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A very good evening to you once more. Since this is the last occasion that I shall have the happiness of being with you publicly for the moment, let me publicly say how grateful I am to you for your invitation in the first place, and for all the Christian kindness and love and the milk of human sympathy that you have extended to me while I have been with you this weekend. I have made you work unconscionably hard. The pressure that you have felt on your anatomy as you have sat so long upon the seats is not altogether my fault, of course. Uh, the scientists would explain it as due to the force of gravity pulling you down to the center of the Earth, you'll see. So it's not altogether my fault. I am marvelously relieved to hear that, in spite of it, you didn't appeal to, uh, appeal to the, uh, organizers of this weekend, and you didn't apparently complain to them, so I was allowed to go on without restraint. I think you must have complained to them, but they probably didn't, uh, convey your complaints to me, so you blame them, if you will, please, rather than I myself. Now, uh, this meeting in some part is part of our series of studies that we have been engaged in on the Epistle to the Romans from the New Testament. But it is, uh, a somewhat of an oddity in this sense that my brief tonight is to speak on one of the technical terms of the Christian gospel. Apparently, the church here is in process of a Sunday night examining the basic, uh, uh, Christian technical terms. And the one they have given me tonight is a specially difficult one. I think they engineered it that way to test, uh, my understanding. I hope I shall pass their examination. Now, technical terms can be bothersome things, do you see? As so with me when it comes to motor cars and computers, do you see, by which I am shown up to be, from time to time, an old stick in the mud from pre-civilized days, do you see? So I scarce know what a byte is in a computer. It's more natural to me to think of dogs in that context, you'll see. And, uh, it is amazing how the young, isn't it, take to, uh, technical terms when they want to, you'll see. When it comes to Christianity, somehow we have the impression it is one of those things that shouldn't be or can't be, uh, conf- uh, expressed in severely technical terms, you'll see. Some of us are tempted to think that Christianity is a little bit fuzzy wuzzy. That isn't so, of course. Christianity likewise has its technical terms. If you were learning, uh, needlepoint, uh, embroidery, you'd have to have your technical terms, wouldn't you? And you, uh, wouldn't be against learning them. So in that spirit, let us come once more to the technical terms of the Christian gospel and consider the one that, uh, is arranged for us tonight. It is the one that is, uh, when you first see it, the most severely off-putting. It is the technical term propitiation, you'll see. It's long since gone out of the English language, you'll see. It wasn't very much in it ever, but it's now gone out of it, you'll see. And, uh, it sounds awfully forbidding, propitiation. It also gets itself involved in another thing that the really learned people who translate the New Testament from its original Greek into English, some of them these d- days disagree over how the particular Greek word should be expressed, you'll see. So you could read a modern translation of the Bible, for instance, and never come face to face with this long, difficult word, you'll see, and not even know it existed, which would be a shame, wouldn't it? You shouldn't be cheated like that. It does. Anyway, I'm about to read a passage in Romans that includes this term, and I'm reading it in a translation that will, uh, keep that old, long, technical term propitiation. If you happen to have a text in front of you and you care to read it with me, you may find that yours doesn't contain that term, but contains something else. And, uh, if you don't have a text and don't care to read it, well, uh, so just listen, and you'll hear the term anyway. So here we are. The passage from Romans is in chapter three, and for sake of context, we shall begin at verse nineteen. Now we know that whatever things the law says, it speaks to them that are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God. Because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight, for through the law comes the knowledge of sin. But now, apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, unto all them that believe. For there is no distinction, for all have sinned and do fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth to be, and here comes our turn. Whom God set forth to be, says the translation in front of me. God set forth to be a propitiation through faith by his blood to show his righteousness because of the passing over of the sins done aforetime in the forbearance of God. For showing, I say, of his righteousness at this present season, that he might himself be just and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus. Where then is glorying? It is excluded. By what manner of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. We reckon, therefore, that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law. Or