Church: Reformed Baptist Church of Franconia | Text: Ephesians 6:10-21 | Date: February 28, 2016 | Speaker: Fred Zaspel

Ephesians chapter 6. Again, beginning with verse 10, we’ll be working our way through this section on the armor of God. Today, again, taking a larger view of it, addressing the subject of our infernal enemy.

Ephesians 6, beginning with verse 10:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one, and take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints and for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly as I ought to speak.

Let’s bow for prayer. Our Father, we’re grateful that your word is given not only to bring us to Christ in initial faith, but to equip us also for life. We pray that you will open our minds and our hearts to hear your word this morning. We pray that you would shape us by it. Give us through this not only a greater awareness so that we may not be naive—a greater awareness of the enemy and the struggle that we face—but also give us a greater appreciation for the victory that has been won for us ultimately in our Lord Jesus Christ. In his name we pray, amen.

One of the great joys, of course, of belonging to Christ is knowing that we are safe in him forever. And the Apostle Paul has expounded this in this letter to the Ephesians at some length. He’s included that God has included us in his saving purpose that runs from eternity to eternity. He opens up with that in chapter one, you remember, that we’ve been blessed in Christ; in Christ we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. And then he begins to enumerate those, and it begins in eternity past, where God the Father has chosen us, predestined us. He has set our destiny to be safe with him forever. He has sent his Son, and the Son has come and secured our redemption for us, the forgiveness of sins. The Spirit of God has come and has sealed us as the down payment of the earnest of our inheritance that will come in full.

Chapter two, he unfolds for us how God came to us when we were dead in trespasses and sins, and he raised us up together with Christ. Again, all our blessings are in Christ, and by virtue of joining us to Christ, we have already become participants in his resurrection, and we have been raised to spiritual life, and in fact, we have been exalted with him into the heavenlies. And we come into chapter four, he begins to apply those things, but it was with all of that in the background that Christ has secured for us our eternal destiny that is safe with God forever. And then he gives us these instructions as to how to live, beginning in chapter 4.

Our Infernal Enemy

As we began to see last time, that is not to say that life will always be easy. And one primary reason why the Christian life is not always easy is that we have an enemy. Now he’s a defeated enemy. The decisive battle has been fought. Christ has won. He has triumphed over the grave. And he will come in time to finish up the work that he has done and bring a complete defeat to Satan. And he will end up, as we read, in the abyss and then finally in the lake of fire. But in the meantime here, we have this enemy that faces us. He’s called the devil, the slanderer. He’s called our adversary. And with him, we read in verse 12, there’s a whole host of help: rulers, authorities, powers of this dark world. In fact, the expression here is particularly graphic. The “world rulers of darkness” present Satan and his hosts as in charge, as it were.

Now, we know God is God over all. But for the time being, this is Satan’s domain. It is called his kingdom. And with his great host of spiritual forces, as we have them described for us in verse 12, he is the ruler of the kingdom of the air. That’s the way it’s said in chapter two and verse two: “the prince and the power of the air.” Now this enemy, Satan, Paul tells us in chapter two, was before our leader. He was our crowned prince, as it were. He was the prince and power of the air, and all of the world, Paul tells us in chapter 2, walks in lockstep with what Satan dictates. He’s running the whole show, as it were.

Now, of course, we’ve been rescued by Christ. We’ve been called out of darkness into light. As Paul says in Colossians, we’ve been transferred out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear son. And while I suspect that Satan knows that ultimately he cannot have us, ultimately, I suspect he also knows by experience that he can very effectively destroy the joy of our salvation. He can hinder witness, he can hinder service, he can destroy the comfort that we should enjoy in Christ, and he can severely damage the blessedness, practically, that we enjoy in Christ, and in practical ways like that, tear us away from God.

Calvin described it this way: that he can drive the saints to madness through despair. That he can create circumstances and contexts that present temptation, that present doubt, discouragement, despair, opposition, and all kinds of things to come against us to destroy us with regard to our joy in the Christian life. And Paul refers to that here in shorthand in verse 11 when he speaks of the “schemes of the devil.” The schemes of the devil—or as the Apostle Peter will write in 1 Peter chapter 5, he’s like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.

