Two Covenants One Story

Sometimes people wonder how the Old Testament and the New Testament connect together. Today, we're talking about that—the prequel and the sequel. So, open with us to the Book of Hebrews. We'll discover that together. Amen.

Good morning. While you're standing, would you open your Bibles with me? If you don't have a Bible, you can raise your hand, and one of our ushers will bring you one. We are going to spend some time in the Book of Hebrews this morning, which is near the end of your Bible, but we're going to start in the Gospel of Matthew.

If you would, open to the Gospel of Matthew, about two-thirds of the way through your Bible. It is the first book of the New Testament, right after the small book of Malachi and just before the Gospel of Mark. In chapter 26, Matthew 26, as you get there, look down to verse 26.

So, Matthew 26:26 records, "And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed it, broke it, and gave it to his disciples and said, 'Take, eat; this is my body.' Then he took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, 'Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.'"

Father, as we open the Scriptures today, I pray that you would open our hearts and do a work in us by your Spirit. We trust that you have given and sent the Spirit to guide us into all truth, to teach us all things, and to bring to remembrance the things that you have spoken. I pray, God, that we would remember the things that you have taught and spoken to us through the Scriptures—not just when we're gathered together in a place like this with Bibles open, but throughout the week. God, remind us of your Word to us and for us.

So, Lord, I pray that this time would be a time of equipping, that we would be thoroughly equipped for every good work this week. Speak to us, we pray this in Jesus' name. And all those that agreed said, "Amen." You can be seated.

It has been said that it was the most anticipated sequel in box office history.

In fact, the movie itself was huge, but it was so anticipated that about 10 or 11 months before it even hit the box office, when the first trailer showed up, people were waiting until midnight to watch it when it dropped online. It instantly had millions and millions of views on YouTube. There were people, maybe even in this room, who were waiting up until midnight to watch the trailer drop just a couple of years ago. Thankfully, I wasn't one of them, but I did watch it the next morning when it came out.

The amazing thing is that this sequel, which was decades in the making, was highly anticipated. A great deal of people in their 30s, 40s, and 50s were looking forward to it. However, even small kids like my son, Ethan, who at the time was about six, were excited about it too. It was no wonder that there were lines out the door on the day it opened, December 14, 2015, when The Force Awakens came to theaters. Within 12 days, it had already made $1.1 billion. To date, that single movie has made almost $3 billion.

The sequel in the Star Wars trilogy, which began back in the late 70s and early 80s, had people looking forward to the same story, the same characters, and the same plotline returning to the screen. People were super excited about it. Let me tell you, the most excited about it was Disney Pictures, who paid $4 billion for the franchise. You can be certain they will get that back and then some, as they are already on track to release the third film in their series making of Star Wars at the end of this year. They just had another one released last year, and billions of dollars are at hand in this sequel.

People are looking forward to the story continuing. The important thing about a sequel is that it is just that: the same plotline, the same universe, and the same characters, in some way, or the story of those characters that continues where you left off, perhaps giving some sort of background story as you go into the next phase. When you see such a thing, it is important for us to remember that when we come to the Bible, there is a consistent story.

Even though, just like in that series of movies, there are different films, it is all the same story. When you come to the Bible, there are different books, but it is ultimately a consistent and unified narrative. In fact, our Bible contains 66 books, and those books have a consistency to them that points to the same end.

As you may know, there are two different sections of the Bible: the Old Testament, which consists of the first 39 books and makes up the first two-thirds of the Bible, and the New Testament, which contains the last 27 books and comprises the final third. However, they all point to the same basic story. The word "testament" is actually a term from the King James Version. If anyone still uses a King James Bible or has one lying around, you know that it contains the "thees" and "thous," and so forth. In that book, every time you come across the word "covenant," the term "testament" is used. Thus, you have the Old Covenant and the New Covenant.

