Well, if you have your Bible, would you open it to Matthew
Chapter 7? You can grab your Bible, grab
your worship guide, kids and adults.
There's one for each of you where you can take notes through
the sermon. So I encourage you to do that.
And then I hope you've come with hearts prepared to work in the
words Lord this morning. All right, that's what we're
going to do. Let's get to work.
We are nearing the end of Jesus's Sermon on the Mount.
Now, we have said that this is a Kingdom manifesto, if you will.
And in the Sermon on the Mount, we are being told the Lord
really is. He's pressing beyond an outward
appearance of righteousness and he's exposing the hearts of
Kingdom citizens, right? And so again and again
throughout this, Jesus has shown that true righteousness is not
merely about what others see in you, but it's what's cultivated
before God in in the heart, right?
So in these verses that we're going to look at, we're going to
look at 7 one through 6 today. And in these verses, Jesus is
turning towards something that impacts every one of us.
All right? And that is, he's going to
discuss, he's going to teach on how we view, how we evaluate,
and how we respond to others. OK, now there's a lot there.
That's what those are very vague ways to describe it.
We'll get more into it. But I do want you to know this
few of Jesus's commands are more quoted and more misunderstood
than this one. Judge not all right?
So we have to ask, what does Jesus really mean?
Is all judgement wrong? Are we to ignore sin in someone?
Or is Jesus calling us to something deeper right,
something more searching, something more humbling, right,
something more holy or set apart from the world?
So we want to give our careful attention to the words of our
Lord and King this morning. And so if you're able, would you
please stand in honor of the reading of God's Word, Matthew
7, one through 6. When I'm finished reading, I'll
just say this is the word of the Lord and you can respond, Thanks
be to God. All right, so Jesus is speaking
here, Matthew 7, verse 1. Judge not that you be not
judged, for with the judgment you pronounce you will be
judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.
Why do you see the speck in your brother's eye, but do not notice
the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your
brother, let me take the speck out of your eye when there was a
log in your own eye? You hypocrites, first take the
log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to
take the speck out of your brother's eye.
Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls
before pigs, lest they trample them under foot and turn to
attack you. This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God, let's pray. Heavenly Father, we we do give
thanks for your word. We are grateful that you as
Creator, perfectly holy, just, loving, righteous, you have
sought to teach us through the written Word.
And so, Lord, we thank you for the Scriptures that we have
opened today, the gift that they are to us as Christians to help
us live a life that honors you, a life that's worthy of the
gospel we've received. We thank you, Lord, that they
are sufficient for all of life, all of godliness, that they are
sufficient to draw sinners to yourself and to save them by
your marvelous grace. And so, Father, we ask now that
you would open our hearts and our minds, open our ears and our
eyes, to see and to understand, to hear, to believe your word.
Lord, would you do this by the power of your Spirit at work
among us. It's in the name of Christ, I
pray. Amen.
You may be seated.
So maybe you're like me. I have found myself in many
conversations through the years where someone will say something
like this. I just don't think anyone has
the right to judge others. Even Jesus said judge not.
It just kind of stops there. And that's meant to be an end to
the conversation, right? Well, you and I live in a world
where one of the highest values is this.
Do not judge others. It's one of the highest values.
That was a bird that flew into the window.
Everybody's OK. Just want you to know if you're
sitting over there, you're going to make it all right.
So the bird may not, but you will.
All right. Hey, we're going to we, we will
read soon. Not a Sparrow falls to the
ground apart from the word of the Lord.
It's Providence. I don't know what else to tell
you. All right, so we have, we have
to ask the question like if that's the value system, this
judge, not we, we have to ask the question, then why do we
make so many judgments, right? Because why?
We'll say, don't judge. There's this problem right at
work. We constantly make judgments
about things right we We judge motives of others.
We judge actions. We'll judge parenting decisions,
parenting tactics. We'll judge political views of
one another. We'll judge how people spend
their money. We'll judge how they talk, the
things they say, the things they talk about.
We'll judge how they live their lives, and at the same time, we
will be greatly offended if anyone judges us in the same
way. Right?
Maybe I'm alone in this. All right.
OK, so which is it? Are we supposed to judge or not?
That's the question and that's exactly the tension that Jesus
is addressing in this passage this morning.
