Amen.  Hallelujah!  The Lord is good and His mercies endure forever.  We’re going to take another side of what we’ve been looking at through the great redemption that Jesus afforded us on the cross.  We’ve been looking at the aspect of redemption that has brought healing to our bodies.  The Lord’s been encouraging us to become bolder in our reaching out and touching lives, and sharing this gospel.  We’re going to look at the great aspects of what this gospel has afforded us, so that we could have a better understanding of what to share with others.  We need to get these basic principles down, to communicate to those that we’re going to be confronting on a daily basis.

At least nine out of ten people that you run into, that you’re going to share the gospel with, believe that if there is any hope of men being accepted of a God, a holy God, it’s going to be through good works.  Virtually every religion believes that.  They get there different ways.  They use different terminology, but it’s basically based on performance.  Does the good outweigh the bad?  We see those, like in Islam, those in Romanism, the Roman Catholic Church, living under constant condemnation and the question of, “Have I done enough?”  Of course, we know the reality is that you can never do enough.  There’s nothing good within man; amen?  There’s not a thing that we can do that causes us to be acceptable in God’s sight.  It’s only faith in what Jesus has done.  “By grace are we saved through faith; and that not of ourselves: it is a gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).

So, it’s all in what Jesus has accomplished.  As we look at these different aspects, we’ll look at some of the great and main topics of redemption, of what redemption has afforded us, at the great truth and the promise of the remission of our sins.  In the chorus that we were just singing there, one phrase just jumped out at me: to stand guiltless before His throne.  Amen.  Think about it.  We stand before a holy God, and He sees nothing in our lives that keeps us from communing and fellowshipping with Him.  As the Scripture says, we are accepted in the beloved; amen?  But just pause for a moment.  Think about that.  We can stand before God, guiltless.  We have total, absolute confidence of being accepted into His presence.  “I go to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (John 14:2-3).  Hallelujah!  You ready to go home?  Come quickly, Lord Jesus.  “It won’t be long and we’ll be going home.”  So, here we are, just rejoicing in the goodness of God.