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We didn't have any comment on verse six, so would it be all right to begin at that, even though we did go a little bit beyond it in some of our comments?
At the end of all things is at hand. He therefore sobered and watched under prayer.
Some of the old things have fervent love among yourselves. The love shall cover the most favorite sins. Use hospitality 1 To another without refuge. As every man hath received the gift, Even so minister the same one to another.
Of Ben Stewart, The manifold grace of God Can a man's feet let him speak as the oracles of God? Any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God-given that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ.
Beloved thinketh not strange, and turned the fiery trial which is to triumph, as of some strange thing happened unto you, but rejoice in as much as ye are for teachers to Christ suffering.
But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evildoer, or as a busy body in other men's matters. Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed to let him glorify God on this behalf.
So the time has come. The judgment must begin. If the House of God, and if it first began at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly, the Sinner, appear?
Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God.
Their souls to Him, and well doing as unto a faithful Creator.
Some were noticing that we hadn't commented on verse six and were wanting to have an explanation of it, so maybe.
We could have some thoughts on that verse.
In particular, how could, how could, how could those who are dead be preached to?
Would that also refer to First Peter 3 and?
20 or 19, would that be related?
I believe it's the same thought. All right. Yes.
I think the point in the verse is that is was for this cause was the gospel preached to them, which are now presently dead, and he's just showing that judgment, as he said is in the fifth verse preceding verse.
That would be executed. Is that there these people that are being judged are not being judged without a cause. And they have, it's not that they have not had an opportunity. God does not judge anybody, uh, unjustly. And so they've had a testimony rendered to them and they're going to be judged according to it.
I wonder if, uh, Hebrews 11:00 and 7:00 will give us what is said in juxtaposition 1 to the other.
That by faith Noah being warned of God, of things not seen as yet. Mooth with fear compared an ark to the saving of his house, by which he condemned the world. How did he condemn the world? By building the ark, wasn't it?
00:05:13
And had there been those that were willing to believe God's message through Noah, they could have found a place in the ark. The the door was open, wasn't it? And so it was God's desire that man should be saved. And so it is today. And the object of all preaching of the gospel is that men might live according to God in the Spirit, but if they don't pay attention to it, God holds them responsible for the message they have heard.
And I for myself don't believe there will be anyone at the Great White Throne.
Who hasn't had a clear and definite testimony in one way or another to his or her responsibility toward God and has clearly indefinitely set their will against it. You know, sometimes in the courts of today, people.
Can end up in a courtroom, perhaps because they got caught up in something that they didn't really understand. And they say, well, I don't know what's happening here, what I'm doing here. I'm I'm not sure what all what's going on here. Not that it happens that often, but it does happen. But there'd be no such attitude at the great White Throne, will there? Nor will there be an attitude like that with the judgment of the living when the Lord separates the sheep from the goats.
Some of them will say, Well Lord, how? How did we not?
Uh, minister to you and so on. But the fact is there was a clear and definite will that rejected. But God's definite object and purpose, shall we say, or desire, which is a better word, is that men should be saved. But you and I have a wonderful privilege to preach the gospel. And God is glorified even if men don't believe, but souls are far more responsible after hearing it than if they don't.
Euclidean 2.
Stop.
Excuse me, in Philippians chapter one verse 27 and 28.
This is only like your conversation. Be as become at the gospel of Christ, as whether I come and see you, or else be absent. I may hear of your affairs, that you stand fast in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel, and in nothing terrified by your adversaries.
Which the gospel is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation and that of God, Is it true that the very thing that could have met, and is the means of salvation, the power of God, and the salvation the gospel, will, in that judgment day, be the thing that is brought up and said. This condemns you because you refuse to.
And so, as Bob was bringing before us in the meeting this morning, it lends a note of soberness to the day in which we live, doesn't it? Because the judgment is imminent.
If Peter could say the end of all things is at hand and of course as far as Israel was concerned at that time.
