Wonderfully Made

If you wanna take your bibles, if you have 1, or pay attention to the screen, we're gonna read the first 12 verses of Psalm 139.

For the director of music of David Asam. You have searched me, lord, and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise, you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down. You are familiar with all my ways before a word is on my tongue, lord.

You know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?

If I go up to the heavens, you are there. If I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there, Your hand will guide me. Your right hand will hold me fast. If I say surely the darkness will hide me, and the light become night around me, even the darkness will not be dark to you.

The night will shine like the day for darkness is as light to you, Tom. Thanks, Dean. If you could keep those words open in front of you, that would be great. My name is Tom, and I'm 1 of the past us here. And, this is a sermon series that we began last week.

We're taking 4 weeks to work our way through this magnificent Psalm, Psalm 139. And, just to underline or to say again, all of the young people in the church are also going to be looking at this Tom with us, through the month of September. So if you do get an opportunity, to speak with 1 of the young people after the service about what they've been learning in their groups, hopefully, you'll be able to have a a better conversation with them because we've all been learning the same thing over this month. So verses 7 to 12 are going to be our focus this morning and let's seek the lord's help as we open it together. Heavenly father, we do pray, please, that you would speak this morning to every single 1 of us here in Jesus' name.

Our men. Well, true Christians, and in true Christianity, the, the mind, they've always understood the importance of the mind. So if you think of Paul's words in Romans 12 verse 2, he says, do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. So the point he's making there is that if we are going to live faithfully for the lord Jesus Christ, then we do need to have the mind transformed. We do need to engage our minds with the arguments of scripture.

We do need to allow them to persuade us so that we intellectually understand what the word of god is saying so that we can then live faithfully for him. The mind has always been very important. But like all Christian truth, over the years, that that doctrine or that idea has been distorted. And so in the 17 hundreds, 1 classic example of that, in the 17 hundreds, a man called Robert Sanderman, who was a Scottish Presbyterian minister, came out of the Presbyterian church in order to form a sect, which became known as Sandemianism or the Sandemian start after him. And he really pushed this wrong idea that saving faith was only about the mind.

So all you needed to do was to intellectually agree with the arguments of scripture, and that was all that was required. If you could understand it, and agree it, then you were a saved person. And so in his thinking, there was no need for an experience of the truth. There was no need for the heart to be moved, and the will to be moved by the truth. All that was required was was the mind.

And still today, there's a there's a form of that kind of thinking. If we understand the mark of a spiritual person to be, only 1 who understands Christian arguments and can regurgitate them and not actually a lived Christianity the truth is making a difference to my life, then that is a kind of sadamanianism. It's all in the head and nothing of the heart. Now the answer to him and to all of of that kind of wrong thinking, really, is just honest biblical Christianity. True biblical Christianity says, yeah, the mind is really important.

It needs to be transformed if you're gonna live for Christ. But also that information of the mind is to be experienced. It's to be a lived theology that moves you in order to actually live for the lord, mind and heart. And I think Psalm a hundred and 39 is probably 1 of the best places in the bible to go to see that union between the heart and the mind between theology and life. So last week in verses 1 to 6, we saw a truth about god that he knows everything.

God knows everything. That's the that's the truth for the mind, but what did it mean for David? It means if he knows everything, then he knows me. He knows me. It's a lived theology, knows everything he knows me.

And in this this week, verses 7 to 12, we see a very similar thing. God knows everything, therefore he knows me. God is everywhere, and therefore he is with me. Theology and life. Heart and mind.

That's what this son takes us to. And so, really, that is the the big takeaway idea just for this particular section. If god is everywhere, that means that god is with me. That is the very heart of god's promises to his people. Remember in the old testament, the heart of the the covenant promise would be I will put my spirit in them and I will be with them, the lord with us.

That's what we're going to see this morning. But 1 thing before we unpack it and dive into it together, I've I think I think a danger with disarm is that we too quickly make it just about me. We just personalize it too much. And this Psalm, Psalm 1 3 9, is is a favorite for, calendars and coffee mugs and devotionals, and that there's so many and rightly so. I mean, there's some wonderful truth here.

