Thanks Be To God

- Thanks be to God. Can you say that with me?

- [Pastor And Congregation] Thanks be to God.

- We're gonna take a few moments here over the next few minutes and you're gonna hear from four of us, the campus pastors, you're gonna hear from, in some brief messages that kind of continue this theme of thanks to God and I wanna begin by talking about thanks be to God that He is God alone. The psalmist says it this way in Psalm 136, "Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of lords. His love endures forever." We're reminded in this passage just who it is and why we should give thanks to this God. We are told to give thanks to the Lord. You probably picked up when you saw the passage that we were reading a moment ago that the word Lord is in all caps, L-O-R-D, in all capital letters. Well, there's a reason for that, because we are told to give thanks to this Lord. This isn't just anyone and this isn't just any name. The word that's translated Lord in this verse, and the reason that it's in all caps, is because it is actually a four letter word that we still don't fully know how we're supposed to pronounce. The letters are Y-H-W-H or Y-H-V-H, depending on how you would want to reference it. And it is the sacred name that God revealed of Himself to His people. Now you may be thinking, well how did we get that phrase and what it is that. What do we say? How do we pronounce it? We use the pronunciation Yaw-way. That's how we pronounce this word, Yah-way. There were not any vowels in this word that was given to us as the sacred covenant name of God with His people. But over time they've taken some letters and put them in there so that we would have something that we could actually pronounce. Now maybe you remember where this name really came from, kind of the origin of this name. There was a time, if you recall, when Moses had an encounter with the Lord at a bush that was on fire but was not being consumed by the fire, we call it the burning bush. In other words, the bush was burning but wasn't burning up. God was revealing His presence, His holiness, in the midst of this, and His presence was calling upon Moses to actually represent the people of God, Israel, to the Pharaoh because the people were in bondage to Egypt and He was going to use Moses to advocate for the people, to say to Pharaoh, "Let my people go." Well, Moses said to God, in the presence there in the bush, he said, "Well, if I go to my people and I tell them that you've sent me and I'm coming on your behalf, what if they say, 'What's the name of the God that sent you?' What am I supposed to say? Who am I supposed to say sent me?" And God replies this way, "I am who I am." I am who I am. This is where we get God revealing the nature of His very covenant name to Moses and to His people. This eternal nature of God, in this beautiful name that we choose to pronounce Yah-way. In fact the people of Israel, at the conclusion of the Babylonian captivity, the Israelites actually quit orally stating the name at all for fear that they would defame the name and instead they replaced it with the name Adonai, which means the Lord or Master. See, Yahweh is unlike any other name of God, and the psalmist is telling us that we are to give thanks to this God. And it's unlike any other name. You see, other names that were designated for God, like the first one that we encounter in the book of Genesis, the word Elohim, that terminology is actually used by pagans to describe their own deities. There are other pieces of language to describe gods that are used by others that don't worship the one true God, but not Yahweh. Yahweh is God's revelation of His own name, His personal name, that is only true about Him. The I am who I am is the only self-existent being in all of the cosmos. God is completely self-existent, and He is completely self-sufficient, and He has always existed from eternity past. God has no beginning. God is the beginning, but is without beginning, and God also has no end. He's unlike any being or anything anywhere. And thus, He is worthy to be worshiped and thanked as the source of all things. If we were able to look into the heavenly realms to be able to see this, we would see the heavenly realms thanking the Lord God Almighty because of who He is. And in fact, we can look into that because we can stop and look through the lens that John the Revelator gave us when he saw a vision into the other realm. In Revelation 11, it says this, beginning in verse 15, "The seventh angel sounded his trumpet and there were loud voices in heaven, which said, 'The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Messiah, and He will reign forever and ever.' And the 24 elders who were seated on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God saying, 'We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, the one who is and who was, because you have taken your great power and have begun to reign.'" You see, as the psalmist reminded us, this Lord, this ever-existing one, the I am who is I am, He is beyond compare. He is the God over anyone that tries to name themselves gods. That's why Psalm 136 says, "Give thanks to the God of gods." Capital G over little G. He's also the Lord and master over anyone who calls themselves lords or master. The psalmist says, "Give thanks to the Lord of lords." There is none like Him. He alone is God, Yahweh. And it is this God that the psalmist tells us to give our thanks. And by the way, if that weren't enough, and it is, He gives us more to thank Him for, because this eternally self-existent and self-sufficient God, the I am who is I am, the one who is beyond compare, that there is nothing to whom He can be compared, that He is God all by Himself, He's also good. The psalmist says, "Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, and He has a love that endures forever for His people." See, there are a million ways that we could chronicle His goodness and His love, like His creation of everything, including us, or His self-revelation of Himself to us, or maybe even His providential care over everything He has created. All of these things should well up in our hearts, the desire to be deeply, deeply thankful. But sitting at the pinnacle of the mountain of God's goodness and love is the opportunity to know Him and to be reconciled to Him through His own Son, the Lord Jesus. Jesus is the revelation of the eternally-existent God, and He is the one by whom we can be reconciled to Him. God gives us this grace because He's good and because His love endures forever. Thanks be to God.

