Alright, if you can turn your Bibles with me to Romans chapter 5. And I'll be reading from verse 9 through 11. Since therefore we have been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God. For while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son.

Much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. Let's pray. Gracious and loving Father, we thank You so much for today. And just the great privilege that we have to call You our Alba Father.

And we're able to pray to You, not because of our own strength, because of our own righteousness, but because Christ mediates on our behalf. That He has mercy, that He's able to sympathize with our weaknesses, that we may not fear drawing near to You. So we pray, Father God, that we would take that privilege and that we would apply it even this morning, Lord God, as we worship You and listen to Your Word.

In Jesus' name we pray, Amen. Last week I finished the sermon by asking you the question of why. We talked about who loves us, when He loved us, how He loved us, and then we said why, but then I kind of threw the question out there for you to hopefully you guys had some good discussion.

If not, at least by yourself you kind of took some time to think about why does He love us? We know who He is, and the fact that the God of the universe has us in His mind, that fact alone should wow us and impress us and change us.

But when you consider when He loved us, not because we had potential, not because we were righteous on our own, we said while we were yet sinners, while we were yet His enemies. And then how He loved us, that His expression of love was to send His only begotten Son, His most precious gift that He has, and to offer it up as a sacrifice for our sins.

So the natural question that we have is why. And just like when we're young, if you're raising young children, as soon as they're able to talk, one of the first things that they start asking you is why. You should go to sleep. Why? Because you need to go to sleep.

Why? If you don't get rest, you're not going to go to school. Why? If you don't go to school, you're not going to get educated. Why? And they keep asking why and why, and then at some point it's like, just because. I told you so. Eventually you kind of squash it.

I don't have any more answers. You're naturally curious because, I think that's human nature. If you don't understand something, you would ask why. But for some reason, at some point in our maturity, we stop asking that question. Why do we have to go to work? Because we have to pay the bills.

Why do we have to pay the bills? Because you have to have a house. Why do you have to have a house? Just do it! At some point, we get to a point where it's like, stop asking why, you just do it. Like why do you do it? Because everybody else did it.

Why do Christians do this? Because everybody else. I came to this church and they were doing it, so I did it. Why do we have to pray this way? Well, that's what I saw, and so I did it. And so after a while, you don't even know why you're doing it.

You just do it. You were raised in a Christian home, this church happens to do this, and everybody else is doing it. And so, it's like, I guess that's what you're supposed to do as a Christian. But the question of why is at the foundation of what we're doing.

So if you don't know why you're doing what you're doing, then it's absolutely meaningless. If you don't know why you're coming to worship God, then you may not really be worshipping God. You just do it because everybody else did it. That's how I grew up. That's why it's extremely important to us when we talk about the Gospel, like Jesus Christ died for us, and we just accept that, we sing about it, we share with other people.

But the fundamental question, when somebody tells you that they gave their only begotten son to die for you, wouldn't the most important question be why? Wouldn't that be the most important? If I told you I had a hundred million dollars I want to give to you, I think the first question you would ask is why?

You don't say, "Thank you!" First of all, do you have a hundred million dollars? That's the first thing you would ask, right? If you realize that I do, you'd ask why. Because if you don't ask why, you're not going to get it like, "Okay, you know, like, what is this?

Is this a joke?" I mean, He offered His only begotten Son while we were yet sinners to reconcile us so that we can call Him our Abba Father and have eternity with Him. And then we don't contemplate the question of why. Now, some of you guys may have, you know, as soon as we finished last week, I heard some of you guys saying, like, "Oh, it's for the glory of God," and I heard various, you know, discussions going on, and all of these things are true.

But at the end, it really is a mystery. Because David himself says in Psalm 3, contemplating his love for Him in Israel, he said, "When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the Son of Man that you care for him?" Now, there was no answer.

He just looks at who God is, and why He's so patient and merciful, he said, "Why do you do this? Why do you even care?" He says, "See, it's this mystery that Paul is talking about in Ephesians, saying, "I'm praying that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened." And he prays at the end of chapter 3 that you may have the, you may be able to comprehend the height and width and length and depth of the love of Christ, that you may be filled with the fullness of God.