We said last time that we are naive to forget that we have this enemy who is bent on our destruction, and that Satan has come against us. This traces back, of course, to the Garden of Eden, the Fall, when God pronounced judgment against Satan. He told him that his end is coming, that this champion coming will crush his head. But in the meantime, there’s this enmity between this serpent and the woman, between his seed and her seed. And whatever the exact nature of his opposition, it is clear that there is this warfare: Satan against God. It is not a dualism—two equal forces fighting against each other—and God is not nervous. But there is this warfare when Satan has set himself in opposition to God and his purpose.

And we see that in so many different places in the New Testament. The world lies in his lap. Chapter 2, the world walks in lockstep with the devil. He’s the prince and the power of the air. And the battleground for this warfare is what John Bunyan called in his allegory, The Holy War. The battleground is the city of Mansoul—the city of man’s soul. And the god of this world has blinded the minds of those who do not believe, and Satan is hard at work keeping men and women from believing in Christ, and then after we come to Christ, he is hard at work keeping us from him.

Well, this passage is given within that context, that broader context, and it’s given to warn us and to caution us and to give alert and to prepare us for what Paul calls the “evil day” in verse 12, the evil day of Satan’s attack. It may be that in a broad sense, that’s all of the Christian life—the opposition is always there. It may be that it’s particular attacks, particular circumstances when the devil exploits a given situation to his advantage. But Paul is warning us here then about this struggle involved in living the Christian life. And in view of that, what I’d like to do this morning, then, is back up again and give the broader context and the setting for this kind of an exhortation and learn more about our enemy. Who is he? Where did he come from? We see him, of course, in the opening pages of the Bible, bringing temptation against Eve, tempting her, tricking her, and through his work, bringing humanity into sin. But how did Satan arrive there? And why?

The Fall Of Satan

For that, let’s look back. Keep your hand here. We will, I think, come back later. But turn with me to Ezekiel chapter 28. Ezekiel chapter 28. This passage, verses 11 through 19—Ezekiel 28 verses 11 through 19—I think traces out for us the source of the evil in this world and what is called the fall of Satan.

A number of years ago, this passage was opened up for me by Bruce Waltke. And I think very insightfully, showing here that while the prophet is speaking against the Prince of Tyre, as you will see in verse 1, the language goes further to speak of Satan himself. And so it’s the prophecy of the coming doom of two individuals. Now let’s take the time to read verses 11 through 19. You’ll notice back in verse 1 and verse 2 that his prophecy is against the Prince of Tyre. But now with verse 11, watch how the language begins to expand:

Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me, son of man, Raise a lamentation over the king of Tyre and say to him, thus says the Lord, you are the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering. Topaz and diamond, beryl, onyx and jasper, sapphire, emerald, carbuncle, and crafted in gold were your settings and your engravings. On the day that you were created, they were prepared. You were an anointed guardian cherub. I placed you. You were on the holy mountain of God. In the midst of the stones of fire you walked. You were blameless in your ways from the days you were created till unrighteousness was found in you. In the abundance of your trade you were filled with violence in your midst and you sinned. So I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, and I destroyed you, O guardian cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Your heart was proud because of your beauty. You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor. I cast you to the ground. I exposed you before kings to feast their eyes on you. By the multitude of your iniquities and the unrighteousness of your trade, you profaned your sanctuaries. So I brought fire from your midst and consumed you. And I turned you to ashes on the earth in the sight of all who saw you. All who know you among the peoples are appalled at you. And you have come to a dreadful end and shall be no more forever.

Well, again, I think what the prophet here is doing is pointing us, of course, to the Prince of Tyre and pronouncing his condemnation as the prophets regularly do with those unbelieving and wicked nations around Israel, and finally to Israel itself for its unbelief and its sin. But the language, I think, goes beyond just the Prince of Tyre. This is a regular kind of feature in the Prophets and in the Psalms as well.

