Clothed in Christ
Colossians. Chapter 3. Is that verse 12? Because the one's missing up here. Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness and patience. Bearing with one another, and if one has a complaint against another, forgive each other, as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all things, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. and be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwelling you ritually, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Good morning everyone again. Let's begin in prayer before we jump in. Father, Lord you have always been faithful and so we pray that you may be faithful in this now. that you may just incline our hearts now. Lord, granting us desires to hear your word, granting us a readiness to receive it, Lord, and granting an open and softened heart that may, Lord, just be changed by it. We ask for all these things, Lord, and that the words would come to us clearly. In Jesus' name, amen. Cool. Now I have a deeply, incredibly deep spiritual question for you guys today. Have any of you ever had a water leak in your house? Yeah, hands up if you've ever had a water leak. Yeah, I did a fair few, right? Sorry, it's not actually, I just wanted to make it bit heavy before. That was kind of what we've been doing in this last little bit in these chapters. At the start of chapter three, someone came to your door and was kind of telling you, hey, I think you might have a bit of a water leak. And then we discovered we did. So then the week after that, Paul was telling us all these things we have to put to death, all these things we have to rid ourselves of. And so we went through the house and said, well, I to get rid of that sheet, need to get rid of that. You did all the demo work. You pulled everything out. You crossed the X or whatever on everything that you had to get rid of. But... What happens once you've done that? You've still got a hole in your roof, if not a bigger one than when you started. You have to patch it up. You have to put something in its place. And so Paul, after telling us what to put to death in ourselves, that old part of us, that old sinful part, he now says, now, fill it up with this. And now Paul's desire more than anything else, he wants for the Colossian churches to be unified. He wants them to have unity, to be together, not to be divided. That's what the old self was all about. It loved itself and hated others. So there could never be true unity. But now he says pursue these things. Do these things together that you might have this unity. And now this is really important because all of us just took, I I mentioned this before, one of the parts of communion isn't that we just do it in a bedroom off by ourselves. Some reasons we may have to do that at some points in our lives, but for the most part we do it together as a church. Because we're not just saying, I have received salvation, we're saying, I have received salvation and so has that person and so was that person and I'm not just a child of God, I am part of the family of God together. And so we are seeking to do it together. And so, we start with our very first verse. Verse 12, actually, sorry, real quick. All the points we're gonna go through today, we'll start with that. Five different points, which is, I don't have them in front of me, but hopefully, old mate will throw them up on the PowerPoint there. So we are chosen by God, and then all the chosen one, all the things that chosen people do. Anyway, so five points starting with the first one now, which is we are chosen by God. Now, let's read from the first verse, verse 12. He says, on them as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness and patience. Now we're going to focus on one thing there. You are God's chosen ones. Now this is the most important thing. Because see, we receive the gift of salvation, right? That's exactly what we're saying when we partake in communion. saying, right, this is Christ's body and blood. This was offered for me and now I'm partaking it because the gift of salvation is given to me. And so we're partaking of it together. But I ask this question, when did God decide to give you that gift? At what point did he think this person's worthy of saving? ah Because the reality is, right, there are people outside who do not know God. There are people in this room that do know God. Why are they out there and you're in here? When, well, because I've been saved. When did God decide to do that? When did God choose to decide to start loving you over that person? When did He make that choice? And that is the thing we are asking today. As you see, our... Christianity, very often in our talk, we talk very much about our accepting God, right? We talk about the time we accepted God and that is part of our Christian walk, we accept God. But we must be careful not to over emphasize it because the thing that the Bible talks about far more is not us choosing God, it is God choosing us, far and away. And as we see in our first first year, we are not the ones who have chosen God. We are God's chosen ones. We have been chosen by Him. And so see, this will be important because this doctrine that we're gonna go through in a second will give us the fuel. It will be the thing that enables us to go on in the practical applications that we will talk about. Where you see the chosen ones, they forgive, they pray together, they do all these things together. You can't do them unless you understand what it means to be a chosen one. And so really the question we're asking in this first part is, when did God choose you? So, for starters, what does the term chosen ones mean? It was a term they used for Israel, right? Because God chose them among all the nations in the world. He says, I've picked you. You are my special people. The reality is, he didn't love the Egyptians like he loved the Israelites. He didn't love the Babylonians. He didn't even love