But when you read those things, very often, they they skip the whole corporate application. It's it's only about me. And so you'll find lines in these devotionals like god is with you even when you don't go to church. God is with you even if you can't make it to be with god's people, which of course is true, but when you set set it against the church in that way, it goes a bit wrong because it all just becomes about me. Where actually the Psalms is the songbook for the church.

It's truth for the church. So it's not just a Spotify playlist, which I listen to individually with my headphones on. It's rather the hymn book that I'm given as I walk into church. It's something I can sing, but it's something that we all sing together as as god's people. And so those 2 things we're going to see by way of application as we go through God is god is everywhere, and therefore he's with me, but god is everywhere, and therefore he's with us, brothers and sisters of Cornerstone.

He's with us together in our gathered corporate life as as his people. And there's a number of points that I want us to look through now in order to, unpack this wonderful truth. There's gonna be 6 or 7 of them, depending on how much time we get. But the first is this. The lord Jesus Christ is with us on earth.

That's the first thing. The lord Jesus is with us on earth. And I get that from verses, from well, from if you look at the start of some Psalm verses 7. David says, where can I go from your spirit where can I flee from your presence? And then he says, if I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there, your hand will guide me.

So, basically, he's saying, it doesn't matter where you go on earth. You could go right off into the very east, to the wings of the dawn where the sun rises, or you could go way off into the west to the farthest shores to where the sea is, because the in in the Israelite Mind West was was always the sea. You could go farthest east or farthest west. You could go right up into into space. You could get on 1 of Elon Musk's new, you know, spaceships and be 1 of the first non professional astronauts to go on a space walk.

Then if you saw that happened, this week, very exciting, you could go all the way up there, you could get in a train called light, and you could move at a hundred and 86000 miles per second, or million miles per second, even though I don't know what it is. You've got the speed of light in the other direction. Wherever you could go, God would be there. And the point he's making is that if god is there at the furthest extremes of life, then he will be with us everywhere in between. F furthest extremes and everywhere in between, the lord will be with him.

And just think about what that means for the church. Wherever the lord Jesus Christ has his congregations here on earth. He is with them. They might be meeting right now in small villages right off in the far east in Japan. The lord Jesus Christ is with that gathering by his spirit.

They might be gathered right on the far western tip of Alaska meeting in a town somewhere or a school. The lord Jesus Christ is with them by spirit, wherever his congregations are meeting, wherever his bride is gathered. He is with his people, corporately, wherever they are on earth. But then think about what that does mean for every individual. It means that wherever his people are on earth, the lord Jesus is with every single Christian person.

That is quite a thought, isn't it? Because as we gather here today, it's a beautiful autumn morning. This is the place that we gather for church. There will be some of our brothers and sisters waking up to another day in a prison cell. All alone and separated not only from their church families, but from their earthly families.

There will be some perhaps who've gone to church today and found that the building has been demolished overnight. There will be perhaps pastors around the world who will be kidnapped today and taken and actually separated from their families. Christians in all of these kinds of situations, And yet according to Psalm 1 3 9, they may be alone in 1 sense, but never really ever alone because the lord Jesus Christ will be with them by his spirit personally with them, and not in a not in a kind of distracted way. It's not like he's with them and also on his phone at the same time. You know, you're trying to talk to him, but he's texting or he's scrolling through social media.

You know, when people are with you in a distracted way, He's not with them in a distracted way. He is personally attentive and present with every single 1 of his children wherever they are. That's a wonderful thing, isn't it? When you look in the book of Revelation, Revelation chapter 2 and 3, you see the lord Jesus' intimate knowledge of his church. You know that bit in Revelation, where we're told that the lord Jesus is writing to the churches in Pergamum and Leodicea and Sardis and all of these different places.

And the point of that is to say, I know. I know what is going wherever my people are gathering, I am present with them, and I know what's going on in those congregations. I know the ones who are starting to tolerate teaching that they shouldn't be tolerating. I know the ones that are on fire for me and are even suffering for my name. I know the ones where people have been martyred and things are really tough.

I know I'm with them all, and I know them all wherever they are on earth. And so that's 1 of the first applications this Psalm points us to. The lord Jesus Christ is with us. On earth, both corporately and as individuals. Secondly, the lord Jesus Christ is with us in order to guide us.