Although there are two covenants, there is one story. The problem is that sometimes we lose sight of this. Even here at Cross Connection, over the last many years, we have spent most of our time in the last third of the Bible, focusing on the New Covenant and the New Testament. As a result, we sometimes forget that the Old Covenant, the first two-thirds of the Bible, is there and holds great importance in the overall narrative. Without it, the stage is not set.

Unfortunately, many Christians never spend any time reading the Old Covenant because they believe it doesn't pertain to them, often saying, "I don't really have any Jewish heritage. I'm a New Testament Christian." However, we cannot fail to recognize the importance of the cohesive nature of the story from Genesis to Revelation.

As we come to the book of Hebrews this year, we are reminded that although there are two covenants, there is one story. This book that we will be studying has been introduced with some trailers, but we aren't going to delve into it fully just yet. We will get into it in a couple of weeks. Next week, for those of you who are Bible enthusiasts, we will discuss who wrote the book of Hebrews. This is a mystery among Christians, and some of you may have differing opinions on the authorship, but that's okay; we can have a little conflict.

When you come to the book of Hebrews, you immediately find that the rest of the story, those 39 books, are actually very important. They set the groundwork for the New Covenant and all that is written in the Old Covenant.

You see, the story began about 4,000 years ago. It started before that, but it really began to pick up steam in a big way with a man by the name of Abram. Abram lived in what is now the land of Iraq. At that time, it was called Ur, Ur of the Chaldees, or Babylon, near that area.

It began when this man Abram was 75 years old. God, as recorded in Genesis chapter 12, began to speak to Abraham in some way, probably through a vision. In other passages, it says that through a vision, he received God speaking to him in a language that he could understand. We talked about this a couple of weeks ago; this is what we refer to as special revelation, where God speaks in a language that we can comprehend. Abram was 75 years old when God first began to speak to him.

As you read the story presented in Genesis 12, you can turn there if you'd like. It is the very first book of the Bible, and the 12th chapter reads in an interesting manner. There, as God speaks to him, it says, "Now the Lord had said to Abram." Apparently, this message that Abram receives from God started before the text of Genesis chapter 12, and it seems as though it may have begun before Abram was 75 years old. God began to speak to him, and He had a very specific word for him.

Genesis 12, verse 1, states, "Get out of your country, from your family, and from your father's house to a land that I will show you." God wanted Abram to leave everything that was common, everything that was familiar, and everything that was secure for him in that day and age. Leaving his family and the group of people he was with was a dangerous proposition. But God came to him and said, "I want you to leave everything that you had."

Here, the story thickens. Like with any story, there is even more tension than just the call to follow. You discover that Abram, at 75 years old, had no child, which is interesting because his name ironically means "father of many." I imagine that was probably a little bit of a twist of the knife. Every single time someone would call his name, "Abram," they were calling him "father of many."

Many people find it hard to believe that Abram, at 75 years old, has no children. His wife, Sarah, is 10 years younger than him, making her 65. They are well beyond the hope of starting a family. Even though Abram is still considered middle-aged, it is difficult to imagine being 75 and in that position.

I have known some families over the years that struggled with having children due to fertility problems. Perhaps you have been in that place, experiencing the devastation, frustration, and pain that comes with it. However, the pain and frustration of modern times pale in comparison to what Abram and Sarah faced 4,000 years ago in the Middle East. It wasn't just painful; it was humiliating. They would have been looked down upon in their society, and Sarah, in particular, would have faced scorn for not having any children.

At some point, God comes to Abram, and again when he is 75, the Lord says, "I want you to do something. I want you to get out of your country, leave everything common, everything familiar, everything secure, and I want you to come follow me out West to a land that I will show you." God does not even tell Abram where he is going. He simply instructs him to follow.

Some of you may have left what was common and familiar to come to California for school, a job, or military service. You came here for a purpose, and you likely knew where you were going. Perhaps you had mitigated the risk in some way, with a plan to return to where you came from. But God tells Abram to leave everything behind without revealing his destination. He simply points him in a direction and says, "Go West, old man."