So their whole pursuit of God is trying to understand why. Why did He love us? How did He love us? It's important for us to see that, because that's what Paul's trying to, he was trying to do. He's trying to set the foundation for your understanding, because if we get to the imperatives, chapter 12, and say, "Hey, you should do this.

You should give your bodies a living sacrifice. You should obey your leaders. You should obey the authority. Pray for them." If we get to that, get to, "Hey, you should, this is how you ought to live," which is extremely important, right? Because that's what, those are in the Bible too.

But if we get to that without really contemplating and wrestling with why, then you're going to end up just jumping through the hoops. Just, "Hey, just do it. Just make money." Right? "Just buy a house. Just do it." But sooner or later, sooner or later, something's going to happen in your life.

You're going to, tragedy's going to happen, or you're going to get laid off of the job, and then you're going to, you're going to have a, God's going to force you to take a step back, and then you're going to be contemplating, "Why am I doing this? Why do I go to this church?

Why do I have these relationships? Why am I doing this?" So Paul has been trying to wrestle with this and teach us what's going on to get us to be contemplating and thinking and meditating so that we would have no understanding of the depth of what it is that we already have in Christ.

So up to this point, he's been talking about justification. So now, starting from verse 9, he's going to be talking about, "If you have been justified, here are the benefits. Here's what happened as a result of it." So if you look at verse 9, he says, "Since therefore we have now been justified by His blood, since now you have been the recipient of this love, how much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God?" So the first and foremost that he says in verse 9, you understand it, is that you've been saved from the wrath of God.

You know, the way that people come to Christ today, the way that the Gospel is presented, if we're not careful, is that Jesus becomes a solution to our loneliness. Or Jesus can be presented as a solution to economic problems, or political issues, or even social justice. There's so many poor people in the world and all of these things, I think, are connected to the Gospel.

But if the primary problem of mankind was economics, He would have sent an MBA. If the primary problem was the government, He would have sent a politician. But the primary problem of mankind was His sin. So he says, "If you've been justified by His blood, how much more would you have been saved by the wrath of God?" First and foremost, the most primary thing that you and I need to understand about our salvation is now we have been delivered from the wrath of God.

So when we contemplate and think about, you know, we've been delivered by the wrath of God, like, again, don't say anything, but how does that affect you? My guess is most of you are affected intellectually. It's like, "Oh, that's good." But probably not emotionally. The reason why is because we never felt the brunt of His wrath.

We don't even know what that looks like. So when we say you've been saved from the wrath of God, it's just a theory. It's just something that you know on paper. But you weren't really delivered or you don't really feel like you were delivered because you didn't understand, you and I did not understand what it is that we were under.

It's kind of like, you know, when you travel outside of the country that you're in, you don't realize exactly what it is that we have until you go to a poor country. And again, like Pastor Peter Troom, his job is to take people into the poorest parts of the world and show how they need Christ and how they need help.

So he gets to see all kinds of stuff, right? But part of the benefit of that is that you come back and whatever it is that you have, you see it in a different light because of that. See, first and foremost, if we don't see our salvation as deliverance from His wrath, and we see salvation as Him answering our prayers so that we can go to a better school or He's going to help us with our marriage or we're going to have, you know, so many, so many things.

And so as soon as He doesn't answer that, it's like, well, how come He doesn't answer? How come He doesn't love me? Without realizing the fact that you and I are delivered from the wrath of God, that in and of itself is the greatest declaration of His love for us.

Even if we don't make a single cent, even if we lose all our jobs and are sick and die early, we would owe our eternity to praise Him because we've been saved by, from His wrath. So that's why when we look at the book of Romans, when Paul is going to the detail of the gospel message, how does he begin the gospel message?

Again, don't say anything. Just think about it. What is the message that Paul gives about the gospel? Today, again, you know, we want as many people to come in and hear the gospel so we try to cut the edges that are too sharp. And maybe if we said this, the people are going to be offended.

And so we kind of highlight His love and grace and then we kind of downplay His judgment in hell. The concept of hell, I mean, I do hear it, but it's not as prominent as maybe it used to be at one point. Paul presents the gospel and he begins from the very beginning chapter.

In Romans chapter 118, "For the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness, unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth." Just in case somebody read that and was thinking, "Oh yeah, those people, right? Those pagans who have orgies and sacrifice their children, they're under the wrath of God." Paul makes it very clear, right?