He is with us in order to guide us. Have a look at verse 9 there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me. He is with us in order to guide us. Now let me just read you some other psalms where this word guide crops up because it expands our understanding of what he means here.

His Psalm 5 verse 8. It's not on the screen. I'm afraid, but Psalm 5 verse 8. Also, Psalm of David. Lead me lord, or the word is guide, guide me lord in your righteousness.

Psalm 23 verse 3, we just sung about it together. He guides me, same word, along the right paths or in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. So when we encounter this word guide in David Psalms, we're not just dealing with a vague guidance, you know, that as we go through life, sometimes we'll feel a, a sense that we ought to do something or an inner prompting which we could call the lord moving us in a particular direction. We're not we're not dealing with that sort of guidance, but rather when David uses the word, he means the lord Jesus Christ is with his people in order to guide them in the truth of his word. He's gonna lead them in straight paths and lead them into the word which he has given them.

Now there's a whole separate talk there about guidance in the Christian life, but I just want us to get to to think about 1 application of that for for us as a church. So think with me to the end of Matthew's gospel, the lord Jesus Christ has risen from the dead, and he has gathered all the disciples to to be with him, and he is about to give them their marching orders. He's gonna send them out into the world with the mission which would become the church's mission forever and ever. And here's what he says to them. And just listen how it echoes the Psalm.

All authority in heaven on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father and of the son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And then he says, and surely I am with you always. I with you always to the very end of the age. Now how do you suppose they responded to that?

I am with you always. See, maybe they thought, but that sounds a bit creepy. He's gonna be with us always. He's gonna be watching. Every breath we take and every move we make and every step we take, every smile we fake and what are the others?

Bond we break and I don't know. Anyway, he's gonna be he's gonna be with. I'm gonna be watching you. I'm gonna be watching you. They might have a bit be with.

Or did they think we are the disciples of the risen lord Jesus Christ and he is sending us into the world to make disciples for his kingdom. We are gonna begin in Jerusalem, and then go to Judea, and then to Samaria, and then to the ends of the earth, and who knows what we're going to encounter together? There's going to be persecutions, and there's going to be difficulties, but surely there is going to be great joys. And how are we going to do this? I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

I don't think they would have seen that as creepy. I don't think that would have been a source of tremendous comfort to them, don't you? That as they go into the world to make disciples God is gonna be with them. The lord Jesus, their kind savior is gonna be with them as they go about his his work. And again, think about what that means for the church.

Wherever god's people are gathered around the world to make disciples, the lord Jesus is with them to guide them in that work. He's with them for a purpose. And so very locally, you think of, our brothers and sisters meeting now in Hook Hook Church in Serverton or our church family at the King Center in Chestington or at the top of the hill in Serverton, Christchurch Servitan. Our brothers and sisters there, or emmanuel Tolworth, where Bart is now soon to be Hope Church at Tollworth in November. St.

Michael's church in full well, our brothers and sisters there, King's church in Walton, These are all our local gospel partners who love the lord, and wherever they are meeting to proclaim Christ and make disciples in his name, the lord is with them. And so this is part of what we wanna say next week at the, at the vision dinner. And I hope it won't be too much of a spoiler. But in some ways, you know, look, what is the vision of Cornerstone Church? Well, it's not down to us or the elders to continually create a new vision for the church.

Our job is basically to try to restate with as much enthusiasm as we can muster what the vision of the church has always been for the last 2000 years. It's not our job to recast it. It's our job to recommit to it, prayerfully, and to say the vision of the church is to make disciples in the world for the glory of Christ because Jesus has promised to be with people who do that. And we want the presence of Christ with us as we do that. And so do you see?

We've seen the lord Jesus Christ is with us on earth, but he's with us in order to guide us too in our in our mission. Thirdly, we see here in this Psalm. That the lord Jesus Christ is also with us in darkness. Do you see that in verse 11? If I say, well surely the darkness will hide me.

And the light become night around me. So here's David, and in his mind, he's gone to the furthest extremes of the earth. He's gone to the east. He's gone to the west. He's gone to the heavens.

He's gone to the grave. He's gone space and everywhere in between. He said everywhere I can think of, the lord Jesus is gonna be with me, but what about darkness? But what about darkness? Will the darkness in life separate him from his people.

