Aberdeen Conference: 2022
Table of Contents
Luke 12:30-34
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Father's house above.
Format and is prepared.
There is the home, the rest we love, There are bright rewards #48.
High in the Father's house.
Of.
Our engineers preferred.
A war.
Thank God and our Father, we thank Thee once again that Thou has directed our hearts.
To that heavenly home where we are headed.
And we thank Thee too, that thou hast not only told us concerning Thy coming, Lord Jesus, for which we wait.
But thou hast in thy word.
Taking us right on into a coming eternity, whereas we have sung together, all taint of sin shall be removed, and all evil done away.
We thank Thee, our God, for the prospect of that precious fulfillment. Behold, the Lamb of God is taketh away the sin of the world. And so we look to thee now for Thy guidance and health in these meetings.
And we know, our God, that thy Spirit is here, willing to lead.
Willing to guide and direct.
As to what we should take up and we pray our God that he may be free to lead.
We pray that.
Thou would direct us to the part of Thy word that would be most suitable for us, and that the remarks that may be made may not only be accordance in Thy mind as given to us in Thy word, but that they might need meet the need of each one. Here don't know what's our God. The various degrees of spiritual understanding and maturity here thou knowest to the.
Various states of soul. And we pray our God that according to thy wisdom, by thy spirit, fellow minister, according to our need. So we commend our time together to thee, and look to thee independence and in expectation, for we ask of Lord Jesus in thy precious and worthy name, Amen. Amen.
For if my brethren would consider Luke's Gospel chapter 12.
It's too big of a chapter I think, to try and take up all of it. It's quite long, but.
I would make the suggestion, and again subject to what my brethren feel perhaps starting off with.
Verse 30 or 31 and going to the end of the chapter. The reason I suggested is that.
I think it fits with what we've had before us in our hymns and in the prayer meeting.
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And the Lord here is directing his own to.
The heavenly side of things to the heavenly blessings. Not in the sense of what Paul gives us, but.
Away from an earthly Kingdom to laying up treasure in heaven.
And although very much, of course, in Luke has a Jewish flavor, yet, as our brother Clarence Lundin used to remind us, more than any other gospel, Luke's gospel is the introduction to Paul's ministry. And that's true. It's very true.
What do my brethren think of that? And I won't be offended if someone says I've got something else on my heart.
Mother had the same thought that the priority of the test already the subject. Amen.
Well, perhaps if that's all right, we could start at.
Verse 30 and perhaps read to the end of the chapter. We can refer to what's earlier on perhaps if we need to, but.
The last half of the chapter would probably be enough for us.
Luke's Gospel chapter 12 and verse 30. For all these things to the nations of the world seek after, and your Father knoweth that you have need of these things, but rather seek you the Kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you. Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. Sell that you have, and give alms. Provide yourself bags with wax not old. A treasure in the heavens that faileth not.
Where no thief approaches, neither moth corrupteth.
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Let your loins be gird about, and your lights burning, and ye yourselves liken the men that wait for their Lord, when he will return from the wedding, that when He cometh and knocketh, they may open unto Him immediately. Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when He cometh, shall find watching. Verily I say unto you, that He shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meet, will come forth and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or in a third watch, and find him so, blessed are those servants.
And this know, that if the Goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through. Be therefore ready also, for the Son of Man cometh in an hour when ye think not. Then Peter said unto him, Lord, speak us out of this parable unto us, or even to all. And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful? And why steward, whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season?
Blessed is that servant whom is Lord, when he cometh shall find so doing.
Now the truth I say unto you, that he will make him ruler over all that he hath. But if that servant say in his heart, My Lord delayeth his coming, and shall begin to beat the men, servants and maidservants, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken. The Lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, in an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him asunder, and will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers, and that servant which knew his Lord's will, and prepared not himself.
Neither did, according to His will shall be feeding with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did commit many commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For enter whomsoever much is given of him shall be much required, And whom men have committed much of him, they will ask them more.
I am come to send fire on the earth, and what will I if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straightened till it be accomplished? Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you nay, but rather division. For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, 3 against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father, the mother against the daughter.
Daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And he said also to the people, when you see a cloud rise out of the West straight way, you say there cometh a shower. And so it is. And when you see the South wind blow, you say there will be heat, and it come at the pass. You hypocrites, you can discern the face of the sky of the earth. But how is it that you do not discern this time? Yeah, and why even of yourselves? Judge ye not what is right?
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When thou goest with thine adversary to the magistrate, as thou art in the way, give diligence that thou mayest be delivered from him, lest he hail thee to the judge. And the judge delivered thee to the officer, and the officer cast thee into prison. I tell thee thou shalt knocked apart thence till thou hast paid the very last might.
I.
Well, as we as we said a few minutes ago.
I believe Luke's Gospel is.
Introduction to Paul's ministry. And in that sense we get many things that give hints as to what was to come. And we know that of course in Luke's gospel, it's not written chronologically the way some of the other gospels are, such as Mark. But Luke tends to group events together or parables together because they have a moral connection. And so it's important to recognize that.
And when reading through Luke, we don't find everything perfectly in chronological order, but.
What I have appreciated about this chapter is that the Lord Jesus is bringing before them, in a general way the giving up of present advantage in order to have future gain. And we all understand that in natural terms. We understand, for example, how a young person might work hard to get an education, anticipating the good job that he or she might get down the road.
We know how individuals and we're encouraged along those lines today to.
Put money aside in order to be able to have some there for retirement and so on. But what we have here goes far beyond all that, doesn't it? Because the Lord Jesus is really calling his own to follow a rejected Christ. They were expecting an immediate Kingdom, of course.
And the Lord here doesn't completely.
Shall I say turn his back on that because he knew very well that there would be an opportunity after His resurrection and dissension for Israel to hear the gospel from a risen Christ in glory. But in a general Ray, in a general way, he points them to treasure in heaven to following a rejected Christ. We get it here, for example, in what it says in verse 51.
Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on the earth.
What did it say at the beginning of Luke's gospel when the angels praised They said.
Peace on earth and goodwill toward men, or good pleasure in man. It could read. But now the Lord says, Oh no, that's not going to happen right away. No way, no.
Have not come to give peace on earth, but rather division, and that's what we are experiencing and have experienced all through the Christian era and will experience until the Lord comes and sets up His Kingdom. But then the encouragement here.
I say it to my own soul. The encouragement here is some of the most wonderful encouragement I believe in the whole Bible.
To those who are willing to follow a rejected Christ.
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Starting off with the verse that we began.
We are reminded that the nations of the world seek after what seems to be necessary in life down here. And it's true, we do need food. We do need clothing. We do need shelter. But.
The Lord goes through all that, including the story with which we are all very familiar, of the rich man who had his fields and his crops bring forth plentifully, and so plentifully that he even pulled down his barns and built bigger ones, and then was all set ready to relax. Take it easy.
Eat, drink, and be merry. Thou hast much goods laid by for many years.
And the Lord reminds him, this night thy soul shall be required of thee. And we see that going on all around us in the world today, where the horizon of men's thoughts is the world down here. How are we going to save the planet? How are we going to fix the war in the Ukraine? Where are we going to get enough to eat?
Supplies are going to dry up and all the rest of it, and it is very real. It is very real. We're not making light of it. We have been accustomed to a pretty significant degree of prosperity in these favored lands, especially in North America, for many years. The Lord has been very good to us, and we'll see later in the chapter that we are more responsible because of that.
But then.
In verse 31 we get the direction, and this isn't the only place where this verse occurs.
Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. And that's a promise. Doesn't say we'll get everything we want. It doesn't say that the Lord will give us whatever we might have had in the past. But all these things shall be added unto you. And what a precious privilege it is for you and for me.
In these last days of the Church's history.
To be taken up with Christ's interests in this world.
It's a tremendous privilege.
Brother Bill, we've been told that all we have as is a spiritual blessings as Christians, you know, we've been blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places and, and now you're telling us, are you telling us that we have earthly blessings too? I'll just explain it. I'm just asking a question because all I've I've always heard that our blessings are just spiritual. And you are quite right, Vern. And sometimes we need dear brothers like you to make us use our language more accurately.
Because strictly speaking, our blessings are heavenly and what we have down here in the way of temporal things the scripture calls mercies. Is that is that what you were bringing out? I wasn't bringing out. That's that's the, that's what it means. Yes, mercies and blessings are different. They're not the same thing. And I, I love it when someone is brings us back to accuracy in those things because.
Our blessings are definitely heavenly and Paul gives them to us in Ephesians one and verse 3.
And we are blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in heavenly places in Christ. We this that isn't brought in here in the same way, but the things that we enjoy down here in a temporal way of their mercies and the Lord is has promised us that he will look after us.
If we look after his interests, we don't need to worry about his looking after our interests.
For the sake of those that are younger here, I wonder if someone would give us just a brief comparison between the the terms the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of heaven. I'll just mention this. A verse that's been helpful to me in regards to the Kingdom of God is in Romans 14.
Verse 17.
For the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink.
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Righteousness and peace.
Boy and the Holy Ghost. So sometimes we say that the the Kingdom of God is not something that is seen, but it's more of a moral thing, a moral term. Whereas with the Kingdom of heaven that Matthew uses in his gospel primarily is more tangible something that will be seen. It's it goes on in mystery form right now because the King's not reigning.
We as believers can recognize the Lord's coming place and we can acknowledge him in in our hearts as the the true King, even though we we have a closer relationship than that. But I was just thinking of since it's it's mentioned in our chapter here, it might be helpful if someone could add to that.
What about her brother Steve? You usually can delineate these things well for us.
Seems to me here it's it's.
The president aspect of things, the moral aspect of things that our brother John referred to in Romans, and seeking those.
Those things to be walking in accordance with the the moral characters of those who belong to that Kingdom.
And just might add, when he says, All these things shall be added unto you.
It might be more than just what the nations seek after, but it's the state of soul that goes through this scene. Not anxious, not caring in a way of being overwrought as to whether we're going to have the things that the nations of this world seek after, but the peace and soul. And that goes along with seeking first the Kingdom of God.
Seeking first his interest here below will not only have our practical needs taken care of, but we won't.
Suffer the anxieties that the world suffers.
I'm sitting here trying to not look back at Luke's gospel from the full understanding of a Christian position.
And wondering to myself.
What did they think he meant when he said Kingdom of God? Because all through the prophets.
Of course we're raised up when there was a need for prophetic ministry, corrective ministry warning.
You get this continuous pattern of serious warning and rebuke to the mass of the people that were going on at best, indifferently at worst.
With total disregard for the privileges they had and for their responsibility to the one true God. And yet woven into that is encouragement for those that humble themselves at His Word, who felt the the straying of the nation, who felt it.
Continuously held out to them. And it's of a moral character. You think of the end of the book of Isaiah and other passages like that. And at the beginning of this chapter, it's there's so many people here. There's an innumerable multitude of people and they're stepping on one another. There's a whole lot of people here just pressing to listen. And yet the Lord seems to address his comments to disciples.
And if you use disciple in the broad sense, of course, many disciples were not morally fitted yet or maybe ever to really enter into the Kingdom of God as we we know it from John's gospel, from the epistles. But I have to think that a godly Jew listening to the Lord Jesus is just trying to process this. Is he talking about a literal Kingdom that's about to come finally?
Or is he talking about something more mysterious and it's.
And so as you say, it's, it has to be a moral character of things that, that, that gradually that the wheels are spinning and, and it's got nothing to do with the Romans. It's got nothing to do with those things. It's got to do with pressing in, in a moral way to that which is in conformance with the with the mind and nature of God.
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I wonder, Bruce, if a verse in Luke 17 and I just make the suggestion.
Might help us in that.
Because as you say, there's no question that the Jews and the Lords disciples who were close to him were expecting a visible Kingdom. But what does the Lord say in chapter 17 in verse 20? Now granted, this was the Pharisees, not his disciples in that same sense, but.
Luke 17 verse 20, and when he was demanded of the Pharisees.
The Kingdom of God should come. So evidently they did. At least some of them understand it or take it as being a visible Kingdom.
He answered them and said, The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation, neither shall they say, lo here, or lo there, for behold the Kingdom of God.
Is within you, or perhaps more accurately, is among you. And so he directs them away from a visible Kingdom to his own person. What was the Kingdom of God? It was the exhibition of all that was suitable in a moral way, in the ways of God, that was perfectly displayed in Christ. You, You agree with that, Bruce?
Yes, and so the Lord makes it clear eventually that there isn't going to be a visible Kingdom, at least not right away. But you are seeing the Kingdom of God, and that is what you are seeing in me, the person of Christ, which bears out what brother Steve said.
I have a question.
In Paul's ministry, what would be the closest state?
Thank you for this verb.
Question in Paul's ministry, what would be the closest total statement that he would give that would?
To this verse.
I'm not sure which verse you're talking about, Dickie. First, the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. I'm sorry.
Isn't that reality the Kingdom of God in that sense?
In contrast with the Kingdom of heaven.
Wouldn't there be what was read to us in Romans?
That it's not in those physical things but Lovejoy and peace in the Holy Ghost. As far as a quote from Pauls ministry. But there's another quote from Paul we might add to it and that's from Acts chapter 20.
Verse 25.
And now, behold, I know that ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the Kingdom of God, shall see my face no more.
That's that he went among the Saints preaching what was proper to them as those that were in the Kingdom of God as to their moral walk through this world. And when we intersect that with the truth of the assembly, we really get it in First and 2nd Corinthians very largely a practical conduct and walk of the Saints through this world. Their moral conduct is what he preached.
Among the Saints.
Could someone maybe take a look at the 1St chapter of Acts? Maybe read that? I don't have a mic handy but.
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Acts chapter one speaks of what the Lord Jesus taught in the 40 days that he was with his disciples.
I was just thinking that I'm not sure what passage you were you were had in mind, but in Acts one in verse 6.
When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel?
And his answer in the next verse. And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father hath put in his own power. In other words, He didn't tell them that it wasn't going to happen, but He told them that it was not going to be their portion that they would know when. And then He directs their focus into another direction, because there was something that they had to be occupied with, and the Spirit of God would be sent down to to empower that testimony that they would give. But.
I was thinking of it. I'm not sure what you had in mind, but I was thinking of it because even though they went through all the Lord's ministry with Him for those three plus years.
They, like we, tend to be a little bit slow learners or slow in transition, and they're still kind of stuck on that same idea. And indeed it is. It is still yet future to us as well, but the Lord redirects them.
Were you thinking of verse 3 John verse three of Acts 1?
And Speaking of Jesus, the antecedent in verse one.
And then it says in verse 2, Until the day in which He was taken up. After that He through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen, to whom also He showed himself alive after his passion, by many infallible proofs, being seen of them 40 days. And here it is, and Speaking of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God.
Brother, if you could also read the last verse of Acts.
Yes, last verse in the book.
And it's very significant.
Acts Chapter 28.
Verse 30 And Paul dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and received all that came in unto him, preaching the Kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him.
Thank you brother.
Well, we could probably spend the whole afternoon on the Kingdom of God because of course it goes right on into the eternal state and there will be a vast moral Kingdom encompassing heaven and earth in a future day. But as Steve reminded us, what we need to get is the meaning that I believe the Spirit of God would have a state from it in this chapter, and it is a moral state that isn't keeping.
With those who recognize the rightful king.
And walk according to his.
In other words, according to his ways and his truth in a world that is opposed to Him and will continue to be opposed to Him until He comes to reign in power and glory.
And what is very precious is.
Verse 32, it says the Lord Jesus says fear not little flock, that is, they weren't to expect a visible Kingdom. If they were expecting a visible Kingdom, God wouldn't call them or the Lord Jesus rather wouldn't call them a little flock. But then he says it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. And if I remember rightly, maybe someone has the Darby translation.
Is that not in the past tense in the JND?
It has been your father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. Yes, it has been your father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.
I don't pretend to be able to explain that fully, maybe others can do a better job, but to me it seems to imply that if we can put it in common language, the Lord Jesus is saying.
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It has already been your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.
You are going to get it. And because of what God has determined in His purposes and councils as a divine person, the Lord could say it's already been given to you in that sense. Are we going in that sense to inherit a Kingdom? We are. And is there any doubt about it or any question about it? Definitely not.
Now this chapter does have a Jewish component to it. The Lord does tell them that he will come as we get in verse 39. There's a there were the Goodman of the house and knowing what hour the thief would come and so on. That's the way the Lord comes when he comes in judgment.
He comes as a thief in the night and he comes as the Son of man. But at the same time there's encouragement here for those.
Who were, perhaps with some justification, saying.
Where is that coming? Where is that Kingdom? And the Lord says.
You've already been given the Kingdom. My Father already has it all arranged for you. You are going to get it, and it has been the Father's good pleasure to give it to you. You won't see it right now. It's not going to be a visible Kingdom, but you're not going to lose out.
I wonder if I might add.
One thought to the discussion about the Kingdom of God, which I.
We have spoken of with the use of the term moral and I know when I was younger I I didn't know what was meant when that was referred to.
That the Kingdom of God is a moral thing? Well, what do we mean by that? And for the sake of the younger like, I was once myself a little bit confused about this.
When we talk about something being moral, we mean that it has to do with simply with what is right.
And wrong in relation to our or with respect to our relationship with.
Men and with God.
It's not something that can be seen. This Kingdom of God does not come with observation, as Bill just referred to. It is invisible. That's why it's sometimes called mysterious. It's not something that can be seen, but it is moral, meaning it has to do with what is right and wrong concerning our relationships with God and with man.
So help me on the use of of his reference here to father.
We're we're used to thinking of.
Of the wonderful position we have now after Pentecost, the Holy Spirit send down to us, indwelling each of us, giving us to be able to cry ABBA Father, because we're sons. We get that in Galatians and other places, and we identify that as a peculiarly Christian privilege blessing. And the Lord introduced it, sending the message via Mary.
To his disciples I ascend unto my Father.
Your father to my God, and your God, after his resurrection, that new place he took was really one for you and me, and we enjoy it today. But here he's talking about your Father. And again I'm putting myself back with them. And are they scratching their heads? Because it wasn't a known revelation, as I understand it, to a godly Jew that they would address the Lord as Father. There's a couple.
General references in the Old Testament, Father of Eternity.
And and and so on, but not the revelation of God is Father. Is this is this the transition bill that you were speaking about from from Luke into Paul or how how do we understand this?
Didn't mean to put you on the spot. No, you're not. I just.
I have enjoyed it that way and I hope I'm right because the Lord Jesus did refer when he was speaking to the nation of the Jews to.
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Heavenly Father He referred to their heavenly Father, and in that way the Trinity, which had not been revealed, at least not in fullness in the Old Testament, was revealed to them. They knew who in their day when the Lord was here, their heavenly Father was, and he introduced them to the expression about the Holy Spirit and.
That your Father will give you the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him, and so on and and so on.
But I like to think that the adjective heavenly is deliberately left out here by the Spirit of God because.
And we don't want to make a man an offender for a word, but the expression Heavenly Father is not really, strictly speaking, a proper expression for a Christian to use. Now we hear many dear believers pray Heavenly Father and so on, and we don't, as I say, make a man an offender for a word. But we don't find that expression once the full truth of Christianity comes out. But I'd like to hear the remarks of others on that.
I have enjoyed it that way and really, really appreciated it that the term heavenly is not added to Father here because the Lord is bringing them slowly into that blessed relationship, which of course we eventually get in the 20th chapter of John. I ascend unto my Father, and your Father, and unto my God, and your God.
Hadn't he introduced them to that in the first part of the Levitz chapter when he in the Lord's Prayer or the Disciples prayer? Yes, he had. Thank you.
But he does say our Father, which art in heaven, so the expression is still there, that's all.
But do you think he was Heavenly Father?
In the new translation, though, it doesn't read that way. Yeah. How is it, Ben? It's Father thy name be hallowed, thy Kingdom come doesn't.
Express it, Heavenly Father. New Translation.
Well, that only supports what we were saying. Would you? Would you see it that way?
Well, it's a wonderful thing, isn't it, to know God is our Father. And what an expression that is. The Lord Jesus could say in another place, the Father.
Himself loveth you, and so if it is, if it has been our Father's good pleasure to give us the Kingdom.
When a divine person says something.
If we could say it this way, it's as good as done, isn't it?
There can be no question whatever about it, but you and I are asked to give up the enjoyment of a Kingdom here on earth in order to have it in the future and to follow a rejected Christ, and without wanting to be critical or throw stones at anyone else.
So-called Reconstructionism or Covenant theology is destroying what we have in this chapter and it is sweeping North America where we all know what covenant theology is. I hope it's the idea that Israel merges with the church and that our job in this world is not so much to follow a rejected Christ, but to jump into the political arena and every other arena.
And get everything all ready for the Kingdom. Because literally they, some of them, it depends. There are different flavors of covenant theology, but by and large, some of them say that we're already in the Kingdom. The Kingdom is here, and it's our job to see that it's established and straighten everything out in this world and bring it all into line with what God would have. Well, if that is true, then we better tear this chapter right out of our Bibles because it's totally contrary to it.
The Lord here is basically saying and we get it all through.
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Paul's epistles and other writings in the New Testament that you and I are now called to follow. A rejected Christ. Yes, he says he'll look after us. Will there be a Kingdom? Indeed there will, and because he has already given us the Kingdom in that sense.
You and I can be encouraged to follow a rejected Christ. It's not a matter of drudgery or a matter of OK if I have to or something like that. No, it's a matter of joyfully and gladly looking after his interest down here and as Dave Harmon was bringing before us, showing to this world the moral character what is right and wrong, not according to the world's ideas, but to God's ideas.
What is right and wrong between me and my fellow man? What is right and wrong between me and God? We are to show that according to what God's Word teaches us and what the Lord Jesus was bringing before His own year. That is a wonderful privilege, and it's a privilege you'll never have in the glory. We'll never have the chance again to follow and serve a rejected Christ.
Recently in Walla Walla the Lord is seems to be has given us a new meeting room. It's previously a church and when they left, they left their hymnals there. And so I was looking at one the other day leafing through it and it just made me thankful for our him look.
I think of Mr. Darby years ago.
Being used of the Lord to help.
Edit this hymn book a little bit and then to think, well, what's he going to call it?
Well, he seemed to be affected by this verse, the Little Flock hymn book, and I think what you say, Brother Bill.
As you read through that, how many times have we?
Sung those hymns and they lifted our hearts right out of this world in the the tone and character that they have. And as we enjoy that why it will give us to be content to be a little flock wanted in this world while we wait.
Hmm.
And so if we have a future Kingdom that is already ours, we can afford to start carrying out what we get in verse 33.
Cell that you have and give home, Provide yourselves bags which wax not old. A treasure in the heavens that faileth not where no thief approacheth, neither moth corrupt them. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also and.
We can afford to use what we have down here for Christ's interest. That doesn't mean being careless with our money or just throwing it away. It doesn't mean using it in a wrong way.
It doesn't mean using it without wisdom from the Lord, but we can use what we have down here. Why? All because there's a Kingdom waiting for us ahead.
And the Lord has promised it to us. And so we can well afford to do what we we are advised to do in verse 33 here, and to lay up that treasure in heaven.
You know, everyone is worried today. So I see on the Internet, or at least I shouldn't say everyone, but people that invest in the stock market now are quite worried about it because I gather that it's gone down a good deal in the last few months. And people are wondering all this talk of what's going to happen, is the market going to keep on going down and so on and the so-called bull market or whatever they call it that has been going on for many years.
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Going to turn into a bear market and so on and all this kind of thing.
Yes, all that is part of life down here for some people, but everyone that has an investment there is worried about it. They're saying where are things going to go and what's going to happen to us?
But you and I can make the very best investment possible, can't we? The very best.
Very best investment there is is to lay up treasure in heaven and it'll bear fruit for all eternity. That investment, nothing can touch that. And so we can well afford to use what we have down here for the Lord and to use it for his interests knowing that it's.
Putting things into an investment that can never, never fail.
So how far are we to take his words?
Sell that you have and give home.
Provide yourselves the bags which wax not all how? If he's saying sell how much? How will you not have a bank account?
How we live from day-to-day, he says. Sell what you have give off.
So I'm thinking that maybe somebody is thinking, what does this mean?
I think this stands in contrast to what we had earlier in the chapter where it says in verse 21, So is he that layeth up treasure for himself and is not rich towards God. For the Jewish mind, earthly riches were a sign of God's blessing, but now their thinking is going to be turned completely on its head as it were. They want to look for earthly riches when it says seek ye first the Kingdom of God. They want to seek it in this world and the blessings, what they thought of as the blessings of this world and as Christians too.
That's not our position to seek.
God's.
Approbation through the material things of this world. That's not what we look for and so he's directing their minds. Heavenwood. Now this is and a new relationship. We've mentioned the word father. It's rather interesting in John in Matthew chapter 6.
Matthew we think of as the most Jewish of the Gospels, and it certainly is. But Matthew chapter 6, the Father has mentioned 12 Times. Matthew Chapter 11, the Father is introduced again. But the disciples we find in connection with the Lord's Prayer has brought out more. In Luke they ask, how should we pray? This was a relationship that they were very uncomfortable with. This is not a Christian way of thinking. We don't ask how should we pray. It flows naturally. Now that we have the Spirit of God and that new life within us, we cry, have a father. It comes as naturally as a baby.
But for these disciples, this was all new, new, all new to them. So I think if we take this up in a very literal way, well, I'm going to sell all my goods and empty my bank accounts. We're right back where the Jewish thinking is. We're thinking in terms of material things and not in terms of spiritual and moral things.
Verse was one remark in our written ministry. Brother Vern was a big help to me and I pass it on.
Because I think your question is an excellent one, but we maybe should be asking you to answer it.
Without revealing too much, but you've got a year or two on me and maybe I should be asking you. But anyway, here's something that.
Really helped me, a brother said.
If my heart is set on anything on which Christ could not have His heart set to that extent, I am out of communion with Him.
Now.
We don't want to miss be misunderstood.
Suppose I have a car. Does Christ have his heart set on that car and therefore mine can be?
No, that's not the thought. But if you and I need a vehicle to get around in, then there's nothing wrong with having one. And if we need a house to live in, there's nothing wrong with having one. And I need clothes to wear and a few other things and so.
00:55:02
How far to carry this verse cell that she had? To me it means sell those things which are not necessary.
For your role in this world, which is to seek Christ's interest.
Now that has to be an individual exercise with each one of us. And I have no one, dear brethren, who have had big homes, but they use them for the Lord. They use them for the Saints. And if they invited a crowd in, they had room to put them up and they had room to have a good number of people for a hymn sing and all the rest of it. They weren't their, their heart wasn't set on that. And what is very interesting, and I'll repeat it because it really.
Impressed me going back in this same chapter.
To verse 15.
It says, Beware of cup, take heed and beware of covetousness, for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.
But the JND puts A twist on it that is rather interesting.
I'm not quoting it accurately, but it's roughly.
A man does not have to be in abundance for his life to be in his possessions. Is that pretty close?
And I can honestly say from my travels and I, I've had the opportunity to travel extensively in some of the poorer countries of the world and I have seen.
People in some of those countries more taken up.
This is a true story and I don't want to single out anybody, but it's not being derogatory. In the city of Kolkata in India, they have rickshaw pullers and the government tried to outlaw them because they said that was too demeaning for one man to grab two shafts of a rickshaw and run through the streets with people sitting in the back of it.
And there was an awful outcry from them. They said, look, that's our living. That's our.
Livelihood. Don't you dare take that away from us.
And I remember talking to a young man who was in his 20s who had managed to scrape together enough money to buy a rickshaw, and he was all excited about the money he was going to make and how good life was going to be for him because he had a good career ahead of him as a rickshaw puller.
You and I would.
What is it really? I don't know what kind of a place he was going to get to live in or anything like that, but I wouldn't even begin to compare with what many of us take for granted. But he was taken up with it more than with people over here that perhaps have a very expensive home or something like that, just because that's what homes cost over here, so.
I guess what what I I would feel this scripture says.
You'll be exercised is what you spend your money on.
Going to help you look after Christ's interest down here? Or is it merely to gratify your own lust?
And I would be the first one to say that I have been guilty of the latter. I don't know. Does that commend itself, Vern? Would you agree with that? Yes. I think it's just your heart will follow your treasure. What is your treasure, exactly? Yeah.
That the monks are old who took this very literally and gave up everything. But I would suggest they were just as occupied with material and earthly things as those that had riches. In fact, they were very much occupied with them. So that was my point. It's.
We're going to be occupied with material things without many or few I'll wind and it's going to be set on things down here, isn't it? Not of things in heaven. I I appreciate the I've not noticed that before the translation of what we had earlier in this chapter that Bill gave us in verse 15. I found that very helpful. What is not because of a man. A man is in abundance that his life is in his possessions. It's where our focus is.
But the issue is so if my focus is my material things, I can sell them all and I'm still going to be just as focused on material things.
Brother Bruce, when you were mentioning earlier about the people at the time thinking, well, what's this about and scratching their head, shouldn't we remind ourselves that dispensationally speaking, what we're doing is gleaning principles? These marching instructions for were for those of that day and that time, not directly for us. We're gleaning principles from it. Looking back from where? After the cross?
01:00:15
And after we've had Paul's teachings, we're looking back at those things and gleaning principles from isn't that an accurate way to put it?
Yeah, but we have we have our own mail to read too, along the same lines. You know, in First Timothy 6, I was just noticing a similar.
Exhortation to US, verse 17 of First Timothy 6. Charge them that are rich in this world or this age, that they be not high minded, nor trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God, or in the God who giveth us richly all things to enjoy. That they do, but that they be rich in good works.
Ready to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come. That they may hold that that they may lay hold on eternal life.
That's a very direct exhortation to us, and sometimes we hear exhortations well meaning that.
That we in the western world are somehow a slink out of the gymnasium with our tail between our legs because we have some prosperity and we make much some make much over the the the object poverty in some countries.
There is the government of God with respect to countries.
And we read in the book of Proverbs why a country is filled with people that are in abject poverty. Brother Manuel Adamus is, I believe, is in Cuba right now. And we've talked a bunch about the Cuban brethren and, and it's, it's a debilitating situation. But to me, it's, it's not glorifying our brethren because of their poverty, even though we are happy for their spirituality.
That perhaps their poverty drove them and helped them to to see things and lay hold of what's really live. But we on the other hand.
I you know, we we don't need to slink out of the room an embarrassment the our exercise ought to be how we use what the Lord has given us not only with our funds, but with our time when we think just in one generation when I think of the housewives on my little St. growing up and and those those women that there was one car.
And the husband went to work in that one car and the women there were workers and they had something on Monday, something on Tuesday, something on Wednesday and just a little kid and didn't, you know, pay that much attention to it, but they'd have a tea break. My mother's from Scotland, but they'd have a tea break at a certain time and some of them would meet and then they back to work and, and, and today we don't have, we're not pressed that way, are we? And some have jobs that are.
You know, 40 hours a week, I've never had one of those, but a lot of people do and and there's a lot of time and what do we do with it? We need to plow that under and invest that time in the things of the Lord or in just just prayers as I'm not the only one. You get older, you don't sleep so well and what you can get a lot done between 1:00 in the morning and 4:00 in the morning in prayer. Can you I think other people probably will experience that. Well, you can cover a lot of ground in in meditate on things. But anyway, that's a digression, but.
We have this.
It's it's the. It's the, it's the portion we have. Let's use it for the Lord. Time is short.
Like that one thought and connection with brother Sam's question when you look at similar portions in Matthew and just comparing Luke chapter 6. I'll just read the verse. He lifted up his eyes on his disciples and said blessed be ye poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God. And Matthew he said blessed are the poor.
In spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the Me, for they shall inherit the earth, and it looks on even to a day in an earthly people.
Inheriting the Earth when it comes to Luke.
It's very much right down to us in Matthew 24 where you get the prophetic outline. It goes on and it looks at the tribulation. It speaks of what those.
01:05:00
Represented by the disciples, the faithful remnant are going to pass through in the tribulation. When you come to Luke 21, the first part of the prophetic discourse very much applies to Christian persecution and it's the disciples. It's not until you come to later in the chapter.