the Australians, although they existed back then. But if they did, sorry, he loved Israel more because he chose them out from among the people. But we know this, that upon Jesus' visit to this earth, something changed. God's chosen people are now made up of Jews and us, Gentiles, Australians, right? That is now what makes up the body of Christ. Gentiles from every nation, tribe of tongue come to become part of the one people of God. And that's a great privilege to be chosen. Just read some of the things that come along with it. He says, you are God's chosen ones, holy and beloved. Now, when you think of holy, you just think I've got to be a holy person. I've got to, know, holier than thou. I'm just so filled with perfection. I'm so obedient. Such a good person. It's actually not the first and primary meaning of holiness. What it was in the Old Testament, if you know about the tabernacle of the temple, it was considered holy. Not just because it was more obedient, it was a building. What it was, it was referred to as being set apart. So it was set apart for a specific and holy purpose. Now think about it like this. You've got a work shirt, right? Most people in here, men and women, we all have work shirts. We have shirts we put on when we're going out in the yard. Is that shirt all that important to you? No. I know we spend a lot of money on work shirts out here in the country, but the reality is we wear them for work. They're not that important because they'll be used, they'll be covered in stains, different things like that. But often we have a chosen shirt, a chosen dress, a chosen attire that we put on that is special, that's important. It is set apart for a special purpose, particularly think of a wedding dress. There's a reason it goes on for one day and then sits in the closet for the rest of our lives if we get around to selling it, which... A lot of people say they will, but that never seems to happen. um And so you see, it is set apart. And so what God is saying here is, you've been set apart. This is funny, some people are laughing at it I've still got that wedding dress that's been sitting there for 40 years. Oh, we're going to sell it. Anyway, sorry. We are set apart for this special purpose. And what is this special purpose? To be loved by God, to be God's people. You've been separated from the world. That's what it means to be holy. And then of course, then that follows that we are to be unlike the rest of the nation. So then that comes around to our obedience. But then he also says that we are beloved, which is just, it just means you're loved by God. Right? And so he says that there is a special love that the people of God have. So this is what I was getting before. The people out there, now God loves everyone, yes. But does he love everyone the same? No. Otherwise, everyone would be saved then. Because this is exactly what Jesus says. That He continues to show love to those who rebel against Him, but there is a special love for those who turn to Him. This is what He means when He says in Matthew 5.45. So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven, for He makes His Son rise on the evil and the good. He sends rain on the just and the unjust. Everyone experiences the blessing of God as their Creator, as them being humans in His Kingdom. But... Some people will only ever know God as creator and judge. But how will we know Him? How will those who are His special people know Him? He's our Father. He is our Saviour. He is our King. Not everyone knows the preciousness of that, that amazing love. But now we get to the more poignant point. Okay, right. So we are loved by God, but now we come back to the point, why were we chosen? Well, maybe we can look back. Why was Israel chosen? You can read in Deuteronomy 7, God says this to the people, It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on or chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh, King of Egypt. Why does he love Israel? Why did he bring them out of slavery? Because he chooses to. That's literally it. And he says, because I choose to, because I made a promise to Abraham. That is why I did it, because I promised to. And he does not elaborate on it any further. He just says, if you think it's because of some reason in you, Israel, because you're so mighty and powerful, says, no, you were the slaves. You had nothing amiable about you. was nothing good that I'm like, oh, I want you, I want this, I want this people. He says, no. And so that continues on with us. God chooses to love people, to choose to love us, but not for any reason in us. And so you see, that is the most important thing to comprehend. God does not love us because of that which is in us. And now, sorry, this first point's going on, the other ones will be shorter. Anyway, but we have to get this point. Now, I'm gonna say a word and instantly people will have all kinds of different reactions to it because it's kind of, you one of those hot topic as in Christianity or whatever. But it is something that we need to talk about. Granted, we're not gonna go into much detail about it. The word predestination. Now, not doing a three-week study on what every kind of thing about it. But the truth remains. All of us believe it. Why? Because it's in the Bible. Okay? How we interpret it, yes, there are different ways to interpret it, but all of us must accept that the words themselves are literally inscripturated. They are there on the page, so we can't ignore them. And the sad thing is that this topic often gets relegated to these debates about, you know, things like the rapture and the millennium, which, yes, we can talk about, but I'm sorry, they are not of the same importance. predestination is central, is pivotal to salvation. Because it is asking the question, why did Jesus choose to love us and when did He? So we've already touched on the fact there is no reason in us. But you see, this is the reason. Maybe if we can