Spurgeon: "Christ is unchanging"
of C. H. Spurgeon. Preached on Thursday Evening, the 23 February 1888
“Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever” (Jews 13:8)
Let me read you the verse that comes before our text. It is always a good habit to look at texts in their context. It is a mistake to cut off small portions of God's Word, and take them out of their context; it is an offense to the Word of God; moreover, it sometimes happens that a passage from the Holy Scriptures loses much of its beauty, of its true teaching and its true meaning, since it was taken out of context.
Nobody would think of mutilating Milton's poems in this way, taking some verses from Paradise Lost, and then imagine that you could really get to the heart of poetic efficacy. So, always look at the texts in their connection in which they are placed. The previous verse of our text is this: “Remember your conductors, who preached the word of God to you; and considering how their career ended, imitate their faith.”
Observe, then, that God's people are thoughtful people. If they were what they should be, they would make a great deal of memories and considerations; this is the essence of this verse. If they are to remember and to consider their earthly conductors, much more are they to remember that great Conductor, the Lord Jesus and all those matchless truths that flowed from his blessed lips. I wish, in these days professing Christians remember and consider a greater amount; but we live in such turmoil, hurry, and worry, that we don't have time to think. Our noble ancestors of the Puritan tradition were men with backbones, of solid and independent gait and self-disciplined men who would know how to behave on the day of conflict; and the reason was that they had taken time to meditate, time to keep an agenda of their daily experiences, time to commune with God in secret. Take the hint, and try and get some’ more thoughtful; in this busy London, and in these difficult days, remember and consider. My next comment is that God's people are made up of imitative people, because we have said here that they must remember who their conductors are, that is, those who spoke to them of the Word of God “and considering how their career ended, imitate their faith”. Now I'm dying for it, today, after the originality of the speech, to show you a path of faith. When a sheep does that, they are bad sheep. The sheep follow the shepherd; e, to some extent, they follow each other at least when they are all following the Shepherd together. Our great Shepherd never aimed to be original; He spoke in words that were never his own, but with words he had heard from his Father. He was docile and obedient in learning: as the Son of God, and as a servant of God, his ear was open to hear the instructions of the Father, and he might say: “I always do those things that please Him”
Now, this is the true path for a Christian, that is to take, follow Jesus e, Consequently, follow all true saints as they can be worthy of being followed, imitating godly men as long as they imitate Christ.
The apostle specifies by saying: “imitate their faith”. Many young Christians, if they were to pretend to follow a path chosen by themselves, they would inevitably fall into many pains, while bearing in some way the way of the way in which the most experienced and most educated Christians have been able to lead, they will know how to keep pace with the flock, and they will also follow the footprints of the Shepherd. God's people are made up of thoughtful people, and to be such one must be imitative and humble, to be educated, and to follow holy and devoted examples.
A good reason, however to imitate the saints it is given in our text; it is because our Lord and His faith are always the same: Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever. You are invited to see, if the old foundations were to shift, if our faith was always changing, then we could not follow any of the saints who went before us.
If we have a special religion for this century, it is ridiculous for us to imitate the men of the first century, and Paul and the apostles are just old fads that are sinister considering their remoteness from us. If we are to continue to improve ourselves from century to century, I cannot refer you to any of the reformers, or confessors, or brave saints in the old days, and tell you: “Learn from their example”, because, if religion has entirely changed and improved, it's a curious thing to say, but we would set an example for our ancestors.
Clearly, they cannot follow them because they have left the earth; but how we believed we were better than our fathers, so then we can't think of learning anything from them. How we left all the apostles behind, and we went for something rather new, this is a pity that we would not forget what they did, what they suffered, and thinks that they were just a collection of simpletons who acted at the height of their own light, but then they didn't have the light that we have in this wonderful century!
Or adored, may my lips be smeared with sores in speaking after the present bad manner, for the dirtiest falsehood that has ever been issued and that is the insinuation that we have shifted the eternal foundations of our faith.
In truth, if these foundations were removed, we might ask ourselves in a certain sense: “What is right to do? Who will imitate them? Who will follow them?
If the milestones are gone, which remains to us of the holy treasure of examples with which the Lord enriches those who follow Christ?
