CALL TO WORSHIP
(Tune – Take My Life – p. 393)

Christ is risen, let us sing,
Glory, honor, praises bring;
Law and justice magnified
By our Lord Who bled and died. (R)

Christ is risen, O what grace,
To our God alone we trace;
Peace with God and blessedness
Through imputed righteousness. (R)

Christ is risen, blessed hour,
In God's plan, by sovereign power;
For His sheep that they might live,
Them eternal life He gives. (R)

Christ is risen, O what love;
Now He reigns and rules above;
Sin and death no victory,
Christ alone has set us free! (R)

TODAY’S SERVICES – Messages by Pastor Bill Parker

BIBLE CLASS – 10:00 a.m. –
Whosoever Will – Revelation 22:17

MORNING WORSHIP – 11:00 a.m –

• OPENING – 1 Corinthians 15:55-57

• CALL TO WORSHIP (above)

• HYMN – One Day – p. 103

• READING – Romans 9:1-16

• MESSAGE – Sarah and the Promised Seed – Heb. 11:11-12

• CLOSING HYMN – Immortal, Invisible – p. 34

MID-WEEK BIBLE STUDY – WEDNESDAY – 6:30 P.M.
God’s Election of Grace (Romans 9 – 11)

The humiliation of Christ being completed in His death and burial, His exaltation began in His resurrection from the dead. This is a great cardinal truth in the Christian system. It has often been shown to be so. It is so by the confession of all Christians, and of the apostles themselves. Paul says, "If Christ is not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. . . . If Christ is not raised, your faith is vain; you are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable." (1 Cor. 15:14, 17-19). Clearly this doctrine is fundamental. It should be often preached and never yielded. It is the cardinal fact of Christianity, without which all her other facts lose their importance.

–William S. Plumer (1867)

BY HIS BLOOD

The blood of Christ (His death on the cross as the Surety and Substitute of His people, God’s elect) resulted in righteousness (perfect satisfaction to God's law and justice). How much should believers expect from Christ based upon His blood? His blood has obtained eternal redemption for all whom He died (Heb. 9:12). This means salvation full and free with no possibility of condemnation and eternal death. His blood answers all the particulars involved in our fallen condition. We are justified by His blood (Rom. 5:9). In His blood there is full and final payment of the sin-debt which means we are cleansed from all our sins. We obtain spiritual life in the new birth by His blood (Rom. 8:10; Col. 1:20). In His blood (His death) there is the assurance and application of life (spiritual and eternal) for all His people whom the Father gave to Him before the world began. This is the power of HIS resurrection from the dead. By His blood He has earned for us all grace here and all glory hereafter. By His blood (which is His righteousness) we who believe in Him have full right and title to the whole inheritance of God's grace.

–Pastor Bill Parker

WHAT THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST REALLY MEANS

It means righteousness established for God’s elect who are identified by being resurrected spiritually in the new birth and brought to faith in Christ and repentance of dead works (John 1:12-13; 3:3-7). It means God’s judgment against all who stand before Him without Christ’s blood as payment for their sin-debt and His righteousness imputed to justify them. What should we do in light of the death and resurrection of Christ? “But now [God] commandeth all men every where to repent: because He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead” (Acts 17:31). This assurance is the promise of eternal life to all who believe God's promise of salvation based on the righteousness of Christ freely imputed and received by faith, and the promise of eternal damnation to who refuse. As the Apostle Paul wrote – “Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for Whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, and be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith: that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death; if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead” (Php. 3:8-11).