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Let's pray a gracious, loving God and her Father. We ask for Thy help this morning as we open Thy precious word. We pray that Thou is leading. Guide us to just the right portion. We pray that Thou would lead by Thy Holy Spirit that there would be blessing and encouragement for each one that is here. We pray that Thou wouldst lead and guide and give us something for our hearts. Lord, we just pray for this. We ask this in Thy worthy precious name, Amen.
I wonder if we can make consider second printing support and if the Lord allows it going to chapter 5.
Unless somebody else has something before them, but I guess my exercise behind.
These chapters, as I feel there's a lot of practical instruction that we can get as believers.
And then the 4th chapter of Second Corinthians. The Apostle Paul is of various.
Exercises that he had which are good for us as Christians. There's a lot of practical things that we can get out of this. The thrust behind the chapter really is to have Christ flowing out of our lives.
And in an example to the world, and then he touches on those various things that might hinder that and how to maybe get rid of them out of our lives. And then in Chapter 5.
You know, it touches on the coming scene of glory, speaks about the judgment seat of Christ, touches on the love of Christ. So if it's the mind of the brethren, I wonder if maybe this would be a profitable portion for us to take out.
Therefore, seeing we have this Mr. Not as we have received mercy, we paint not renounce the hidden things of dishonesty, nor handling the word of God as easily, but by manners.
Manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. But if our golf will be hit, it is said to them that are lost in whom the God of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not unless the light of the stories. Gospel of Christ, who is the image of God. Society of the world.
Preached not ourselves, but these by Christ. Use the Lord and ourselves your servants, for you to say for God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness. I signed in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the Excellency of the power may be of God is out of us. We dare it. We are a couple of every side.
Yet not distressed. We are precise, but not in despair.
Persecuted and offers shaken, passed down to now destroyed, always worrying about in the body of the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body when we which live are not always delivered. I do that for Jesus sake, for the light also Jesus might be manifest in our pleasure. So then death worketh in us to life and.
We have in the same spirit of faith, according it as it is written.
I believe and therefore have I spoken. We also believe in therefore to be knowing that he was raised up. The Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with years for all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might do the Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving I've been with me now unto the glory of God, For which Cosby faint not, but through our hours, man parish at the end is renewed day by day.
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Which he thought for a moment, worketh for us a bar more clean and internal way of Lord, while we let not have the things which are seen, but the things that are which are not seen, or the things which are temporal, those things that that are not seem very terrible.
I.
Well, as I mentioned, having this chapter number of moral exercises that are brought forward that would.
Be good for us to.
Pay attention to and employ in our own lives so that.
Of each one of us.
Representation of Christ in this world.
And is very.
The testimony of these rules about those things are not hindered and.
First verse. It's interesting that he mentions this word painting.
You might say a problem today has always been an issue with just throwing our hands up and giving in.
Talking to brother recently about this.
And just anytime that there's a work of God going on.
We can always take it to the bank that the enemy is going to sow his full weight at that work, try to disrupt it, be it a collective work or an individual work. And at the end of the day, trying to stumble us as believers. And if we give in to that tendency is just to again throw our hands up, throw in the towel and and and be wearied by it.
And it's interesting here, the Apostle Paul no doubt was a man of like passions like ourselves. And no doubt he felt the weight of of of the persecutions he endured and, and the work of the enemy to try to stop his ministry. And but he says, you know, we, his exercise was not to faint. And I think that's something that, you know, we need courage today, don't we?
That's good. I have a.
That the Lord wants willing servants, seeing we.
Ministry. The Lord's given every single one of us, even the youngest kid in this room, a service, a job that we can do for him.
And it is so easy to be discouraged by the attacks at the end, by our own failures, he says. As we have received mercy, we faint not. And so I think it's important for all of us to understand that.
It's been put this way, God doesn't fall.
Qualified. Qualified.
Are we willing to follow in the world? They look for humility and being smart and, and being hungry. That's that's what they talk about. You know, if you're looking for a good employee, that's what you're looking for hunger. They want that drive. They're humble, they're not full pride and they're smart. But all the Lord wants is willingness.
But we will, and the Lord says, I want to use you.
I've also heard he says that he doesn't need our doesn't want our abilities, he wants our availability.
I think it's.
A concern to it, I know.
Thank you. Not everyone mentioned over 24 verse 12.