Coming to our text, Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever, my first observation is:
I. JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF IS ALWAYS THE SAME. HE IS, ERA, AND IT WILL ALWAYS BE THE SAME.
There have been changes in situations and circumstances in our Lord, but He has always been the same in his great love for his people whom he loved or always was the earth. Before the first star was lit up, before the first living creature began to sing the praise of its Creator, He loved his Church with an eternal love. He spied on her in the glass of predestination, he painted it from his divine foreknowledge, and he loved her with all his heart; and it was for this cause, that he left his Father, and became one with her, to redeem it.
Precisely because of this love he went with her accepting all that ruckus of wounds and lacerations, paid his debts, and nailed his sins into his own body on the tree. For her, slept in the grave, and with the same love that brought him down, has risen again, and with the same heart that truly strikes at the same blessed betrothal he ascended in glory and awaits the wedding day, when it comes again, to receive his bride made perfect and blameless by His grace. Never for a moment, be like God above all, never stopped blessing, not even as God and man in the same divine person, or as dead and buried, or as risen and ascended, he has never changed the love that flows from him for his chosen one. He is Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.
therefore, beloved brothers, he did not change his opinion about his divine purpose towards his worshiped Church. He decided for eternity to become one with her, which would also become one with him; e, having determined this, when the fullness of time had come, he was born of a woman, made under the law, he assumed the likeness of sinful flesh, “and being found in the form of a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient to death, and at the death of the cross.” Yet, he never abandoned his purpose, set his face like a flint stone going up to Jerusalem; even when the bitter cup was placed on his lips, and seemed to stagger for a moment, he returned to a strong resolution and said to his Father “If it is possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I want, but as you want.” That purpose is strong for him now; for the sake of Zion he will not keep his peace, and for the sake of Jerusalem he will not remain, as long as his righteousness continues as brightness, and his salvation like a burning lamp.
Jesus is still supporting the church with his great works, and he will neither fail nor discourage in it. He will never be happy until all those he has bought with His blood are also glorified by his power. He will gather all of his sheep in the paradise earth, and they will again pass under the hand of Him who told them, that each of them was brought there by the Great Shepherd who laid down his life for them.
Adored, he cannot go back from his purpose; it is not according to his nature that he could do it, because he's Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever.
He is also the same yesterday, today and forever, in “shareholding” of its offices for the execution of its purpose, and in giving effect to his love.
He is also a Prophet. Men try to put it aside. What is falsely called science, comes forward, and demands that he be silent; but the sheep follow him, “because they know his voice; and they will not follow a stranger, but they will flee from him: because they don't know the voice of a stranger.” The New Testament teachings are like a ringing and true day bell as if they were a thousand eight hundred years old; they have not lost any value, none of their absolute certainties; they stand like the eternal hills.
Jesus Christ was a Prophet, and he's the same yesterday, today and forever. He is the same, also, like a Priest. Some now grin at his precious blood; Alas, that's it! But, for His elect, your blood is still their purchase price, by which they win big, through the blood of the Lamb they achieve victory; and they know they will praise him in heaven, when they have washed their garments, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. They will never stray from this high priest of theirs, and by His wonderful sacrifice, once offered for the sins of men and perpetually effective for all the blood-bought race; they will give him glory in his eternal priesthood before the throne of the Father. In this we rejoice, Yup, and will rejoice, that Jesus Christ who is our priest, “the same yesterday, today and forever.”
Even as King he is always the same. He is the supreme head of the Church. In front of you, o Jesus, all your subjects greet you! All sheaves bow to Your sheaf; the sun and moon and all the stars respect and serve You, You who are the King of kings, and the Lord of lords.
You are the Head over all things of Your Church, which is the body.
Adored, if there is any other task that our God has taken on for the completion of his divine purposes, we can say about him, about each level, that He is “the same yesterday, today and forever.”
He is once again, so too, the same in the relationship with his people. I like to think that, as Jesus was the Husband of his Church years ago, He is still Her Husband, because it hates the one who divorces.
