CALL TO WORSHIP

(Come, Ye Sinners)

Come, ye sinners, poor and wretched,

Weak and wounded, sick and sore,

Jesus ready stands to save you,

Full of pity joined with power.

He is able, He is able;

He is willing: doubt no more.

Come, ye needy; come, and welcome;

God’s free bounty glorify.

True belief, and true repentance,

Every grace that brings us nigh,

Without money, without money,

Come to Jesus Christ, and buy.

Let not conscience make you linger:

Nor of fitness fondly dream.

All the fitness He requireth

Is, to see your need of Him:

This He gives you, this He gives you;

’Tis the Spirit’s rising beam.

TODAY’S SERVICES –

BIBLE CLASS – 10:00 a.m. – Brother Jim Casey

Liberty In Christ – Romans 14:14-23

MORNING WORSHIP – 11:00 a.m – Brother Mark Pannell

• OPENING – 1 Peter 2:6

• CALL TO WORSHIP (above)

• HYMN – Rock of Ages – p. 126

• READING – John 1:1-13

• MESSAGE – Necessary Evidence – John 3:14-21

• CLOSING HYMN – Blessed Assurance – p. 255

Birthdays: Winston Pannell – Mar. 12^th | Leon Drake – Mar. 14^th

I am preaching today for our brethren in the Sovereign Grace Fellowship at the Veteran’s Center in Honolulu, HI. I will be preaching again this Wednesday. The Lord willing, Debbie and I will be back in Albany this weekend. Please pray for us as we meet with our brethren in Hawaii, and as we travel home this weekend. —Pastor Bill Parker

In the Tabernacle of old there was an altar of incense. The incense ascending with the prayers of Israel typified the merits and intercession of Christ, His perfect righteousness which is imputed to His people and which can alone make the worship of sinful beings accepted with God. Neither time, nor events, nor even the remaining sinful corruption within His children can lessen the power and worth of Christ’s blood of righteousness. As the fragrant cloud of incense rose to heaven, and the high priest sprinkled the blood upon the mercy-seat of ancient Israel and ceremonially cleansed the people from guilt, so the merits of the slain Lamb of God are accepted with the Father as a purifier of His people from the defilement of their sins. —Copied

PUTTING ON CHRIST

Does Satan accuse you, that you are a sinner before God, and cursed by the law of God? The charge is just – OWN IT. Yet this need not destroy your peace of conscience. PUT ON CHRIST, your breast-plate of righteousness. “For, He was made sin for us, that we sinners might be made the righteousness of God in Him,” (2 Corinthians 5:21).“Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us,” (Galatians 3:13). By Him, all who believe are completely justified, fully discharged, and perfectly acquitted from ALL things (Acts 13:39). Though “sin hath reigned unto death, yet grace reigns through the righteousness of Jesus Christ our LORD, unto eternal life” (Romans 5:21). Now why is Christ, His grace and righteousness, thus held forth to us in Scripture? Surely it is that we should so put Him on in our conscience as to answer every demand of law and justice, silence every accusation of Satan, possess peace and joy in God knowing assuredly that we have eternal life in Christ. O this living and abiding in the LORD is precious! It is living like ourselves, children of God, members of Christ, and heirs of glory! —William Mason (1773)

“But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, SEEING THAT YE HAVE PUT OFF THE OLD MAN WITH HIS DEEDS; AND HAVE PUT ON THE NEW MAN, WHICH IS RENEWED IN KNOWLEDGE AFTER THE IMAGE OF HIM THAT CREATED HIM: Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all.” (Colossians 3:8-11)

Everyone who believes in Christ has “put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him.” What does this mean? The “new man” describes what a believer is in Christ and what Christ has made him to be as a sinner saved by grace who believes in and trusts the Lord Jesus Christ for all salvation and eternal life. To put this new man on is to believe what God says of us as believers in Christ and not what we see or feel in the flesh. God’s Word to all whom He has given the gift of faith is that they are saved from sin by His grace, justified (not guilty, righteous) by His grace in Christ, sanctified by His grace in Christ, and preserved unto glory in and by Christ.

Everyone who believes in Christ has also “put off the old man with his deeds.” The “old man” is his former connection with Adam in the Fall and in spiritual death evidenced by ignorance, self-righteousness, and unbelief. To put off this old man with his deeds is to repent of our dead works and former idolatry in light of the glory of God in Christ and salvation based on His obedience unto death for us (His righteousness imputed). It then is to fight all sin continually in a godly way being motivated by God’s grace in Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5:16-18). Many who claim to be Christians try to fight what they view as sin in a legal and mercenary way. They are trying to earn God’s forgiveness and blessings. Such is the way of the old man and not the new man. Those who have truly put on the new man know that Christ is all, and in all. They know that all blessings of salvation are theirs, not by their works, but by the grace of God and based on the blood and righteousness of Christ alone! They know that if they have Christ as their Surety, Substitute, Redeemer, and Intercessor, they have all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Him and are certain to enter the glory of eternal life in Christ.