Jesus Christ in Relationship to the Creation & Church

Well, today we're going to continue on. There's a section that we're going to look at here, and we've already started that section. So a couple questions come up. Actually, I'll just do both of them here. This is referred to, I don't know what you guys have picked up on this, but as you go through scripture, especially the New Testament truths, Paul's epistles, Many times you'll see the idea of the person of Christ and the work of Christ. And that helped me tremendously in understanding a section of scripture well. Is that section of scripture talking about something that describes who Christ is? Or is that section describing his ministry, his work, especially his work on the cross?

So that's why I put this down. I think you already know the answer. What we've seen is that starting last week, starting in verse 15, we saw a description, a wonderful description of the person of Christ, who he is, his relation to God the Father, his relation to creation, and then we're going to see today his relation to the church. But then starting in about verse It's verse 19, Paul is going to switch and talk about his work on the cross, called the work of Christ.

So the person in the work of Christ, and I always like what our brother Hal would tell us, he says, when he would talk to a person, he says, you know, you need to understand who Christ is and what he has accomplished, because both of those are key in understanding about salvation. who Christ is. He's God. What has he done? He's died for the sins of the world. He's died for you personally. So the person, the work of Christ are critical. And then we're going to see that Macaulay picks up on that in his outline here. So in his outline, I'll just go down here.

So this section, 15-18, talks about the person of Christ. So last week Andrew covered the relationship between God the Father Christ's relationship to God the Father. Then we started last week in the relationship to creation. We're going to kind of wrap that up and then we're going to go into the relationship to the church. And then starting in verse 19 we're going to talk about the work of Christ.

So that was why I wanted to have that kind of that prelude. So keep person of Christ, work of Christ. Actually you'll see that in different verses and then if we have one I'll point that out to you. Actually, you'll see there'll be a statement about who Christ is and there'll be a statement about, well, he did something. And I think we may have one of those today. But it's kind of good to keep that in your mind. OK. And that was from Macaulay. So could someone read these verses? You can read them from the overhead or from your Bible, 15 through 18. And you get extra points when you read, you realize.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is also head of the body, the church, and he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he himself will come to have first place in everything.

Great, thank you. Alright, so you see if you work down through here you see the first verse 15 talks about his relationship to God the Father. And then we go into the creation section which is the last. The second half of 15 goes down through all the way through 17. And then we see it starts into that he's the head of the body. So that's kind of the vision of these verses here. So actually, last week, actually Pat kind of got me thinking. Last week, Andrew did a great job. He talked about some of the prepositions that are in here, and I'm going to highlight those.

But I decided to go back to a picture. I think Roy Smith will probably... This picture is one that... Actually, let's ask a couple of questions first before the picture. I got into questions this week. So we're going to describe the Son of God. and we're going to describe his relationship to the church. And I'm not sure why I put that in necessarily now, but anyway, the questions are there, but we're going to talk about those too. So let's go to my picture. I show this to Bonnie, and she goes, oh no, Roger, a picture, oh.

It looks so complicated, and I don't know, what's going on here? So, what's that? It's a racetrack, it's a hockey rink. Think of that oblong thing as being I portrayed or thought of it as maybe a propane tank. If you barbeque. And prepositions have a direction and a location.

And actually, it's a lot more complicated than this, but because Pettit kind of asked the question at the very end, I decided to just highlight the four prepositions we're going to see in describing Christ. We're going to see that We're going to see the word in, and it's described here as, I'm pointing to it, let's see, is that a pointer? Yeah, in right there. I circled it in red. We're going to see the preposition in. We're going to see before, preposition before. Preposition ice, into or unto or of or for rather. And then dia, through.

So we're going to see those in describing who Christ is, we're going to see those four prepositions used And Andrew started last week with that, and we're going to finish up this week. So those are the four prepositions. And these are the other prepositions that scripture has. And this one just happened to come for free, highlighted.

I didn't do that. I copied it. I couldn't get rid of it, so I just, you know, what can you do? It's already in the video thing. You can't erase it out. So it's just there. up and down. It's amazing, the prepositions. As you go through scripture, you'll come upon these and it's kind of good to note them. You don't have to be a Greek geek to do this. Most of the good commentators will mention the original preposition, so they'll help you out here. So now I've highlighted those prepositions in the text.

