We hear now the word of the Lord from Matthew chapter nine, verses 18 through 26.

"While he was saying these things to them, behold, a ruler came in and knelt before him, saying, my daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live. And Jesus rose and followed him with his disciples. And behold, a woman who had suffered from a discharge of blood for 12 years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his garment. For she said to herself, if I only touch his garment, I may be made well. Jesus turned, and seeing her, he said, take heart, daughter, your faith has made you well. And instantly the woman was made well. And when Jesus came to the ruler's house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, he said, go away, for the girl is not dead, but sleeping. And they laughed at him. But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose. And the report of this went through all that district."

The grass withers, the flower fades. But the word of our God endures forever. Uh, the week before last, uh, the panhandle of western Nebraska received two feet of snow. We've all had this, uh, terrible cold, but last week, they had to deal with about two feet of snow. Um, I'm originally from that area. I kind of keep my eye out anytime something happens out there.

Uh, my father, who also grew up in that area, remembers a similar snowstorm. He told me about it before, uh, that happened when he was in high school in the 1970s. Uh, where the Panhandle also received about two feet of snow. But it was in March of that year, and it was a very heavy, wet snow. It was such a significant snowstorm that started snowing one day, and then the next day, it took the entire day for the emergency workers to to clear all the roads and to make it safe for travel. And so it wasn't until the day after that where his father, my grandfather, uh, who was a bus driver at the time, got permission to take his bus and to go out into the highways and byways and to try to find, uh, stranded, desperate, uh, travelers who had been left and, and stranded on the side of the road by this incredible snowstorm that fell. And so that day, my father went with my grandfather, and they picked up people and brought them back into town, uh, where they had a place to go to get warm and to get food and other things they needed, uh, while they recovered and prepared to go on their way. Well, on a on a later trip, a later route through that day. So again, at the very end of this day, uh, my grandfather came across an entire bus, a Greyhound bus, uh, full of people that had been stranded all this time for about two days.

And they were very weary. Um, and these people had clearly become extremely desperate about their situation, so desperate that they had actually begun to tear the bus apart. They had torn the the padding off of the seats and had put it in the back of the bus to burn it, to start a fire, to keep themselves warm in the back of the bus. It never in my life has it crossed my mind to tear a bus apart. Never in my life have I wondered, uh, boy, would these, uh, seat cushions work well as fuel for a fire if I needed to stay warm. But they were at that stage of desperation. Desperation drives us to do the kinds of things that we wouldn't otherwise think to do. And these people were very, very desperate by the time my grandfather came across them to bring them back to safety. When we come to the story today, we see three people who are clearly in dire straits. They are absolutely desperate when they encounter Jesus. You know, last night we celebrated and remembered the event of Christmas where we heard the stories and the Bible readings about the birth of Jesus, the incarnation and birth of Jesus into this world, to be the Savior of the world. Well, this morning, the sermon text is not so much about the event of the incarnation, the event of Christmas.

START OF TRANSCRIPT

But nevertheless, this morning we are seeing a passage that very clearly spells out the significance of Christmas, the significance of why Jesus had to be born and to become a human being, a man like us in every respect, yet without sin. And so as we look at this story of three desperate people encountering Jesus, our big idea is this that Jesus came to save desperate people. Jesus came to save desperate people. So there are sort of three scenes to this story. And so we'll look at these scenes individually. First we're going to see that Jesus saves the humbled. Jesus saves the humbled. Then second Jesus saves the hopeless, Jesus saves the hopeless. And then third, Jesus saves the helpless. Now, again, as we consider this particular text, this is that's about the significance of Christmas. Don't worry. Stay with me. We are going to look at several different aspects that deal with the incarnation, the birth of Jesus as we go along. So stay with me on this. So in this first section, in verses 18 and 19, we see that Jesus saves the humbled. In verse 18 we read while he, Jesus was saying these things to them. So Matthew is telling us this ties directly to the story that we looked at last week, where Jesus was talking with the disciples of John, who came and asked him a question about fasting.

