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301.
And.
I'm going to.
Would the brethren be happy to continue on with First Corinthians 6?
What verse would you suggest?
Perhaps verse nine, do you think?
1St Corinthians 6, verse 9.
Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God? Be not deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the Kingdom of God. And such were some of you a year washed. But ye are sanctified. But you're justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.
All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any meets for the belly, and belly for the meats, but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God has both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by His own power. Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ?
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Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid. What know ye not that he which is joined to in harlot is one body for two Seth, He shall be one flesh.
But he that is joined unto the Lord is 1 Spirit flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body, but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. What know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are gods.
Before we start on this subject, I'm sorry, but I just want to go back to something else because.
And there's a question box outside, and I don't know if it got used, but there was a great deal of discussion after the last meeting that I at least heard about some of it. And it had to do with the subject that we had in the first part of the chapter as to what it meant for a brother going.
To the law against brother and we did mention in the meeting that this had to do with civil matters. The example was given of someone who backed up in the parking lot, hit another vehicle and then.
His two brothers could just deal with it themselves. The thought of taking that to the world.
Is a lawsuit in a court would be wrong and that's what this chapter is speaking about but the question came up whether it takes into.
Its scope, any other matters like criminal matters. And I just want to say, and others can maybe add to this if I'm not clear enough, but this is not speaking about criminal matters.
Matters like murder, which a believer can do, David murdered, or another case that I know came up long time ago, and Dorothy was one of child abuse. In such cases, the law has something to say about that, and if a believer knows about it, they must report it to the law. This chapter is not speaking about that. The law requires that those things be reported.
I think that's the case in Canada as well as the United States. And so we have the instruction from the Word of God in such cases. There's a number of verses, but first Peter chapter 2.
Says in verse 13.
Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be to the king as supreme, or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well. For this is the will of God. And so in such matters it might be against one who is called a brother, but the law requires that that matter be reported.
And so we have to wait before the Lord whether we should report it. Now, there are cases perhaps where the law would require us to report something and we can't. But we need to carefully weigh that before the Lord. And that is the case such as we have if the law would require that we can't preach the gospel. That exact case is in Acts chapter 5.
Where we're told that Peter says, well, we ought to obey God rather than men, so you judge. And he continued on preaching the gospel even though the authority said that they couldn't.
So I just wanted to make that clarification. In the case of reporting a crime against the laws of the land as required by the law, that is not a matter of taking a brother to court. That's a matter of simply reporting a case that the law requires to be reported and then the government takes up with the case. The person who reports it is merely a witness, a very different thing from what we have in this chapter.
So when I was newly married.
There were times when Esther and I went down to the courthouse in Ottawa at lunchtime and we would eat our lunch there and while we're eating lunch we would watch whatever case was in progress. There was a case in progress in Ottawa at that time where the minister of a church.
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Had had one of the Sunday school teachers babysitters, children and she thought that there had been some abuse going on. There was some bruising that she thought she saw and so she reported them immediately to the Children's Aid Society without ever finding out what was really going on.
And that Mister and his family went through a long, long, long abuse in the.
Newspapers and through the court system and at the end was found to be unsubstantiated and not guilty.
So my question to you is, does there need to be some discernment and some are there, are there other steps that you might take first before you go immediately to report something to the government that you think might be a problem?
I would say inequivably, yes, because whether Bob mentioned yesterday, what we have is principles given to us here, and we need to weigh before the Lord what the case is and how the Scripture should be brought to bear on it. And so every case is different and we can't lay it out step by step here, but only present the principles. And I would say the very first thing we should do in any matter as a Christian is take it to the Lord.
Thank you, Robert. Might be helpful to mention that there God has extended authority to three different spheres, the family.
The assembly and civil authorities and these are all spheres of authority that God gave to men and.
There there sometimes can be overlapped. They're distinct. What pertains to the assembly normally doesn't pertain to civil, and what pertains within the family doesn't necessarily need to be taken to either the assembly or.
Civil authorities unless it gets be out of this beyond the family's control and order. And so I think we need to remember that and our government is happens to be very.
Taking up this cause of of abuse in families and when they step in, things can get complicated.
They those kind of things should be handled in the family. If they are not handled in the family, it can spill over and become a more major issue.
The singing of the verses in Deuteronomy 19, it speaks of a false witness there. And I was considering more the portion of the diligent inquisition and the responsibility that we have in the assembly to search these things out and to be diligent, make sure that they are true.