Why would Abram even consider doing that? There is something about God's word to him that piques the interest of this childless man, whose name means "father of many." God speaks to him in a vision, saying in Genesis 12:2, "I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing. I will bless him who blesses you and curse him who curses you, and in you, or through you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed."

At 75 years old, the father of many receives a message from God: "You want a family? Come follow me, but you're going to have to leave your family to do so."

And so, amazingly, Abraham, who was called Abram at that time, completely trusted in God. He left his family, his country, and his father's house, abandoning all that was secure, comfortable, and familiar. He took with him his wife, Sarah, and his nephew, Lot, because his brother had died, and Lot was now under his care. He also brought all the possessions of his household, including his servants, and began to follow God on this adventure, not knowing exactly where he was going to go.

Ultimately, they traveled about 400 miles to the west and ended up in a place that was then called the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, and others. Today, we call it Israel. He followed God, and in the midst of it, he experienced pain, difficulty, famine, and fear. Yet, he continued to follow God because he was looking forward to the fulfillment of the promise: "I’m going to make you a great nation, you father of many who has no children."

You may wonder what happened next. If you follow the story from Genesis chapter 12 through Genesis chapters 13 and 14, you will see that in the Old Testament, a lot of time can pass between the pages. By the time you reach Genesis chapter 15, about ten years have passed. Abram is now about 85 years old, and he is still childless. He did his part; he went where God told him to go. He stepped away from everything, putting himself in a difficult and insecure position. Now, his wife is ten years older; he is 85, she is 75, and they have no children.

But the plot thickens a little more. In Genesis chapter 14 and the beginning of Genesis chapter 15, Abram, in an effort to defend his nephew Lot, inadvertently picked a fight with a whole bunch of people around him. He didn’t intend to, but now he became the enemy of all those surrounding him. This ongoing conflict in the Middle East, with the land of Canaan, Israel, surrounded by enemies, is not new. Let me tell you, though every president in modern history has come into office saying, "I’m going to fix it," they will never be able to fix it.

It's been going on for 4,000 years, and there's only one who will be able to fix it. He is the true Messiah, and he won't be voted into office. Let me tell you, because he is already King of Kings and Lord of Lords. When he, the Prince of Peace, returns, then he will bring peace. However, there won't be peace, although there will be peace of courts; I guarantee you. But that's another story that has nothing to do with ours today.

There was Abram in this place in the land of Canaan. He did what God told him to do, and now he is surrounded by his enemies. You can imagine he was fearful. In fact, we know he was fearful because the word that came to him in Genesis chapter 15, verse 1, says, "After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, 'Do not be afraid.'" Now, who do you encourage and tell to not be afraid? People who are afraid. And so God comes and says, "Abram, do not be afraid." Why? "Do not be afraid. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward."

You have to read this in the right way to see it in the text because it's not written like your text message that might be in all caps when you're saying something really sternly. Notice the way that Abram responds to God here. Abram said, "Look, God, what will you give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" Then Abram said, "Look, you have given me no child, no offspring, and indeed the one born in my house is my heir."

There is some frustration in this, and I appreciate this about Abram. I think God did too because Abram was honest before God. He is afraid. He has left everything. He is in a difficult position, and God comes and says, "I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward." Abram responds, "Wait a minute. Hold on. What about this little thing that we had going on? You said, 'Come follow me. You give me children,' and I have no children. The one who will inherit everything if I die is a servant who was born in my household. I go childless."

Behold, verse four, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, "This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir." Then he brought him outside and said, "Look now toward the heaven, count the stars if you are able to number them." He said, "So shall your descendants be."

Notice this. This is the word over Abram's life that, in many respects, he is famous for. Abram believed the Lord, and God accounted it to him for righteousness. God reiterates his promise.