1. Jesus Saves the Humble (Matt. 9:18-19)
2. Jesus Saves the Hopeless (Matt. 9:20-22)
3. Jesus Saves the Helpless (Matt. 9:23-26)

Jesus Saves the Humble (Matt. 9:18-19)

They said, why do we in the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast. Back in verse 14, just up the page. So it's right in the middle of this conversation is Jesus is answering this question that Jesus is interrupted from continuing further on this conversation. Jesus, as we look at the story of his life, he is constantly interrupted. Everywhere he goes, he is being interrupted, and here he is interrupted by a man whom Matthew describes as a ruler. Now we know from the parallel passages in Mark chapter five and Luke chapter eight, where we read the other accounts of this story from the perspectives of the other gospel writers. We know the name of this man. This man was named Jairus, and this man is a ruler. He was the equivalent of what we would have in our church as a ruling elder. That's not just a coincidence. In fact, we base the office of ruling Elder based on what was happening in the Old Testament church, the Jewish synagogue system. For these rulers. We find these rulers a few places in the gospel. For example, Nicodemus, who came to Jesus in the night. In John chapter three, we find in John chapter three, verse one that he also was a ruler. These rulers, like our ruling elders, oversaw the worship of the synagogues. Now, in our church, ruling elders are highly esteemed that we give them a lot of authority and deference and and respect.

Uh, but of course, if you get beyond the walls of this place, um, sorry to those ruling elders among us, but people probably don't think too highly of the fact that someone would be a ruling elder here at Harvest Community Church or really any office in the church, because outside these walls, uh, the offices in this church are not highly thought of. But think about a society where everything revolved around the centrality of the synagogue, where everything happened at that place where people gathered weekly to worship, at that place in the way that we worship here today, these rulers would have been very highly esteemed. They would have had a lot of authority, not just in the walls of the synagogue, but beyond and the whole community. This is a man of high place, high prestige, high position, high privilege, high authority. And notice the manner in which he comes to Jesus. He comes as a man who is humbled. By the suffering of his daughter. We read that this ruler came in and knelt before Jesus. Now we know who Jesus is, and he knew something about what Jesus could do for him. But he probably didn't know the whole story that we celebrate every Christmas. That this Jesus was truly God and truly man. So when he kneels before him, it's unclear what exactly he was doing and what exactly he knew. This word for kneeling could refer to an act of worship, but probably adhir just refers to some kind of act of respect.

The thing what you might do before someone who had more authority than you. This ruler acknowledges the authority of Jesus as He comes before him, and he comes. Even though he has an incredibly high role in his community, he comes and and kneels before Jesus to show his respect to this teacher, whoever he thought that Jesus would be. And this ruler comes to Jesus and makes an extraordinary request of Jesus. It's extraordinary in two ways. First of all, it's extraordinary because he says to Jesus, my daughter has just died. He's asking Jesus to restore his daughter to life. Now. Jesus has done great miracles. He's healed people in various ways. He's calmed a storm. He's driven out demons. But he has never quite raised some from the dead. At least not yet. The extraordinary thing for Jesus or for him to ask Jesus to do this. The second way in which this request is extraordinary is because he asks Jesus to lay his hand to come with him so that Jesus can lay his hand on her, on the daughter. Now, the reason this is so extraordinary is because what we've talked about in a few places that we've studied, what Jesus is doing is the Old Testament ceremonial law made it very clear. That to touch whatever wood was unclean would make the one who touched that unclean person or thing themselves unclean.

The ceremonial law prohibited touching what was unclean and chief among what was unclean. In fact, sort of the the the paradigm, the main example you would think of what was characteristically unclean was death. Death made someone unclean. And so this little girl was unclean because she was dead. And so her father was asking Jesus to come touch someone who was unclean. This was a threat to his purity, to his cleanness. Now, it's interesting to compare what this ruler asks of Jesus compared with the centurion that we saw a few weeks ago, earlier in Matthew chapter eight. Jairus, this ruler is a high official in the Jewish church, in the synagogue, whereas the centurion was a high ranking gentile military official. But more than that, second of all, Jairus asked Jesus to come with him, whereas the centurion stopped Jesus from coming with him. The centurion knew it would be. It would make Jesus unclean if he came into the house of a Gentile. So the centurion said, you don't need to come. You can just say the word. And I know that my servant will be healed, whereas this man, this ruler, wants Jesus to come explicitly so that Jesus can touch his dead daughter, to bring her to life. So this man believes in some respect that Jesus can help him even though his daughter has just died. But when we compare Jairus with the centurion, we're meant to understand that Jairus or the centurion had the stronger faith, that Jairus had the weaker faith.