- Thanks be to God, He frees us from sin. We read this in Romans 6:18, "You have been set free from sin and have become slaves of righteousness." Well, for those of you who spend regular time in God's Word, which should be all of us, isn't it encouraging when you get to passages in your Bible that are highlighted, that are marked up, maybe underlined, maybe even have personal notes on the side of those passages, maybe even crinkled pages because of tears you may have shed while reading those passages? Maybe you know that feeling. Well, that's what happens to me whenever I get to Romans 6 in my Bible. Now the chapter heading, which is actually added by man so we know what we're getting ready to read, says this, "Dead to sin, alive in Christ." You have to remember that if sin didn't exist, there would've been no need for Jesus to leave heaven, to come to Earth, to live a sinless life, to die on the cross, to be raised from the dead, and to ascend to the Father. If sin didn't exist, there would've been no need for all of that to happen. That was the plan from the beginning, that there would be no sin, that Adam and Eve would enjoy all of God and all that He is, and all that God had given them, free from sin. But enter Satan, enter temptation, enter the choice for Adam and Eve to choose to worship God or worship self, and enter the decision to rebel against God, and enter into the world sin. And from that day forth, every one of us has been infected by the virus of sin. That's made perfectly clear to us in Romans 3:23 where we read, "For all have sinned." We all then fall short of God's glorious standard, and no one here under the sound of my voice should have any illusion of that, that they've sinned. Let's be clear on that. Well, all have sinned, and God has been telling us this in Romans 6:23 that, "The wages of sin is death." But the passage also goes on to say, "But that the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord." Because of sin, God foreknew that He would have to send His son to His creation, to live that sinless life, to die that horrible death, to be nailed to the cross, and to be placed in a grave. And God foreknew that the only way to demonstrate victory over sin, and victory over Satan, and victory over death was to raise Jesus from the grave, never again to die. And God, having done everything that He needed to do to free us from sin, left us, individually, with the same choice to make that Adam and Eve did, to choose God or to choose rebellion against God. And for those who actually accept God, here's what we read in Romans 10:9, "Those who confess with their mouths that Jesus is Lord, and believe in their heart that God raised Him from the dead would be saved." Saved from what? Well, saved from death. And what causes death? Sin causes death. Listen, before a relationship with Christ, we were all slaves to sin and slaves to unrighteousness. You know that as well as I do. But when we receive the grace only found in the gift of Jesus Christ, we become slaves to God. And again in Romans 6:18 we read, "We have become slaves to righteousness." That Jesus ripped off the chains of sin from your life and mine, so why on Earth would we try to put those chains back on? But that's what we do sometimes, right? Where we have a tendency to do just that, to put on the old self and those old things that used to weigh us down. And those old things that used to weigh us down, well you know what, all you gotta do is read Galatians 5 for an unexhaustive rundown of what those things were, what you once were, but what you are now, you are not, because in Christ we have been set free. So let's do exactly what we're told to do in Hebrews 12:1. Let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. We have to remember that in Jesus Christ, what He died for and who we are in Christ Jesus, we can't lose sight of our identity in Christ, that we are forgiven, that we are redeemed, that we are restored, that we are reconciled, that we are His children. We are so co-heirs with Christ as well. We are new creations and we are at peace with God. We learned that from that last series. And we are no longer slaves to sin. We are free. Galatians 5:1 tells us this, "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free." And in John 8:36, "So if the Son sets you free, you are free indeed." Thanks be to God, He frees us from sin.