He says, "Abram, you will have a child. It's not going to be this Eliezer in your household who will receive the inheritance. You will have a child. This child of the promise is going to come from you." Abram believed God, and the Lord accounted it to him for righteousness.

As you go through Genesis chapter 15, you see that God establishes a covenant. The way they would establish a covenant 4,000 years ago in the Middle East involved entering into a contract, a league, a treaty, an agreement, a testament between the two: Abram and God. God assures him that he will have a child.

What happens next? Another 14 or 15 years go by. Things keep going on and on. Then you come to Genesis chapter 17, where you find that Abram is 99 years old, and his wife is 89 years old. They have no children and are way beyond the time when one would typically have children. Expectantly, they are not decorating the tent for a nursery.

In the midst of all this, they think, "Maybe we need to help God out. We need to try and fix this situation." Has anyone ever tried to help God out before? So they attempt to fix the fix. They have a servant in the household named Hagar, and Abram's wife suggests, "Maybe you could go into her and have a child. This will be a surrogate, and that will be the child." It sounds like a good idea, so they proceed with it.

However, as you know, when you try to fix the fix that you're in, God often needs to introduce another fix to address the situation you tried to fix in the first place. For the last 4,000 years, the world has been experiencing the fallout of that fix.

But God comes back again in Genesis chapter 17. He once again meets with Abram and says to him, "Listen, it's been a while." Abram responds, "Yes, Lord, it has. It's been a quarter century. I started following you 25 years ago. I left everything, came out here, and have been in this difficult situation, living in a tent in the middle of a barren wilderness because you said, 'I'm going to make you a great nation.'"

God says, "Abram, I got one for you. Listen, I'm going to change your name. You will no longer be the father of many." Wait, hold on. You're going back on your word here. No, no, no. I'm going to name you Abraham, father of many nations. Let's just rub some salt in that wound, huh?

And your wife, she's not going to be called Sarai. She's going to be called Sarah because next year, about this time, your wife is going to be 90. She's going to have a baby. You know what Abraham does? He laughs. So God says, "Okay, that's what we're going to name that baby. That son, laughter, Isaac."

At a hundred years old, Abram becomes the father of Isaac by his wife, Sarah, who is 90. They have Isaac, laughter, a little laughter in their old age. Through Abram, God passes the covenant and the relationship down to Isaac.

Story number one on your outline: God enjoys working through impossible circumstances. Why does God enjoy working through impossible circumstances? Well, I can think of two immediate reasons.

First, in impossible circumstances, you and I are forced to trust. We can't do this on our own. We can't fix this. Abram already tried to fix the fix. I know that every single one of us in this room has been in impossible circumstances. We've tried to do it on our own. We've tried to fix the fix. God says, "No, I guess we're not there yet. We need to push a little bit further into the impossible situation."

God loves to work through impossible situations. He enjoys working through them because it's there that we trust Him.

Secondly, it's there that He gets the glory. If you could fix it, you'd say, "Look what I did." And I would too. We'd all say, "Check this out that I did. I'm so intelligent. I am so industrious. I am so entrepreneurial. Look what I did." But God says, "No, we will have none of that."

In fact, you know what Abraham's fix was? He tried to fix the scenario, and you know what it's been called ever since? The child of the flesh, whereas the other one was the child of the promise.

And so Abram begot Isaac, and the promise in the covenant went down to Isaac. Then Isaac begot Jacob, and the promise in the covenant went down to Jacob. If you've been reading through the Bible this year from Genesis chapter one until now, you're probably around Genesis chapter 49 or chapter 50. The entire story is there in the book of Genesis. This opening prequel to the larger story shows that Abraham begot Isaac, and Isaac begot Jacob. God changed Jacob's name to Israel, and Israel had twelve sons who became the twelve tribes of Israel.