Deuteronomy 19.
Verse 16 If a false witness rise up against any man to testify against sin, that which is wrong, then both the men be between whom the controversy it is, shall stand before the Lord, before the priests and the judges, which shall be in those days, and the judges shall make diligent inquisition. And behold, if the witness be a false witness, and have testified falsely against his brother, and so on.
It would be good that we be righteous to do a diligent inquisition in those things, wouldn't it?
It was interesting driving home last night that I had a van.
Of young people and they started discussing the reading meeting yesterday and.
They were quite excited about some of the things that were said and and but one of the comments that was made was, you know, that were to forgive one another in these things. But what about the responsibility?
That each one has in the matter that might be before us in the chapter, and it could be any matter. We said it was civil, but.
And so they were these young people were discussing the fact that, you know, we have to take responsibility for our actions and go to that brother or sister if we've offended them in some way. And we see that in Numbers chapter 5 and and that we're to confess those things one to another and make it make an atonement.
I felt a really good example of that though was Boaz and Ruth.
And, you know, there was a matter there that had to be.
Figured out if he was to take Ruth for his wife and so he went to the kinsman there in the 4th chapter of Ruth.
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And he took those.
Ones with him to witness it.
Somebody may know the verse, but verse 2, verse two. And he took ten men of the elders of the city and said, sit you down here and they sat down.
He didn't just go to his kinsmen and say that he would purchase the property. You know, there could have been deceit that he might have kept back why he would want all those things. The greatest, the greatest portion of that was to take Ruth for his wife. And he might have very well lost that if he had laid that information out. But he did. He laid everything out in pure honesty, as a true believer should. That's faithful. And, and I believe that that's what really we have in our portion here. And, and that really could have been a civil matter with Boaz and the kinsman there.
Civil matters are often involved with controversies, aren't they?
And I was just thinking of a portion in Second Samuel chapter 15.
Where Absalom comes up to steal the hearts.
Of the people, and his approach was as we see in verse 2. And Absalom rose up early and stood beside the way of the gate. And it was so that when any man had a controversy, came to the king for judgment. Then Absalom called unto him and said.
Of what city art thou? And he said, thy servant is one of the tribes of Israel.
And.
Verse four and Absalom said, moreover, oh, that I were made judge in the land that every man was had a suit or A cause might come unto me and I would do him justice. Well, there's one place to go, isn't it? And that's to the Lord. That's that's the first course or recourse of action, isn't it? We know that.
Absalom did this for an intent or purpose that was to gain the support of the people.
His intent was not to render a fair rendering or a fair judgment, but he did this under pretense. But we can go to one who has our interest at.
At heart and the interest of all that are involved. So we have a resource 1St and we should avail ourselves of it.
We haven't.
The first Epistle of John.
Chapter 5.
If.
One sends. We know that.
We have an advocate, first of all, that would.
Intervene that we might be restored Lord Himself, but here we have a case of perhaps one that sins, and we have prayer here of the Saints as a resource that says.
Verse 14. This is a confidence that we have in him.
We ask anything according to as well. He won't hear us, heareth us. And if we know that he hear us whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him. And so.
Collectively, we're able to take a matter to the Lord for a brother that has sinned.
Here talking about two cases. There's a brother that sins, but it's not a sin unto death.
He's prayed for and through prayers of the Saints and perhaps he himself.
Owning it, he's restored says.
Vinny Massey, his brother, sent a sin which is not unto death. He shall ask. He shall give him life with them that sin not unto death.
And so instead of the Lord taking this one in death.
He's restored.
But then it goes on to say there is a sin unto death. This could be a brother that we're talking about here that perhaps falls under.
Civil law or under the laws of the land somehow, and he's done something that.
Perhaps, perhaps prayer is.
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Says that.
I do not say that he shall. He shall pray for it.
It may be something that between this one and the Lord that only the Lord himself can intervene.
Perhaps of a civil matter, it says here all unrighteousness is sin. There is a sin not unto death. What does it look, Lord, look for when there's sin? Repentance. So even though this man may have fallen under a civil law for something he has done.
It could be that if there's no repentance there, the Lord would take this one home.
In death, but if there's if he cries of the Lord and he repents about it.
The Lord is able to work.
With civil government.
Government of any sort and perhaps have the person's.
Crime sentence reduced forum but he ends up not being taken home and death.
There's a way out for him.