The centurion thought that he could do it from afar. Jesus praised the faith of the centurion. None in all Israel have I found such faith as this Gentile centurion. But nevertheless, gyrus does make the request. Why does he make the request if he has weaker faith that really wants to make sure that Jesus can do the job by asking Jesus to come so that he can see Jesus, see it through? What leads gyrus to do it? Well, the answer is very clear. Gyrus is desperate. He's desperate. Where else is he going to turn? To? Whom else is he going to go? And he's desperate also because it's unclear how Jesus will respond. Jesus is under no obligation to help. Remember, this man is just bursting in interrupting this conversation. Not the best way to start a request for help to interrupt someone who can help you. But remember, as a ruler, this would have been one of the Jewish religious leaders. If you're at all familiar with the story of the Gospels, you know that the religious leaders did not get along well with Jesus. In fact, they were enemies. These religious leaders were going to be the ones who were going to instigate the crowd to chant Crucify him! On the day when Jesus would be condemned and sentenced to death.

How then will Jesus respond when one of his enemies comes to ask him for help? And the response here, the response of Jesus underscores the great compassion of Jesus. Where it was maybe unclear how Jesus would respond. We see exactly how Jesus responds in verse 19 when we read that Jesus rose and followed him. Now this could mean that Jesus was seated or that he was reclining at table. And so he had to physically get up to go. Or as some commentators point out, the way this Greek is written could refer to what we say in English is something like he up and went, he up and followed it. It underscores the the immediacy that he rushed out to help, to help this little girl who had died. What's also extraordinary that really underscores Jesus's compassion is where it says that Jesus rose and followed him. The word followed shows up many times in the Gospel of Matthew. This is the only time that Jesus is the one following someone else. Every other time. The word follow is used in the Gospel of Matthew, it is always used to describe other people following Jesus, either that Jesus tells them to follow him or that they are following him. But here Jesus follows this man to go help. Jesus jumps at the request to save this desperate man's daughter. The key question that this first scene unfolds for us is will Jesus help when he doesn't have to? Will Jesus help when he is under no obligation to? Will Jesus help when an enemy comes to ask him for this help? The Bible says that we were enemies of God, but that while we were still his enemies, Christ died for sinners.

And we're seeing the beginnings of this here in this story. But before Jesus can help this girl, he is once again interrupted just as Jesus was interrupted with his conversation with Jesus. John's disciples. So another desperate daughter comes to seek Jesus's help. And in this next scene, we meet this woman who has been hopeless for 12 years. And the question is, can Jesus save even her? So in the second scene, the second section, we see that Jesus saves the hopeless.

Jesus Saves the Hopeless (Matt. 8:20-22)

Notice in verse 20 we read, and behold, this is the same word we read in verse 18. Behold, it's it's sort of oh, look at that. You sort of it's sort of a word that describes something. Oh, there she comes. Look at this. Look at what's happening, a sudden arrival. And again, we have to note how frequently Jesus is interrupted. It's not just in this story. It's all over the Gospels. Jesus is regularly, frequently interrupted, and yet how graciously he responds. One commentator, William Hendrickson, observes this and points this out. He says what we would call an interruption is for him a springboard or a takeoff point for the utterance of a great saying, or as here, for the performance of a marvelous deed revealing his power, his wisdom, and his love.

What for us would have been a painful exigency. A painful delay is, for him a golden opportunity. Well, this woman that encounters Jesus, that interrupts Jesus, we read, had suffered from a discharge of blood for 12 years. Now, the law made very clear in Leviticus 15 that bodily discharges from both men and women made them unclean, which means that this woman had been ceremonially perpetually unclean for 12 years. Now, she would not have been quite in the status of a leper. She didn't have to remain outside the city. She didn't have to shout unclean as people approached her. But nevertheless, this would have been an absolutely humiliating, degrading experience. And after all these 12 years, she had not found a solution. This woman was hopeless. And yet. Hearing about what Jesus had done for other people must have sparked some hope in this hopeless woman. Maybe Jesus can help me too. And for this woman to seek help from Jesus came at some considerable risk to Jesus, and she must have known about it. The air condition was addressed specifically in Leviticus 15, verses 25 through 30, where it talks about a woman with this kind of a discharge, and immediately after this, in Leviticus 15 verse 31, we read this thus by the law that told her that she was unclean. Thus you shall keep the people of Israel separate from their uncleanness, lest they die in their uncleanness by defiling my tabernacle that is in their midst.