Get the destruction of Jerusalem that was going to take place. Then he goes on into what we would call future things still to us. And when it comes down to our chapter here, I think it is very much a present application to us. And maybe what we get in Matthew can often be a case of where we are looking at things that apply to very directly and earthly remnant in the coming days and we draw principles and apply here. I think it's right to us.
Write to us everything #337.
Let us, Brother wall on earth and foes and strangers mix, be mindful of our heavenly birth, our thoughts on glory. Fix that. We should glorify Him here. Our Father's purpose is 337.
God who dwells.
Above we call our father and our friend.
And blessed all his children.
All Chelsea in the end.
Oh no deserts, love, they will come.
When you make.
Houses.
Where all of us are concerned, take us home.
To see him and see him.
Oh, no, no.
No.
How so long, God?
Confess.
My love.
And shall see.
I'll read free. We are blessed.
Then let us.
Breathe and while on Earth.
We have fallen.
Bakers Mix.
Be mindful of our heavenly birth.
Our son, the Lord.
Relax that we should glory.
I am here.
Our Father's.
Savior shall appear.
I'll only hold.
Seek High Ground
Talk—Dave Mearns
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So home.
It's found 51 Times in the Word of God.
It's not where I'm supposed to pick up. I'm just reminded of this 51 Times in the word.
The first one is in connection with a woman. The last one is in connection with a woman. There's 49 in between.
Our little swamp has 91 dimensions.
Almost twice as much.
That we have in the work. I thought, oh, those brethren as they wrote those hands, what did they have before they had before them? Oh, I just love that. That's just ask the Lord for his help.
I go to my father. We're so thankful for the Lord Jesus. We're so thankful. It's our privilege to be here this evening. We're so thankful for the courage of our brother here in Aberdeen to invite us here to these meetings. We know that there's a lot of work involved and so we're so thankful. We just pray for a special blessing for each of them and for ourselves too. Our God, we're all here.
With our need.
We're all here expecting.
And we're expecting blessing or we wouldn't be here. That's why we hear our God, you just betray. We earnestly pray as we have had in the meeting so far that the blessing would continue. So we ask will I help now as we would just spend a few minutes. My precious word that it would be a time of real profit for us. We ask these things, giving thanks and the worthy and the precious name of that blessed One, our Lord Jesus, who we await.
And.
And will soon be home. Amen.
So a few months ago I was in Angola and I arrived there on a Thursday.
And right there. And it was a hot, smoggy day, or a hot, dusty day. And the next day was Friday. It was another hot, dusty day.
Saturday I got up.
It's another hot, dusty day.
What day Another.
Hot, dusty day.
Monday.
Another.
Hot, dusty day Tuesday.
Oh, I love the dust. Why it rains. It's not the rainy season, but it rained and it rained hard and there was mud everywhere, everywhere everybody has stepped. And when we ooze up around the sandals and as we walked from the street where we were through this village.
Up to where the meeting room was, it was just all mud, just a mess.
But we found there was rocks here and there and there was little chest of grass where we could step and that way would be just a little bit higher than the mud. And I thought of that in connection with the world in which we find ourselves. You know, it speaks about a lot. It says about lot that he fell in the slime ****.
The the the men of Sodom and the men of Gomorrah. And there was there was 5 kings against four that they fell in the slime pits, but there were those that escaped it, says Clematon. And I just thought of what a difference there is between low ground and high ground.
You know, this is what we've had today is a little taste of the high ground.
In our, in the world that we find ourselves, it's low ground, it's low ground. No, it's like to have your feet all wet and muddy. It's just not pleasant. Well, as we, we made our way to the, to the meeting room there we are trying to we're trying to find these high places where we could step to stay overnight and there would be sometimes three or four steps where there wouldn't be anything and you'd have to step in the line and you'd.
Get it all over yet. We got to the other end and we took up the subject of foot washing and it's not what we're going to do tonight. I was thinking a little bit, I want to look at one man. But before we do that, I'd just like to make a comment or two with regards to what we had before us this afternoon in loop Chapter 12.
Luke chapter 12 just looking at to keep my mouth right here in order to be heard. You hear me out there in the field.
So loop checker, well I was thinking of this.
This portion we didn't get very far and I appreciated the suggestion of this portion. I thought just for a second we could look at the context. So here we we had.
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Brought before us here, not little flock and our brother Ron mentioned it's where the name of the flock came from. I've appreciated that earlier they were looking at the name from Zechariah as the poor of the flock. And I I thought if you look at their Zechariah, it's it's the time when Zechariah is is taken away captive and the tour of the flock were left and they had tremendous, tremendous blessing for them. But here.
What characterizes the poor of the flock?
Well, we find that in the context earlier in the chapter and in I enjoyed the list here. We won't go through it, but it says in verse 23, life is more than meat, the body is more than rain. And consider the Ravens, the anonymous solar wreath. So it speaks about the reason that I thought about the Ravens and how wonderful it says that the word provides for the Ravens.
In our area we find the Ravens, the crows that are on our bird feeder, but they're also the side of the road eating rope kills. They eat anything.
And there's all kinds of things provided for them, but at least they have wings to go and get the food to where they have to go. The thing that they're lilies.
This is the lilies here it says consider the lilies, how they grow, they toil, they spin up. Now lilies don't have any, the wings to go and get that refreshment, to get that moisture. They are entirely dependent on the Lord, entirely dependent on the Lord. And that is the point of the little flock that we have here. And so we are to be to this thing entirely.
Dependent upon our Lord. So what does it say to our government? Verse 28 O ye?
A big thing.
I'm sure.
Oh, I love those thoughts concerning that which should characterize.
Our own souls as we go through this scene and we find much lower out, you know, the enemy has all kinds of slant hits as we have that golden storm fell in all kinds of slumping. The enemy of our souls has has a whole buffet for all of us. The feedback doesn't be oh Lord would have us to seek that high ground.
We'll compete on that, which is good. Well, the one I wanted to look at is in the book and I'm just going to do this for a minute just to show you what characterized.
This young person.
Seeing first kings.
Bruce Kings.
14.
Christians, Chapter 14.
We climbed here.
Young man, child. We don't know the age of them, it says in the first part of the chapter. At that time, Elijah, the son of Jeroboam, fell sick.
I'm not going to go through this whole portion. It's a long one. You can read it when you get home, but.
He, he really wanted to see this child raised and I thought of this because.
The the man Jeroboam, he doesn't have a very good connotation. Doesn't every time you hear that name, we we think that Jeroboam who caused Israel to sin or what a horrible king he was, but he had this son and.
He said he's going to to try to disguise yourself to speak to the prophet to see if the son that was sick because he raised up. Well, I'm not going to go through the story, but let's go down to the.
What we find about this, this young person, it says in verse 13 in all Israel, this is a this is a forecast. This is a prophecy rather 12Th verse. It says Arise now therefore and get thee that I know house. And when thy feet entered into the city, the child shall die and all of Israel shall mourn for him and bury him. For he only is a jeroboam that shall come to the grave, because in him.
In hand there was found some good things toward the Lord God of Israel in the House of chair of long. You know, I thought of this in connection with this young person and I thought of how highly the odds were stacked against this young person to go on for the Lord. They were just so highly staffed and yet here was someone.
00:10:02
Who I could put this way, was seeking high grounds.
Here was someone who had a tenderness towards the Lord and what happened was the Lord took them out of the scene. And as we read further we find that Jeroboams family was a disaster. He was a disaster.
He had, he had the potential for such promise. If you go to the promises that were made to Jeroboam, if he would only follow the Lord, that there was going to be tremendous blessing and he did anything but. And yet here in this household.
It was beset with so many things that were against him. It was tenderness towards the world.
Well, what about us here tonight? So many young people here.
Young people and you know, as I said before, the enemy of our souls, he has this world soul full of slime targets for us to fall into. And yet the Lord would have us to seek high ground. He would have a he would have us to have a tenderness. He would have, you know, as I was saying in the meeting this afternoon, I was thinking what these wonderful things, but what it seems like it's taken an awful lot of faith to be able to characterize by these ones that lived at this time and to be paralyzed.
With the moral attributes of the Kingdom, it says that Oh ye of little faith, of little faith.
I love that.
I love that everyone of us can make hold of that.
In such a way that we can seek.
Inside the hits that the enemy has forced those high places.
The Lord must have us to lay hold on that which is really like, you know, we spoke about home. And for those of us here older, we've got a few extra birthdays than you folks that are younger. Home. Sure. Sure. Looks good. It really looks good. I understand. I remember when I was young and the Catholic home, Yeah, it was nice. It was nice. And I I pondered it with mild interest and we enjoyed the thought of going home.
But we are still here. We are still here, aren't we?
You young folks.
It's going to time if the Lord needs us here, that.
A lot of birthdays too.
So what about between then?
All the Lord would have you to have a little faith.
And Sleigh Holt.
Almost reading that.
We we read about the little flock.
To think young people of the Lily that we spoke about.
What can a Lily do to survive?
It can't do a thing. It is totally dependent on the Lord for everything. And yet we read Psalm and all his glory was not arranged like one of these.
Oh, every one of us.
Have the dependence in our lives.
Like the Lily?
But this man, there was such tenderness toward him in such a way that the Lord just said, you know, take him home.
What about us?
Do you have tenderness towards the Lord? Is there that?
We pick up all kinds of performance. Do we seek the high ground, those places that are not defined equal? It's wonderful to be here, but not always here, though.
We see those things.
Oh, we must be left elderly, that we might be at the fighter towards the Lord. Let's pray.
Governor, Father we.
You think it's our privilege to be here?
And to read from these blessed pages that which is so good for our soul. Thank you for watching.
We pray that there will be like 10 minutes towards the hour God.
Watch him, we pray they would be left their Lily in total dependence upon me.
We ask these things are gone. We're here in our great need and we really need all of these things and so we would ask for help tonight. We think of each one here. We're all in a different part of our journey. So many young ones here are God so much in this world to discourage, which is earnestly great if they were to reach out and they hold and the things that are really nice and we ask these things are gone as we await the return of that blessed one, our riches.
Take us home. And his worthy name we pray. Amen.
Luke 12:35-40
Reading
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
May it scenes of confusion.
And creature.
Complaints.
How sweet a little soul is described.
Union will Saints.
To find out.
Mercy, there's room.
To play from you.
No love.
Sweet thoughts that you.
Say.
Again was submission.
And straight as the day.
So.
He we shall call.
Grace.
Thyroid, last word and the smiles of my face.
And ground the silver.
I groan.
We wave, bless and Lord.
To join to.
Save glory.
To thy praise.
Blessings save your.
Phone.
To the Lord.
Our gracious, loving God and Father.
When we read of thy word, how?
Comforting and and what peace thou brought thy disciples, when I said, when thou has said, I go away.
To prepare a place for Thee. And if I go away, I shall come again to receive you unto myself, that where I am, thou shalt be also. Oh, accompanying words these were. And we thank thee, our blessed Lord Jesus, for that portion, that position, and that prospect that awaits us, that heavenly home. But we thank thee, our blessed Lord Jesus, for.
That wonderful promise that the Lord himself shall descend from heaven.
And so, Lord, we wait for thee, we know that draws near. And thank You for this Oasis that we have before us, Thy precious Word. And we, Lord, we are needful people. And we just pray that Thou would open up the Scriptures to us for what is needed and that we might glean more of Christ here in this scene. And so, Lord, we look to thee, We pray for liberty of the Spirit for guidance.
We thank You for Thy precious word, and we wait before Thee as we again take up Thy portion that Thou has so graciously brought before us. We thank You for this time.
And give thee the thanks and thy precious name, Lord Jesus, Amen.
But for those that weren't with us yesterday, we started off in the latter part of Luke 12.
And we didn't get very far. Would it be alright to go on with that then?
Sounds good.
Luke's Gospel chapter 12. I think we got down to verse 35. Is that about right?
We started at verse 30. We didn't start at the beginning of the chapter, but.
We got the 1St 35.
Luke's Gospel chapter 12 and starting in verse 35. Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning, and you yourselves like in the men that wait for their Lord, when he will return from the wedding, that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open it to him immediately. Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching. Verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meet, will come forth and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch or in the third watch.
And find them so. Blessed are those servants. And this know, that if the Goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through. Be therefore ready also, for the Son of Man cometh in an hour when you think not. Then Peter said unto him, Lord, speak us out of this parable unto us, or even to all. And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise Stewart, whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household?
00:10:09
To give them their portion of meat and due season. Blessed is that servant whom is Lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing. Of a truth I say unto you, that he will make him ruler over all that he hath. But if that servant shall say in his heart, My Lord delayeth his coming, and shall begin to beat the men, servants and maidens, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken. The Lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, in an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him asunder, and will point him in his portion with the unbelievers.
And that servant which knew his Lord's will, and prepared not Himself, neither did according to His will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given of Him shall be much required. And to whom men have committed much of him, they will ask The more. I am come to send fire on the earth, and what will I if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straightened till it be accomplished?
Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth, I tell you nay, but rather division.
For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided 3 against two, and two against three.
The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against their daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And he said also to the people, When you see a cloud rise out of the West straight way, you say there come with a shower, and so it is. And when you see the South wind blow, you say there will be heat, and it cometh to pass. You hypocrites, you can discern the face of the sky and of the earth.
But how is it that you do not discern this time? Yay. And why even of yourselves judging not what is right? When thou goest with thine adversary to the magistrate, as thou art in the way, give diligence that thou mayest be delivered from him, lest he hail thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and the officer caste into prison. I tell thee that thou shalt not depart thence till thou hast paid the very last might.
Without fogging us down or going backwards, I just would like to make a practical comment about verse 34.
Treasure is before the heart. Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
We we know the importance of the heart from many passages of Scripture. I think of the passage in Proverbs. It says keep thy heart above all. All things are all that is kept or out of it are the issues of life.
But we can't really control our affections in a certain way, but we can control our mind.
And so in Colossians 3, I remember years ago the correction a brother gave in a reading to that passage, it says set your affection on things above. And he he corrected me with a better reading and said set your mind on things about.
And we have control over that. You may wake up in the morning and feel grumpy and feel uninspired to get into the scriptures before you rush off to school or work.
But if you, no matter how you feel, you can put, you can control your mind and you can put it on things above and guess what happens? The heart follows. In Psalm 16, there's a beautiful example of that. And no doubt that would speak prophetically of that perfect man that was to come, the Lord Jesus Christ. But let me just read a verse there that I, I, I think of at times, Psalm 16 and verse 8.
I have set the Lord always before me.
You can do that no matter how you feel.
You've got chronic medical conditions. I've lived with those. It can get you, it can't. It can push you to be a little grumpy, but you can still set the Lord before yourself. I have set the Lord before me and knowing what happens, because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved. It gives confidence, doesn't it? And then it flows on verse 9. Therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoices. My flesh also shall rest in hope. It's a beautiful flow of things, but I just wanted to point that out. I unless I was daydreaming, I didn't think we got on to verse 34 much.
But the treasure is something we we mentally have latched onto in our hearts. Affections follow it, and it's beautiful.
00:15:08
Perhaps I can make one more remark before we enter into the chapter.
Maybe others have gotten the same feedback, but I got some feedback both yesterday and today that we were sometimes throwing around some terms that.
Our young people didn't totally understand such as covenant theology and dispensational truth and the Kingdom of heaven and so on.
I think they were briefly discussed yesterday and if we get on to a long tangent discussion on them we'll lose what's in the chapter, but I would just suggest that.
If you want to get some enlightenment on those things. And you young people are far more technologically oriented than some of us in my generation.
Go to Bible Truth Publishers website, click on their digital library.
And their whole library is on.
Is online there and you can access it free and quickly. There is a pamphlet on covenant theology there which is fairly short and to the point which will help get you started on what it is. And then if you feel you need to know more about it, there are other more detailed references if you want to know a little bit about dispensational truth.
And others who I'm sure would back me up in this pull up a slightly longer.
Pamphlet or booklet? It was written 60 years ago or more by Paul Wilson, A Defense of Dispensationalism.
Paul Wilson was a young people's man. I remember him very well. And in my generation, we broke our necks to get to a conference if we knew Paul Wilson was going to be there. So it's not written in a highly intellectual way that you can't understand, and it's very well done. Anyone that's read it, I know would back me up a defense of dispensationalism. And you can pull it up online and read it online, or you can order from BTP if you want to know more about the Kingdom of heaven or the Kingdom of God.
Again, pull up the digital library. Punch in that phrase in the search engine, in quotation marks. Not just the words, or you'll get a whole slew of things that just have to do with heaven and Kingdom and so on, but in quotation marks. Plug in that phrase and you will get plenty. You can read on what the Kingdom of heaven is.
And when you do your own research like that, it often tends to stick with you even better than if you.
Here at a Bible conference. So I just make that remark as a bit of a suggestion and if if some somehow you're not clear on some of those.
Well, with regard to verse 35, it has always been interesting to me that the girded loins comes before the light burning or the lights burning. Girding up the loins is something that we don't do quite as much of in this country, but you still see it in the East where men who are working in the fields wear something that is just loose and.
Hanging out, as it were, when they're at home.
When they're going to work, they cinch it up, bring it around their waist, and then they're ready to go out to work. That's where their strength is.
And that's what the Lord wants you and me to be doing down here in this world. We had it yesterday. We are left here in this world to look after Christ's interest. A tremendous privilege, tremendous privilege. Just think, He has gone back there to heaven, but left you and me in this world as ambassadors for Him to look after his interests.
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And the first thing that we are told to do here is to have our loins girded. But then when our loins are girded, it will follow that our lights will be burning. That is, there will be that which exhibits. And we had this yesterday, the Kingdom of God, the character of Christ, the moral character of all that he is.
And it shines out.
It really does shine out if we act for him.
Let me give you an example because sometimes a story carries at home. Many years ago and I knew the brother well, he was dealing with a various companies in his business and he got a rebate from one of those companies for some business he was doing with them.
And one of the representatives of that company who gave him back the rebate said, well, that'll be a nice bonus for you.
And the brother said yes after the government gets its piece of the action referring to income tax.
Oh, the company representative said. You don't. You don't have to declare this on your income tax. You don't have to do that.
It's not on our books in any way that anybody would ever know anything about it. You just put it in your pocket and keep it.
Well, the brother's reply was excellent. And he told me this himself. He said, I told that man, he said, well, I always like to do my books as if the Lord were looking over my shoulder.
Well, nothing more was said. The representative went his way and the brother went on with his business.
Fast forward 10 years.
The representative was seriously ill in the hospital.
Knew that he wasn't going to make it.
Didn't know where he was going when he left this world.
And he still had the brother's phone number. He called him up, he said, referring to him by name. He said, would you come and visit me?
I don't know where I'm going. I'm leaving this world soon, going into eternity, and I think you're someone that ought to be able to tell me something about it and what to do.
And he led him to Christ.
All on the basis of a light that was burning. All on the basis of moral uprightness in this world. Did he preach the gospel to him? No, not on that occasion anyway. He did later, of course. All he did was exhibit the Kingdom of God, and it bore fruit down the road.
Lord.
Was Albert? Hey Hope for anyone who wants to know.
Tell us why you're saying that hurting your loins is what? What did you say? Truth. What? Give us a little more what that means.
Well, girding our loins with truth, of course, is part of the armor, as we get it in Ephesians 6. But I believe here the Lord is using it as a general term. In other words, we're not left here. And I'm quoting a brother whom I've never, whom I never knew, because he went to be with the Lord long before I was born, James B Dunlop. And but he lived and labored in the same area where I live now, and.
He gave an address on a New Year's meeting way back in the early part of the last century, and he said.
Quotation. We are not left in this world simply to lead good, morally upright lives and then to go to heaven at the end, he said. We are to do all of that, but much, much more. We are to be living witnesses to this world of the grace that brought us to Christ, and that means not relaxing in this world and simply doing what is right and going to heaven at the end.
But our loins girded, looking for that work to every man, his work that the Lord has given us to do.
We see a picture of that. You watch a Workman, a Carpenter, when he gets up in the morning, his tool belt he puts on, you know exactly what he set it out to do if he's a Carpenter, if he's a plumber, that's a little bit different. He Gertz it about and anybody who's ever watched Weight Lifters.
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Professional weight lifters or even somebody working in the gym that's working with heavy weights, we talked about this, but it can they put this belt around them, this leather belt that they cinched very tight and it's wide and it helps them have more strength when they do what they do. And as brother Bill pointed out, it also helps them from getting a hernia. But you, when you see them do it, you know what they're about. And other kinds of work may be the same thing. You see them putting up to a belt on or something around their ways to do that.
I was kind of joking with a brother looking at Bibles back there and there's these tiny little Bibles that have Old and New Testament in them and I noticed they're 40 bucks now. Back in when I used to work as a welder, the Christians I worked with, it was like our 6th gun. We put it in our back pocket here every morning and we had other things we had to take as we went to work as welders, but that was one of them. It was in our back, right back pocket ready to go and bring out.
At at work.
So that was our cinching and girting about as we got up in the morning. Does that make any sense?
Yeah, so just some nebulous terms. I'm just saying asking that question because the young people don't know what to mean when you say Gert your loins. Well, what does it mean? You know, does it treating him with truth? You you gave us the scripture in the 6th of.
I believe it means getting before the Lord privately and personally and allowing the Lord to apply the truth to your own personal life.
I believe that's the girding, and in such a way as that the Lord can fit us to be.
Useful to him as our master.
I once had the responsibility for a certain.
Geographical area in the business and I had to hire staff and I had an HR guy assigned to me to help me. It would sort through and do all the advertisements, do all the hard work.
Then he'd bring in certain ones for me to interview if he thought that they were a good candidate. And one evening he brought in a a young man. He seemed bright and all that. And I visited and chatted with him. He had some experience, but I knew when he came in that I wasn't going to hire him. And but we had a courteous conversation and and then he left and my HR guy came in all excited. Well, what did you think? What did you think? I said I'm not hiring him. He said why? I said he didn't have a belt on.
And he thought I was the most ridiculous person in the world. He says, why would you not hire a guy just because he has a doesn't have a belt on? I said because we're in the construction business. That's the best he's ever going to look. And if he's not tightened up when he comes in to see me. I didn't care that he didn't have a tie, but he didn't even have a bell tie. So well, my HR guy, he just walked. He thought I was lost my mind, but I didn't think I lost my mind. I had almost lost my life once because as you say.
Assam.
You see construction workers and they have a vest on, a reflective vest.
And I was a young manager and I was making my rounds and I was up at a height and I was flapping in the breeze like that and, you know, in a hurry. And my vest caught on a piece of handrail or a piece of steel, I can't remember. And it yanked me back off my feet just about. And I almost fell to my death. I never told you that. But but anyway, ever since then, I take it very seriously.
You know all the guys and I even learned how to tell the guys in Spanish tighten up, you know, get that it's supposed to be zipped up, be organized and and and I believe that is one of the principles for us as servants of the Lord. We need to apply the truth to ourselves and it gives a certain spiritual discipline and reality in the inward life and it enables us to be fit for the masters use with this scripture that our brother Bruce was bringing before us.
In the 13th verse of the first chapter.
Of first, Peter, gird up the loins of your mind. That would be a part of it, right?
That's a girding up, you know now that set to your mind that just.
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Wonder and.
Fanciful things girded out. Think about, think on things that are important.
Paul gives us a list of those things and Timothy in Philippians, doesn't he?
We have an example in First Kings chapter 18 verse 46, Speaking of Elijah. The hand of the Lord was on Elijah and he girded up his loins and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel. I mean, this is just a very simple picture, but we can all picture in our minds in Middle East, they wear flowing garments. You can't run in one of those. Run in one of those. It's not as if they're wearing the wrong garment, but it has to be put in its proper place. Otherwise we can't function. We can't.
Perform our service and the verse that we're looking at is about service and testimony.
Our service and testimony. So it's about putting things in the proper place in perspective. And I like the verse you read there in First Peter because it's not just physical, it's mental, isn't it?
Beat it to death. But I think sometimes we need to explain it so that the young people can know what we're talking about. Amen.
What about the second part of the verse?
Your lights burning.
Reminded me of a verse that had on my heart in the prayer meeting yesterday. I I didn't read it. It wasn't necessarily an exact fit with my thoughts. But in Philippians 2, verse 15 says that you may be blameless and harmless the sons of God without rebuke in the midst of a crooked perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world. And I have a note like the stars in the night sky. And I think Mr. Darby has a.
A footnote regarding that in his translation among whom ye appear as lights in the world. You know, the moral darkness that's descending in this world is really astonishing, the rapidity that the rate at which the darkness is coming upon this well and.
Again, I'd like to hear what other people's thoughts are in terms of practical application. But as that night falls, you know it doesn't take much of a little candle to cast the light.
Part of the Armor of God that we get in chapter 6.
Refers to having your loins dirt about with truth.
And the truth is, what is going to keep us from being defiled by the filth that is in the world? I'm reminded of the.
Of the patient by her brother Dave Mearns the other night at the picnic.
About seeking a high ground.
And there's a lot of.
Of teaching and doctrine and cultural.
Tolerance in this world is not according to truth.
And so if we have our loins gird about with truth, if we're grounded in the Word of God.
And if we are acquainted with what Scripture teaches on some of the current issues that we face today.
Then it will enable us to find that high ground and we will be preserved from the defilement. And I believe a natural outflow of that state is that we will be, our lights will be shining.
In this Dark World that where truth not only is is their apathy, but truth is being positively rejected and cast out. And if we have our loins skirted about with truth in a spiritual sense, we will be shining as lights in this world.
The Bill told is the light here a light shined out and years later it bore fruit. Well, if we use the analogy of a Workman putting his belt on, many of these workmen are getting up before dawn and they need a light to go do their work. Well, I would say that Bill's story about Albert Hayhoe, and he had truth. He acted on it. Something in him shined out.
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That's what happens when you girt about with truth and you go whatever you are called to do in a secular work or wherever you go, there's a light that can shine out. You can dim it. But if you're Gert about with truth and as Bruce was saying, you that every day you you gather that in and you you have your devotions before the Lord and you get ready as before you go out, something will shine.
And it'll shine and people will see it. It will affect them. Even if you don't think it does, it does.
The day in which we live, it doesn't take very much light to make a difference. If you had a candle and you lit it in here, it wouldn't make much light. But you turn all these lights out at midnight, that candle will make a big difference. And we're living in a dark, dark day. All you have to do is maybe tell the truth or something and it and that is an impression on people because things are so dark.
First thing mentioned in Ephesians.
In the whole armor of God that our brother referred to is the loins gird about with truth.
Then it progresses to the feet shod with the gospel of peace. And some have applied that to evangelizing. I don't think it's evangelizing with our words and lips the way we think of evangelizing. It's more the evangelizing with the effect the truth has had in our own lives. So we walk through this world with the spirit of peace.
And so as you say, burn as the world gets darker, a person that just exudes a certain contentment and peace will will stick out, as they say, like a sore thumb. And so it's to say we it's quite a, a harmony and a balance between that which which is for our own preservation and protection and that which also can be a blessing to others.
Well, we probably should move on. We've said quite a bit about loins girded and lights burning, and we won't get through the chapter if we don't, but.
In verse 36 we find something else that's very important, the loins girded and the lights burning.
Are in One Direction, but then.
We are to be like unto men that wait for their Lord, that when He will return from the wedding.
When he will return from the wedding, that when he cometh the knocketh, they may open unto him immediately.
This comes to life in an Eastern wedding.
I don't believe the wedding here has any significance relative to.
You and I being the bride of Christ or something like that. It's rather the thought that in an Eastern wedding, especially a wedding of a wealthy man, he would have a significant number of servants who would be engaged in taking him to his wedding. And they make a big show of weddings in the East. They, they really do. And they, they, they party half the night sometimes, which is fine.
But the point is here that the servants don't get to go into the wedding.
They're the ones that look after the horses or whatever, look after things and they are compelled to stay out there in some kind of a shelter or a building while the wedding is going on. And again, I say I don't have any fault with that. I, I tried to call a brother over there who was getting married and I called him at approximately midnight his time, thinking that I'd get get through to him after the wedding was over.
And I am not exaggerating. The noise was so loud in the background from the festivities that were still going on that I could only.
Say about one sentence or two and then had to hang up because he couldn't hear me and I could hardly hear him. And I don't say that in any way, in a derogatory way. I just say it as a fact. That's the way they go. And you can imagine these servants waiting in some kind of a shelter and as the wedding goes on and the night goes on, they would, in a normal course of things, be tempted to fall asleep.
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And many times that would happen.
But what the bridegroom really appreciated was if he came out and there were those servants waiting and watching, ready to go. And he said, OK, let's go. And they were all ready. Instead of his having to go around and shake this one and shake that one and wake him up and say, come on, let's time, the wedding's over, let's go. And that, that is often what happens. But now when he knocks on the door, if they're awake, they open unto him immediately and they say, master, we're here, we're ready.
And that's what the Lord wants from you and me, doesn't He? He wants those who have not settled down in this world and just relaxed. He wants those who are engaged in His work but at the same time ready to go at a moments notice when He gives the shout.
I.
What's the significance in verse 37?
Of the Lord, that he shall girt himself, girt himself, and make them to sit down, to meet, and will come forth and serve them.
I've read that verse for 50 years.
And I can't wrap my mind around it.
You and I were invited.
And let's use an American illustration.
Suppose we were invited to the White House.
Waited there for a banquet.
And when we get there?
President Biden invites us in and says, you sit down.
I'm going to serve you.
Now that would never happen.
But.
That is really what the Lord is going to do to you and me.
If he's going to say to you and me, you were faithful in the world that rejected me, and now I'm going to make you sit down and serve me.
I don't know, maybe others can comment on it, I just I just can't.
Can't understand it. What do you think, brother Ernie? You've you've read it many times.
What we have in Exodus 21.
And to read it.
Thou buy in Hebrew servant. Six years he shall serve, and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself. If he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master have given him a wife, and she have borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out by himself. That this has always struck me as unbelievable that one would do that, leave their wife and their children behind, and go out free.
But it says in verse five, If the servants shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children, I shall not go out free. Then his master shall bring him unto the judges, and shall bring him to the door, or unto the door post, and his master shall bore his ear through them all, and he shall serve him forever.
Again, when Bill says he can't get his mind around it, it's not the understanding of it intellectually, it's the comprehending that this one that gave himself for us is not willing to go out free.
But He will serve us.
Go ahead, burn. Sorry. I'm sorry. My I have hearing aids. But what is he going to serve us? Heavenly happiness.
Will be happy, that's what he'll service. I believe that's not I've heard somebody say that.
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Will be the happiest that God is able to make us happy.
What was your thought, brother? What do you think?
I, as I say, I can't, I can't wrap my mind or my affections or anything around it because.
Our brother has just brought out Christ is going to be a servant forever.
And what's she going to service? Just what you say. Eternal joy and the fullness of all that He is in himself for all eternity, served up with no hindrances of any kind. No old you and I were talking about it yesterday. No sinful flesh to get in the way. No infirmities of age and weakness or disease. No interference from a contrary world around. Everything perfectly suited.
To that eternal life which He has given us, and then the full display of all His glories which will take us for an eternity. An eternity to will never exhaust them, will we?
Doesn't get any better than that.
Having taken manhood to himself.
Remains a man forever it's.
Can't wrap your head around that. OK, The man forever. There is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. Present tense, still a man. You can see that woven through many passages when you stop and think about it. Confirmation. He remains a man forever down here though he were Son.
He took servant to it, to himself as a man. He was the girded 1 here important people. They come into a a tour someplace, you know, a politician or whatever.
They don't worry about girding themselves. No, they're just flowing and matter of fact, really important people. You know, they come in and they don't even want to carry a briefcase. You know, they just come in. You know nothing in their hand. You know their, their, their sidekick has the, even the papers and the briefcase for the, for the work that needs to be done, not the Lord. He gird himself with a towel, laid aside his garments and girded himself with a towel to wash their feet.
And he serves us now on high, as the daughter puts it, with sympathy and love, And he's going to serve forever. It is just as Nick was saying. It's beyond comprehension to serve up the joys of heaven for the likes of us made fit.
Father's house.
Like the picture that we get in Genesis 14 when?
