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But every time God answers “no,” we learn a little more about how to pray. We can say that, even though God did not answer this specific request, He did so to teach me patience, or trust, or humility, and maybe that’s what I should have been praying for all along! So whatever God’s response may be to our petitions, we are still better off for praying!

The Law kills (2 Cor 3:6). But Christ is not only the Law incarnate, but also the Gospel incarnate. And the Gospel brings to life.

O, pity for evermore that there should be such a one as Christ Jesus, so boundless, so bottomless, and so incomparable in infinite excellency, and sweetness, and so few to take Him! O, ye poor dry dead souls, why will ye not come hither with your vessels and your empty souls to this huge, and fair, and deep, and sweet well of life, and fill all your vessels?

The abundant life is a life lived with one foot on earth and yet the other in heaven.

Feast or funeral? That’s a major question as we approach the Lord’s Table. What are we here to do? Are we rejoicing, or are we mourning? Is this a festive banquet we have come to, or a funeral service?

While our life this side of heaven is one of faith, and not sight, yet God gives us a glimpse—literally—of the vista of heaven in the Supper. Praise God for His visible word!

For though we are a bruised reed, Jesus will not break us. He is gentle. How does He show this gentleness to us? By being broken for us. We are so delicate that we could never hope to take the harsh blow that God’s justice requires, so Jesus took it for us.

God’s glory is the splendid, majestic, and marvelous manifestation of any and all of His attributes. God’s glory is everything that makes Him God. And can you imagine claiming that as our own for even one second?

Inasmuch as it is the rule of all truth, containing all that is necessary for the service of God and for our salvation, it is not lawful for me, nor even for angels, to add to it, to take away from it, or to change it.

Add anything to Jesus and you’ve got nothing. Add nothing to Jesus and you have everything.

“This is the only true worship of God: Faith most pregnant with works, faith I say with no confidence in the works.”

We who are many become one in Christ. Any and all dividing differences are set aside, and we come together in solidarity under the head of the body who is Christ.

Without salvation by grace alone we can have no “peace and rest in our consciences.” We will always be fretting about, wondering if we have done enough, prayed enough, or paid enough to earn God’s good pleasure.

In the Gospel we are presented with a stain-removing Savior, Jesus Christ. There is hope for your blemished, tarnished soul in His hands.

The reality is, however, that prayer does not come naturally. It is a supernatural, spiritual action. Therefore, since it is not an inherent instinct or reflex, we need to practice.

Friends, you don’t want a mere memorial meal. Ultimately, that can do nothing for your soul—it cannot strengthen you, sustain you, or save you. You want Jesus. If you have Jesus, you have everything. And in the Supper you have Jesus!

As John Calvin noted, “we know we are requesting nothing absurd, nothing strange or unseemly – in short, nothing unacceptable to him – since we are asking in his own words.”

Our Confession says that properly keeping the Sabbath entails, in part, the preparation of our hearts and the ordering of our common affairs beforehand (WCF 21.8). I want to focus in on that “beforehand” aspect and offer some helpful tips on how to prepare for worship on Saturday.