is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also. If so be that God is one, and he shall justify the circumcision by faith and the uncircumcision through faith. Do we then make the law of none effect through faith? God forbid. We rather establish the law. So here then is our word propitiation, and let's take the bull by the horns and meet first the objection that some have, that the Greek word concerned that Paul actually wrote with his own pen, or his secretary did for him, should not be translated propitiation. It should be translated something like expiation. You say, what is the difference? Well, let's start with the expiation, uh, possibility. That also is a big old technical term, isn't it? We may paraphrase it near enough for tonight to say that expiation is a term you could use for blotting out somebody's sins, expunging them from the record and from the memory of God, clearing the dirt of sin away and getting rid of it and shoveling it into, uh, the dustbin. You say, well, what's wrong with that translation? Well, in itself, it's a good idea, isn't it? I'm not going to argue against it tonight because that is a very valid concept that we find in Holy Scripture, and indeed a very wonderful concept, uh, this idea of blotting out human sin from before the very face of God. Paul uses a very similar metaphor in another one of his letters, does he not? He talks like this, that God has forgiven us all our trespasses, having blotted out the bond written in ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and has taken it out of the way, nailing it to his cross. With my simple, naive mind, I love those metaphors. Paul pictures God's holy law as having kept, like a good accountant, all the long record of our shortcomings and our breakings of the law and our sins and trespasses and all the big bad things we've done and all the nasty little mean things we've done as well. And having broken God's law, God's law has kept the record of them a long bond, an awful record. They say when you're about to drown, your life flashes up before you in remarkable detail. I don't know, I've never been in this situation. It would be a something, wouldn't it? Would you enjoy it? I don't think I would. If tonight we had a flashback like that in our memories and could read set out before us every sin, every nasty little mean thing. Every uncleanness, every untrue. That we have ever done. This word expiation is not to be despised, is it? For in itself it is true. Paul says here, for those who trust God's Son in true repentance of sin. God does this marvelous thing. He takes the bond r- that is compiled by his law against us. And as though he were an ancient scribe who wanted now to cross something out and would take a sponge and obliterate the ink from the page. So God takes the record that is against us. For everyone that trusts the Savior, God himself sponges it out, blots it out from the record against us. And then the apostle adds a lovely twist to it, doesn't he? He says he's taking it out of his way, that bond that was against us, expunged, but he hasn't done it up some obscure corner. He's taken this thing and nailed it to the cross of Christ, that heaven and earth may see that through the death of Jesus, those who in true repentance trust him may have their sins blotted out. Oh, I love in my imagination to listen to those hammer blows. To know that I needn't hide anything. I needn't try conveniently to forget anything. I may know that all the sins I can remember, and all those many more I can't remember, but, uh, God knows them. Can be... and have been nailed to the cross of Christ and the pardon there exposed for all to see. Is that kind of thing that lies behind some popular Christian hymnody, you know. It may be kind of doggle verse, but never mind, it gets to the heart of the matter. My sins, wrote one hymn writer, my sins, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought, my sins, not in part, but the whole, were nailed to his cross, and I bear them no more. It is well, it is well with my soul. That, in simple form, is what many people take to be expiation. Through the sacrifice and blood of Christ, our sins blotted out. Why then argue about the translation? That's good enough, isn't it? Isn't that good enough for you to know your sins can be blotted out? Why drag in this other big long word, propitiation? Well, of course, it's a question of being as honest as we can be with what scripture is saying, and being as exact as we can. I'm about to say that the word should not be, uh, here in Romans chapter three actually should not be translated expiation. I'm not arguing against the fact of expiation. I'm going to suggest that what Paul is saying here is something different, and that the Greek word he uses should better be translated here in this chapter by that old-fashioned term propitiation. You say, what does that mean anyway? Well, in the Greek tongue, uh, used by pagans, for instance, who believed in pagan deities, they believed that when they sinned against their deities, their gods got angry with them. And therefore, what had to be done was to appease the anger of their gods, which they pro- uh, did by offering sundry sacrifices and things. That is what the word predominantly means in its Greek usage outside, uh, the Bible. Therefore, the