Awaiting His Arrival - Ready for Jesus to Return*

The return of Jesus Christ is more than just waiting for a future event—being fully convinced that He is coming back changes the way we live today, filling our lives with urgency, purpose, and hope. In this message, Pastor Chris Teien shares five biblical ways to be ready for Christ’s return, drawing from both Old and New Testament promises. From remembering Jesus’ sacrifice to living holy lives, this sermon will encourage you to prepare your heart, align your life with eternity, and invite others into the hope of salvation.

Link: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2285086/episodes/16335659

As 1 Corinthians 11:26 (NLT) reminds us, “Every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord’s death until he comes again.” Communion is more than a ritual—it’s a declaration of ongoing faith and living hope that Jesus is coming again.

When life feels uncertain or overwhelming, this message helps you refocus on what truly matters. You’ll be reminded that Jesus is returning to make all things right—and that gives you strength to live with peace, perseverance, and purpose. Whether you're a longtime believer or someone seeking hope, this message will help you live with eternal perspective and confidence in God’s promises.

Key Points:

1. Remember That Christ Will Return – Communion points us to the cross and the coming King (1 Corinthians 11:26).
2. Realize That God Speaks and Change Happens – God’s Word created the world and will bring judgment and renewal (2 Peter 3:5–7).
3. Repent and Live a Changed Life – God patiently waits for us to turn to Him before the day of the Lord (2 Peter 3:9).
4. Live Rightly in Light of Eternity – We are called to live holy and godly lives as we look forward to His return (2 Peter 3:11–12).
5. Remain Ready and Help Others Be Ready – Stay spiritually awake and actively share the Gospel (Luke 12:40).

Notable Quotes:
“Jesus is coming back, and our mission is to live and proclaim His hope until He does.”
“Communion is not just looking back at the cross but forward to His return.”

Actionable Takeaways:
Reflect deeply during communion—Jesus’ return gives it eternal significance.
Confess sin and reset your life around what matters most.
Share the message of hope with those around you.
Live with spiritual alertness—Christ could return any day.

Scripture References:
1 Corinthians 11:26, John 14:3, Acts 1:11, 2 Peter 3:5–12, Luke 12:40, Isaiah 9:6–7, Daniel 7:13–14, Revelation 22:12

Keywords:
Jesus’ return, second coming, readiness, communion, hope, repentance, holiness, Gospel, eternity, Christian living

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The WELL Faith Podcast offers encouraging, Bible-based messages from Pastor Chris Teien and guests. New sermons are released every Sunday. Replay episodes are marked with an asterisk. Find us online at ChrisTeien.com and Rockwell.Church in Virginia, MN. Email comments to wellfaith24@gmail.com