The reason that God had established these holiness laws, these laws of what was clean and what was unclean to separate the clean and the unclean was particularly so that God's tabernacle. The tabernacle was the mobile tent form of what later became built into a physical structure of the temple. It was to keep God's tabernacle and later God's temple clean from the defilements and the impurities of God's people. And the holiness and the purity of the tabernacle and the temple was a was a fragile holiness, a fragile cleanness, so that it was liable to corruptions, liable to defilements if it was made unclean by God's people. And that's why God had to separate the unclean so that they would not pollute the tabernacle. Now, if you're paying attention, if you're playing from home, playing along at home, this is one of the first major instances where we see a Christmas theme arising in this story. Because even as we read last night in John one verse 14, at Christmas, we celebrate the fact that the word became flesh and dwelt among us. That word is that he tabernacled among us. Jesus is where the presence of God pitched his tent in our midst, in human flesh, veiled in flesh, the God had see as we sing Jesus the holy tabernacle of God.

Understand, the law said that people like this need to be kept away from him, lest his cleanness, lest his purity be defiled. But just as Jesus up and followed the man to go touch an unclean dead girl. So the purity and holiness of Jesus is not enough to stop this woman from touching him. And when he touches this woman, it's not enough for his power to to to burst forward and for his holiness to overcome the uncleanness of this woman, not the other way around. He wasn't defiled, rather she was cleansed. She was healed from her discharge at that time. Well, how then will Jesus respond? Jesus is a tabernacle. Jesus is the Holy One. How will he respond when he knows that this woman who is unclean has touched him? And we see that when he turns around and he sees her in verse 22, he says this, take heart, daughter. He doesn't scold her. How dare you touch me? He says the opposite. He says take heart, daughter. Your faith has made you well. Now, very literally, this word made well both here and then back in her own thinking, back in verse 20, if I can just touch him, then I will be made well, excuse me, verse 21. If I touch his garment, then I will be made well. Those words there that are translated as made well is very literally be saved. If I touch his garment, I will be saved.

And Jesus says, take heart, daughter, your faith has saved you. Her faith was not a great work that she performed. Her faith was, as one commentator Lenski writes, the hand that received the gift from Jesus. The key question that's surrounding this particular scene is Will Jesus help when there is risk to him? When he is risking being defiled, being made unclean? Will Jesus help even when it is risky for him? You may know the story of a woman named Cory Tenboom, uh, a Dutch Christian, that when the Nazis invaded the Netherlands, she, with her family, had a role in helping to hide Jews from the Nazis. It was incredible risk to their family. Eventually, the Tenboom family was caught. They were discovered for what they had been doing. Uh, the the Gestapo arrested them, and they sent them off to a concentration camp. Now, Corrie Ten boom survived, but both her father and her sister died in that prison camp. One of the reasons their story is told a lot. And she wrote a book of this called The Hiding Place. Uh, very famous story. One of the things that's underscored is that it's one thing to help when there is very little cost. If you don't need much from me, maybe I'll go out of my way to help you. But it's another thing entirely to help when the cost is great. And for Jesus. It's not only that he was under no obligation, especially when we're talking about helping his enemy, the ruler who came, the religious leader who came to ask for his help.

But it's also that his help would come at great risk. Now, even though his purity and holiness is so strong that it cannot be corrupted or defiled by the pollution of this woman. Nevertheless, what he is doing here will eventually require him to go all the way to the cross. Where he is not necessarily harmed here. He's just able to heal. Eventually, what he is doing is going to have to be paid in full. The power that he has come to establish to accomplish the the kingdom, the forgiveness, the fountain of cleansing for these unclean, polluted, guilty people is going to require that he pour out his blood at the cross so that sinners can still to this day, look to him and to be saved by faith in Jesus. Now. Finally. After this interruption, on his way to see a hopeless or to see a helpless girl, this hopeless woman who interrupted the process, Jesus finally arrives at the home of this helpless girl who was already dead. Now Jesus. Here we might say, well, maybe he has good motives. Can he really, though, raise the dead? And that's exactly what we're going to see in this third section where Jesus saves the helpless.