presumption is that it means that kind of thing too, in the Bible. That's just where some people, uh, begin to fight shy. They say, can't mean that, surely. I mean, the true God, he never gets angry, does he? Surely we don't have to try and appease his wrath. I wonder how you feel about that matter. Does your God get angry? If I might put it in more extreme form, would your God ever send anybody to hell? You say, goodness me, sir, you don't believe in hell, do you? That old-fashioned, antiquated idea with a lot of demons in green livery and forked tails and, and tridents stashing the people down into the flames like you see in some medieval churches. You don't believe in that, do you? Well, not in that gruesome depiction of it, of course not. But the question is, does... does God get angry? Sometimes we feel, no, God couldn't possibly get angry because what we know anger by our personal experience very often is us losing our tempers and blowing our tops, do you see? Uh, and we, when it's all over, feel ashamed of ourselves, and our friends have to explain to others, well, he's a nice chap, really, now and again he blows his top, but it soon blows over, you know, and he's not such a bad chap after all. We can't think of the Almighty losing his temper. No, he never does. Let's get that out of our mind. When the Bible speaks of God being wrath, it doesn't mean that God has lost his temper. But the Bible is insistent, isn't it, that God gets angry. How wouldn't he get angry? I believe you would sometimes, wouldn't you? When you hear that snipers around Sarajevo have not accidentally but deliberately shot little children, aiming at their heads, what kind of reaction do you feel in your heart? Of course, you don't lose your temper, do you, over it? Do you feel any reaction? Or are you so hard-boiled to this evil world that you can pass it off? Oh, that's one of these things that happens. It doesn't upset you. I imagine if those children were your children. In fact, I imagine even though they're not your children. When you hear of delib- deliberate and repulsive evil like that, you feel indignation, don't you? Shouldn't you? Suppose I live down your cul-de-sac, and, uh, uh, you have a fair child of seven years old, a delightful little girl, and I'm one of these show-off drivers of automobiles, you know, and, uh, you appeal to me vigorously, look, please don't come roaring down here at sixty five miles an hour. One of these days, a little child will run out in front of you, and you'll run them down. I take no notice, and half drunk one night, I come sixty miles an hour and do precisely that, and I run over your child and kill her. What is your reaction? Not a question of your losing your temper, is it? Well, I tell you this, if you don't feel a profound indignation against my folly and selfishness that has murdered your child, then I'm going to suggest to you, you never did love your child anyway. You really loved that child. You will feel a surge of indignation against that utter folly of my selfishness. And the last thing you'll say, you'll you'll say is that, well, never mind, it doesn't matter. Love can never say that. Oh, I know if the women next door came out and saw what I'd done, they'd come out with a carving knife ready to carve me up. I know that. Twenty years time, the women will have forgotten all about it, you know. I must tell you this, that twenty years time, God would not have forgotten about it. And if I have not repented, he will hold it against me. He will never say my sin didn't matter. Why? Because he loves the child. Therefore, God is not only angry with the sin, but, says the Bible, so long as sinners don't repent, God is angry with the wicked. It is the expression, the other side of the coin, to his love that is indignant and hates sin with all the hatred of the divine heart of love. We must rid ourselves of the idea that God's lo- uh, God's uh, wrath is something funereal, you know. The Bible in its picture language has it otherwise. In the last book of the New Testament, when we read that uh, God's final wrath is poured out upon sinful mankind, we have the picture given us of the angels coming with bowls full of the wrath of God. It is a picture, isn't it? And they pour out these bowls of the wrath of God upon the earth. The interesting thing is the description of how they're dressed. How would you suppose they'd be dressed? Because I'd imagine them dressed up in funereal black with blood oozing out of their mouth and eyes and old hags, horrible. No, no, that's how the Greeks pictured the avenging Furies. The Bible pictures them as dressed in white, brilliant white, magnificently pure white. All the wonder of it, isn't it? Like an alpine mountain with new laid snow, dazzling, beautiful in its purity. That's God's wrath. And we may learn to thank God for his wrath against sin. It's the thing that's going to keep heaven clean. God's inveterate hatred and opposition to sin. Ultimately, it's a beautiful thing. So the Bible at least says, yes, God gets raw. And that raises this great question. If God is angry against my sin, how can I meet him? That's why I have called, in part, our topic tonight, meeting place between God and man. I suppose if we get convinced that God is angry against sin