Like him, he was the Brother born out of adversity for his first disciples, he is still our faithful Brother. He was like a Friend who kept himself closer than a brother to those who were severely tested during the Middle Ages, he is equally a Friend to us on whom the end of the world has come. There is no difference in the relationship of our Lord Jesus Christ with His people at any time in history. He's just ready to comfort us tonight as He was ready to comfort those who were with Him when He was down here.
Sister Maria, He is like when he came down to your Bethany, and helps you in your pain for Lazarus, He is like when he came to Martha and Maria that he loved. Jesus Christ is just like he is ready to wash your feet, my brother, tired after another day's journey through the bad roads of this world; He is the same and will take the pelvis, and the pitcher, and the towel, and he will wash his loved ones there, as he did when he washed the feet of his disciples.
What He was to them, He is for us. It is a source of happiness if you and I can truly say, “what He was for Peter, what He was to John, what he was for Magdalene, this is Jesus Christ to me “the same yesterday, today and forever.”
Adored, I have seen men change; oh, how they change! A little frost causes the green forest to wither, and every leaf gives up its grip, and flies in the blast of winter. Thus our friends fade away, and the closest intimate ones leave us in the time of trial; but Jesus is for us what he always was. When we have old and white hair, and the others have closed the door to those men who have lost their former strength, and they can no longer serve them in turn, they will say “Even with graying hair I'll take you: I did it, and I will be born; I will also bring, and I will deliver you”, because He is Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.” So, adored, it concerns Jesus himself; He is always the same.
Now let's take it a step further.
II. JESUS CHRIST IS ALWAYS THE SAME IN HIS DOCTRINE.
This text must refer to the doctrine of Christ, since it is one with the imitation of the faith of the saints: “Follow the faith of these, considering the end of their conduct: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. Do not get carried away here and there by various and strange doctrines, because it is good that the heart is made stable by grace”. From the connection it is evident that our text refers to the teaching of Christ, that is, He who is “the same yesterday, today and forever.” This is not according to madness “development” namely that theology, like any other science it must grow, watered by the splendid wisdom of this enlightened age, bred by the superlative skill of gentlemen of light and led by the present time, so far superior to all who came before them!
We don't think so, brothers; because the Lord Jesus Christ was the perfect revelation of God. He was the express image of the Father's person, and the brightness of His glory. In previous eras, God had spoken to us through His prophets but in these last days He has spoken to us through His Son. Now since That was a complete revelation, it is blasphemous to suppose that there may be someone more revealed who has been made known in the person and ministry of Jesus Christ the Son of God. He is God's ultimatum; the last of all, He sent His Son.
If you can conceive of a more brilliant figure of God than the one that was seen in the Only Begotten, I thank God that I am unable to follow you in such an imagination. Per me, He is the last, the highest, the greatest revelation of God; and as He closes the Book which contains the written revelation, He never makes an offer to take this, lest he take your name out of the Book of Life, and never challenges you to add it, so that he would not take away from you the wounds that are written in this Book.
In this era, the salvation of our Lord Jesus Christ is the same as that offered in all ages. Jesus Christ still saves sinners from guilt, from power, from punishment, and from the contamination of sin. Yet “there is no other name under heaven that has been given to men so that we must be saved.” (proceedings 4:12) Jesus Christ still does all the new things; He creates new hearts and righteous spirits in the children of men, and engraves his law on tablets that were once made of stone, but that he turned them into flesh. There is no new salvation; some may speak as if there were, but there is not. Salvation means to you today, just what it meant to Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus; if you think it has another meaning, you have failed together.
E, yet, salvation through Jesus Christ comes to men in the same way as it always has. You must now receive it by faith; in the time of Paul, men were saved by faith, and they are not now saved by works. In the apostolic age they began in the Spirit, and we don't have to start in the flesh now. There is no indication in the Book, and there is no indication in the experiences of God's children, that is, there is never the possibility that there is any change in the way we receive Christ and live through him. “by grace you are saved, by faith they are and it does not come from yourself; it is the gift of God”, God's gift today, as much as it always has been, because Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.
Once again, this salvation is just the same as the people it was sent to.
Now it will be preached, as always, to every creature under heaven; but it addresses itself, with a particular power, to those who are guilty, and those who confess their guilt, to broken hearts, to men who are tired and with a heavy load of sins. It is to these that the Gospel comes with great sweetness. I mentioned earlier those strange words from Joseph Hart: “A sinner is a sacred thing, the Holy Spirit did it like this.”