That's what he's asking now. In other words, are there things that we go through? Some type of loneliness or some type of sin or some type of suffering or some form of discouragement or some depressions. Are are there things in this life? Are there darknesses that will wrap us up so tightly that even Christ can't come with us, but he won't be there.

Well, look what he says verse 12. No. Even the darkness will not be dark to you. The night will shine light the day. These amazing words for darkness is as light to you.

Darkness is as light to you. And so do you see he's saying, lord, this is fantastic. This is fantastic because for us, There is quite a big difference between darkness and light, isn't there? So you imagine the road that you live on walking it at midday is 1 thing, walking it at midnight is quite another thing. Same road, and yet we know that darkness is not as light to us.

That darkness can confuse us. That darkness can be a fearful thing if we don't know what's hiding in it. But darkness has a way of confusing landmarks that we know so well. Suddenly things look different and we don't recognize them and they bring a separation between us and our environment or people look different. You know, it takes you longer to recognize them because darkness brings a kind of separation.

It is not we cannot say darkness is as light, but the lord doesn't suffer from any of that. The darkness does not confuse him, and the darkness is not a fearful thing for him, and the darkness does not surprise him. And most importantly, for this arm, the darkness does not separate him from his people. In Genesis 1 verses 3 to 5, we're told that the lord named darkness and that the lord named the light. Now what does that tell you?

If he can name it darkness and name light, It tells you that he is sovereign over darkness and sovereign over light. They are 1 to him, and therefore nothing that we go through. No darkness of any kind can separate us from him. Whatever the darkness, he will be with us. 1 of the noises that we hear very often here at Tiffin, and I'm really hoping it's gonna just start now.

That will prove what an anointed man I am if it will just start is is the sound of a siren. Yet very often. Most of the time, it's really irritating. The sound of a siren is some ambulance or fire engine or police car going going past. Now what does the noise of a siren tell you?

It tells you that there is a delay between the onset of suffering and the arrival of help. They don't go together. The siren says something has happened we're not there now, but we'll be there soon. Every time you hear a siren, you can remember that now. There is a delay in this world between the onset of suffering and the arrival of help.

With Christ, there is no such delay. Where wherever his people are in the darkness, he he is he is there. He is right there. He is with them personally. There is no delay in his arrival.

Do not have to wait for him to come. He's there at the moment when the darkness hits. Nothing can separate us from him. No darkness at all. He's there.

Whatever it is, he is there. And so brothers and sisters, isn't that if that's true? Is that not a promise we want to enjoy when we go through the darkness to know that he is there? I mean, how how strange would it be when you've got those paramedics with you there at the onset of suffering and to claim that you do not need them because you've got it yourself and you're gonna solve it all in in in your own strength. Wouldn't it be make more sense to to make use of 1 who is with you always, even in darkness.

That is what David is saying here. Right in the east, he's there. Right in the west, he's there. And no darkness can separate him from me. He is with me always.

No matter what I go through, and the Psalm is a way of saying, I I praise the lord. That's what I want. Praise the lord. Help me when I when I need you because you're with me. And so we see thirdly that he's with us in darkness.

Fourthly, The lord Jesus Christ is even with us in our sin. The lord Jesus Christ is with us in the darkness of our sin. Have a look at the first words of the Psalm again or verse verse 7 rather. Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?

Now, some commentators actually take this to be David trying to flee from the lord because he's feeling guilty for some particular sin that he's committed. In other words, he's done something wrong. He's trying to run away from god, but he's discovered that he cannot escape from god even in his guilt. Now I wouldn't take it that way because I think the context is not about I've done something wrong and I'm trying to escape, but rather, isn't it wonderful that wherever I am he is with me? And yet it is also true and you see this in the Bible that sometimes god's people do go on the run for the wrong reasons, and yet they find that god is with them there still.

So if you think about Jona, he's probably the very best example of that, isn't he? The word of the lord comes to Jona, the prophet. I'm sure you know the story. And the lord says to him, I want you to go to that great city of nineveh and preach against it for its great wickedness has come up before me, and Jonah hears his commission and just says, I'm not doing that. No.

I'm not going. No. No. You find someone else, and he tries to flee from the presence of the lord by going in exactly the opposite direction. Okay?