and therefore sinners, we think the best policy is to keep clear of God as far as we can. We shan't be able always to do that, shall we? The Bible declares that we must one day meet him. We shall all stand before the throne of God. If God is angry against sin, and rightly so, how can we meet him? And that is where our, our verse comes in. You'll see that proclaims that there is this meeting place between God and man through Jesus Christ, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith, through his blood. Because Christ, by dying on Calvary and suffering the penalty of sin, has satisfied God, has assuaged his indignation, so that God now is free to accept us without compromise. That is the difficulty, isn't it? When we come to think about forgiveness. What does forgiveness mean? Well, I must tell you what it doesn't mean. When the Bible says that God is prepared to forgive us, it doesn't mean that God eventually caves in and said, I was a bit bothered about that, but, uh, now time has gone by, you know, and so let's agree to forget it, shall we? God will never do that. He will never say the sin didn't matter. His anger that prescribes, that prescribes the penalty for that sin must be satisfied. As the Bible puts it, he's got to be righteous, hasn't he? Just you imagine I have, uh, run over your daughter and killed her, and you were to arrive up in heaven and find me there. You say, half a minute, God, is that goading there? Yes, that's goading. What, the goading that ran over my daughter? Yes. How does he come here? Oh, I forgave him. You did what? You said, did you, God? How, how interesting. In the end, it didn't matter. Really? What kind of a heaven could be built on that? By saying, well, Earth's experience is over now, and there's a lot of nasty things on that basis, just saying it didn't matter. God won't. God says that if he's going to forgive us, first of all, he must do it without compromise. The sense of justice in our hearts, let alone in his, must be satisfied. God has to express his approval of sin before the universe and show that the forgiveness has been honorably made. And that, says the Bible, is what Jesus Christ has done by dying on a cross and bearing not merely human spite, but God's just wrath against our sin. But oh, what a wonderful thing it is. Because having offered that sacrifice that appeases the divine wrath, Christ has made a way for us to come and to meet God and to be sure that we can be accepted. Now, if you are reading some old versions of the New Testament, you will not find the word propitiation there, nor even the word expiation. You will find the word mercy seat, and all of you who are over eighty five will, uh, will rejoice in that, and you'll say, ah, now at last, uh, we haven't got one of these modern preachers, we've got a real, genuine, authentic, old-fashioned time preacher, and he's now using the right word, whom God has set forth a mercy seat through faith in his blood. It's a charming English word, isn't it? Possibly influenced by Luther's translation, Gnade Stura. Eh, you'll see, right or wrong, I can tell you the history of it. You'll see, it's a little bit complicated and involve a little la- lesson in language, but put up with that, it'll soon be over and cost no more. You'll see, in the Old Testament days, when God, uh, arranged for Israel to build him a sanctuary, in that sanctuary there were two compartments, eh, and the second inner compartment was where rested the symbolic throne of God. It was called the ark, but it was made in this fashion. Uh, let me show you, rather you go ask, don't, don't, don't criticize the artwork, but just by way of kind of seeing it, we'll see. There was a vessel moderately like this. Don't criticize its details. It was an oblong box, uh, made of wood, overlaid inside and outside with gold. The ark. On top of it was a cover. It was a slab of pure gold. Let me show you another picture to show the distinction between the ark and the cover. Uh, here it is. There is the cover, uh, now lifted up so that you can see the difference. This is the cover, this is the, uh, box, this is the ark. Now the term mercy seed that some of your old translations use here in chapter three, God has set forth Christ to be a mercy seed. That term owes its origin to this particular piece of furniture. If in those same ancient translations you go back and read the description of this, the old King James version, for instance, will call this piece of gold that formed the cover of this ark, they'll call it the mercy. Well, actually, in the Hebrew of the Old Testament, the thing is called gapores. When the Jews of Alexandria, uh, in the third century BC came to translate their Old Testament into Greek, and they came across this word for this slab of gold here that covered the ark. Uh, they scratched their heads, of course, and decided what now, how should they translate it, you'll see. So they hit upon a word. In Greek, it is epithēma. I mean, something placed on top is a pretty, uh, bland word. You could use it for a cover or a lid or something if you like. Epithēma. It's a noun, and to cover. Then they decided that wasn't quite enough, because it wasn't just a cover. This was the place where Israel was to meet God. They were the original instructions. You