Melchizedek, priests of the Most High God. He comes out with bread and wine and.
In more than one way, the Lord is going to be the one who supplies sustenance and joy to the whole earth when He comes again and reigns over this world. But for you and I, He's going to supply that sustenance and joy for all eternity. And going back to the reference to John 13, where the Lord girded himself and washed the disciples feet, you know, we might be like Peter and say, Lord, thou shalt never wash my feet.
He couldn't bear to see the Lord take that place. That one who he called Lord, he thought this is far below him. How can he do this? And you know, we might sort of have the same thought when we read this chapter and say no, that that can't be for the Lord to gird himself and take that that place.
JG Ballot had such a sweet answer to that from Hebrews Chapter 7 and verse 7.
And without all contradiction, the less is blessed of the better. Yes, He comes forth to bless us, but we're the less that are blessed for the better.
Even now.
We were talking at supper last night at a table. If we allow the Lord to work in US and through us.
He's going to reward us. How do you even get your head around that? We allow him.
The work in US and through us, and then he's going to reward us for that.
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Amazing.
And it doesn't mean that we won't serve. In Revelation 22, it says, and his servants shall serve him, and they shall see his face. And so we will have the privilege of serving up there. I'm not sure what kind of service it will be, but there will be a service that we can render up there for the Lord. Maybe someone else has a thought on it, but.
I like that.
What you quoted there from JG ballots ministry, Steve, that's that's beautiful that the less is blessed of the greater and the Lord Jesus will be the center of all up there. He will have the preeminence up there in everything, but then he blesses and he serves.
Another thought to remember, and that is brother Nick referred to Exodus 21. He remains a servant forever. He'll serve us, but he's not our servant.
He's a servant of God. As a man He serves us, but he's not our servant. If he was, we could tell him what to do. No, He tells us what to do. He's God's servant, not ours though. He serves us and need to keep those things in their proper place in our hearts.
He wants to show his kindness.
Who are we to say no, you can't do that?
He wants to glorify himself and he says more blessed to give than to receive. God's a giver.
Where? Who are we to say no, no, you can't be that?
It's amazing that he wants to make us as happy as we're able to be happy.
Fall to His glory.
Still picture.
First Kings, chapter 10.
This gives a little bit more perspective.
On the role of the servant.
Chapter 10.
And verse 5. Verse 4.
First Kings chapter 10, verse 4.
And when the Queen of Sheba had seen all Solomon's wisdom, and the house that he had built, and the meat of his tables, and the sitting.
Of his servants doesn't say the activity of his servants. What repressed her was impressed her was the sitting of his servants and the attendance of his ministers. That's attentiveness and their apparel and his cup bearers and his assent by which he went up to the House of the Lord. There was no more spirit in her, and she looked down to verse 8. Happy are thy men, happy are these thy servants?
Which stand?
Continually before thee, and hear thy wisdom.
We think of service in terms of activity, but what we see here?
Is attitude readiness and of course that's pictured in our our chapter 2 when it speaks to the servants being ready and just like to suggest that.
Heaven is going to be a continual occupation with our Lord Jesus Christ, with His glory, with His wisdom, and we will serve in that respect.
I'd like I'd like to add one more point.
To also send Jude that he is going to present a faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. And I think of that his joy is it going to exceed?
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Why yours and mine? He is going to be happier to have us there than we are going to be to be there. And you think of it in Luke 15 where the the shepherd brings his sheep home, and he calls his friends and neighbors together, and they says, rejoice with me.
He's got his sheep home.
And you know, sometimes we come to a conference like this and I saw it in in Walla Walla too, with some of the my brethren.
They were so excited to have their brethren there. They were very thrilled to serve them some coffee or serve them some food or do it wasn't anybody.
Commanding them to do it. It was the joy of their hearts. And I see it here too. What a what a welcome we get. But when we get home to heaven, we're going to.
The large Asus is going to be excited to see you.
And not only that, when he had seen you for 10,000 years, he's still going to be. It's not going to fade away.
And that's the kind of savior we have.
What a what a wonderful thing he really is. If you come somewhere and somebody's excited to see you, why, it really makes a difference in how you you feel. Well, you're going to feel that.
More than you've ever felt it here when you see Jesus.
Brother Bill mentioned, imagine going to the White House and having President Biden serve you. I read a story about Lincoln that he used to go visit the troops and he would sit at the bedside and he would personally take a towel in cold water and dab the brow and just hold their hand and speak comfort to them. There's a little picture that I remember.
From reading about it of someone serving a servant.
The President of the United States and those looking on sometimes sought it a bit strange, but the soldiers loved him all the more for him.
Well, the next few verses give us an interesting, at least to me.
Combination of that which is meant spiritually and perhaps.
If we could use the term again without over using it. A moral and spiritual.
Application to ourselves. And yet because of the time in which it was given, it has a Jewish background to it. Verse 38 And if he shall come in the second watch or come in the third watch.
And find them so. Blessed are those servants. The Roman night was broken up into four watches of three hours each. First one started at 6:00 in the evening, went to 9, and then three hours on and on and on and so on. 4 total watches. And it starts off here with the 2nd or the 3rd watch. We know of course in Matthew chapter 14, when the Lord came to His disciples walking on the water, He came in the 4th watch of the night.
That would be from 3:00 AM to 6:00 AM. But it gives us the thought, and it gave those who were listening to the Lord the thought that He could come at any time. He could come at any time. Now, the background is Jewish. It says if the Goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and would not have suffered his house to be broken through.
Be ye therefore ready also, for the Son of Man cometh at an hour when ye think not.
Now that of course, is spoken in a strict, strict interpretation to the godly Jewish ones who in a coming day during the tribulation period will be looking for the Lord to come and save them from their enemies, looking for the Lord to come. And he comes as a thief in the night to his enemies. He comes unexpected and unwanted.
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But to those who are looking for him, they will be happy to see him.
Well, you and I can apply that I believe to ourselves and say the Lord is coming for us and He doesn't come to us as a thief in the night. Whenever you get that expression, it has to do with His appearing when He comes to judge this world, to set up His Kingdom. But you and I can apply it to ourselves, I believe in this chapter. When is the Lord going to come? We don't know.
But we do know that there is no prophecy that has to be fulfilled before the Lord can come. And how wonderful that is sometimes, you know, we can get a little.
Shall I say it discouraged when the Lord doesn't come?
Allow me to tell a story and I hope it's all right.
When I was over in India several years ago at a conference hosted by the brethren from Bhutan, and they have it on the Indian side of the border because it's much easier for people to come there than to get a visa to Bhutan.
They have a question meeting.
People can put questions into the box and there are plenty of them, and somebody put this question in.
We have been hearing for a long time that the Lord is coming and he doesn't come and he doesn't come and he doesn't come.
Why doesn't the Lord hurry up and come?
How are we going to answer that one?
The questions were handed to different people and that one fell to me and I really had to ask the Lord for an answer for it.
So I said I'd like a show of hands of how many people here have been saved in the last 10 years.
And I'd say a good 50% of the hands went up.
I said OK, now what about the last 20 years? How many here have been saved during the last 20 years?
75% of the hands went up.
Well, I said, you know, I was waiting for the Lord to come well over 20 years ago, well over 20 years ago. But I said, aren't you glad he waited for you?
I'm glad he waited for you and you are too. And if the Lord has more out there that He's.
Willing and happy to save. Can you and I wait a little longer?
And that was that seemed to satisfy them. And you and I have to look at it that way, don't we? We have to look at it that.
Our Lord is long-suffering, and not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. We are to count that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation.
And it is. And if we look around this world today, the Lord is doing a wonderful work in many lands where the gospel has not gone out before. The Lord is using modern technology in a wonderful way.
He may come in the second watch or the third watch, but if he leaves it till the 4th watch just before the morning.
That's all right, too, and you and I can afford to wait, I believe.
But we can get discouraged wondering when the Lord is going to come. And this is an encouragement to our hearts, isn't it?
The anticipation ought to build.
Participation ought to build just before the verse you quoted.
Bill in second Peter 3.
Where it says the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation.
Verse 14 Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look for such things, be diligent that you may be following a human peace without spot and blameless.
So while we're waiting, we trust. We're watching.
While we're waiting and watching, we trust that we're occupied with what he would have us do in the meantime and not grow discouraged by the long-suffering.
01:05:02
Perhaps that's why John when he wrote in his.
Book that we called Revelation, that he spoke of the Kingdom and patience of our Lord Jesus Christ, because He is displaying such patience.
Awaiting that moment that our brother back here was was mentioning.
Moment that will burst upon us and never end.
We patiently wait for it, as does he.
Maybe some other brother has a comment on it, but I have looked at verse 39 as a warning in the Lords day for those who did not believe and verse 40 as an encouragement to those who did. Is that is that a right thought?
Those 2 watches.
What is the 2nd and the 3rd? That's the darkest part of the night.
That's when you're you'll be asleep. You're most likely to be asleep at that time. So it's really a warning.
I've enjoyed the Mr. Harvey's translation of verse 38. It says and if he come in second watch and come in the moon watch.
Find them watching or waiting.
How many of our brethren have?
Look for the Lord to come. Expected Him to come their whole lifetime.
How many of our brethren have looked for the coming of the Lord in their whole lifetime? And then they reached old age and they went home. Well, what about them being watching and waiting when He comes? Just enjoyed this. He comes and he, He watches, He sees. And in the second watch there they are waiting and watching. He comes again in the third watch.
There they are, waiting and watching. Will they know that portion? Yes, they will.
You spoke of your father-in-law, brother Bill, and we probably all heard this story, but he spoke of coming home from work. And I don't know what the layout was, but apparently he would come around the corner and he could look up at his house and they're on the porch. His daughter Gracie would usually always be there.
Watching as soon as he came around the corner, she'd wave. And he said that just helped him get up those last few steps after being weary of work. One day he was tied up and he was quite late. And he said I was really looking forward to coming around the corner and seeing her. And yet he said I looked up and she wasn't there. So he said I went on up the hill, but not with quite the same energy that I usually have. And he said I opened the door and she was there on the floor plane with her brother and sister.
And he said, oh, there you are, Gracie. And she said, oh, Daddy, I just quit watching. Well, isn't there a danger for us now? Right at the end?
To just quit watching if he comes in the 2nd and in the 3rd and finds him watching.
Anybody who's taken their children on a trip where at the end there's some kind of exciting adventure.
Have probably been irritated by their children saying are we there yet, are we there yet, Are we there yet?
Maybe you can think about that a little bit and say there's maybe a lesson in that. Are we there yet? Are you coming yet?
Bill Bruce had said anticipation should build.
And we can choose that. We can choose that. You were mentioning earlier about the mind being set on that and choosing that to continue to anticipate and to build with it because it is closer today than it was yesterday. No matter what you think or where your affections might be. And if you drift a bit, we're closer than we were yesterday. It's closer. And I sometimes hear brethren say that.
We're one day closer. One day closer. That's anticipation.
231.
01:10:08
Are dwelling as I am.
Creative thinking of pleasant.
Snow bird to a substance but.
Lord Murdoch.
Android.
The.
Host is leading for good. I'm his bride.
With a number of gildsmiths meeting.
Through the ways we roll.
This way to sing together.
Play all my heart from home.
And my name refers my blessing.
Is a finger.
Ever loving.
Father.
Flew well.
On everyone.
We want to meet our brethren from.
Every.
Distance.
You're not one will seem a stranger.
No mercy me more.
Oh Lord my face. See I.
Lord stands restraining time.
On the planet.
Ignore it.
Father, we thy children.
Bless.
Thee or thy love upon us, they blessing me I can see.
Now our father friends are gone.
I promise you.
Since my daughter asked me.
To win everything.
When we see our masters.
Of my soul's dream of the living.
And it's gonna make standing great easy.
Billy, thank him.
My Father, gracious God, we thank thee for portion we've had before us. Thank you for girding the safety that is with girding our loins with truth, and whatever you think thee that thou did, skirt thyself and wash thy disciples feet, and we thank thee.
For the hope we have have thy soon return, and we pray that we would be watching, and we thank thee that.
How it warms thy heart, How it will warm thy heart to see.
Those watching thy servants watching in Jesus name, Amen.
The Mystery
Address—Bruce Conrad
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
In this afternoon by seeing him #294.
Our Lord, enlarge our scanty thought.
To know the wonders thou hast wrought.
Unloose our stammering tongues to tell thy love immense, unsearchable.
Hymn #294 Some brother could start it with a suitable tool.
Can Lamb of God?
For us.
In all life, love.
And.
Teach us all.
God and painting life.
Forever.
Called.
To all of you, I will.
Answer.
Fear those still love the Lord for it.
How blessed are they?
Who?
Share altered by.
Thy watch.
Ful side.
Life and strength from.
There is favor.
With Famous.
Yeah.
They live.
Hath roar on Moonstone summary.
Palms to tell my love.
Amen.
Answered Joy.
First, corn.
Many.
Brethren thou.
To her will.
And Earth must fall.
Here's all thy shame and.
All the throne.
And.
She.
We pray.
Our God, our Father.
We bless and thank Thee for the love that has reached out to us.
In the person of thy well beloved son.
We stand here.
I stand here.
And you and I are both in the presence of.
Many whom thou didst foreknow.
Before these very worlds were made upon which we stand.
00:05:03
Thou has called them.
And justified them.
Soon.
We all shall be glorified together to be with him like thy son.
We look to the.
This afternoon that Thou would guide us into that which would help us all along. Refresh our hearts.
And sharpen our sense of who we are and whom we serve.
While we're here in this world, Lord Jesus that hated thee without a cause and cast thee out.
So.
We feel.
We have a couple barley loaves and a few small fishes and would say, like the disciples, what are they among so many?
And truly, the inheritance that is ours is so vast. The well so deep.
Depended upon thee, our God, there would be.
The work of the Holy Spirit to bring before us that which would be for our prophet with clarity.
And so we commit the time to thee, we ask for thy blessing and my help our God.
In that worthy name of our God and Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
So where are the 14 year olds?
Who's 14 in here?
This one right back there, 22 right back there. My eyes aren't as good as they used to be anymore.
There's 12. Great. All right. I'm going to try to try to stay linked up here this afternoon.
I'd like to read first of all a passage.
Genesis 17.
Genesis 17 chapter 17 and what? Abram was 90 years old in nine the Lord appeared to Abram and said unto him, I am the Almighty God, walk before me.
And be thou perfect.
Verse 3 And Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him.
Let's just leave it right there.
Now let's turn to the very end of the book of Romans.
16th chapter.
And it seems to me there's a little bit of an appendix here at the end of this epistle to the Romans, starting in verse.
25.
Now to him.
That is of power to establish you according to my gospel.
And the preaching of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began.
But now.
Is made manifest, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, the eternal God made known to all nations for the obedience of faith to God only wise be glory through Jesus Christ forever.
I have it on my heart to take up some doctrine.
Some teaching.
And I want to take up this doctrine because it's very, very practical.
Because without our heads on straight as to the teaching that is appropriate for us.
We really don't know what direction we should be headed in. Sometimes we do really don't know what's appropriate for us in every situation.
We lose track.
And our actions and the energies of our lives can be severely misdirected.
And so I would like to take up what the scripture calls in somewhat of a technical way.
The mystery.
Or.
I believe it's in Ephesians 5 where the Apostle Paul refers to it as a great mystery.
And it concerns Christ, yes, and the church.
Together called in Paul's epistles the later epistles that he wrote from prison the Christ.
The reason? I read that brief passage in Genesis 17 that occurred to me last night while I was pondering this.
00:10:07
Is that God appeared to Abram and I think it was about the fifth time he did so.
But he kind of recalibrated things with Abraham and justice focused him in and said, OK, here's here's going to be the character of our relationship.
I am the almighty God. You are going to walk before me.
Be thou perfect.
In other words, get aligned with my thoughts. And then he proceeded to speak about some promises.
And then he proceeded to put Abram through the paces. You know, like you and I were poured from vessel to vessel.
And Abram had to learn some lessons in chapter 161718 and so on as you know the story.
I want to tell a story about myself, kind of a stupid story.
But I think it illustrates.
How misguided we can be if we're not properly aligned with the purpose of God for us in that present time.
About 12 years ago when I was still working, I was transferred by my company to Texas to Dallas, TX.
And so my colleagues who had already lived there said, move to this town, just don't bother running all around, just move here. So we did.
And we rented a house and.
Eventually bought the house and we have a little piece of grass out front. Not very big by rural standards.
And for some reason I'm out there and I'm looking at the grass and, uh.
It's I'm from spent most of my life in New England.
And grew up on the East Coast. And, and so I'm out there on my lawn and I see what looks like weeds.
These little runners, they're going everywhere. And I'm like, man, this isn't right again. I have all these weeds and I, I must have been out walking or something or. And And so it was a hot day.
And so I started pulling these things up.
And I'm pulling in, I'm pulling here and it's going way over there and coming up and I'm gathering them up pretty soon within.
Half an hour, 45 minutes, I got this pile of weeds, I think they're weeds. And I started moving over and started another and my neighbor across the street.
I think he sees me, you know, and.
And he's kind of out there making himself obvious. He's out there across the Little St. So I said, you know, I should meet him anyway. You know, I've been here a little while and should be neighborly. So I go over and introduce myself. He says, well, what are you doing over there? I said, I got all these weeds all over my lawn. And it just shakes his head. He says those are not weeds. That's the kind of grass you got.
And here I am thinking that I'm doing something positive and profitable and I'm just being an idiot.
And it's a lot of sweat and energy, too. And I got this big pile out. You can imagine how embarrassed I was to kind of bag them up and hope not everybody going by saw me.
But it's just an illustration coming from New England, you see something like that and that's that shouldn't be there or grass grows this way in Texas. That's just the kind of grass you got that can take 110° and not much water.
It's the same for you and me as Christians.
It's the same deal.
And we need to understand what we're about.
And so when we read in the end of Romans, the Epistle to the Romans, chapter 16, we're at the very end of the Epistle.
And the Apostle Paul covers an immense.
Immense ground all about where different peoples are coming from, His assessment of them, God's provision for sins, how a man can be justified before God, the basic questions of life. If you were saved later in life, you can remember asking these questions. You know, what am I here for?
What's what's right? How is there a God and how do I get right with him if there is one?
And Paul, beautiful, masterfully, the Spirit of God takes you all through that in the early part of Romans, then switches into the next subject.
I understand my sins are forgiven, but what about this nature that I have that?
Doesn't seem to have disappeared after I accepted Christ as my savior. And so you have the wonderful truth at the end of chapter 5 and the doctrine in chapter 6 and the experience in seven and and it burst forth in chapter 8 and all of that and the beautiful parentheses and chapters. Well, what about Israel? Is it all over for Israel now? How does that fit beautifully.
00:15:14
Takes that up, and then the practical side, and then the epistles all over.
But there's nothing about the church really in Romans.
I think the one body which most of all of us have been schooled, schooled in in various assemblies, most all of us understand we're very conversant in that truth that we are one body really not taken up much in Romans. Maybe one's kind of passing reference to it. But I would submit to you this that I've started to think of lately that where Romans ends, Ephesians, Colossians and Philippians picks up and goes on.
And Paul gives a little teasing of it, I believe at the end of his epistle by saying there.
Referring there, I would say to two aspects of the stewardship or the ministry that God had given to them to him. One is the gospel.
Specifically, the gospel of the grace of God and the other is the revelation of Jesus Christ according to the mystery.
Now just on the first one, the gospel of the grace of God, isn't it fascinating?
That in John's writings. In the Gospel of John, I don't think the word gospel appears once.
I don't think John refers in his three epistles or in the Book of Revelation.
Specifically using that language of the gospel.
Because what really was His ministry? His ministry brings the Son of God before has come down from heaven.
And here He is, That eternal life which was with the Father is now manifest unto you.
And speaks of the communication of that life and the possession of it and how it is displayed first in him alone and then as we get in his epistles, which thing is true in him and in you? Different subject. And so it's fascinating too. At the end of John's Gospel, you don't have the ascension.
Don't need to go anywhere. He's come and he's here and he's walking with him.
As I picture it, I just picture the Lord and Peter and John just walking down the beach, just walking off into the distance. The Lord is walking all the way through John's gospel.
Then there's nowhere needed. It's almost like you don't need to go anywhere else. He's here. The Son of God has come.
But not with Paul.
It's different with Paul, isn't it? We know his personal story, at least as much of it as we get in the various epistles and in the book of Acts.
And his encounter with the Lord Jesus was not sitting with his brother, mending that or fishing within his family business and meeting.
Jesus, who perhaps they at first thought was just a man from a nearby town, and then he calls them and off they go. No Paul, Saul of Tarsus, we all know the story. Heading away from Jerusalem in pursuit to the death.
Of God's Saints who had put their trust in him and he encounters.
The Lord Jesus Christ is a glorified man and that's where his history starts. And so in Pauls doctrine.
It starts in heaven.
It is heavenly in its character. It shows us how we end up glorified in heaven with Him and so on. Now a brother. I think I looked at the schedule.
And a brother tonight will stand up here most likely, and preach the gospel, but he's not going to stand here and say.
It's my gospel.
Paul said it's my gospel in Romans chapter one. I think he uses that expression my gospel.
He got it from the Lord himself and it was communicated to him.
And he had it laid upon him in a distinct way, that it was a stewardship, a dispensation, if you will, that was his to carry out. But his gospel isn't just. And I don't want to spend much time on this, but his gospel isn't just. Here's how you receive the forgiveness of sins.
But he could speak of the gospel of the glory of Christ and the gospel of the blessed God. God has been blessed, made happy, so to speak, by the great work of his Son in this world. He sent him, the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world, and he's been glorified by what he did and how he did it. And God has now been glorified and filled with delight.
00:20:13
At the great work of his son.
And Paul uses the expression, the gospel, the good news of the glory of Christ the man.
Who was spit upon and who had the crown of thorns?
Exalted as man.
There's one man in glory in the glorified condition. One man.
You say, well, I thought my grandfather, I thought my grandfather went to, went to be with Jesus. He did. If he put his trust in Christ, he's absent from the body. He's present with the Lord.
But not a body. The body is still where you laid him.
But not the Son of God himself, the Lord Jesus Christ, spirit, soul and body, arisen a glorified man, the first fruits of a coming harvest. He's alone in that sense, as a man.
And Paul shows in his gospel how it is that you and I as sinners can not only be justified in Christ, but what our present position is, and how God for his own glory has picks up you and me and shows us how our destiny and our life is hid with Christ in God. Wonderful. Paul's gospel.
I don't want to spend much time on that. I want to go to the next aspect of his ministry.
Which is in verse 25, the preaching of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery.
A mystery, boys and girls, is not something that cannot be understood or that you have to figure out.
It's called a mystery because it was once hidden.
It was hidden before the Lord Jesus revealed it to the apostle Paul.
We read there in verse 25, which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made manifest, and by the Script, the prophetic Scriptures, according to the commandment of the eternal God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith.
It is very important.
It is pivotal.
For us to understand as believers that the character of truth.
That was communicated to us by the Apostle Paul, which is comes under the heading of the mystery. You can look upon it almost as a technical term.
Is understood by us because it has ramifications in our heart's affections, our patience, our joy, and our ability to walk worthy of this vocation wherewith we've been called.
Why would God hide it?
It's an interesting verse, isn't it, in Genesis chapter 15 when the Lord is speaking to Abram?
And he tells them that he and his seed, they're going to go down into Egypt for 400 years, and in the 10th generation, they would come out.
By his strong armed, strong arm of Jehovah, because the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet full.
What an interesting passage that is. In other words, he was going to exercise all kinds of patients on those, on those peoples, those tribes, those peoples that were in Canaan 400 years worth.
And yet he knew what the result would be, because known unto God or all His works from eternity.
He knew how it would shake out, but in.
Utter fairness.
He suffered impatience for them, that they would manifest what they were or what they were not.
And when they proved by their.
Amazing immorality and degradation that they filled that land with such moral filth.
And sorrow that the Lord could say the land vomits out the inhabitants thereof.
And at the same time, what does he do? He brings his people who have been nurtured down there.
Nurtured under under Pharaoh in Egypt and brings them out with a high hand, and then brings them into the very land with certain responsibilities and so on.
00:25:02
God down through the ages as we know, has dealt with with man as he is fresh out-of-the-box, so to speak, since sin came into the world.
Man in Nature and the Jew is a little sample representation of what all men are.
And so the question obviously could be raised, well, if you just just hedge them about and just tell them exactly what you would like them to be and to do that they'll do, it'll work out. And so he hedges them about and he gives them his word and he raises up then in the face of their failure, Kings.
And prophets, and priests, and all the rest.
Until they prove themselves as iniquitous.
As those that he had rightfully displaced from the land.
And yet, when responsibility by men fail, God is free. As we were speaking the other day, some of these young brethren here God is free, being God to fall back on his own sovereignty.
Because after all, he is God.
And wonderfully, when he falls back on his sovereignty, because he is good.
He manifests his choice in a way that is for man's blessing. He does it sovereignly.
And so promises are made, as we all know, down through the prophets profit after prophet. We call them major and minor, and the theme is consistent.
That the prophet would speak to the mass of the people as to their failure and then hold out hope and blessing for the to the in the future. For those that would receive the message, as Brother Sam mentioned, bow their heads in acknowledgement and humility and God offers to that moral group.
The hope of a wonderfully glorious future, that future for Israel, has not yet taken place.
It is still future to this day.
And so for God in past days to say, well, you're going to be set aside and I'm going to do something with Jew and Gentile and I'm going to make of Twain 1 Newman. And they're going to have the highest privileges that that that you, you can't even imagine.
It would be confusion, would it not? It would cause them to scratch their head.
And so it was kept secret, it was hidden, and God faithfully and righteously held out the test for the first man.
And so when the Lord Jesus came, he came to his own. He came in the fulfillment of all of those promises to, AT, to, AT, and he displayed miracles. He displayed God's goodness, His miracles, His words, everything about him exuded that this was the very sent one of God.
This is the Messiah, the Christ.
And man then sealed his wickedness by saying, this is the heir, come, let us kill him, that the inheritance may be ours.
You say, OK, that's it for Israel.
And if that's it for Israel?
Then man has been able to thwart the purpose of God concerning blessing on the earth of that favored people.
Then God made promises to Abram, and he made promises to Isaac, and he made promises to Jacob that he's not going to fulfill.
Because he made specific promises to them and to their seed. He made promises about the land. He made promises about the other nations.
He made many, many promises that are not yet fulfilled.
And so his brother Bill was commenting in the reading meeting. It isn't. Isn't it so strange?
If you have a King James Bible like I have and you read in the prophetic scriptures that.
These terrible judgments are going to come upon Israel, and maybe it's 80% warning to unfaithful Israel, and maybe there's a little 10 or 20% in there. That's a wonderful promise to those that would humble themselves. And in the top of your Bible, they'll say the church receives a blessing or about to receive a blessing. It's so interesting, right? All of those judgments.
Oh, they're for Israel. They earned them. But these blessings are for the Church.
Makes it illogical. It makes no sense. That's what's being taught today throughout Christianity.
00:30:05
And if you don't get your wits about your young brothers, young sisters, you're going to be swept away by it. You're going to lose your bearings.
And you're going to think you're pleasing Lord, pleasing the Lord by XY and Z, and you're not going to be pleasing him at all.
Because after all, if these distinct.
Repeated promises to the people of Israel are not fulfilled. What about your blessings?
You Christians, what about your blessings? You've been more faithful than Israel? I don't know.
What's to say? Well, yeah. Well, he kind of changed his mind. He was kind of interested in this, and then he decided to do that. No, that's not God. God's not like that. You know that.
Not one word will fail of all His good promise. And so, as we see in the let's turn to Luke 13.
I think it's the 13th chapter of Luke.
Verse 6. Verse 6.
He spake also this parable. A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three days I come seeking fruit on the fig tree, and find none. Cut it down. Why Cumber hit the ground.
And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it and dung it. And if it bear fruit well, and if not, then thou shalt cut it down.
For three years the Lord Jesus manifested himself to that favored nation of Israel.
Up and down the land, tirelessly presenting himself as the Son of the Father, as the anointed one is the Messiah. And was there fruit? There was not. Not only did they not accept him, but in their rejection of Him they they shepherd him into the Romans, that he would be crucified. Three years, no fruit.
Is Israel all done? No. So we read in the book of Acts after the Lord Jesus has ascended.
And after he has, as man, received the Holy Ghost, you might say a second time.
And poured him out.
Onto the earth, upon those individuals who had put their trust in Him, forming one body.
The body of Christ formed the children of God, once individual units, if you could put it that way, the children of God. But it's not our faith that unites us, it's the Holy Spirit indwelling us.
That unites us together to Christ, the risen and glorified man, into one another.
And so the church started in Acts chapter 2, but the truth of the church was not even communicated in Acts chapter two or three or four for that matter, and go on a bunch of chapters. It was a revelation to me when I first heard that many years ago in Dorothy, NJ.
How strange the truth the church should be started on the day of Pentecost, but.
They didn't know what had happened to them fully, and as they went about preaching first at Jerusalem and then throughout Judea and Samaria and then to the other parts of the world, their initial testimony was to Jesus and his resurrection. And so much was it. A added year. Let's dung about. Let's dig down.
Let's really get to the point.
Now the Spirit of God is no holds barred, so to speak.
That's what you do. You dig down and you get the nourishment, the fertilizer, if you will. You get it down there. That's one more year and that's what we read in the early chapters of Acts. Let's see if one more year we'll do it and did it.
And so Stephen?
Perhaps the best and the brightest, we might say, is called on the carpet.
And he gives a wonderfully profound description through their history of privilege and rejection and.
And turning their backs in the face of it.
Amazing, amazing oration that he gives.
And they fly upon him, and he the heavens are opened.
00:35:02
A second time and he sees the Son of God standing on the right hand.
Of the majesty on high, as if he hasn't sat down yet.
And I believe that was the turning point in the seal of that added year, that 4th year.
And lo and behold, who is standing by but one Saul of Tarsus and one of the brothers. We're reading one of our readings. We're going through axes as is if the Lord, it's as if the Lord said, Satan, you've you've you've taken away one of my best. And Saul is standing there. He says, I'm going to take your best.
I'm going to take this one who exceeds in zeal and his animosity to Christ and his people says he's coming with me.
So he arrests them, He apprehends them on the way to Damascus and fits him, the very chief of sinners. He fits him with a special dispensation. What Paul could say was my gospel shows how the Sinner not only receives the forgiveness of sins, because if God just forgave your sins and left you there as a forgiven Sinner.
It doesn't necessarily you The forgiveness of your sins didn't give you new life.
You could have your sins forgiven and still have the same old life and nothing more. Did you ever think of that?
But he didn't do that. He gave us life.
He justified us.
He reconciled us to himself.
And on and on. The truth of Paul's gospel, what he could say, is my gospel.
And he shows that you are not only chosen, but he called you in time, and he justified you in Christ, and he's going to glorify you. It's spoken as a past tense thing, strangely enough in Romans chapter 8.
And so it is that we have now.
The postponement of the blessing of Israel.
Until some future time.
And you say, well, that's a little bit. How do you know that? Let me just the time is going.
By But let me Jeremiah 31 just for one passage, we could.
Obviously you could spend days on this subject.
Months. Years.
Just to pluck out one example, Jeremiah 31.
And reading from verse.
8 Behold, I will bring them.
From the North Country, and gather them from the coasts of the earth, and with them the blind and the lame, the women with the woman with child, and her that travaileth the child together.
A great company shall return thither. They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them, I will cause them to walk by the rivers of water, and so on.
And then further down in verse in chapter 31, verse 31.
Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel and with the House of Judah.
Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant they break, although I was in the husband unto them, saith the Lord. But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the House of Israel after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my law on their inward parts, and write it in their hearts, and will be their God, and they shall be my people, and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord.
For they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them.
Saith the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the Son for a light by day in the ordinance of the moon and of the stars, for a light by night which divideth the sea, when the waves thereof roar. The Lord of hosts is His name. If those ordinances depart from before me, saith the Lord, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me forever.
Thus saith the Lord, if heaven above can be measured in the foundations of the earth, searched out beneath, I will cast out off all the seed of Israel.