Ultimately, through a number of twists and turns in the book of Genesis, this family of Isaac, Jacob, and Abram ended up down in Egypt. That's where the book of Exodus starts: the children of Israel are down in Egypt. When you turn the page from Genesis chapter 50 to Exodus chapter one, you fast forward 400 years. Four hundred years pass, and that one man, Abram, with his descendant Isaac, and Isaac's descendant Jacob, along with Jacob's twelve sons, have multiplied. Now there are hundreds of thousands, potentially millions, of them living down in Egypt.

Not only are they living in Egypt, but they have become slaves. They have become the servants of the nation of Egypt, and they are under severe taskmasters as refugees in a land that is not their own. They began to cry out to God. It is recorded in Exodus chapter two, verse 24: "So God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." Four hundred years later, the great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren of Abraham are there in Egypt, facing a difficult situation. They cry out to God, and God hears their cry. Their prayer from heaven goes, "I remember my covenant, my agreement with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."

So what did He do? Exodus 2:25 continues, "And God looked upon the children of Israel, and He acknowledged them." God sent a deliverer, a man named Moses, to go down and retrieve God's people out of Egypt, to tell Pharaoh, "Let my people go." Through a number of twists and turns and various plagues upon the Egyptians, the children of Israel, the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, came out of Egypt by God's power. He brought them forth out of Egypt because, point number two on your outline, God always makes good on His promises.

For some of you this morning, this is a really important reminder: God always makes good on His promises. Sometimes there’s a decade or two, or even forty years, but God always fulfills His promises. He brought the Israelites out of Egypt and led them to a place called Mount Sinai. There, God established a covenant—not just the covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but now with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob's descendants. God establishes a covenant with the children of Israel.

Moses goes up on top of the mountain and receives from God the conditions of the covenant, called the law of God. He brings the conditions of the covenant down to the people and says, "Here are the conditions of the covenant. If you fulfill these, you will be God's covenant and promised people, and He will bring you into that land that He promised to your great, great, great, great grandfather, Abraham." That is why it is called the Promised Land, and He is going to give that to you. But here are the conditions of the promise, or of the covenant. In Exodus 19, they said, "All that God has said, we will do and be obedient. We’re going to do it all."

However, we find that while God always makes good on His promises, we do not. As part of this covenant they entered into, God brings them into the Promised Land. There, they were to be God's promised, covenanted people to serve Him. So, they built a temple to God where they would come and serve Him in worship as the covenanted, promised people of God.

Yet, almost as soon as they entered into the covenant with God at Mount Sinai, they broke it. Though God makes good on His promises, we do not. I have heard people sometimes conclude, "Well, you know, those children of Israel, they just weren’t so good at it. I would have kept the covenant." But you don’t know your own heart. They broke the covenant.

As you follow the story from Exodus through Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy—the first five books of the Bible—it becomes more and more clear with every turn of the page that this point is true.

Humanity has a fatal flaw that God's law cannot fix. Yet, the story of the old covenant, from Genesis through Malachi, centers on the family of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the children of Israel. These first 39 books focus on the narrative of these people under this covenant with God and the story of man doing his best and working his hardest to maintain God's covenant by keeping God's law.

However, the fatal flaw of humanity is exposed in the old covenant. Because of sin, it is an absolute impossibility for us to keep the covenant established under Moses. There is no way. From Moses down to Joshua and through the judges—names like Gideon, Barak, Samson, and Ehud—on to Samuel, who was both a prophet and a judge, and ultimately the kings: Saul, David, Solomon, Rehoboam, Jeroboam, and many others whose names we may not remember, they are all scattered throughout the books of Kings and Chronicles in the Old Testament.

Every single one of these people failed. The nation of Israel failed every time to fulfill the covenant of God. They succumbed to idolatry, gluttony, greed, drunkenness, and immorality. In response, God sent prophets to them—Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Obadiah, and many others—to call them back to repentance and to return to faithfulness to the covenant. Yet, every time they turned away from that faithfulness, they failed. Ultimately, they went astray and were devastated by their enemies.