build this ark, Moses, you put it in the holy place, you will put that cover on it with those cherubims coming out of the side, and there will I meet you. It was the meeting place of God and men. One day a year, though only once, the nation's representative, their great high priest, was allowed actually to come in, and drawing aside the final curtain that hitherto veiled the ark, he was allowed to come in and stand before that ark and, so to speak, meet God, face on, direct. On what terms could he come and meet God, if God is a God who is wrath against sin and against sinners. How should he come? Here is a simple drawing, give its artistic innocence, uh, that, uh, tries to get across a little detail of the ceremony that was then enacted. When the man came in to meet God and stood before that ark, symbol of God's earthly throne, that ark contained, among other things, the two tables of God's law. I tell you, one thing that priest didn't do, he didn't start to mumble to God, look God, I know we've come short, but we've jolly well done our best, and we think we qualify for your mercy. We have, after all, done our best. There was no silly talk like that. There wasn't any talk at all. What the man was told to do is to come with his incense and then with a basin filled with blood that had been taken from the animal sacrifice that had been offered on the altar outside as an offering for sin. As he, as the nation's representative, came to meet God and stood before God's holy throne and the law it contained, he said nothing. He took the blood and sprinkled it on that lid and before the ark. That was not a pagan idea. That was an institution that God himself laid down. What was it saying? The man was saying, we have broken the law. We deserve its penalty. But by God's mercy, God has allowed us to use a substitute. We've been allowed to confess our sin above the head of the animal. The innocent animal has died in our place. You say, how did that help? That was only a symbol, wasn't it? Well, yes, it was only a symbol. But it taught this. And without the shedding of blood, says scripture, there is no forgiveness. Sin can only be forgiven when the penalty has been paid. In those far off days before Jesus Christ came to our world, God prepared men's minds, women's minds, for what Christ would do when he came to die on the cross. And so early on, he used these symbols, and when people had sinned and sought God's forgiveness, then they were allowed to confess their sin, as I say, over the head of an animal, and the animal died in their place. They didn't pay the cost of sin. What did an old animal know about sin? Do you see? Cows don't go to bed at night with a bad conscience and have sleepless nights, do they? What? Animals know nothing about it. It's human beings that get bad consciences and pass sleepless nights. Why then did God use those ancient ceremonies? Why, that shedding of blood, those animal sacrifices were like toy money that parents sometimes give to children, to teach children in their games the lesson through toy money to prepare them for when they grow up and they find the value of real money, and they find that things really cost, and you have to pay. That was God speaking to the race in its childhood, getting across the basic principle that sin must be paid for. God's wrath against sin be, be assuaged. The penalty paid in full. It was that that Jesus did, when he died for our sins and suffered the penalty of sin. All we like sheep had gone astray, the Bible says, turned each one to his own way. The Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all. I paid the penalty and satisfied God. And the way is open for us now to come and meet God. That is wonderful, isn't it? We'll see, in the end, it comes down to very practical things. One of these days, so sure as you can see that faint picture of that ancient symbol of the throne of God. One day, we shall actually stand for the great reality. We must appear before the judgment seat of Christ. That being so, we do need to know, don't we, what will happen to us when we stand there. It is no good indulging in wishful thinking. I remember in my youth, when I was not long a member of your church here in Panton Hall, some valiant souls strove to take the Christian gospel to some of the suburbs, and for that purpose they erected a big, uh, marquee somewhere, I don't know, over there somewhere, you'll see. And I was hauled in to help, uh, and going around doors and giving out hymn books and things and all sorts of things, you see. Uh, well, uh, my good friend in those days, he had a friend in the city who was a, a business lady, you see. One afternoon she invited him and me, if you please, to tea. It was a very luxurious tea. She was a wealthy businesswoman, you see. And in the course of the tea, she said, well, Bill, now do tell me, what do you preach to the people in no- that tent thing down the road? And Bill took the opportunity to tell her, to say what w- what uh the preachers preached, you see, and in the course of his remarks he happened to say, of course, preaching a great message how you can be saved and sure of God's forgiveness and sure of heaven that we can meet God in peace. And when she got a word in at last, she said, uh, uh, uh, uh, you say you were sure