And so we know that the Lord is there working isn't He, in all sorts of ways for us. And we have that advantage as Christians to be able to go, as Brother pointed out, in prayer to the Lord, not just for ourselves but for others as well.
In verse nine of our chapter we have what is spoken of as the Kingdom of God and when you speak of the Kingdom.
Spoken of in different ways in Scripture, but it is a sphere of authority, isn't it? It's recognition of God's authority. And when we're born again, the Lord Jesus said to Nicodemus, you cannot enter the Kingdom of God unless you are born again. And so we are born into a sphere where God's authority is recognized. And I think that's very helpful. I.
Knows in Matthew's Gospel, it speaks of the Kingdom of heaven and there's other expressions to the Kingdom of the Father, the Kingdom of the Son, of his love, but they're all different aspects of this sphere of authority that we are in.
A brother made the comment some time ago that really helped me. Was the Kingdom of God is moral?
The Kingdom of Heaven is territorial, and he explained it in this way. Kingdom is a sphere that recognizes an authority, and so the Kingdom of heaven that you have so much in Matthew is recognition of Heaven's authority.
Now in the United States we have on our money, in God we trust, and in a certain sense the whole country is in that Kingdom of heaven. It doesn't mean that everybody's real at all, but there is a recognition in some way of the authority of heaven. If you go over to China, the rulers of that country are atheists. So that country, as far as the authorities, is not in the Kingdom of heaven.
But there are believers there that are in that Kingdom.
But when you deal with the Kingdom of God, I'd like to look at a verse in Romans chapter 14 that shows what we mean when we say that the Kingdom of God is moral.
Romans chapter 14 and verse 17.
For the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink material things.
But righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, now those are not material things. Those are moral characteristics. Righteousness. If you recognize God's authority in your life, then it's going to be reflected in your way of life.
And so he goes on in this verse in chapter six of First Corinthians, where we're studying to deal with that, knowing not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God, be not deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards nor revilers.
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Nor extortioners shall inherit the Kingdom of God. That's not characteristic of a person who is a true believer that recognizes God in the picture, that recognizes their responsibility to God. These things that are mentioned are not characteristic like you say, Brother David.
Murdered. Terrible.
Fell into terrible adultery.
And I sometimes say, I hear brethren say they can do that.
I say I would rather say they do that. I don't say they can because.
That's the old flesh working in them.
But that's not characteristic of a person in the Kingdom of God. And so if you are going on in that kind of sin.
It puts a big question mark up.
Have you truly been born into God's family? I can't look inside to make that judgment. God does. But if you truly recognize His authority, the Kingdom of God, why then these things that are mentioned are not going to be characteristic of you?
Do you agree with that, Tim?
I do, but I have a question for you. What does it mean for to inherit the Kingdom of God?
I don't know how to answer that, so I've always taken it just a little bit differently I guess to.
That, I mean, I agree entirely with what you said, but inheriting the Kingdom of God here seems to me to be that time when we come into the place where there's only that moral authority recognized. That would be the coming state. Or you could just say this would be those who go to heaven, which raises another very serious question about these verses as to how it is. But I think you've answered that as well. Believer may do these things, but they won't be characteristic of him.
To those who will end up in that coming place of glory in heaven, where this is the only thing that's acknowledged, this is not characteristic of them because they have a different life altogether.
Sometimes the Kingdom of God is viewed and it's outward characteristic of what is seen and evident. It's also called the Kingdom of God, like the parable of the tares and wheat and so on. So there's a mixture, but there God has a separating process at the at the time when the Lord comes and the the genuine ones that really inherit it.
Are only those that are really born again?
And none on this list qualify. They are disqualified.
God, it's interesting that when he wants to make his grace great, he that's what he's doing in this present dispensation. He is forgiving everybody that comes to him and asked for it. But many abuse that they pretend to enter in. They make a profession of Christianity and in that aspect they're seen as part of the Kingdom of God.
Or heaven. But they don't end up there because there's a separating process and so this is a warning.
We It's a wonderful thing. Paul was the chief of sinners. God chose him specially because he was the worst, because he wanted to magnify his grace. There's nothing that magnifies grace like a Sinner.
The list here of such were some of you. The Corinthians were in that category.
And by nature, everyone of us here is in that category. That's what our flesh is like if we let it go. And so God has chosen to magnify His grace through the work of Christ. It's a wonderful thing to be forgiven and all that. But the warning is, do not abuse God's grace. This list is a warning.