Fell around each other, wax cold, and I know a little bit about what depression is and becoming under the influence that plays around.
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Mr. Harvey says because lawlessness shall prevail, the love of most shall relax. Hold. That's definitely an issue that we have to deal with in the world where so much is going awry. It seems like the lesson maybe things are out of control, but they're not out of control. God's allowing all these things to come to pass and.
That's the status of things in this world and it affects our hearts as well. And and there's so much wrong. So what's the news?
I can't fight against this.
I'm about to be overwhelmed and overcome by this, and that's an actual tendency, so that's why we have.
So we can be together and encourage one another to press on that in his birthday. And even though things are in bad shape all around us and even in Christian testimony, we don't have to throw our hands in Twitter.
Not the second epistle of.
Any of the officials in the testimony written from the perspective of the testimony. And so this is talking for Indians.
In the 1St fiscal 2.
The.
Perspective was the defense of the of the official list view the Church of God rather than the Lord, and 2nd of course.
Things are out of life. Whether it's just been mentioned, we we know from.
Technically it says that in the last day of perilous times. So I was talking about just the general aspect of things in the last days. We have that aspect, but then we also have.
The discouragement of the ruling of the testimony of God going on around. So what's that do so naturally make this discouraged, It makes us.
Not on a put forth energy towards the work of the work. The expectation is that this is the time that's the most important to be faithful in things services for the Lord ministry and and you know we we do the revelation two and two we get the churches there you see.
The first three churches of the latest speaks of.
But there's a message to the entire church.
But then in the last one, In the last four.
Particularly the older. And so because it's why it's at it, because the collective testimony was such that there was.
It's not much good to say tonight, says the majority of the collective testimony. And so the thrust of it is to the to the individual and the overcomer. And so in these last days, when we walk through these difficult times, there may even be failure around us. We may even have to deal with the.
Problems within our own local assemblies. We may have a lot of things that that mark failure both in the world at large and also in the Christian testimony, but as it says.
If we go to Hebrews chapter 12, it's a little different.
Little different context here, but I I like what it says.
In verse 12.
Hebrews 12 and verse 12 Wherefore lift up the hands of chaining down on the feeble knees, and make straight paths for your feet. Let's thought which is lame be turned out of the way, but let it rather be healed. And so, though there is a great deal of.
Of.
Stuff around us that can be discouraging. There's also a great deal to take encouragement from. And if we go back a couple of verses into chapter 3 here, it says now the Lord.
The Lord is there is liberty.
But we all with open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. So even in this day of ruin, even in this time of much discouragement, we have the resource of focusing our attention on Christ. And what the outflow from that should be, is the characteristics of Christ should be displayed in our life. And I want to talk more about it as we get a little further into the chapter, but I.
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It's hard to say what your favorite verse and.
Is but there's don't know me. I often quote verse six. I love 2nd Corinthians 4 and verse 6 and it says for God had commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give the light and knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And then the next verse says that we have this treasure in earthen vessels. It was a distinct decision by God to shine.
That knowledge into our hearts, it wasn't something that we sought after. He came to us to give us the knowledge of the glory of God.
In the face of Jesus Christ, isn't that beautiful? Have a lot to take encouragement from and a lot of incentive and motivation to to be conformed into the image of Christ.
One thing that really helped us what we do whatever trials or experience or whatever the way is down by giving the Lord thanks support it says in first lesson is growing his thanks on the Lord for all things and James says count it all joy my friend when you call in a diverse trials, but that's what will give us victory, but then our eyes will get off the circumstances off our brother and our.
Situation and on the Lord and when we give thanks to the Lord for something that's difficult there's.
He's just like he's ready to embrace us and fill us with his victory that he wants to give us. So just.
This encouragement, you know, sometimes.
All somewhere else in this book, he said.
In First Corinthians he talked about all the things he went through, like persecutions and imprisonments and afflictions, and he said somewhere in that list he says in necessities. So sometimes the difficulties in life, they're actually for our blessing if we can give thanks for them and.
The Lord and like it says in Philippians, casting all your care upon him and rejoice evermore. So if we give thanks, the Lord can put a joy in our heart even in the most difficult situation and then we'll that will help us to not faint. Just a little word to help us know how not to faint.