It was the end of their history as a nation, at least in responsibility, before God was at an end, and God was about to destroy that city of Jerusalem and about to take away every vestige that they could look to.
In terms of worship according to what they had had in the Old Testament.
But how much more for you and me who are living right at the end of the grace, and we can see all of the events forming around us for that judgment which will fall. So it leads into that next verse.
The end of all things is at hand. Be therefore sober and watching the prayer. As we were saying this morning. That doesn't mean we are to walk around with a long face, doesn't mean we are never aware of smile. It doesn't mean we are never to have.
Joy in our hearts down here, but it is the sober and serious understanding of the time in which we are living and the fact that as the old.
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Saying goes that we're all familiar with row, row, row your boat gently down the stream. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily.
Life is but a dream. Well, that's not the way the Christian life is. It's a life of joy. But as we had brought before us in the address, it's the life of Labor. It's the life of giving up my own things, my own will, my own comfort.
What I want to do in order to represent the Lord's interest down here.
We will realize the solemnity of the.
The changes that are ahead for planet Earth just to think rather than to live in land where democracy is, is, uh, defended to the hill.
And they don't realize that it's just about over. It is just about over. The whole system of government is going to be dramatically changed. God is going to intervene directly.
Into the affairs of this world and the Lord Jesus is going to take the reins of government. To me, it's so solemn to think that the Lord Jesus, when he was down here in this world, you never have him laughing.
He was one who had joy, said He rejoiced in spirit, but he was the Man of sorrows. How could he, when he saw the misery of the people amongst whom he passed, and then experienced their rejection, knowing that it was going to be for a terrible judgment? How could he laugh?
Could not and there needs to be that soberness with it. There's there's two things mentioned here in verse seven. Sober and soberness is in connection in contrast with drunkenness.
And watching this in contrast with sleeping.
And we can be those two things in the spiritual sense.
Drunkenness in the spiritual sense is being under the influence.
Not of alcohol, perhaps, but of other things to the point where we cannot function properly as Christians.
And watching is in contrast with sleeping.
Does it mean to be asleep?
Means not to be alert.
You know, sometimes we're pretty alert when it comes to our own affairs, but when it comes to the Lord's things, oh, how important it is to be alert in every sense of the word. The Lord help us, dear brother, You really believe the Lord is seeking to awaken us right at the end? And I don't think, I don't see how this world can go on very much longer the way it's going today.
I don't understand how it can. Others have said that before, you know, and here we are still here. But brother, one of these days it's going to happen. The Lord is going to come and things will dramatically change.
The Lord help us to live in the view of that fact. I think that's the expectation of verse 7.
For some time, but I believe that we're seeing now the begin, the beginning of the decline and perhaps the eventual fall of North America as a, a power in the world and the, uh, power, the, uh, government of this country and, uh, the country to the north, uh, they, most of, uh, the light that we've had in connection with Christianity is being given up and the word God is being given up in a public way. And so there's, uh, not that watch because they're.
As they do from the beginning. But umm, for the Christian, their responsibility now? Because we know these things, because we have knowledge of the will of God and we believe in the absolute perfection of the will of God, We say we do. Then we set aside the will of the Gentiles. We walk and we're responsible way before the Lord.
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You know what, sometimes in my own soul, uh, the Psalm 84 and I think it's verse 11, it says no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. That's the will of God. No good thing is he going to withhold from you or I?
If we walk uprightly, we'll have everything that we need in connection with our Christian path, but we need to recognize that this world is just about to end. What we see with our eyes and what we're experiencing in this scene is just both and last night, a Sodom. Nobody in Sodom had a clue that it was the very last night of their existence.
Not even a lot. A lot. And his wife and his two daughters had to be drunk.
In that song, serious to think about rather than it just seems to me that the Lord is speaking to us that we are giving down to the end. We need to hold on to things down here pretty loosely and be simple in our living habits.
Appreciate that Robert in the address, but remember brother.
Speaking about the importance of being simple, a Pilgrim is somebody that is simple and is living at this. Lord help us, brethren.