For all that they have done, saith the Lord, and so on.
It's a serious thing.
To not take God as his word.
And so when the Epistle to the Hebrews, we have this passage quoted, I believe, by the apostle Paul was the author, though he.
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Goes under the radar in that epistle, and he quotes that very passage of a new covenant that I will make. With the church, No, but with the House of Israel and the House of Judah. The church is not the House of Israel, nor is it the House of Judah. It's something totally different.
And so to play fast and loose with promises made to God's earthly people is foolish. It is not proper and intelligent understanding of the Scriptures. It's not taking God at his word.
And you start pulling on that thread and you're going to unravel the promises that God makes to his heavenly people.
And so we learn that even though the church was formed on the day of Pentecost.
In the stoning of Stephen was a tipping point and we have the Saul of Tarsus saved. He disappears for a while because he had he had to get his loins girt about with truth before his light would shine. He goes down into Arabia. He has to go through some experiences, he has to learn some things practically and even though from the very beginning he preached that Jesus is the Son of God.
Certainly there was development in his understanding of the truth and how many revelations that God.
That God appeared to him with we are not told, but we know that He did. And so he comes out with this truth that he had received by revelation, a truth that had been hid as we read at the end of Romans.
A line of things called the mystery.
The revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began.
Some things in life, in work, in natural life are difficult. Some things are less difficult.
So when you get a way to sort things out, you take it.
When the New Testament will turn to another portion in a moment when the New Testament tells you that the mystery of Christ and the Church made-up of Jew and Gentile both losing their identity and being formed into one Newman the body of Christ.
When we lay hold of that, it starts to put things in perspective in what we call the Old Testament, and I was so helped by a statement Mr. Darby made in his writings, I can't remember where.
But he's put it like this, unless you abstract or take out of the prophets, the church, the assembly, you cannot understand the prophetic scriptures.
And what he means by that is if you keep looking for the church in the Old Testament scriptures.
You're never going to understand them.
But if you take away off the table, so to speak, the that that those passages are a revelation of God's new thing of Jew and Gentile made into one body associated with him in heaven, you take that off the table, then you'll begin to understand. And when it says Israel, it means Israel. When it says Judah, it means Judah. And when it says the nations or the Gentiles, it means that.
And so it's also helpful to take it a step further when you read.
And we're here Pauls ministry in the book of Acts or in other places how he preached to the government powers or to the leaders in Israel, and he begins to quote Old Testament passages about the blessing of the Gentiles. You understand that he's basically saying, look.
You guys are finding it so hard to understand that God has blessing for the nations.
But here, it's all over the place in the Old Testament. That does not mean that the Old Testament is communicating.
That the distinction between Jew and Gentile would be lost, that the middle wall of partition would drop, and that there would be one body. No, it means that Israel will be the head of the nations and that the Gentiles, like it says of Joseph, his branches reach out over the wall. There will be a blessing for this Syrian, They'll be blessing for the Egyptian, they'll be blessing for many nations.
Underneath subservient to Israel as the head of the nation, because Israel's name means, I believe, a Prince with God.
So when you get that, when you can see that for yourself, it is incompatible.
To accept the scriptures in the New Testament that say the truth of Christ in the church.
Known as the mystery was hid in God and not revealed. Once you see that, it opens up so much of the truth to you, so much you can say, well, it doesn't mean this back there in Isaiah 42 or whatever. It has to mean something else. Yes, it does. It means what it says it's saying. It means Israel, it means Judah, it means the nations.
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Let's turn to Colossians chapter one quickly.
I'd love to spend some time in the end of chapter one and beginning of chapter 2, but I doubt we'll have time so.
Let me just jump right to verse.
25 Again the apostle Paul writing to the Colossians from prison, he speaks of two ministries.
You still with me?
You 14 year olds.
He speaks of two ministries.
The gospel which he calls my gospel. My good news.
And he speaks of the mystery of the Church of Christ, the mystery of Christ in the church.
And at times when Paul writes the Christ, if you look in the Darby translation or Kelly or somewhere.
It's referring to that mystical union of Christ and the Church.
And using the expression or the name, thus Christ.
Typified in picture when he took the woman from the side of the man and he called their name Adam.
And so in Colossians one verse 25, he's speaking about his second ministry, whereof I have made a ministry according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you.
To fulfill or complete the word of God, they say, well, John wrote, you know, the book of Revelations at the end of the Bible.
Now how does Paul get off saying he's completing the Word of God? Because by the revelations he received from the ascended Christ, he's putting the last pieces of God's revelation from himself to man through the apostle Paul. And it concerns this wonderful truth of the Christ, that out of Jew and Gentile he's made one new man and united us to himself in heaven, and we shall be his heavenly bride.
And Israel will be blessed on the earth.
And I've heard Stephen say this many times in the face of the challenge. Well, you guys think that there's like 2 purposes of God.
And we say no.
As a matter of fact.
It doesn't very often speak of purposes, if ever in the plural. Its purpose. God has, and he has had and has an eternal purpose, singular. And when it speaks of counsel, it doesn't speak of counsels. We have it in our beautiful hymns sometimes, and the best writers speak about the counsels of God. But if you look it up and spend, you go down through your concordance, you'll see it's the counsel of God.
The counsel of God is how He has chosen to carry out His eternal purpose.
And He has one purpose, to glorify His beloved Son. And that blessing, that fullness, flows out to you and to me.
And so the mystery which again hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his Saints, to whom God would make known. What is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles? Which is Christ in you the hope of glory. Let's turn just briefly as we close up here to Ephesians chapter 3.
I am seeking to press home to your understanding, something that perhaps you have read many times, and I just want to take it and not speak to you as if you have never seen it before, but I want to take it from here and I want to put it up here.
Because I think it deserves much more emphasis than we often give it. It's vital to understanding the prophets. It's vital to understanding prophecy. It's vital to understanding God's purpose and how his counsels will carry out that purpose in heaven and in earth. And so again in Ephesians chapter 3.
For this 'cause I, Paul the prisoner of Jesus Christ, for you Gentiles.
If you have heard of the dispensation or the stewardship of the grace of God, which is given to me to Eward, how that by revelation He made known unto me.
The mystery as I wrote a four and few words, whereby when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.
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And then he describes it rather succinctly here, that the Gentiles should be joint heirs, joint body, joint partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel.
Is promising Christ by the gospel I believe you can find in other epistles of Paul.
That is the promise of eternal life, because in Paul eternal life is held out there, the mystery.
Now the mystery, as he goes on to say in this chapter, not only is it to be understood.
But it has a practical side, verse nine, and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, the administration of the mystery.
There is a way that it is, you might say, realized and and affected presently in this world because almost all Christian blessings are present. You have been blessed and I have been blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ presently in Israel's blessings, typically our future.
And you read through the prophets, and you see that future blessing. This is what I'm going to do for you.
But with the Christian, with the Christian testimony and the revelation in the New Testament, this is what I have done for you. This is what you have, and this is what you are.
And so in verse nine, to make all men see what is the fellowship or the administration of the mystery.
Which from the beginning of the world here it is again hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ the to the intent that now.
Unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This revelation of this line of things to the apostle Paul.
Was given at a certain appropriate time after the stoning of Stephen.
It has been now made known to you and me. It is part and a key part of the faith which was once delivered to the Apostles.
Once delivered to the Saints and the apostles and prophets, where you might say the conduit, the.
The the ones who received it, understood it, enjoyed it and communicated it. But it's not just for them, it's for us. It's for you and me, The faith which was once committed or delivered to the Saints.
Isn't it interesting in First Corinthians 11?
When the apostle Paul is speaking about the Lord's Supper.
And he says, There I received of the Lord, that which also I delivered unto you.
That the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread, and so on.
And I've often thought of that and if I'm Peter and I'm John and I'm like Paul, how do you get off with this? Like we were we we were there that night. You weren't even there. We were there. And how do you get that you received this from in revelation. But he wasn't lying. He received it. And This is why in the Lord's day, when we put that that the table and the loaf is on it.
And we know that it speaks of the Lord's body given for us in death.
And hence ensues all of our blessings through his death.
Brought life to you and me that there's an added character in it, isn't there? And I believe that's what the revelation that Paul got about it. Because if the church isn't known, that which is the one central expression of it that we can see with our eyes and taste wasn't going to be made known either.
Because the church, even on the night of his betrayal, was still.
A mystery hidden God. And so that added aspect of that one loaf representing all of us as partakers of one loaf, members of one body, was the revelation committed, communicated to the apostle Paul. And the other revelations that we can understand and enjoy that were uniquely revealed to him, we get in First Corinthians 15.
You say, Yeah, well, that's about the resurrection.
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Let's just we have a minute or two. Let's just turn to 1St Corinthians 15, just very briefly.
One Corinthians 15 in verse.
Verse 51.
Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed, and so on.
You say, well, the Old Testament Saints understood that. They seemed to have the faith that there was a resurrection. Yes, that indeed they did. Martha says it at, at, at.
The time when the Lord came at Lazarus death, he says, I know he shall raise at the resurrection at the last day. And when Paul stood before the council in the book of Acts, maybe 20 chapter 2225, somewhere in there and he's standing there and he's giving defense and he's and he says, you know, I was raised in the strictest sect of the Pharisees and I can check all these boxes. And one of the boxes he checked was, yeah, I believe in the resurrection and angels and spirits.
And we have those beautiful.
References in Job. I think it's the 14th chapter in the Psalms.
Indicating that Old Testament Saints sauce as as Brother Gordon Hale put it to me once, he said the Christian is now in the light of day. The revelation has been out. The true light has shown, has shown and you and I are in that light. But in Old Testament days, it's like a if you're out doing something at night or working or walking or whatever and it's a dark night and you'll get some Thunder for a moment everything is lit up.
So you have Psalm 16.
Reference to the resurrection in Psalm 17 and so on. Beautiful, beautiful foretaste, but it's not the revelation of what we get in First Corinthians 15. The timing of it is tied to the trump of God. The change that takes place is into a body that is incorruptible. And the fact that the trump is mentioned in First Corinthians 15 ties us, ties it, and links it.
Overlaps with it, you might say, into First Thessalonians 4.
Where as you all know.
Paul makes that statement to those new believers.
Saved only weeks perhaps by this time.
In First Thessalonians 4.
For this we say unto you, by the word of the Lord.
That's a revelation that he had from the Lord, and so we see in these passages as we.
Put them together and we start to ponder them. We see that the mere existence of the Church.
As united to Christ, risen and ascended was.
A mystery hidden God.
And therefore the expression of he and and us, He and her, if I could put it that way.
Was not revealed and so Paul adds that character to it as to the supper on the Lords table. And her destiny is also not known because she wasn't known. And so that's brought out as a revelation in First Corinthians 15 and then the destiny of the Lord descending into the clouds of heaven.
And ushering us into heaven with himself to be glorified.
We have just touched, as we often say, the tops of the waves.
But if you are a believer, whether you are 14 or.
Or thirteen or nine or eight or seven, or whatever you are.
It perhaps has not dawned on you yet, as it often doesn't to us who are much, much older.
The reason that you are a believer?
And that you're part of the Church of God.
Is because He chose you in eternity past, as we say.
Before those mounts of beautiful mountains that we've been seeing driving over here, before those were even created, he had you as an individual in mind because election is personal.
It says whom he foreknow, not what.
Israel's adoption and election was national. Yours is personal.
The origin of your blessing.
Was in eternity.
It's remarkable, isn't it?
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And you've been made part of the Church of God, and you're part of it now. And this is the practical side of it. And our time is gone.
But it has a practical side to it because right now, while we're here in this world, we're part of something heavenly. We're not of the world as we often see. We're heavenly men by birth. We've been called from above.
In the truth of the mystery, and when we realize what we are part of, it has a separating effect upon our hearts and upon our lives. And it brings us to realizing that we're just strangers here. We're strangers and pilgrims, and it flows out into the various aspects of life, if properly understood, and the heart is engaged.
And also, just to close, you're part of the Church of God, and the Church of God is going to outlast these mountains.
Think of it.
The origin of your blessing was before the mountains were made, before the earth was formed for you.
And he's going to fold it all up like a garment.
And the Church will still be with him as his bride, not just his wife, but his bride, often to eternity as we had in the Reading meeting to day. How wonderful these things are. Brother called me once I was driving home. It was very late. I was so refreshed. A comment that he made.
He said when the world's when the world's were framed by the word of God.
The angels shouted for joy. Think of it, watching, being able to see what God did to create the world. They shouted for joy, the sons of God.
What happens when he creates a new heavens and a new earth? As Peter tells us, this one is going to be dissolved. He's going to create a new one. Where you going to be?
This is going to put you in a closet somewhere.
No.
The sons of God, the children of God are. I believe we're going to see it.
Changed new heavens and a new earth where sin has never come. Sin will never have been associated with that new heavens and that new earth, just like you have a life to which sin has never been attached.
Wonderful.
Let's just close in prayer.
Or God our Father.
What can we say in light of these things? Help us, young and old, to lay hold these precious things we know it is Thy desire having made known unto us the mystery of Thy will, Thou hast abounded towards us in all wisdom and knowledge. Help us to exert the spiritual energy and virtue.
That we may lay hold of these things in our understanding, and more than that, that they would be the.
Sanctifying, refreshing power in our lives as we recall the origin of our life and our eternal destiny. Lord Jesus, to be with and like thyself.
We just commit.
These various passages we've read, the thoughts so feebly expressed to Thee, we ask for Thy blessing upon Thy Saints. Preserve us in the knowledge, the understanding, the appreciation of truth, that we might not turn out by the way, we might not be tossed to and fro by the winds and the doctrines of men. And so, our God, we just commit the time to Thee. We ask for Thy blessing upon Thy precious Word.
In thy worthy name, Lord Jesus, Amen.
Luke 12:41-48
Reading
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270.
And shall we see thy face? And.
Hear thy heavenly voice.
Will Grace.
Will make our hearts rejoice.
Where the name?
Worship Divine.
No God, no distance there shall hide.
Lord, is that themselves growing?
Fraud of my boneless love.
That gave the.
For us.
For Earth we shall with the.
And we'll all be lost more.
He now.
Here Lord, I sorrow and my cross record.
What makes us no day near?
Way.
To save the Lord here.
Within our hearts.
Thou dwell in love and afford.
The joy that love imparts.
Yes, all the way for the day.
All our heart.
With I precious word on our laps and to be open give us a fresh spirit of dependence.
On the leading and direction of the Holy Spirit.
And Lord Jesus again we look to these the head of the church, let us know our needs and now that are pleased to minister by those joints and bands of supply those gifts that thou has given that thy people might be nourished and built up and edified. And we pray that we might receive without us have for us this afternoon. We thank thee for thy precious word. We thank thee for the light that it sheds on our path and the.
Of our hearts that perhaps need more illumination.
That thy word would find its way there. And our God and our Father, that we might have hearts ready and willing to receive and to hear and to do what thou let's bring before us for my precious word. And so, our God and our Father, again we thank thee for thy beloved Son. We thank thee for thy eternal counseling.
00:05:08
Purpose in Him and how we have been brought in by sovereign grace. Help us to walk in the enjoyment of it and in the enjoyment of it to receive Thy word this afternoon. So we ask this, our God and Father, and the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen. Amen.
But once again, for those that have just perhaps gotten here, I do see a few faces that weren't here this morning. We've been looking at Luke 12.
Would it be OK to go on with verse 41? Is that does that seem about right?
Luke's Gospel chapter 12 and verse 41. Then Peter said unto him, Lord, speakest thou this parable unto us, or even to all? The Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise Stuart, whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his Lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing. Of a truth I say it to you, that he will make him ruler over all that he hath.
Button, If that servant say in his heart, My Lord delayeth his coming, and shall begin to beat the men, servants and maidservants, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken. The Lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, in an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him asunder, and will point him his portion with the unbelievers. And that servant which knew his Lord's will and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.
But he that knew not and did commit things worthy of stripes shall be beaten with few stripes. For under whomsoever much is given, of whom shall be much required, and to whom men have committed much of him, they will ask the more. I am come to send fire on the earth, and what will I if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straightened till it be accomplished? Suppose you that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you nay, but rather division.
For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided 3 against two and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father, the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother, the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.
And he said also to the people, When you see a cloud rise out of the West, straightway you say there cometh a shower. And so it is. And when you see the South wind blow, you say there will be heat, and it cometh to pass. Ye hypocrites, you can discern the face of the sky of the earth, but how is it that you do not discern this time? Yeah, and why even of yourselves judging not what is right, When thou goest with thine adversary to the magistrate, as thou art in the way, give diligence that thou mayst be delivered from him.
Lest he hail thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and the officer caste into prison, I tell thee thou shalt not depart thence till thou pay the very last might.
I.
What's very interesting and instructive for us here?
As we remarked earlier on in the chapter, the Lord has a crowd of people around him. As Bruce was bringing out in one of the earlier readings, they were.
Treading one upon another. There were so many people there. And yet the Lord begins the chapter by saying in verse four. And I say unto you, my friends.
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And so the Lord is really speaking to his own in this chapter. But then Peter wants to know, Lord, is this for everybody or just for us? What what about this, what you're telling us?
And it's nice to see here how the Lord brings it down, not merely to his friends, but right to the individual level.
And that's where it all starts, doesn't it? If you and I are going to live and walk for the Lord and to please Him, it has to start with us as individuals. I say this very kindly, but.
Sometimes, and it's not all bad, but sometimes we tend to look at our brethren in our local assembly, our local gathering, and say, well, those who are older and those who take the lead.
They ought to provide a nice atmosphere for everything to work smoothly and things to grow nicely, and for us younger ones to get teaching and food for our souls. And from the vantage point of those of us that are older, that ought to be a real exercise. But what does the Lord say to Peter here?
He says in verse 42, Who then is that faithful and wise steward?
Whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season.
And maybe if you're a young person here and allow me, if I can, to speak to you for a moment, because like Bruce Conrad, I can remember when I was young and sat where you are and.
Everyone of us.
Not only has a work for the Lord that he has given us to do, but the gift to do it. And as Peter reminds us, and well, let's turn to it and it's in first Peter, let's let's read the verse because it's important. Peter remembered what the Lord had told him here.
And in first Peter chapter 4.
And verse 10, First Peter Four and verse 10.
Peter says as every man, notice that every man, not just some older brothers and sisters, every man hath received the gift.
Even so, minister the same one to another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
In Scripture were stewards not only of material things, but also of spiritual things.
The only difference is if I share my material things with someone else. If I do what we have earlier in this chapter and sell that I have and give alms.
I quite naturally am that much poorer materially than I was before if I share what the Lord gives you and me spiritually, either in gift or in the manifold, as it says here.
In Peter, the manifold grace of God if I share something spiritually.
I'm not any poorer afterward, am I? I'm richer because I have shared it with someone else. And so I believe Peter learned a real lesson here, that here he as an individual had a responsibility. And the Lord, as what we're saying, don't worry about anybody else, Peter. I'm speaking to each one of you individually, and you are stewards.
Of the things that I have given you.
And of course, the steward is one who has responsibility for things that essentially don't belong to him, but he is given the responsibility of.
Giving them out according to the mind of the one who has entrusted him with them.
And what a wonderful thing that is. So if you and I, everyone of us, have something of the Lord that we have learned.
The Lord says I want you to look for an opportunity to share that, to be a good steward of what I have given you and what a privilege that is.
00:15:07
In Mark chapter 13 and verse 34 in connection with what Bill is just saying.
We have this.
Account that the Lord speaks of, he says, for the Son of Man is as a man taking a far journey.
Who left his house, and gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the Porter to watch?
Well, once again, this is.
Taking up Christ's interests in this world, isn't it? And what is, if we could say it this way, His primary interest? His people.
And so you get that same expression in Acts 20. Maybe it's been referred to already. I know we did refer to Acts 20, but it's worth reading this verse.
It's often struck home to my own soul. Acts 20 and verse 28.
Take heed, therefore, under yourselves, and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers. Now this is a little different line of truth, because these were elders in the Ephesian assembly. We're not all overseers.
But the principle is the same, to feed the Church of God, and here in our King James it reads, which he hath purchased with his own blood.
Again, I like the J&D translation which he hath purchased.
With the blood of his own, the blood of his own, that's how much he values his people. That's how much he values each one of us. And each one can be an encouragement to the other as being a steward of what we have been given.
A faithful and wise steward to give out meat in due season. Now you and I aren't Peters and John's and Paul's and others that were laying the foundation of the church, but the Lord gives us each act which is of Christ, and He wants us to use it as a faithful and wise steward. Now there are warnings here. We're going to come to them, warnings about what can happen if that servant says my Lord delayeth his coming and so on.
But first of all, there's encouragement.
Verse 43 Blessed is that servant whom is Lord, when he cometh shall find so doing. And what a what a privilege that is. And again I say it's a privilege you won't have in the glory. We won't have the privilege of serving him in the place where he was rejected. Will we serve him? We had that in the last meeting. Definitely we will. But the service that is rendered under difficult circumstances.
Is especially precious to Christ.
It's possible for us to be.
So conscious of our collective privileges and the collective aspects of Christianity that we give a short shrift or we don't pay attention as much as we should to our individual responsibilities and our individual privileges.
00:20:03
Speak of the body of Christ, we speak of the Church of God, we speak of the assembly. But it says in, I think it's Second Corinthians 5, if any man be in Christ, there is a new creation.
And really, in new creation, we are individuals and.
I was just thinking, Bill, of what you were saying about in the assembly. You know, sometimes the younger ones can mumble and grumble a little bit. Well, I'm not, you know, we don't have that great teaching where I live and all of that kind of thing. I know when I was saved and gathered to the Lord's name in a very small assembly, the brethren got along so wonderfully and sweetly. But the older ones were saved later in life. But it didn't hinder our enjoyment, our fellowship, the worship.
Was real.
And precious.
The teaching, there wasn't so much of it, but we're responsible ourselves.
To lay hold of the truth as individuals and if we get some good teaching in the Assembly, it's a bonus, is the way I look upon it. At the end of where we didn't read in Colossians there. I think it's the end of the first chapter.
Yes, Colossians one verse 28 Speaking of Christ in you the hope of glory verse 28 whom we preach warning.
All no warning every man individual warning every man and teaching all no every man in all wisdom that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. So whether it's the children in our family, we are wise to seek to understand the bent of our each particular child because.
As it says, raise up a child according to the tenor of his way.
And the children are all different.
Ideally, they have a different response from us, a different way of teaching and handling them. So, so it is. There's a side of the individual blessing that we ought not to lose sight of. We're chosen as individuals. We're called. It's a narrow door. We come through 1 by 1.
We have an individual and personal relationship with the Lord and even though our collective blessings are wonderful.
We ought not to just eclipse that other side of things. I believe some of the encouragements to the seven church through the Angel of the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3. Some of those rewards that are held out are very personal. I will give him a new name that no man knows, and he that receive it, he'll he feed on the hidden mana. And those things are just, they are precious. And if the Lord tarries and I don't expect him to.
But as things go, more and more of us will be find ourselves going along literally with two or three.
And we again, we ought to have the spiritual courage.
For a very short time to continue on in that way because we're going to be ushered into into the sphere of glory where.
You'll see the many, many songs that he will have been brought home to glory.
And it's not enough to hold the doctrine of the Lord's coming.
Because in verse 45 he says in his heart.
He might not say it out loud.
But the servant, it's an individual who says in his heart, My Lord delayeth his coming.
And it's one thing to hold the doctrine of a pre tribulation rapture. You say, yeah, where I go we hold that. But is it a reality in my heart and in my life that I'm expecting the Lord?
And if we don't, what happens? As was read in Mark 13, we have it in our 45th verse. If we say in our hearts, My Lord delayeth his coming, what happens? The practical life, the moral side of life, deteriorates.
Happened with Israel in the last prophets and Agai and Malachi. They gave up the enjoyment of the promises that they had, and down they went. And it manifested in the abuse of marriage, the abuse of their brethren, and all the rest. And so it can be with us to beat the men, servants and maidservants, unrighteousness towards others, to eat and drink with the drunken.
00:25:10
As you pointed out in verse 47, it says in that servant which knew his Lord's will, he knew.
Makes him all the more culpable.
Well, there is very real warning here and very real encouragement, isn't there?
Just think of it in verse 44, which we didn't talk about.
He will make him ruler over all that he had.
Isn't that wonderful? And as was remarked this morning, the Lord not only gives us the work in our souls, not only starts the work in our souls as we get in Philippians 2.
He provides that which is needed to will and to do of His good pleasure, and then He turns around and rewards us for it. Will it be worth it all in that day when He takes His rightful place and there we are associated with Him?
We can't, we can't conceive of what that will be like.
Yes, rewards are never the motive for faithfulness to Christ.
The only motive that Scripture knows for being faithful to Christ is the love of Christ constraineth us. Second Corinthians chapter 5. The love of Christ constraineth us. That's the only motive that Scripture knows for service to him. For rewards are an encouragement, and what an encouragement the Lord gives us here. He will make him ruler all that he have over all that he has.
But then there are the warnings. The warnings. And it's another case in Scripture where in its primary meaning, the warning is directed at an unbeliever. The Lord knew that under the umbrella of Christianity there would be those who were rank unbelievers who would take the place of being overseers and shepherds and stewards and all the rest of it. And you and I don't have to look very far.
To see where it has happened and where those who have taken the leadership among believers, sometimes believers, sometimes unbelievers have abused things and lined their own pockets with money and done everything that is spoken about here, but it ends up being with an unbeliever. The end of verse 46 will appoint him as portion with the unbelievers. But can a believer go down that road? Sadly, he can.
Sadly we can, if we get away from the Lord, a believer can go down that same Rd. because the flesh and the believer is no better than that in an unbeliever. And if it starts to act, this is a warning to all of us, isn't it? But what can happen?
You can see the difference between what we had earlier.
With those that were watching and waiting, loins girded, lights burning. And now what we're taking up.
There it's it's affection, watching and waiting.
Their their affections are engaged, they're looking, they're waiting. And what are they introduced to? A display of affection on the Lord's side towards them, and a wonderful enjoyment of it. Is there any bound of time connected with it? Doesn't seem to be.
But now we come down and he introduces his coming as Son of Man. Well, we look for him as the bridegroom, don't we, properly speaking, as the church.
Well, they also look for His coming, a Son of man, to take his rightful place. And that's the time of manifestation of faithfulness and of reward for faithfulness and service. And so that's what we get now in this part of the chapter.
00:30:07
So you see the distinction between the two, I don't want to say the ones, the rapture and the other coming in power and glory, so much as two aspects of His coming, one that's in connection with affection and the other that's in connection with faithfulness for service. Well, certainly we see faithfulness with those watching and waiting earlier, but I think the large emphasis is really on the affection part. And now we get that, which is for service. But how has the Church been?
Has she been faithful? Have those individuals responsible and have been faithful? If we've been faithful, well, there's reward for faithfulness. And that more seems to be bound by the sphere and time of the Kingdom when it will be set up that there will be a place of responsibility in that sphere of ruling in his Kingdom, though that's not maybe specifically exactly mentioned.
But I think that's more the content.
That in connection with the servant that says My Lord delayeth his coming, that's not an expression of disappointment.
That's an expression of a sigh of relief, because he doesn't want him to come.
And so he says, I don't want him to come, must be he's not coming. And you know, the doctrines that teach and deny the any moment expectation of the Lord's return for his Saints really feed into the.
Desire.
Of that which is false and Christianity that does not want to see his coming.
It really lines up with that spirit of things that doesn't want to see him come. I'm happy down here. I've got a good down here. I really don't want that disturbed. I want to go on in my own way. Well, it's already been remarked that has a decline as well. It's not. Again, it's not an expression of disappointment, you might say. It's like he's not coming. Good. Now I can go do what I want to do. I don't have to worry about looking over my shoulder.
And without wanting to revisit the subject in detail, that is one of the tenets of so-called covenant theology. In essence, it destroys the hope of the immediate return of our Lord Jesus Christ at any moment.
Most of the time the Lord's coming is not outright denied, but it is put way off to the side without it being as Bruce was, bringing out a present living daily hope. Maybe the Lord will come today. It's put off to one side and getting this world ready for the so-called Kingdom is what occupies the heart. And that is not what the Lord left us with. He left us with the.
Present living hope of his coming at any moment.
And that already has been discussed. And as you were bringing out Brother Steve, it's connected far more with affection than with a knowledge of truth and so on. Yes, we need a knowledge of the truth and we need responsibility, but it's connected mainly with affection. But here we're getting responsibility now, which is connected with his appearing. And what are we doing?
View of that day, how is what I do today and how I live going to stack up when the Lord comes back with us. Well, we know, of course, that some of the reward will be as we get here, positions of public honor and administration of the Kingdom as we get in Luke 19 have the authority over 10 cities or five cities or something like that. There will be other rewards that it will be more private.
But there will be rewards. That will be the Lord's public recognition of faithfulness down here, and that will all come out of his appearing wanted. And so there is a warning here about there's an encouragement for faithfulness, but also a solemn warning for unfaithfulness.
00:35:23
Bill, could you tell us if he says?
The Lord delayeth his coming. How would that be when they're handing out the rewards?
That would have to be, I can see it would be if he was coming for the Saints, which I don't know that this does that.
Thing he delays is coming, but how could he that be a sigh of relief because that doesn't come until the Lord comes back in judgment. Is that understand my question? No, not completely. Brother Steve brought that out. Maybe you better ask him that question.
Yeah, it will. It's not. This is if this is rewards, then how? What? What's he saying here?
So the Lord delayeth. He's coming. He's not looking for a rapture.
Is he? I would say he's not looking for the Lord to come at all.
And, and maybe it's just a good reminder, there are only two comings of Christ. The first one's already taken place. The next one is yet to come. Yes, it does have two installments, which isn't the subject of this chapter. That he's going to take his own first.
To be with him and then return with them in power and glory. But that's all one coming. That's the second coming. There isn't 3 coming. So he's not expecting the coming at all. Whether it would be a servant that had been taught the rapture or not. He's not expecting him to come. He doesn't want him to come. And so he says, oh, he's delaying is coming. It's really it's, it's never going to happen. Not in my life time anyways.
You know, so I can do what I want to do. But that's been the attitude of the church. I said as a queen and I'm no widow is its ultimate expression. I, I'm at the top, I'm, I'm ruling, I'm reigning, I do what I want. There's no one going to come and hold me accountable. And so it it's going to have its full expression, I think, as we see the Falls Church and Revelation.
Gentile Church is pictured in Vashti in the book of Esther, and she gets so infatuated with herself as being the head of all the women.
That she forgets that her glory is to be the glory of the man and that that comes to full, it ripens into fullness as we read in the Book of Revelations with the false church saying I sit as queen and am no widow. I've got everything, everything is good. And so as, as one of the writers put it, the wish is parent to the thought and the wish is for delay, as Steven said, and it gives.
Its offspring.
Is these thoughts that Oh well, he's not coming soon anyway. That's really underneath, under the surface of it, the wish.
Though she set aside.
Then answer your question, Brother Burn. Yes, it does, yeah.
I think that's the real key to it, the way Steve put it, that the rapture and the Lord's hearing are often merged together in Scripture. Yes, separate as to time, but they're really one coming, one to take his own home to be with himself, and one to come back in judgment. But in this chapter that distinction is is not particularly emphasized because the full truth of all of that wasn't going to be.
Really manifest until Paul's ministry and so.
I think Bruce put it well a few days ago. We're looking back at this chapter from the vantage point of having known and appreciated Paul's ministry. But what the Lord was giving out here was to those who hadn't had the benefit of that yet. And so perhaps things would seem to our minds to be a little blurred into one another, but they're not really.
He was speaking to a Jewish audience and he was speaking to those who at the same time were.
Going to be part of the church. And So what he gives them is what was suitable for that time and place. But then everything kind of becomes more clear as we get further light given to us later on in the in the epistles.
00:40:10
Bill, I have a question. This portion would seem to me to become very important to the tribulation Saints. They will read this and they will see that there there are believers in the tribulation and we know the remnant then comes. But there we've been going through revelation in our assembly and we see the different Saints that are martyred and and they're there in glory. But there are there are believers on this earth who.