For example, notice first that he’s talking about how he describes this ruler in verses 9 and 10: “You will still say, I am a god, in the presence of those who kill you, though you are but a man and no god in the hands of those who slay you. You shall die the death of the uncircumcised by the hands of foreigners, for I have spoken, declares the Lord.” Clearly here we have a human king himself in view. But often in the prophets and in the Psalms, you’ll find that the language suddenly in the midst of a prophecy goes beyond anything appropriate for a mere human being.

We came across an example of this last week in our prayer meeting here on Wednesday evening. We’re reading Psalm 45, a psalm that is given to celebrate the wedding of the Davidic king. And the language is just glorious. He’s great, he’s beautiful, he’s the most attractive of them all, he’s successful, he’s victorious, he reigns over everyone, and then suddenly: “your throne, O God, is forever and ever.” And suddenly we’ve gone beyond something of a mere human king, and we’re speaking ultimately of the messianic king himself. And you find that kind of thing in the prophets, where the language suddenly bleeds over into others.

We find that often in the prophets and in the Psalms, particularly with regard to messianic prophecy, where you have the track of God coming to deliver his people. God will come and reign. David’s son will come and deliver God’s people and David’s son will reign. And then finally you have passages where those two tracks converge, like in Psalm 45, and this Davidic king is himself God come to reign, which of course resolves entirely in the incarnation of Christ. And you find that kind of thing now, I think, with regard to the Prince of Tyre as well.

For instance, verse 14: Clearly, I think this is not appropriate of any human being, but he’s speaking of an angelic creature. “You are an anointed guardian cherub. I placed you. You were on the holy mountain of God in the midst of the stones of fire. You walked.” And I think what we have here all of a sudden is the difference—the difference between the king of Tyre himself and this individual being described here is the difference between natural and supernatural.

Now, who’s he talking about? Well, Ezekiel’s hearers would probably have associated the words that are used here with Melqart, the god of Tyre. And so the prophecy speaks then of that, of the fall of the gods of Tyre as well. And Ezekiel himself seems to have in view some kind of angelic creature, but even then it’s not just an ordinary angel, if you can speak of that. Not just your everyday old ordinary angel. This is an angel par excellence. He’s superior to all the others in his class. He is the angel who is the “anointed guardian,” or the hovering cherub who hovers over. He’s superior to the others. It seems that perhaps Paul picks up on this in 1 Timothy 3, when he says that an elder should not be one who is a novice, lest being lifted up with pride, he fall into the snare of the devil. Probably an allusion back to this. It seems that this is picked up again in Revelation chapter 12 as well.

But we are speaking then of an angelic creature and, again, a superlative kind of angelic creature. Notice his condition at the time of his creation. Verse 12 describes what he was like: “Son of man, raise a lamentation over the king of Tyre and say to him, thus says the Lord God, you were the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.” Now this first expression, the “signet of perfection”—it’s a difficult phrase to translate. I think the King James says, “you seal up the sum.” It’s some kind of superlative kind of language. The idea is that you are the ultimate perfection of creaturehood. And there are two aspects then that are given to that specifically.

Number one: you’re full of wisdom. That is, he’s wiser than the wisest. Verse three gave a hint to that: “you’re wiser than Daniel.” That is, this is an enemy that cannot be simply outsmarted. He’s wiser than the wisest, full of wisdom. Next: perfect in beauty. The very ultimate of aesthetic beauty. In terms of form, symmetry, he’s beautiful. He doesn’t appear with a pitchfork and horns. That’d be very nice if he did; it’d make it easy. But he’s the very consummation of beauty. And so Paul can say of the devil, he appears as an angel of light.

Verses 13 and 14 describe his position: “You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering.” And he lists them all. Verse 14: “You were an anointed guardian cherub. I placed you. You were on the holy mountain of God in the midst of the stones of fire. You walked.” First of all, while he’s dealing here, of course, in metaphor, but he’s telling us that he’s the highest order of creation, closest to God of all created beings. He’s this hovering cherub. Verse 13, he’s in Eden. That is, you are in the region of ideal perfection. You are where God walks. Again in verse 13, with all of these precious stones, you’re like the priest wearing the stones on his breastplate in offering worship to God for the people. Again, metaphorical description, I’m sure, but Ezekiel himself is a priest, and he’s likely saying something like, this one was in heaven what the high priest Aaron was on earth. Or we could put it this way in contemporary language: he was heaven’s worship leader.