identify when Jesus started loving us, maybe we can find out what it was. Maybe that, you know, okay, like maybe it was the fact that, you know, I did come up and make that commitment. Maybe that's what made Him start loving me. What thing was it? What is the point in our lives where He chose to love us? And here we read it several passages that laid out, but Ephesians more clearly than any of them. Ephesians 1, 3 to 4. be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. You see, it also talks about this book in the... talks about this book in the letter of Revelation, right? The book of life that everyone's name is written in, who will come into heaven, who will be accepted before the Lamb, before God. And when does it say that book was written? Before the foundation of the world. Now look, I'm not trying to set your interpretation of what you think predestination is about. I know there are a million things, but we must accept this truth. When did God choose to start loving us? Before we were ever born. before creation began. We must accept that fact because otherwise we start trying to identify a point. You will lose all your assurance, all your hope that God will ever love you because you'll start looking at yourself. The whole point is He's telling you, I loved you before you ever did anything. And that gives us a great encouragement because if He loved us before we had ever done anything, what makes you think He'll stop loving you because of what you've done now? He just loves you because He chooses to, because He's promised to. God works by promises, not by works. And so you see, it comes at the root of this immense love that you were born as a baby and you were loved by God as one of His people, even though you may not have come to know it yet, even though you may not have accepted it yet, you were one of His. And it's this immense love that is you're so unworthy to receive that enables us to be united as a church. It will be this which allows us as we go on to our next point. And so we go on to our second point now. Just realising now I changed the order of my sermon and it is not going to have sorry. So we're actually going to what's technically the fifth point, which is chosen ones give thanks. Just don't worry about the PowerPoint, it'll be all right. um So read from the last verse now. Whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. So now my fifth point was, Chosen ones give thanks. And now there's a really important part, reason for this, that we skip all the way to the end before tackling the stuff in the middle. Because see, what is the right response to this immense love? To finding out that there is a book that gains you entrance into heaven and that your name was written in it before you were ever born. The right response is to give thanks. It is to be filled with joy and thanksgiving. Thank you God. we should be incredibly happy. And so you see, in one of the first messages that I gave in our series in Colossians, I talked about a train. Do you guys remember the train at all? You don't have to remember the details, but do you remember me talking about a train? Yeah? There you go, Nate does love it. Yeah. We built this train. Most important thing was, the train engine was the gospel, but the gospel wasn't the fuel. What was? If you know the point that we're just talking about, it was Thanksgiving. was giving thanks because there are plenty of people that know the gospel. They know it in word, they know it in fact, but they're not saved. They know it up here but it's not down here. Why? Because they don't give thanks for it. When something comes from the heart, it is expressed in gratitude. When something's up here, you can do whatever you want with it. You can be angry, frustrated, whatever. When something comes from the heart, it is to be an act of gratitude. oh sorry, something in my throat there. And so you see, it is this thankfulness for the immense love that you have been chosen by God, not just that you chose Him. And so it is this now that helps us to seek unity with our brothers and sisters in Christ. Because you see, this is the most important thing, because we are always told to do things in Christianity, not because others do them, but because God has done them before us. So you are to love others, why? Because they loved you? No, because God loved you. This is what constant passages in the Bible are talking about. We love because He first loved us. We forgive because He forgave us. We submit to authority because we trust God loves us and puts those in who are in authority there for a good reason. Everything is done because He has done something beforehand, not because of what the other person does. And so, that is why he says in that passage that in everything you do, you do it in the name of the Lord Jesus. We do it because of what He has done for us. So now we go on, what are we to do? The second point, which is actually the third point, sorry for the confusion. Anyway, chosen ones forgive. Let's read from Colossians 13 to 14. Bear with one another, and if one has a complaint against another, forgive each other. as the Lord has forgiven you, so you must also forgive. And read verse 14 as well, and above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Now let's just break this down. I love the first part because it says we must bear with one another. Can I ask, can you guys put your hand up if you feel like a burden in the church? Oh, no one. Oh, okay. All right. I hate to break this news to you, most of us probably don't think we are. Every single one of you are. Because it says we have to bear with one another. Now look, of course some people are probably going to feel more like a burden than others. Not going to say who those people are, because of course I don't have a list. um But the reality is we must accept something. That it's not like we just come to church and then it's like, oh man, everything is just