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I think it's imparted to observe in that last.
Part of the first part of verse 11 That you refer to that.
The and such were some of you. That is the past tense. And so it's Paul the apostle writing by the Spirit is assuming that there's been a real work of the Spirit of God and that he is speaking to those who are real. Now there was a question asked yesterday about when do we actually rain with Christ? And I'd like to turn back to a verse in Matthew chapter 19 for a moment.
And I think it's relevant to what we're discussing, and I'll explain why in a minute in Matthew chapter 19.
And verse 27 it says, Then answered Peter, and said unto him, Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee.
What shall we have, therefore? And I think that idea, forsaking all ties into our chapter and what we're being asked to do here.
To be willing to be defrauded, to be willing for the sake of the Lord Jesus to give something up. And then it goes on. In verse 28, Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, that ye which have followed me in the regeneration, when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon 12 Thrones, judging the 12 tribes of Israel. I do not believe that this is figurative language.
I believe that there will be a role for those disciples with a replacement for Judas.
And I believe in that administration as well. Each believer, like it says earlier in our chapter and we were talking about yesterday, we have a role in judging activities on this earth.
And incredibly, even though we're less than angels, if I can do this and make this analogy, doing a review of the behavior and the actions and the execution of angels, incredible to think about. And now that the relevance to what we're talking about is that we are new creatures in Christ, there's been a real work in our lives. We were these things, and now we're something new and we have this future ahead of us with Christ.
To be active in his administration. And it is important that we have the moral character now in the light of what we, in light of what Christ has made us and of what we're going to be with him in the future.
Anything of that Daniel Chapter 7.
It speaks of.
Verse 18 but the.
Saints of the Most High so take the Kingdom and possess the Kingdom forever, even forever and ever. So what Robert is referring to?
Is our portion in that coming day as the New Jerusalem? New Jerusalem and Heavenly Jerusalem are not the same thing, the New Jerusalem?
Is composed of the Church of God Hebrews chapter 12, where the Church of the first born ones.
Sometimes is mistaken. It doesn't refer to Christ in that verse. In Hebrews chapter 12, we are the Church of the first foreign ones, that is, we are in a particularly.
Special place in relation to.
The administration of the Kingdom in that coming day, we're going to reign with Christ. He's not going to reign without us.
And so.
Robert has referred to the New Jerusalem, which will come down out of heaven. You look up and you'll see the new Jerusalem illuminated. It's going to shed its beams all over the millennial earth. But the first born ones are the Church of God. None of the Old Testament Saints in that group. And we will be administering the the Angel.
Will step back. They will no longer be in control of the world. It's like a Prime Minister Trudeau and he took office in Canada a few years ago.
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He chose a new cabinet entirely. Mr. Harper's cabinet was completely dismissed.
He had a new cabinet and he administered through that. So the Lord will not administer the coming world through the angels. They are the executors of God's judgment at the present time, but not in the millennial state condition of things. It will be the Saints who will take that place of administration. Is that?
I was looking at.
Few verses in Galatians 5 and very similar what we have here.
And 1St Corinthians only. In Galatians chapter 5 we have the remedy for a given.
The spirit that dwells within us.
True Christian position before God in Christ as Spirit that dwells within us is a power that separates us from those things.
That were mentioned in First Corinthians 55 or 6:00. So we have a list of almost the very same things here in Galatians.
Flesh. The things that the flesh will do if it's not brought under check and it says that.
The end of verse 21. They that which do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God.
So the spirit that dwelt within us.
Produces fruit.
For God's glory, it produces a character within us.
That is able to shine outward.
A character that reflects Christ to the world.
But that is.
Our true position before God is in spirit, not in the flesh.
In in Corinthians we haven't hear more given to us as what the flesh produces without the Spirit perhaps.
But the true.
Position that we have in Christ before God and Him is in the Spirit.
But if we, we allow those things of the flesh to go on on hindered, but certainly produce these things that we're reading about.
The question is, like Doug mentioned, is using the grace of God as a license to continue to do them. That is condemned very seriously in Jude, he says.
There in verse four says, For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation.
Ungodly men turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God in our Lord Jesus Christ. That's the danger in our day is to say, oh God's a gracious God, you'll forgive. Doesn't matter what we do after we get saved. It does matter and that's what he's addressing here. And it's interesting in our chapter in verse 11 it says.