Again in verse 13, he has all the trappings of the king with the gold and its wonderful settings. He was a priest king, the very highest, the very closest to God. Verse 14, “you’re the anointed cherub who covers.” You remember in the Old Testament tabernacle, in the Holy of Holies, there’s the mercy seat and hovering over the mercy seat are the cherubs hovering over. And we also know that the Old Testament tabernacle was not the pattern for heaven, but it’s the other way around: that it was patterned after the sanctuary in heaven. And he is describing this here as this creature was this hovering cherub over God’s throne—guardian, protecting, watching over, and ready to do his will. In other words, he’s the very highest of God’s creation and the very closest to God.

Again in verse 14, he’s on the “holy mountain of God.” That is, he was where God dwells. Same with this idea of walking about in the holy mountain of God. He had access to the very presence of God. That is all to say, in his position he was the very highest of all creation, the highest of creatures and closest to God. And then verse 15 we have a description of his character: “You were blameless in your ways,” that is you were sinless, you were without sin “from the day you were created until unrighteousness was found in you.” Created perfect, created sinless. This is the origin of Satan. Perfect, holy, highest of all God’s creation, and the closest to God.

And then finally, in verses 16 through 18, he describes his sin and his judgment. Verse 17, his sin is the sin of pride: “Your heart was proud because of your beauty. You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.” His sin was the sin of pride. He had delusions of grandeur. He was, in fact, the greatest of all God’s creation, the highest of all God’s creatures, and he thought he had something to do with it. Like Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon, puffed up—look what I’ve done. This is my kingdom. And he didn’t realize and didn’t take time to recognize until he’d been put out to pasture for a while that God is God and rules over the kingdoms of men.

Verse 16 makes reference to his dishonest trade. The idea, I think, probably is that of soliciting other angels in his rebellion. This is Satan’s army. This is what Paul refers to in Ephesians 6: the principalities and powers of the air. And as I say, verses 16 through 19 tell of his coming judgment. It’s actually unfolded in a series of things. Some are yet to come, I think eschatological, but we’ll focus on one in verse 16: “In the abundance of your trade, you were filled with violence in your midst, and you sinned. So I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, and I destroyed you, O guardian cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.” Cast out of the presence of God. Somewhere in the ancient past, somewhere prior to the Garden of Eden, he was rejected and cast out. I think there’s a reflection of this in Revelation chapter 12.

This is where we get that old spiritual. Any of you familiar with it? “Heard a great rumble up in the sky. Must have been the Savior passing by. Heard a great rumble down in the ground.” And then the basses come in: “It must have been the devil jumping up and down. They kicked him out of heaven. They kicked him out of heaven. They kicked him out of heaven because he would not join the band.” We try to have some kind of a grid around here to choose songs; that one never made the cut. But it does at least capture this that’s going on here, and I think it does so rightly.

The World Ruler Of Darkness

And this is where it affects us. He has become the world ruler of darkness, back to Ephesians chapter 6. Satan has become then the world ruler of darkness, or as he is called elsewhere, the god of this world; as he’s called in Ephesians 2, the prince and power of the air. Or as the Apostle John speaks of him, “the whole world lies in his lap.” Or as Paul says, he takes men captive at his will. Or as Paul says to the Corinthians, he blinds the minds of those who do not believe. I think this is reflected in the Mount of Temptation when Satan came after Jesus: “Bow down before me and I’ll give you all these kingdoms of the world.” That was not an idle boast. This is why then Christians are described as those who have been rescued out of the kingdom of darkness and translated into the kingdom of God’s dear son.