There's much to be done, you dear young people. It really is a joy to see you here taking interest in the Lord's things. But I'm gonna challenge you to use your talents.
For that which is going to last forever, this world is putting earthly objectives in front of you. The squirrel is not going to last that long. If you run towards those things, what are you going to have in that day when we're taken out of this world? You need to use what we have in view of God's eternity. Lord help you there, young people.
Well, one of the big hindrances to believers going on together is found in verse 8, isn't it?
Above all things, have fervent love among yourselves or charity.
For love or charity shall cover the multitude of sins.
That verse should not be used to.
Passover. That which is a serious sin, a dishonor to the Lord. That isn't a thought.
There are things that have to be addressed and serious sins that have to be taken up, but I believe the thought is here. So many problems and difficulties I speak to my own heart arise from.
Slights and misunderstandings and things that perhaps are done that affect me personally, not so much the Lords honor and glory, not so much something which the Lord is going to have to look to the rest of us to take up, but rather things that we can pass over. Excuse me and let them go.
Select something, go and to hold those grudges and cause strife among ourselves.
I was impressed a while ago by reading a story in a secular magazine. I was sitting in an office waiting for an appointment and I picked up a magazine there and there was a story there about a girl who had found herself in.
A Bob Evans or a Cracker Barrel or something like that somewhere in the United States. She was in her early 20s. She was all by herself, had a meal, went to pay your bill, swiped her card there at the cashier.
And was reluctantly told, sorry, your card is no good. I don't know whether she overspend her limit or what was wrong with it. But anyway, the card was no good. And there she was with only a bit of pocket change in her wallet and no money to pay her bill. What was she going to do? She said, I don't know what I'm going to do. She said to the cashier, I don't have any money. I have no cash. Well, have you got another credit card? No, I don't have another credit card.
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Man standing behind her said Here, use mine.
Swiped his credit card through.
Of course that one worked. He paid her bill for her. She said. Oh, she said, oh, Sir, thank you so much. Give me your name and address so I can pay you back. No way, he said. No way. I'm not even going to tell you who I am.
And she was so impressed that there were still people in America that would do that.
But I ask you and me, why could he do that? And why did he do that? It was over the goodness of his heart. But there was another reason, wasn't there?
He could well afford it, he wouldn't miss it, and probably many of us here in this room could and would have done the same thing because we wouldn't use it either.
$20 or whatever it was, So what?
And you know, it's those that are spiritually wealthy that are able to forgive. Are you spiritually wealthy? If you're spiritually wealthy, then you don't take slights you don't worry about. You may let them go. You say that's not worth getting excited about. That's not worth extracting the last bit from my fellow brother and sister as we get the young just servant in Matthew 18 did who was forgiven the huge debt and then went and grabbed his fellow servant by the throat.
So I suggest that that's the thought here. It's letting things go that affect me.
And if I can go on for one more moment, we find the Lord Jesus doing the same, don't we?
Just one incident that comes to mind. They said to the Lord Jesus, thou art a Samaritan and hast a devil.
How did the Lord answer that?
What an insult for a Jew to be called a Samaritan. Hard for you and me to understand, but that was a rough insult. The Lord ignored that completely, didn't He?
To say he had a devil was a reflection on his father and on the power of the Spirit of God in him. And so he answers that he says I have not a devil.
In Proverbs 19, which is perhaps where Peter got that, we have something of the same idea. Perhaps we could read Proverbs 19 and verse 11.
Says there the discretion of a man, the prudence is anger, and it is his, and it is his glory surpass over a transgression.
MMM beautiful. When there is personal offense, love is able to forgive and to cover emotions in offenses and just.
We may, uh, uh, come across as we seek to move together as Christians, but when we hold a person to every last ounce of what he owes us because we feel he said something or she said something shows that we're really not walking in Christian grace and the kind of love that is needed in these last days. And, uh, we need to have this kind of charity or love that he's speaking out here. I'd just like to say too, the beginning from verse seven on to the end of the chapter.
