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[0:00] Take out your sword with me. Your Bible. And turn to the book of Ephesians chapter 3.

[0:12] ! We come to the end of Ephesians 3 this morning! as we've been walking through Paul's prayer, his prayer for power, his prayer, Lord, that ignites our ability to do chapter 4 5 and 6. Chapter 4, 5 and 6 of Ephesians are the therefore section. It's therefore walk in a manner worthy.

[0:38] It's all application after this chapter 4, 5 and 6. But before Paul gets to that, he prays for power. He prays that we have power in the inner man through the Spirit to be able to do, to walk in a manner worthy.

[0:56] So, Ephesians chapter 3, we're going to read verses 14 to 21, but we will be focusing on the last two verses of chapter 3, verses 20 and 21, which are commonly called the doxology or the benediction, the praise, you know, the doxology, the giving glory to God, to Him be the glory.

[1:20] Right? But first in verse 20, he talks about what God we're talking about, and then verse 21, to Him be the glory. To that God be the glory.

[1:33] So, if you're able, please stand as we read from Ephesians 3, beginning of verse 14. So we'll hear the prayer, and then we'll hear His praise.

[1:45] Ephesians 3, verse 14, for this reason, going back to chapter 2, for this reason, because of what God has done, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name.

[2:04] That, here's His prayer, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.

[2:25] And, that, second prayer, that, you being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know, experientially know, the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge.

[2:49] Ultimately, that, you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. Now, to Him, who is able to do exceedingly, abundantly, beyond all that we are asking or thinking, according to the power that works within us, to Him, be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever.

[3:25] Amen. Amen. So, reads His prayer. Let us pray. Father, give us minds to absorb, give us hearts particularly to receive, to believe this kind of God that Paul believed in, to believe how able you are, how powerful you are, and that that power, which is beyond what we can even conceive, it works in us.

[3:53] Help us to trust that and then, to praise you. to you belong the glory, we pray in Christ's name. Amen. Please be seated. I'm functioning a bit on overdrive.

[4:12] We picked up Zach at the airport at, I don't know, 11 at night last night or so. Well, we went before that, but we had to wait because the plane was circling and then it was...

[4:23] Anyway. So, I didn't get as much rest. So, if I start nodding off, you'll forgive me. So, let me begin this way.

[4:35] So, is God limited? Does God have any limits? Is there anything that God cannot do? That's a trick question actually.

[4:49] But I appreciate the yes. Or no. 2 Timothy 2, Paul says that God cannot deny himself. That's something he cannot do.

[5:00] He cannot deny himself. He can never act contrary to his nature. So, God cannot lie. God cannot be tempted by evil.

[5:14] He is holy. He is loving. He cannot let sin go because of his holiness. So, what is he, here's the easier part.

[5:29] What is he able to do? Give me some examples from the Old Testament. What was he able to do in the Old Testament that no one else could do?

[5:40] Creation. Six days. Let it be. Let there be. Right? And it was. Spoken word. What else? Part of the ocean.

[5:51] Or the Red Sea. Right? The whole Exodus experience. He revealed his power to humiliate and dethrone the Egyptian gods.

[6:03] One after another. In the plagues of Egypt. Just humiliated them. What else? Daniel and the hungry lions. Daniel and the lions then.

[6:15] Right? So, we have example after example. Sarah. 90 years old able to have children. Jericho. The walls fell in. That doesn't happen.

[6:26] That's impossible. Yet the walls fell in. With a trumpet blast. How about the New Testament? Starting right off. Virgin birth.

[6:40] Mary said, how can it be? Jesus' miracles. The 5,000. Jesus giving sight to the blind. The lame walking.

[6:52] The lepers are cleansed. The dead are raised. The storm is calmed with a word. Right?

[7:02] He is able. In fact, when he comes, when he gauntlets into Jerusalem, right, at the horror of the religious leaders as he comes in on the donkey proclaiming himself king, they say, stop praising.