Eight hundred years passed from the time they entered the promised land. Eight centuries went by filled with failure and repentance, subjugation by their enemies, including the Philistines, Moabites, and Ammonites. Finally, in the sixth century BC, the Babylonian Empire rose to power and came in to wipe out the nation of Israel, destroying their temple.

They take them captive back to Babylon. They are removed from their promised land because of the breaking of the covenant. As this is happening, as the nation, city by city, is being dismantled by the Babylonian Empire, God speaks through a prophet named Jeremiah. God says this, which you can note down in your notes: Jeremiah 31, verse 31.

"Behold, the days are coming," says the Lord, "that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Not like the covenant that I made with their fathers the day that I took them by the hand out of the land of Egypt, my covenant, which they broke, though I was a husband to them," says the Lord. "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel in those days," says the Lord. "I will put my law in their minds and I will write it in their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall know me from the least of them to the greatest of them," says the Lord. "For I note this: I will forgive their iniquities, and their sin I will remember no more."

What does God say through Jeremiah? Let me tell you this: the old covenant was a covenant whereby you would bring your sacrifices to God to deal with your sin, but you could never do it well enough. So God says, "I will bring my sacrifice to deal with your sin," because God always keeps His promises where we don't. When God brings the sacrifice and offers the sacrifice, He can say, "Your sin and iniquity, I will forgive completely, pardon, and remember it no more."

Point number four on your outline: God's law under the old covenant exposes our need for Christ and the new covenant. You see, there are two covenants, but there is one story. When we come to the New Testament and study through Matthew and all the way up...

To Revelation, we're looking at the sequel, if you will, but it's still just one consistent story. The old covenant points us to the new covenant. The old covenant establishes our need for the new covenant. It shows you and me that there's nothing we can do in and of ourselves to try and fix the issue of sin. We can't fix it. We can't deal with it. All of our sacrifices will always be insufficient, but Jesus comes and offers the sacrifice for us, which deals with it all.

This brings us quickly to Hebrews chapter 10. I told you we'd get there; it just took a little while. Turn your Bibles to the New Testament, near the end, to Hebrews chapter 10. Normally, I read from the New King James Version, and many of you have that version, but I want to read Hebrews chapter 10, verses 1 through 10, in the New Living Translation. You'll still be able to follow along, and I think you'll see how this brings out the scripture.

Hebrews 10, verse 1: "The old system under the law of Moses, the first covenant, was only a shadow, or shall we say a trailer. It was only a trailer, a dim preview of the good things to come, not the good things themselves. The sacrifices under that system, the first covenant, were repeated again and again, year after year, but they were never able to provide a perfect cleansing for those who came to worship. If those sacrifices could have provided a perfect cleansing, they would have stopped, for the worshipers would have been purified once for all time, and their feelings of guilt would have disappeared. But instead, those sacrifices actually reminded them of their sins year after year."

For it is not possible, Hebrews chapter 10, verse 4, for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin. It never was possible. That is why, in verse 5, when Christ came into the world, he said to God, "You did not want animal sacrifices or sin offerings, but you have given me a body to offer. You were not pleased with burnt offerings or other offerings for sin." And I said, "Look, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written about me in the scriptures."

First, Christ said, "You did not want animal sacrifices or sin offerings or burnt offerings or other offerings for sin, nor were you pleased with them, though they are required by the law."

The law of Moses is significant in understanding the two covenants. In verse 9, it states, "Look, I have come to do your will." He cancels the first covenant in order to put the second into effect, for God's will was for us to be made holy by the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time. That's the rest of the story, right? There are two covenants, but there is only one story. The first covenant points to the second; it's the prequel.

In 1983, we saw the release of "Return of the Jedi," and later, "The Force Awakens," which can be likened to the new covenant. Therefore, on the night that He would be betrayed by Judas Iscariot, the night before He would be crucified on a Roman cross, the Lamb of God who comes to take away the sin of the world was with His disciples. They were observing the Feast of Passover, which is the remembrance of the first covenant—the leaving of Egypt under the first covenant.