We have a series of expectations that pertain to how we ought to carry ourselves because, uh, it is the end of all, the end of all things about hand. And the first one is to, to be sober. And we need to be sober because we have an enemy that is lurking at all moments looking for an opportunity to upset us and to turn us away in the path and trip us up in some way. And there's no time for us to underestimate the power of the enemy. We need to be sober in our Christian lives.
And it's the opposite of carelessness, his father has been saying, But also we need to pray. And prayer brings before us the idea of express dependence. We may be, uh, super realizing there's an enemy, but we may, uh, overestimate our own power, thinking that we can handle the enemy and we're sure to fall. But we have prayer as a great resource for us, and that is to express our dependence upon the Lord every single day of our lives.
There were no match for the enemy and we're surely going to be swept along by the current of things in the last days, but.
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But the Lord would keep us, and then to express this love that we're Speaking of to one another in regard to those who overstepped their bounds with regard to us in a personal way. It is to the glory of a man to pass over transgression. Can we do that?
Are we able to have that kind of forbearance?
That's what Christian, Christian Love Is All about.
Another verse is in Proverbs is uh.
Chapter 10 and verse 12.
In our chapter it says love covers a multitude of sins where it says love sufferers all sins.
And I think it's like you mentioned, Bill, it's not a matter of trying to hide sin.
He that covereth his sins shall not prosper, it says.
But it is.
There be a health to souls when there is sin. Notice in James uh chapter five I think he gives the sense in which way sin is covered.
In uh chapter 5 in the actually the last verse of the epistle.
520 Let him know, let's read verse 19. Brethren, if any of you do air from the truth, and one convert him, let him know that he which converted the Sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins. So it's a sense to be a help to that person, so that the thing doesn't have to come out into the open.
In time, There's another verse in Proverbs 2 That I find very beautiful and I think, uh, flies.
Is in chapter 27.
And verse 5.
Open rebuke is better than secret love.
Baseball are the wounds of a friend.
But the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.
So sometimes.
We are wounded, I have to say that in my own experience.
There's been words administered to me at times that have left me wounded.
But getting into the presence of the Lord about it, I have found that what was said to me was extremely helpful. I needed the correction. We needed bread. None of us are sufficient in ourselves. And so sometimes in that way.
Sin is covered, not that it's ignored or try to be covered up.
Without addressing it, no sin must be addressed. And I, I really appreciate what was mentioned about this verse. This is the agape love. You know, in our day, it doesn't seem like we understand very well what that love is because we find it very easy to love when we're loved, when people treat us right, but when we're not treated right.
We find it a little bit tough to laugh.
And it's because we don't understand what this word love means. It's not love.
That comes as an emotion, and sometimes I think we think of love as an emotion. It may affect our emotions, brethren. Yeah, but love is more of a decision.
And I love to when I'm talking to the young people and the youth village, they're in our area where we go to preach the gospel, I often ask them, why does God love us?
The first answer I get is because we're his children.
Do I counter that? And I say, well, if you're not a believer in the Lord Jesus, you're not his children. You're not until you accept the Lord Jesus as your Savior.
The next answer I get is because we're His preachers. Well, that's true, and I would guess that God loves us because of that. But I say I want to give you another answer that I think helps to understand it better. God loves us because God is love. It's nothing to do with what's in me. He loves me because of who He is in His own person.
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And to me, that is so beautiful to get a hold of. It doesn't depend on what he's found here. Even as a believer, sometimes I fail. Does he still love me? Yes, he certainly does. His disposition of love has never changed. He may not be able to show his love sometimes because of what I allow in life, but it's love never changes. And oh dude, get ahold of that, brethren. That's the love we are exhorted.
I should say commanded.
And in John's epistles, I should say, but John's Gospel and his epistles, there are seven times when we are commanded to love one another. Doesn't say love one another if you possibly can. No, it's a command rather, and it's the love of decision. It's the love of sacrifice, and God loves it cost him.