He is; the Savior is for sinners only. He did not come to save the righteous, he came to seek and save the lost, it's still “for you the word of this salvation is sent”; and this statement still holds true, “This Man receives sinners and eats with them”. There is no change in this statement, “the poor have the Gospel preached for them, and it comes to those who are furthest from God and hope, and it inspires them with divine power and energy.
Adored, I can bring many who testify that the Gospel is the same in its effects on the hearts of men. Still it breaks through, and still makes whole; still hurts, and still heals; still kills, and still hurries; it still seems to throw men down into hell in their terrible experience of the evil of sin, but still lifts them up in ecstatic joy, still they are almost exalted to heaven when they rely on it, and they feel its power in their souls.
The Gospel which was a Gospel of births and deaths, of killings and resurrections, in the time of John Bunyan, it has just the same effect on our hearts on this day, when it comes with the power that God has put into it by His Spirit. It produces the same results, and it has the same sanctifying influence it always had.
Looking over the narrow stream of death, we can say that the eternal results produced by the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ are the same as they always were. The promise is fulfilled on this day for those who accept Him as well as for those who left earlier, and that is, eternal life is their inheritance, they will sit with him on his throne; e, on the other side, the threat will still be a sure fulfillment: “These will go away in eternal punishment.”, “But those who don't believe, they will be damned”. Christ made no change in his words of promise or threat, nor will his followers challenge him to do so, because its doctrine is “the same yesterday, today and forever”.
If you were to try to think on this matter, and imagine for a minute that the Gospel has really moved and changed with the times, it would be very extraordinary. You see, here is the Gospel for the first century; make us a brand, and notice how far it goes. Then there is a Gospel for the second century; make us another brand, but then remember that you have to change the color for another shade. Both of these people will have had to alter the Gospel, because a very different effect could have occurred in the same kind of minds. For eternity, when they all get in heaven from these nineteen gospels, in the nineteen centuries, there will be nineteen categories of people, and they will sing nineteen different songs, dependent on it, and their music will not blend. Some will sing “of the gratuitous grace and love of the dying man”, others will sing of the “evolution”. What a discord it would be, and what a sky it would be, also! I would not aspire to be a candidate for such a place.
No, let me go where they praise Jesus Christ and Him alone and sing, “To him who loved us, and he washed us of our sins in his blood, to him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen”. That's what the first century saints sang; Yup, and that's what the saints of every century will sing, without any exception; and there will never be changes in this song forever. The same results will flow from the same gospel until heaven and earth pass, because Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.
We can play the same note again, for a moment, because
III. JESUS CHRIST IS THE SAME IN REFERENCE TO HIS WAYS OF WORKING
How did Jesus Christ save souls in ancient times? “It has pleased God to save those who believe by the folly of preaching” (1 Corinthians 1:21 ): and if you look down through the history of the church, you will find that, where there has been a great religious awakening, it was linked to the preaching of the Gospel. When the Methodists started going very fast, who they called men who made such mystifications?
They were not called “Predicators Methodists”? That was always the name: “Here comes a Methodist preacher”. Ah, my dear friends, the world will never be saved by Methodist doctors, or by Baptist doctors, or anything else like that; but the multitudes will be saved, by the grace of God, through the preachers. The preacher is the one to whom God has entrusted this great work. Jesus said,: “Preach the Gospel to every creature”. But men have grown weary of the divine plan; to be saved, they are going to the priest, from music, by theater actors and no one knows this!
Good, they can try these things as long as they like, but nothing can ever come of the whole thing but absolute disappointment and confusion, God will dishonor them, the Gospel in disguise, hypocrites manufactured by the thousands, and the church dragged down to the level of the world.
Stand on your firearms, brothers and continue to preach and teach nothing but the Word of God, because it pleases God, to save those who believe by the folly of preaching, and this text still really stands: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever”.
But remember that there must always be the prayers of the saints with the preaching of the Gospel. You have often had to observe that passage in the Acts regarding new converts on the Day of Pentecost, “They were persistent in following the apostles' teachings” (proceedings 2:42): they reasoned about a great deal of doctrine in those days.