great. just weight off my shoulders all the time. Yes, in salvation, yes, the weight is lifted off. But you must bear the burdens of the people in this church. You may come in and someone may share something with you like, wow, that's heavy. But you are called to bear that burden. Better yet, you actually must bear with people as in that talking about the fact there would be friction in this church. We have to bear with one another. And then it goes on. And if one has a complaint against another, forgive each other. What does that mean? There's also going to be complaints in the church. Oh my goodness, this expectation. We must realize this thing. Why are there going to be problems in the church? Because we ain't at heaven yet. Because we ain't there yet. You guys still have that old part in you, that old self. And sorry, it's going to rub me the wrong way sometimes. It's going to rub others the wrong way sometimes. But yet, what is our answer to that? Is it to say, well, I know you're incredibly loved by God, but my goodness, I don't think He really knows who you are. I don't think He's really seen just this irritating side of you quite so much. No. It is to acknowledge the fact that the same work that is going on in you is going on in that person. And so we must respond in the same way that Christ did. You see, this is a really hard part. When he says then forgive each other, don't hold on to it, don't seek to be avenged, don't wait for your time to strike back, don't take your pound of flesh, forgive one another. And this is the hard part. As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Now, of course, there's one part here where it says, you've been forgiven so much, your debt is infinite, so you must forgive this person. But it's not just that. It's not just saying forgive because you have been forgiven, but forgive in the same way that Jesus has forgiven. How did Jesus forgive? Did He sit there and say, well, I'm going to mumble and groan about it and just kind of be, I guess I have to forgive them out of obligation? No. My goodness, as the very people who nailed Him to the cross, was sitting there mocking him, he cried out to father, his father, with a prayer for them that the father might forgive them. I'm sorry, no one does that begrudgingly. That is a heart of gratitude to God, even in the midst of incredible suffering. And we can only do that when we comprehend the fact of how much we have been forgiven. When we see that, when we know that that same love is being worked in us through Christ. my friends, understand this, we must be eager to jump to grace because otherwise the devil will use that. He will use it to make church a hard place for you, to make this life harder for you. We must ask God to make the pain of holding a grudge greater than the pain of forgiving because pain, there will always be pain and forgiveness, always, every time, it will hurt. because inevitably that person will probably hurt you again. They may not even change. That's the hard part. But we must go to forgiveness because otherwise that short-term pain will turn into long-term pain. It will become harder for us. Hatred only gives you the short-term pleasure, but it will give you long-term pain. And so the aim of the church, like it says in verse 15, is to act in harmony. You ever seen someone with autoimmune disease? They have something which means their body is literally fighting against itself. That is what happens when we allow unforgiveness to continue. You might think, well, this is just between me and this person. I'm sorry, if that person is in the church, it's affecting all of us. It does. Even if that person has left, if they are still part of the universal church, it still affects your church here. And so you see, because when a body attacks itself, it does not work well. There is no harmony. So, we must be eager to pursue forgiveness and we must seek to do it from the heart. If you are going to forgive someone simply out of obligation, I'm not going to say don't do it, but I think you should stir up yourself to actually understand that that person is loved by God just as you are. Better yet, I think you should stir up the undeservedness of the love of God towards you. Because if we forgive people begrudgingly, it still leaves room for the devil. We must seek... We must be eager to forgive that person because we want the unity of the church to be restored. So then going on to the second point, now, chosen ones pray. So Colossians 3.15, verse 15. He says, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you are called in one body, and be thankful. Paul wants peace in every part of the church. That you could enter into any conversation between any two people and say, wow, this is incredibly peaceful. Wow, these people get along. Wow, things are going well here. People aren't at odds with one another. He desperately wants that, that the parts would cooperate with one another, each part of the church. How do we achieve this peace? How does it come about? Do we have to hold an intervention for every single person that we have a slight grievance with? I think that would be kind of funny because we'd be here all day, but no. Yes, there may be times for things like that, but mediation talks, public confrontations, even getting together and singing kumbaya together, it's not gonna unite us together. What is the thing? Philippians 4, 6 to 7. It says, not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And the peace, yeah, there you go. The whole verse there. So you see, what does he say will bring you peace? And if you have peace, then the church has peace. If we're all doing this together, what was it? Bring your requests to God. The church that prays together stays together. You want to put it that way? The reality is that a church that is filled with the vision is a prayerless church. If you look at our churches that have just torn each other apart, it is because