Transcript

Chris T 0:00

Alright, so those invite cards that we have talk about hope. One of the greatest hopes of the church is that Jesus is going to return. And if you are excited about Jesus to return, that will make a difference in the way that you live your life. It will make a difference in the way you choose to spend your time and what you do with your finances. It is hard to not know exactly when Jesus is going to return because, on one hand, you need to continue life here. If you knew that Jesus is going to return in three years, then why bother to say for retirement? Why go to school? Why do all those things? But you don't know. Jesus might return in your lifetime, or he might wait. But we trust and we wait. And so we're having communion today, and the things we always talk about during communion are remembering Christ's body. I received from the Lord what I passed on to you the night when he was betrayed. The Lord took Lord Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, broke it, and said, This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And it was a celebration of the Passover, a remembrance of when you read in the book of Exodus, that the Passover lamb was slaughtered. The blood was put over people's doors so that they wouldn't be killed during that time. You have to read about that. But the blood saved them. And Jesus' blood and body saves us. And so Jesus was having the Last Supper, the last time he would eat with what would be his apostles. And so we remember that during communion. We, like churches across the world, have communion. Some churches have communion every Sunday. We have it once a month, usually in the beginning of the month. It's a memorial to remember what Christ has done. It's a way to proclaim his death and resurrection, and we are commanded to do it. So we remember Christ's body and we remember Christ's blood. In the same way He also took the cup after supper and said, This cup is a new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. So we are told that it's Jesus' blood that makes it possible for us to be saved from our sin. It was his blood that paid the cost, the ransom for our sin. And so we remember that. And so we all understand that. We have communion. Those of us who are believers in Christ, who have received Christ, we take communion. It's a great time to remember what Christ has done. It's a great time to confess any known sin in our life. It's a great time to recommit our lives to Christ. And then there's this verse that comes right after it, which is supposed to encourage us, which I think is very important. And what it says is that we need to remember that Christ will return. 1 Corinthians 11, 26. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Until he comes. We're supposed to do this until Jesus returns. There's this, if you read through scripture, you see repeatedly that Jesus is going to return. And I wanted to highlight that today. What's real interesting is that if you're really comfortable in this life, if you're one of the few people who have arrived, you're healthy, you have no fear of anything, the future looks bright, and everything about your life is wonderful, then you're probably like, why would I want Jesus to return? This is like heaven on earth. But if you're like the other 95% of people who get frustrated with the sin in the world and have difficulties in their own life, maybe with your body or uh just all of life in general, Jesus' returning looks pretty good to you. Sometimes it's hard to know exactly what we will become or what the Lord has planned for us, but we trust that it's way better than what we have now. And it's life eternal, and it's life surrounded by righteousness. And it's just so much better. That should encourage us, it should motivate us, it should make us change the way that we live. And in Acts 1, verse 8, Jesus says, You'll receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. And then it says, After saying this, Jesus was taken up to taken up into a cloud while they were watching, and they could no longer see him, and as they strained to see him rising into heaven, two white robed men suddenly stood among them, and they said, Men of Galilee, why are you standing here staring into heaven? Jesus has been taken from you into heaven, but someday he will return from heaven in the same way you saw him go. So when Jesus ascended into heaven, there was the promise by angels that Jesus would return in the same way. And someday Jesus is going to return. So we're going to look at 2 Peter chapter 3. Second Peter writes to the persecuted church, to a people that are suffering, struggling, having all sorts of difficulties in life. And I wanted to highlight some of that before we actually took communion. A passage that talks about the fact that Jesus is going to return and how we should live our life remembering and making that fact an importance in our life. It's interesting that not only could Jesus return, but you could die now. You could die tomorrow. Tomorrow might you might not die tomorrow, but tomorrow could be your last functional day. I heard of a story of a pastor, heard the story of a pastor who was doing marriage counseling and he reclined on his chair and the chair broke, fell back, and he hit his head, and he's been a vegetable since. We don't know what we have left in this life. So if you've never received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, today is a good day. If you have not said things to people that you think you need to say, you should do that. You should be constantly living life, knowing that this might be your last day, that Jesus may return, or it may be the last day for the person that you are around. But awaiting his arrival. This is my second letter to you, dear friends. In both of them, I have tried to stimulate, stimulate your wholesome thinking and refresh your memory. When you need hope, some of the best things that uh can happen is for people to encourage you, to help you to remember things, to stimulate your mind, and give you the facts that you need. That's why scripture is so very important. That's why the