Believe the preaching of the 144,000 they there are people who are preaching the gospel of the Kingdom. I would say that they will be preaching this these passages from the Scriptures that these will have great value to them. Those who are faithful servants of God preaching at that time and they will consider these things and you know they should know if they read the Scriptures they should be able to mark down pretty close to when the Lord's coming is. But if you don't pay attention.
Just like we have so many nowadays, they don't believe it. There is no so many in evangelical Christendom. They they are not expecting the Lord's coming. As you said, they put it aside and they have other beliefs. But if you do pay attention, I would say that there be preachers preaching right out of this text right here at someday in the future during the tribulation to the remnant, to those who are believers of that time. Would that be accurate?
I personally believe so, yes. And I believe they will actually know these scriptures and other scriptures like Matthew 24 and various ones that refer to this time, and it will give them real intelligence as to what's going on, yes.
In fact, there was an older sister in our local assembly and she went to be with the Lord when I was still in grade school at the age of 95. She could well remember sitting on JN Darby's lap and she was a little girl.
And.
I didn't get this from her, but my mother told me that she always, when she wore out a Bible, she put it away very carefully. She said, I trust that someday the godly remnant will pick up those Bibles and read them and get the truth of what they need to learn. And I thought that that was something, really something for that older sister to do.
Didn't lose the importance of it and the message to ourselves in Matthew 24 and 25. This falls. It can be those chapters can divide it into three parts. You have first of all to Israel and then the Lord turns as it were and addresses his disciples and it's no longer the Son of man coming, but now it is.
The Lord has made him ruler of his household and it speaks of the household of faith and then we have 3 militaries given and then.
What reverts back to the return of the Son of Man and taking up with the nations? This.
Parallel portion in Matthew occurs in the middle section, which speaks to us now. It's really faithful faithfulness in the Lord's absence. And it says there, it speaks of this one. If that evil servant shall say in his heart, my Lord delayeth his coming and so on. In verse 50 of Matthew 24, the Lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him. That's not our expectation, but that evil servant that will be.
His end, the Lord will come in a day when he doesn't expect it. The church gave up the the hope of the Lord's coming as a something that it could occur at any time very early in its history. So much so that there will be those that will insist there's no mention of it in the church fathers. And Mr. Darby just invented this because they put it on him. It wasn't him at all. He didn't come up with it. It's scripture. And there were, I believe, multiple ones that the Lord LED.
To recognize, as we have in Matthew 25, at midnight there was a crime made. Behold, the bridegroom cometh at midnight cry. And there was a recognition that the Lord was going to return for his own.
The portion that we have before us, it's interesting in verse 2047.
J&D translation says, but that bondsman who knew his own Lord's will.
00:45:02
And had not prepared himself, nor done his will shall be beaten with many stripes. There are many that taken that place within the fold of Christianity throughout its history that claim to be his own, but in denying the Lord's coming.
Their relationship.
With.
With the master has been out of place and as a result, their relationship with their brethren is being out of place. But Christendom is full of individuals that have that fit this description. We're not just looking forward to a future future time. We could look at the what we call the dock ages and how the church ruled with a rod of iron enriched herself and still the church if you speak of it and like for example, the Roman Catholic Church is is is rich.
We've been going through Revelation 2 and we have those descriptions.
In the is it the 18th chapter?
Where we get maybe the fullness of it brought out in a head, the 17th and 18th chapter. But we shouldn't imagine that these things haven't been going on. You know, there's two individuals W Cotton Court who are responsible for.
Much of the scholarship that goes into modern Bible translations. They were contemporaries of J&D and William Kelly. I don't remember which one that wrote it, but.
Suggested that you know any coming of the Lord including Thessalonians 4 was nothing but what he called a spiritual theophany. In other words, just a spiritual experience that we can go through and these were churchmen that were looked up and admired but the effect of this doctrine on the church to lose sight of the fact that the Lord could come for us at any moment it was absolutely devastating it's.
And and likewise we we can.
Get discouraged. You can't. I'm not saying we can lose our salvation, but.
There are plenty that take their number amongst Christianity.
Call the Lord their own and yet.
They're not real. They're they're they're unbelievers. And we can be easily misled if we're if.
We lose sight of the Lord's coming. I don't know that I put that very well.
You think it'd be right to say with the many and few stripes that you get a contrast between the responsibility of professing Christianity even world Absolutely. That's why I think it says in verse 47 you his own Lord's will they take their place amongst the ranks of Christianity. They're baptized they they're they're in high positions.
And they will be considered very responsible a.
And then ignorance we find here, you know, ignorance is not an excuse, but there is less responsibility and they will be beaten with less stripes.
It's important to recognize that ignorance is not an excuse, but there is degrees of responsibility.
Just to add to that, I would suggest that the end of verse 48, beginning with the word. For unto whomsoever much is given of Him shall be much required, and to him to whom men have committed much, much of Him they will ask the more.
That perhaps is directed more to believers now.
It has an effect on an unbeliever too, but the church and the individuals in the church are never going to be beaten with stripes for being unfaithful. That's a wrong thought. That's clearly an unbeliever that is in view there but for you and for me that know the Lord for you and for me.
There are degrees of understanding and knowledge and spiritual maturity among believers.
And also there are degrees of, shall we say, material prosperity among believers. And it bears on what Brother Bruce said. I think it was in the first reading meeting that when if we could say it this way.
00:50:03
Those in perhaps countries where they don't have as much as we do, perhaps look over at those in Western Europe and North America and get, they say, oh, very rich countries, you've got so much and so on.
Maybe you could repeat it Bruce, but the way I've looked at it.
I don't tend to become either defensive or apologetic about that. I say to them, if they're believers, I say you pray for us because we are going to be held far more responsible for what the Lord has given us, whether it's in material things or spiritual things. So you pray for us because this, and I quote this Scripture to them, the Lord is going to hold us very, very responsible.
Did I get that right, Bruce? Is that what you were saying? Yes.
You know, sometimes I hear men that I used to work with say, well, money is the root of all evil. And I have to say it's the love of money that's the root of all evil. And a person that has very little of this world's goods can be dominated in their character by the love of money. And a person who happens to have much like many of the brethren associated with the recovery of the truth in the 19th century.
Where people of great tremendous means and they plowed it under, they used it for the Lord and it resulted in tremendous blessing around the entire world. So they had money, but it wasn't their object and they they used it like it says of the of the it's such an interesting parable of the unjust steward of that without turning to the parable, he used a temporary position.
For his future benefit. And so the council there that we get from the parable is to use their temporary situation and resources that we have in light of eternity.
So what is the many stripes and the few stripes?
Well, I would suggest Virgil that it really is a way of referring to degrees of punishment in hell.
The Lord by his Spirit often uses something that we can all understand. And in the days when this was written, that was what was meted out to people as punishment. You, you got, you got a dose of Roman scourging and it was something else and.
I believe the Lord is simply showing us that there will just as there will be degrees of reward in heaven, there will be degrees of punishment in hell. It's an awful thing to think about, but the Lord will meet out the punishment in hell according to the responsibility and knowledge that individuals have had, I believe.
Going to say that and Bruce says not Miss Bruce, the other Bruce writes about that.
And I have a lot of difficult trying to wrap my mind around that and understand that because.
How can hell be any more than hell than what it is? I mean how if you end up in a lost eternity and it's described by the Lord and many of the gospels tied hand and foot in outer darkness?
Tormented day and night.
You.
Wailing and gnashing of teeth. And the wailing is the fact that you will remember for all eternity the opportunity that you had to be saved. And you brushed it aside. And the gnash in your teeth is your enmity and hatred will never cease. Is that correct? Yes.
How can there be any?
Worse than our certain I mean what do they turn up the heat or something? I, I, I don't mean that derogatory, but I'm just saying I can't understand how there can be.
Different degrees of hell and where you're in hell, and it can't get any worse than that.
I don't understand it either, Virgil, but I guess we just have to fall back on scripture and say here it is and how it'll all pan out. We don't know. I don't know unless someone else has a better answer than that, but.
00:55:02
I would say because God is just and we believe that that if someone like Hitler.
Is going to receive something different than some lost heathen out of the jungles of Africa or South America that has rejected whatever presentation God gave to him much differently? Because God is just. That's where I rest.
I don't understand it, but he says that he's just and he's going to be just and how he dispenses punishment.
It also says of hell where the worm dieth not. What did you say? But it also says of hell where the worm dieth not. And so, you know, Hitler's conscience is not going to be, you know, he, he's not going to forget what he did. He's going to remember that for all eternity. So there's that side of it too. That's sort of a maybe a passive punishment that they'll endure. He'll never forget what he inflicted.
And and of course, the man less responsible won't have.
That conscience to bear.
But Lemoyne had a verse that I think perhaps is helpful to.
You want to read it? Revelation 20.
Verse 13.
Says in the sea gave up the dead which were in it.
Death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them, and they were judged every man according to their work.
Even that have been mentioned will be they have had the gospel of creation, haven't they? No matter what else is lacking to them.
Creation itself, the heavens testified.
That can be rejected.
Here they're judged every man according to their works.
In a broader way to.
Word of the severest judgments fall in the tribulation.
They fall where the greatest responsibility was, whether it be the Jews.
Have the oracles of God committed to them, or the church have the testimony of Christ? And I think the greatest and severest judgment seemed to fall on that which had the testimony of Christ.
Western world is punished first as the Lord comes out of heaven. He punishes the Western world where the gospel has been preached, not not to, not the Far East, whether in idolatry.
Maybe somebody could read Matthew 2314?
You said Matthew 2314.
Woe unto ye scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, we devour widows houses, and for pretense make long prayer. Therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.
Not in the new translation for some reason.
Well, as we were saying a few minutes ago, our time is going here. But the end of verse 48 ought to be really exercising to us, all of us. I.
Under whomsoever much is given of him shall be much required, and of him and to whom men have committed much of him will they ask the more? And of course we understand this in natural things. Those who have been given more and more responsibility will be held more responsible, even in a natural way. You work for a big company and.
Someone at the lower end of the ladder makes a mistake or.
Does something wrong? He won't be held as responsible as someone in management who ought to have known better and who ought to have been able to foresee what the consequences were of what he did or did not do. And I would only say this, that, and we want to be careful how we say it, that those of us who have had the privilege of being gathered to the Lord's name.
01:00:28
Need to pay attention to this.
As one brother has said years ago in our written ministry, he said if we have more than other believers, we can use it in one of two ways. We can use it to attempt to accredit and distinguish ourselves collectively, or we can seek to use it for the blessing and up building of the whole body of Christ.
Now I would hasten to say that.
Reaching out to the whole body of Christ ought to be in our hearts. It's not always possible. Someone who was a true believer said of William Kelly. That man.
Excuse me, that man has a mind made for the universe, but it's a pity that he restricted his usefulness to so few.
Well, William Kelly didn't restrict his usefulness to so few. His ministry was well made, very much available to anybody who wanted to avail him or herself ever.
But he wouldn't go and preach in the Episcopal Church or something like that to compromise the place that he took outside of all that. And so I just say that it ought to be in our hearts that if we have more than others do, let's seek to use it for the whole body of Christ now does that. And I'll go one step further. Does that mean that we want them all to be gathered to the Lord's name?
Yes and no.
But I don't like to keep repeating Jay and Darby, others have two. But he had a way of putting things, he said. I have never in my life asked anyone to come among brethren.
Categorically, he said that, he said. My thought has rather been what does the soul need?
What does this soul need? And then to seek to minister according to the need at that time. If souls are gathered through that ministry, that is well and good, but it has never been my object. I repeat that because.
It was a big help to me to see how that we ought to be willing to use what the Lord has given us to any believer anywhere, or for that matter, to an unbeliever who needs the gospel without any reference necessarily to thinking. Well, ultimately I want them to gather to the Lord's name. Yes, we should want to see that, but that's the Lord's work, not yours and mine. We present the truth as it is needed.
Remember meetings of Christians at one time, and I had a burning desire to see them gather to the Lord's name.
But they were all mixed up on eternal security and things like baptism and so on. They needed more fundamental things.
And we had to start from.
First principles, if you like. And so I just mentioned that. I think it's very important that we look at it in that way, and I believe this verse plays into that thought for those of us that perhaps have had more of the precious truth of God than others might have had.
I've enjoyed Acts 28 and verse 30, and Paul dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and received all that came in unto him, preaching the Kingdom of God and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him.
Confidence in the truth and that it's God's work.
We can't go out and twist anybody's arm to come in to receive Paul's doctrine, but he receives all that come, so to speak. It's got to be God's work, and we have to be willing to minister the truth of God and whatever capacity and ability he's given with believers where we find them as the opportunity is, and let the work be the Lord's to bring them in.
01:05:18
Has been given to each believer is not for just the gathered Saints. It is for the church at large and when when people come across your path as brother Bill was saying whatever their need is. If you can do something about that need do it. You will honor your Lord and what I have noticed right now at our brother Bernie Breck back in Marengo has a Bible study.
And all the people in there are from all different kinds of backgrounds and different levels of understanding of the word of God. Most of them are the Lords. Sometimes they bring people in that are not saved. And so then you focus on the gospel. But it didn't take long before they will say something like, how do you guys know this stuff?
Have you been to seminary?
Oh, where did you learn these things?
How do you know these things? And I've had that experience over the years. We'll come and see.
Sometimes I'll answer well from farmers who open the word of God.
Boy, did I benefit from that, from the Campbells and the renos and the the the Buchanans, the farmers that knew the word of God back and forward and would open up and maybe in simple ways express those things.
How much they learned over the years. Listen to those. And Dan Anderson and Charles Whittaker, They were farmers for a while. They had been missionaries. They've been in Africa and some of their stories on the farm, learning from them, That's all. I learned a lot of these things, My father, the farmer.
Simple men, often who weren't so simple when it came to the Word of God and when they expressed that people notice and then they'll they'll come and see.
And then the Lord does his work. As our brother Bill was saying, he's the one that draws men to himself. The Lord Jesus gathers people around himself, not us.
We sing #13 in the appendix.
Soon shall close thine earthly mission.
Soon shall pass thy Pilgrim days. Hope shall change to glad fruition, faith to sight, and prayer to praise.
I love God by Christ salvation.
Rise or sin, and fear and joy to fly in every station.
Something to do or bear?
My favorite girls were made in me playing what I found.
Glory armed my grace, and bring my prayer.
And he turned away.
Sunshine, what a thine earthly mission soon shall pass, thought I Pilgrim.
All shall change to look like fruition.
Make you sight and have prayer to praise.
01:10:32
Thanks.
God and our Father, we just would thank Thee for the readings that we enjoyed so much.
He just would like to thank me, those of us who leave, and my dear Son our Lord Jesus, that we don't have to go to hell. We thank Thee, Lord Jesus, for dying on the cross to save us from our sins. He thank Thee for the future that awaits us. Soon we will be with thee in the glory, Lord Jesus, to be with thee, to light, thee to be like thee, to enjoy thy company and the wonderful blessing for all eternity.
And now, as we have these few moments to reflect with one another on my goodness to us.
We pray that we might be an encouragement to one another to go on faithfully. A little time that's left. We give thanks again. Lord Jesus, my goodness to us, Our God and Father, we thank thee for thy beloved Son. We pray in his wonderful name, Amen. Amen.
Gospel 1
Gospel—Steve Stewart
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I want to welcome everyone to the Gospel meeting this evening, and we'd like to start the meeting this evening with #15 on the hymn sheet.
If someone could stop.
That course, I appreciate it #15.
Awesome.
There is room.
It tells you all around.
Yet there is room.
Oh, guilty may draw near.
Oh, while they need nothing.
They know, may hear.
Yet there is room.
God's love in Christ we see.
Yeah, there is room.
Greater it could not be.
Yes.
Only sunny game.
His willing now to say.
Oh, when him they leave.
Yeah, there is room.
All things are ready come.
Yet there is room.
Christ, everything I've done.
Yet there is room.
Work is now complete.
Before the mercy.
Seat, oh savior, you will meet.
Yet there is room.
God's house is failing fast, yet there is room.
Some guests will be the last.
Yet there is room.
Yes, and Salvation's Day.
From you will pass away.
Then grace no more will say.
Yeah, there is room.
Let's pray before we start the meeting.
Our God and our Father, our hearts, look up to Thee this evening.
We thank thee for thy well beloved Son. Our Lord Jesus Christ is there at thy right hand, the Savior of sinners, and our God and our Father. We thank Thee that we can present him tonight to this audience, and we pray that if there is one here this evening that has not yet received him as Lord and Savior.
At the work of thy Spirit of God.
Would impart that needed faith and hearing air to receive the message that seed might be sown into good ground, that it might produce fruit for thy glory and the glory of Thy beloved Son. I think of that day when thou survey the travel of his soul and be satisfied. And so we pray that the gospel message this evening would add to that number.
For thine own glory, and the satisfaction of thy heart, our God and Father.
We pray Thy help and Thy blessing for the glory and honor of our Lord Jesus Christ, and we would ask it in His alone, Precious.
And worthy name. Amen.
Like to start with a portion in the book of Acts in the 17th chapter.
X-17 if you're here tonight and you don't have a Bible.
00:05:04
It's OK.
Or if you have one and you're not familiar with it, don't be anxious about trying to get to the right page. Just listen. We'll read it. This book is the Bible.
It's God's Word, divinely inspired, given from God to you.
It's the truth, and it's the only truth that this world has.
There was a man here once.
Who said to himself, I am the way, the truth and the life that this world nailed him to a cross and this book now.
Is the only receptacle of truth in this world.
And we're going to read from its holy pages and see what God has to say this evening. Act 17.
And verse 24 God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands, neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all life and breath.
And all things and it's made of one blood, all nations of men for to dwell on the on all the face of the earth.
And have determined.
The times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation, that they should seek the Lord, if happily they might feel after Him and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us. For in Him we live and move, and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said. For we are also His offspring. For as much then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the God.
Like unto gold or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.
And the times of these, of this ignorance God went in, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent, because he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness, by that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, and that he hath raised him from the dead.
The God that these verses present to us is the God of the Bible, the God who gave us.
This Bible and it declares that He made the world and all things therein, and he gave life and breath to you and to I life and breath.
You don't think about it, but just take a breath.
Breathe in, breathe out. You feel it. Maybe you're young.
And it feels strong.
Healthy. Maybe you're old and it feels.
Fluttering. Tenuous.
The breath that God gave you.
Your life breath.
I want to turn back to Genesis to see where God first gave that breath of life.
Genesis, the first book in the Bible, and we're going to look at chapter 2.
Verse 7.
And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.
In time, God took that man.
And he?
Caused a deep sleep to fall upon him in verse 21.
And from his side he took a rib, and he formed a woman and brought her to the man.
God put them in the Garden of Eden. He provided everything that they could need or want.
In verse 16 the Lord God commanded the man sang Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, for in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die.
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God gave man everything. Notice that word every that he might freely, freely. That's the liberality of the heart of God. But he had a restriction. There was one tree that he was not to eat of, and if he ate of that tree, he would forfeit.
That breath of life that God had given to him.
And the day he ate of it or in more accurately, might be.
Rendered this way, that in the day thou eatest thereof, that eateth thereof, and eating thou shalt die in dying. Excuse me, thou shalt die.
He would forfeit that life's breath.
In chapter 3 we find.
The enemy of God appears Satan in the form of a serpent.
Determined to destroy what good God had made.
And he comes in and he deceives the woman.
To take of that tree that God had restricted from them, and to eat of it. And she gave to her husband, and he ate of it as well.
What was the result?
Verse seven in the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons. And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the cool in the garden and the cool of the day. And Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden.
And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden. I was afraid because I was naked, and I hid myself.
And so he begins to excuse himself. He blames the serpent. He blames his wife. And man loves to point the blame everywhere but himself. You know, they made those aprons of fig leaves. And I suppose if Adam looked at Eve, she might have said, how do I look, dear? Oh, you look fine. You might say to her, how do I look? And she would say, oh, you look fine. And.
Maybe they look fine and we like to congratulate each other that we look just fine.
Well, when the voice of the Lord God was heard, they didn't look so fine anymore and they hid in the garden.
Man is self congratulatory, isn't he?
While those excuses.
That's all they were. Excuses did not defer the just judgment of God. And he had said, in dying thou shalt die.
And he has to pronounce upon that man. Verse 19. In the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat bread, till thou return to the ground. For out of it thou was taken. For dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return. And then we turn over to chapter 5. And we read in verse 5.
And all the days that Adam lived were 930 years, and he.
Died.
You have inherited that same life breath from Adam.
And that life breath that you often call your own is not.
It's forfeited through sin.
You know, in the Declaration of Independence that celebrated today, there is a claim that there are inalienable rights for man. And the first one stated is life. And I'm here to tell you today you have no right to that life that you have.
It's forfeited through sin.
And the forfeit must be paid.
And Adam paid the forfeit and he died.
And my friend.
And I speak to everyone in here, saved or lost.
Life breath that you're breathing in your seat right now is forfeit.
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And the day may come when the forfeit must be paid.
And so man spends his whole life not knowing when that day will come, when the forfeit must be paid.
Ever looking over his shoulder, ever trying to plan.
To prevent that inevitable payment.
Like to turn to a verse in Hebrews?
Chapter 9.
Hebrews 9.
Verse 27. It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.
You know, death is just like the sheriff.
That comes and arrests the man.
But then he brings them before the judge.
Not only must the forfeit be paid.
But after the forfeit is paid judgment.
My brother.
Repossesses course.
People get a car.
They take a loan.
And for whatever circumstances neglect inability to pay, they don't make the payments and the bank sends out a notice.
You're short.
You've missed your payments.
In Romans 3 tells us all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
And the bank sends another notice. We're going to come and take your car back. You forfeited the right to it. And my brother gets a notice from the bank, Go take that car.
It's their car, but they don't have a right to it anymore. They forfeited it.
And now they're just waiting for the day when the repo man will come and take their car. They don't know when it is.
The repo man comes and he takes from the rich. He takes from the poor.
Young and old, he gets his notice. He comes. He takes it from the town accountant.
Pulls out in the street. Town accountant runs out of his house, jumps up on the car, stands there on the hood. You're not taking this. The hood dents in.
And across the street, out of the police station, comes a night officer. And he says, Bill, get out.
The repo man showed us he's got the legal paperwork. It's not your car.
Comes to the trailer out in the boonies.
There's a young single mother, 3-4 kids.
Knock on the door and need your keys.
Oh, you can't take my car.
It's my only way to get to town, get groceries.
So winner.
I'm here alone with these kids. You can't take that car.
No exceptions.
Give me the keys.
Another four footed car drives by the road. The repo man says pull over.
I'm after that car and he mocks.
It makes fun of the repo man and he takes evasive measures and he pulls into the Wendy's restaurant, gets in line, orders his lunch.
And he thinks in the line there, the repo man can't touch his car, but he waits till he pulls up to the drive up window and he backs up and the grappling hooks come out and they grab that car.
The man jumps out and he says wait wait wait, I can pay.
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Take me down the street to the bank. OK, I'll take you down the street. Drop you off at the bank. Wait here. Runs in the repo. Man drives away. Doesn't get paid unless he impounds the car. Death is cruel. Death is.
Comes whether you're rich or poor, irregardless of your circumstances, it doesn't come at a convenient time it. And so that's a little picture.
Of you, your life is forfeited through sin, and you're just waiting for the moment.
When the forfeit must be paid.
And after this the judgment.
What hope is there for you, my friend?
Could we sing the 1St 3 lines versus the number six?
God and mercy sent his Son to a world by sin untone. Jesus Christ was crucified.
Who was for sinners? Jesus died.
Oh, the glory of the grace.
Shining in the Savior's face.
Telling.
Sinners.
From above, God is life and God is love.
Sin and death no more shall reign.
Jesus.
Died and lives again.
In the glorious highest height, see Him?
God, supreme delight.
Oh, the glory of the grace shining.
In the Savior's face.
Telling.
Sailors from above.
God is.
Lord and God.
Is love.
Who in his name believe?
Everlasting life receive.
Lord of all is Jesus now.
Every knee to him must fall, O the glory.
Of the grace shining.
In the saviors face.
Telling.
Sinners.
From above.
God is.
Light and God is.
Loved first Timothy.
Chapter 2.
The end to verse three. First Timothy 2 The end of verse three. God our Savior.
Who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men. The man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. The same God who made all things, and gave you life and breath.
Is God the Savior and He?
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Has given his well beloved son.
A ransom for all his life.
For your forfeited life.
On Calvary's cross.
Turn back to John's Gospel.
Chapter 6.
John's Gospel, chapter 6.
The people. This was in the time the Lord Jesus was here on this earth.
The crowds that were following him in verse 30, verse 31 make this statement. Our fathers did eat manna in the desert, as it is written. He gave them bread from heaven to eat. Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven, but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven.
Giveth life unto the world.
Verse 35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life.
God sent his well beloved Son.
Who his Son in the God had God is in Trinity.
There are three persons in the Godhead, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. 3 persons and one God.
That's how the Bible presents him to us and the person in the Godhead that the Scripture calls the sun.
God the Father sent him into this world to become as the bread of heaven, to give his life for this world.
I want to turn to Hebrews.
And we're going to look a little bit at the detail of that wonderful story.
Hebrews.
In chapter 10.
Hebrews, chapter 10.
And verse 5 this is Speaking of the Son of God.
Wherefore when he cometh into the world?
He saith, sacrifice and offering. Thou wouldest not but a body as thou prepared me.
When we look back at Genesis, we saw that God formed that man of the dust of the ground.
And after he was formed, his body formed from the dust of the ground, God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.
Uniquely different from all the rest of the creation.
They are the other creatures in this world were formed all at once, also out of the ground, and Genesis speaks of them as having the breath of life. But they were formed with their life all at once, and when their bodies die, their life goes back to God that gave it.
Won't turn to the 104th Psalm, but we could read that there.
The man is uniquely different.
His body could die, but because the body was created separate from the soul, the soul lives on even after the body is dead.
And so it's appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment. But now the Son of God comes into the world. And in contrast to all that had gone before, where God had given directions for the people to sacrifice animals because of their sin and and a basis on which they could approach God and worship him.
Now the sun comes, and he says, sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire.
00:30:04
Because if we look back.
We find in.
Chapter 9.
Excuse me, I think I've turned back page here.
Verse 13.
For the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctified to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
All of that previous order of things that we read of in the Bible.
When the sun came in, he was the fulfillment.
Of all that they looked forward to. And so he says when he comes into the world, sacrifice and offering now what is not?
But a body has Thou prepared me, and burnt offerings, and sacrifices for sin, Thou has had no pleasure. Then said I, Lo, I come in the volume of the book. It is written of me to do thy will, O God.
If we were to read on in the Book of Genesis, after the portion we read, we would come to a point where man built a tower called the Tower of Babel with bricks. And he said, I'm going to build a tower that will reach right up to heaven.
And you know your sins and mind and all of man's kinds have piled up like that Tower of Babel, as if they could reach right into heaven itself. Man's rebellion and sin and rejection of God, as if he could reach right into heaven itself and insult the throne of God.
And it called into question the very nature of God.
How could God allow that to continue?
And how could God, if he is a God of love?
Ignore his holy nature.
And forgive that sin.
It presents, you might say, a question. If he would forgive that sin, then he compromises holiness. If he simply judged man and consigned him to a lost eternity, then what about his love? And it calls in a question as to his very character of his nature.
How is it that God is going to be a savior gone?
And the Lord Jesus came into this world, and a body was prepared for him. The Son of God came into this world, and he became a man that's called the incarnation, and he was born in Bethlehem, born of a virgin.
He was the God, man, man and God and one person completely.
Holy man, spirit, soul and body, and yet God too, but different than you and I in that.
He did not have a forfeited life because he had no sin.
He was sinless and spotless.
God demands that sin must be.
Paid for.
That his holy nature would be vindicated. But what man could ever offer his life?
For your forfeited life. Because every man and woman in this world already had a forfeited life through sin, But he came spotless, sinless, holy, and he could give his life.
A life that was never forfeited.
And so when he comes into the world, he says, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God.
He comes and he says whatever it takes.
Whatever it takes to render a satisfaction to the throne of God.
Whatever it takes to deal with this question of sin.
00:35:05
I yield myself up wholly to it. I come to do thy will, O God. And by the eternal Spirit he offered himself without spot to God on calvers cross.
He offered himself a ransom for all. He was the bread of heaven that came down to give his life for the world.
Whatever it took.
He gave himself wholly up to whatever had gone required.
Let's look back at the gospel.
Of Matthew.
Matthew 20.
7.
On the Cross, verse 45.
We read Now from the 6th hour there was darkness over all the land unto the 9th hour and about the 9th hour Jesus cried with a loud voice saying Eli, Eli, Lama Sabachthani, that is to say My God, my God, why?
Hast thou forsaken me?
Verse 50 And Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.
Whatever it took.
And in three hours of darkness on that cross and Calvary.
God showed what He was in all his nature, in all his holy nature against sin.
And the judgment of God was poured out upon the Lord Jesus Christ and those hours of darkness on the cross.
And yet God also showed what He was in His love and His.
Nature.
As that God who loved you and I.
And was this? And is the Savior God not willing that any should perish?
And that the one he gave was his well beloved son.
The object of his own heart's affection.
He gave a full display of his love.
And the Lord Jesus Christ on that cross, in those hours of darkness, rendered a satisfaction to God, or by God is able to come out and say to you, whosoever will may come, able to say to you, come and find forgiveness of sin, come and have life come.
John's Gospel, chapter 3.
Verse 14.
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, Even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not a Son into the world to condemn the world, at the world through Him might be saved. He gave His.
Life that was never forfeited on that cross.
That you who have a forfeited life through sin might have eternal life, a life that can never be touched by death again. And not only that, a life that is able to enjoy God and fellowship and communion with Him. Because we read in John 17, we'll just turn to it.
John 17.
00:40:03
Verse three. And this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God.
And Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent not like that forfeited life of Adam and Eve that ran and hid in the garden, and that did not want to have any association or fellowship with God. They wanted to stay out of his sight. But a life that can walk in communion and fellowship, enjoy God, enjoy his Son the Lord Jesus Christ.
A life, a relationship with him.
And the offer goes out to you, Sinner friend, receive the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior, we read in Acts 17. God isn't really giving you a choice. God commandeth men now everywhere to repent.
He's not leaving it up to you, he says. Repent.
Repent and believe and receive the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior.
We read in Hebrews chapter 13.
For those who receive the Lord Jesus Christ.
Can enjoy this.
Precious Scripture.
Verse 6.
So that we may boldly say the Lord is Excuse me?
End of verse five. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee, so that we may boldly say the Lord is my helper. I will not fear what man will do to me. You might be afraid to receive the Lord Jesus as your Savior for what you think other people might think about you.
What your friends might think, what your neighbors might think. Don't worry, the Lord Jesus Christ will never leave you or forsake you. That life eternal that God has to give to you.
Because your life that you have now in that breath, you're breathing now is forfeited.
Is a life of relationship and of knowing one who will never leave you nor forsake you all your life long.
I've kind of come to the end of our time, so I'm going to just close it there.
And we're going to close in prayer. You can receive the Lord Jesus simply in your seat.
God's throne is satisfied. He's come out free in his love.
And he would draw you to the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, this evening. Let's pray. Our God and our Father, we pray the entrance of thy word giveth light. We pray that it might reach some lost soul here this evening and draw them to the Savior, thy beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. And so we do.
Thank thee for him. We thank Thee that He is satisfied all the holy demands of Thy throne above.
Now it's been glorified in the work of thy beloved Son. Thou art free, and thy love and thy grace.
To reach.
I swear each of us were lost, dead in trespasses and sins. Make a sign on eternally. So we just commit this little time to Thee, Thy precious word, Thy blessing, and the precious name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.
Five Senses
Children—John Bilisoly
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
That would like to come up closer. There's still seats here available because I want you to be able to to see as well as hear which hearing won't be a problem. But it'd be nice if you could see because we I'm going to need some of your help today too. So feel free to come on up and while we're you're coming up, we can go ahead and maybe sing a few hymns together. So if you have one.