they have not prayed for each other. They have not prayed together. Prayer is the thing that unites us. Because you see why? Because as we pray individually and together, what are we doing? We are lifting our eyes to something other than ourselves. Every part of division comes from us looking at ourselves, from saying people don't appreciate this, people don't notice this, people need to do this, because I see it they don't. But we need instead to come together and to lift our eyes together to the thing that we can actually get behind together. Because our opinions will never unite anyone, but it's the opinions of Christ, His teaching, His Word, His salvation that will bring us together. And I offer a poignant point here. If we do have anger towards someone, if we do, if we are struggling in bitterness with that person, I know with some people this might seem just weird to go out and do this, but it will solve a lot of problems. Go and pray with that person. Go genuinely sit down, just be like, man, you you really peeve me off. Can we pray together? Maybe don't start it like that, but you know, just go and say, hey, I just, can we just pray together? Cause... Hopefully it's helpful if that person knows you have a problem. But you go up and just say, because when you pray with someone, it is incredibly hard to be angry at them. Maybe you don't have to pray together, but at least be praying for that person. That is the most important thing. Because that is the thing that will put your hatred to death and actually enable you to do something constructive with the problem. And so we must focus on the big God that destroys the division that we have over our small faults that happen in the church here. And now we finish with this final point now. The chosen ones sing together. Now we'll get to that point in a second, but let's just read from our verse here. Verse 16. with thankfulness in your hearts to God. Getting very tongue-tied this morning. Now, first part, let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. Now, He's not just saying you individually, He's saying us as a church. The gospel should be the center of all we do. The gospel should feel at home here. Every time you hear communion, you hear the gospel, you should be, oh, I'm so glad to hear that again. It shouldn't be, wow, I haven't heard that in three months. The gospel should be at home here. It should be abundantly. rich here all the time. You can look at churches, this isn't a complete rule but it's a pretty solid one. Look at churches that have been abandoned, that are virtually falling apart. Ask yourselves the questions as you go to those places, is the gospel there? Is it constantly before the people? Are they constantly talking about the death and resurrection of Christ and all the benefits for them? The forgiveness that is an offer? Often no. That is what kills churches. because there is no true life in them because they do not have the gospel and they're just full of corpses really. So the gospel must be spoken in a church, in conversations, prayed about together, preached often. But now Paul gets to a useful point. As he says, you are to teach and admonish one another in all wisdom. Now Paul used a similar phrase in Colossians 1.28. He says, it is my job here now to teach and admonish you, to warn you. And now he says, all of you are to do that. In that sermon, I said, it's my job to teach you guys, to admonish you guys, to warn you. But now the job is actually given to each and every one of you. All of you are to teach one another. And now here comes the harder part. That means that being a part of this church means we must be open to correction. Now, many of us feel like we're not at any point in our friendship where we could actually bring up something that maybe we see in each other's lives. We should start as a starting point. If we are part of this church, you should be open to it. Now, we've talked about the legalism stuff before. We are not to use this to say, man, goodness, that person was showing a bit too much skin, you know, from the goodness, you see how much skin there was? The ankles there, wow. No, biblical correction done with gentleness and respect, but it should be a part of our church. But now I go on to the main point of this last point. He says that we are to sing Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs to one another. Now, how does gratitude normally express itself? In words, think about a child, 12 year old, he's been asking since the 26th of December, can I please have a bike? Can I please have a bike? Can I please have a bike? He's just been asking over and over to the point of nagging where mum and dad are just so sick of hearing it that they're like, why didn't you just wait till Christmas? We've heard you, you'll find out. And then on Christmas day, he's been waiting all year and he receives that bike. How does he respond? He sits there and say, oh, that's cool, isn't it? No, he doesn't respond like that. Any child who receives the gift they've been asking for says, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. They're normally just sitting there over and over and over again. They don't stop talking about it because they're so happy that you got it for them. You've been loved by God from the foundation of the world. Our hearts should be filled with gratitude and it should express itself in words. And better yet, it should express itself in worship, in singing. Because you see, this is a particular unified way of showing our thankfulness to God. Singing is one of the best parts of church because, look, I know you'll think a lot of churches, me just sitting here kind of receiving and singing is when we respond. Singing is active. Singing is where you look up to God and worship Him. And it is actually a very unifying thing. And now the important thing in here, when he says we are to sing to one another, that's not a suggestion. I know Don already