“And the association”: they thought a lot that they were in church-association in those days. “And in breaking the bread”: they did not neglect the blessed ordinance of the Lord's Supper in those days: “In breaking bread”. And then what follows? “And in prayers”! Some say today, that prayer meetings are a good, well-devised religious expedient. Ah, my dear! What a religious expedient the one provoked at Pentecost, when they gathered together in one place, and when the whole church prayed, suddenly the place shook, and they heard the sound as of a mighty wind manifesting the indwelling of the Holy Spirit!
Good, you can try to act without prayer meetings, if you like; but my solemn conviction is that, as these decrease, the Spirit of God will depart from you, and the preaching of the Gospel will certainly be insignificant. The Lord will have the prayers of His people to go with the proclamation of His gospel if they represent the power of God for salvation, and there is no change in this matter since Paul's day, because Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. God still required the house of Israel to do this for them, and He still grants blessings in response to trusting prayer.
Remember, Furthermore, that the Lord Jesus Christ has always been willing to work by the spiritual power of his servants. Nothing comes out of a man that is not in him first. You won't find God's servants doing great things for Him, unless God works mightily in them, as well as through them. You must first have been endowed with the power from Above, otherwise the power you will not manifest it in what you do.
Adored, we want our church members to be better men and women; we want Christian children to become Christian men; and we want Christian men among us to be strong in the Lord, and in its power.
God will work through his servants when they are fit for his service; and he will make his tools fit his works. It is not in them that they have any strength; their weakness becomes the reason for His strength to be seen in them. There is still an adaptation, there is an appropriateness for his service, there is a cleansing that God puts on his instruments before he does mighty things through them; and Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever, also in this matter.
All the good that is ever done in the world is done by the Holy Spirit; and how the Holy Spirit honors Jesus Christ, so He puts great honor on the Holy Spirit. If you and I try, either as a church or as individuals, to do without the Holy Spirit, God will be quick without us
Unless we adore it reverently and confidently, we will find that we will be like Samson when his tresses were shorn. He tried to melt like he had done long ago; but when the Philistines were upon him, he could do nothing against them. Our prayer must always be: “Holy Spirit, live with me! Holy Spirit, live with your servants!” We know that we necessarily depend on him. Such is the teaching of our Master, and Jesus Christ is “the same yesterday, today and forever”.
I don't want to tire you out, my dear brothers; but let me just for a few moments, to speak on a fourth point!
IV. JESUS CHRIST IS ALWAYS THE SAME RISEN BECAUSE “HE IS THE SAME YESTERDAY, TODAY AND FOREVER”.
I will repeat what I have already said, Jesus Christ always has the same resources. Sometimes, we sit very sadly, and let's say: “Times are very dark”. I don't think we can very well exaggerate their obscurity; and they are full of ominous omens, and I don't think any of us can really exaggerate such omens, because they are truly terrible. But it's still true: The Lord lives, blessed be my rock”.
The Church feels she needs faithful men? The Lord can send as many as ever. When the Pope dominated everywhere, nobody thought, I would guess, that the first man to speak out against the old faith would be a monk; they thought they had taken stock of all the men that God had at his command, and they certainly didn't think he had one of the leaders of the Reformation in a convent; but there was Martin Luther, the monk who shook the world and although men did not dream of what he would do, God knew everything about him.
Calvino was also there, who was writing that famous book of his Institutions. He was a man full of diseases, I think he had sixty diseases in his body, and he suffered greatly. Look at his portrait, pale and emaciated; and as a young man he was also very shy. He went to Geneva, and he thought that he had been called to write books; but Farel told him, “You are called to lead us in preaching the Gospel here in Geneva.” “No” Calvin answered because he withdrew from the task; my Farel insisted: “The breath of the Exalted God will remain on you until you go out and accept”. Under the threat of that brave old man, Giovanni Calvino accepted, ready and sincere in God's work, never hesitating in life and death. Then there was Zwingli in Zurich, he had stood out, also, e Ecolampadius, e Melantone, and their followers: “Who ever expected them to do what they then did?” Nobody. “The Lord gave the word, great was their company that published this”. And so, today, He only has to give His Word, and you will see that serious preachers of the eternal Gospel are beginning to go all over the world, because he has the same resources as always. “He is Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever”.
