Seth and what it brought. The seventh generation of Adam through Cain was Lamech, who flaunted his rejection of God's word and God's ways by being a polygamist and boasting of killing another person. While the seventh generation of Adam through Seth is Enoch, who we're going to look at this morning, who walked so closely with God that he didn't even experience death. And so the author Moses, he's contrasting the line of Cain and the line of Seth. And it's from the 10th generation down through Seth. It's through the 10th generation down through Seth that no Noah would be born. And so what happens, what you see in chapter 5 is Moses, he begins to trace this line. And you may be thinking to yourself as you're reading the genealogy, as you're looking at the genealogy right now, you may be thinking to yourself, "Wait a second. Are we really going to read through the genealogy?" And the answer is yes.

This is what you signed up for 100 days ago. You signed up for expositional preaching. And uh we're actually going to make it through an entire chapter today. And we haven't done that once yet together. So we're going to make it through an entire chapter. And here's the deal. This this section is hardly ever taught on. And most people just kind of blow right past this section. Mo most of you guys probably if you're reading the book of Genesis, you blow right by this section. And um most pastors do the same. They don't normally teach on it. But here's the deal. It actually is quite instructive. It teaches us how to live wisely and well in a culture that's marked by wickedness. Because if you turn over to chapter 6, you don't need to. I'll read it to you. But we're told in chapter 6 that the Lord saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. So that's the backdrop that tells you what's happening within the within the surrounding culture. So this passage what it does when you slow down and meditate upon it, it reminds us that humanity was gloriously created, it presents us with humanity's glaring problem. And you ought to know what the glaring problem is by now. And then it tells us of a great hope. So with that in mind, let's read the text together. And what we'll do is is I'll mispronounce some names as we read it. And then we'll uh we'll come back and we'll see three things this passage is teaching us. So Genesis chapter 5, here's how Moses records it. This is the book of the generations of Adam. Now, right off the get-go, that should remind you that book of the generations, anytime you see you see the word generations, this is a new section in the book of Genesis. So new section. This is the book of the generations of Adam. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them and he blessed them and named them man when they were created. When Adam had lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image, and he named him Seth. The days of Adam after heathered Seth were 800 years, and he had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days that Adam lived were 930

and then he died. And if you're a notetaker, uh if you want to underline something, underline the phrase and he died. When Seth had lived 105 years, he fathered Enosh. Seth lived after he fathered Enoch 807 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Seth were 912 years and he died. Underline it again. When Enosh had lived 90 years a heathered Kenan. Enosh lived after he fathered Kenan 815 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enosh were 95 years. And he died. When Kenan had lived 70 years, he fathered Maha Lel, the first Hawaiian.

You got to get a laugh where you can. When Kenanid had lived 70 years, he fathered Mahal. Kenan lived after he fathered Mahala Lal 840 years. And he had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Kenan were 910 years and he died. When Mahalel had lived 65 years, he fathered Jared. Mahalel lived after he fathered Jared 830 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Mahalel were 895 and he died. when Jared had lived 162 years after he fathered Enoch. Jared lived after he fathered Enoch 800 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus, all the days of Jared were 962 years and he died. When Enoch had lived 65 years, he fathered Methula. Enoch walked with God. after he fathered Methula 300 Methuselah sorry Methuselah 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enoch were 365 years. Enoch walked with God and he was not for God took him.