And it cost him terribly. Now that's the love we are told to love one another with.
Fervent love to one another. Oh brethren, to me it is exercising. I'd like to hear perhaps some thought.
Why does God have to command us to love one another? What did you say about that, Bill?
Well, I suppose on the one hand, we're not under law in the New Testament, are we? But God gives us commandments which are the delight of the new life, the new nature in us to carry out. And we get that in John's ministry, don't we? It says love is of God. And in our King James, that verse in first John 4 reads, we love him.
Because he first loved us. But if you notice in.
The Darby translation to him is left out. We love because he first loved us. But it seems, isn't it true, brother Bob, the way you were saying it, that all too often the natural tendency is to revert back to natural love and to revert back to that which is the response of the love of others, and when that is what characterizes us.
Then we will find that all the slights and all the irritations in others, and the way I irritate others too, and all the things that happen among us will take over, and I venture to say they have caused.
More difficulty among believers than bad doctrine and things like that. Not that bad doctrine isn't serious, and I'm not making light of it, but far more trouble has come about because of perceived slights.
And ways of doing things. I know I talked to a dear brother not too long ago who had left the assembly, and when it came right down to it, he didn't disagree with what was done and what was said. He finally was forced to admit it was.
Was the attitude and there was a spirit in which it was done. That's what got to me.
Well, God commands us to love, doesn't he? Because that new life will.
Will love, but we need to be exhorted to let that new life display itself. Is that, is that right?
Yes, and I remember, uh brother AC Brown talking about the difference between the commandments of the Old Testament and the commandments of the New Testament.
I really have enjoyed it. He put it this way. The commandments of the Old Testament were do this and you will live.
The commandments of the New Testament are.
Live and you will do this.
And he first gives us the light that wants to do it, and then the commandments are the divine directives for that new life.
I remember a sister in South America where there was a problem.
Saying there was a problem on some sisters. I don't know what it is, what it was about, but.
She said. I hate that sister.
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And a brother that heard it made a good comment I thought.
He said if you really do hate that sister, it may be that you've never been born again into God's family. And that's true, you do hate that sister.
But I wanna tell you, he said. If you have been born into God's family, you have a nature that is able to love that system.
But that was a very good answer.
We need to be challenged about that brother. And Bill says they're just sometimes those little things we allow to wrangle in US. Let them loose, brethren. Don't hold on to them because they will hinder you, not anybody else. You hold on to them because you think you're going to make that other person suffer. That's not the case. You are going to suffer. Let it loose. That's what's called roots of bitterness in Hebrews chapter 12.
#2.
Watch carefully that those roots of bitterness don't spring up and trouble us. There's another verse I'd like to read in first John chapter 2. In connection with that, she mentioned I'll and I have found such a blessing.
First John chapter 2 and verse.
Then he that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling.
In in isn't that beautiful?
You really love your brothers. There won't be any occasion of stumbling.
Another verse in this song. I'm 119, it says.
Great peace, as they which love thy law and do nothing, thou offend them.
Do I get a pen then?
Because there's something in here, my old flesh, that gets offended.
Rather than it's not the spirit that's been offended, it's a flesh.
Lord help us brother, and this is really important.
Question of our law at the bottom of every division, every divorce, every rec friendship are held offensive. How can those of us who've been forgiven for so much hold some minor insignificant thing against our president? It's true this admonition would solve a lot of things because all of these things you said, it harms you first. It does. But though that verse you quoted about a root of bitterness, it says it will trouble many.
It grows there and it destroys the person and the Lord has to bring that person under judgment. In that parable about the unjust servant that was turned over to the tormentors, I believe the Lord does that. If we hold on to something and we will not forgive our brother, our sister, He will turn us over to the tormentors. He will allow the enemy to come in and tear at the flesh because we won't listen to his, his quiet pleadings. He will allow things to come in our life that will turn us.
In the in a government, a way of government into into our lives. This admonition. I once did a study on that word charity why the King James translators chose that word at its time and the what it meant at that time.