He also has the same resources of grace. The Holy Spirit is fully capable of converting men, to hurry, to enlighten them, to sanctify them, and to instruct them. There is nothing he has done that he cannot do again; God's treasures are full and are now flowing as they did at the beginning of the Christian age. If we don't see such great things, where the strength it contains lies? It is in our unbelief. “If you believe, all things are possible to him who believes”. Before this year has passed, God can make an awakening wave on England, on Scotland, and on Ireland, from one end to the other, Yup, and He can flood the whole world with the Gospel if we want but we cry out to him for this, and He will do it, because “he is the same yesterday, today and forever” in the resources of his grace.
So I close my sermon with this fifth paragraph which I will be very short on:
V. JESUS CHRIST IS THE SAME FOR ME: YESTERDAY, TODAY AND FOREVER.
I will not speak of myself except to help you think about yourself. How long have you known the Lord Jesus Christ? maybe, only recently; possibly, since many years. Remember when you first met him? You can point to the patch of ground where Jesus met you? Now, What was He for you, before? I'll tell you what he was to me.
Jesus was for me my only faith in the beginning. I relied on Him very hard, because I had such a load to carry. I unloaded me and my cargo at His feet; he was all in all to me. I hadn't ruled out a shred of hope from him, nor any faith outside of Him, crucified and risen for me. Now, dear brothers and sisters, you have someone further away than Him? I don't hope; I know you don't have it. I do not have a shadow of a shadow of trust anywhere, except in the blood of Christ and on His righteousness. I entrusted myself fully to him in the beginning, but I rely harder now. I faint sometimes, in His arms; I died in your life; I lose myself in its abundance, he is all my salvation and all my desire. I am speaking for myself; but I think it is speaking for many of you, even when I say that Jesus Christ is for me “the same yesterday, today and forever”. His cross, before my weak eyes, it will be my comfort in dying as it is my strength in living.
What was Jesus Christ for me in the beginning? He was the object of my hottest love; It wasn't like that for you either? He was not the Chief among ten thousand, and at the same time the most lovable? That charm, what beauties were there in that dear face of his! And what a freshness, what a news, what a delight it had put all our passions on a flame! It was like that in those early days, when we went after Him into the wilderness. Although all the world around was barren, he was all in all to us.
Very well, who is He today? He is now closer to us than he was before. He is the only gem we own; our other jewels all turned out to be glass-like, and we ejected them from the box, but he is the Koh-i-noor in which our souls delight; all perfections joined together to make an absolute perfection; all graces surround Him, and are reflexively turned towards us. That's not what we say about him? Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.
Which was for me Jesus Christ in the beginning? Good, he was my highest joy. At the time of my youth, as my heart leapt at the sound of his name! It wasn't like that for many of you? We can be fuller in voice, and heavier in the body, and slower in carrying our loins, but His Name has a lot of charm for us as it always has.
There was a trumpet that no one could blow except one who was the true heir, and there is no one who can ever recover true music outside of us if not our God to whom we belong. When he puts me to his lips, you would think that I was one of the trumpets of the seven angels; but there is no one else who can make me sound like that. I cannot produce such music as that alone; and there is no theme that can ravish my heart in ecstasy, there is no subject that can stir my soul, as long as I hold Him. I think it is with me as it was with Rutherford, when the Duke of Argyle called him, how he began to preach about Christ “Now, man, you are on the right sequence, take care of it”. The Lord Jesus Christ knows every key of our souls, and he can awaken upon our whole being to harmonies of music that will set the world to sing with His praises. Yup, he is our joy, our everything, “the same yesterday, today and forever”.
Let us go forward, then, to the immutable Savior, through things that change of time and meaning; and we will soon meet him in glory, and He will be unchanged there, as compassionate and loving when we return home to Him, and we see it in its splendor, as he was for his poor disciples, when he himself had nowhere to lay his head and was suffering among them.
Oh, you know him? You know him? You know him? If you don't know Him, He himself will reveal himself to you tonight, because of his sweet mercy! Amen.