When Methuselah had lived 187 years, he fathered Lamech. Methuselah lived after he fathered Lamech 782 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Methuselah were 969 years and he died. When Lamech, now this is a different Lamech than the one that we read about last week. When Lamech had lived 182 years, he fathered a son and called his name Noah, saying, "Out of the ground that the Lord had cursed, this one shall bring us relief from our work and from the painful toil of our hands." Lamech lived after he father Noah 595 years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Lamech were 777 years and he died. After Noah was 500 years old, Noah fathered Shem, Ham, and Japth. This is God's word. Okay. Now, as I was reading the genealogy, I could feel some of your eyes starting to glaze over. Um, and here's the reality. like genealogies. They aren't the most exciting sections of scripture. To be sure, every part of scripture is inspired, but not all parts of scripture are as as inspiring as others. But like I said in the opening, this genealogy, it's actually pretty instructive. This genealogy teaches us three important truths that we need to consider. What does it teach us? Well, it teaches us that humanity was gloriously created. It teaches us humanity has a glaring problem. But then it teaches us that humanity has a great hope. So let's work through each one. First, humanity was gloriously cre uh created. The the Sethite genealogy is introduced in verses 1 and two with a look back. Did you notice that? And it reminds them and us as the readers of it that humanity was gloriously created by God and blessed by him. The language of verse one, it's reminiscent of the Bible's opening poetry of Genesis 1 27 where we read that so God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created them. Male and female, he created them. So, it's reminding the Sethites. Moses is writing this to Israel as they're coming in to the as they're leaving um Egypt and making their way towards the promised land. He's reminding them, God has created you. The line that is traced from Adam and Eve down through Noah to you, this line was gloriously created. Humanity alone is created in the image of God. No other creature bears God's image. And this look back, it reminded the descendants of Seth that the fall, though it had marred the image of God in each and every one of them and in each and every one of us, it hasn't been oblit obliterated. And because they were image bearsers, they had this unbelievable privilege and an unbelievable potential as image bearsers. Think about it. as image bearsers. They had the capacity to hear God's word, which is something, as Kent Hughes points out in his commentary, no other creature except for angels can do. And as image bearsers, they were charged to steward the earth on behalf of God. And the image of God within them, it suggested the possibility of having an intimate relationship with God. So, not only were Adam and Eve created in the image of God, they were given the command to be fruitful and to multiply. And as the descendants of Adam and Eve, they were to carry on the creation mandate. And Genesis chapter 5, the genealogy, it demonstrates, it tells us that the Sethites, they took this command seriously and they got busy and they filled the earth. the the genealogy, it suggests extraordinary multiplication. The the 10 generation structure of the genealogy, it what it does is it probably indicates that like a lot of other biblical genealogies, this listing is representative rather than complete. Uh Kenneth Walker, uh Bruce, did I say Kenneth Walker? Okay, Kenneth Walker, that's the running back for the Seahawks. It's not who I meant. He needs to get 20 touches today though. Um, Kenneth Matthews, Kenneth Matthews, Bruce Walkey, John MacArthur, Derek Kidner, they all believe that this material is arranged stylistically from the the 10 generations from Adam to Noah and then after the flood, 10 generations from Noah to Abraham. So if it's arranged stylistically, what that means is if there's gaps between the ancestors, it leaves tremendous room for substantial increase in population. Just tremendous opportunity for population. Think about it. If you have flexibility within the genealogy, plus the ref plus the repeated phrase that the patriarchs had other sons and daughters, plus super cold nights, plus living on the average of 900 years. How many babies you could produce in 900 years? I just told you about some of my offspring. They were popping 21 out. How could you how many could you do in 20 in 900 years? So Seth's genealogy, it reminds us that humanity was gloriously created and they were living out God's command, living under God's blessing. And uh even after the fall, even after the fall, they were living out God's command to be fruitful and multiply and spreading the image of God upon the earth. And at at this point, we were told last week that from Seth's line, some of them had begun to call upon the name of the Lord. And even as people like ourselves, even as people who the image of God is marred in us, we're still called to carry out the creation mandate to steward the earth's resources to make it productive and profitable without exploiting the earth. We're still called to be fruitful and multiply. And I've noticed within this congregation, you guys take that seriously. Um, you are joyfully fulfilling that command. Good for you guys. So, we see that humanity was gloriously created. But then the second thing this genealogy teaches us is that humanity has a glaring problem and the relentless repetition of the phrase and he died and he died and he died and he died. It what that does is it functions like a drum beat signifying the con the consequences of sin is spreading fast and furious. Humanity has a glaring problem. We get caught up in the the ages of the patriarchs. Don't get caught up in that. Um get caught up in the reality that each and every one of them dies. The world the the world is not the way it ought to be is what Genesis 5 is telling us. The world is not the way it ought to be. We see the grim reality of sin and death. And note these realities regarding sin and death. First, it's autonomous. It's autonomous. It's they they chose moral autonomy. Adam and Eve did. Meaning when Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, they decided they wanted to determine right from wrong apart from God. That's a moral autonomy. We're going to be the captains of our own soul. Thank you very much, Lord. We're going to decide what's right and what's wrong. Thank you for very much. This is what they did. And here's the deal. Um, in our culture, you don't have to deny God's existence. just his lordship because even the demons know that God exists. So you don't have to deny his existence, just his lordship, which is exactly what Satan did with Adam and Eve in the garden. Satan didn't deny God's existence. He started out with, "Did God really say?" It's not a denial of his existence. It's a denial of his lordship. Will you submit? Will you live your life in obedience to his word and his ways? So moral autonomy, they wanted to put themselves in the position of God and humanity has been doing it ever since. So it's autonomous, a law unto themselves. So note this. This is the grim reality of sin and death. It is autonomous. Secondly, it's universal. It's universal. When Adam and Eve conceived and Eve gave birth first to Cain and then to Abel and then to Seth, their sin nature, Adam and Eve's sin nature gets passed on to them. This is what theologians call universal sin. Meaning it's the sin nature is passed on to sub every subsequent generation. When my girls were really little, like fresh babies, people would come over and they would say, "Oh, they're so cute." And I'd say, "They're the cutest little natural-born sinners you're ever going to see in your life." Because each and every one of us, we're born. And you found out real quick that I was right. Um because the word no came before mom.