[7:22] This is wrong. And Jesus says, hey, if they don't praise the rocks, God is able to make these rocks praise. Me. So, what is God able to do?

[7:36] That's going to be our focus today. God's power at work within us. What is he able to do within us? Every Sunday, every Sunday, we end our service with a benediction or a doxology.

[7:52] We, I read a, a, one of the ones from scripture, like the end of Ephesians 3 here, to him who is able, to him be the glory.

[8:03] Right? To him be the glory. Why? What is the purpose that we do that? What, what does it serve? What are we doing when we do this, when we close in such a way?

[8:16] We don't just say, see ya. We end with a declaration of God's glory at work in us.

[8:28] So, I want to kind of unpack that. What are we doing? Why do we do it? Well, here, here, as we kind of look closely and reflect on and meditate on these words, how does Paul declare God's glory to him be the glory according to the power that works mightily within us?

[8:51] remember what we've seen in this prayer. We've seen Paul's prayer, a particularly bold way to pray. He prays two things in verse 16. He prays for strength.

[9:02] He doesn't pray generally for strength. He doesn't just say, Lord, strengthen us. He says, right, according to the riches of your glory, grant that we be strengthened, not just strengthened, but strengthened with power.

[9:18] How? Through his spirit. Where? In the inner man. Why? that Christ may dwell. That Christ may dwell. That we might see Christ dwelling in us because the spirit is energizing and empowering.

[9:36] So, we might ask that kind of prayer. Is he too bold? Is he asking too much? Do we ask boldly of God to not just strengthen us, but to strengthen us with dunamis, right, in the inner man through his spirit?

[9:57] Do we pray like that about our temptations? Do we pray for the rebel that we care about who's wandered from God? Do we pray for the loss like that?

[10:07] Do we pray for our own recovery that boldly? And then his second prayer in 17 and 19 is about the love of Christ. He's praying that we grasp it first of all, and he prays in verse 18 that we would know the whole dimensions of God's, of Christ's love, right, with all the saints.

[10:27] We would know it with all the saints, so it's a corporate thing that we do together, we learn together, we comprehend with all the saints what is what? The breadth and the length and the height and the depth, right, and then to personally experience the love of Christ, to know by experience the love of Christ.

[10:47] Do we know that? that's a bold prayer as well, to grasp how big it is, but then to experience it, to know it personally, to walk with that.

[11:03] Feels like we're near the shore. I feel like I could smell the seaweed. it's not even an app. So do you feel these prayers that are beyond your reach?

[11:20] Do you feel like that's too much to pray? Do you dare to pray like this? Do you dare to pray like this for your marriage?

[11:30] Do you dare to pray like this for the lost? Do you dare to pray like this for this church, for this community? So why does Paul pray so boldly?

[11:44] It's because he has a personally bold view of God. He has a personally bold view of God. As he closes this prayer, he ends with an extraordinary doxology, praising the Father, and he ascribes to God two things.

[12:05] In verse 20, he's going to talk about the kind of God. He's going to talk about the power of God. He ascribes, he acknowledges, he attributes to God, to him who what?

[12:19] Who is able, has the power to do beyond. So verse 20 is about his power, and then verse 21 is the actual glory, to him be the glory.

[12:31] Excuse me, verse 21 is then to him, to that God, in verse 20, to him be the glory. And where does he want that glory to be shown?

[12:41] In the church, and in Christ Jesus, to all generations, ever and ever. Right? So that's how we're breaking it down.

[12:53] So verse 20 will be the first part. He ascribes or acknowledges to him whose power is infinite and far beyond our imagination.

[13:05] So giving that mindset, I want to praise God. So it's one thing to say, I praise you, Lord, I give you glory. Paul's saying, I give glory to the God who is able to do right beyond all, exceedingly, abundantly beyond all we ask or think.

[13:23] I mean, why does he get so wordy? Because this is what he thinks about God. So to him whose power is infinite and far beyond imagination, we could say that.

[13:41] We would all say, yeah, I believe that, but do we pray about that? Do we think that way? Is that how I walk through life with that kind of view of God?