As they partook of that Passover, Jesus, with His disciples, took bread. In Matthew 26:26, it says He blessed it, broke it, and gave it to His disciples, saying, "Take, eat; this is My body, which is given for you, broken for you." Then He took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you, for this is the blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the removal of sins."

As we do every seventh Sunday here at Cross Connection, we are going to partake of communion today. This is a remembrance that the old covenant couldn't do it. This is the theme, the focus, and the point of the book of Hebrews that we will see as we go through this book. The old covenant was insufficient; it couldn't do it. Jesus is better. He comes to fulfill what the old covenant could not do, fulfilling the whole thing so that you and I could be forgiven of our sins.

When we partake of the bread, we remember His body that was broken for us and His blood that was shed for us. Hebrews chapter 9 states that without the shedding of blood, there is no removal of sins. He had to die. We could offer sacrifice after sacrifice after sacrifice, but it was not enough.

When you read through the Old Testament, you realize that there are more than 1,400 years of sacrifices every single year. We can't even fathom the amount of animals that were sacrificed, and none of that ever dealt with sin. But Jesus came and offered one sacrifice once for all. As we, like Abraham, put our faith in Him, He accounts it to us as righteousness. That, my friends, is good news. That's why we call it the gospel. Amen.

Casey and Emily are going to come up and lead us in a song again, and our ushers are going to hand out the bread and the cup. Please take both and hold on to them; we will partake together in just a moment. But let me pray.

Lord, I thank You for Your great grace towards us. Even though we tried in our own efforts—many of us can remember trying to make ourselves clean—no sacrifice that we could offer would ever be sufficient. But Jesus, You came 2,000 years ago, the just for the unjust, the Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world by laying down Your life as a sacrifice.

Lord, we thank You for the fact that You gave Your body to be broken for us and Your blood to be shed for us, that we might experience the forgiveness of sins that Jeremiah the prophet prophesied of 2,500 years ago. As we put our trust in You, You forgive us and pardon us of our sin, and You remember our iniquity no more.

Now, before our ushers distribute the cup and the bread, it may be that this is the first time you have heard this good news or that you understand it. I want to give you an opportunity to put your trust in Jesus, just like Abraham did 4,000 years ago, to receive righteousness with God—a right standing with Him.

If you want to receive Christ as your Savior today and be forgiven of your sins, would you, just where you're sitting and in an attitude of prayer, lift up your hand? Anyone here this morning? God bless you. I see you up here in the front. Anyone else? There in the back, here on the side. Anyone else back there? God bless you.

If that's you, just pray out loud with me where you're at: "Dear Jesus, I recognize that I need You. I've tried to fix myself, but I confess I can't do it."

I pray that you would come into my life, that you would forgive me of my sins, and help me to follow you by faith all the days of my life. In Jesus' name, Father, we do thank you that you are a good Father and that you have loved us with an everlasting love. You have demonstrated your love towards us, that while we were still sinners, you sent your Son to die for us.

Jesus, we thank you that you gave your life for us. On the night in which He was betrayed, He took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, "Take, eat. This is my body which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me." Let's partake together.

In the same way, after they had eaten, He took the cup and said, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me." Let's partake.

Jesus, we remember your body broken for us and your blood shed for us, knowing that with or without that, there is no removal of sins. We thank you that because of what you have done and our trust in you, you have taken our sin and cast it as far as the east is from the west, never to be remembered again.

I pray, God, that we would walk in that confidence, fully assured of your goodness and your grace, and that that full assurance would be a witness to those we interact with this week. We don't have a high and holy view of ourselves; we have a high and holy view of you. We don't boast in what we have done; we boast in what you have done. I pray, God, that that would be evident in us. Thank you for your saving grace. Amen.