Those who are under the law will be judged by the law. Those who are not under the law will be judged outside of the law. But repeated over and over again. Again, Romans 2.5, "But because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed." Romans 2.8.

"But for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury." Romans 4.15. "For the law brings wrath." Again in Matthew 3.7, John the Baptist, when he saw the Pharisees coming, he said to them, "You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" Not only Paul, Jesus himself says in Matthew 5.29.30, "If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away." I mean, that's violent, right?

He said, "If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It's better to go into heaven and avoid hell because of that." Verse 30, "And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away." I mean, it is violent. So the imagery that Jesus is giving to his people is that that's how hideous his wrath is.

Now, hell wasn't just some place. You know, we kind of try to create hell and to take the edges off of hell so that, you know, it's just a place. Like God just withdraws himself, so it's just a bad, dark place. Bible describes hell as created by God to punish the devil and his angels and his followers.

And whoever chooses to worship the devil are going to have the same punishment under them. So hell isn't simply God just kind of like, "Ah, I'm just going to walk away." The Bible describes it as his wrath poured out. He created hell just as much as he created heaven.

That's why he doesn't just say he delivered us from wrath. He says it delivered us from his wrath, his divine wrath. See, without understanding where we stand before God without Christ, grace wouldn't be biblical grace. We make grace out to whatever we think grace ought to be. You know, you can have people pour their lives into you, your parents or whoever, and if they don't give you what you want, they did nothing for you.

So grace becomes whatever we think grace is, but without understanding what it is exactly that we have been saved from. J.I. Packer says in his book, Knowing God, of God's wrath, he says, "God's wrath is never the capricious, self-indulgent, irritable, morally ignoble thing that human anger so often is.

It is instead a right and necessary to objective moral evil." Hell isn't just God saying, "I had enough and I'm just going to banish you." Hell is calculated. Hell according to scripture was reserved for punishment. Right now we live in a period of grace where God, the Bible says that he is withholding his judgment.

So the wrath of God is being stored up. But as the scripture says, "It is appointed for all men to die once. After this comes judgment." So in Revelation 6, 15-17, it says, "Then when Jesus comes, the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks and in the mountains." Again, from our perspective, when we think of his second coming, he's going to come and restore the church.

There's going to be a wedding ceremony to redeem his church glorification. But for the world who does not know him, the Bible says when he comes, you would think that there will be mass revival. But that's not what the book of Revelation says. The book of Revelation says that when he comes in his full glory, that he's not coming as a humbled king.

He's not coming as a servant of man. The Bible says that he's going to be coming in his rightful throne of king of kings and lord of lords. Because the period of grace is over. And now he will divide the wheat and the tares. He will divide between the sheep and the goat.

So when he comes, he comes to redeem and to judge. And those whose names have not been found in the book of life will go on into eternity gnashing teeth. So the Bible describes him when he comes in verse 16, they said, calling to the mountains of rock, fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne and from the wrath of the lamb.

One of the greatest parts of the gospel that illustrated is the Lion of Judah, the coming. And they turn around, they see instead of a lion, they see a lamb who comes meek, the king of kings and lord of lords who comes meek as a lamb to be offered as a sacrifice for our sins.

And yet at the end times, they see a picture of the lamb as a judge, the wrath of the lamb for the great day of the wrath has come and who can stand it again? Because we don't think, you know, we just kind of like hell is like, oh, we know it's there.

It's kind of like death. We know it's coming. We know that every single one of us has an expiration date, but we don't like to think about it. It's just morbid to even talk about it. We know it's there. And it's kind of like the way that we approach hell.

We know that the opposite side of the cross is hell. And yet we talk about it. We know it's there. It's, it's mentioned in the Bible, but we don't really consider and contemplate and let it affect us the way God intended. I think when Jesus came, the whole book of the old Testament was to, was to prepare for the people, for the Messiah to come.

And the way that God prepared the Messiah to come is to pour upon his wrath. He the beginning of the nation's Israel's history. He warned them, if you do not obey my commandments, here's curse upon curse, upon curse, upon curse. So if you follow Israel's history, Israel's history, basically Israel piling upon themselves, curse after curse, after curse, after curse.