[13:52] That kind of bold view of God. So I called it a doxology. We actually have a song in our hymn book, I think it's called doxology, right, where we sing, praise God from whom all blessings come on.

[14:09] So we're defining who God is. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him all above ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son, and Holy God.

[14:21] Right? I get it right somewhat? Off tune, but. Okay. Doxology.

[14:31] So doxology. So that's a Greek word, right? So it's doxa and logi, right? So log, logi, logi means word of God, right?

[14:42] The logos, right? So logi, and then doxa, doxa is glory. So it's to say glory, the word of glory. That's what doxology means, a glorious word.

[14:55] So it's to ascribe glory to God, right? To him be the glory. To him be the doxa. And the usual common form is glory be to God.

[15:07] God. And here Paul not only says to him be the glory, but he expands on it. So it shows us what he believes about God in verse 20.

[15:20] What does he believe about God? To him who is able. To him who is able. And actually you could translate it to him who is powerful.

[15:34] Because again he uses the word dunamis, which we get our word dynamite from, right? It's a forceful power. To him who is powerful, right? To him who can rescue Israel from the mighty army of Pharaoh.

[15:52] To him who can calm the storm. To him who can create light out of nothing. Who can create, right, in six days. He didn't need six days, but he does it in six days.

[16:03] He creates all that is power. It's a power that's able to raise the dead.

[16:17] So, what does he say about this? What does he praise? So, now to him who is able, it's about his power. And then notice the rest of verse 20, there's six modifiers here, six qualifiers.

[16:32] what kind of power, what kind of ability does he have? Right, it's ability to do, it's ability to do exceedingly, it's ability to do abundantly beyond all, it's ability to do exceedingly abundantly beyond all we ask, exceedingly abundantly beyond all we think, and it's ability to do according to, six, according to the power that works within us.

[16:59] So, six definitive, six modifiers, six clarifiers of God's power to do. It's not just ability that sits there, it's ability that acts, it's ability to do.

[17:15] And it's ability to do far more beyond all, beyond any other. And then he adds this, exceedingly, it's this Greek word that takes several words in English to translate, exceedingly beyond, exceedingly superior, exceedingly abundantly, super abundantly, infinitely more than.

[17:46] I mean, it's God's power. how do you, you know, Paul just gets, he gets, here we go. How do I define God's power? It's exceedingly abundantly beyond far more than anything else.

[17:59] God's ability has no limits. It's immeasurably more than we even expect.

[18:17] so, Daniel, in Daniel chapter 3, so, so, Ron mentioned Daniel 6, where Daniel and the lion sent, but before that story, Daniel chapter 3 described Daniel's three friends who, right, who would not bow down to the image, right, and if they did not bow down to the image, they're going to be thrown into the fiery furnace, furnace, which is burning, what, ten times hotter than something else, right, so it's just smoke, if you go in, you just smoke, and what do his three friends do, his three friends, what was it, hat rack, haystack, and under the bed we go, that was Delinda's dad's translation of the Meshach, hat rack, and shad rack, yeah, I don't know, but I always remember hat rack, haystack, and under the bed we go, so what did they say?

[19:21] they said we will not bow down, and our God is able to deliver us, but even if he doesn't, but even if he does, so they're not name it and claim it guys, they believe in the power of God, they absolutely believe in the power of God, but they also believe that God sometimes lets us suffer, well, often lets us suffer, and some to death, and we know the story, he delivered them, they were, there was three of them, and then there was a fourth member, they saw four people walking around the fire, most likely pre-incarnate Jesus Christ, so, so, now look at the end of verse 20, so he applies all this power to us, what extent is this power?