In the English language, it's closely associated with the word cherish and if you cherish something.
You prize it. If you prize it. There's an idea of protection in that. It's it's prize. We only get that if we're gonna prize our brethren. Sometimes people say love is blind and you may look at somebody and boy, that sister loves that brother. Love is surely blind, or vice versa. What do they see in that person? Well, somewhere along the line they chose to love that person. And even when the age brings wrinkles and they don't look so pretty anymore, and there's even love that was greater than the beginning, it's because a choice has been made and they prize them.
They prize them. You mentioned how that we can't really love until we are first loved by Christ. He says we have his love shed abroad in us. There's the pool, there's the resource from which love can go and flow out. It's there already. So when he tells us to, well, I can't love that person. They did this, they did that. They're like that. Oh yes, you can. You can love it out of the new creature that you are in Christ and he can do that. And if we see them, I remember Ron Reeves doing the thing with the the lettuce, the head of lettuce, peeling away the outside and saying that we need to find Christ in our brethren. Peel away the outside, look for it in there.
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If we see someone in Christ being prized by our Savior that he prizes them, He's chosen to set His love upon them and it has nothing to do with their behavior. I can choose then to love them and prize them and cherish them because God values them and I can learn to value them as well as them as well. And if I look with my new eyes and I look that way, I will find in them Christ. And if I can't prize that, then maybe I'm not born again.
Like the brother warned the sister, I need to look at myself and find out where my heart is. But if I do.
I will find in them the same thing that Christ does, that He prizes them. He set his love upon them, not because they're special or there's something about them that comes out of them, but because He chose to.
It is possible to be, even as believers, injustice collectors.
Sign of a poor state of soul. A poor Christian if he's a injustice collection.
I believe. I believe he is.
The problem with the Corinthians was that they were taken up with knowledge and the display of gift and so on, and so Paul tells them all about gifts and how it was to be regulated and so on.
But then he points out that which was supreme over at all, and that all the gifts and all the knowledge that there might be, even in a right sense, was no good if love were not practically explained. And as we've already heard, every believer has the capacity to.
Display divine love. But if we're not careful, we can get away from it. And I say again, the Corinthians were taken up with things like knowledge and gifts and a public show of things, all of which really ministered to the flesh and wasn't love at all. And So what love does is what we have in First Corinthians 13, isn't it? And Paul brings before them the practical display of love.
That if they really were walking in the good of all that Christ had given them, then that is the way that the knowledge would be used, that is the way that the guest would be exercised, rather than to, shall we say, accredited, distinguished themselves.
Another word that's used in the New Testament that is translated love, and it's bileo. It's, uh, brotherly love, and it is something that is encouraged as well in Scripture. It's interesting to see that it is often connected with this agape love, but it is more the thought of the mutual cultivation of appreciation of one another.
Bill, I've known you for quite a while. I think I really appreciate you.
I don't know if you do the same to me, but if there is then that means that that brotherly love and scripture tells us in Hebrews chapter 13 verse one, it says let brotherly love continue.
It's to be cultivated, isn't it, that mutual appreciation?
00:45:02
But sometimes we need to go beyond that even that. You notice how it puts it in, uh, First Thessalonians chapter 4. And I'll read you a few verses that puts the tube together.
And it's interesting to think about it and I think it's profitable to meditate on. I don't know that I understand it that fully.
But not as that through Thessalonians chapter 4 and verse 9.
As touching brotherly love, as filial.
Ye need not that I write unto you, for ye yourselves are taught of God, the love that's agape one another.
Notice then.
Second Peter chapter.
1.
When we are exhorted to add to our faith.
Different qualities.
Verse five starts the list.
But the last two things on the list.
The end of verse 7.
Add to godliness, brotherly kindness, that that beloved and the bride.
Charity or luck? Agape luck?
So if I would do something deliberately, Bill?
To offend you.
There might be a suspension of the brotherly law.
Could you still love me?