Such were some of you. And notice what follows. But ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, set apart. But ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God. And so how important it is to realize that this is not to be characteristic. In the epistle to the Ephesians, Paul says that these things are never to even be named amongst Jews.
Like to read just two verses in Romans 6. Seems like they cover this too. 1St 2 verses. What shall we say then? Should we continue and sin that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we that are dead descent?
Live any longer there is.
Look at the verse in Luke three and eight in Matthew three and eight that speaks about fruits that are meat for repentance.
In my margin for meat for repentance, that says.
Fruits that are answerable to amendment of life the.
The correction.
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Of our life and to live it for him in a way that's pleasing. I'm sorry to say though, I'm still confused about verse 9.
Does that mean then, if I can take you back for a moment and ask the question again, if one is confessed that they are a believer but yet they continue to live this life?
As as we have been speaking about that they should maybe go back and check themselves. Would that be a fair?
Paul says to the Corinthians, examine yourselves whether you be in the faith. I think he had questions about them.
And when a person goes on in this kind of sin, brethren, I don't think we do any good by saying, oh, they got saved when they were young, they just gotten away from the Lord.
That just gives them a free pass to continue their sin. The keyword what you read there is repentance. Repentance means a change in thinking and that is so important in dealing with these matters. Has there been repentance? There can be tears without repentance.
Repentance of John the Baptist says bring forth fruits worthy of repentance. In other words, fruit doesn't just get produced in one day to the next. It may be over a course of time, and so if there's true repentance, it will show in time.
But also on the other side of that truth is that the believer can never be lost again, right? I do believe that, and I think that is extremely important to recognize. I just say that I find that there is a real backlash against that because of some who say they're believers and live like the devil. So to take it up on the other side.
Which goes along perfectly with what you're saying. Is it that a true believer cannot continue in these things? It's not possible.
And perhaps the main thing that I know about that is in Hebrews chapter 12, we have a Father that will not let us, can't happen. And it says at the end of that Hebrews 12.
In verse.
Justifying the verse here.
In verse eight he says if you be without chastisement, where of all that's all true believers are partakers, then are you ******** and not sons?
And so if you've trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ and you fall into some sin and you're convicted about it and Satan brings in that doubt of dark into your heart to say, well, I was, I even saved in the first place.
It's good to examine, yes, but do you love the Lord Jesus? Do you feel that sin? You want to get it right with God? That's because He put even that there. It's the goodness of God that leads you to repentance, and it's the work of the Father to restore. It cannot be that one of Christ's sheep will ever be lost.
I'd like to.
Follow up on the thoughts that have been expressed with we've been talking about God's part a little bit and keeping his sheep true, but I think there's a very important verse in Second Timothy chapter 2 and verse 19.
The foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal. The Lord knoweth them that are his, and I'm thankful the Lord knows them that are his. It's not my job to figure out who saved, who's not saved, but if somebody is misbehaving, I have no basis for saying they're a believer.
And then it says at the end of the verse, let everyone that name with the name of Christ depart from iniquity. No matter what you feel, no matter how you're behaving, if you're going to name the name of Christ, it is your responsibility to repent, as has been mentioned, and turn away entirely from the sins. There is no basis in Scripture anywhere for anybody who name the name of Christ to continue for one minute in sin.
Tells us that in first John 2, doesn't it?
My little children, I write these things on to you that you said not.
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Where every attack of the enemy there is a divine remedy. It's good to see in these verses that everything that the enemy may seek to bring against a believer, an unbeliever, God has something provided to help us defend. We know from first John that were opposed by the world, the flesh and the devil. And the Father opposes the world, the Spirit opposes the flesh, and Christ opposes the devil.
We have the 10 commandments in the first part of the 10 commandments, our obligations and our conduct towards God, the last part obligations and our conduct towards man. So we have in verse nine you have things where you're taking advantage of another for pleasure. In verse 10, we're taking advantage of another's possessions. People seek pleasure, people seek possession, but God has given us a remedy. The last verse of our chapter.
With the price therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are gods. So for our body it seeks pleasure. Our spirit seeks things to consume it as well but God has provided something there's a remedy. It says in verse 11 year washed you're sanctified, you're justified if a judge comes into a courtroom, he has washed himself. He has put on robes he has sat down where he is to.
Carry on his duties.