[20:18] it's according to, it's according to the power that works within us, that works, that is literally, that present tense is working within us, it's according to the power that not just will work, but is working within us, it's already there, it's not abstract power that's external that we invite in, it's internal power that's already there, it's transformative power that everyone who has been born again has experienced, everyone who has been born again, everyone who has been transformed by the power of God, what we read in Ephesians chapter 2, right, we who were dead, have been made alive, he made us alive, because when we were dead, there was nothing we could do but sin, we could believe, we have believed, we had our free will according to our nature, but we did not have the total free will yet, and a limited will, our will was held up by our flesh and by the rule of Satan in our lives, until God took Satan off of the throne, and raised himself up in our own heart, transformative power,

[21:42] Paul says in Ephesians 3 verse 7, he talked about his imprisonment, he talks about his sufferings, and how God had transformed him, he had been a selfish person before, he had been a violent persecutor against the church, and God met him on a road, come to Jesus moment, except it was Jesus coming to him, there was nothing Paul did, Paul was against God, against God, against God, against God, well he thought he was for God, he was for the Jewish God, he had a prejudice, and then Jesus met him and boom, he's changed, instantly transformed, instantly transformed, humbled, right, so that's Paul, so how is the father able to work in us, in what ways, what does that look like, right, Philippians 2, 12 and 13 says work out your salvation with fear and trembling, why should we do that, work out, we have, we cooperate with God, it's not, we're to obey, we're to follow, we're to work it out, we're to not work for our salvation, but to work out our salvation, right,

[23:04] God calls us to walk in men worthy, and then the next verse he says, Philippians 2, 13, for it is God who is at work within you to do two things, to will and to work, I often pray that that verse, when I don't feel willing, and I don't want to work for God, when I feel very selfish, I pray, do the willing and the working within me for your good pleasure, you do it, you do it, because I, you know, you know my heart, Lord, you do it, I still want him to do it, I just, you know, I'm hurting, I'm weak, I love that, how is he able to work, well Hebrews 2, let's look at a couple of references in Hebrews 2,

[24:05] Hebrews 2, 18, for because he himself has suffered when tempted, talking about Jesus, because he himself has suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted, I don't know about you, but I love that verse, and it shows how distinct in the Godhead Jesus is, in the Trinity, it's only the Son who really can sympathize with us, it's only the Son that has experienced temptation, the Father has never experienced temptation, he can't be tempted, Spirit has not experienced temptation, he can't be tempted, but Jesus has experienced, why?

[24:50] Because he became a man, right? Because he emptied himself and he lived as a man and he was tempted in all things, yet without sin, and because he's experienced temptation, that Barnabas, whoever's writing Hebrews, probably Barnabas, who says to us, he can sympathize, he gets it, he understands how hard it is, look at him in the garden, he gets how hard temptation is, there were things Jesus did not want to do that the Father wanted him to do, yet not my will, but thine be done, right?

[25:26] Jesus had to work through that and so because he gets it, so that should encourage us to go to him, that should encourage us to pray that he gets it, right?

[25:39] Hebrews 4, 14, since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, he's ascended up to heaven, let us hold fast our confession, why?

[25:50] For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are yet without sin, therefore let us with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

[26:12] Again, kind of saying the same thing, he can sympathize, he's not one who's unable to sympathize, but one who can sympathize with our weaknesses, he gets it. So let's go to him.

[26:26] He's able to help us in our temptations, he's able to help us in our weaknesses, he wants to, he sympathizes, and so he wants to give us more mercy and wants to give us more grace in time of need.

[26:45] So is the evil one sending fiery darts toward you to feel shame, to feel guilt for what you've done in your past?

[26:57] Is the fiery darts coming at you that you are unworthy? You're not good enough, you shouldn't, who are you? That's the evil one.

[27:09] And Jesus is there to sympathize with you and get it. Because he attacked Jesus just as well. And then one more, Hebrews 7 25, consequently he, Christ, is able to save to the uttermost, not just save a little bit so you barely get it, but to save to the uttermost, to rescue you all the way to those.

[27:37] He saves those who draw near to God through Him. Since He always lives to make intercession for them.

[27:49] Do you realize Jesus, your Savior, is still praying for you? Do you know that He's still interceding for you? He is praying like He prayed for Peter, right?