Like if we misunderstand him here though, I want you to be
aware of this. If we misunderstand this
passage, then we will fall likely into into two ditches,
right? Either we will become harsh and
self-righteous, condemning others at every opportunity, or
we will become passive, undiscerning, and tolerant of
sin and error in people's lives. We'll just allow it to happen.
But again, Jesus is calling us to something deeper.
All right, And it would be better to say it this way.
Jesus is calling us to something that's shaped by grace and
truth, which is what John declared.
The apostle John declared of Christ when he came that he is
full of grace and truth. So here's the main point of the
passage. If you're taking notes, you can
fill in the blanks there and you worship God.
Because we have received grace from God, we must deal humbly
with our own sin, help others lovingly with theirs, and handle
holy things with wise discernment.
Because we have received the grace of God, or because we have
received grace from God, we must deal humbly with our own sin,
help others lovingly with theirs, and handle holy things
with wise discernments. Jesus is going to unfold that
for us in three clear movements. The first we'll see is that we
must examine ourselves humbly before judging others.
Secondly, we must correct others graciously after confronting our
own sin. And thirdly, we'll see we must
discern wisely when handling holy things.
So here's what's before us if we are to live as citizens of
Christ's Kingdom. And I trust that that's why
you're here today, all right, as believers, to learn how to live
as a better citizen of the Kingdom of Christ, right?
Then we must learn to judge rightly, all right?
We're not as hypocrites, not as harsh critics, but as those who
have been transformed by the grace of God.
Amen. And so let's begin with the
first command here. Number one, examine yourself
humbly before judging others. This is covering verses 1 and 2.
And so as we as we come to verse one, Jesus gives one of the most
well known commands in all of Scripture.
Judge not that you be not judged.
Now again, this is one of the most misunderstand understood
commands of the Bible. Jesus is not forbidding all
judgment. He is not telling us to abandon
discernment. He's not telling you to ignore
sin. In fact, later in Matthew's
Gospel, he warns us to beware of false prophets and to test them,
which requires discernment. Later.
Later in Matthew's Gospel, he commands us to confront a
brother who sins, right? So what then is Christ
forbidding in Matthew 7? Well, he's forbidding a spirit
of self-righteous, hypocritical condemnation of others, right?
Yet this, this sort of posture of the heart that places us
above others as their judge while ignoring our own sins,
That's what he's forbidding here.
So I don't want you to miss the reason he gives.
Judge, not that you be not judged.
It's the reason, judge, not that you be not judged.
Now this is often called a divine passive, a divine
passive. Now what that means is there is
an implied judge here. Judge not that you be not judged
by who? The implied judge here is God
Himself, right? In other words, Jesus is saying
that if you take your seed as judge over others in a proud,
condemning style, then you are inviting God's judgment upon
yourself. Verse 2 makes it even clearer.
Jesus says, For with the judgment that you pronounce, you
will be judged and with the measure that you use, it will be
measured to you. So in other words, the standard
you apply to others reveals your hearts, right?
It reveals what you think about yourself and it will also become
the standard by which God will deal with you right now.
This is exactly what we see echoed in the in Romans 2 verse
one, and Paul writes there he says when you judge another, you
condemn yourself because you, the judge practice the very same
things, right? So listen, the issue is not
whether we make judgments, it's how we make those judgments and
it's from what kind of heart are we making those judgments.
You see, Jesus is exposing a critical fault finding spirit, a
spirit that is quick to condemn others, a spirit that's slow to
extend mercy to someone, a spirit that's blind to its own
need for God's grace. Consider how easily we do this
right? We see what we see someone
else's sin, and we'll magnify it, all right?
We'll, we'll, we'll make sure that we amplify that thing to
the NTH degree, all right? We'll put it under a microscope,
we'll dissect it. We'll put it under a magnifying
glass so that's easier to see. And that's what Jesus is
exposing here, right? We'll analyze the sin.
We'll shake our heads at the sin.
We'll talk about the sin either, you know, we might say it,
anyone might use it as a as like a veiled prayer request.
But really it's just gossip. Have you heard that?
So and so did such and such. We should really pray for them.
But really the motivation behind that was just to tell the story,
right? But when it comes to our own
sin, let's keep that private. But let's minimize that.
But let's excuse it, right? I wouldn't have done that if I
hadn't. Blah, blah, blah.
All right? You don't know the way I was
raised. You don't.
You don't know the kind of dad I had.
You don't know. You know the anger I deal with.
You don't know my life experience.
And right, all these things contribute to the kind of person
I am. Well, excuse it.