I believe I could, brother Bob. And I want to say for the record that in the other category the feeling is very mutual.
But that's a good point though, isn't it? We don't want to belabor it too long, but even if there has sometimes occasion arisen when that brotherly love.
Can't be shown out if a brother is offended with me and I pretend that there's nothing wrong.
That's not gonna solve the problem.
But Divine Love ought to be operative in spite of anything that happens like that.
And they say that because I often heard.
In different places where I've gone the complaint, there's no love in this assembly.
When I hear that, I say the person that's complaining is the first one guilty.
Because of coffee. Love in its own character. Love that loves when there's nothing lovable. So if there's no love in this assembly, you start. You start loving. And love provokes love.
Brother Bob, when you were talking about being wounded and how the scripture talks, the faithful are the wounds of the friend.
When somebody has already shown that they really care about you, they really love you, and they come and correct you and there may it may hurt, is it a lot easier to swallow? Is it a lot easier to take when you've already had it proven to you they really care for you?
Our brother was talking about an older 1 putting the hands on a younger one and like shooting the arrow and so on. There it is again. If somebody who really has already shown they love me, they care about me and they come alongside to do that. Boy, it's a lot easier to take when they're, I have a sense that they really love me and there's a sense of grace in this love towards me. Well, I, I then I can take that. And it's, it's much, it's applied much more readily when there has to be some wounded.
Which you said Sam, is Romans chapter 15 and verse 14 and I think that is a very good point to think about.
Laying the groundwork so that we can be helpful in correction when there's necessary, when it's necessary.
One of the ways Roman. Let me go ahead. Excuse me, just read this verse. Romans 15, verse 14.
I myself also am persuaded of you, my brethren, that ye are #1.
Full of goodness.
#2 filled with all knowledge and then #3.
Abel also to admonish one another.
00:50:03
Go ahead Bruce, I was just going to say one of the ways in which we can manifest love, show love to one another is what we have in the next verse and that is in using hospitality. And this means to open our homes to one another and to bring them in. Have you ever, am I the only person here that has that feeling or experience? But have you ever?
It's a little bit of coldness between you and another brother or sister, a couple. Bruce, can you speak up a little? And then what happens is you.
You get the notion to invite them to your home for a meal and you spend an evening with them and after they go home, you see them. I really enjoyed that. And you feel closer to them. You feel like, uh, whatever there could have been developing between you, they seem to have, have, uh, been just just anticipated. So I think that, uh, there's a reason why the, the expectations flow on here. And he talks about using hospitality.
In fact, you'll see it elsewhere in the Hebrews 13.
Just turn to Hebrews 13 real quick right here. That says let brotherly love continue verse one. Then what's verse 2?
Be not forgetful to entertain or strangers.
So the same idea of using hospitality flows on after an exhortation to love. There's a reason why the Spirit of God puts these two things together. And so let's open our homes to one another in a regular way. I think it will build those bonds, strengthen the bonds that we so desperately need to have strength in among us.
Please Bruce uh, comment on the last, uh, words that verse 9.
Without murmuring, it should be translated.
I suppose that would come up when couple so and so has invited me and my wife to their house and we had a nice time and a month or two go by and we kind of feel like we all them to have them over too. But I don't like them. I'm too busy. I don't wanna that would be doing it with murmuring or grudging. It should be because I we have an open heart toward one another and not because we feel we have to repay the kind of that's not the kind of Christian love that should be seen amongst them.
My father taught me a good thing in this regard, and I'll be here forever grateful for it. He's home with the Lord now, and I remember seeing him.
In situations where maybe it was pointed out to him that a certain person was upset with him.
My dad, when that happened, he would make a special effort to go and be more friendly, more kind and spend more time with that person. And it worked every time. It just all the stuff went away. And I learned from that that it didn't give Satan an inroad there. It didn't give him a foothold.
At all. It was gone. And I, I watched him do that over the years. Just go after that and uh, you know, that's a good lesson to see.
Number 84 in the appendix.
Number 84 in Atlanta.