[28:01] That your faith will not fail. That though you may fall, that your faith won't fail. And then that you get back up stronger, more humbled, more self-aware, more self-denying, more not trusting yourself, right?

[28:22] Not leaning on your understanding, but only leaning on His. So do you believe God is able, I'm asking you today, do you really believe that He is able to do beyond all that you're thinking or asking within you?

[28:41] Do you believe there's another level of praying that sometimes your prayers are too little? That often your thinking is too little of God?

[28:54] Your God's too small. God's love. Can He really help you fight sin? Can He really help you overcome temptation?

[29:06] Can He really, do you really, is He really able to do that? Is He really able to have this power already in you? To strengthen you, to endure whatever He has you going through?

[29:21] does your belief drive you to pray for that kind of power? Or do you limit what you're at, what you ask Him?

[29:34] I can't ask that. Do you ask big? I mean, do I ask Him to save the lost?

[29:46] Do I really believe He can save the lost? Do I really believe He can change that person's heart? Do I really believe He can open that blind person's eyes? Do I really believe that He can raise from the dead that person who is dead to Christ?

[29:59] Who sees no need of Him? Do I believe that? Do I believe He can change a life like He changed Paul's? Like He changed mine? So, first thing He ascribes to Him whose power is infinite and beyond imagination.

[30:19] now He prays for glory. So now His prayer in verse 21 is to Him be the glory. To Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever.

[30:35] So let's break that down, verse 21. First of all, to Him be the glory. So there's no verb there, it's actually just kind of, just literally, it's to Him glory, glory, or glory to Him.

[30:48] So it may mean, to Him belongs glory, or it could be to Him is due glory. So glory, what's glory?

[31:00] We use that word a lot. What is it? in the Old Testament, it was just, it was huge, right? Glory filled the temple, right? It's like, you know, the Shekinah glory was just, and nobody could go in, right?

[31:17] It's like, what is that? So glory in the Old Testament is an emphasis of God's presence. So we talk about glory like that there in the tabernacle where He filled the tabernacle, right?

[31:31] It's just, it's a presence, it's a very clear presence of God. So in the Old Testament we have that, right? Pillar of fire, right? A cloud, right?

[31:45] Usually something stunning. So the best way maybe to define glory is that it's the sum of all God's absolute perfections.

[31:59] It's all of His manifested nature. So all those characteristics that we say of God, He's holy, righteous, and good. He is forgiving, and merciful, and compassionate, and all these things.

[32:11] All that Exodus 34 6 says when God proclaimed His name before Moses, right? He is the God, right? He has this wonderful side of mercy, compassion, love, and forgiveness, and He has this other side, right, that seems to compete with that.

[32:31] That's His holiness and injustice, and His righteousness, right? So how can He forgive when there's justice, right? So that's where it meets on the cross. He can only do it in Christ.

[32:41] Christ. So it's all of that. So glory is all of that of God, all His names, all His attributes. So we kind of lose, so we kind of throw out words, splendor, radiance, wonder, magnificence, right?

[33:03] Glory. So notice where the glory, Paul says, to Him be the glory, where? In the church. Isn't that interesting?

[33:15] In the church. Like it was in the tabernacle. That's in the church.

[33:26] In the church. In the ecclesia. In the gathering of those who are called out from the world. Right? Not in the world. Not in the every church, because many churches aren't following God or don't believe in His word, but those that do believe, those that follow Jesus Christ, those that actually trust the word and don't parse it out, that's His church.

[33:55] And this is unique because there's no other doxology in the New Testament that has this. It's only here does it talk about His glory in the church. church. But this is Ephesians and the church is one of the emphases of this letter.

[34:13] We get to understand what is the church by reading Ephesians. It starts in chapter 1 all the way through chapter 6.

[34:24] It's the church. It's not the individual Christian. It's the individual Christian in the church, gathered with the church. That is God's emphasis. Where He has, the church is God's masterpiece, right?