Bible is so important. It's hard to remind people of things they've never heard. It's hard to encourage people with things that they've never learned. And that's why it's important for us to be in God's Word. I would like to see us distribute, keep distributing these New Believers, New Testaments all over. You don't know how God can use it with the notes in the front and in the back. It could really change a life. I was going through a drive-thru the other day, and I had this on this, one of these on the center console of my truck, and when I was giving the girl in the drive-thru my money, when she gave me my change back, she looked over and she's like, What is that? Is that a Bible? Can I see that? And like, you can have it. She's like, Oh no, that's fine. I'm like, no, really, you can have it. We give these away. And she took it. So I don't know if she'll do if it will change her life or she'll give it to someone else. But people out there are searching, and it's really the best tool that we have here in the church to lead people to Christ and to help them grow in their faith and to help disciple them. There's lots of other tools too, but this one is the whole New Testament and a bunch of notes for under $3. And it is a great tool. Stimulate their thinking, their wholesome thinking, and refresh their memory. And then he writes, I want you to remember what the Holy Prophet said long ago and what our Lord and Savior commanded through your apostles. Most importantly, I want to remind you that in the last days scoffers will come, mocking the truth and following their own desires. They will say, What happened to the promise that Jesus is coming again? From before the times of our ancestors, everything has remained the same since the world was first created. Have you ever come across these people before? These people that laugh at your faith in Christ and go, oh, that's a myth. Why do you follow those old wives' tales? That's mythology. And then they come up with all these reasons why God can't be real. If there's so much, there's so much pain and suffering in the world. If Christ was really going to come back, he would have done it by now. Or in the time when this was written, people expected that Jesus was going to come back in their lifetime. So these people that were holding on to this promise originally given when they started to die off, then other people got concerned and they're like, wait a second, I thought Jesus was coming back before you died. So Jesus has actually waited 2,000 years so far. And so some people question that. They scoff. They say, You're naive to think that. Why force your book of rules on me? Why would I want to live my life that way and miss out? And they have all of these criticisms and questions, and they continue to do whatever they want, and they don't want you to force your religion on them. They mock, they scoff, and they follow their own desires. Rabbi Zacharias in the book Jesus Among Other Gods wrote, We hear so much criticism from skeptics about what they often brand as secondhand faith. It is implied that many people believe in God only because of the context of their birth or family or determined conditions. If the criticism is justified, and undoubtedly it sometimes is, why do we not show the same distrust of secondhand doubt? If it is possible for a person's belief to be merely an echo of someone else's faith, are there not hypocrites in doubt also? People mock, people scoff, people don't understand what we're trying to do, people don't understand how Christ loves us and how we can take a book and read it and say it's God's word to us, and they don't get it. The Holy Spirit can help them to understand, the Holy Spirit can help them believe, and when they see your Christian life in action, they're often encouraged to live out their faith. They're often encouraged to find hope in difficult times when they see you living for Christ. Sometimes you're the only Jesus people see, sometimes you're the only Bible that people will read. But we need to remember that Christ is going to return and that people around us may not understand our faith in Christ. And there's a spiritual battle that goes on too that tries to keep us from growing in our faith, tries to keep us from sharing Christ with others, tries to keep us from living for Christ. Remember that Christ is returning. Number two, realize that God speaks and change happens. So, 2 Peter chapter 3, verse 5. They deliberately forget that God made the heavens long ago by the word of his command, and he brought the earth out from the water and surrounded it with water. And then he used the water to destroy the ancient world with a mighty flood. And by the same word, the present heavens and earth have been stored up for fire. They are going to be kept for the day of judgment when ungodly people will be destroyed. God spoke and creation happened. God spoke and people were created. God spoke, and all this that we have came into existence. And then as people became really wicked, God spoke, and there was a great flood, and many people were destroyed by the flood. And he won't flood the earth again. He promised not to, but there will be a cleansing by fire, a cleansing of the earth by fire. And we don't totally understand exactly what that means. Is that the whole universe? Is that the earth? Jesus is going to come reign on the earth, a renewed earth. So is that a cleansing of the earth we have? It's goofy. I don't even know if I should say it, but I will. But what pops into my head is that I remember if you really made a mess out of silly putty, you could stick it in the microwave and it would get soft and pliable again. But if we really make a mess out of the earth, God can renew it and make it fit for his purposes, full of righteousness. But that doesn't mean, and people accuse Christians of this all the time, it doesn't mean we should check out from our earthly responsibilities. It'd be stupid to say, there's no reason for me to take care of the earth or recycle because Jesus is going to make it all new someday anyway. Because you don't know when that's going to be, and that could