Jesus Saves the Helpless (Matt. 8:23-26)

If there's anyone who is more helpless than this little girl, I don't know what it would be.

Here she is dead. So dead that in verse 23, when Jesus arrives on the scene, there are flute players and a crowd making a commotion. Uh, mourners. Now, this is very common. When someone died, you would bring in musicians and you would bring professional mourners, as well as the family who would have mourned, uh, the Jewish Mishnah declared that even the poorest in Israel should not hire less than two flutes and one wailing woman. When someone died, it was important that that death was appropriately mourned. It wasn't something they tried to hide. They gave full vent to their frustrations at the dead. And when Jesus comes across this motion or this commotion in verse 24, he says, go away, for the girl is not dead, but sleeping. Now, when Jesus says this, it's very clear from the response of the people that the girl is in fact dead. They laugh at Jesus. That gives confirmation that she's not sleeping in the way that we would think of sleeping. She is, in fact, physically dead. The question then is why does Jesus talk about her death as sleeping? Why does he say that she is not dead but sleeping if she is, is in fact dead? Now this is the way that Jesus talked sometimes. Probably the clearest example is in when Jesus raised Lazarus in John chapter 11, uh, when Jesus heard the news that his friend Lazarus had died, he told his disciples, our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.

And there again, when Jesus said this, it confused his disciples said, oh good, he's just sleeping. If he's sleeping, then he's going to recover. Everything is well. But then in John 11 verse 14, we read that Jesus then told them plainly, Lazarus has died. Don't mistake the fact that when I told you that he was sleeping, that he was just sleeping, I meant that he was sleeping in the sense that I go to awaken him. But he has in fact died, which means that I go to raise him from the dead. And that's why Jesus uses this language of sleeping and awakening. Because even though we can't rouse someone who is dead as though they were merely sleeping, this is entirely within Jesus's power. Just like you might wake up a sleeping child. Something I know something about. Who's so asleep, so sleepy he can't get out of bed in the morning. You have to do it a few times. Eventually you can wake that sleeping child. So Jesus has the power to raise the dead. Now notice again the compassion of Jesus. With what he does. We read that when the crowd had been put outside, Jesus went in verse 25 and took her by the hand. In all of this, Jesus could have been hands off again. This is a dead girl. This is the height of pollution.

In ceremonial cleanliness is a dead girl. But Jesus goes in and though he could have been hands off, he could have at least put on some medical gloves. Perhaps. But just as the impurity of the woman with a discharge cannot stop, the power of Jesus cannot defile the holiness of Jesus, so the impurity of this girl's death cannot pollute Jesus one bit. Rather, Jesus is purity. His holiness is so powerful that it drives away the uncleanness of death altogether. And Jesus raises her from the dead. Why then, did Jesus touch her? To show his love for her by drawing near to her in the flesh, to touch her and to heal her. The key question is. Will Jesus help? When it seems too late to help. There's a tremendous story in second Samuel 12. About David after his sin with Bathsheba and the child that was conceived with Bathsheba, with whom he committed adultery. And this child is afflicted by the Lord at the Bible says, and this child for seven days is on the edge of death. And during that entire time David, the child's father, he fasts, he eats nothing. He doesn't get up. He doesn't wash himself. He doesn't anoint himself. He just lays flat on the floor. And when people try to bring him food, he refuses to eat anything for seven days, fasting and praying and interceding for the life of his child who is dying.

At the end of this time, the child dies and his servants are so afraid to tell him that the child has died, knowing what a big deal it's been while this child has been on the edge of death, how will he respond once the child has died? But David, seeing them, he asks, is the child dead? And they confirm that that's the case. And we read immediately David rose, he washed, he anointed himself. He changed his clothes. He went to worship in the house of the Lord. He and he ate food. And there, perplexed by his actions, why did you react one way while the child was living and another way after the child died? And he explained that he did all he could before it was too late, all he could before the child died, saying, who knows, perhaps the Lord will be gracious. But after the child dies, he says, the child will not return to me. I will go to the child, but that child will not return to me. Now it is too late for David. There was nothing left to do, but not for Jesus. For Jesus when this dead child of the ruler has already gone into a place where it is too late, our our Lord Jesus has the power to raise her from the dead. Will Jesus help when there is nothing more to do, when there's absolutely no earthly way to help? Here we are seeing this significance of Christmas, the significance of the incarnation, because here you see God Almighty, the one who alone has power over life and death.