That you'd like to sing. Just give it out loud.
There's some on the back too that are called children's hymns, so if you're more familiar with those that's fine.
Does anyone have one?
If I'm not looking at you, just go ahead and shout it out, OK?
#5 OK, I think what we'll do is we'll sing the 1St and the last verses of these hymns that you give out if that's OK. So number 50 happy day that fix my choice haunting my Savior and my.
Rest my love divided heart.
Lessness.
Nor ever from thy heart, who is in my bed of every Christmas.
Happy day. Happy.
When Jesus washed my sins away.
He told me all the Lords and pray.
And live rejoicing every day.
Every day.
Happy.
Day when Jesus was.
OK, who has another one for us to sing this morning?
Four. OK, all right, that's a nice one too.
Christ is the Savior.
Sinners, grace is the Savior for me.
Lord, I must save him since darkness.
Nobody is grace. I am free.
So you love sinners.
Savior of sinners like me.
Shedding his blood aboard my grandson.
This is the savior for me.
Boys and girls, maybe forsake of time, we'll sing one more and then we'll get started. And if we have time, at the end of the the time that's designated for this meeting, we'll sing some more. So who has one more to finish up with for now?
00:05:09
What was the number?
42 Thank you.
Want to stand and sing this one?
Why don't all you kids stand? The rest of us can sit. I'll stand.
Number 42.
A little child outside.
Pause for a minute here in order to ask the Lord to help us in our little time together. Our loving God and our Father, we thank Thee for these precious hymns that point the way to the Lord Jesus, so simply point the way to salvation through the work of Calvary's cross and his precious blood that was shed there. We just thank Thee for that mighty work. We thank Thee for so loving this world that thou hast sinned, thine only begotten Son.
And so we just ask for thy help now as we have a little time together. We just pray that there might be something that would be impressed on each of our souls, our hearts especially. We pray for the dear boys and girls here. And we just ask our Father if there happens to be someone here that's reached that age of responsibility and has not yet made a decision for the Christ, has not yet accepted Thy Son, the Lord Jesus, as their own personal Savior.
We just pray that thou would cause something to be said.
That would stir their their conscience and their heart to want to come to Him. We pray for Thy help and look to the independence in the precious name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Now it's customary for us to say a verse if you'd like to, and we'll try and and do that now at this time. But I know the memory verse in the messages of love was Jeremiah 17, nine through 10. Part of it was highlighted, but I'll read the whole.
Portion they have here the hardest deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? I the Lord search the heart. If anyone would like to say the verse I will turn this on and we can hear you that way. So would anyone like to OK Landon good.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who cannot I, the Lord, search the heart? Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. Perfect. Thank you.
OK, go down here.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it either? Lord, search the heart. Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. All right, that's good. Thank you.
The hardest deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked again. Not I, Lord, search the heart. I try the rains. Even to give it to one. According to his wife, according to the fruit of his drinks. Jeremiah 17, nine through 10. Thank you.
Did I see your hand or were you just waving? Okay.
Would you like to say any verse?
You want to hold this and you can stand up and then they can see you.
Children away your parents and the Lord, for this is right.
Honor, Father.
For this is the first commandment.
Promise.
A season six one and two. Very good. Thank you. I know. It's kind of scary up here, isn't it, to say your verse in front of so many. You did good, though. Thank you. How about any of you kids? OK, Emily, I'm going to let you hold it, OK.
The heart is disabled above all things, and desperately wicked.
00:10:04
Who can I? The Lord says to the heart.
Jeremiah 17, nine and 10.
Very good. Thank you. Did I miss anyone else in this section here? OK.
Learn to do well. Seek judgment, please, for the oppressed.
Judges are fatherless and praise for the widow. Isaiah 116. Thank you. OK.
That is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it? I, the Lord, searched the heart. Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. Thank you, Courtney.
You like to say it. You want to stand up too.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know? I, the Lord, search the heart, or try the reins even to give.
Each one according to the.
His ways according to the fruit of his doings.
Jeremiah 17, nine through 10. Thank you. Thank you very much. You did extra too, so.
The heart is the sea full Above all things. I'm desperately wicked. Who can know it?
I, the Lord, search the hope. Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. Thank you, Maddie. Very nice. OK, let's see. Anybody else down here? All right, let's go over here. Any of you girls?
Like to say a verse?
Just go like this if you'd like to.
Well, OK, we'll give you another chance maybe at the end. How about down here?
OK.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know? I, the Lord, searched the heart. Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. Thank you. Very good. All right. Anybody else in this role?
I have a pretty good idea that most of you know it, but I know it's a little hard.
The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who cannot I, the Lord, search the heart. Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. Very nice. Thank you. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know that I, Lord, search the heart. Jeremiah 17, nine and 10. Thank you Anne. OK. God is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? I, the Lord search.
17, nine through 10. OK, thank you. All right.
Would you like to say it?
I did, Lord, search the heart.
And.
Do you know what you can help him, Earl? I should know it myself.
Is that did you just learn to the end of that? That was the end of that in the paper.
That started out the heart is deceitful above all things. Is that? Is that what you learned?
For all things.
And desperately wicked. Who can know it? Who can know it?
I'll say the part you said by the Lord.
Either Lord.
That's right, search the heart. Search the heart.
And then if you stopped there, as it did in the paper, it was found in Jeremiah. Do you remember that? Jeremiah 17?
Nine through 10.
13.
Thank you very much. How about OK?
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it either? Lord teach the hat gem is 17/9 and 10. Thank you very much, very good. All right, thank you boys and girls for all okay.
00:15:08
The heart is deceitful.
Above all things. Above all things.
And desperately and desperately wicked.
I the Lord, I the Lord.
I'm sorry, who can know it was at the end of that?
Jeremiah 17.
910, nine and 10. Good. Thank you very much. You girls, you getting braver? OK, that's fine. Anybody else that I might have missed? OK.
When to do well, Seek judgment, Relieve the oppressed.
Georgette Valeris pleads for the little.
Yeah, 117, Thank you. All right, very good. You kids did very well. All right. Well, I want to just mention at the beginning here of our time that I have two, two burdens for you boys and girls. And my heaviest burden is if there would be anyone here sitting up here or perhaps somewhere else in the room that doesn't know the Lord Jesus as their savior. That would be my that's.
I would say that's my heaviest burden right now for you. The other one is that those of you that have accepted the Lord Jesus as your Savior, that you would go on in your lives day by day, and that you would live a life that's pleasing to the Lord Jesus. So those are my two burdens for you boys and girls this morning #1 if anyone is unsaved, that they would be saved.
And then that all of you.
That are the Lord's would go on to please him in your lives. I want to start out with a verse.
In the book of the Psalms, and this is Psalm 139.
And these are the words of King David who are very familiar with this verse because we repeat this verse to one another quite often.
At least part of the verse and the verse I want to read is verse 14.
I will praise thee. This is what David is saying to the Lord, to Jehovah I will praise thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Marvelous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well.
Well, I was just thinking of that verse, boys and girls, and thinking about how true that is that we have a a body that the Lord has given us that is fearfully and wonderfully made. And it never ceases to amaze us when we hear new things about how the body functions. And I really don't know that much about it. But one thing that we talk about sometimes and that's what my.
This morning is going to be about, we talk about what we call 5 senses, 5 senses that have to do with our bodies. And I'm not going to try and I'm going to try and be very simple because that's how I understand it myself. But I would guess, I guess I would say that senses are the way in our, our bodies react to certain things and sometimes we hear the expression.
That someone has a keen sense of smell, let's say, or someone else has a keen sense of hearing, and what that means is that they.
Hear very well or they smell very well they can maybe pick up things that someone else wouldn't pick up like they say do you smell smoke And you're saying no, I don't smell any smoke Oh yeah, I can smell smoke maybe you're walking along somewhere and pretty soon you see some smoke in the air say Oh yeah OK, I knew I could smell smoke so this is. The Lord has created such a wonderful thing as these senses and I.
I believe and and and others could probably verify this, that we have more than five senses, but we commonly talk about 5 senses and we're going to just take up those five. We could refer to them as a seeing.
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Hearing, smelling, tasting and touching. OK, so sight, sound.
Smelling, tasting and touching is another way to say it. You maybe have learned those in school, those five senses that that we possess. And you know, when any one of those senses doesn't work properly, it affects us, doesn't it? Yeah. It affects our body.
And our body is amazing. It can compensate for some of those senses that we might be missing, or maybe one of them isn't working very well, or more than one of them. And our body can compensate for that in a wonderful way. And many have, but it would be very difficult if you didn't have those senses because your body is so dependent on those.
To alert you to things so these senses are sending.
Messages to our brain that maybe warns us of danger, maybe it warns us of.
Many things and, and, and so we can react, we can, we can do something about it. And so I, I just wanted to take these up if I could in a spiritual way more. I just want to make it simple and I, I have some object lessons here to help us with this because I think it's so important for us.
To realize the importance of these senses that control our body in a natural way. And I want to look at it too, because I believe that whether you're unsaved, and I trust you aren't.
I hope some of what we have today here will speak to you and if you are the Lords, if you are saved, you know we have an enemy named Satan that wants to hinder us from being.
Living a life that's pleasing to the Lord.
And he will, as as we'll see in our little illustration here, he will do whatever he can to keep us, to keep these senses, we'll call them, from functioning properly or working. So I would like to have help from a boy here that would be willing for me to put a cloth over his eyes.
We call it a blindfold, so if one of you boys would be willing to help me.
I would. OK. I would put a blindfold over your eyes. Is that all right? OK. And I won't I won't let you get heard or anything like that. OK, I'll help you out. So let me get something out of here.
And so this is the one that is dealing with sight and oh, how important and how much we value our sight. Now I'm going to just put that over there like that.
And.
You let me know if you can't see very well.
Is it pretty dark? OK, good. That's what we wanted. All right, So what's your name? Teddy. Teddy. OK, Thank you, Teddy, for helping. So Teddy has a blindfold on. And now what we're going to do is I'm going to ask Teddy a question, and then we're going to demonstrate something here. Teddy, do you like gummy bears?
OK, well I've got some gummy bears here that I'm going to bring out and.
I want you to have a package of these gummy bears, but the problem is you're going to have to find it, OK? So I I will kind of lead you around and what I want you kids to do, you other boys and girls. I want you to help Teddy, OK? I want you to help him find these these gummy bears that I'd like to give him.
So.
You can, you can just tell him where to go. I'm going to kind of lead him to so he doesn't bump into things, but you just tell him that you don't have to raise your hand. You just say you need to go over here or you need to come this way to get to these these gummy bears. OK, So you, you go ahead and you begin to instruct Teddy where to go. All right.
Go ahead, just just tell him. Help him out.
They said to go straight. Well, that didn't help a lot, did it?
OK, keep helping him.
00:25:00
You're hearing lots of voices, aren't you, Teddy? You speak loud so he can hear you.
Keep telling him.
They said go right. Someone said left, someone said turn around.
All right, all right. Very good. Teddy, were you having a little trouble? How come?
You can't see. All right, all right. Well, you know what? You were never very far from. You can go ahead and pull that off. You're never very far from them. The problem was I kept moving them on you. So you were getting close and some of them were directing you. But then then they were, you were hearing different voices. And you know, what it reminded me of is boys and girls is that.
That this world has lots of you can sit down now. Thank you. But I'm going to give you a a bag of these. OK. Thank you for your help.
World has lots of voices and people are going to say, come, come this way and you're going to see this more and more as you get older. This is the way to come. You're going to have a lot of fun here. This this is going to be the best for you to do this. I've got just the right idea for you. You're going to hear lots of voices like that, but it's it's going to be a lot of confusion. So what is it that we need to get direction for in our lives? I know you're young.
But you're here at Sunday school, you're hearing the Word of God. What does the word of God tell us?
About this let's look at a verse in Isaiah 45.
And I've got it written down here, so I'm going to go ahead and read it. But if the reference is Isaiah 45 and verse 22.
And this is what I'm going to apply it in a, in a gospel sense, I'm going to make an application here, the verse says.
Look unto me and be saved all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is none else.
That's, that's it, boys and girls, There's only one way to be saved. It's to look to the Lord. Do you remember the story of Israel in the wilderness and how they complained and murmured against Moses and against the Lord, and they were making accusations about being brought into the wilderness to die in the wilderness, that that's what the Moses was doing. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among them and a bit them, and it said many.
Many people, much, much of the people died. And so Moses was told by the Lord to take a serpent, make a fiery serpent kind of like, just like it looked like the serpent's that were biting them and put it on a pole. So he took brass and he made a serpent of brass. Brass speaks of judgment in the word of God. And he was told to put that, that snake, that serpent on a pole and lift it up.
And anyone that had been bitten of a serpent.
Of one of those fiery serpents could look to that pole and they could live. They could not. They would keep them from dying. What a beautiful picture it is of the Lord Jesus lifted up on Calvary's cross. He is the only way of salvation. But you're going to hear lots of voices that there's other ways. No, look unto me, all the ends of the earth. Look unto me and be saved all the ends of the earth, for I'm God.
And there is none else. We have to look to him. We have to look to the Lord Jesus.
And faith, OK, that was our first one. And I, we won't take the time, but there's a beautiful story about a man named Bartimaeus. And he asked the Lord. The Lord asked him a question, I should say, and I want one of you to answer. Give the answer that the Lord gave him. The Lord said to him, I mean, I'm sorry, the Lord asked him a question and then, and then.
You give me Bartimaeus's answer, the Lord said to him.
What wilt thou that I do unto thee?
So here's Bartimaeus. He's blind, he can't see, and they he hears the Lord's coming. He throws off his coat, and he goes and stands, falls down before the Lord. And the Lord says, What wilt thou that I do unto thee? What did he say?
Or that I may receive my sight. Did you hear her, Lord? Thank you, Lord, that I may receive my sight. That's what I would desire for anyone here, any of you boys or girls that haven't accepted the Lord as your Savior. All you have to do is call out in faith. You can do it in your heart. You can cry out.
00:30:14
Lord, that I might receive my sight. I'm the own that you're a Sinner. And he will, he will save you.
He's, he's longs to do that for you. And what a day that was for Bartimaeus to cast off that old coat. I understand that coat kind of marked him as a blind man. He didn't need that anymore. He threw it aside and he followed the Lord. I think it's a beautiful story. Well, we could take much more time, but we won't now. We're going to go to the next one. The next one is hearing or sound.
I'm going to ask a girl to help me who would be willing.
To help me with this one.
Any of you girls?
Would you like to help? OK, let me tell you what I'm going to do and and if you don't want to do it, I understand.
I've got these things. Well, I'll show you.
I've got these things called earmuffs.
And these are for wearing when you're doing noisy things like running the lawnmower, a chainsaw or something like that. I've I've disinfected them so they're clean. Would you mind putting these on? You wouldn't mind. OK, what's your name?
And Hannah. OK, Hannah, thank you for being willing. I'm going to put these on you and then I'm going to ask you a few questions. OK. All right, so let's go ahead and you can stand up here so they can see and.
I'm going to try and adjust these there.
All right, so OK, you just stand there and I'm going to ask her some questions. How how old are you, Anna?
She can, my goodness.
Maybe I Maybe she's a lip reader.
What's your favorite color? Color, Anna.
OK. We'll ask her another question. Are you having a happy time at the conference?
Have you met any new friends at the conference?
All right.
But I'll ask her two more questions.
I'm going to ask it quieter because my voice is being so amplified.
The same questions all right.
You can stand up again, just for a minute. How old are you, 6? OK. What's your favorite color? OK, That's the one we didn't hear when I asked you. All right? And I asked if you were having a happy time at the conference. And I asked if you had met any new friends and if you like gummy bears.
All right, good. Was it a lot easier at this time after we took those out?
You couldn't hear. You could hear. OK yeah. All right. Well, I, I didn't compensate for the the amplified voice. My voice is being made louder. And I actually thought this morning that maybe I should get some some of those earplugs and put them in first and then put those on. But anyway, the point is, boys and girls, that.
Hannah was having a hard time hearing everything you know it says in John chapter 5 and verse 24.
That beautiful verse that we probably all know by heart.
It says, Verily, verily I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me.
Hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is past from death unto life. I'm going to start a verse and someone, someone else finish it. It it's in Romans 10 and verse 17. So then faith cometh by.
Who can finish it? Faith cometh by.
Anybody want to finish it?
Did did did somebody say, yeah, you know, OK, OK. And then what is the rest of the verse? Faith cometh by hearing and hearing and hearing cometh by.
What's this?
What's this?
00:35:01
The word.
The Word of God, thank you. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Very good. OK, let's move on.
We're going to move on to smell, and again, I'm going to ask another girl to help with this if we could. This one's a little bit harder, but I think we can get the the idea anyway.
All right, who would like to help me?
OK, would you like to help me? So what I'm going to do? What's your name?
Evangeline OK, All right, Evangeline, if you want to stand up here, I'm going to try and put this mostly just over your nose. It might hang a little bit over your mouth, but I want you to be able to breathe. So you adjust it how you want, but we just want to and it might cover your eyes a little bit. I hope that doesn't bother you too much. Now let me Is that tight enough?
OK, all right, so now.
While she's doing that, I want to turn us to an account in John chapter 13 about Mary.
And you probably know where I'm going with this. And I'm only going to read actually in John chapter 12. I'm only going to read a few verses here.
Jesus six days, verse one of John 12 before the Passover came to Bethany where Lazarus was, which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead. They made him a supper and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at table with him. Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly.
And anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair and the house was filled with the odor of the ointment. What a beautiful story that is. So as as has often been said to us, and I think it's so precious, is that first the ointment that Mary poured out was placed on the Lord Jesus. And then it it says here that she wiped his feet with her hair. So now it's on Mary. And then it says.
The whole house was filled with the odor of the ointment. Isn't that wonderful?
And so I actually brought some, I think this was spikenard. Now I don't know if the spike nard that we have here is the same, probably not. But this came from Israel, this little box of spikenard. And I'm going to ask.
Evangeline.
If she can smell it.
You can smell it a little bit, all right. Yeah, it's strong, but you can smell FK. I thought maybe you wouldn't smell it at all.
But and I I probably won't take the time to go around to every child, but if you want to after, you can certainly get a whiff of this spikenard.
Anyway, it was a in Mary's case, it was costly and she loved the Lord so much she poured it all out on him. Wasn't that something? What a sacrifice she made. So okay, all right, well, let's just keep hustling along here and we'll let you all get.
A Sorry I'm going so fast.
OK. All right.
See. Did I get you Emily? Yeah. No. OK.
OK, all right. And then it smell nice.
Yeah, really. Nice. OK, you can sit down now. Thank you very much. And I don't think I, I didn't give you any, did I? So I'll give you a pack for helping me and you a pack. And the rest of your kids can have some too afterwards.
I did. I did want to look at a verse real quickly in Genesis chapter 8. Who can tell me?
The first time that we have a mention of odor or smell, or sometimes it's called a saver, which is another word for odor, I guess. What's the first time it's mentioned in the Word of God?
Who can think of? I gave you a big hint because I told you where it was, but that may not have helped you a whole lot.
Does someone know?
What it's about in Genesis 8.
OK, I'll tell you because we are. Our time keeps ticking by.
00:40:04
It's when Noah came off of the ark with his family, and we're told they're in verse 20, that Noah builded an altar unto the Lord and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fell and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the Lord smelled a sweet savour. Isn't that nice? And the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground anymore. For man's sake, I'll stop right there.
Another beautiful picture to us boys and girls of that which was yet future when the Lord Jesus would.
Offer himself up to God, as we're told in Ephesians chapter 5, it says He offered himself.
I'll read the verse and walk in love as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us, and offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour. Well, what a wonderful sacrifice the Lord made. And you know, it says that that expression sweet smelling savour. Those words in the original language are used one of their place in the New Testament and it's in connection with giving.
Giving in in a sacrificial way. Did you boys know?
That in girls that if you give something and you do it for the Lord Jesus and it's something that maybe costs you something, not necessarily money, but it might be your time or it might be something else that he looks at that as a sweet smelling saver. I'll just read the verse because it's so beautiful and we've heard it many times, but it's in Ephesians chapter, I mean in Philippians chapter 4 and it says Paul speaking and he says.
I have all and abound. I am full, having received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you.
An odor of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well pleasing to God. What a beautiful thing it is when we give willingly from our hearts and the enemy of our souls would would want us. Like I said, in all of these things.
There's the enemy has a way to counterfeit it. He wants to us to be stingy or to to do just the opposite of what the the Lord would have us to do.
OK, I'm going to call on you again, Evangeline to I should have just left this on you. Let's, if you don't mind standing up one more time. We're going to now go to the sense of taste.
And I'm going to just put it over your mouth, OK? So like that.
Now.
Yeah, just OK now, so she's got that covering over her mouth, which is going to make it hard for her to taste because I was going to open up one of these, which I will, and I was going to offer her a gummy.
But you can't put it under there. You're not going to be able to eat it, are you? You're not going to be able to taste it. No. You know, boys and girls, we have an enemy. And. And if how would it be if we left that on you at noon time when we're having a meal? Would that be good? No, it wouldn't be nice, would it? You can take it off now. Thank you.
We have an enemy that wants to keep us from tasting what God has for us. You know it says in Psalm 34, O taste and see that the Lord is good.
Happy is the man that trusteth in him. What a wonderful thing it is to be able to taste. I've got 2 verses I I jotted down here. One is Psalm 100 and 19103.
And that's another beautiful.
Psalm Psalm 100 and 19103 and it says.
There, how sweet are thy words unto my taste. Yeah, sweeter than honey to my mouth. And then we have one more in the Song of Solomon.
And.
That one is in chapter 2.
Song of Solomon, chapter 2 and verse 3 as the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons. I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste. This is kind of the language of sometimes we refer to her as the bride, the bride, and she's speaking about her bridegroom and she's saying he's sweet to my taste. I sat down under his shadow with great delight and his fruit.
Sweet to my taste. Have we tasted to see that the Lord is good. He wants to prove to you in your lives, boys and girls, that he is good. May we trust him in that? We've got one more and we've got just a few minutes. And so I want to talk now about this sense of touch. And I'm going to ask Landon, would you be willing to help me? OK. Because I know Landon well, and he'll forgive me.
00:45:16
If need be, but Landon I've got.
Something I want to put on you. Have you ever, have you ever in your life been tied up, maybe in fun tied up or OK or had handcuffs put on you? OK, All right. I, I thought about bringing rope and tying you up, but I, I had these laying around for some reason some time ago. We were playing with them. So I'm going to put these on you if you just put your hands behind your back.
I'm going to.
Stick these handcuffs on you.
Alrighty.
OK, they're on there pretty, pretty snug. Now, Landon, if I was to ask you to reach out and touch me, you're going to have a little hard time, aren't you?
You're pretty good. What if I asked you to give me a hug?
Not so easy.
Would it be OK if we left those on you for the day?
And we'll, we'll make sure that somebody feeds you at lunchtime.
Wouldn't be very nice, isn't it, would it? You know, and I do have a key. I I hope it's in there, Landon. You know, boys and girls, Satan loves to put shackles on people, even boys and girls, and keep them shackled and in *******. And there's a story about a woman that was bowed down with infirmity for I think it was 18 years.
And she couldn't even lift up her head and the, the Lord healed her on the Sabbath. And the Pharisees, the self-righteous Pharisees and scribes, they said you, you shouldn't, I'm paraphrasing, you shouldn't do that on the Sabbath. And he calls them hypocrites because they would very quickly take their animals and water them. Or if their animal fell in the ditch, they would get them out of the ditch. And he said, why shouldn't this woman who's the daughter of Abraham and has been in ******* by Satan?
That expression for 18 years be loosed and the Lord looses her and she can stand up straight. What a wonderful thing. There's another story too.
In connection with the the woman that reached out in faith and Landon was having a hard time reaching out. You know, she reached out in faith and she just touched the hem of his garment and she was healed. She was, she had an infirmity for 12 years and just that touch of faith saved her Boys and girls, the Lord wants you to be.
Freed from your ******* and it tells us in in John chapter eight, I think it is and maybe verse 36 it says if the sun therefore shall make you free. How does how does it go the rest of it one tells the rest.
You shall be free indeed. Say it again, you shall be free indeed that's right. If the Son therefore shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. Will end and we're not going to leave you in this condition The Lord Jesus is the only one, boys and girls, that can deliver us from ******* and.
It's through his work on the cross, so we're going to set Landon free here.
And then we're going to close.
All right. Thank you for.
Being a good sport Landon, you can take one of those packages.
I was going to say, you might have to have one of them on.
All right, there we go. Thank you.
OK boys and girls, I hope you understood what we were trying to illustrate here, how that you have an enemy that wants to use our senses that the Lord has given us for our enjoyment and for for His pleasure too from us. The enemy wants to block those, but I would encourage you all to use your senses.
That your your sight, you're seeing, you're hearing, you're smelling.
You're tasting your touch for the Lord's glory. Let's pray.
Loving God and our Father, we just pray that thou would exercise each one of us concerning what we've had before us. We thank you for that mighty work. We thank you for such a precious Savior, such a tremendous gift that thou its give. We thank you for his finished work at the cross and Jesus precious and worthy name, Amen.
Encouragement for the Wilderness, Hebrews 4:8-16
Address—Bill Prost
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
We are not going to read the whole chapter, but just before we read, we'll point out a couple of things. Hebrews, of course, is largely a Jewish book, very likely written by the apostle Paul, although he does not identify himself.
And it of course has a Jewish flavor to it. It assumes that there were some who had outwardly taken the place of being believers in the Lord Jesus, but without any inward reality.
And there were others who perhaps were true believers, but who were becoming discouraged and who were having trouble adjusting to the fact that they were not going to see an immediate Kingdom.
And this passage was impressed on my heart considering what we had in the readings.
Because there it talks about a Kingdom and how our Father has already in one sense given us the Kingdom, but at the same time it is not going to be an immediate Kingdom that will be displayed in this world.
And I believe what we have here in this chapter has real encouragement for you and me in these last days, because when God allowed the book of Hebrews to be included in the Canon of Scripture, he didn't mean it only for Jewish people to read.
The church is largely Gentile, and it has wonderful instruction and encouragement for us.
We're going to look at things from the wilderness aspect because Hebrews is largely a wilderness book.
And of course, and many of you already know this, the other book in the New Testament that is largely the wilderness or a wilderness book is Philippians. And there are some parallels between Hebrews and Philippians.
But here we have what I believe is very, very instructive for us.
Although it was written to largely a Jewish audience.
And so we'll start reading from verse eight of Hebrews chapter 4.
It says for if Jesus had given them rest, read Joshua there instead of Jesus. They're really the same name. Joshua means Savior, but they put the word Jesus, the name Jesus in here in the translation. It really is a reference back to Joshua of the Old Testament.
For if Joshua had given them rest.
Then would he not afterward have spoken of another day? And that's earlier in the chapter God had spoken of another day. Why? Because that rest that Joshua gave them in the land of Canaan was not intended to be their permanent rest.
He would not afterward have spoken of another day.
There remaineth therefore arrest to the people of God, for he that is entered into his rest, that is God's rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his.
Let us labor, therefore, to enter into that rest, lest any man fail after the same example of unbelief.
For the Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight.
But all things are naked and open under the eyes of him with whom we have to do.
Seeing then that we have a great high priest that is past, it says into the heavens, read through the heavens.
00:05:03
I believe that is the JND translation and it will be helpful to see that in a few minutes. That is passed through the heavens. Jesus the Son of God. Let us hold fast our profession.
For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly under the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
We want to talk, first of all, about REST.
We all want to have rest, don't we? We want life to go smoothly.
And I happen to be one of those people, I don't mind admitting it, that in my life I like, as they say in English, as an idiom. I like all my ducks in line. You've heard that expression. I like things to run nice and smoothly.
I like it when I get up to find things in order. I like it when I go out.
And go to will save for purposes of discussion where I live. Start the snow blower that it'll start up and work. I like it when the chainsaw starts up and works. I like it when I go out to do something with Mike or go to do something with my computer that things work and so on. I don't like a breakdown or something that makes a mess of things.
But it keeps happening.
It keeps happening in every sphere of life, personal life, family life, business life, assembly life, everything. Continual upsets.
Why is that?
Ah, it is because God wants to lead you and me into the precious truth of what He is bringing before these Jewish believers that our rest is not here.
Now don't get me wrong, there are some of our dear brethren in foreign lands that wish heartily that all they had to worry about was something that didn't start right, or the odd power outage, or some little thing like that where they couldn't use their computer for a while or something.
But nevertheless, these little things can be difficult.
And you and I here in these favored lands of Canada and the United States have experienced many upsets in life in the last 2 1/2 years. And I feel, and I can say it openly for those that are younger here, especially you young people who suddenly have had your world as it, as it as it might be said, blown apart by the events of the last 2 1/2 years.
And just as we thought that Covad was winding down and as we hoped everything was going to go back to normal, then what happens? Big war in the Ukraine.
And again, there are many in the Ukraine who heartily wish all they had to worry about are some of the inconveniences that you and I experience as a result of that going on the Internet or going to the store to order something and finding that it's out of stock. And maybe you'll get it in September or October.
They don't know.
They wish that's all they had to worry about. But what I'm saying is that no matter where we are in the world today, the Lord is allowing things to be severely disrupted. And the Lord, through the author of the book of Hebrews and by his Spirit, is reminding them that if Joshua had given them rest.
He wouldn't have had to speak of another day.
And then he says, there remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.
I'm not a Greek scholar, but anyone can look this up. The word for rest in verse 8 is not the same word as the one for rest in verse 9. The word for rest in verse 8 is a general word.
But the word in verse nine could be translated a Sabbath keeping.
00:10:02
There remaineth therefore a Sabbath keeping to the people of God. Why does the Lord say that here?
Oh, I believe at least this is the way I've looked at it in my own soul.
God has before him the blessing of the Church in heaven.
And the blessing of Israel on earth. And both are.
Recognized in this verse.
Does it refer to future blessing in heaven for those that know Christ as their Savior? Indeed it does.
But is there going to be a rest for the people of God on earth?
Is God going to forget about all his promises in the Old Testament, all those wonderful promises in the prophets?
Absolutely not. When God makes promises, He keeps them.
And so there's going to be a time in a coming day when Israel will be brought into blessing in the millennial day. And unless we see that.
Will never be able to understand the word of God.
I guess I'm old enough, as I've said before, to remember Harry Hayle, and I learned much from him as a young man.
And he used to say to us, I have never in my life met a man or a woman either who could understand the Bible unless they realize that God had in His purposes the blessing of the Church in heaven and the blessing of Israel on earth.
But back to this rest.
We like to have rest down here.
But it says there in verse 10, for he that is entered into his, that is God's rest.
Hath he also hath ceased from his own works.
As God did from his. What does that mean? That means simply that God wants to bring home to you and me that if you and I are going to have rest in our souls, it is going to have to be referred to a future day.
God does not promise you and me rest down here. Yes, we can have an inward rest.
But when Israel was going through the wilderness, they had to realize that that was not what God intended for them.
Could they anticipate and endure the wilderness because of what was ahead? Yes, they could.
And Joshua was one who did. Caleb was another. They endured 40 years in the wilderness.
Even though they weren't guilty as many others were.
But that was not their rest. Canaan was ahead, and that's where God directed their gaze.
And He would direct your gaze and mine, because God will not rest until His purpose has been accomplished. His counsel has been accomplished. And I loved it the way Bruce brought it out yesterday. Purpose and counselor in the singular.
All God's purpose and counsel are centered in Christ.
And until the Lord Jesus has his rightful place, God does not rest and neither can you and I. And if we try, God is going to keep. And I hesitate to do say this expression because it sounds irreverent, but God is continually going to upset your applecart and mine too.
And believe me, it's not always pleasant.
We've had it pretty good here in North America, haven't we?
We have been on the receiving end of prosperity such as the world has never known previously in its history. I think it's safe to say that.
But mostly through the churches history.
Many dear young people, and I know it was this is not particularly a young people's meeting, but it's meant to include all Christians, so I hope it's OK to speak at your level sometimes. Many young people.
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We're not allowed to think in terms of a career or a home or a marriage or family life.