Of this and and I was really glad Tim that you connected it to chapter 3 and verse 18 because we have a special word here at the beginning of chapter 4 it says therefore and that is a is a link to the chapter before So what we have in this chapter is directly related to what we have in verse 17 and 18 and we already read that but turn back into the Old Testament for.
A couple verses here. The first verse I want to to look at is in Exodus chapter 24.
And I.
I want to set this in context. So in Exodus chapter 24, we have a really interesting portion that I've been thinking about recently for a little while, and this was at the giving of the law, and I just want to read just a couple verses. Verse 9 then went up Moses and Aaron, Nadab and abide you and 70 of the elders of Israel.
They went up into the mouth, and they saw the God of Israel, and there was under his feet, as it were, a paved work of a sapphire stone, as it were the body of heaven in his clearness.
This is amazing.
This is an incredible picture here of glory, of the glory of God in giving the law. And it says that they saw the God of Israel and under his feet were this pavement of sapphire. That's a precious stone and it and it would have been just incredibly glorious. Not only was it sapphire stone, but it was clear the light shone through this stone.
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And it would have been incredibly glorious to have been on the mount at the giving of the law hair and to have seen this. But it's interesting, the effect.
So let's turn over to Chapter 33.
And we won't go into a whole lot of detail, but in these intervening chapters we know that the children of Israel sin very grievously.
Before the Lord.
Very, very grievously before the Lord, Moses was up in the mount, and the Lord had given him the table of stone on which the Lord had written the law. And as Moses came down out of the mount, he he threw the stone, the tables of stone.
On the ground and they were broken to pieces.
Because of the sin of of the children of Israel.
But at the end of that.
That Moses asks a special request of God and I want to just read a few verses here in Exodus chapter 33 verse 18, he says, and he said, Moses said, I beseech thee, show me thy glory. And he God said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy.
On whom I will show mercy. And he said, Thou canst not see my face, for there shall no man see me and live. And the Lord said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock, and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by. I will put thee in the cleft of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by, and I will take my hand. Take away my hand, and thou shalt see my back parts.
And my face shall not be seen.
And so this happened. And what was the effect? Well, we'll turn over just to Chapter 34, to the end of Chapter 34.
And we're going to read just a few verses here, verse 31.
Sorry, Verse 30. And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come nigh unto him. And Moses called unto them. And Moses and all the rulers of the congregation returned unto him. And Moses talked with them. And afterward all the children of Israel came nigh, and he gave them the commandment. All that the Lord had spoken with him in the Mount Sinai tell Moses had done speaking.
With him he put a veil on his face. But when Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him.
He took the veil off until he came out, and he came out and spake unto the children of Israel that which he was commanded. And all the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses face shone. And Moses put a veil on his face again until he went in to speak with him. And this is just a a little illustration that we have in the Old Testament that I think it's a beautiful illustration.
Of what we have in verse 18, we all so each one of us have this opportunity. We all with an open face, beholding as in a glass of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by Mr. That's what happened to Moses. Moses beheld the glory of the Lord and he was changed. He was physically changed. It says that his face shone and it says it over and over again several times.
We read that his face shown the brethren, we have the opportunity by faith.
To look at the glory of the Lord and as we do that, there's going to be a change in us. Now we see as it were, through a glass darkly. That means that it's kind of like we're we're looking through a window that that is maybe frosted and and we can't really see as clearly as we would like to see.
But we can see the glory of the Lord shining through that window.
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And that's what it says here. We have this opportunity and if we take that opportunity, it's going to change us so that we faint not.
Therefore, seeing we have this ministry as we have received mercy, we faint not as we take time to look at the glory of the Lord. The effect is going to be that we're not going to faint.
When we deal with these adversities that Josh was talking about, a lot of it has to do with our perspective.
If we look at it from the standpoint of.
Just being overcome by these things that are around us. We're we're going to get discouraged and we're going to get down. But like Josh said.
Anytime there is an effort made for the purpose of.
Bringing glory to God, the enemy of our souls is going to have his entire heart invested in trying to cause something to disrupt that effort and.
So.
What's the perspective, how we are we looking at these things that happen that are discouraging from the standpoint of just a happen chance, there's nothing that happens but happened chance.
Everything is ordered of God. Oh, and the enemy of our souls steps in. Why doesn't the Lord step in and stop it? Because He's trying our faith. He wants to know, are we going to trust Him in spite of these adversities? Are we going to just throw in the towel like Josh was saying? Or are we going to see his hand in this and are we going to wait on His power? You know, there's that verse.