- Thanks be to God, that He gives us a family. Several years ago the restaurant Olive Garden used this slogan in their advertising, "When you're here, you're family." In their minds, unlimited salad and breadsticks was enough common ground to bring people together and make them feel like family. What they were tapping into was this longing inside each of us, I think, to have a place where we belong, a place that feels like home, or at least what home should feel like. Well after this weekend, maybe most of us have had lots of times with our families, and for some, perhaps you've had your fill of family for a while, but there's no denying that there is a longing inside every human heart to belong. And that's what's so interesting to me about how the scripture speaks about these relationships inside the church. I mean, look at what Paul says in his second letter to the Thessalonians. 2 Thessalonians 1:3 says, "We ought always to thank God for you, brothers and sisters. And rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love all of you have for one another is increasing." Thank God for you, brothers and sisters. You see, when we're forgiven and set free from sin, God brings us into His family. He adopts us as His sons and daughters. What a thought, that we who were enemies of God could be forgiven, could be cleansed and adopted, all because of the work that Jesus did through His sacrifice. So Paul tells these Thessalonian believers, "We should always thank God for you, brothers and sisters." And he gives two reasons. He says, "Your faith is growing more and more. And secondly, your love is increasing." And these are some healthy, these are signs of like a healthy spiritual family, growing faith and increasing love. So do you want your faith to grow more and more? Do you wanna see an increase in the agape love of God flowing through your life? Lean into the family. Lean into the family of faith, not away from it. You see, when brothers and sisters come together, when we're united in the gospel, when we're being transformed by the Word, when we're submitting to the Spirit, when we're walking in obedience, no wonder that we would see growing faith in God and increasing love for one another. In fact, I think one of the greatest ways for our faith to flourish is by being connected to the family, by having meaningful connection to Christ-centered community. By contrast, the thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy. So the enemy of our souls, he knows that one of the greatest ways to steal our joy, or to kill our faith, or to destroy our unity is to isolate us from the rest of the flock. Satan hates this idea of family, of brothers and sisters, because if he can isolate us, or make us believe we don't need the family, then we're in a prime position for us to be deceived. Which is why it's so sad to me when people don't value family time like they could. It grieves me when someone wants to act like a spiritual orphan, me against the world, and give up all the blessings and benefits of being in a loving, faith-filled family, called the local church. It really saddens me when I hear people say sometimes, "Well, I don't need to be at church in person, 'cause I can get the same thing at home," or, "If I was gonna watch a screen, I could just stay at home." Brothers and sisters, let this not be our view. Thanks be to God for the family He gives us. You know, I get the same thing at home, that mentality. Can you look your sister in the eye, your sister here in the eye and say that to her, as she wakes up early every Sunday to get here well before the worship gathering begins, just so she can be a friendly face at the door, welcoming the rest of the family to worship? Can you look your brother in the eye and say that to him as he gives up his time on a Wednesday to invest in the teenagers of our church and take on all of the awkward conversations that come with that? Can we look at them in the eye and say, "I get the same thing at home." You see Olive Garden actually got this right. When you're here, you're family. But let me turn it around. When you're family, you're here. I don't just mean in a building, 'cause the church is bigger than that, but I mean you're invested. You're leaning into the blessing of a faith family. Maybe right now you're in a strong spot in your faith, good. Allow the weaker family members to lean on you. Or maybe you're struggling right now with your faith. That's okay, lean on the stronger members of the family. Carry each other's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. This is what it means to be a family of faith. Thanks be to God.