He didn't know his psalms or the theology of the psalms at least very well. He thought he could and tried to in disobedience flee from the spirit of the lord, but what did he discover to his horror that no matter how far he went, the lord was with him there, the lord was with him and had gone after him, not in order to condone his sin, not like he'd gone because it doesn't really matter, but because he would not abandon Jonah in his sin. He would go after him and be with him, even in his unbelief to hold him into bringing back. Another example would be Adam. Think of Adam in the garden.

It's the same thing. He sins against the lord, and what does he do? He does verse 7. He tries to flee from the presence of the lord. He tries to go into hiding.

But the lord god walking in the cool of the garden says, Adam, where are you? Where are you? I've come looking for you can't escape me. This is my garden. I know these bushes in these trees and these hiding spots.

I know. I know. I'm coming. And so again, the lord comes after him, not in order to condone or excuse his sin, but because he will not abandon Adam in his sin. Where can we escape?

Can we even hide from god in our unbelief? No. We will find him there refusing to abandon us in our unbelief. 1 of the songs that we love to sing here is he will hold me fast. And verse 10, if you notice that this song uses that exact phrase.

He will hold me fast. Here's the words from the song. When I fear my faith will fail. So this is someone who is in the darkness, Christ will hold me fast. When the tempter would prevail.

So this is a struggle with sin. The tempter's gonna prevail over me. He will hold me fast. I could never keep my hold through life's fearful path. For my love is often cold.

That's someone who's struggling with unbelief. That's someone who's stuck in sin of some kind. My love is often cold. And yet what is the comfort of the Psalm? He must hold me fast.

He will hold me fast. He will hold me fast. For my savior, loves me so. He will hold me fast. Brothers and sisters, isn't it true that from time to time we just get lost in the darkness of our sin, particularly?

That that we get lost in stupid patterns of thinking, and we put ourselves into the darkness because of unbelief in some area. Where David is saying, here in this Psalm, that even there, the lord will not abandon us because he died for us He died to pay the price for that sin. He's known it, and he shed his precious blood to cleanse us of it. And so even if we stupidly walk away from him into sin, He's not ultimately gonna abandon us in it because he died for it. And so he's gonna hold us fast.

Even in the darkness of sin, the children of god will not be able to hide. And doesn't that just make you wanna repent then? Doesn't it make us wanna repaint? If that's true, and god is so kind to be with us even there, that's the sort of truth that makes you wanna shed yourself of stupid thinking, doesn't it? And come back to the lord who's gonna be with us always even in the darkness of our sin.

Let's move on. He'll be with us in even in our sin. Next, the lord Jesus Christ will be with us in death. He'll even be with us in death verse 8. If I make my bed in the depth, which is the word for grave or show.

If I make my bed in the depths, you are there. As we saw last week, as well as that being true for David and for us. That truth right there was also true of the lord Jesus Christ, wasn't it? On good Friday, when he was laid into that tomb and the stone was rolled across the entrance, There was a sense in which the lord Jesus Christ was at that moment the loneliest he has ever been. He was separated from everyone and everything and even those who had loved him on earth, he was truly all alone.

Except not alone because verse 8 says, if I make my bet debts in the grave, you are there. He was not all alone. Even in death, the father was with him in order to raise him from the dead, and that's exactly what happened. 3 days later, the darkness of death was turned into the light of resurrection because the father had not abandoned him even in death, but was with him in order to raise him. And ever since that moment, the Christian church has had the same hope that even in death, the children of god will never be alone, but that he will be with them in order to raise them.

You see verse 8 makes absolutely no sense and is not very comforting at all if it just means Well, I'm gonna die and you will be with me, and that's the end of the story. You won't abandon me in death. You'll be with me in death. That that's not a very good Spotify song. That's not a very good him.

I'll die. You'll be with me, and that's the end of the story. What makes it a great song is resurrection. I'm gonna die, and you will be with me, and that's not gonna be the end of the story. You are going to be with me and you won't abandon me to decay.

You're gonna raise me 1 day, and I will enjoy the same resurrection life as the lord Jesus Christ. The lord Jesus will not abandon us even in death. Isn't that 1 of the worst things about death? The very worst thing about it is that it separates us from everything that we have loved in this life. There comes a moment when even people who have walked with us and loved us for years.