made this point in the start. Some people are terrified of singing and I understand it because some people are tone deaf and that's okay. But we can have a million excuses. I sing in my head. I'm, I don't know, maybe some of you use the excuse, I'm just, I'm too manly to sing. That's a woman's thing. Maybe you think my wife's told me too many times that she, I feel like she's grating her ears or something like that. I don't know. Whatever someone may be saying. But keeping our mouths shut during worship is a misuse of the mouth that God gave us. He gave it to us that we might bless Him. It's the best purpose that we could possibly use it for. We use it usually during the other six days of the week to curse other people and curse God. We should at least use it one day of the week to bless Him, to honor Him. this is a hard word for some, but refusing to sing reflects a heart that does, is not truly grateful to God. Or better yet, at very least a God, sorry, a heart that is scared of men more than it is, sorry, able to sing to God. And so I want to offer a quick encouragement to those of you who feel you can't sing. There's probably plenty of you. But one, who is the most encouraging person to listen to when you hear them in the congregation? Is it the ones who can sing? It actually isn't for me, because you might be singing for a multiple of reasons. You might be singing to impress people, but who's the one person you can guarantee is definitely not singing to impress people? The person who can't sing at all. I love that. because you are someone who we know when you were singing loudly, you're not singing because people can hear you, you're singing because He can. He hears you. And so you should lift your voice to God because of the gratitude that He has shown this immense love to you in choosing you. I also want to share with you something, something that we should comprehend as a church. When have been some of the most amazing times of worship in your life? Now look, I've been to churches like, you know, our Hillsong's, the ones with the flashy lights and everything, and look, I've had some really good times of worship there. I'm not going to deny that. But I've also had some really amazing times. You know, the most amazing time of worship I had? It wasn't in one of the churches with all the flashy lights and the smoke machines. wasn't in a church filled with islanders. I was actually in a church with about 200 middle-aged white fellows, most of them who could not sing at all. But it was a minister's conference and most of them obviously ministers. And if they're there, they're going to sing. All of them sang together and my goodness, you could hear the tone-deaf ones. But man, it was incredible. You couldn't even hear the singer or the guitarist, but those people sang and it was electric. And so you see, When as a church, we lift our voices together, it doesn't actually matter that you're tone deaf. It doesn't matter at all. There is actually something that God made in music when we all sing together collectively. It just sounds amazing. I genuinely believe when we are all gathered together in the new heavens and the new earth, when all of us from every nation, tribe and tongue, I don't think you're suddenly going to be given the gift of being an amazing singer. I think you'll still be tone deaf, but we will all... lift it together and it will be incredible. And so I just want to offer it to you. You have been chosen by God before the foundation of the world. He wants you to know that and He wants you to know that He's given you a mouth that you might praise Him for that. And also, just a quick thing, if you do have a strong voice and can sing, please sing loudly because it encourages those around you to sing as well. And so, we should not be ashamed to worship God with all our hearts in His house. So, concluding, bring everything together. Sorry, I I've been bit stumbling over myself this morning and all that. But anyway, here we go. All of you who have accepted Christ are to know this, that He accepted you before Him. before the foundations of the world. Such an incredible thing to know because our assurance is so often shaken. But you would know if you believe in God, your name is written in the book of life and it cannot be blotted out. Are you grateful for this? Are you happy about this? then we ought to be thankful. And our thankfulness is to express itself how? How has He said it should express itself? We are to bear with one another. You are to forgive one another. You are to pray with one another. And then what are we meant to do together? Sing. Sing because we are unified. If we're not singing, I'm assuming you've got some problem with someone in the church. We are to sing together. And so now, I'm going to invite the worship band up and we're going to have three songs, one after another. I know you're probably a bit tired, but there's some oldies but goodies and we're going to sing them together. Better yet, maybe I'll up on the sound desk and just mute it all. So we have to go acapella because we are going to sing together because all of you have been chosen before the foundation of the world. Your salvation is secure and that should make you happy. Even if you didn't get anything in my message, you have been chosen by God. Be happy about it. So let's sing together. ah I should probably finish in prayer. Good idea, eh? Father, you have given us so many reasons to be thankful and yet this most of all. For all those who have placed their faith in you, they were chosen before they had done anything. Before the creation of the world, Lord, you chose us. Lord, we are immensely loved, we are immensely cared for, immensely provided for. So now Lord, fill our hearts with your joy and let us sing because of the love that we have been shown and the grace that is provided to us through your death upon the cross. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.