We justify it even, right? Well, if they hadn't done such
and such, then I wouldn't have responded the way I did.
But that was on them, right? They got what they deserved.
Justified. Here's the problem, brothers and
sisters, we are often very skilled at being prosecuting
attorneys for others and being really great defense attorneys
for ourselves. And Jesus says that kind of
judgment has no place in my Kingdom, no place in my Kingdom.
So then we have to ask, well, what should we do?
How does this, how does this land on us?
What's it calling us to do? Well, first, it calls you to
humility, right? Yet before you evaluate someone
else's life, you should examine your own hearts and examine it
with honesty. Bring things into the light,
Don't keep them in the dark. Examine it with humility.
Understand that your whole life is lived before the face, before
the eyes of God, right? Secondly, it calls us to merce.
On one hand we have humility, on another we have mercy.
If you have received grace from God through Christ, you are a
believer in Jesus Christ. He's raised you to walk in
newness of life, Then you cannot live with a harsh, condemning
spirits toward others. All right.
The forgiven do not become merciless.
They don't become merciless. Thirdly, it calls us to fear
God, to Revere Him, to understand that He is the
perfect judge. It's not just about Jesus.
What Jesus saying here is not just about how we treat others.
It is also about how God will deal with you, right?
We, you are not the final judge. You might put yourself in the
place of judge of someone's life, but you are not the final
judge. Again, your whole life has lived
before the face of God. You will stand before God one
day. So we should fear God as we
think about judgement. So we must put away the posture
of superiority. We put away the instinct to
condemn others. We have to put away the
eagerness to point out the faults of someone else.
And instead, this text invites us to take the low place, to
take the place of those who know their own sin, to take the place
of those who cling to God's grace.
Hide ourselves under the shadow of His wings.
Amen. But that does raise an important
question. I think that if we're not the
judge in a hypocritical, self-righteous way, does that
mean that we never address sin in others?
Do do we just ignore someone else's sin?
Do do we pretend that it's not there?
Well, Jesus answers those questions for us directly in the
next verses, right? So point #2 correct others
graciously after confronting your own sin.
Correct others graciously after confronting your own sin.
Here we're looking at verses 3 through 5 S.
Jesus presses the issue further here, using one of the most
vivid and unforgettable images in all of Scripture.
If you've got a visual mind at all, you should chuckle as you
read this right. Why do you see the speck in your
brother's eye but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?
Now, the word for spec here refers to something small.
It's like a splinter or a tiny piece of debris.
But the law, the word log here refers to a large beam.
Literally a log, right? Something massive, something
impossible to miss. Maybe at the very least, you
could think of a 2 by 4 protruding out of someone's eye,
right? Jesus is exposing the absurdity
of hypocrisy. Why are you, with a 2 by 4
protruding out of your eye, so concerned about the speck of
dust in your neighbor's eye, your brother's eye, right?
It means it's meant to be a piercing kind of humor, right?
It's so absurd, the image is so absurd that it makes you
chuckle. But at the same time, it's
piercing the truth behind it because it reveals something
true about ourselves, right? We noticed quickly where others
fall short. But when it comes to our own
sin, as we said a moment ago, we're often blind, or at least
we don't want to see it for what it truly is.
We'll minimize it, we'll hide it.
And so Jesus continues in verse four, he says, or how can you
say to your brother this log in your eye?
Hey, let me take that speck out of your eye.
Do you hear the assumption in that the man is offering help,
but but he's in no position to give any help, is he?
And and Jesus then names it plainly in verse 5, You
hypocrites. That's strong language, but it's
necessary language. It is hypocritical.
It's exactly what it is. The the issue is not that the
man is wanting to address sin. The issue is that he is doing so
hypocritically without dealing honestly with his own faults.
All right, and then Jesus gives the proper order.
First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see
clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.
All right, notice carefully here.
Notice the wording. Jesus does not say ignore the
speck. He says deal with your sin
first, then you will be able to help your brother.
So this is not a call. This is not a call to avoid
correction. It's a call to purify
correction. Correction is not removed in the
New Testament. Correction is redeemed in the
New Testament. The correction in the Kingdom of
God is meant to be humble, not proud.
It's meant to be after the goal of restoration, to be
restorative in its nature, not condemning.
And it's meant to be clear sighted.
I've dealt with the log in my own eye, and so that I'm not
reacting as a hypocrite or acting as a hypocrite here.