That's why Jesus has the power to raise this girl from the dead. But you also see that though God could have boomed a voice from heaven to raise this girl from the dead, we see Jesus as a man in the flesh, showing visible compassion, drawing near to this desperate child, this helpless child in the flesh. For the we as we look at the story, might be saved through faith in him. The application for this story then, is receive Jesus's salvation by faith. On Christmas morning. We rightfully give special attention to Jesus's incarnation. But it would not be right to think that the significance of Jesus birth was limited to December, any more than it would be right to limit the message of the death and the resurrection of Jesus to the time where we remember Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Rather, Jesus's birth, his life, his death, and his resurrection is always at the center of every Lord's day. When we gather week by week, because the the birth, the life, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus is the central message of the whole Bible. So while this is not a Christmas passage, we see here so plainly the reason that Jesus had to take upon himself a human nature. So that Jesus in the flesh could could come near and touch two people.

One woman could touch him and he could touch and take by the hand a dead girl. It's this touching, this palpable, this tangible expression of the lavish love of God that John overflows in his amazement and wonder at in First John chapter one, where he's talking about the fact that God Almighty has become flesh. He writes this in first John one. He says that which was from the beginning. We're talking about God Almighty, the word who is in the beginning with God, that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and have touched with our hands. A privilege that was shared both by this woman with the discharge of blood and this little girl whom Jesus raised from the dead. We have touched with our hands concerning the word of life. The life was made manifest, and we have seen it and testified to it, and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the father, and was made manifest to us that which we have seen and heard, we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us. And indeed our fellowship is with the father and with His Son Jesus Christ. Jesus, him came close. Jesus took upon himself a human nature so that we could see him, hear him, and touch him. Well in our story in the Gospel of Matthew here.

Before this. So far, we have seen Jesus demonstrate his authority in many different ways. We've seen him his authority to cleanse sinners. We've seen his authority over the the winds and the waves. We've seen his authority over the demons. But we're starting here to see his compassion. We saw in a few verses earlier in chapter nine, verse 13, when Jesus declared that he came not to call the righteous but sinners. But now we see a little bit more of the glimpse of Jesus's compassion. We see it lived out in his response to three desperate people a humbled father, a hopeless daughter, and a helpless daughter. Jesus responds to the interruptions. Jesus rushes to save them. Jesus reaches out to touch them. Now our God is to pure and to holy, to be in the presence of evil and pollution. But not because he cannot be in their presence lest he be defiled. In fact, only our God is capable to purify the impure, to sanctify the unholy, and to forgive the guilty. And so on. This Christmas morning, we must remember why Jesus came to save desperate, guilty, polluted people like you and like me. The question is, are you desperate for what Jesus alone can provide? Are you humbled enough to set aside whatever position, whatever privilege, whatever authority, whatever power you think you have to kneel before the maker of heaven and earth who humbled himself as the greatest servant of all.

Are you hopeless enough to recognize that nothing and no one else in this world can save you? Can meet you where you are. Can meet your deepest needs outside of Jesus Christ, the Lord made flesh. Are you helpless enough to acknowledge that you are dead and your sins and trespasses, and that it will require the Lord of life to take upon a human nature so that he can die so that you can live. Gaze upon him in this story. You see his compassion for desperate people. In this. Do you feel his special, compassionate love toward you as sinner? Jesus came to save desperate people like me. Like you. That's the significance of Christmas. That's why Jesus had to be born in this world. That's what we celebrate this week and every week as we gather Lord's by Lord's Day, by Lord's Day, to declare and proclaim all that Jesus Christ born, lived, died, resurrected, and ascended to the right hand of the father, all that he has done for us and for our salvation until the day that he comes again. Let's pray. Heavenly father, we thank you for our Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for his love and his compassion for his people that we see shown forth so clearly in this passage. Help us. We pray to love Jesus, to delight in his coming. This morning and every Lord's day as we gather together. For it's in Christ's name that we pray. Amen.