be a long time from now. So you should put those bottles and things in the recycling for the sake of your grandkids or whatever to help the earth to be a better place. But we should do what we can for social justice, to help the earth to be the place in which we live, to be a clean place, a place that's safe. And know that eventually Jesus will make all things right, but until that happens, that we need to keep living for him. And we need to realize the power of God to be able to speak and to change things, to be able to transition our existence and our time in history into whatever he has for us next by speaking his powerful word. God speaks and change happens. We don't know a whole lot about the earth that we live in. Scientists claim to know a lot, and they seem to think they know how things work, and there's global warming or there's not global warming, and there's all of these theories and all of these things that they try to piece together as facts. But scientists don't know everything about the earth. They don't know everything about the ocean. They keep discovering new creatures in the ocean. The ocean is so big and deep, they don't know all of the things that go on in the ocean, and so they're constantly discovering new fish, new animals, new things. And in this book, Amazing Truths from uh Michael Julian from 2016, he says that 95% of the universe is still a mystery. Today, astronomers have come down on the side of believing that galaxies and galaxy clusters are pregnant with some sort of exotic material that is invisible to us. They are calling it dark matter. They haven't yet identified what it is exactly or even established that it truly exists, but it's not for lack of trying. Despite decades of using every imaginable means of detection from gamma ray telescopes and outer space to cryogenic subatomic particle monitors buried deep inside a northern Minnesota mine, their occasional tantalizing reports of success remain as unreliable as Elbus sightings. And dark matter isn't even the most astonishing thing modern astrophysicists have discovered about gravity. Astrophysicists have discovered another mystifying reality. They call it dark energy. All told, astronomers have concluded that dark energy comprises some 68% of the total universe and dark matter about 27%. That means only 5% of the entire universe is visible to us. In other words, everything we call scientific knowledge is based on but a pittance of what there is to know about our world. 95% of it is hidden from us. Even with all of our advances, our science is 95% in the dark about the universe it seeks and claims to understand, about what is real or not, what is possible or not, even about a prosaic force that exists literally literally right under our noses. We don't know what God has for us in the future. We don't even know what's out there, but we know that God has reached out to us and God has revealed himself to us through his word and through his son. Jesus is the radiance of his glory, the exact representation of his being. We have the word, we have Jesus the Son, we have the Holy Spirit to help us to know the Christian life, to help us to live the Christian life, help us to share Christ in the Christian life, and that whenever God wants to, he can speak and change our entire existence. So faith is going through life, knowing that God is in control and that God has a plan, and if we've received Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, that we are secure in God's hands. So realize God speaks and change happens. Someday He'll speak and we will transition from this existence to the next one. And if we know Christ, that will be a great and wonderful day. If we've rejected Christ and we haven't put our faith in Jesus, haven't repented of our sin and asked Christ into our life, then that will not be a very happy day at all. Number three, repentance is what God desires before he upgrades our existence. God wants us to repent, to change, to turn, to change one's mind, to turn one's life. It's a turning away from sin and turning to God. It's a change of mind, a forsaking of sin. It's putting sin out of one's thoughts and behavior. It's resolving to not sin again. On one hand, you could turn from lying, stealing, cheating, immorality, cursing, drunkenness, and those glaring sins of the flesh. And you can also repent and turn from the silent sins of the spirit, such as self-centeredness, selfishness, envy, bitterness, pride, covetousness, anger, evil thoughts, hopelessness, laziness, jealousy, lust, and more. So it's more than sorrow, it's wanting to turn. You don't need to clean yourself up before you come to God, but you should desire to change and desire to follow the Lord. 2 Peter 3, 8. But you must not forget this one thing, dear friends. A day is like a thousand years to the Lord, and a thousand years like a day. The Lord isn't really slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he's being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent. But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief, when the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and the very elements themselves will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be found to deserve judgment. So this whole timing, it's not that God forgot. It's just God has a different time schedule. God has a different time frame. To God, a day is like a thousand years. So if God sees a thousand-year time span, to him that's no big deal. To us, that's a really long time. And he wants people to repent. He's waiting for more people to come and receive Christ as their Lord and Savior. He's keeping the door open for your friends, for your children, for your grandchildren and their friends to receive Christ. The door is still open for them to be saved from their sin and to be adopted as children of God, to be able to be saved and assured heaven and all of the things that come with us. The door is still open, and Jesus is still available at this time. So he is waiting, and repentance is what God desires before he upgrades our existence. He's waiting. And we need to be sharing Christ with others, offering