You see, it's only when we have honestly and seriously
confronted our own sin before God that we are able to see
clearly enough to help someone else.
All right? Think of it this way.
If you had something in your eye, all right, something
painful, something that needed to be removed, right, you, you
wouldn't want a person with blurred vision and shaking hands
trying to fix that, would you? Right, you?
You would want someone who can see clearly.
It's not someone who's careful their hands are steady, right?
Someone who understands what they're doing.
Well, Jesus is saying when it comes to dealing with sin, you
must first address your own blindness, your own lack of
clear sight, your own shaky hands before attempting to help
someone see better. So how does this shape us then?
Well first it calls the serious. I'm going to use the word
serious. Serious self confrontation.
Not surface level confession, not vague acknowledgement.
I'm really struggling this week. Could you just pray for me?
No, but a real honest confrontation with our sin
before God. Right?
But before you speak into someone else's life, you must
ask yourself, have I examined my own heart and have I examined my
own heart? Am I aware of my own need for
God's grace? Secondly, this passage, this
portion of the passage calls us to offer what we might call
gracious correction. You have to notice the word
Jesus uses brother, if you can help your brother.
But the goal is not to win an argument, but the goal is not to
prove a point. The goal is always to win a
brother. Amen.
That's the point of correction, gracious correction.
That means our correction should be marked by gentleness.
It should be marked by patience and love and a desire for
restoration. Our correction should be filled
with the Spirit. Amen.
And 3rd, it calls us the clarity of vision.
Only those who are honest about their own sin can help others
rightly. You see, pride blinds, but grace
clarifies. When you know how much you've
been forgiven. You will not come at others
harshly. You will come with humility and
with care for their soul. So the text is not saying ignore
sin and others. No, it's saying don't ignore the
sin and others. But neither can you rush in
carelessly. Amen.
But even that, I think, raises another question, like we're to
examine ourselves humbly and correct others graciously.
Does that mean that we treat everyone the same in every
situation without distinction? The Bible take a stab at that.
Jesus answers that for us in verse 6.
Point #3 Discern wisely when handling holy things to serve
wisely when handling holy things.
Now in verse 6, Jesus had something that at first glance
might feel surprising. It might even make you a little
uncomfortable because it's a bit jarring.
Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls
before pigs lest they trample them under foot in turn to
attack you. Now this is not a verse about
how to handle your dog at home or your pigs, all right.
But why does Jesus say that here?
Why? Why offer this after what he's
just walked through? I think it partly because he
knows his words in verses one through 5 could be easily
misunderstood. They could be easily
mistranslated to mean judge not ever.
If we hear judge not, we might think, well, I should never make
distinctions, I should never notice things.
I should treat everyone the same.
I should just keep offering truth no matter how it's
received. And Jesus here in verse 6 is
saying no, no, listen, you have to understand, grace does not
mean gullibility. Grace is not being you become
gullible. Grace does not mean you become a
doormat. Love.
Love does not mean that you should lack discernment right
here. Jesus is using strong imagery to
describe a certain kind of people, dogs and pigs.
Now if you're offended by that, just remember he called us
hypocrites just a few verses ago, right?
These were not household pets in the day of Christ.
They were unclean animals. They're often used as images of
those who are hostile dogs, aggressive like dogs,
unresponsive to the sacred or trampling upon it like a pig
would, right? And so here he's Speaking of
what is holy. Here he's Speaking of pearls.
He's talking about things that are precious, right?
Things that are valuable, things that are set apart.
And so the warning is this, do not take what is sacred, what is
precious, and continually place it before those who will only
despise it and trample on it and respond with hostility.
Again, I don't want you to misunderstand what Christ is
saying. He's, he's not giving you
permission, brother or sister, to write someone off too
quickly. You don't have that permission.
He's not encouraging you to have a harsh or cynical spirit toward
others. You understand that we are
called by God to boldly proclaim the gospel and to broadly
proclaim the gospel. But but he's teaching us here
that there are times, there are times where the gospel is so
offensive to someone that they display a settled, hardened
rejection of truth, a contempt for that message which is holy.
And in those moments Christ is saying wisdom is required.
There are times to speak up, and then there are times to close
your mouth. There are times to press in, and
there are times to back off and entrust someone to the Lord in
prayer, even Jesus himself at times.
We'll see it as we go through the gospel.