And so each one of us, we are obligated to conduct ourselves in a manner worthy of it. And it's a solemn thing. And we we fail sometimes, sometimes miserably. First Corinthians 4 says, Therefore judge nothing before the time until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the councils of the heart. Then shall every man have praise of God. So there's things that we only know in part and we evaluate in part, but we are obligated.
Man seeks pleasure, man seeks possessions, but God has given us a body and his Spirit to be submitted to God. But again, for every difficulty there is a divine remedy. I'd like to read some verses in the context of what we covered yesterday and continue with today. Think of the apostle Paul writing where there's a difficulty and he's trying to remedy it and he's providing a divine prescription for a work of the enemy in Philippians chapter 3 and verse 20. I just like to read 5 verses.
Think of these, think of the individuals to whom they were addressed, and how they might respond. Philippians 3, verse 24. Our conversation, Our citizenship is in heaven, from whence also we looked for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working, whereby He is able even to submit, subdue all things unto Himself.
Therefore, my brethren, dearly beloved, and long for my joy and crown, so stand fast and the Lord, my dearly beloved, I beseech Yodius, and I beseech Synteke. He uses the word beseech twice, one for each of them, that they be of the same mind in the Lord. And I entreat thee also, true young fellow, help those women with labor with me in the gospel. Think of those individuals who are written. They were brought. Their citizenship is in heaven.
We look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus. He's going to change our vile body. The end is in the Father's house. We're pilgrims in the wilderness. The end is in the Father's house. For every difficulty there is a divine prescription. There were 10 commandments. Conduct toward God, conduct toward man. There's the seeking of the enemy, seeking pleasure, seeking possessions. But God has given us our body and our spirit to be fully yielded, and He can satisfy us with pleasures forevermore.
You can satisfy us with treasures in heavenly places. In Christ Jesus we have it all, and if our thoughts are lifted into heaven, into what we have, then the remedy is applied and God can provide to us what we need to resolve the difficulties.
It's a wonderful thing when a soul gets saved and comes to know the Lord as his Savior.
To be able to administer forgiveness to that person in the outward sentence.
To to wash them, to baptize them, to identify them with the name of the Lord Jesus, to give them a clean sheet to start out with as their new Christian life. That's what that's what it's Speaking of here in verse.
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11.
But ye are washed, ye are sanctified, set apart in holiness.
Identified with the Lord Jesus, the righteousness that that is becomes ours through faith in Him. So how wonderful to to administer this and treat people in this way, but the danger is not to abuse that afterwards.
We recognize that we are set apart, sanctified. What a wonderful thing. Who is it that's done the sanctifying? It's God. And when He sets you apart, He sets you apart with a purpose in mind. He wants to use you. I like the illustration one time.
Of a brother that you used, he says. I go to the grocery store and as I go down the aisle with my card, I pull off a can of.
This and I pulled off a box of this. What are you doing with those things? I'm setting them apart. I have a purpose in mind to use those things for. So, dear young person and all of us, how important to realize that when God saves us, He not only washes us, but He sets us apart. He sanctifies us not for any earthly purpose, but for a divine purpose.
And how little we seem to grasp that. And I think if we had grasped the immensity of the fact that the God of the universe has set me apart for his purposes, then there wouldn't be the tendency to go back to these things. They are part of the world where the judgment of God hangs over it. No, they are, we are part of now, a completely different people.
Fact. The word Church in the original ecclesia means called apart, called out ones. We are not any longer a part of this world system. We are a people that are set apart.
And neither do we have part in the sense of the flesh, do we?
I think that's a really important thing when we come to these verses. We if we see verse 11 as a work of God.
We certainly understand that about justified. We know what that means to be cleared of every charge before God by faith in Christ.
Before that is put the setting apart that was mentioned, and then before that is the washing. Except the man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.
Cannot see it. I think it says John 35. And so it's really the work of the Spirit of God to take the word of God and produce a new life there. And that makes us into something different, something that we weren't before. The old life is still there to be kept in the place of death. That's the truth we have in Romans 6. But this new life is something entirely new before God. And that's why it can say that here. Such were some of you.
Absolutely. Before we were saved, this is what characterized us, but it doesn't any longer. We have another life that this has nothing to do with, and it's so important to understand that.
I just go back for a moment to what it says in verse 9.
Speaks about the effeminate or the new translation has those who make women of themselves, which is a big thing in the world today.
Or abusers of themselves with mankind, sodomites and the terrible things that are all around us now in the teaching in the world is that people are Born This Way. But the Word of God doesn't teach that.