[34:37] It's the realm of His presence. He is among us. So, we misquote a verse from Matthew, you know, where two or three are gathered.

[34:49] There He is. Well, what if there's only one gathered? He is still there. Is He not there? Yeah, He's there. Yeah, that's talking about something else. Where two or three are gathered, that's talking about something else.

[35:01] That's talking about church discipline. particularly. Okay, and that when you make a decision, a serious decision, right, He's there with you. But He's, you know, lo, I'm with you always.

[35:13] Right? So, for short people, lo, I'm with you always. No. King James. His glory is, so, so in the church, so, how does that show?

[35:30] How does that visible? So, look over at Ephesians 5, 25, where He says, husbands love your wives. How should husbands love their wives?

[35:41] Just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her. So, how is the, how is the glory of God shown in the church? Well, it's shown in the church because it's, that's who Christ loves.

[35:55] that's who Christ gave Himself up for, for the church. Right? That He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and blameless.

[36:20] He displays His glory in the church by saving her, by cleansing her, by washing her, by, by, He's interested in having, presenting her back to Himself in no spot or wrinkle.

[36:37] So, so how does God, how does that look in our church? Well, we have a bunch of beggars who have found bread. We have a bunch of lost sinners who have been found by Christ, who have been saved by Christ, been forgiven.

[36:53] All their shameful deeds have been dismissed and forgiven and washed away. That's glory. To love us like that.

[37:09] The Father loves the church because He sent the church into the world, or sent His Son into the world to die for sinners and then gather them as the church. So, I mean, church is radical.

[37:26] The church is a uniting of Jew and Gentile. It's a gathering, not of all, a bunch of white people that all come from the same background and all have the same income. Right? That's not the church.

[37:37] The church is integrated with all kinds of people from all different colors and all kinds of different backgrounds and all kinds of levels of income, rich and poor. And, you know, James, Letter of James talks about that.

[37:49] It got rich and poor in the same congregation. So, that's, and that's glory. I mean, what other organization gathers all these kind of people together and they're all on the same grounds before Christ?

[38:04] And then he says, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus. In Christ. It's glory in Christ. Why? Because Christ is the head of the body.

[38:16] He's the head of the church. He's the mediator of the church. He's the only mediator we need. I don't need a priest to go to the Father. I don't.

[38:27] I don't need to go to a confessional to go to God. I just need my knees on the ground. Right? My soul on the ground. My heart on the ground.

[38:40] And I go through Jesus Christ. In Christ. Come in my name, Jesus said. I go in His name. He's my mediator. He's the one I go through to God. All our blessings are through Christ.

[38:55] Chapter 1 of Ephesians. It's all these blessings through Christ. In Him. He's the reason for the church. And so, when does He show His glory?

[39:07] Verse 20. Verse 21. To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus. Where? To all generations. To all generations.

[39:18] From the first century on. To all generations. And actually, to generations past because there were believers before the cross who were looking for Him. Like David, who was forgiven.

[39:30] Who was, right? Had atonement. Whose iniquities were pardoned because He looked forward in the mercy and grace of God to the one who was coming.

[39:42] Right? So Old Testament believers are saved the same way New Testament believers are saved. Right? By grace alone. Through faith alone.

[39:54] In Christ alone. There. So He shows His glory to each contemporary age of the church.

[40:11] Then He ends with Amen. Right? That's how we end our prayers. Right? That's what we're taught. We're taught to bow our heads and close our eyes and fold our hands and to pray to Jesus and in the end to say Amen.

[40:23] Amen. Amen. That's what Amen means. Right? That's how we end the prayer. Right? And actually, I said before, you know, we tend to end our prayer in Jesus' name.

[40:36] Amen. And that's okay. But actually, theologically, we should put that part in the front of our prayer. Father, I come to You in Jesus' name. Right? Because in Jesus' name is about how I get to the Father.

[40:49] He's my mediator. But the Lord understands. And we got habits. But what's Amen? So Amen is... What language is that?