Even Christ Himself at times withheld further words, or He
withdrew when faced with hardened opposition, instructed
His apostles to do the same. So this verse does not
contradict the call to humility and grace at all.
It completes the call to humility and grace.
Right. Kingdom citizens must be humble
and gracious, yes and Amen. And they must also be
discerning. Think of giving something to
someone that is deeply valuable to you.
It's something precious. If it's a family heirloom, it's
something that means a lot to you.
And you give it to someone and they have no regard for it.
They don't care about it. They don't recognize it's worth.
They don't treat it with, you know, with care.
They they misuse it. They even mock it.
Now over time you realize this is not helping and it's also
dishonouring what is valuable right?
That that's the picture that Jesus is painting here.
The the issue is not the pearls value.
The gospel has the value at all times.
The the issue is the response of the one receiving it.
So again, how does this shape us?
How does this inform how we live day-to-day?
Well, first it calls us to value that which is holy.
I want you to understand the gospel is not common.
It's it's not worthless. The truth of the gospel is not
disposable. We must have it.
It's highly valuable. It's the story of God giving his
most prized possession, his own Son, for the sake of sinners.
You know, Paul writes that we were bought with a precious
price, the life and the blood of Jesus Christ himself.
So we must never treat God's truths lightly.
We must never treat the truths of the gospel lightly.
As believers, we must be careful not to place them in context
where they are persistently scorned and trampled upon as
unbelievers. Many of you in here today are an
unbeliever, that there's a warning here for you.
And the warning is this. You want to be careful not to
scorn or trample on gospel truths.
Instead, you should beg God to help you believe them with all
your heart and all your soul to trust them emphatically.
Secondly, this passage calls us to exercise discernment toward
people. I want you to understand this.
Not all rejection is the same. It's just not.
You have to be discerning, right?
Some people might reject initially because they're
struggling. They're questioning, they're
struggling with the truth. They're they're questioning
their validity, the wrestling with what you're telling them.
They're also having to wrestle with their own sinfulness and
wrestle with a perfect holy just God.
And, and recognizing that they're falling short.
You understand that, right? And so they may be hardened at
1st and maybe even be hostile at first, but you're called by God
to patiently walk with them. Others may harden themselves
against the truth, right? They mock it, they attack it,
they'll blasphemy it in crisis, saying here that wisdom
recognizes the difference in those responses.
Thirdly, this passage calls us to trust God with the results
You and I cannot manufacture the results of someone's heart.
We're not God, we don't have that power, right that I love
this old saying from the Puritans.
The same sun that melts the ice hardens the clay.
And it was a description of how they would talk about what the
gospel message does. The same gospel message will
soften the heart, it'll melt it and it will also harden the
heart, right? The gospel message softens sums,
it hardens others. Your job is not to worry
yourself about the results. Your job is to be faithful to
God in your proclamation of the gospel and to trust God with
their heart and soul. Amen.
There are times when continuing to press the same truth into a
hardened heart does not lead to repentance, it'll lead to
greater resistance. And in those moments, you
entrust that person to the Lord in prayer, knowing that only he
can soften the heart. You beg him for wisdom on how to
proceed. So as Kingdom citizens, you are
not called to be harsh toward others.
You're not called to be naive either about sin.
You're called by God to be wise. You're called by God to examine
yourself humbly, You're called by God to correct others with
grace, and you're called by God to discern others wisely when
handling that which is holy, God's word.
And when all those things come together right, they reveal a
heart that has truly been shaped by the grace of God.
And that brings us to this question that we all must
answer. We all must answer this.
Am I living this way? Am I living this way?
Am I examining myself humbly before I will judge others?
Or am I really quick to see others faults while remaining
blind to my own? Am I correcting others
graciously after confronting my own sin?
Or am I speaking up from pride rather than from love for
others? Am I discerning wisely when
handling what is holy? Or have I been careless with the
truth and naive and how I employ it?
You see, this passage exposes us brothers and sisters, by nature,
by human nature, we do not live this way.
It requires a supernatural experience with the grace of
Christ. We we are quick to judge.
We're harsh with others and we're slow to examine ourselves.
We're gentle with ourselves. So that means that you and I as
Christians need more than instruction.
We need the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.
So look to Christ today. Where you have judged wrongly,
he has judged rightly. Where you have been harsh, He
has been merciful. At the cross, Christ bore the
judgment that you and I deserved.
While we were still sinners, Christ died for us so that we
might receive mercy instead of condemnation.