Why? Because the persecution was so savage that they never knew what a day might bring forth.
I've read a good deal of the history of some of the Scottish Covenanters. Yes, they made mistakes. They stood, though, for truth that they believed in in the latter part of the 17th century, during the reign of Charles the Second of England. They stood for what they believed to be the truth.
And when they would get married, those who stood firm for the truth in Scotland at that time.
Sometimes the man who would give the message at that meeting would say to the wife, love your husband, but you better have a good winding sheet ready for him.
Winding sheet. That's what they buried them with. Wound them up in a sheet. They didn't bother with a wooden coffin because they knew that life might not last this that long.
Tell you another story.
Excuse me?
Perhaps the young people and the children here will be able to relate to this because it concerns a young girl who lived in France back in the 16th century. That's during the 1500s, during the Reformation.
Arlette was her name and this is a true story. Every word is true.
Arlette was ten years old.
And her father was a man by the name of Robert, or we would call him Robert.
And he had laid hold of the truth of the gospel.
And the truth of justification by faith or let's mother had passed away, gone to be with the Lord. And so she was compelled to travel around with her father and some other men who were very earnest in that day, in preaching the gospel. But they knew full well the risks they ran. And one night when it was a cold, rainy night, very, very difficult, they took refuge in a forsaken cabin in the woods.
In the South of France, where it was chilly at night and against their better judgment.
They lit a fire and of course the smoke rose up out of that cabin. People saw it in the neighboring town, alerted the authorities that some Huguenots, as they called them in those days, were probably hiding out there, and they all got caught.
Well, of course it didn't take long for them to be brought to court, and the punishment in those days for doing what those men were doing was to be let out in a public place, tied to a stake, and then wood piled all around them and lit.
And they gave up their lives for Christ in that way.
They accepted that as a matter of course. They accepted that as being the price they paid for being faithful to Christ.
There they were, on that day, let out.
Tied to the state, Wood piled up, fire lit.
And there was Arlette, at 10 years old, looking on.
As her father, and several other men with him who were faithful unto death.
And I don't know.
Whether I can tell you the rest of the story without choking up, but it's true.
Or let was mature for her age. She knew what this meant. She'd heard her father and those men with her talk about something like this, as if it could very well happen to them.
And are letting you the Lord.
And she knew what was going on.
And suddenly the thought evidently rushed through her mind.
This is the martyrdom that they always talked about.
There were kind people there who had a hold of Arlette, and the authorities, of course, excused her. They figured, well, she's just a little girl. She followed her father and those that she loved, and So what was going to happen to her after her father was dead? I'm not sure.
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But all of a sudden, Arlette realized what was really going on, that this was really happening.
And she broke loose from those that were holding on to her, raced into the flames.
Took a hold of her father's hand and stood there and gave up her life to.
Can you imagine?
Living with that is your future.
What kept her going? What kept her father going?
There remaineth therefore arrest to the people of God.
There remaineth therefore arrest.
Bringing it down to our day.
And I've said this before, so forgive me if you've heard me say it.
But back about 100 and some years ago, more than that, it would be probably closer to 150 years ago.
There are problems and difficulties in England and I believe this had to do with difficulties among some of the assemblies there. Excuse me.
And a younger brother appealed to an older brother, very distressed at what was going on and not knowing what was going to happen.
And he said whatever is going to become of us.
Maybe you wonder about that too sometimes. Maybe some of you along with me that are gathered to the Lord's name. You see weakness coming in and it does come in, and I'm part of it.
And maybe you see things not the ways they used to be, and you wonder whether they could improve somehow. And so on.
This younger brother said whatever is going to become of us.
The older brother wisely replied. Priceless answer, he said. Scripture knows no future for the believer but glory.
We're not promised a future down here. We're not promised to rest down here.
What does the Lord want you and me to do? I have to cease from my works, cease from trying to make life too comfortable down here.
Now, I don't want to be misunderstood and we said this in the reading meetings.
I must confess that I very much enjoyed the good beef that Tony and Becky served up to us at noon.
Was it wrong to enjoy that? Should we have pushed our plates away and said no? No, Tony, just give us some bread and water and that'll do. Or a few vegetables? I don't think so. It says in First Timothy, who giveth us all things richly to enjoy.
Let me reminisce again for a minute. I was privileged to know and sit under the ministry of our late brother Clifford Brown and I wonder I I remember once his being in our home at at a meal and my mother was a good cook.
And she asked him during the meal, she said, what did the Lord mean through the apostle Paul when he said he giveth us all things richly to enjoy? Clifford Brown just pointed at his plate and said this is one of the things he meant, and that was right.
The good gifts that God has given, it's OK to enjoy them, but.
They're a means to an end, not an end in themselves.
Do I use them for the glory of God? That's the point. But if it's to try and create a rest down here where everything will go smoothly.
It's not going to work. The Lord is going to turn everything upside down every time you look around.
In order to make us realize that the rest is future, well, we better get on with this year.
Verse 11, though, says, Let us labor therefore, to enter into that rest.
Lest any man fail through the same example of unbelief, What does that mean? Labor to enter into rest? Why not just relax? That's the way you get rest.
Oh, the Lord knew that Satan would continually be at us to try and get us to make a comfortable existence down here.
He knows that it would be a continual difficulty with Satan whispering in our ear. Make yourself comfortable. What does the world tell you when it advises you to go and get into some luxury item or something that's really desirable? You're worth it, isn't that right? You deserve it. You've worked hard. Now you've got some money in your pocket. You deserve it. Go after it.
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And the Bible is the only book in the world.
That will tell you and me to lay up our treasure in heaven. And so we have to labor.
That doesn't mean in the sense of working for it, but it means constantly, constantly being on guard lest we be pulled down to the level of the world. And that is what Satan has been all too successful in doing, is pulling Christianity down to the level of a worldly religion, saying, yes, you can have Christ if you want. He knows he can't take that away from us in the sense of.
Taking away our salvation. You can have heaven before you, but enjoy life down here. Life's too short not to have some fun and to enjoy it.
Remember, a nurse at the hospital where I used to work summed up her philosophy in this way. She said we're not here for a long time, but just to have a good time. That was the way she looked at it. She had a lot going for her. Very attractive girl, good education. She was having the good life.
But it only lasted as long as the horizons of this world were before her.
And she didn't want to hear about eternity.
We need to be on guard. And then we come to what is the meat of what I'd like to talk about this afternoon.
There are three things which are necessary and an encouragement to you and me if we are going to have our hearts directed to arrest. That is future to God's rest, God's rest.
And the first one.
At first glance sounds rather severe.
The word of God is quick. That doesn't mean it moves fast. The word quick there has the sense of being a living word, alive, alive and powerful.
Sharper than any two edged sword. Now this verse is often used in the gospel, and rightfully so. Very, very good, but it was written primarily to believers.
Why is that? Do we need the Word of God sharper than any two edged sword?
Piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, you know the soul is the.
Seat of our appetites and our desires. Naturally the Spirit is the God conscious parts of our being. And sometimes if we're not careful.
The desires of the two can be at odds with one another.
My spirit ought to be under the control of the Spirit of God.
And to seek the things of Christ. But sometimes my soul says, oh, my soul lusts after this and that and the other thing.
And we all have different things that we like.
I've met people that really love motorcycles.
More power to them. I never had any desire to own one.
But I don't mind telling you that I was a car buff from the time I was four years old.
Loved cars, still do. Now I can't drive them anymore.
Well, that's just as well. Maybe then I don't get occupied them within the same way.
And many people have different things that they like. One brother that I sat on or sat under his ministry, he said, Billy said I don't have any care for what kind of a car I drive. He couldn't even change the tires. I found out one day when I was riding with him. But he said I don't. I like to spend money on my home. That's the that's the snare that I have.
So it can be different things.
But the Word of God comes in and divides asunder between soul and spirit.
And of the joints and marrow. Oof, serious.
The marrow is inside the bone.
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But that Word of God is able to Pierce right to where that marrow is. Is that marrow necessary in your body? Indeed it is. That's where your blood cells are formed. Absolutely necessary. Your bone marrow goes bad and you're not going to make it unless you get a bone marrow transplant.
And is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Why doesn't it say the discerner of the?
Actions. Oh, it's because what starts out in the heart is what translates into action.
And as you and I think so, ultimately we end up acting. And if God can get control of my thoughts through His Word, our actions will follow.
The point I want to make with the Word of God is if you want to enjoy God's rest.
In your soul.
The Word of God is absolutely necessary. Don't be afraid of letting it cut. And it does cut. And sometimes it hurts.
I admit that and I have had it cut me pretty deeply.
I can still remember that verse. Make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lust thereof. Oh, did that hurt a few times in my life.
And other verses 2 The Lord's word cuts, but don't be afraid to let it cut. And what you and I, I suggest, need to do in these last days is be more and more familiar with the Word of God. And I say to each one here, and if I can be allowed once again to speak perhaps directly to those that are younger.
Saturate yourself with the Word of God.
Because the wisdom of this world is going like a tangent like that.
Away from the Word of God When I was growing up, the Word of God was read in schools. It was the backbone of society.
Everyone respected the word of God and if we referred to the word of God.
People knew what you were talking about.
I remember even reading a secular book when I was a boy and one boy in school was who was a real Rascal suddenly started to act.
Very good and doing the right thing and behaving himself and everything. And his teacher was so surprised, it said right in the book. The teacher in front of other people said to that boy, well, the teacher said, this is indeed finding Saul among the prophets.
Everyone in my day knew exactly what that meant. If you said that to people today, they'd shrug their shoulders and said, I don't know what that means. Finding Saul among the prophets. I know pretty well everyone here knows what I'm referring to. And so the point is, the world has changed, and it's getting so bad now that the world is calling good evil and evil good.
And the only place that you and I will find that which directs us.
To the rest that is going to come.
Will be this precious book, and so that's why these lines are so striking.
And so serious here.
And that's why it says in verse 13.
Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight, but all things are naked and open under the eyes of him with whom we have to do.
At first glance, even as believers, you and I may find that frightening.
Because even as believers, we can try to deceive people, or we can be guilty of what is called duplicity. Duplicity.
What does that mean? It means that I'm I say something that can be taken in two different ways, so that depending on whom I'm talking to, I can say, well, I really meant this. But when I talk to someone else, I can say, well, actually, I really meant this.
And then if those two people start to talk to one another, I'm in trouble. But the point is, we can be guilty of that. We can be hypocrites where we say one thing and do another, as the Pharisees did.
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It's frightening.
But isn't it wonderful in one sense and comforting to know that you and I deal with a God that we can't fool?
Isn't it comforting in one sense?
I will remember reading the story of a woman and this was a secular story.
About a woman who ended up actually being.
I believe a professor at Harvard. She was bipolar and had a severe case of it too.
And when she wanted a psychiatrist to look after her.
She picked a man on the recommendation of others, and she said so herself. She said I in my bipolar state.
Could be very guilty because she was very smart, very smart. And she could be very guilty of fooling people who were trying to help her by pretending this and pretending that. And she said I wanted a psychiatrist who was much smarter than I was and no matter what trick I tried to play on him.
I wanted someone who would see right through it.
Well, of course he did, and no matter what she said to him, he would know exactly where she was going and where the truth lay. And she appreciated that. You and I appreciate the Lord that way. Isn't it a comfort to deal with the one?
Sees right through us and if we try to do something that is not according to his mind.
He's not going to Passover it, He's going to pull us up on it and deal with this in utmost love, but in utmost wisdom and knowledge. Wonderful.
But then there's more than that.
That's number one, the Word of God, and we want to impress that on each one because we will never, never seek God's rest until we are willing to submit ourselves to the cutting edge of the Word of God in our lives.
But God doesn't leaveth with that.
God, as it were, doesn't give us a good cut with his word and say, now let that settle you down for a while, if I could be.
Plane without being irreverent.
There's more.
Verse 14 Seeing then that we have a great high priest.
Oh, isn't that beautiful?
That is passed through the heavens. Why is that a better translation? Let me put it this way.
Well, let's finish the verse. Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession.
Or confession.
For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
We have a high priest.
And who is who was a priest in the Old Testament? You had to be part of the family of Aaron to be a priest in those days. But the priest went between men and God, and now all that has been done away with. And in that sense, every believer is a priest today.
But we have a great high priest who intercedes for us.
But the position he is in is important. He has passed through the heavens.
Let me try and explain that without being too complicated. It's well known that scripture recognizes 3 heavens and it tells us and we won't turn to it. But you know the scripture in the book of Acts where the apostle Paul rehearsing what had happened to him, he told about being caught up to the 3rd heaven. Sorry, not an accident in Second Corinthians. Beg your pardon, it happened.
During his experience in Acts, but it's recorded in Second Corinthians Chapter 11 anyway. Or 12 rather. The point is that he was caught up to the 3rd heaven that is clearly the dwelling place of God.
00:40:09
What are the 1St and 2nd heavens?
It seems from scripture that the first heavens or the 1St heaven.
Is what we might call the atmosphere around this earth, where the birds fly, where the universe is, and so on. That which you and I can at least appreciate to some extent with our naked eye. And so it says in Genesis chapter one. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
But I I would call the 2nd heavens and.
This. This is the best definition I can come up with. The 2nd heaven.
Is really the sphere of spiritual activity?
And it is where the conflict takes place between Satan.
And the good angels, the elect angels. It's where Satan appears before God, as he did in Rome.
Or in job Rome, not Rome in job and accused.
You might say Job to the Lord and where the Lord said to Satan, have you considered my servant Job? And so on. And there was a dialogue there. It's where I believe the activity occurred when.
There was a dialogue between the Lord and Satan's hosts, who shall go out to Ramoth Gilead and persuade Ahab to fall there. And one said after this manner, and another after that, and so on, and eventually one.
Of Satan's demons said, I'll persuade him, The Lord said, How we'll all go and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.
And the Lord said, go ahead, you'll succeed. That's where that kind of thing goes on. That's where spiritual warfare that you and I face goes on.
But where's the Lord Jesus? He's passed through all that.
He's no longer subject to anything in this world or in the universe. He's no longer subject, if we could say it reverently, to all the spiritual activity of Satan and his hosts. He's above all that.
But can you sympathize with you and me? Yes, he can. Why? Because he's been here as a man, and he remains a man.
I say this reverently. Is he still God? Indeed he is in every aspect. Colossians 2IN him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.
But is he still a man? Yes. Does he have all the thoughts and feelings of a man? Yes. Does he have a human soul? Yes. Does he have a human spirit? Yes. He can identify when it says dividing asunder of soul and spirit. We want to be very reverent in this, the Lord Jesus as a man.
Has both soul and spirit.
He doesn't need the Word of God to divide asunder between his soul and spirit, but he's a man.
He has the same makeup without sin as you and I have.
And he looks down and he sympathizes with what? Your sin and mine. Oh, they're having such a hard time. I guess I'll let them off the hook for this. Oh no. That's why the Word of God is brought in. God never excuses or sympathizes with sin, but He does sympathize with our infirmities.
And he intercedes for us on that ground.
Why? Because he has been here.
Now you and I might say, well, how could he in one sense sympathize with you and me?
If he never was subject from within to all the effects of sin.
He felt them from without. But to be blunt and plain about it, I don't believe the Lord Jesus ever had a migraine headache. I don't believe he ever got the flu. I don't believe he ever got up in the morning and.
00:45:00
Just didn't feel right.
Because of some inward problem. If he didn't feel right, it was usually I suppose, and I say reverently.
Because he didn't get much sleep that night, because he had to go out, if we could say it to the Mount of Olives and sleep. And then he'd be there early in the temple and he could be tired and he could be hungry and thirsty and all the rest of it as a man. But he never suffered from the effects of sin inwardly, because he was perfect.
But who suffered more from the outward effects of sin?
The Lord Jesus, because here he saw his creation spoiled.
Have you ever made something beautiful only to have someone else spoil it, make a mess of it?
Yeah, we've seen that happen, haven't we? Maybe you're good at something and you do the your very best and someone else comes along who thinks they can improve on it and spoils it.
When I did surgery, I always gave strict instructions that I didn't want the dressing changed on that particular surgery, and sometimes well meaning people in the hospital would change that dressing even though it was put on in a certain way for a reason. And sometimes they spoil what I did.
Another occasion I remember doing surgery on a man and a.
I gave him a sheet of instructions. Very, very clear.
You are to use crutches for at least 10 days and don't put weight on that foot.
He came in to have his dressing changed in four days.
Unbelievable. That dressing was filthy and dirt all over it and everything like that. I looked at him. I said, what have you been doing?
Well, doc, you know, I, this was Canada, so he talked in Canadian terms. We're a metric up there. He said, you know, I always go for a 5 kilometer walk every day. That's a little over 3 miles. So you know, well, I had to do it. I have to have my walk every day.
Who do you think suffered more from looking at that? Him or I? I can tell you I did what a mess he made of my work. A mess. Of course it cost him to it cost him nine days in the hospital and IV antibiotics and so on. And I think he learned his lesson. But the point is to spoil something that you've done. The Lord Jesus suffered.
But he sympathizes with your infirmities and mine.
He wants us to come to him and we all have infirmities of different kinds. Sometimes they're of the body, sometimes they're of the mind, whatever they may be, He wants us to go to him. We'll never be rid of those infirmities till we get home in the glory. But the Lord Jesus says, I, I sympathize you come to me because he has been the word tempted here.
In verse 15 is rather unfortunate. The thought there is tested, tested. God can't be tempted with evil. No, we get that in James. But the Lord Jesus was tested. It only proved who he was and what he was. You and I failed that testing. He never did, but he can sympathize with everything that you and I.
Are going through.
And then we don't have much time left. But look at the last one.
Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace.
That is not the same as the high priesthood of Christ, although it is related to it. The throne of grace is ultimately, at this time, God's throne. The Lord Jesus isn't on his throne yet. He's on the Father's throne, waiting for the time when he is given his rightful place and sits on his own throne.
And isn't it wonderful when he sits on his own throne? You and I are with him. He won't take up his own throne.
00:50:05
Until he has you and me with him.
But now when you and I approach the throne of God, what kind of a throne is it? You know, we don't think of all that, especially in North America. Here Canada still recognizes.
And I is a good subject of her still referred to Queen Elizabeth as Her Majesty the Queen. That is her proper title. And in Canada we recognize her as the head of state, although not the head of government, but she's the head of state. But in years gone by, kings and Queens had absolute authority. Whatever they said went.
If they said take that man out and execute them, bang it happened.
If they said throw that man in prison, it happened and there was number appeal against that. We don't have that anymore. And in countries like the United States that have a Republic form of government, we're not used to that. But the point is.
A throne brings before US1 who would normally be not only very highly respected but also feared.
And we should fear God in a proper way, but it's a throne of grace.
Why is it a throne of grace? Because God has come out to this world in grace. He has come out to you and me in grace. And sometimes when we fail in our Christian lives, and we had this up at the camp at Morningstar, Satan whispers in our year in our ear, you really messed up. You really blew it.
Or, as the handout said, I think.
My wife's comment you've struck out. You've struck out.
You've messed up so badly that you can never live for the Lord again. You've made such a mess of things that you better just give up on it. Go out into the world. Live like a worldly person.
Know when we come to the Lord, it's a throne of grace and maybe we come in our weakness, our infirmity and our weakness is real sometimes and we say, Lord, I just don't have the strength to do this or that or the other thing.
And yet we feel the Lord leading us to do it.
What do we do? Come to that throne of grace?
And what do we find there that we may obtain mercy?
Now there's a difference between mercy and grace. Grace is the goodness of God that I do not deserve.
Mercy is not receiving the judgment of God, but I do deserve.
You can see the difference.
When we come to Christ as Savior, we first of all receive mercy.
And then we appreciate the grace of God. But from God's side, the grace was there first, a throne of grace that we may receive mercy. Do we deserve the Lord's mercy for our infirmities? No. The Lord has a right to say, look, those are your infirmities and they're part of sin in this world. And man brought sin into the world, not God. So if you have to live with a few infirmities, well, you're going to have a rough time, but you can.
You can muddle through somehow. No, the Lord doesn't do that. That we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need or.
Someone else has put it timely help or seasonable help. What does that mean? It means that we get exactly what we need, when we need it.
Exactly what we need when we need it. Let me give you an example. Pardon me, I'm going overtime a minute or two. Hope that's OK.
Back in the 1800s, when Charles Spurgeon, who was a very well known gospel preacher and probably almost everyone here knows his name, was walking toward the place in London, England, where he frequently preached the gospel. And he was to have a gospel meeting that evening. And a believer who knew him very well was also walking toward the gospel. He was going to attend the meeting.
And he caught up with Spurgeon, fell into step with him.
00:55:03
And they got into a bit of conversation.
And this brother in Christ said to Spurgeon, his name was Charles, he said Charles.
If the Lord called upon you to be burnt at the stake for Christ along the lines of those brothers and that dear young girl that I talked to you about earlier, he didn't refer to them, of course. He just referred in general, he said.
The Lord called you to be burned at the stake for Christ.
Would you have the grace to go through with it?
How would you answer that question?
I thought Spurgeon gave a good answer. Spurgeon said, well, brother, he said at the moment, he said, I don't know that I would have the grace for that. But he said it's not the kind of grace I need right now. Right now I need grace to preach the gospel in about 20 minutes. That's the grace I'm asking for. That was a good answer, a good answer.
God will give you the grace you need. Seasonable help.
When you need it.
A throne of grace. And we never need to be afraid to approach that throne, no matter what we have done. Now, there are times in our lives when maybe we have failed very seriously. And I, I don't want to refer to it and kind of end on this austere note, but there are times in our lives, perhaps when we fail so seriously.
That it becomes public knowledge.
And our brethren in faithfulness to the Lord have to deal with us, and that becomes very, very difficult.
And we may feel very deeply about it. And if the Lord works in our hearts, we can be restored fully in our souls.
But sometimes, in order to be restored, we hesitate to approach that throne of grace. All I can say is.
We ought to feel our failure deeply. But remember when the Lord saved you, When He saved me, He knew very well how I was going to turn out. He knew every failure of which I would be guilty.
He knew how your life would turn out, and he saved you anyway.
All that you have done, that I have done.
Was under the shelter of the blood of Christ long before we were born.
And that's why it's a throne of grace. Let's pray our loving God and our Father.
We thank thee for what we have in this chapter.
Arrest in the future for the people of God.
Arrest Lord Jesus, into which thou hast entered.
But that thou wilt not fully experience.
Until we are with the.
We thank Thee for thy precious Word, our God, even though it has to cut deeply at times. We thank Thee for thy high priesthood. Blessed Lord Jesus, that intercedes for us that is there.
To keep us from failure and to sympathize with our infirmities.
And we thank Thee, our God, for that throne of grace to which we can come to obtain mercy.
And find seasonable help we commit to Thy word to thee, and pray that Thou wilt bless it to our souls.
And ask all, Lord Jesus, in thy precious and worthy name, Amen.
To Whom Shall We Go?
Open—Phil Barela
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Sleep well.
The.
Straight line for me, I'll drink.
Emmanuel's Land.
My.
Whatever time it was.
Glory.
I don't understand your first time.
I.
The God and Father, we thank Thee for the sentiments of this hymn.
We thank thee that in thy love and Thy perfect wisdom and the hard webbing weaving our web of life.
Weaving at our God for ultimately for the glory and honor of thy beloved Son, to think in that day He is going to be admired in his Saints and all them that believe. And we will rejoice then, Father.
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And delight in him that he has that place he is so worthy of.
Meanwhile, we are here, still in the wilderness, we have been reminded.
And that work is still going on. Father, we thank You for it. We thank Thee for little, little evidences of it that we can see here and there that delight our souls. And now we're cast on the Our God. And Father, we do know there is that flesh within each one of us.
Who would hinder what thou would say to us?
And so we pray that.
That the thou just have. Lord Jesus says we have been reminded a word from thee for right now.
What we need for that work to go on in our souls.
That might prepare us for that blessed moment is just before us.
When we don't look for Jesus at our our garment.
But when we'll look upon my blessed face?
So we seek thy help.
A gracious undertaking, looking to thee, our God, and we trust with open hearts and open ears. We ask it in the wording and precious name of the Lord Jesus, Amen.
It's really hard for me to get up here.
Being a local brother, I kind of feel like an intruder, but I hope it will.
Help us blend together a little more as our time here has been so sweet and we've heard from our brethren from different places and I just am encouraged being a local brother.
To voice a few thoughts just to let my brother know how happy we are and how encouraged we have been. All those I've talked to, so encouraged for your presence here.
And for the words that's been before us, it seems right from the start, it was something that we all needed. We all needed to have our focus on the Lord and on heaven. And you know, I was thinking there came a time right down there at the end that the Lord said to the disciples, he said, will you go away also?
Will you go away? Also, You know, there's, there's a lot of things happening, isn't there brethren?
There's a lot that are being discouraged, there's a lot that are leaving.
There's a lot are talking about leaving. There's a lot that we don't see it meeting very often. There's a lot that we don't see at the prayer meeting. Where are they? What are they doing?
Why isn't the prayer meeting an attraction to him? Why isn't it important for them to be at the reading meeting?
And we see these things happening in the assemblies, and we come to the breaking of bread. Maybe there they are.
And maybe on a, on a pretty regular schedule, they're at the breaking of bread and that's wonderful. It's one of the most wonderful meetings we can attend.
But where are they in the middle of the week?
What's going on? What's attracting their hearts?
That they're not there. They're not there.
Well, we also go away.
You know, you know, we also go away.
One of the disciples.
He says, Lord, to whom shall we go? To whom shall we go? And it is that is so good to get that down, isn't it, brethren?
If I say to you, will you go away too? Will you go away too?
Would you please hear these words of Peter's Lord? Where would we go?
I sometimes say when.
Someone leaves the assembly that I've known for years to be in the assembly, and I haven't been in it that long myself. The Lord gathered me to His precious name in 1974.
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And it just seems like yesterday. And their souls, I know when I came into the assembly, the Lord brought me into the assembly and they're not there anymore. And I sometimes say to my wife, I say, I wonder where they are. I wonder where they're going.
I've lost track of them. I never hear of them again.
They're living out the solemn epithet, the solemn truth of to whom shall we go? There's nowhere to go.
So please bear with me a little bit while while I just touch handed in our eyes and our hearts start to wander a little bit.
And then we also get occupied with things that are happening in the world. We get trouble, we get we get distracted.
And we find ourselves saying, you know, I'd like to get above this hole. I'd like to get above it all. And sometimes we choose the wrong way to get above it all. We say, oh, I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to buy me a new this or a new that. I'm going to make some real good investments and make me some more money so that I can do this or do that.
So that I can.
Get away from the trouble and be untouched by it. I can live my life like the beginning of Luke chapter 12. There's a farmer there.
And he starts to question himself. He's had a good year and like was brought before us, he even has to tear down his own barns and say I'll build bigger ones. And then I will say, relax, take thy knees.
You know, maybe there was troubles in the community, troubles in the city, troubles with the people of God, troubles in the world, and we kind of like to forget about it and get above it all. We'd like to rise. We'd like to be suspended.
Trans dental meditation, we might call it. We'd like to float.
That's a serious thing.
You know we'd like to not be touched.
By all the problems.
Because, see, when we're touched by the problems and the difficulties, there's only one place to go. Are you willing to go there?
Are you willing to find out that Jesus Christ is the only answer for us? Is the only answer you know, as I get older, it's not so much going to heaven with me anymore.
I'm glad I'm going to heaven.
But what is occupying my heart more and more and more?
Is seeing him.
We will get to see him.
And it says Jesus himself will come.
Jesus himself, Oh, I just want that to grip everyone of our hearts in this room.
We will one of these days.
We're going to get to see Jesus.
Heaven is going to be in the background, really. And really, Heaven wouldn't be Heaven, would it, if he wasn't there.
And so as we get older and as we go along, the only thing that's going to keep us is himself.
Himself, his very person. Him.
To see the Lord Jesus himself.
Polycarp before he was martyred, he said they tried to tie him, retie him and he said to the young man that was trying to retie him to the post so that they could burn him.
And he said, young man, he said, you don't need to tie me to this post. He was in his 80s. He says, I've known the Lord Jesus all my life and he's never done me wrong. You don't need to tie me to this post. I'm not going anywhere.
The man was considering who he was going to see.
And the young soldier in frustration, thrust his spear in the polycarth, and he was with the Lord.
It's it's just something to get the right perspectives, it says.
Neither be ye doubtful minded. Don't seek to be suspended. That's where Job really had a problem, didn't he? What did he say? I thought I'd die in my nest. And as our brother and have faithfully brought before us. We live in a time in in a in a country where prosperity is where every one of us rich. We're rich. We eat like kings. We have vehicles. We have homes of comfort, heat, air conditioning.
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We're rich.
And oh, it's nice. Yes, it is. And I'm not denying anybody's word that they said that, that, you know, these things are given for us richly to enjoy. Enjoy them in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ and never lose sight of his face in the enjoyment of them.
But someday we're going to be with him and may these things, as it were, take the seat they need to take, and that's the very, very, very back seat.
You know, the very backseat because.
Heaven is our home, Christ is our Savior. And Job had a problem. He said I thought I'd die in my nest. He said I wanted to die in my nest. You know, and, and if and and then there's another, another place to where?
I'm trying to recall it it's it's in the Old Testament.
It it talks about setting your, your, your nest on high and I can't recall where that verse is, but there again, it it's brought out to us that we shouldn't seek that either. Let's see.
Habakkuk chapter 2 and verse 9. Woe to him that covereth an evil covetousness to his house, that he may set his nest on high.
That he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil, this is woe to him that does that.
You may seek out the wrong means and go to the wrong people to get the wrong resources to be able to set your nest on high, and it might just be that which puts you in *******.
And distracted the rest of your time here.
Stay free, stay free, keep our eyes on the Lord Jesus.
Keep our eyes on Him and what He's done for us and what He's doing for us. I was so struck that it says and all the hymns that we've been seeing have blended so nice with the thought of having our home, the Lord Jesus our Savior. This is not our rest. We don't want to get occupied with things here. The hymns have been so nice, but I was really struck with this. It says in this hymn that we sang number 77.
I will bless the hand that guided. I will bless the heart that planned, when thrown, where glory dwelleth in Emmanuel's land.
Oh, we're going to be blessing him for every trial, difficulty and situation that we've ever gone through down here that has helped us to keep our eyes on him.
Don't take your eyes off of me, says the Lord Jesus. To whom shall we go, Lord? To whom shall we go? So I just leave that thought, my brother. And the meetings have been so sweet and so good. And may He encourage our hearts to go on and not get distracted. The time is just about over.
Seeing the Lord
Open—Eugen Soare
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Also enjoying something along the lines our brother brought before us.
Of looking to the Lord.
Gazing on the Lord and glory.
I will not gaze at glory, but on my King of grace.
I.
In numbers 12.
You have a portion.
Numbers chapter 12 and verse one.
And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married, for he had married an Ethiopian woman.
And they said, Hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses?
Hath he not spoken also by us?
And the Lord heard it.
Now the man Moses was very meek above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.
And the Lord spake suddenly unto Moses, and unto Aaron, and unto Miriam, Come out E3 unto the Tabernacle of the congregation, and they three came out.
And the Lord came down in the pillar of the cloud, and stood at the in the door of the Tabernacle, and called Aaron and Miriam, and they both came forth.
And he said, Hear now my words, If there be a prophet among you, I, the Lord, will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream.
My servant Moses is not so who is faithful in all mine healths.
With Him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches, And in the similitude of the Lord shall he behold.
Wherefore then, were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?
What was the problem?
With Miriam and Aaron.
The problem was they were looking at their brother naturally.
At a servant of the Lord.
And he had done something marrying an Ethiopian woman.
And as it were.
They sought to perhaps set him aside.
Or make it a matter of shame to him.
Notice that Moses did not fight.
He did not make it a matter of contention.
But the Lord said it right.
We see that Moses saw the Lord.
So we may have a tendency to look upon a brother or a sister.
And say there is something not right in their life, therefore I will not hear.
I will not listen to what God has given them, but that is not right.
We see from this example this scripture written for our learning that it is not the right path for us to do.