So we see in verse 16 the preposition, I think in is actually probably better, for in him, and I've underlined all things because this is creation, all things are creation, all things were created both in heaven and on earth and so on. Let me get down to the last part, all things have been created through him, next preposition, and for unto him, and he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. So that's kind of the the prepositions that show up in here and like I said sometimes and like that one for for in seems to be better and we'll see that as we go through the class here a little bit okay so now let's just jump into and put it so high it went off the page there a little bit okay alright so this is the first part of verse 17 he is before all things So Christ is before all things.

And Andrew also pointed out what he thought was good. The verb is, is a me. The state in which someone or something continuously exists. And it's in the present tense. So Christ continually exists before all things. So what does that mean? Before is the idea he existed prior to. So let's look at a couple of verses, pretty familiar verses.

Could someone read John 1.1? In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God, and the Word was God.

Okay, so what do you think, and then let's look at John 8.58? I tell you the truth Jesus answered before Abraham was born, I am. Okay, so what do you think is trying to be If we talk about, like back in John 1 it says, the Word was in the beginning, the Word was with God, the Word was God. What's being conveyed there about Christ? He was there before creation.

Exactly. Good word. You get a star for that. If we were handing out stars in the class. So the idea is that he is before things. He existed prior to. And we're going to see that he not only existed prior to, but he was the prime mover in creation. And when it says, I am, that's the one for, he's always been there. He's always been present. He's the ever-present one. Then Kostel kind of points out that This revelation clearly separates Christ from every created entity. He has a force. It has a force of He and no other in the Greek.

And it's all things. Everything. And we see that all things, as I noted before, it shows up in the previous verses. All things is all created things. There's nothing that was created that He didn't create. He didn't create sin. But He created everything. Okay, thoughts or questions before we move on to the next part? We're going to just kind of chunk through this.

And this section is pretty amazing. Just one marvelous truth after another about who Christ is. This section of Scripture has been the greatest concentration of truths about Christ in Scripture. Okay, so the next section is And in him all things hold together. And the subject of this little phrase there is all things hold together is the idea to stand together. And actually I thought this is good. The word hold together shows Christ to be the cohesive power of the universe.

I was talking with my son after last week when Andrew presented his... We were talking about atomic forces and he was telling me about all these different forces. He said, well, Dad, you know there's a strong force and there's a weak force. He was dealing all these forces and I'm thinking, wow. Man has described all these. And they give them names. If you're into physics classes, this stuff you study and it's cool stuff.

But the bottom line is that Christ is that power that man has tried to describe. He is Christ himself. He is the cohesive power that holds us together. And it's in him. And that's one of the prepositions there. Creation was in him. What's cool is, back in 16, creation was in him. better than by him. In him, I think it's better. So it follows that all things hold together in him. He created all things, were created in him, and he holds all things together in him.

Yeah, go ahead, Roy. Just a question. Why did you prefer in versus by? Well, I thought it fit. Actually, a couple of the commentators and I, and I forgot, maybe it was Weiss or someone else, They looked at the, you know, there's cases basically, and I've forgotten, you know.

In, I preferred In because it fit, as it came down to this one, it fit better, I thought, with the thing. And it also fit better with the fact that he was prior to all things. And I like the idea that he knew what he was going to create. So in his mind, if you will, It fit better with the fact that Christ as the Creator knew what He was going to create. So that's why I prefer the EN over the BI.

Is it more personal? I thought it was. And then we got down to this one. It's the same word. It's just a matter of what English word do you attach. If you're going to attach BI to it, it's still the EN in the Greek. So do you have a thought about that? I don't want to disagree with. OK. Yes. OK.

When you use one of the most misunderstood uses of it is when it's with Dave or locative and interpreting. the context accordingly. And if it's marketed, it would be in. If it's dated, it would be by means of. In both cases, this is a dating. change much.

It's very personal, isn't it, that the Savior is the force using your words and the power holding all things together. And it was by His power that He did all of this. By His word, He just spoke it into existence. It's just phenomenal no matter which way you take it.