And when the grace of the Lord takes hold of your life, it
begins to transform you. Brothers and sisters, it humbles
you. You.
You see your own sin more clearly.
You're not walking around with a log in your eye.
You're noticing the specks now. It, it, it humbles you.
It it softens you. It makes you willing to
sacrifice time, to sacrifice just your own desires, your own
whatever, to be able to help others in their time of need.
It softens you towards their needs and it teaches you to deal
honestly with your own sin before you confront the sin of
others so that you might lovingly deal with theirs.
So the call today for believers and unbelievers is the same as
it is every week. Come to Christ, find help from
the Lord in your time of need. But listen, if you are an
unbeliever again, if you don't know Christ as your Lord and
Savior, I, I implore you, turn from your sin.
Trust Christ as your Lord today. And if you do know Christ, you
are a believer, then I urge you as well live as one who has
received grace from on high. Examine yourself with humility,
Be honest in your evaluation of yourself.
Correct others with grace, with gentleness, with a desire to see
them redeemed, to see them reconciled to God, and discern
wisely those holy things that God has called you to handle,
those gospel truths as you cast them abroad, as you boldly
proclaim them. Recognize when you're dealing
with pigs and dogs, and when you're dealing with someone
who's sincere and wanting to understand.
In doing so, you will reflect the heart of your King.
Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you
for your grace and your mercy. We thank you for your great help
and our time of need. Father, we thank you that you
have given us this instruction on how to rightly judge sin and
the world in which we live. And to God, it is my prayer that
you would help us to be the kind of people who are humble, who
understand our own sinfulness, who understand our own struggles
with temptation, our bouts with fallen nature.
God, would you help us to be wretched over our sin?
Would you help us to be mournful over our sin?
Would you help us to find mercy and grace at the cross of
Christ? As we re remember our
transgressions, as we think on those?
May our souls be comforted by the truth that Christ bore every
one of our iniquities on Himself, that He bore our
transgressions, that He has made us new, that He's healed us by
His own stripes, that He's given to us His own righteousness and
taken our unrighteousness on Himself.
And help us to be comforted in that, that we might go out
boldly proclaiming the gospel, rightly judging sin, and seeking
to truly help others out of the miry pits, to see them brought
into the marvelous light of your salvation.
So God, I guess my prayer is that you would help us to not
burn with anger so much so over sin that we will not.
We refuse to proclaim the gospel.
We refuse to call people to repent.
But God give us soft hearts toward others.
Help us to be willing to help a brother in need.
Father, I pray for unbelievers today.
I pray, Lord, that You would help them now to judge rightly
the state of their own soul, that you would help them to see
that before you. They are stripped naked, they
are bare in their own sin. They are covered in the darkness
of iniquity, and they're in need of a Savior.
They're in need of the marvellous light of salvation.
They're in need of a new heart, and may they beg you today to
save them. May they call out to you, as
Romans 10 teaches, that everyone who calls upon the name of the
Lord will be saved. May that be true of them this
day. I'm going to give you a moment
now in your seat to seek the Lord in prayer, to bring your
sin before Him, to confess before Him today, to judge
rightly your own hearts, to be honest in your evaluation of
yourself, and to plead with Him to provide all that you need
today. Heavenly Father, we thank you
that we can boldly approach your throne of grace and our time of
need, and we can find mercy and grace in every situation.
That we have a sympathetic high priest in heaven who was tempted
and tried as we are, yet without sin.
And so he knows the need of our souls.
He knows the need of our lives. We thank You, Father, that You
do not leave us in our need, but that by Your mercy and grace You
meet every one of them. You tend to our hearts and to
our souls as a gentle shepherd does His sheep.
You call us away from sinfulness.
You call us away from temptation.
You protect our lives, You guide us in the way that we should go.
You make known to us the path of life, and at Your right hand are
pleasures forevermore. We thank you, Father, that you
are a good God. You're faithful to every
generation and steadfast in Your love.
And we know that now as we have sought you in prayer and our
time of need and the Father help us to live a life that would
honor your great name. And especially in this area of
how we rightly judge. Maybe do that in a way that
would bring honor to you. And maybe do that in a way that
would cast a light on sin. We cast a light on darkness.
And having cast a light, people would see it for what it really
is, that they would be drawn to Christ our Lord, that would be
saved. Father, forever, we love you.
It's in the name of Christ we pray.
Amen.