And so at the end of the book of Malachi, the last prophet prophesies and he's done, there should have been a sense of terror. If God is faithful to everything that he said at the beginning of Israel, woe is us, woe is us. Because the only way that Jesus is going to make any sense, if they recognize the wrath that is to come.

But when Jesus came, that's not what they were looking for. They didn't realize that they were under the wrath of God. They thought Jesus was going to come, we're the apple of his eye, even though they were seeped in their sin, no matter how much they try to keep the law, they can rub off the dirt that was piled on from generation to generation.

Not recognizing that the King, the judge has come. The only beings that we see in scripture that seem to have recognized who Jesus was, were the demons. When demons encounter Jesus, look at what they say, Luke chapter 4, 33-34. And in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of the unclean demon and he cried out with a loud voice, "Ha, what have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?

Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." The demons didn't see Jesus and say, "Oh, finally, maybe we'll have some deliverance, maybe he'll feed us, he'll take care of us." They knew. They knew immediately as they saw him and recognized that he was the Holy One of God, they fell in terror.

"Are you going to destroy us now?" Matthew 8, 28-29. When he came to the other side to the country of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men met him, coming out of the tomb so fierce that no one could pass away. And behold, they cried, "What have you to do with us, O Son of God?

Have you come here to torment us before the time?" Isn't that incredible that the demons already knew that the time of torture was coming? As soon as they recognized Jesus, what did they do? They fall on the ground on their knees in terror. "Have you come before your time to torment us?

Is it now are you going to bring judgment?" Because they recognized who he was. See, that was the problem with the nation of Israel. They didn't recognize who he was. They had no fear of the presence of God. They were praying for revival, not realizing that if God drew near, they would die.

They're praying for God to come near, to come close to them, not realizing a sinful man can't stand in the presence of this holy God and not be utterly destroyed. So they were hoping for revival. They were hoping for Emmanuel, not realizing the wrath of God that was remaining under them.

When you and I think about the cross, we think about His grace, His love, and His mercy. But think about it from the perspective of the angels. What a strange scene to see the God who created them hanging on the cross, bearing the wrath of God upon Himself. I think Dr.

Harris many years ago came and he gave us the darkness and the glory, and he was preaching through a different perspective. I know a lot of us had a difficult time understanding, but it was so powerful because he was basically showing us the cross from every angle, from the Father's view, from Jesus' eyes, from His mother's view, from the soldiers, from the leaders of Israel, from Israel, from the beggars.

And then he started going to the spiritual realm, from the angels and the demons. What did they see when they saw the cross? As much as we see the cross as hope and mercy and salvation, think about what the demons saw. They were already terrified that the time was going to come when they're going to be tortured because of their rebellion against God.

They look at the cross and the Father doesn't spare His own Son. That He is bearing upon Himself all the sins of mankind on His Son. So imagine if the demons are looking at this thinking, "If He doesn't spare His Son from His wrath, what will happen to us?" Can you imagine the terror that the demons were under when they saw Jesus being crucified?

That's why it says in James 2, 9, you believe that God is one, you do well, even the demons believe, but they shudder. See, believing that Jesus was Son of God did not cause hope for them. They were shuddering in great fear because if He really is God, we are ruined.

Second Peter 2, 4-6, it says, "For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept unto the judgment, if He did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a heralder of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly, if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes, He condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly." The whole book of Revelation is a glimpse into the wrath of God that's coming upon the world.

It's kind of like the curtain that's been temporarily lifted and John was given a vision of what that wrath was going to look like. And he was terrified. And that's what the book of Revelation is. For those whose names are written in the book of life, it means we have been spared from that.

And yet it is warning to the whole world that this is what it means when he says, "The wrath of God remains on mankind." You know, those of you guys know, I'm a FAB and I'm proud of it. I was born in Korea, you know, and I came when I was seven, went back and forth, and so I see myself as bicultural.

Like language-wise, English is much easier, but culturally I'm a FAB. So whenever I hear the story about what's going on in North Korea, and I know North Korea, Kim Jong-un, the crazy guy, you know, we don't want him to have, you know, people are starving to death and nuclear bombing and all this stuff.

And I know most of us here that kind of detached. But I remember what it was like when I was growing up in Korea. I mean, even in a young age, because they were terrified of the Korean War happening again because the North Koreans were digging tunnels to come into South Korea and they were, they really wanted to go back to war.