It doesn't teach it that God made us that way anyway. It does say that we were born that way in terms of having an old nature, because that's what this is. We're all born with the nature that wants to sin. And some of us might be more prone to some sins than others, but these are characteristic works of the flesh. And when we accept the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior, God doesn't work and he puts a new life that this is not what we are any longer. And so if the world would say to a Christian, you can't help it that you're a certain way because this is how you were born.
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That isn't true. When you accepted the Lord as Savior, you now became something different. And so it can truly be said such for some of you, but not any longer. You're a new man, a new life in Christ, entirely different now before God. And it doesn't matter what the world says of us trying to characterize us along with those people that they study in the world. The Word of God tells us what we are. We don't listen to them. We take up this book and listen to God.
So we have a power to resist that flesh. I will not be brought under the power of any. That's the mindset to to walk in the new life. And so a Christian has the power.
I think it's important, like you mentioned it, Tim, that we recognize that we are dead to sin. That's the position we occupy now. There is a dead man laying out in on the floor out here. And you, he was a pretty bad drunkard in his life, and you can give him all the alcohol you want. Is he going to reach out and take it with his hand? No. Why not? He's dead.
And that's our position. And so Scripture says, consider yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God. I think sometimes we make accommodation. I don't feel that dead inside doesn't feel that way. We're not talking about feelings, brethren. We're talking about what God says we are. Christ died for our sins. We died with him. And so God looks us at us as dead to sin.
So don't make accommodations for the flesh to accommodate its desires. Yes, We were born that way. And I what they say sometimes I was born that way. Yeah, you were. I was born when I was a boy. I told lies. I'm thankful I had parents that discipline me for telling lies. And I learned that I couldn't get away with it.
You're going to accommodate lying in a child.
It's going to get worse as time goes on. Are you going to accommodate murder?
They can all say I was born that way, yeah.
It's sin, but we in our Christian position are dead to sin, alive to God, so let's not give place to the flesh in its demands.
What does it mean?
It says, all things are lawful unto me.
Sounds bad, like it's a contradiction the way you just said. I don't think it is. Help us understand that.
In verse 13, perhaps is something of an answer meets for the belly in the belly for meats.
That God shall destroy both it and them. In other words, there was a occupation with what was offered in sacrifice to idols and.
Is it lawful? Yes, it was lawful. And he says in another chapter here in Corinthians, if you go to the marketplace and.
Eat whatever is set before you asking no question for conscience sake. But if anyone says this was offered and sacrificed to idols.
Then don't eat. So there was a there was an occupation with foods in in connection. I'd take it to be that. Do you understand that way?
It doesn't doesn't mean that a Christian can commit murder and it's not sin anymore. It means that the law is not the regulation of what's right and wrong. Christ is.
Christ is the the law. We imitate Him. If we imitate him, we will do what's right according to the law.
Couldn't have been brought up in a better context, could it?
The Spirit of God it just explained that there are a great many things that are not allowable for the Christians, so we can't get confused on that point.
It it means it's like you're saying it's all legitimate things are lawful for me, but that still is not my position in Christian liberty. And he's now going to go on and show how as Christians we are called into a liberty, but that isn't a liberty to do our own wills. It's a liberty to do the will of God even as Christ please, not himself.
01:00:09
And so I believe that's really the case and and in particular as you brought out by the dog about the law.
It's not the measure at all. It's Christ himself.
The standard has been raised higher by Christ and the Old Testament isn't wasn't good enough. The Lord the Lord said you were. Even to go as far as loving your enemies. The law never required that. So we as Christians have a much higher standard.
In Colossians chapter 3, verse 3.
Colossians 33.
For your death and your life is in with Christ and God. When Christ is our life shall appear, then shall ye appear within, and glory mortified. Our Fourier members, which are upon the earth fornication. I'm seeing this inordinate affection and evil scientific and courageousness, which is idolatry, or with things safe. The wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience.
And then and the whiskey also walks sometimes when you live and down. But now you also put up all these things and your Rathmatus. That's for me. 50 communication over your mouth.
The apostle Paul was brought up under the wall, was schooled in the law, and the law lists a list of things that thou shalt live.
We have this. To me, all things are lawful.
But all things are not expedient. Then he repeats that again in the 10th chapter.
In verse 23, all things are lawful for me, but all things are not obedient.
All things are lawful for me, but all things edify not.
Also, Paul also speaks about the Christian life is running a race.
