The following message is by Pastor John Piper.

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D. desiring God. O'R G.

Let's pray.

Gracious Father, I ask that your word would be exalted tonight, that your word would be exalted on Sunday morning, that your word would be exalted in our lives, in our hearts,

and our minds, in our actions.

You have exalted your word with your name.

Your word is God breathed.

Your word is pure, refined 7. pure refined seven times on the ground in a furnace.

Your word is sharper than a two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit and bone and

marrow and revealing the secret things of the heart. Your word is life. Lord grant me to be a faithful instrument of your word. Help me I pray to

speak it in compelling and powerful and holy spirit enabled ways now.

Get through massive strongholds in people's lives that have kept them from hearing the truth of the word and loving the word and yielding to the word and obeying the word and exulting in the word and following the word and eating the word and being

satisfied by the word and going to heaven with the word.

Get through, oh mighty God.

I ask this in Jesus' name, amen.

Now instead of moving quickly forward into chapter six, it has seemed good to me that

we should linger one more time in chapter 5 of the Gospel of John in order to ask a question

that I think raises an issue that is massively important to the Gospel of John and to all the other writings of the New

Testament namely how did Jesus and how did the Apostles view the Jewish

scriptures the old we call it the Old Testament. And what did those scriptures have to do with Jesus

...