[41:00] Do you know? Is that English? No? Well, it's translated... Yeah, it's transliterated from Hebrew. It's Hebrew. You actually have to read it from right to left, not left to right.

[41:15] Amen. Amen. Amen. is the Hebrew. Amen. It means firm, faithful, truth.

[41:30] It's one of the... Yeah, it's Hebrew. So every word is... It's not like Greek. Every word has definitive. Hebrew is like... Firm, faithful, confirmation, truth.

[41:42] But all about solidity. Solidity. So in the New Testament, it's the congregational response to truth.

[41:55] It's a confirming and an affirming. So the congregation can say, Amen. Amen. And what they mean is, let it be so.

[42:08] I agree. truth. Word. Or swerd.

[42:21] Because the sword of the Spirit is a word of God, right? Swerd. But it's that. It's that. That's what Amen is. It's like I'm agreeing. I'm saying, Yes, that's it.

[42:33] So it is appropriate during teaching, during a sermon to say Amen. When your spirit says, Oh, yes. You don't have to say it loud. You just say, Oh, Amen.

[42:45] Amen. Whatever your personality is, do it, yeah. All right. So, let me give you a couple of other examples of doxologies. So, at the end of our service, we kind of rotate through.

[42:58] I rotate through different doxologies that I state at the end of the service. So, some from Hebrews, some from Jude, some from Ephesians, some from Thessalonians, where are we now?

[43:09] We're in 2 Thessalonians. There's a whole bunch of them that rotate through. And I rotate through them according to the theme of worship, right? So, I draw from the theme of worship. We do a season on certain, you know, whether it's through a particular port of Psalms, or we're going through the Advent, or we're going through the season of Lent, going through Easter, summertime, we're going through various things.

[43:33] So, here's one that's familiar to it. Hebrews 13. Now, may the God of peace who brought up again from the dead our Lord Jesus. Now, notice again, before he gets to the doxology, before he says, to whom be the glory, he's defining the God, the God of peace who brought up again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, may he equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever.

[44:10] Amen. So, you notice the actual doxa, the glory part, comes at the end. Or Jude 24, there's a favorite. Right? Sometimes the benediction or the doxology is reminding us and blessing us as we praise God.

[44:26] Now, to him who is able, we love Jude 24, to him who is able to keep you from what? From stumbling. How able is he?

[44:37] He's able to keep you from stumbling. How? But I stumble. How come I stumble? Because I'm walking in my way. I'm not leaning on him.

[44:49] Keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ, our Lord, be glory. Right?

[45:01] So it's glory to God and the Savior, Jesus Christ. To him be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority before all time and now and forever. Amen. When you hear these kinds of words, do you feel impelled to join the apostle in praise of God?

[45:25] Do these words, when you reflect on them and hear them, do they lift your soul? Do they strengthen your faith? Yes, that's my God.

[45:37] I want to say amen. Amen. Do these words reflect your own belief and conviction to magnify God's grace and power?

[45:51] These are words worthy of reflection, of meditation.

[46:02] I mean, think through, I mean, just these two verses in Ephesians, to him who is able, I can reflect on that for a while, to do exceedingly abundantly, beyond all that I'm thinking and praying.

[46:25] It's beyond what I can even conceive of. According to the power that works, and I need to reflect on that more, according to the power that is working within us.

[46:41] to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, not just to me.

[46:53] It's not about me. It's to all generations. Forever. Ever. All may I believe it. Let us pray.

[47:07] Father, we do believe these truths, and we want to believe them more. We want to think like Paul. We want to think more like Paul. That our prayers to you would reflect what we think of you.

[47:22] How able we believe you to be when we pray. And yet, Lord, you know us. You know that we're weak, that often we get distracted, often we don't meditate, we don't reflect, and so our prayers still effective if we pray to Jesus, but sometimes are not as powerful.

[47:47] So, increase our faith, Father. Bolster our faith. Lift our soul by these truths. We pray because we come in Jesus' name.

[47:58] Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you.