How depressing. Um that word came fast and it just that that sin nature gets passed from one generation to the next and all of humanity now has this builtin propensity to distrust God and to sin. The Apostle Paul in Romans chapter 3 you know it puts it plainly he says for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. All have sinned. Now, that Greek word that's translated all, this is a freebie. No extra charge. It means all. When it's translated, it actually means what it says. It means all, which means me, means you. It means the person that you're dating right now that seems like they're perfect, they have a sin nature as well. It's one of the tricks of marriage, is it not? You get in the marriage and you think, "My spouse is perfect." And then you live with them for like two weeks and you're like, "No, they're not. They're just as sinful as I am. Holy smokes, what the heck facade for so long." Um, it's universal. And we try to hide it. We try to brush it aside. We try to ignore it. And yet you can't. You can't. It's universal in nature. Here's the third reality we see regarding sin and death. It's hopeless. It's absolutely hopeless. The genealogy continually repeats this depressing phrase, "And he died." I had you underline it. People get again, they get caught up in how long the patriarchs live. And it is impressive that have an average lifespan of 900 years. But the real emphasis on this chapter isn't on on how long they lived. It's that they all they all died. verse 5, verse 8, verse 11, verse 14, verse 17, verse 20, verse 27, verse 31 tells us again and again and again and they died. And they died. So the Sethites, they lived under the double-edged sword of human experience. As one commentator put it, life produces hope only to see it dashed by the all too real finality of death. Is this depressing? The glaring problem of humanity is the grim reality of sin and death. And there's nothing we can do to fix it. And if you've ever been around a dead body,