First Corinthians, I think it's chapter 2. It says that your faith stand not on the wisdom.
Men, but in the power of God, are we going to trust in Him to come in and over overcome these things? You know, I'm trying to find it. I can't put my finger on it, but in the axe the disciples were being persecuted for preaching the gospel and they were commanded to stop preaching the gospel and they didn't. They kept going and it says that they, I can't remember the exact terminology, but they counted it all joy that they were found worthy to suffer for the name of Christ. Why, how could they say that?
Well, because they could see beyond the immediate adversity as to the glory that it brought God and I, there's another aspect of it and something that I was sharing with with Josh earlier about is that those of us that have been involved in this camp have come to expect in the, in the weeks leading up to the camp, various things by the enemy of our soul to come in and cause discouragement. I'll just share a couple from Taiwan.
Monday my irrigation pump went out, you know, and normally I would probably pound my head on the table and just be extremely frustrated, but it was par for the course. I expected. It was like, OK, this is what's next. You know, the Lord worked through that. We handled that. And yesterday morning my, my well pump went out and same thing. You know, normally I would probably be pretty upset by that, but again, it's par for the course and so.
To me.
Now, having been exposed to this over a number of years now, it's an affirmation as to the benefit that this work has for the people of God and for God himself. And so when the enemy of our souls starts sticking his hands into our lives and messing things up like that, what's the perspective? Are we going to get discouraged by that, or are we going to recognize that he's doing that because he's trying to disrupt the work that's of real value?
And we're going to see the hand of the Lord behind it, testing our faith, and we're going to trust Him to work through it. Has he ever failed it? He never has.
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So it's a matter of perspective in large part.
1012 on this first version, but I have a question the kids and that is it says therefore, seeing we have this ministry.
Number one, what is the word ministry mean? Somebody tell me what the word ministry means.
We don't often often use this word in our day-to-day lives.
Somebody give me a definition for ministry.
Michael.
Nope.
That's what we that's what we normally associate with it, but it's actually not the definition of ministry.
Jed.
No guess, Cody.
What? Nope.
Something that we each have here. I'll give you guys a hint everybody.
Signed up for this.
Before we got here.
Does that give a a good enough hint, Kevin?
Starts with an S.
Service service. So ministry is just a different word for service.
We have a service. It's kind of interesting. So my next question is who's this week?
Is that talking about Uncle Tim, Uncle Josh and Uncle Matt and Walt?
Is that who he's talking about?
The people that are doing most of the talking here.
Who's this we?
I'll put it this way, I want you to raise your hand if you're part of this week.
Everybody that's in this room that's above 5 years old should have their hand up, right? Because we can take dishes and put them in that in that window, and that's a service for the Lord.
OK, so I'm going to make this really, really personal. Each one of us are part of this week. So we should sit up and take notice and and listen, right? Because we're, we're part of this. We have this ministry as we have received mercy.
What's mercy?
Trevor, have you received mercy?
What's mercy?
Toby, can you help him out?
Yeah, not getting what we deserve in the way of punishment. So we haven't. This is kind of interesting to connect these two together. So we've escaped some punishment, we've received mercy, and as a result we have a ministry.
So each one of us that are saved that have.
Escape the punishment that is due to our sins. We have a service to others.
And it's something that we should be willing to do and not think. So there were some of us that climbed the hill this morning.
And you know, I'll have to be honest with you, I had to stop a couple times on the way up the hill and suck a little bit extra air.
Because I'm not as in as good shape as I should, but.
The faint is to give up, and I think we've been talking about that. So I just want to make this really, really practical for each one of us. Each one of us have the ability, like we were talking about, to see the glory of the Lord and to be changed. But as a result of that, we have a ministry, we have a service, Each one of us have a service, and you all have signed up for part of that service. It's not just those of us that are a little older that might be.
00:35:11
Have some responsibility associated. We all have this service.
The Lord said that the Son of man is not come to be ministered unto, but to minister. And in John chapter 13 verse 12 it says so after he that is the Lord Jesus had washed their feet and had taken his garments and was sat down again. He said unto them, Know you what I have done to you? You call me master and Lord, and you say, well for our so I am.
If I then your Lord and Master have washed your feet.