- Thanks be to God that He gives us the victory. If I were to point your attention to 1 Corinthians 15:56-58, here's what the apostle Paul wrote. "The sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God. He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm, let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain." You see, the sting of death affects all of us, doesn't it? It is a great enemy that can, at times, attack in ways that seem dark and bleak. It's hard to make sense of, and it can certainly feel permanent. But we all know and can relate to the reality that death really does have a stink to it. However, what we can't rush by is that Paul defines what the sting of death is. And here it is, sin. In fact, in Romans 3:23, listen to what Paul wrote, "For the wages, or the payment, or the penalty of sin is death." So following this teaching, we can note that death results from sin. This is why as we just read, the sting of death is sin. And then verse 56 of 1 Corinthians 15 continues in this way as Paul continued and said, "And the power of sin is the law." What does that mean? Here's what the law of God helps to point out. It's the holiness of God and the conscious awareness of our sin. Romans 3 actually helps to give some framework to that idea. So here's what we can see within our text. We experience the sting of death because of sin. And sin occurs because of our rebellion against a holy, righteous, and set apart God. We miss the mark. And left to ourselves, sin will run rampant, destruction will ensue, and death will be the only result, and it stinks. But thanks be to God. What a transition, what hopeful anticipation, simply because of this, victory is possible, and it is only possible in Jesus Christ. You see, Jesus took our sin, bore our shame, died the death that we deserved, but three days later, He rose again. And because of His victory over sin and death, His victory becomes ours. His righteousness, as He fulfilled the law in every way, becomes ours. His life is shared with our life. No longer does death have to swallow us up, rather death has been swallowed up in victory where we can proclaim, "Where, oh death, is your victory? Where, oh death, is your sting?" It has been defeated, it has been conquered. And what we can't miss in all of this is this. Jesus is forever victorious, and we will forever share in that victory. Therefore, as verse 58 goes on to say, "Stand firm, brothers and sisters, let nothing move you." Why? Because even if we die, yet shall we live. So give yourself to the work of the Lord, for your labor in the Lord is not in vain, it is not worthless. God will use you and your life for His purposes in the world, even speaking of the victory that we have in Jesus. I love how Paul also wrote about this in another place, 2 Corinthians 2:14 to be exact. Listen to what this verse says. "But thanks be to God who always leads us as captives in Christ's triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of Him everywhere." Just as a king would lead his captives in front of him to spread the aroma of victory in a triumphal procession, we are the captives of Christ who have been captured by Him so that we can now spread the aroma of victory wherever we may go. In other words, we spread the aroma of our victorious king who has given us the victory. So whatever you do, we do for the Lord. Whatever befalls us, we don't have to be shaken. We have victory through Jesus Christ, over sin and death. We can find victory when it feels like we are losing the battle. We can find victory when the forces of darkness seem to invade. This is because the battle belongs to the Lord. The victory has already been sealed through what Jesus has done, and this victory has been given to us. You see, Jesus is forever victorious, and we will forever share in that victory. Thanks be to God.

- Grateful for the reminders of why we are thankful to God. And in just a moment, we're going to take time to share the Lord's Supper together. And we'll do that momentarily, not quite yet. We're gonna prepare our hearts for that. But maybe you've heard this conversation about the gospel, the good news about this God who has been so gracious to us, who's good, who's different than everything or anyone in the entire cosmos, and who has been good to us by giving us an opportunity to be reconciled to Him through the gift of His Son. And maybe you've never before personalized that, where you've put your faith and your trust in Jesus as the Savior of your life. I want to encourage you this day that you can do that, that God has made a way for you to be able to experience forgiveness and new life, to have your sins forgiven now, for your life to be made new now, just like you heard in Felicia's life earlier, and for you to have the promise of eternity with Him. And it's all because of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. It is by His grace and through our faith in Him that we can be saved. This is that which we would thank God for. And if that is your need, in a few moments when we end our worship gathering, there'll be some folks that'll be down here and they would love to talk to you more about what it means to receive Jesus and to know Him personally. But I would remind you here, if you have been transformed by God's grace, you should be a person who is filled with gratitude. And that really, our time around the Lord's Supper should be a time of deep gratitude for what God has done for us in Christ. As I was reading what Paul wrote about the Lord's Supper, I was taken by a phrase in light of today. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 11, beginning in verse 23, "For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you. The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread. And when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, 'This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.' And in the same way after supper, He took the cup saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this whenever you drink it in remembrance of me, for whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.'" I was taken with that phrase that, 'The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread. And when He had given thanks." I was reminded in my mind about how often Jesus would give thanks to the Father, in virtually every occasion. And I was reminded as well by what Paul taught us about thanks. Paul, borrowing from the language of the Lord Jesus, wrote this to the church in Thessaloniki, said, "Rejoice always, pray continually," listen to this, "Give thanks in all circumstances for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." Now what Paul did not say there is he didn't say give thanks for every circumstance. He said, "Give thanks in all circumstances." Some circumstances are really bad. Have you faced those? You've had them, right? They're horrible. They may be tragic, they may be awful. Not every circumstance is a good circumstance. But what we can do is, maybe even if we're not thankful for that particular circumstance, we can still be thankful in that circumstance, thankful for a God who is sovereign over the trouble, who is sovereign over the evil, who is sovereign over the tragedy, thankful for a God who is good and whose love endures forever. We can be thankful in every circumstance. And Paul tells us why we should be thankful in every circumstance. First he says, "Because it's God's will that we be thankful in every circumstance." Why do you think it is the will of God for us to be thankful in every circumstance? Because God knows what ingratitude and unthankfulness does to our soul, it destroys us. You need only look back at the very beginning of humanity to figure this out, because Adam and Eve were tempted by the enemy for what? Thinking that God was holding out on them and they needed more. This was born in pride, but what it was was ingratitude. And what ingratitude does is it destroys. And so it is the will of God that we be a thankful people, because that is some, that's health to our body, that's health to our soul, as opposed to being toxic to us and destroying our soul. But he not only says it's the will of God, he says specifically, "It's the will of God in Christ Jesus." Jesus, we are thankful to Jesus. He's who we're thankful to. But listen to this, He's also the model of our thanks. Because when you think about the life of the Lord Jesus, you realize that He's thankful for so many things at so many times. When Jesus was feeding the 5,000, He took the bread and the fish and He gave thanks because He knew God was the one who could supply all of this. When Jesus was at the tomb of His friend Lazarus, do you know what He did? He gave thanks at the tomb of his friend Lazarus because God, He knew God could be trusted, and He knew what God was going to do in that moment. When Jesus was having his last Passover meal with His disciples, He gave thanks. He was giving thanks for what He knew that the Father had called Him to and the horrible death that He was going to die on behalf of sinful people, and yet He gave thanks in the midst of this circumstance. After His resurrection, He's walking on the road to a Emmaus and He meets two people, Cleopas and Cleopas's wife. I suppose. And He begins explaining to them what the scriptures say about the Messiah, and they invite Him to the house and He comes, but they were kept from seeing Him. They did not recognize that it was Jesus until He gave thanks and He broke the bread. Then they could see, they knew it was Him. I don't know what it is about giving thanks, but there is something that we need to pay attention to because it is good for our soul to be a thankful people. And Jesus has modeled that for us. Paul says, "Give thanks in all circumstances." Why? It's the will of God. Then He says, "It's the will of God in Christ Jesus." But let's get more specific. It's the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. You personalize this, you be grateful, you be thankful because this is God's design for our lives. So I want to give us a few moments to prepare our hearts before we take an opportunity to share the Lord's Supper together. Let's just prepare our hearts. And you're going to see on the screen four prompts and I wanna give you some time, just to be able to reflect on those. They're really from what we just talked about in these short messages that we put together. Would you just take time right where you are to just posture your heart in thankfulness around these four primary ideas? And then in a moment I'll come back and I'll begin our time of the Lord's Supper. You know what's beautiful about the Lord's Supper is that it really takes all of time and puts it into one moment. We talk about an event that occurred in the past. There was an event that occurred in past tense, what Jesus has done for us, that we celebrate, but we celebrate it in this present moment. And when we celebrate it in this present moment, we are actually looking forward to what is going to happen in the future. It's as if all of time gets wrapped up in one place and in one space as we celebrate this moment together. When Jesus was celebrating this Last Supper with His disciples, says that, "While they were eating, Jesus took bread. And when He had given thanks, He broke it and gave it to His disciples, saying, 'Take and eat, this is my body.'" I'm gonna ask you to take the bread out if you would. Bread is pictured as unleavened. Leavened was a