All right, thanks. OK, so let's go on. And then I borrowed again, actually, Macaulay had a good summary of his attributes from 16 and 17. Christ is the originator of all things. And then I have the two choices here. OK, the opening words of this verse 16 use the word by or in to show that the plans for creation were born and formulated in his mind. And that's why I kind of like the word in. I don't know. That's mine. But you have a point.

Christ is a builder of all things. This is expressed by the words through him, which pictures Christ as producing that which he conceived. Christ is the owner of all things. Preposition four, unto, carries this idea. This is for his pleasure, and honor, and glory, that all things exist. Though stained by sin, the ultimate aim of all will be His glory. Christ is the predecessor of all things. This is conveyed by the preposition before, which shows Him to be above and before all of creation. Lastly, Christ is the sustainer of all things. The word hold together shows Him to be the cohesive power of the universe. The truth of the matter is that every heartbeat is a gift of His grace and sustained and maintained by Him alone.

I think that's something that's really, you know, for the believer that... Go ahead, I'm sorry. Sure. I'm just kind of looking at all this and, you know, you said Christ created everything. So what's God's job in all this? You're talking about God the Father? Yeah. Well, I mean, it's sort of like, you know, they're all God, right? We have the Father... But it sounds like this is the stuff that Christ... Well, and this was, you know, and there's a little saying, but... Let's see.

The Godhead, God the Father, gave God the Son to be the creator, if you will. And the Holy Spirit is to illuminate the Son. I mean, there are... Scripture points out that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all have roles to play. The Son is the Creator and the Holder together. That's His function. And the Holy Spirit is to illuminate Christ. And what's cool is that the Son says, I do nothing except what I see the Father doing. So there's no discontinuity. But I agree with you.

It's hard. You want to say, well, we've got three guys in the job here. We've got the father. What's he doing? We've got the son. What's he doing? We've got the spirit. What's he doing? And scripture does tell us that. But, you know, I don't know. Does that help? So what is the father doing? Is he just kind of watching over everything? Making sure everybody does what they're supposed to do? We're good. So Pat, you want to add to this?

What kind of surprised me is in John 5, 17, it says, But Jesus answered him, My Father has been working until now, and I have been working. And then also it says, No man can come to the Father unless it has been granted, unless he, the Father, draws him. So God is working, the Father is working to draw everyone that comes. And I wonder sometimes, maybe people reject the Father who tries to draw them. But it says he, no one can come unless it's...

Right, well then you see the ministry of the Holy Spirit, and also in John there, somewhere in there, in early parts of John, he talks about the fact that the Holy Spirit's mission is to convince or convict men So the Holy Spirit is involved with men too in showing them their sin to come to Him, to come to God, to come to belief in Him. So we see aspects of the whole Godhead working in relationship to man, right? It's interesting, it doesn't say what he was doing. He said he was working. What does it say in Genesis?

Genesis 1.26, that's what I was thinking.

I mean that mentions the idea that it was all of the Godhead who let us make man in our image. There's one God and three persons. What we're trying to explain to Trinity here is what we're going down that path. One God and three persons. And we see the description of these three persons working, right? The Father's working, the Son's working, the Spirit's working. Roy?

A wonderful thing in the Genesis record, it says the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the wanderers. And we are also told that an angel The Spirit of God will come upon you and he that is born of you and gives his name and everything and what he will be. The Spirit of God is involved in the birth of our Savior. He's involved in revealing Christ to us. He's involved in all of that but it is the Father himself who plans It's difficult, but I love it. Praying, executing, and the actual instigation of us being in Christ is done by the Holy Spirit. We were baptized by the Holy Spirit into Christ.

That's His work. They're all working. Well, I've heard actually that the idea is that the father is the planner, the son is the executor. Somebody has tried to capture the planner, executor, and there's something out in the Holy Spirit. I've forgotten that little acronym thing. You're trying to explain to the Trinity what you're trying to do. And actually we have a lot of incredible information about that. Well, this is great! This is good! This section is pretty amazing. Pretty amazing stuff. So now we're going to switch gears here.

We're going to talk about Christ in terms of His body, us. He, Christ, is also the head of the body. And we have another AME verb the state in which something continues to exist. He continues to exist as the head of the body. And head here metaphorically is spoken of God, of Christ, and of believers. We think of head sometimes maybe not the way scripture looks at it. So I want to address that a little bit. The noun head has a definite article with it, stressing the exclusive position He is not a head, He is the head. And that was from Macaulay.