So South Korea, especially in Seoul, we were right on the border, so if war broke out, we would be the first city that get hit. And so there was constant fear. If you see spies, if you see anything strange, turn them in. And at 10 o'clock, the lights would go off.

And if you don't turn your lights off, the police would come and bang it on your door. And so again, as a young child, we live in fear. But more I began to understand the history behind the Korean War, I started having more sympathy toward North Korea. Because what happened was, because of this, at that time, the communism and capitalism, they were going back and forth and Russia backed North Korea and the US and the allies backed South Korea.

And then they started to go back and forth. And the North Koreans pushed their way all the way to tip of South Korea, to Pusan. So everybody that was living there had to pack up their bags. And we're talking about everybody. We're not just talking about a few people.

Everybody who lived in South Korea had to pack up their bags, get on a train or boat, and they had to go all the way to the tip of Korea. And then the allies come in under MacArthur's rule, he pushes them all the way back to the border of China.

And then China decides to get in. And so they start pushing back. And so they're going back and forth, North and South. And so they decided to say, "You know what? Too many people are dying. This is not worth fighting." So they just drew an arbitrary line right in the middle of the country.

And if you happened to be stuck in North Korea, you became North Korean. And if you happened to get stuck in South Korea, you became a South Korean. But the problem with what happened was, so many young men were forcefully recruited into North Korean army when they came. So they didn't join it.

It wasn't because they believed it. They were forced to do it. And many of the people who were forced to take their children and go back and forth, and some people were up there for business trips. And Christianity was thriving in the North Korean side more than the South Korean side.

So all the famous pastors and missionaries were all stationed up in North Korea. So when the country got divided in half, basically all of them got stuck in North Korea. And now, after 50 plus years of watching what happened in the North, and how they've been under suppression and starving to death, and you even hear stories of cannibalism and all kinds of horrendous things that happened.

When I look upon that, I said, "Many of you who come from Korean tradition could have easily gotten stuck over there." And I know you say, "No, I was born here." Of course, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about your grandparents, or maybe great-grandparents. They could have easily been stuck in North Korea or been dragged into the army, and we could have easily been part of North Korea.

So all the stories of North Korean suffering and the oppression that they are under, you and I could have easily been a part of that. So when I look upon that, I have sympathy because, one, I thank God that that didn't happen. But then I look at the people who got stuck out there, and pray for mercy for them.

See, when you and I don't understand what we have been saved from and how you and I were deserving of this wrath, we don't recognize what we have. That's why Christianity, to some people, becomes boring. If the church isn't exciting enough, if it isn't done properly enough, if there isn't enough older people rushing out to younger people, if certain things don't happen a certain way, Jesus is not enough!

See, if we really understand what it is that we have in Christ, all this other stuff is trivial, isn't it? If we've been saved from the wrath of God, that you and I were deserving of hell, and by His Son's death and sacrifice, He plucked us out of that, for the rest of our lives, even if we go hungry and sick, shouldn't that be a source of praise and glory?

It's because we forget what it is that we and I have been saved from that the air conditioning becomes a big deal. The distance of parking, the cleanliness of bathrooms, the smooth transition of songs. All of a sudden, these things become a much bigger deal than it needs to be, because we have forgotten what it is that we truly have in Christ.

"Therefore," he says in verse 10, "for while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son. Much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life." If He was able to save us by His death, how much more can He sustain us by His life?

Not only did He pluck us out of hell, we're secure in His hand. That this was not a one-time thing, and that we keep slipping back to that. He said it's secure permanent. We have been justified. If He saved us by His death, how much more will He reconcile us by His life?

Romans 8.31, "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?" And finally, verse 11, he says, "More than that." More than just being plucked out of hell, more than being able to sustain us, he says, "How much more we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation." What is the ultimate goal of salvation?

Ultimate goal of salvation is not simply to get you out of hell. We have to be delivered from the wrath of God, because the ultimate goal was what? Jesus said, "I have come to give life, and to give this life abundantly." That's what He came to do. Remember what the word "life" is in Greek?

There's the bios, which means the biological life. And what's the word that Jesus uses exclusively? Zoe. To be alive. He didn't just give us life so that you can exist in heaven forever. He says, "No, He brought us back to life, to be alive." So let me ask you, when do you feel the most alive?