hope, offering hope while there is still time. It's interesting that in Matthew 24, 14 it says that we can speed his coming. So the Bible says if you want to hurry this along, there's something that you can do. If you think it'd be awesome to have our existence upgraded and to be with Jesus instead of all the struggles we have going on with our life on this earth right now, that we can speed his coming by sharing Christ, by discipling others. Matthew 24, 14. This gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. Now, you might not feel comfortable hopping on a plane and going to the ends of the world, but there are other people that are getting called by God, have given their life to be those people to go out to the ends of the world and share Christ. And some of those are available to even support through the Great Commission Fund. So on your offering envelope, there's a section where you can give money to the Great Commission Fund, and that is the money to fund ministries and missionaries around the world. If you want to help speed his coming, help support missionaries that will bring Christ to the ends of the earth to testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. It seems like that could almost happen at any time because it seems like two-thirds of the world has some kind of internet, cell phone, communication, television, something that could proclaim Christ that they could hear the message and with all the technology and things that we have. And we can have video conferences around the world. I took a two-day online train the preacher class seminar thing, and so it was based out of Texas, and I don't know, some other guy was somewhere else, but it came on my screen, so I felt like I was right there with the rest of them. And the same thing can happen with proclaiming Christ around the world. There was an article that came out in December that listed the top 50 biggest churches in the United States, and Life Church is the biggest, with I don't know what it's 53,000 or something like that. But they do an amazing job of trying to proclaim Christ around the world through all the different social media things, through the UVersion Bible lab and all of the different things they have thought outside of the box, beyond just their church to try to figure out a way to reach others. And we can do the same thing. So we don't have technology people and everything, but we can use some of their tools and we can make connections. Some of the connections we can make are with people that are from different parts of the world that actually have come near us. Maybe they're in our school in the schools or near our workplace, or maybe we've befriended them on some social network thing or something. But people around the world are able to communicate, and since we can communicate, we should communicate Christ. Number four, right living today is fitting for our future, for our future life. Right living today is fitting for our future life. 2 Peter 3 11, since everything around us is going to be Destroyed like this, what holy and godly lives you should live, looking forward to the day of God and hurrying it along. On that day he will set the heavens on fire and the elements will melt away in the flames. But we are looking forward to the new heavens and the new earth. He has promised a world filled with God's righteousness. So somehow God is going to clean up the mess. He's going to get rid of the wickedness, he's going to get rid of the disease, he's going to get rid of all the bad, he's going to clean all that up, and then we will be able to exist with Christ in this perfect place, is what the Bible says. That's all through the Bible. It's prophesied in the Old Testament. Jesus talks about it while he's here on earth. Jesus has his apostles write about it in Scripture. And in Revelation, it talks about it. And it will be a great thing to be part of for all eternity. And that should motivate us and encourage us. No matter if people are scoffing and persecuting us for our faith, no matter if our life is difficult now, we have that hope of heaven and knowing that Jesus is in control and that we have great days ahead. Isn't that the greatest hope to know there's great days ahead? If you think it's good now, it's only going to get better. If you think it's bad now, it's going to get better, I promise. Right living today. So that means that we should live our lives in a way that honor God. A way that we should turn our back on sin and live for Christ. We don't want to be disqualified from serving Christ. We don't want to trip other people up by falling into sin. We need to live right to live rightly for our future life. 2 Peter 3.13. We are looking forward to the new heavens and the new earth he has promised, a world filled with God's righteousness. And so, dear friends, while you are awaiting for these things to happen, make every effort to be found living peaceful lives that are pure and blameless in his sight. And remember, our Lord's patience gives people time to be saved. This is what our beloved brother Paul wrote to you with the wisdom God gave him. God has the door open. God wants us to live rightly. God wants us to share our faith and to live in a relationship with him, to know that our life, our future, our eternity is secure in his hands, to hold on loosely to the things of this world and hold on tightly to the things of eternal value, to the things that God has given us in his word, the things that the Spirit helps us to live out and to share, and to have that trust. We look forward to that day. We don't want to be so heavenly minded we're no earthly good, but on the other hand, we want to keep our eyes on heaven and know that's eventually where we're headed. We're citizens of heaven's aliens and strangers in this present world. So just real quick, Jesus had actually told a story that uh puts this into perspective, and then we'll have communion. So I'll read this and then we'll have communion. So, number five, remain ready for Christ to return. Jesus, Luke chapter 12, verse 35. Jesus says, Be dressed for service and keep your lamps burning as though