The world belongs to Satan. This is his territory. He is active in his opposition to God. Now we know from plenty of other places—we know just theologically—that God is sovereign over all things and so there are restraints and there’s a leash or however you want to describe it. And we know from passages like in Job that there are restrictions that are placed and he can only go so far as God can say and so on. But broadly speaking still, this is the way the Bible consistently describes this world as living as a world that is under the grip of Satan. And that is how we are to understand the advance of evil in our society: that above it all, there’s this grand conspiracy with a mastermind above it all, where he directs all things according to his purpose in opposition to God’s.

And so when Paul says here in Ephesians chapter 6, “we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the world rulers of darkness,” he’s intending to impress us that the enemy we face is a formidable one. He’s the highest of God’s creation. He is powerful. He is cunning. He has a great army at his disposal. He’s scheming. That’s the word that he uses here. He has flaming arrows. Okay, it’s a metaphor. But he has ways of attacking the Christian. And it comes in the evil day. It comes with force. He can come with subtlety. He is a master deceiver. He’s wiser than the wisest. We’re up against an enemy that’s bigger than us.

Now it would be much easier for us if when Satan does his work, or when he sends his demons to do their work, it would be nice if they all showed up with a pitchfork and horns and a red suit. But in fact, as Paul says—I’ve mentioned this earlier—when Satan appears, his emissaries appear as angels of light. And that’s why it’s so, so deceiving. I think it’s in the Scofield Reference Bible that there’s a reference made to that. Satan appearing as an angel of light, Scofield refers it back to the garden: that in fact, when Satan appeared to tempt Eve, it was not in the shape of a serpent. That’s a serpent or a snake; that’s the metaphor. He actually appeared as an angel of light. Whether or not that’s true, I don’t know. But the point is that he is deceiving and when he comes and when his emissaries are sent out, for example, in false doctrine, they don’t just put up on a sheet of paper just how easy they are for you to see it. They put on a nice collar that looks respectable. And they talk about the love of God, and they talk about the love of Jesus, and they talk about morals. And it’s awfully deceiving.

His religions are attractive. He’s desirable in appearance. He’s beautiful. He’s full of pomp. He’s full of pageantry in his religions. They can look impressive on so many levels. And as you see the manifestations of the work of Satan in this earth, they are not always at first glance something that’s repulsive. And it’s this Satan with his great army of fallen angels that Paul tells us in verse 12 here is our ultimate enemy. This infernal enemy stands behind the opposition, stands behind the attacks, the seductive allurements of the world. He’s like a lion walking about seeking whom he may devour.

And the Bible presents Satan as working powerfully and subtly through—and let me give you a few examples—through individuals, bringing them to conform to the world with its philosophy, with its standards, with its morals. We find that in Ephesians 2 verses 1 to 3. Satan works through governments. A graphic depiction of this is in Daniel chapter 10 where we have the Prince of Persia and the Prince of Greece contending against Michael the Archangel. And you have this graphic portrait of a heavenly warfare of Michael the Archangel against these princes, these angels of the governments of this world. I wonder who the Prince of America is. Sometimes I think I know.

Satan works powerfully and subtly through individuals, through governments, through the world system in general, in the widespread promotion of evil. Again, I keep referring back to Ephesians 2 verses 1 through 3. We saw it there where we have to understand the world in terms of a grand conspiracy. Atop the whole world system is Satan and the world walking in lockstep according to his designs. And the acceptance today of everything from homosexual marriage, sexual perversions of all kinds, false religions—all of it is so organized that you have to wonder, who’s standing behind it? In every indecent Hollywood production, every lie of the media, every false doctrine—behind it, we have to see this organized work of Satan working to the destruction of God’s purpose.

Satan works against the church collectively, bringing opposition. He works against believers individually. He pressures the church by pressuring us to keep in step with the world and its ideas and its ideals and its morals and its standards and its practices. It opposes our witness. The devil lures us to sins of the mind, sins of the flesh. He creates situations that will make conflict within the church. He promotes division. He brings opposition both doctrinally and morally, as well as in any other kind of practical way that he can.