The body, I think this is another kind of connection between the body of Christ and the church. In Ephesians, we studied this last year. And He gave Him, He God the Father, so we have God the Father and God the Son spoken on the same verse. He God the Father gave Him, God the Son, as head over all things to the church, which is His body. So the idea that Christ's body, in a metaphorical sense, is the church, the body of believers. So that idea comes across in many, many verses. And here's another set of verses here.

Ephesians 1.22, And he put all things in subjection under his feet, and gave him as head over all things to the church. And then in 23b, As Christ also is the head of the church, himself being the savior of the body. And you could argue here, here's a verse, person and work again, try to look for that. Christ is also the head of the church, himself being the savior of the body.

So you could describe that as his work. So if you're coming into the person and work thing a little bit. And then here's an important distinction as we talk about headship. It says, and this isn't from Corinthians, but I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, and I dropped out a section, and God is the head of Christ. So something to think about here is, headship, don't think of superiority and headship, right?

Because there's no God the Father and God the Son are equal, right? But there's a headship relationship, because it says God is the head of Christ. So there are equals there, but one has headship. Then it says Christ is the head of every man. Well that's pretty obvious. Christ is God and we're man. But then the part I dropped out was the part that talks about husband and wife.

And there's another equal situation, but one has been given headship. So I was thinking, if God the Father and God the Son are happy with headship, Husband and wife should be happy with headship. Is that a good argument? Maybe, maybe not so much. Sometimes we're not as happy with each other as we should be, right?

I'm totally guilty of that. We just let them know. I'm told to. I should be. I'm sure Bonnie lets you know. She does. She's not silent in that matter. This is why the Holy Spirit intercedes in our prayers. Exactly. Amen to that. But it's cool here. You see that God is the head of Christ. You say, wow. And you can see how cults can go wild with this. If you're not careful, you can run with this and make this into a bad doctrine.

God is the head of Christ. Well, okay, I want to have my relationship with God the Father. God the Son? Nah, He's not head. I want to go right to the head. Well, God set it up that His Son would be the Savior, and would be saved by Him. The Holy Spirit would illumine Christ. So, be careful with what headship is about. Okay, so now we go to the next part of the verse.

In the text it says, He is the beginning. I'm sorry. And the text says, he is the beginning. And actually, literally, it's who is its beginning. And we have another Amy here again. So this is a state in which Christ exists as he is the beginning. And beginning identifies who Christ is. He's the beginning of all things. Beginning denotes an act, a cause, an origin. Christ is the beginning because he is the efficient cause of creation.

This is kind of covered before in the previous verses. And what I found here is, and it comes to, if you look at the, I got that from the inner letter, that's my little translation from the inner letter, who is, it's beginning, and it's has been supplied. So it seems like that it's referring Two possibilities here I saw, and maybe Roy can help me here too. I thought that could be referring back to the church.

The church didn't begin until Christ died on the cross, and he became the firstborn. He's the first of the new creation. Exactly. So it seems like that it was supplied because it was felt that its beginning was the church, but you could take beginning to be the general beginning. These verses I have here talk about verses that support Christ being the beginning. Now let's just look at a couple of those.

Does someone look at Revelation 3.14? And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans writes, these things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. Right, so that's speaking of Christ there I believe.

So he's called the beginning there. And then, how about somebody, Revelation 22, 13? I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Right, so Christ is called the beginning and the end. So it seemed like in the context here, this is probably talking about the church, its beginning, but it certainly is a beginning in a general sense too.

Well, the first poem from the dead sort of focuses us on his talking person. Right. And it seems like that fits well with what we're talking about. So we're going to go to that one next. Who is Christ as the firstborn from the dead? And it's actually dead ones. It's in the plural. And this is kind of a cool thought here. The word dead is plural in the Greek text, showing that he is the only one who has ever broken the power of death. And he's the first one of those. He's the first one to ever do that. And we can break the power of death because we're in him, right? We're not making it by our own power. Exactly, right? We're not making the power of death by our own power, right?

So firstborn here, and we actually had it earlier, is this word, two parts, first and to beget. And here's another place where you can kind of go astray, and people have. They try to make Christ a created entity, and he's not. This is speaking more of he's the preeminence. He's first in priority. And it's not to be taken as first to be born.