We'll have to say goodbye, and we won't be able to go with them into that last stage. It brings that separation. But David says that the child of god will never have to truly do that alone because the lord Jesus Christ will go with them to a place no 1 else will come. He will come with them into the depths, into the grave in order to raise them again 1 day. He is with us in death.

Lastly, the lord Jesus Christ is with us in heaven. He's with us in death. He's with us in heaven. Verse. If I go up to the heavens, you are there.

So many wrong ideas about heaven on there that when we get there, it will just be a chance to reunite with the people and the pets that we've loved on earth and the things that we've enjoyed. And whether god is there or not is sort of incidental I mean, it's great if he is, but if he's not, that's okay too because I'm with my stuff. I'm with my stuff. And I'm with my people that I love. That is a just a sub Christian distortion of what heaven is.

The very best thing about heaven is what David identifies in verse 8. When I go to heaven, you are there. To be in the presence of Christ is to be in heaven. And that's where the whole bible story is going, isn't it? You look to the end of the book of Revelation and we hear this great voice from the throne announcing the fulfillment of this Psalm.

Now god's dwelling place is among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and god himself will be with them, and will be their god. And so we've seen that at the furthest extremes of life, to the east and to the west, up and down, now and into eternity, whatever happens to us as a congregation and to you as a child of god, the lord Jesus Christ. Is going to be personally powerfully present with you. In Romans 8, Paul puts it this way, who shall separate us from the love of Christ.

Shall trouble, or hardship, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword. And then he says, no. In all of these things, We are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced, and isn't this what David has been telling us this morning? For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future nor any powers, neither height nor depth.

He must have had this Psalm in mind, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, east or west, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, our lord. Wherever we go, he is there. And just before we close, a final thought for anybody here who might not yet belong to the lord Jesus who might not be might not be a Christian. And this final fort comes from Revelation chapter 6, and we're going now to to judgment day where the lord Jesus Christ returns in judgment. And here's what we're told about a certain group of people This is Revelation 6 verse 15.

You just have to tune in at at because it's not on the screen. Then the kings of the Earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else both slave and free, hid in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains. They called to the mountains and the rocks, fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne. And from the wrath of the lamb, the great day of the wrath, their wrath has come, and who can withstand it? And do you know what is so disturbing about that?

Is the difference between those words and Psalm a hundred and 39. Because in Psalm a hundred and 39, there is nothing more glorious and more comforting than the presence of the lord Jesus Christ. But in Revelation 6, we're told there's a group of people for whom the presence of Christ is neither reassuring nor comforting, but absolutely terrifying. Here are a group of people who have discovered that they cannot flee from the presence of the lord, and now he is with them forever in judgment. And so do you see the question is, not if every 1 of us is gonna spend eternity in the presence of Christ because we will.

But in what way will he be present with us? That's the question. Will he be present with us forever in order to judge us for our rebellion? Or will he be present with us forever in order to maximize our joy forevermore? Every single person in the presence of Christ forever, but will it be as judge or will it be as savior.

I hope you can see from this song that the latter is the best place for us to be. Let's pray together. Heavenly father, we thank you that as your people, both as a church and as individuals, we have this remarkable truth to enjoy that wherever we go, you will be with us. We think of those father among us now who who might be internationals. And it's so wonderful having internationals with us in this congregation.

But perhaps they've come here and the culture is different and the language is different and everything feels a bit strange and they've had to leave all their loved ones in another country. But we thank you that if they love the lord Jesus Christ, then he is with them wherever they go. We pray for those in the congregation who are really are going through darknesses of different descriptions. Whether that be a darkness put upon us or a darkness of our own making. We thank you lord Jesus that if we really belong to you, then even the darkness cannot separate us from you.

That you will be with us to guide us to hold us and you will not abandon us. We thank you that even in that moment of great separation, the moment of death, we will not have to descend into the ground alone. Because you will be with us in order to raise us. And when our eyes open for the very first time in glory, we will see that verse 8 is true. If I go to heaven, you are there.

And so we pray father that in all the extremes of life and in everywhere in between, we would delight that you, our saviour are with us in Jesus' name. Oh, man.