All things are lawful.
In that sense, I'm not under the law. It's not the works that I do under the law that justify me before God, as was the case in the Old Testament.
In the New Testament, in Christianity, we're under grace.
Sins that I've committed or dealt with by the work of Christ on Calvary's cross. So it's not a question. All things are lawful for me. It's a matter of I'm not under the law and it's not what I do. Those things are dealt with by Christ always cross. They're still the matter of that our Christian life. All things are not expedient. Yes, it's not a matter of my justification before God. Those things that I that I do, but it's not expedient in my Christian life. The apostle spoke of running a race and putting aside those things that hinder.
You know, if I'm at work and my steel toe boots and I've got some tools in my pocket and I'm trying to run a race, I don't go, I don't get very far. Put aside those things, those weights that so easily beset us all things are not expedient. These things, they're not a matter of justification for God because it was dealt with Christ, but they don't help us in our Christian pathway.
There are two there are two aspects of Washington here. I believe that ye are washed is being quickened by the Holy Spirit of God.
Morally put into a new position.
Not the washing of water by it's not the washing of the blood of Christ here. It's the washing of water by the word were put into a new position before God born again. But it's on the belief and the apprehension of the finished work of Christ.
That we are justified.
That's a question of the expiation of sin, and that requires the blood of Christ. Now the whole thing revolves around the work of the Spirit of God.
In setting apart an individual for blessing and imparting that new life, that divine life, that's the washing I believe. Now sanctification here is in the absolute sense.
But sanctification is also used in a practical sense. That is, we should be more sanctified this year than we were last year from the world. That's in the practical.
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Practical sense of the word here it is absolute or positional. Is that right?
I believe that what the brother read there in Colossians is very important, lines up with the chapter that we have.
Here in let's just read a couple of verses there, or read them over again.
Colossians, chapter 3.
Says uh.
Verse 3 For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ and God. When Christ, who is your life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.
This is a Christian living.
Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth, through the list fornication on cleanness and ordinate affection, evil, concupence and covetousness, which is idolatry for which sake.
The wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience.
Children of disobedience, we don't want to be.
Like.
Those in the world that are going on and disobedience.
But if we give way to that flesh that's in us, we can imitate some of those things. It should not be. Our Christian character has been pointed out. It would not be because of the faithfulness of Christ would intervene in some way. But we have that flesh within us that's able to do these things, if not mortified, meaning cut off.
Is cut off. How do we do that? The Lord?
Has uttered on the cross. But we have a practicality too, don't we? We have we have a practice that we're to practice these things. And so we have the the flesh in us that fall in nature day by day. There's things that come up and how do we deal with it? How do we cut it off to keep it from acting? It was one verse that's encouraging to me.
And concerning this is in Peter first Peter.
Chapter 4.
And verse one.
It isn't for as much then, as Christ has suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves. Likewise with the same mind. Now we know that the Lord Jesus died for us as a man.
In flesh of the body, but he had no sin within He He wasn't tempted like you and I in the same way.
He didn't have a fallen nature within himself that would be subject to things of the world and and the lust and everything that's around. He didn't have a nature that would be attracted to those things. But we do.
When it mentions arming ourselves.
Likewise, with the same mind, it means.
A dependent mind. We should have dependence in prayer upon the Father.
A submissive mind.
A lowly mind, we should try to imitate our Lord Jesus in every way. And then it goes on to say, for he that has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin.
I wondered about that.
But you know, if we have an attraction to something, and we do, oftentimes after we're saved, we have to admit it, we have the old nature within us.
How do we not give way to that?
We cut it off.
We suffer, don't we?
We don't give the flesh its way, we don't give that will of ours its way. We don't allow what we're lusting after to have to do that thing. We cut it off, but we suffer for it. The flesh suffers for it, but it says here it ceased from sin.
The flesh suffers, we suffer for it, but we don't sin. And that's that's the key thing.
Oftentimes we're attracted to things, we're tempted to do things, and it's if we don't allow it, we're going to suffer for it. Inwardly, the flesh suffers. Let it suffer. We don't sin. Don't give way to it. That's been encouragement to me, I hope. Maybe somebody else.
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Would be encouraged by that not to give way, but cut it off.
#318.
Remark Before we pray, we read in Exodus chapter 30, we read of the labor, but it's significant that there are no dimensions that are given.
So the priest was to avail himself of that, and we are thankful that no dimensions are given for that neighbor.