So there are a couple of verses that kind of help us here. One is in Acts. Somebody read Acts 26-23. And actually, it's an interesting one. Go ahead, someone can read that. "...that the Christ would suffer and as the first to rise from the dead would proclaim light to his own people and to the Gentiles." Right. So it kind of uses the idea that he was the first to proclaim light. And I kind of take that. He's the first one to show that it's possible to to live again, to both the Jew and Gentile. And then the one in Revelation is really good.

Revelation 1.5. I can read that one. That's a good one.

It says, And from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth, to him who loves us, and released from our sins by his blood. So he's referred to as the as the first one from the dead. You know, Roger, I was thinking how interesting it is that they're comparing...

I mean, we're also born from the dead. The dead being dead in sins and without a savior. And so, he in fact was really born from the dead. I mean, he was raised from the dead. So, it's an interesting correlation there and analogy. Right, right. About how we're reborn, but it's not necessarily being raised from the dead dead. It's being raised from being dead. A spiritual death. A spiritual death.

Right, right. No, that's really cool stuff here. I mean, I agree. Roy? Just a thought, the word prototoko is similar to our word prototype. Right, exactly. He was the first one to rise to the first prototype of a new creation. We're a new creation in Christ. He's the first one off the assembly line. Not quite the same as that, but anyway. The difference is that he took our sins upon him so that we would not They're the punishment of those sins and the Holy Spirit identifies us with Him in His death, burial and resurrection in such an intimate way that now our identity is His. Since He's the prototype, we're also part of Him in that resurrection body relationship. That's pretty amazing. Yeah, what kind of struck me is, back in 15, this word was used back in 15 earlier, that Andrew covered last week.

He is the firstborn of all creation. But this is another whole wonderful thing in here. He's the firstborn of all creation, but now it tells us He's the firstborn from the dead. Here's another, this new creation, a new creation in Him. So there's two aspects to this. And the verse is going to finish off, and that's why it's going to say, So that, with a purpose that, that's the last part, there was a purpose to that, that He now is the firstborn from the dead.

That's even more wonderful than being the firstborn of all creation. So that, with the purpose of that, he himself will come to have first place in everything. And this is another cool Greek word, ginomai. Come into a new state of existence. And this one kind of floored me a little bit. Maybe Roy can help. I'm hanging on Roy here today. All my Greek questions I'm going to ask Roy.

He came into a new state of existence. I guess the whole thing is, a man never died. He's God and he's man. A man never died and came back from the dead. Christ is the only one. We have these ones where people were raised temporarily and then they died again, like Lazarus. They died and they raised for a while, but then they eventually died. Christ came back from the dead and He lives. That's a new state of existence. I was racking my brain here thinking wow.

The new state is that there's no sin in him. And for that reason he is new. He's come into a new existence from having all sin on him to having no sin on him. Because the sin issue has been dealt with. Well and also when he then was seen in the resurrected body He didn't die because he just was lifted into the heavens.

Right. He already had returned from the dead but he was walking around. So he was seen in his resurrected body. Exactly. So that's the body that he went into the air with was that resurrected body. So he didn't die again. You're right. Christ is the only truly resurrected person because the other ones died. He was seen by hundreds of people. never died again. Right, that's great.

So the bottom line here, that he is to have everything, the one who is preeminent. Because of that, he is a focus, if you're talking about God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit, Christ is a focus of God's plan for everything. And he should have the preeminent, he should be the one that gets all the glory. And it's not like the Father and the Spirit are jealous of that. Go ahead, Roy. Just a thought.

The person in the work of Christ is wrapped up in the term, the name of Christ. That his name would be above every name that is ever named on earth. The person in the Word, those that call upon the name of the Lord, they are believing that who He is and what He's done is sufficient for them, that He is their Savior. There's an awful lot of that. There is. We use the, in His name when we pray, don't we? Right. And what we're doing is calling upon God to hear us on the basis of our Savior. his reputation, his worth, who he is. He's above everything now. His name is above everything. This is all God's plan, not at the court expense of the Spirit and the Father. This is God's plan to have Christ to have all the glory and all the preeminence. That's His plan.