He also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that you should do as I have done to you. Verily, verily, I say unto you, the servant is not greater than his Lord, neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. So if the Lord Jesus can humble himself to the point of ministering to his disciples, you and I very much so have a responsibility to be in service for the Lord's people, and ultimately that's a service for the Lord himself.
Allow me to quote Mr. CHM.
May we be instant in season, out of season, and in no wise discouraged by the condition of things around us, but rather find in that very condition and urgent reason for more intense devotedness.
So, related thought to what you just said, Dad, has the glory of the Lord changed?
What do you young boys think?
No, the glory is not changed, not a little bit. We may not be able to see it very clearly right now because we're looking through a glass darkly, but the glory of the Lord has changed, has not changed.
And in fact, earlier in chapter 3, we find out that the glory.
Well, maybe I should read it.
So verse 9, for if the administration of condemnation be glory, that's what we read about in the Old Testament in Exodus, much more doth administration of righteousness exceed in glory. So the glory has not changed, the objective has not changed, Christ has not changed, He's still as glorious and we're going to behold that.
With.
Out anything in between really, really soon. But we have the opportunity right now by faith to look at that glory.
So then we get to verse two and it says that.
We should not handle the Word of God deceitfully, but by the manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.
So there's those in this world that would, as it says in the beginning of that verse, we have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness. So there are those that are.
Walking in craftiness and and handling the word of God deceitfully or dishonestly. But we have the opportunity to handle the Word of God in truth. How do we do that?
Well, when we were up on the mountain this morning praying, one of the things that was mentioned is that we would let the word of God speak to us.
And receive it for what it says, instead of taking our words and our thoughts and applying to them to the Word of God.
I don't know if I can make this very clear, but when we bring our thoughts to the Word of God, that's when we end up, as it were, here.
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Handling the Word of God deceitfully.
And and not having the ministry or the manifestation of truth.
So we have to be careful that when we open the word of God that we, as David said, search me and try me, that we allow it to have its effect on our lives and our hearts. And that is going to help us to hold the truth and be able to give it to other people so that there's blessing. And that's what we desire here at camp.
And that's one of the reasons why we named it Still Waters is because.
The picture is of sheep, and sheep cannot drink if there is turbulent water.
Sheep need to have still water. They actually will look at at the water and if they can see their own reflection in the water, then they'll drink of it. And so the the picture there is of a situation that we can readily receive the word of God and have that refreshment and that benefit that is so necessary in our lives.
My brother once said in the Sunday school in that revelation, that is God giving a revelation of his thoughts to us. Revelation is God telling us what we couldn't figure out by ourselves.
I thought that was a good explanation. My brother decided one time that God spoke to him just like he spoke to the apostles said I pray and God talks to me every morning. Well, you know, it's a funny thing. It didn't go too long before he started believing things that were contrary to this book.
Because we can't trust our own hearts, God has given us what we need in this book. We don't need to go any further than this book because if we do, we a lot of times get ourselves into trouble.
So I remember it being said of Mr. Kelly that he bowed to this book like an old fool.
May we be that foolish?
I have a couple notes.
Three conditions of a vessel, and I don't remember who mentioned this, but you think of a vessel as something that carries. You think of this afternoon, we're going to be out playing outside and and we're all going to want something. We're out in the hot sun. What are we going to want?
We're going to want a drink of water. Well water just doesn't hang out in the air. You can't just go grab water like in outer space. You have to carry it in something. And that's what a vessel is, like a water bottle. But the thing that makes the bottle valuable is what it carries.
If somebody had an empty water bottle and they said here you can have an empty water bottle. Gee, thanks for thinking of me. So there's a clean vessel in this verse 2. There's an empty vessel in verse five and a broken vessel or a crackpot in verse 7. But these things, if the Lord's going to use us in this ministry has been so beautifully brought out, we have to be clean inside. If if I if you're out in the field.
You need.
Drink of water, you're really super thirsty. And I go and I find a mud puddle.
And I take my water bottle, I dump out all the clean water and I fill it full of muddy water and kind of let some of that out and then go put clean water. And then are you going to drink it? Is it going to be a help to anybody? No, because it's not clean. It's all dirty. It's nasty. So we have renounce, but we have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty. And Steve was just talking about how we need to let the word speak to us. It says it's A2 sided, a double sided sword. There's one side for somebody else and one side for us.
And it says in Matthew 7 it says, Judge not lest ye be judged, For with the same measure that ye measure, it will be measured unto you.