you know that's true. In the last year,

I was in the room with a six-week old baby who died and had to bury that baby. I was in the room with a great member of our church back in southern Oregon when he died. I was in the room when two separate instances when their bodies were being taken out. And you see death and you can't shake it. You see death and you think to yourself, it's utterly hopeless. There's nothing we can do to fix this. And again, the Apostle Paul, he puts it so well. He explains humanity's problem. He tells us in Romans chapter 5, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin and so death spread to all men because all have sinned. He says this is the continuation of it. Death has come in it to the world and because of it all have died. Adam, our first father, he sinned and he died and his descendants followed him into sin and death because again the apostle Paul tells us the wages of sin is death. And there's this pattern to the patriarch's lives. And here's the pattern. A person's named and lives so many years, number of years, he fathers a son. I mean, we read this again and again. He he's named, he lives so many years, fathers a son, and then he lives so many years after he fathers a son, and he has other sons and daughters. Then he lives a total of however many years, and then he dies. That's the pattern. And by the way, that's going to be the pattern every every single one of us. Every single one of us, there will be an epitat, there will be an obituary that will be read regarding your life. Again, this sounds rather depressing. And as someone who does funerals, a lot of them, um, they can be rather depressing depending on what's told in that in that obituary because every single obituary, it will state the basic details of our life and we will die. This is why the psalmist says, "Lord, teach us to number our days so that we may gain a heart of wisdom." And again, it this sounds oh so depressing. Some of you right now are thinking to yourself, "My goodness, Travis, I brought friends to church. Can you say something that's hopeful?" Okay. Okay. This passage has told us that humanity was glorious, gloriously created, but then reminds us that humanity has a glaring problem. Sin and death has entered it and it has affected each and every one of us. But then the genealogy tells us that humanity has a great hope. There's a great hope. When you come to the seventh generation from Adam, you come to Enoch. Go ahead. And we're told Enoch walked with God and he was not for God took him. Meaning the Lord took him and he didn't experience death. And that's supposed to jump out at you. The fact that and he died and he died and he died and he died and then all of a sudden there's this one who didn't experience death. There's this one who walked with God so closely that the Lord just took him. This shines like a a single brilliant star above the earth's dim record of this chapter. And as I mentioned, the placement of Enoch, of his name here, it couldn't be more intentionally dramatic. The seventh from Adam in the line of Seth is godly Enoch who walked with God. While the seventh from Adam in the line of Cain was wicked Lamech. So again, there's this contrast. Lamech who shows us the way of sin and what it leads to. It leads to death upon death upon death. It leads to this sinful, boastful, ugly, oppressive way of life. And there's a contrast between him and Enoch who escapes death because he walked with God. And then of course he becomes the ancestor of Noah whose birth is recorded at the end of this chapter. So notice what's happening here. We've been in the book of Genesis for nine weeks now. I hope you see what's happening here. There's a contrast between the two lines. Huge contrast between the two seeds. And this points right back to Genesis 3:15. It echoes Genesis 3:15, where the Lord told the serpent that there would be enmity between his seed, the offspring of the serpent and the offspring of the woman, the godly line and the ungodly line. There's this conflict, he says, that's going to take place. And you see this actually being played out in the contrast right here between these two lines. One's a scoundrel and one's a saint. One's completely rejected God's word in his way as Cain and one has walked with God so faithfully he escapes death. Well, what does it mean that Enoch walked with God? First of all, the phrase is only used of two people in the Bible. It's used of Enoch and then uh Noah. And it indicates uh this walking with God, close companionship to God. That's what it indicates as if walking side by side with God. It implies friendship with God and intimacy with God. Well, how do you get that? How do you foster friendship and intimacy with God? You remind yourself of a couple of things on the daily. And you got to remind yourself on the daily of these things. First, you got to remind yourself on the daily that I'm a saint who happens to sin. Which means you come to the Lord daily humbled for our sins as we examine our lives in light of God's word and his ways. But then in the same time, what at the same time, you acknowledge that in Christ, you're assured of deep forgiveness as you embrace the promises of God. Tim Keller, the great the great late pastor, put it like this. He says, "You're more sinful than you know, but in Christ, you're more loved than you dare to dream." And you need both of those realities. You need to be become aware that I'm more sinful than I know. And that humbles you out. And then to be assured, but I'm more loved than I've dared I've ever dared to dream. And that actually when that penny drops on your heart, it act it enables you to press into the relationship and say, "Okay, he's seen me at my worst, but he loves me still." that enables you to press into your relationship with the Lord. Um, it gives you it gives you the intimacy you crave to be fully known and all of us crave to be known. It gives you uh the intimacy that you crave to be fully known even at your worst and then the deep assurance that you need to keep progressing in your relationship with God. So, how do you foster how do you foster this close relationship? Well, this deep intimacy, you press into the twin realities that I'm more sinful than I've ever thought. And that humbles me out. It opens me up to recognizing I really need the Lord in my life. But then the twin assurance of that is you're more deeply loved than you've ever dreamed. And I press into this relationship with him. So close comp uh close companionship to the Lord, this deep intimacy with God. Second, it implies consistency with God. Consistency. Well, what do I mean? You know what a walk is? It's one foot in front of the other repeatedly consistently. Remember in the ancient world there were no planes, trains, automobiles or even bicycles. So the main way you got from here to there was by walking by putting one foot in front of the other. The phrase also indicates this deep obedience for the metaphor of walking suggests walking alongside God's path in the same direction. a long obedience in in the same direction to quote Eugene Peterson. So it's this this consistency with God. And then third, how do you what does walking with God? What does this mean? It means confidence in God. Enoch from the line of Seth and remember it was from Seth's line that people began to call upon the name of the Lord. So, six generations after they begin to call on the name of the Lord, Enoch, he had confidence that God's character is good because it got passed from one generation to the next to the next to the next. He had confidence that God's character was good and his ways are perfect. And so, he trusted him. And that's that idea of trust. That's really what confidence is. It's this outgoing faith in a in another person. And this is exactly what Enoch had because we're told in Hebrews chapter 11 let me let me read it to you. By faith Enoch by faith, notice that by faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death and he was not found because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God and he pleased God because he had outgoing faith in him. So walking with God, it implies outgoing faith in him, a daily surrender to him, and growing in intimacy with him. Well, then the question becomes, well, how do we walk with God? Because here we are in the 21st century, thousands of years removed from Enoch. So the question is, how do we walk with God in our time, in our place? How do we get to know God and walk with him? And here's the reality. In God's grace, he doesn't leave us to our own devices. He doesn't leave us up to our own devices to say, "Well, you just kind of figure it out on your own." No, no, no, no. He actually took the initiative in sending his son to us who is the final and full revelation of God. We're told in Hebrews 1:es 1-3 this regarding Jesus Christ. We're told long ago at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He's the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. So we have the final and full revelation of God. So we're not left wondering. And Jesus himself actually asserted this. Jesus says in John chapter 14, "Whoever has seen me has seen the father." So we begin to walk with God when we come to and we put outgoing faith in the person of Jesus Christ. And then we daily submit to his word and his ways. And we're not going to do it perfectly, by the way, because we're going to still battle our fleshly desires, each and every one of us. But over a course of walking with God, there should be consistency, an everinccreasing consistency in coming under the lordship of Jesus Christ. And again, it's a daily submission. Jesus says Luke chapter 9, whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. So our walk, it begins when we put our confidence, our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it continues as we daily come to him and we let his word and his ways shape our lives. It grows in intimacy. We grow in intimacy and friendship with God. And you remind yourself of the gospel realities. The gospel realities that you're more sinful than you care to admit. You're way more care. You're way more sinful than you care to admit, especially in church. You don't care to admit that in church, but you're way more sinful than you'd care to admit. And yet, at the same time, in Christ, you're more loved than you dare to dream.