And so if you deviate from that, you say, well we've got to give the spirit equal time here. We're going to have a Holy Spirit day. How about more time? There's all those denominations that it's all about the spirit. Exactly. So you think, well... It's the spirit in you. Do all these things in the spirit. I know. And the Spirit says, and Christ described the Spirit's job, His job is to glorify me.

And the Godhead has no problem with talking about headship, one glorifying the other, but we as man, because we're man, we have a problem with that. Well, I can't give that person too much. Anyway, we're man and we struggle with that, but the Godhead has no problem with that.

So, I don't know. Well, actually, we whizzed through that faster than I thought. But anyway, any thoughts? Actually, next week we are going to go to his work, starting in verse 19. Actually, the reason you may wonder, I chopped this up. You can blame me for this structure of why we are covering only two or three verses at a crack here. But I thought, wow, each one of these verses has such potent information that it's good to think about over several weeks. So that's why I decided to have this 15-18 in two weeks. You could have done it in one week, but I think you missed out.

I also got the pleasure of having our brother Andrew with us. That was totally cool. I wish he was here a lot closer. It would be wonderful. But the Lord has His plan. Maybe in time that will... I don't know. I have my prayer. Other thoughts or questions? Well, go ahead. I'm sorry. Totally off the cuff. It's somewhat related. It's the verse I wondered about.

This is in 1 John. There are three that bear witness in heaven. These three are one. And then, in verse 8, and there are three that bear witness on earth, the spirit, the water, and the blood. And these three agree as one. I wonder... Tell me again, that's 1 John 5? Yeah, it's 1 John 5. Well, there's 7 and 8 that talk about witness.

And what I've wondered is, When you say the water and the blood, these three agree as one. The spirit, the water, and the blood. Well, let's go back to 6 for a second here. It says, this is the one who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ. not with water only, but with water and with blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three that bear witness, the Spirit, the water, and the blood, and the three are in agreement. In verse 9 it says, For this is the witness of God, which he testified of his Son. I just wonder sometimes, what's the water in the blood? Is it death? Is death water from inside? A lot of times water is a metaphor sometimes of God's word. The question is, is that the case here? Christ said he was the living water too, didn't he? He obviously gave his life, blood is pretty obvious. Yeah, without the blood, the sins wouldn't have been, because that was what was required, was the blood. Well, it's a witness. Right.

Is that speaking of the humanity of Christ? My first thought is that water is speaking of his word. That's my first thought. And certainly God's word did bear witness of Christ. That's certainly a true statement. The question is, is that what he's talking about here? Certainly his blood did.

It's in a context of Gnosticism. And that's one of the things that John is writing about in this epistle. Is that the witness of God is pure. And that it is not just spirit. It is also physical. That he has come in the flesh. And those that deny that are anti-Christ. That's a very strong message in this book. That he was communicating. So whatever you do with these verses, it's in that context. Right. That's good. Well, Pat, why don't you let me think about that? It's about a witness. Right.

And, you know, obviously his, you know... It's interesting in 10, it says, he who believes in the Son of God has a witness to himself. Well, and it also speaks to the Holy Spirit as being a witness, right? And that fits with a good part of scripture, that the Spirit is witnessing about the Son. And that's, yeah, let's use that as well.

But it's making a distinction here because it talks about the water, blood. It talks about the Spirit, the water, and the blood. So it's making a distinction between those three. The thing that comes to mind is Word. First John is a challenging book. I've been through it a couple of times and I know every time I go through it, I think, Lord, did I really do that right?

If you're not founded in Paul, though... Oh, I agree. These churches that teach 1 John and then they've never taught the epistles of Paul and especially Romans. Oh, I know. No wonder it's confusing to people. It's totally confusing. The part that says you don't sin.

Wait a minute, how about... Wait a minute, how can that be? So, anyway, let me think about it and I'll try to address it to you. Other thoughts? Other easy questions? Well, I'll give you some extra time here. I know Bonnie will appreciate it. We thank you, Father. Thank you for your time today, Lord. Thank you for the blessings we have, Father. Thank you for this marvelous section on who Christ is. And we thank you that we can just look at it and marvel at it. Father, thank you for your word that just tells us so many wonderful things about our Savior. We ask it in His name. Amen.