picture of impurity, and to be unleavened meant it was a picture of purity, certainly a picture of the Lord Jesus, the sinless sacrifice on our behalf, whose body was broken, and whom He said that this was His body. Father, how we thank you for the gift of the Lord Jesus and for His body given to us, His body broken on our behalf, so that your body, your people, could be made whole. We thank you for that sacrifice, the sinless one for the sinful ones, that we might now be able to participate in the beauty of the life of God. So for that, we say thanks be to God. We thank you, we thank you, we thank you. And together we eat with gratitude. Take and eat. And I'll ask you to open the cup. At this same Passover meal, it says that, "Jesus took the cup, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to His disciples saying, 'Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.'" Father, how we thank you for the blood that was shed, because we know without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins, according to your word. We thank you that Jesus' life was poured out for us, knowing that He was fully human and fully God at the same time, but could shed real blood, offering Himself as a sacrifice in place of us. Where we should have stood to accept the judgment due us because of our sin, your grace, Lord Jesus, stood in our place. Your mercy overwhelmed us, and you gave your very life for ours. Thank you that because of the blood, the wonder-working power of the blood, that we can be forgiven of sin and set free from the bondage of the kingdom of darkness and brought into the kingdom of light. And so in these moments, we don't do as the world does, the world drinks to forget their problems, and their issues, and their stuff. We drink to remember and we drink now together, gratefully. The response of gratitude really ought to be worship. When I say worship, I don't mean just singing a song. Worship is bigger than our songs. Worship is a whole life yielded in obedience to God. And when our hearts, listen to this, when our hearts are properly postured before God, we are a grateful people that serve Him out of deep gratitude in our hearts. When we are people that are not grateful, we've got a heart issue. We need to preach the gospel to ourselves more. Because when we really understand what God has done for us, in Christ, we are a grateful, thankful people, and that pours out on the people around us, that they see us as grateful, thankful people. The response of a grateful heart is worship, a whole life yielded in obedience. But one aspect of worship is to be able to praise the Lord in song. This happens all through the course of scripture. And when God's people together are praising the Lord in song, it does something to lift all of our faith. Sometimes when I'm singing, I'm over here, and in each worship gathering, sometimes when I'm singing, I'll just take a look around and I'll see people and faces all around the building that are lifting their hearts or lifting their hands to sing praises to God. And with some of them, I know their stories, I know some of the things they've come out of, I know some of the things that they're dealing with, yet I see them thanking God and worshiping God for who He is, and it lifts my faith. When we, corporately, are together, and we're gathered, and we're worshiping together, it lifts our faith because our brothers and sisters are reaching out to God in the midst of whatever circumstance that they have, and are giving thanks in all circumstances. We have so much to be thankful for. So let's take a moment and stand to our feet and sing with our mouths and our hearts a song of worship to the one who is deserving of it. ♪ How great the chasm that lay between us ♪ ♪ How high the mountain I could not climb ♪ ♪ In desperation I turned to heaven ♪ ♪ And spoke your name into the night ♪ ♪ Then through the darkness ♪ ♪ Your loving kindness ♪ ♪ Tore through the shadows of my soul ♪ ♪ The work is finished ♪ ♪ The end is written ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪ ♪ Who could imagine so great a mercy ♪ ♪ What heart could fathom such boundless grace ♪ ♪ The God of ages stepped down from glory ♪ ♪ To wear my sin and bear my shame ♪ ♪ The cross has spoken ♪ ♪ I am forgiven ♪ ♪ The King of Kings calls me His own ♪ ♪ Beautiful Savior I'm yours forever ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪ ♪ Oh hallelujah ♪ ♪ Praise the one who set me free ♪ ♪ Hallelujah ♪ ♪ Death has lost its grip on me ♪ ♪ You have broken every chain ♪ ♪ There's salvation in your name ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪ ♪ Then came the morning that sealed the promise ♪ ♪ Your buried body began to breathe ♪ ♪ Out of the silence ♪ ♪ The roaring lion ♪ ♪ Declared the grave has no claim on me ♪ ♪ Then came the morning that sealed the promise ♪ ♪ Your buried body began to breathe ♪ ♪ Out of the silence ♪ ♪ The roaring lion ♪ ♪ Declared the grave has no claim on me ♪ ♪ Oh Jesus yours is the victory ♪ ♪ Oh hallelujah ♪ ♪ Praise the one who set me free ♪ ♪ Hallelujah ♪ ♪ Death has lost its grip on me ♪ ♪ You have broken every chain ♪ ♪ There's salvation in your name ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪ ♪ Oh Hallelujah ♪ ♪ Praise the one who set me free ♪ ♪ Hallelujah ♪ ♪ Death has lost its grip on me ♪ ♪ You have broken every chain ♪ ♪ There's salvation in your name ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪

- Let's sing this chorus again ♪ Hallelujah ♪ ♪ Praise the one who set me free ♪ ♪ Hallelujah ♪ ♪ Death has lost its grip on me ♪ ♪ You have broken every chain ♪ ♪ There's salvation in your name ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ my living hope ♪ ♪ Oh Jesus Christ my living hope ♪