Don't say anything. Just think about it. I know some of you guys who've been a Christian for a while will say, "When I worship Jesus." This is not a seminary class, you know, you're not going to pass or fail, so don't say what you think is theologically correct to say.

I'm asking you a real question. When do you feel the most alive? I'll answer it for you. Okay, if you disagree with me, you can come talk to me afterward. I believe you feel the most alive is whatever that you are doing brings the most joy. Correct? Am I wrong?

No. Whatever brings you the most joy. So if bungee jumping brings you the most joy, you're going to have every opportunity you get and you're willing to, if you like watching basketball games and that's what brings you the most joy, that's where you're going to spend the most time, that's where you're going to spend the most money.

Right? If fantasy baseball or basketball is what brings you ultimate joy, that's where all your time and money is going to go. Right? Whatever brings you the greatest joy is where you feel the most alive. So life and joy go hand in hand. Yes or no? It is. Right?

So when he says that he has come to give life and give this life abundantly is to make you alive. So how does this connect to what he's saying? If we have been justified by his blood and saved from the wrath of God and rescindled and we are firm in his hands, his ultimate goal of this so that you and I may rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom we have now received reconciliation.

So the greatest evidence of justification in the life of a believer is joy found in Christ. Is joy found in Christ. What causes a man and a woman to persevere in his faith? Because we believe that life is in Jesus. If you don't believe that, you may fake it for a period.

You could fake it for a period. I mean, everybody can fake it for a period. I can fake being a marathon runner for like three minutes. I can even, I can fake that. I can put on the clothes and get in line and register. I can fake it. You know, but I'm not going to fool anybody for a while.

Everybody can fake it for a period. You can maybe fake it in college, but you're not going to fake it in your twenties. You can, maybe you can fake it when you're single, you know, and you're going through the motion. So you come to church and you, you, you do your duty, right?

But you're going to go wherever that causes the greatest joy in your life. That's where your life is going to take you. So if it's not Christ, then eventually time has a way of weeding the church out. Time and circumstance and, and, and suffering and trials has a way of weeding the church out.

If Christ isn't, if your faith is not in Christ, if your life is not found in Christ, sooner or later, your life, your money, your time will be spent pursuing whatever brings you the greatest joy. But those who have been justified, right, have been reconciled, access to God restored, that we have the source to go to the author of life and call him our Abba Father, that we've been plucked out from hell and we are sustained by his power, his ultimate gift for us is joy everlasting.

It's not simply to be in heaven forever, but to be alive in heaven forever. If joy in Christ is not what brings you to church, it will eventually take you out somewhere else, right? It will. Maybe not today. Maybe you have too many friends here. Maybe there's too much history here.

Maybe you've invested too much here. But if your attraction is not Christ, sooner or later it will be revealed. That's why the scripture says, when Paul says 2 Corinthians 5, 14 and 15, when all kinds of trials are coming, the very church that he almost died for is questioning his apostleship.

If there was any reason to quit as an apostle, it was in the context of writing this letter to the Corinthians. That is enough. I've had enough. And yet Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5, 14, for the love of Christ controls us. In NIV it says compels us because we have concluded this, that one has died for all, therefore all have died.

And he died for all that those who live might no longer live for themselves, but for him who for their sake died and was raised. So again, as we again wrap up this morning's sermon, as we look and examine to see our faith, is our faith in our connection with Christ the source of my joy?

Recognizing what it is that he has given us. Are we living each day thinking about something else? Only if God would answer this prayer, if only God would change my circumstance, not realizing what it is that we have already been given in Christ. Joy and happiness is not having what we want, but wanting what we already have in Christ.

I pray that that would percolate in our hearts and cause us to celebrate and be thankful for the rest of this week. So let's take a few minutes to pray as we invite our praise team to come back up. And again, take some time to come before the Lord and examine, to think that maybe if our salvation has become mundane and plain, and it doesn't move us as it used to, that as we study through the book of Romans, that it would cause us to reflect deeply, right, of what it is that we have in Christ, the hope that we have in Jesus in the future, and how that affects our joy today.

So let's take some time to pray as our worship team leaves us. (papers rustling)