And, add to all of that, he has any number of devices. Paul speaks of his “schemes” here, the schemes of the devil. Think of some of them that we know of in scripture. In Job, Satan has a vast array of weaponry: physical suffering, the weather, rogue gangs. Hebrews 2, Satan has the power of death. 1 Thessalonians 2: “I wanted to come to you, but Satan hindered us.” That is, Satan works through opposition to Christian service. 1 Corinthians 7: Satan works through sexual temptation. 2 Corinthians 2: Satan works through personal offenses and an unforgiving spirit. 2 Corinthians 11: Satan works through false doctrine, and there’s where he speaks of the angels of light. 2 Corinthians 12: again, Satan works through physical suffering. Ephesians chapter 4: he works through all kinds of activity that we’ve seen here—through speaking lies and all kinds of situations that he can exploit to his own advantage.

And that, of course, is not to mention your own proclivity to sin because of your still fallenness. Through all of this we can be brought to sinful behavior. We can be brought into sinful thought patterns. We can be brought into discouragement, to despair. We can be brought into doubt. And all of this our adversary can bring against us in opposition to God. And so the Apostle Peter writes, “be sober, be vigilant, for your adversary the devil walks about like a lion.” Or as Paul says here, “we wrestle not against flesh and blood.” If it were just a matter of punching somebody in the nose and getting on with it, that would be easy. If it were a matter of just warfare with artillery, that would be easy, comparatively. But we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. We wrestle against principalities and powers, this great host of darkness.

Well, this then is the world that we live in. And the Apostle Paul writes this passage to tell us that we would be very naive to forget it. Behind the scenes is an unseen but a very real world of spiritual warfare. I know that people can overblow this and sensationalize spiritual warfare and such, but we cannot let them distract us from the truth of the matter: that there is this spiritual warfare all around us in the unseen world, fighting over the city of Mansoul.

And in all of this, Paul brings it to bear in his final discussion here in Ephesians. We must not be naive or ignorant of Satan’s devices. This is not merely a human struggle. Our struggle is on a higher plane. Our enemy is above us. He is beyond us. He’s more capable than we are, more powerful, more cunning, more wicked. To withstand his assaults, Paul says we are in desperate need of divine strength. And so, take on the whole armor of God. Learn what it is to be prepared with the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the spirit, and recognize the resources that we have in God’s strength.

I mentioned this last time that one of the things this tells us then is that we have to be intentional about our Christian living, about overcoming these opportunities for Satan to exploit against us and to bring doubt, discouragement, despair, sin, temptation. And I want to mention a practical thing, and that is those of you who are here in our Sunday morning Sunday school hour, Pastor Boyd has been going through this book, Practical Christianity, Practical Christian Living, Practical Holiness, by J.C. Ryle. For some reason, “practical Christian living” doesn’t sound like an exciting topic to a lot of people. This is the stuff of Christian living. This is what we need. It’s the kind of things we need to think through. It’s the kind of instruction we need. Prepare yourselves, and all of that that Pastor Boyd is doing in Sunday School is, in essence, taking us here to use the resources that have been given to us to think through these issues well.

Well, I think we should remember, too, that the Apostle Paul here does not write all of this to discourage us. He doesn’t write it even to scare us. He wants us to be sober and aware of it all. But he writes also to encourage us in telling us that God has given us these resources in this armor metaphor that he has for us. And we’ll see how to use those in the days to come. Satan is a real adversary. He is an ultimately defeated foe. In just time, he will see his final end and he’ll be crushed. But in the meantime, we must be strong against him. So it’s ours then to acquaint ourselves with the armor that’s provided, put it to use in divine strength.

Let’s bow together for prayer. Our Father, we thank you that you have not left us here alone. We’re thankful that our Lord has prayed for us. We’re thankful that he makes intercession for us. We’re thankful that he has sent his spirit. We’re thankful that he’s given his word to fortify our minds, to strengthen us for the evil day. Bless us, Lord, to this end. Make us faithful until the day he comes. We pray in his name. Amen.

I realized there were two songs that were in the bulletin. I just wanted to make sure that we were—wanted to sing the one that he wanted us to sing, so. That’s why we have a little conference up here. So we will.