So we ought to be fair. We got to be a clean vessel before the Lord that we're honest with ourselves.
00:45:04
Before the Lord and He'll show us stuff that isn't right in our lives, and it hurts.
And we have to say, if we're going to grow, we have to say, Lord, you're right. Like if we lose our temper, the Lord will show us you lost your temper and we can't disable. They made me mad. That's not the point, Lord, I own it. I lost my temper.
Help me and he does. It's beautiful. And then we can be used. Then we can fulfill that ministry.
What is it that we carry in this vessel?
They're talking about.
It's spoken of here as a treasure.
What is specifically spoken of?
In our chapter here, that is that which we carry in our vessel.
I'm going to suggest that it's what we have at the end of verse six, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God and the face of Jesus Christ.
I believe that's what it's Speaking of and it's talking about the treasure that we carry in our vessels.
I don't know about anybody else, but that's pretty exercising.
Is our vessel fit for that treasure? Are we corrupting our vessel with things that would dishonor the treasure that we carried?
In the best.
You know, we, we spoke about service earlier and.
You know, I, I think if we exercise our service in a proper way, it's going to.
Manifest Christ, of course, and it's going to be for the good of others.
And.
The danger is that we can almost take up with this ministry that we've all been given, as it's already been mentioned.
And use that to exalt ourselves.
And that would not be the mind of the Lord, would it? Because ultimately that is taking away from the glory of Christ that might be seen in our life to exalt Him. And it would be putting that on myself. And so we have in verse 5, just back up for a minute that it says, for we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your servants.
For Jesus sake.
So when the Lord Jesus walked through this world, did he ever do one thing to please himself?
He did nothing to please himself.
Scriptures say that Christ pleased not himself.
And I have to hang my head because I don't think I can say that.
Too often I do things to please myself.
And so it's important that as Christians.
Not only as we've been commenting already to kind of get rid of those things that.
Are dubious and wrong in our lives be a hidden things as we noticed or things that we're carrying on in walking in craftiness or deceit or.
Using the word of God in a wrong way.
00:50:00
But we need to keep before us that.
We're not out to please ourselves.
And if we're going to try to and do that, it's going to take away from this ministry that we've been given, It's going to taint it, it's going to mar it, and it's not going to shine.
And you notice too.
He says that we preach not ourselves by Christ Jesus the Lord and I think.
The impact of our ministry, again, it's just not the guys up here.
Talking.
You know, our ministry is wide and it's very from, as Uncle Steve said, putting the dishes away or whatever the Lord has put into our hands to do.
The impact should be to glorify Christ and and and affect others in a positive way and move them closer to the Lord. I believe all true ministry will exalt Christ and whatever shape or form it it takes, it will ultimately move others and ourselves closer to the Lord, will it not?
So verse 3.
Is a lot like a children's him we sing.
What? What him am I thinking about?
Guys know.
Starts with the word this.
Anybody get it?
This little light of mine. So this verse says, if our gospel be hid.
It's hid to them that are lost.
So we can, we can hide our gospel, and shamefully.
I think probably each one of us have to hang our heads and say that we've.
Hidden.
The gospel that has been entrusted to us to share with others, this is part of that ministry or that service that we're talking about earlier.
We can hide it.
Song says put it under a bushel, no. Or under a basket, no. We gotta let it shine.
I want to challenge each one of us to let it shine.
Here we can hide it, but it has an impact on those that need it the most.
That's these, the ones that are lost.
Sadly we have in verse four, in whom the God of this world hath blinded.
The minds of them that believe not so there is a active work of Satan to hinder the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
From shining forth.
And Satan would like to hinder it in our lives. He would like us to hide it.
And the apostle is saying here, let's not faint. Let's in light of the glory of God that we have before us, let's let it shine.
It says of Moses in the Old Testament that we read, it says that he put a veil on his face. And I think that that's the reference that is being made here, that we can put a veil on her face and hide that glorious gospel. I think it's so beautiful.
Lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ.
Who is the image of God should shine unto them?
We have the opportunity to let the glorious, the light of the glorious gospel of Christ shine out in our lives, and he wants us to do that. That's part of this ministry there, this service that we have such a privilege to be involved in.
And letting our light shine for him.
And what is our light? It's not our light, it's his light.
I think it's so beautiful that we're literally just a mirror. You guys, You kids know what a mirror is.