More sinful and more loved.

You know what those are? Those are the very things that led Jesus to the cross for you. The very things that led Jesus to the cross for you. The glaring problem of humanity is is our sin problem. And it's alienated us. It's alienated us from God. And we're told again and again and again. And this chapter demonstrates it that the wages of sin is death. And we can't fix it. But God in Christ, what he does is he takes the whole sin dilemma and he turns it inside out. And the wrath of God that should have fallen on us for our sins has fallen on him. He bears our sins. He dies in our place. He bears all of our sin. He dies in our place. And there's nothing that communicates our sin and God's love quite like the cross of Christ. This is why Paul Romans 5:8, he says this. He says, "God demonstrates his own love for us in this. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. our deep sinfulness that we can't solve. And God's deep love for us compels Christ to the cross. And when we meditate on these realities, it fosters his intimacy with the Lord Jesus Christ. And these realities are actually symbolized right here at the Lord's table. the elements of communion. The bread representing the broken body of the Lord Jesus Christ. The cup symbolizing the shed blood of Jesus upon the cross. It reminds us that our sin was so deep, it was so pervasive that God himself had to enter into the creation to solve it. And then the table itself, I don't know if you know this, but the table in first century, the table in the first century was not was not just simply about eating. The table was symbolic of deep friendship. It was symbolic of saying I identify with that person completely. And you know what Jesus says? He says, "Whenever you eat of this," meaning come regularly. He's identifying with you and you're identifying with him. There's this deep friendship that's taken place because of what he's done. So the deep the deep sin, Jesus's broken body, the shed blood of Jesus paid for the table representing you're deeply loved by me. I've identified with you completely. You're my friend. Come to my table. All of this is pictured at the Lord's table. So, we're going to come to the Lord's table in just a moment. And here's what I want to say. If you're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, we invite you to come and receive the elements. But if you haven't given your life to Christ, then let me let me say this. We are grateful that you're here. Really, honestly, we're really grateful that you're here. And we respect where you're at with your journey with the Lord Jesus because all of us are on a journey. And so, we respect that. But we ask that you would respect us and this meal because this is a covenant meal for believers. So I'm going to pray and then when I'm done praying the table will be open and what we do at Faith Community is you come forward to receive the elements and then when you have them you'll return to your seat and when everybody has them I'll come back up and we'll pray and then we'll take the elements together. Okay, let me pray.

Father, we are so grateful once again to be your children, to be people who have entered into a relationship with God himself in the person of Jesus Christ, recognizing our own sinfulness, Father, recognizing there's nothing we have done to deserve our relationship with you, but you being rich in mercy have gone to the cross in our place. Your body was broken. Your blood was shed to pay the penalty of sin. The wages of sin is death. And then you've come up on the other side of it through death in the resurrection. And you have guaranteed eternal life for us. and you invite us as friends to come to your table and to remember all that you have done to have deep communion and companionship with you. And so, Father, as your people, we rejoice. We celebrate and we long for the day, Father, and we pray it soon that we will stand upon a renewed creation and we will look our Savior in the eyes. But until that day, Father, have us be about your business. Have us be about your work and proclaiming the gospel, loving people well in the name of Jesus Christ. We thank you and we love you in Jesus name. Amen.