of heaven, Bill, she said. Yes, said he, yes, I am. Oh no, she said, you couldn't be sure of heaven. And turning to me, just I was a youth, she said, are you sure of heaven? I would, yes, madam, yes, I am indeed. Oh no, she said, that's impossible. You, I don't doubt you are a good living young man, of course, I said, I'm sure you are, but you know, you haven't lived very long yet, have you? And and what happens in later life if you do some desperate sin? Well, I said, madam, I hope I won't, of course, but um, as I understand it, because my trust is in Christ, and my sin is covered by his death and blood. Oh no, she said, no, no, no, no. No, she said, that that can't be so. You see, the way to be saved, it it all depends on our striving, you see. I said, is that so, madam? Yes, it's our striving to keep God's holy law. I said, well, I didn't know that. And I was young and very rude and brash, you know, and insensitive to people's feelings and all that. And I said, well, madam, um, uh, what do you suppose God is going to say to you when you stand before his throne? Ah, that was an unfair question hitting below the belt, wasn't it? And she sort of startled and said, well, I don't know. I think he'll say, well, you did go wrong there, my dear, and you did, uh, do something rather seriously wrong there, but you know you were provoked to it really, and you couldn't help it, and on the whole, I think God would be merciful to me. I said, he won't, madam. Oh, I was rude. I... She said, how do you know? I said, I, I, uh, the Bible tells us what God is going to say anyway. Where, she said. And I quoted her those words with which we began our reading this evening. We know that what things soever the law says, it says to them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world become liable to the judgment of God. I think I see her face yet. It went chalk white, because I was so rude. She said, God will never damn me! People live in that fanciful hope, don't they? It's no good, ladies and gentlemen. We must face reality. We have sinned. And God tells us that if we come to him on the basis of our doing our best to keep his holy law, the verdict cannot be anything else than this, that we have sinned, we come short, we d- deserve its penalty and must suffer it. All the reason why many people are so uncertain in their hearts of salvation is because they haven't faced that prime reality. Face it, that we are sinners before God and liable to his wrath. Then God has a wonderful salvation right at your elbow, and you don't have to wait. And you don't have to wait until you die and emerge into eternity. You can have this wonderful thing now. For God has set forth Jesus as a meeting place. Come to God through Jesus and the blood he shed at Calvary. And paid the penalty of our sin, honored God's law, assuaged God's wrath, and if we come through Jesus, we may have God's kiss of welcome on our cheek forthwith, his arms of love around us, and the guarantee that he will never, never cast us out. The matter settled now and settled eternally. All we began on such a glum note, didn't we, with the long big word propitiation and talked of solemn things like the wrath of God, but herein is the treasure and the joy hidden. Face it, let it drive you to Christ, and this very night you may have God's own assurance that the matter of sin and its penalty is all finished and finished forever, since for those who trust Christ, there is now no longer any condemnation. They have passed from death unto life. They have eternal life and will never be rejected. Oh friend, that's worth studying the technical terms of Christianity to get at that, isn't it? May God help us all tonight, both to understand, and having understand what Christ can do and has done for us, may we not just understand it, but like that priest in his way was prepared to take courage in both hands and do what God said and come and meet God on the basis of the blood of the sacrifice that God had ordained, let us take our courage in both hands. And if never before, then now. Rise up and come and meet God now, this night. Through Jesus Christ. Confess our sin. Own that we deserve the penalty. Plead the blood of Christ and God's own promise that the blood of Jesus Christ, God's son, cleanses us from all sin, such that there is no wrath, there is no condemnation, nothing but the eternal welcome and peace of God. Shall we pray that God will help us understand this and grasp it and seek him until we find it? O God our Father, we thank thee for diagnosing our need realistically. We thank thee for thy divine honesty, that thou art not a God of pretense, but a healthy God, who facing the deserts of our sin, has found a way of forgiving us honorably, justly, the penalty fully paid. And so tonight we bring our study to thee. Authenticate thy word in our hearts, we pray, that we may have that conviction coming from thee, that this is thy word to us. It is true. Grant, Lord, that we may then, if never before, take that step, personally rising up to coming to meet thee, to know through Jesus Christ thy pardon, thy welcome, and thy peace, and the security of thine eternal love. So bless our study, and we in turn shall bless thee unceasingly forever, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.