you were waiting for your master to return from the wedding feast. Then you'll be ready to open the door and let him in the moment he arrives and knocks. The servants who are ready and waiting for his return will be rewarded. I tell you the truth, he himself will seat them, put on an apron, and serve them as they sit and eat. So here we have the master of the house who goes off to a wedding party and he's gonna come back, and he says, when he comes, when he comes back, if you're ready when I get back, we're gonna have I'm gonna serve I'm gonna seat you, we're gonna have a party, we're gonna do our own banquet, and it's gonna be a great thing. But you gotta be ready, you gotta be awake, you gotta be waiting for me. Verse 38, he may come in the middle of the night or just before dawn, but whenever he comes, he will reward the servants who are ready. Understand this. If a homeowner knew exactly when a burglar was coming, he would not permit his house to be broken into you. You also must be ready all the time, for the Son of Man will come when least expected. Jesus is saying, You gotta be ready, you gotta keep, you gotta keep focused on going to return sometime soon. Robbie Robbins was an Air Force pilot during the first Iraq War. After his 300th mission, he was surprised to be given permission to immediately pull his crew together and fly his plane home. They flew across the ocean to Massachusetts and had a long drive to western Pennsylvania. They drove all night, and when his buddies dropped him off at his driveway just after sunup, early in the morning, there was a big banner across the garage. Said, Welcome home, Dad. How did they know? No one had called, and the crew themselves hadn't expected to leave so quickly. Robbins relates, he said, when I walked into the house, the kids, about half dressed for school, screamed, Daddy! My wife Susan came running down the hall. She looked terrific, hair fixed, makeup on, beautiful yellow dress. I said, How did you know? So I said, I didn't. She answered through cheers of joy. Once we knew the war was over, we knew you'd be home one of these days. We knew you'd try to surprise us, so we've been ready every day. So it is time for communion and I'll ask the guys to come forward. But my question is, are you ready for the Lord to return? And if so, who are you bringing with? Who have you shared this message of hope with? Who are you trying to help find a relationship with Christ? Who have you tried to bring into a relationship with Christ? For them to believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins or rose again, and that by placing their faith in Christ, by repenting of their sin and placing their faith in Christ, they can be saved. A great way to enter that relationship is by praying, something like, Lord Jesus, I realize that I'm a sinner, that you died on the cross and rose again. Please forgive me and to come into my life and save me. Make me the person you created me to be. I want to follow you. That is a great way to enter into that relationship with Christ and to be saved. Bless the guys to come forward. It's time for a communion. And I already talked a bit about communion, so I won't say a whole lot about it again. But take this time to recommit your life to Christ. Think about the distractions in your life, the things that are keeping you from living the life that Christ wants you to, the sin in your life that trips you up, that makes you feel guilty, that makes you feel like you can't be used of the Lord. And just confess that to him and ask him to help you not to do that anymore. Music will play, and I'll come back up in a minute. Jesus gave his body on the cross for us to be forgiven of our sin. His body was broken, and it was part of God's plan. It wasn't a mistake. He wasn't taken by surprise. He purposefully died on that cross for you, and he wants you to remember that and to share that message with others. Let's pray, Jesus, we thank you so much that you have allowed us to live in this time and in this place where we have freedom to know of you and to worship you and to live for you, and a freedom to make the choice to serve you. Lord, I pray that you would help us to live lives that are worthy of your calling in our life. And we thank you for dying on that cross and suffering at your broken body. We thank you for that in Jesus' name. We take this, we eat. Jesus sacrificed his blood on the cross. He was the sacrifice of all sacrifices for all time. No longer do animals need to be sacrificed because Jesus was the perfect sacrifice. And since the bill has been paid, the sacrifice has been made, it's a great opportunity for us to thank the Lord and to recommit our lives to him and to praise him for all that he's doing. Someday your life that might not make sense now, the Lord will be able to show you how he was working in it and how it can be pieced together in his plan for your life and the people around you. So praise him and thank you for that as the music plays, and I'll come back up in a minute. Christ sacrificed his blood for you so that you could be fully forgiven. It's not that you worked your way into a right relationship, but he forgave you of your sin and adopted you as the child of God and assures you of heaven, gives you the Holy Spirit to live the Christian life and to understand Scripture and gives you all of these opportunities. And we thank him for that. Jesus, we thank you so much that you have given us Bibles to read and the ability to understand them, even ones that read themselves, audio Bibles that if we're not good readers, that we can hear. Lord help us to be listeners and readers of the word and doers of the word and sharers of the word. Lord, help us to trust in you fully. We thank you for this opportunity to worship you together. We take this and we drink. And then the reminder that Jesus is going to return. Revelation 22 12 says, Look, I'm coming soon. My reward is with me to repay each person according to his work. He's going to notice, he's going to review our work, he's going to reward us for the things, the good things that we've done. The Lord is going to return.