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You guys know what a mirror is? You look at it probably at least once a day maybe.
So if you take a flashlight and you shine it into the mirror, what's going to happen?
What's the mirror do?
It reflects the light.
What if that mirror is really dirty?
What if we took a?
We have some T-shirt paint.
Over in one of those boxes over there, we took some T-shirt paint and sprayed it on the mirror and then took a light and shined it into the mirror. What's going to happen?
Is that mirror going to reflect the light from that flashlight?
Not very well.
And so that is going back to our lives being clean so that we can reflect the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.
So we talked about service and like Steve said, this is something that each one of us needs to be exercised about, is something that's been very much on my heart of late.
And some of you young people have already heard me talk about this, but I would say that.
One of the greatest services, One of the most important services of a Christian is to carry the gospel message.
In chapter 5 there's a verse that says now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by.
We pray you in Christ that be reconciled to God. So what that's saying is that because.
Christ is no longer physically in this world presenting the gospel.
He's chosen us. He's made us to be ambassadors for him to go about that service of speaking to others of the hope that's in us so that they might be brought to Christ and if we don't fulfill that service.
It's dark there. There's no presenting of the hope that God has offered to this world. We're the ones that that bring that message. If we don't do it, then who's going to? Nobody and so.
I, you know, I, I would. I've said this before, I don't count myself to have the gift of an evangelist.
But I love preaching the gospel, and Timothy was told to do the work of an evangelist. Timothy maybe wasn't an evangelist from the standpoint of a spiritual gift. Sounds to me like he was kind of a timid guy. But he was exhorted by the apostle Paul to do the work of an evangelist. So.
Even though you and I may not be evangelists spiritually, as far as our gift goes, we still have the responsibility of being ambassadors for Christ and doing the work of an evangelist. There's no other way that this world to get that message.
As we carry that message, as our brother mentioned, we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord. Out in the ball field, we take a big old 5 gallon container of water. Well, what would it be if it was all clean inside, but we took empty milk jugs and they're all clean and we put the empty milk jugs in the five gallon container and then all that would be left would just be a little bit of water.
How effective would that be? It wouldn't be very effective and that's what happens when we go to minister and we're and it's about us.
It's not very effective, it's not very helpful. There's a horrendous amount of work. Think how many loads you'd have to take out to the ball field.
To give everybody a drink of water if most of your bucket is full of air.
And we don't preach ourselves, and the test is what are we trying to accomplish. And as our brother mentioned, all good ministry is a glorification to Christ.
It's all about Him, it's not about us. And if we're trying to look good, I've heard it explained this way. You can either have the blessing or you can have the glory. The glory belongs to God, and if we try and get it, we're stealing from Him.
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And when we steal from him, we lose the blessing. And it would be like being at a wedding and you see the bride and the groom and they're up there. And if I'm at the wedding and I'm going around and I bump into everybody, hey, don't I look nice? Look at this tide. Doesn't this look good? Oh, look at me, look at my new shoes. Double S look good. You just feel like whatever, it's not about you. This is, you know, this is about this couple that are getting married. Well, that's what happens in our lives when we try and look good. We go around and bump into everybody. Don't I look at look at these new shoes. Doesn't that look good? Oh, look at my new shirt. Isn't that nice?
Really. And what happens is we lose the blessing. God wants to bless us.
That's His heart's desire. You see that through the Old Testament, over and over and over and over and over. But if we steal that glory, then we lose the blessing. We want to be empty vessels. We want to be able to carry that gospel, that light to other people. And we get a blessing when we do that job. It's not. The Lord knows what He's doing, and it's the right thing.
So maybe we can start or 6.
Next time.
Our God and Father, who just thank thee for shining.
The light of the knowledge of Thy glory into our hearts in the face of Jesus Christ. We thank You for this treasure. I just pray that Thou will help us to carry it in vessels that are meat.
And fit to be carrying such a treasure. And we just pray that that will help us to not hide the treasure, but be willing to share it with others that they might come into the same blessing. We just thank you for this portion that we've had before us. We pray that all hope make it good to each of our hearts. Thank you for the practicality of it on our day. And we just commit the rest of the day to thee for thy honor and glory. And I just pray that it would be.
For blessing for each one here we think of many that are still traveling and we pray for that kind of keeping for them.
We just commit this today. And the name of our Lord Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.