To be setting aside someone that the Lord is speaking to us through.
Keep our eyes upon the Lord.
And as we have in job.
Chapter 42.
A man.
Who went through great trial?
At the end he could say Job Chapter 42.
Verse 5.
I have heard of thee by the hearing of the year, but now mine eye seeth thee.
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Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.
We have heard.
Of the Lord.
It would seem that Job he finally saw the Lord.
In realizing His glory and His Holiness.
And looking upon his life, that which he had righteously.
Argued with his friends concerning.
He realized.
I have nothing.
Before the Lord.
Would this be?
A thing for us to do.
Have we seen the Lord in such a way?
Where it strips us of any.
Thought of.
Good. That is in US.
Where we see how holy?
And how pure he is.
And we repent and dust and ashes for having any inkling of glorifying ourselves. Any inkling of.
I am something.
No, before the Lord.
Speaking personally.
As an individual, a Sinner, saved by grace alone, I have nothing to glory in except the cross of Christ.
And so through trial.
And considering our ways being before the Lord personally.
We can see the glory of the Lord and have a moment of.
Where we truly see how great he is.
We are blessed.
In John chapter 20.
We have a portion.
Where we are called blessed.
John chapter 20 and verse 29.
Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, hast thou believed?
Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed.
How blessed we are.
We have believed by the grace of God, by the gift of faith, we know and believe that Jesus Christ is risen. He is a glorified man. He is on high in the glory.
And when we turn to that wonderful portion of Hebrews.
Is it cheapers?
Chapter 2.
We verse nine we see Jesus who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death.
Crowned with glory and honor.
We see Jesus.
So we can look around at failure.
We can look around at others. Indeed, we can look at ourselves as well.
But when we look at Jesus, that's where our.
Proper places.
I would say.
And as it were, when we have the Lord before us individually, is there anything else that can fill our eyes?
Perhaps we are all in the line and we're looking towards him. Or perhaps we're all in a circle and we're looking towards Him and that fills our eyes. He fills and we don't get distracted by our brethren.
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We don't get distracted by things down here. We don't get distracted.
By the afflictions that afflict us.
But we see him.
There was another man.
In Acts Chapter 7.
Acts Chapter 7.
Verse 55.
Before we read, perhaps we can talk a little bit about Stephen.
Young people, older ones.
He wasn't distracted by the things of this earth.
He wasn't distracted by friends.
He had one object and that was the Lord. He sought to do the Lord's will. He was full of the Holy Ghost. He sought to do the service that was in his before him to do.
And even.
In martyrdom.
Verse 55 But he Stephen, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven.
And saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God, and said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.
What a vision to have before.
Leaving the scene.
And surely we have that vision before us when we're up in glory seeing the Lord Jesus Christ.
At the right hand of God.
I spoke a little bit about distractions and and such. We know John Mark, he was, he was didn't want to go to the work.
He didn't want to go.
To the work with Paul.
And Barnabas, he left them. Perhaps it was too hard. We don't know what state of soul was, but let's be encouraged to be as Paul, Barnabas, Silas, they were focused to do the will of him that sent him to do the will of the Lord. They had the Lord before them, I believe, and so they could go through trials and tribulations.
Because the Lord was before them.
So may we have the Lord before us.
Something to Do for the Lord
Open—Virgil Redman
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Much of A speaker, I'm more useless speaking to kids, but I still see a lot of kids around here. So but I just wanted to follow up a little bit.
Encourage the young people.
This is important for what we do before the Lord.
Is it insignificant as others might think? Well.
That's not a very good job the Lord's given me to do.
That's the only way we look at it, isn't it?
And does the Lord have something for you to do, even if you're a little kid, young lad?
A young girl, I believe the Lord if you, if you are the Lords, if you believe in the Lord Jesus as your Savior, He definitely has something for you to do, even in this late hour. I know we're expecting.
Well, we should.
The shell the Lord's return at any moment. Is there time left to do something for the Lord?
Indeed there is. And he will have us to occupy. He'd have us to keep busy.
And we need to have the right attitude. It's not so much of what the Lord has us to do. Do we have a willing heart to want to do it. That's where it starts.
My son, give me thy heart.
And the brother was talking in Hebrews about our rest. Well, it's no time to rest yet. No time to pull up the the lounge chair at the pool and just relax and take it easy. The Lord has us something to do and it's important to him. May not be important to me or I may think, well, this brother or this sister or what he's doing, well, you know.
It's not that significant, but it is to the Lord, so let's just read a couple of verses.
That I enjoy.
And I keep in mind as First Corinthians.
Chapter 15.
We read from 57 verse 57.
But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, with that in mind, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, For as much as you know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.
Well, you would think, well, there's a contradiction. How can you be steadfast, unmovable, and then always abounding in the work of the Lord? Well, it refers to the last verse in 57 that we that we just read, we have the victory through the Lord Jesus Christ. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.
But we need to be dependent on Him, don't we? We need to fill our weakness and then He can work through us.
When we're guided by His Spirit. And so with that in mind, we ought to be steadfast, unmovable.
Always abounding in the truth and what the Lord has given us and be guided by the Spirit of God, and then we're abound in the work of the Lord.
Also in.
Colossians chapter 3, the same verse sort of applies.
In Colossians 3.
And in verse 23 And whatsoever you do, do it hardly as to Lord, and not unto men, knowing that the Lord you shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for you serve the Lord Christ.
So so we keep in mind.
It's the Lord that we serve.
And there was.
A lad that we speak that is spoken of in John's Gospel.
That he was the only one that brought a lunch, didn't he?
And I don't they don't say how old he was.
Did the Lord use what that lad had? Indeed he did.
Served over 5000 men and women. What 1015 thousand? I don't know.
So even if you're a young lad, Or what about that young maiden, that young girl?
Who spoke to?
The wife of the man who was in charge of the army of the Syrians.
He was a great man, they said. But what was he? He was a leper, wouldn't he?
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And she just happened to mention that there was a man in.
Judea or Israel or Palestine, they could heal them. Of course Elijah couldn't heal them, but the Lord could. And so she happened to mention. So there's things that you and I can do that may seem not to be important or or insignificant to others, but is this important to the Lord? It sure is and we can be encouraged.
Encouragement to others.
In what they're doing.
I had the wonderful privilege job of taking out the trash at Morningstar. No, that's not very glamorous, but it's needful, it's important. And I had a young dear sister. Almost.
During the day several times thanking me for taking out the trash.
Well, that's encouragement, isn't it?
And was it in vain? Not at all. Did the Lord notice it? I'm sure He did, and I trust in my heart that I was doing it as unto the Lord.
Time is running out, but each and everyone of you young people get busy.
There's not the time to rest, it's time to work for the Lord.
And there's so many things that we can do for the Lord. We can write a letter to somebody that's.
Held up or or or confined to their their room.
We can leave a track somewhere.
Or if we go out to dinner, take out a thank you card of four things that God wants you to know. So many things that we can do. If you see somebody working in the kitchen, thank them for their work. You know, in, in the Morningstar, we were all busy doing something. People were taking care of the horses. Other people were cooking, washing dishes. Did you thank him?
Well.
Maybe you didn't think, well, OK, they were just doing the dishes, but maybe they were doing it as unto the Lord. You know, the Lord sees everything we do if it's for Him.
We have to have a heart for the Lord, and we have to do it as unto the Lord and not unto men. Or we we seeking recognition or are we seeking some kind of honor because.
We're an evangelist or we're a missionary or whatever, and we hold them in high esteem. Well, what does the word of God say if you just turn to 1St Corinthians 12 and it says here?
In verse 22, name much more. Those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary. Wow.
I guess I've fallen in that line and those members of the body which we think to be less honorable.
Well, we shouldn't think that in the 1St place should we? But maybe some do. Upon those we bestow more abundant honor and our uncommon parts have more abundant comeliness and so. Or maybe I should read the next one for our company. Parts have no need, but God has tempered the body together having giving more abundant honor to that part which is lacked.
Does everyone of us have something that we can do to honor the Lord? Indeed we do. So just keep that in mind that whatever you seek to do for the Lord, do it heartily.
And young people, let me just say this to you, It's not in vain.
Nothing.
Escapes the eye of the Lord.
What I do maybe, you know, maybe a lot of people didn't even see me taking out their trash or they just passed by me and say, well, he's the old trash man. OK, fine. But did the Lord catch that? I'm I'm absolutely sure he did.
So whatever you do, even if nobody notices, nobody ever says anything to you, just know in your heart if you've done it for the for the Lord and you want to honor him, whatever it is, you speak a word in season out of season.
Whatever it is.
You'll get your reward because it pleased the Lord and honors Him. And that's what we should do. That's what we should do. Stay focused for stay busy. Occupy till I come. It's not the day of rest, it's the day of action.
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And how much we need to be before the Lord every morning. Well, Lord, what do you have for me to do? You know when Paul was converted. I like this when he the first thing out of his mouth. Lord, what do you want me to do? What do you got for me? Well, he had no idea. He had really no idea what was lied before him.
But he was a faithful servant. The Lord gave him grace to go through all that he did. We don't have to go through all that, thank the Lord. But I'm just saying I want to encourage you young people and kids.
Well I'm a kid, what can I do? Well what did that kid do that churches lunch do? I've never fed 5000 or plus people but he did now. I guess he remembered that the rest of his life.
But we don't know what the results going to be. We don't know how the Lord can use a word or or write a card to somebody that shut up and and shut in. I mean, and.
You know, there's a lot of people that we can write to.
What about Helen Christensen, 104 years old? Maybe we should write to her and encourage her. We all need encouragement and we all have something that the Lord can use us through. We just got to remember that it's for the Lord's honor and for the blessing of somebody else.
Restoring the Fallen
Open—Sam Ludvicek
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Galatians 61 Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, you eat her spiritual. Restore such a one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.
2nd Corinthians, chapter 5.
Verse 14.
For the love of Christ constraineth us.
We've had a lot to encourage us in this conference.
And the first brother who stood up in this meaning.
Spoke of.
Will you go away too?
If this were a conference of military leaders.
Talking about a military campaign, they might talk about the victories and the good things, maybe the kinds of weapons they had and so forth, and there be a lot of encouragement.
But they certainly would talk about one thing that is going on. We hear this coming from our government leaders. We hear it from those who are climatologists and so forth. They use the term existential threat.
Well, brethren.
Evangelical Christians are losing their young people at a rate never seen before. Why?
Now, if I were this were a military conference and I knew that a certain area of the battlefield that the the soldiers were being slaughtered vast numbers, I'd want to know why. What's going on over there? Why are we losing them?
Now, if you're rebellious in heart and your young person or an old person doesn't matter.
You know you've got a problem in your heart.
If you've been attracted by the world in a way where you're taken up with those things, I don't need to tell you. You already know.
And I don't need to wag my finger in your face about something like that. You already know what it is.
I saw something that pierced my heart.
In this regard, I watched a video of young people that had gotten away from, stopped going to their evangelical church and had gotten away, but we're coming back and they were being asked why did you leave? What was going on? What happened?
And there were those who had just gotten with the wrong company. That happens. They've gotten their eyes off, but a goodly number of them said something like this.
This one young lady in particular. This pierced my heart.
She said I had a mother and father who loved the Lord.
And they had devotionals in her house.
And they loved us and they they didn't get a divorce.
And they had us at services on Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday, and they gave to missionary efforts and so on. But she said, you know what?
Now this may be an indictment of North America in the West.
But you know what?
Their Christianity costs nothing.
And their Christianity was boring.
That pierced my heart.
She said she loved her parents.
But she said I didn't want any part of that.
Wanted something else?
I don't know her full story, but that thought I know that there are thoughts like that that go on in young people.
They're looking for something authentic, something real in front of them.
Are we to blame? Somewhat.
Are we authentic?
Does our Christianity ever cost us anything?
When we go about our way.
Do we pay a price for it at all?
Certainly different brothers who've gone to other lands have told us about what they see there, and there's often a price to pay.
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When Brother Bill talks about going to India.
You can lose your life over there.
Other places.
The first verse I read about restoring Section 1.
Had a nice chat with Bill at camp about.
How we get ideas in our head about some things, and I said, I heard a brother say.
About I mentioned this verse and he said, oh, you know, I heard this from an old brother that the Lord restores people by He just gets ahold of him and he restores them and he brings them in and they come down, they bow down before their brethren and they're done. It's fixed.
No one is ever involved.
Does not the Lord use his servants?
To go after them, to pursue them.
This brother I was talking with, he said, no, it's the Lord, he does it, He does the work. You just shut him up to the Lord, pray for him, but you just shut him up to the Lord. And he told me the story of David and the prophet.
And I kind of shook my head and I said, brother, you just proved my point, that whole story.
The prophet came to Daniel, sent of God and told him a story, and he said, Thou art the man.
And he recognized it, and he did repent.
Are there not those worth going after?
I told this group of young people at camp, I said I don't know what what it is, but I love the verse that Jonathan Lebanon quotes over and over again. And it's one I just.
Read here The love of Christ constraineth us. Romans 55 in the middle of the verse says The love of Christ is shed abroad in our hearts.
Can somebody looking at us tell that?
There's a brother back home we I have a very good relationship with. I love him.
And we do have a good relationship and we're friends.
And I enjoy being in his home and with him.
But he has a tendency to be what I call the get off my lawn guy. Wag, wag, wag, wag, wag, get off my lawn. And we kind of joke about it a bit. You being that guy, you know what? That's never convinced anybody of anything, ever.
So I told this group of young people, and some of them are probably here, I said I don't know what it is, but I know that what's coming down the road for you, and some of you are already in it is very difficult. Some of you're in a battle nobody knows about.
And you're suffering, and you don't even believe you can talk to anybody about it.
Because they might just wag the figure in your face.
But I said, I want you to know.
That I love you so much that I ate inside.
When I look in your faces.
And there are others that do too. Maybe they don't show it very much the.
And some of you are headed on out.
And your parents don't even know it yet.
George Barna, who collects statistics on what's going on.
Amongst Christians said that most young people check out by the age of 13 or 14.
They still go to the youth groups and they still go to the young people's things and they're still coming to church with their parents, but they've already checked out.
Now I have told people that when I was a young man, I got away from the Lord as a teenager. In my case, it wasn't because I was interested in the world. It wasn't because.
Of whatever multitude of things can get ahold of people is because I gave up.
I couldn't live the Christian life. I'd never been taught deliverance.
And I didn't know what that was. All I knew was that I couldn't do it.
And yes, I did get with wrong people, people that led me astray and so forth. But the real reason, and I know that there's many like that that are gone.
You parents that have lost some already, you grandparents that have lost some, you grandparents that have great grandchildren that are gone or going.
A lot of that is because they don't understand deliverance and they've given up and they're gone.
Now the Lord is going to tea. If they're really his, He's going to teach them through failure, and he's going to draw them back.
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Who knows what kind of wreckage will take place in between? How much better, if prayerfully?
We could do something like Galatians 6/1.
Few years ago, I think it was 2014 at Kiev.
I said to Bill Prost. I said, you know Bill.
We've gotten pretty good at putting people away, but not very good at restoring them. And his answer to me was we're not very good at either.
We're not.
But how much better would it be if we got pretty good at going after people that have gotten away from the Lord?
Especially young people. How much weeping? I think there's some parents and grandparents that do a little weeping.
Do you weep for your other brother and sister's children?
In the prayer meeting on Wednesday nights.
Is there some weeping going on about those kids and those young people that have gone?
Maybe we need to have a few more tears on that.
And maybe some of the young people that are bored in that fair meeting.
My whoa, that brother, that that brother really cares.
He's praying not just for his own kids, for somebody else's. And there's some tears in them.
Can we not do that?
We can enjoy so many things that we have. We have such great treasures.
And we can share those things.
But those are the young people that are leaving in droves.
From Christian homes that profess the name of Christ, the.
That really hurts my heart and I don't have all the answers for that.
But maybe, just maybe if there's a bit more authenticity, a bit more.
Showing of love.
A bit more going after them, a bit more going the extra mile and someone sees that they might respond to it. Now we know nothing will work without the Spirit of God guiding and leading in those things. But I I dare say there's some people here, maybe some older ones.
That have said will say that some point in their life there was restoration that took place. We all go through things where there's a drifting or coldness that comes in, and then we need restoration. Can you not remember someone who came alongside you and put the arm around the shoulder and it was a great help to you at a moment in your life? Yeah, I'll bet you can. And I bet you can tell me the stories.
We need more of that too.
Let's go after some of those.
Right from our knees and in our prayers and cry out for them.
I don't know the answers to all of this, I just know my heart aches.
Can we pray?
Father, I know their aching hearts and moms and dads in this room.
And our grandparents too, because someone in their family has drifted away, her gone away, has gotten themselves into circumstances that are of the utmost difficulty. And sometimes, Lord, we are perplexed as to even what to pray.
And we hardly know sometimes what to say.
And maybe at times we've done the wrong thing. Well, Lord, we confess that we have failed.
And we can do like Daniel and identify with all thy people and.
Say I we.
Have seen we've fallen short.
In caring for one another and going after those who are hurting.
Lord, your example in the gospel of going after that one that gets lost in the wilderness and going after them.
Perhaps we can learn from that and seek.
As your children.
To go after those who wander and seek to find them.
Bind up their wounds and help them to come back to the place where it's safe.
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And where they can be well cared for.
Lord Jesus, we thank you so much for what we have in you.
You are our Lord, our God, our Savior, our friend.
Father, we thank you in the precious name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Gospel 2
Gospel—John Kaiser
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Good evening.
I don't suppose there's anybody here tonight?
That really comprehends.
How significant this occasion is?
I know I don't.
There is one person present tonight who does.
That seems to contradict my previous statement, but that's because I was looking at the group here. God.
Knows the significance of this meeting.
And we have about, according to what I've been told, 45 minutes.
To talk about eternity.
45 minutes.
To deal with forever.
And you know, I look over this crowd and I really can't see you very well. I don't have good eyesight. I see some of the front rows that I can recognize, but beyond the first few rows, I can't hardly recognize a face. But God looks into your heart.
He knows what you're thinking tonight. He knows why you're here.
Tonight I want to start off with what I believe is the most well known, the most popular gospel song in the world.
I don't suppose too many people have thought of it that way. Turn to number 40 on your hymn sheet. If you don't have a hymn sheet, you probably don't need it because this is very well known. I want to sing just the 1St 2 verses.
Of #40.
Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so little ones to him belong. They are weak, but he is strong.
Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so.
Jesus loves me, He who died heaven's gate to open wide. He will wash away my sin.
Let a little child come in, yes?
Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me.
The Bible tells me so.
Let's pray.
God our Father.
We who are thine.
Recognize.
Even if we don't comprehend it, the responsibility of each soul here tonight to thee.
And you know the need of each soul.
And we pray that by your spirit.
With your word you will address.
The need of each soul. Tonight we ask in Jesus name, Amen.
Why did I stop on the second verse of this hymn?
Jesus loves me, he who died Heavens gate to open wide.
You know, I believe that the common perception of God, if you look at the religions in the world and you ask the religious man on the street.
He's uncomfortable talking about God. He'll talk about his religion, but he's not comfortable talking about God.
Because he doesn't, the average person does not feel welcome.
To God.
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But this is the truth of the Word of God.
Jesus loves me, he who died. Heaven's gate to open wide. Why would God open the gate of heaven wide?
It's because he loves you here tonight. Heaven's gate is open wide. It isn't like God cracks the door and says, well, if you're good you can come in. No, it's not. That's not it. God doesn't do that. He opens the gate wide and offers free admittance.
Now some of you may have seen this little sign I have here and I apologize.
That my visual aids are not designed for a crowd this large. I've done the best I can.
But I'm sure some looked at this little sign here that says Divine Entertainment.
And thought, what on earth?
Entertainment is a popular subject. People are are.
Continually pursuing entertainment.
They want entertainment, Children want entertainment, and we understand that. But this in this society, adults want entertainment. Everybody wants entertainment.
And of course, when people think of entertainment these days, they think of amusement.
But I want you to understand the original meaning of entertainment was.
Hospitality.
Hospitality, the word entertainment, means to contain between walls.
It comes to the French word entre between.
Attainment to hold between and It has to do with hospitality.
I want you to know that there's nobody.
More interested in your entertainment than God is?
God has opened the gates of heaven wide because He wants you to enjoy.
His hospitality.
You say well.
How entertaining is heaven? Wait till you get there. I can't tell you. We have, we have pictures in the scriptures. We have the story of the prodigal son who came to his father, and it says they began to be buried, and it says, never says that they stopped being merry. God has more ideas for your happiness than you ever thought of.
You know when you think of divine entertainment.
Of course we think of heaven.
But you know God wants to entertain you now. He wants you to enjoy heaven right now.
And when we think of heaven, we think of happiness, and God wants people to be happy.
On his terms.
God designed us to desire happiness because He wants to give it.
But God has terms.
Heaven has two, shall I say 2 facets.
Happiness, yes. And holiness.
Now, my friend, holiness means you're fit for heaven. You know, a lot of people talk about going to heaven and they don't realize they're not fit to be there.
We want to talk about tonight is what God has done to make you fit to be happy.
In heaven.
Both holy and happy. Now the word holy, we think of the word holy. You may have a Bible in your seat there and it says Holy Bible. That means it's a special book. It's fit for God. That's basically what that word means. The word holy means. It also means, of course, without sin, it's perfect.
It's the Holy Bible. It's the perfect book from the word of God, from God himself. It's the word of God.
And there's a scripture that says we're not going to turn to it, Holiness.
Becometh line house, O Lord, forever, I want to tell you, my friend.
Unless you're holy, you will never be in heaven.
You're shut out, but that's not what God wants. God wants you there, and God has done a wonderful thing so that you could come there. You know, there's a verse that we often quote, and many here are familiar with it. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish.
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But have everlasting life.
I'd like to turn to.
We just quoted John 36. I'd like to turn to for a moment to Ephesians 318, and these are all introductory remarks. Turn to Ephesians 318, please, and we'll see something there.
Ephesians chapter 3.
Verse 18 says, we'll start here in verse 17, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that you being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with All Saints. Wouldn't you like to enjoy what All Saints enjoy?
May be able to comprehend with All Saints what is the breath and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ.
Which passes knowledge, The love of Christ, the love of God. They've all they're the same, the Father and the Son.
In concert together.
Want to want you to enjoy?
What is the eternal?
And I thought I had something here. I don't see it.
Want you to enjoy?
Love God's love. The Bible tells us God is love. The Bible tells us also that God is light.
God wants you to enjoy both, and so it says in this verse. Ephesians 3 verse 18 May be able to comprehend with All Saints what is the breadth.
Breath. We had that word so God so loved the world. There's the breath.
Length God so loved.
The world that he gave, God went to such lengths. He gave his.
Son.
Depth that whosoever God can take the worst.
And make it the best.
That whosoever.
Believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. That's the height.
You know the Lord Jesus, when he was here on earth, he said this is everlasting life or this is eternal life, to know thee, to know you the only true God and Jesus Christ.
Whom God has sent, you know.
There's old, old.
Puritan writer wrote We knock at the gate of heaven.
On the heart of God opens.
God welcomes.
You tonight, but he does not welcome your sin. Now the question is how does he do it?
Turn to the Gospel of Luke chapter 23 please.
Luke chapter 23. A few of you have seen this illustration before. It's I don't apologize. It's my favorite. I've been using it for 50 years. Luke chapter 23.
And we're going to talk. We're going to jump right into the middle of the story of the crucifixion.
That's when they took the Lord Jesus out and hung him on a cross. Luke chapter 53.
And it says here verse 33 And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified him. Now the word crucify is connected with the word cross. That means they nailed him to a cross, they crucified him.
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And.
The malefactors, Now the malefactors were introduced a little bit earlier that these were two criminals that were let out to be crucified with the Lord Jesus. And so it says here, they crucified him and the malefactors, one on the right hand and the other on the left. So that means that Jesus was in the middle. And so we have 3 crosses here.
Representing the Lord Jesus and those two criminals.
And you know if you had passed by.
Calvary that day and looked up the hill, you would have seen three men on three crosses and you probably would not have noticed much difference between them except that the man in the middle, if you could look closely, you would see that he had been really badly beaten and that was the Lord Jesus. But otherwise you might have thought, well, there's three criminals being crucified today.
You know, the Bible tells us man looks on the outward appearance.
God looks on the heart. Think about that as you sit in your seat tonight.
You feel you may think you look pretty respectable, you may have even been told that you look nice today. But how about your heart? God looks on the heart. Man looks on the hour to appearance. God looks on the heart. And so when man looked at Calvary they he saw three.
Three what looked like ordinary men hanging on crosses.
Tonight we're here to discover what God saw and what God did. Now the Bible tells us there is no difference. For all have sinned and all have come short of the glory of God. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. That's a that's a sweeping statement about all humanity, but it did not include the Lord Jesus Christ.
He was the demonstration of the glory of God.
He did not come short of the glory of God. We're talking about mankind. The Bible says all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And so when when God looked down on Calvary, he saw something very different.
He saw two wicked men, two criminals, 2 malefactors. The word malefactor means Mal, means bad factor means do a bad, too bad, doers.
And Jesus, the perfect Son of God, for those of you who can't see this very well, this white cross.
Is outlined in blue. Because Jesus was perfect, because he was God the Son, He could not sin. The Bible tells us he could not sin, and he never did.
Well, why was he there? Because God so loved the world that he didn't just give a babe in a Manger.
He gave his son on the cross.
He gave him to the greatest extent he could give him. He sent him to die.
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Here it was between 2 sinners.
God saw his perfect Son there, and he did rescue him.
Let's read the story.
We'll start verse 33 again. And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified him and the malefactors, one on the right hand and the other on the left. Then said Jesus, father forgive them, for they know not what they do, and they pardon his raiment and cast lots.
People were indifferent, but Jesus was not. The people were dividing his clothes. They said they parted his ring. As the Bible tells us elsewhere. They gambled for Jesus clothing and while they were gambling for Jesus clothing.
And he was hanging on the cross, he said. Father forgive them, for they do not know what they do.
And that is a very rich statement.
You and I often think we know what we're doing, and so often we do things and discover later that we really blew it.
And we didn't know it. We when we go into things quite innocently and ignorantly, and we often hurt those we mean to help, we often do damage where we meant to help.
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And of course, there's plenty of other times we say, oh, it's just a little sin or a little white lie, or this doesn't matter. I want to tell you everything matters. Everything matters to God. God who made the universe and monitors every subatomic particle in it and monitors your heart tonight. To him, everything matters. Everything. He's interested in everything.
God is not an indifferent spectator. God is not only watching, he's working. And while these men were gambling for Jesus clothes, Jesus said Father forgive them for they don't know what they're doing. It's true statement. They didn't know what they were doing.
They are as clueless as we often are.
But God knew what he was doing.
God had planned for Jesus to be there. God had planned for Jesus to ask.
For those people's forgiveness. By the way, when people do things wrong to you and they treat you badly, do you pray for their forgiveness?
If you don't.
Why not?
Jesus did.
Jesus prayed for those that had scourged Him, had whipped Him, had mocked Him, had abused Him, had crucified Him.
Because.
He wanted them to be forgiven, and God wants you to be forgiven tonight. Isn't that amazing? God who knows all you've ever done? You can only suspect some of the things you've done. God knows all about him and He still wants to forgive you.
So.
Let's read the story here.
Verse 34 to pick up the story again then said Jesus father forgive them for they do not know what they do, and they parted his raiment and cast lots, and the people should be holding and the rulers also with them derided him saying he saved others, let him save himself if he be Christ the chosen of God.
Not too many of us, I think.
I hope not, would mock somebody is dying.
But these people hated Jesus.
The people who crucified him hated him.
Jesus prayed for those that hated him.
They deliberately crucified him. They mocked him when he was dying.
They said if you're the Christ, the chosen of God.
And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, and offering him vinegar, saying, If thou be the king of the Jews, save thyself. And a superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek and Latin and Hebrew. This is the king of the Jews. There was a sign which I don't have here was placed over the head of the Lord Jesus.
Again, mockery. This is the king of the Jews. The Jews didn't like that sign that was pilots touch. This is the king of the Jews and it was true statement.
It was a true statement. Jesus, being there crucified, was the rightful king of the Jews.
And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him. Now that word railing is not common these days, but it means to speak abuse, I believe very abusively.
To issue cat calls, to speak loud, maybe use vulgar language, railing is to speak very abusively and here one of the malefactors will say maybe this one here.
Which were hanged railed on Jesus saying, if thou be the Christ, save thyself and us. And the other answering rebuked him, saying.
Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation?
Now these men had been on the cross for some time, and this man was actually. The Bible tells us that originally both of the thieves that were crucified with the Lord Jesus mocked him. But apparently one began to think.
He maybe he heard Jesus say, Father forgive them.
That was not common language. Here was a man who was being crucified, looking up and addressing God as Father.
00:25:03
Can you call God your Father tonight?
He wants that too.
And so the other thief rebuked.
The railing thief and said, do you not fear God seeing you are in the same condemnation?
Don't you fear God. We're all condemned to die. It's time to think seriously. And my friend, tonight every one of us is under the sentence of death. The Bible tells us it is appointed unto man once to die, and after this the judgment.
Now that verse is found in Hebrews Chapter 9 verse 27, I believe. And this thief had never heard that verse, but he knew the truth of it. He knew that after death.
He was going to meet God.
And my friend, you are going to meet God.
I can tell you something about your life. I can tell you something about your future. You are going to meet God. God guarantees it.
My question is, Are you ready and are you getting ready? Are you doing anything to be ready?
This man began to think seriously. He said, Do you not fear God, seeing you're in the same condemnation and we unjustly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds. What does that mean?
He knew these men were had been condemned by the Roman authorities for.
Stealing. They were thieves, and the law had said that they should die, and so they were dying. They deserved, according to the law, they deserved to die. The Bible says the wages of sin is death.
The wages of sin is death.
We all deserve to die, you say. I don't think that I don't believe that. Then take your God said it. It's in God's word. Romans chapter 6 verse 23. We could look it up where our time is too short.
Romans chapter 6 verse 23 says the wages of sin is death.
Have you ever sinned? And God says.
Proper payment for that sin is death.
But.
He did say who had to make the payment.
Jesus came into the world to make the payment.
We're going to find out more about that.
The wages of sin is death, but the rest of the verse says but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Now wouldn't you like eternal life as a gift?
Just think about what a great gift that is and God.
Offers it to every person here tonight. Eternal.
Life, not eternal physical life. Who wants to live on in these bodies for eternity the way they are? No God offers eternal life.
With himself. Remember I quoted a verse earlier. This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. This is the life of heaven.
Eternal life.
It's a gift, and this man didn't know about it, but he did know about the wages of sin.
He knew that was death.
He says, Does not thou fear God? Sing thou are in the same condemnation, and we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds.
But this man hath done nothing amiss.
You know if you spend time considering the Lord Jesus, your knowledge of Him will grow. God will see to it.
It says, And thy light shall we see light? And so it says here.
He says this man has done nothing amiss. And he said to Jesus, Lord, Remember Me when thou comest into thy Kingdom. He addressed the Lord Jesus. He spoke to the Lord Jesus respectfully, very respectfully. He said, Lord, Remember Me.
When you come into your Kingdom, he didn't say if he'd come to the conclusion that the person on the center cross was indeed the Messiah, was indeed the king of the Jews, the rightful king of the Jews, and they believed that if Jesus was the rightful king of the Jews.
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And God would see to it that he got his rights and he would be king of the Jews. He would have his Kingdom. And he didn't understand. And my friend, it's not a matter of understanding that you say I don't understand the Bible, I don't understand the gospel. It's not a matter of understanding. It's a matter of submission and trust. Submission to and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
This man turned to Jesus and he said, Lord, Remember Me?
When you come into your Kingdom, he just acknowledged who Jesus was and said, Lord, Remember Me? He didn't ask for anything more than that. He knew what he deserved.
But you know, when you come to God, you always get more than you ask for. Always.
Because God is a generous giver, it says. God plentifully rewardeth the proud doer, and he plentifully rewards everybody.
God is a great rewarder, the Bible says. He that comes to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder.
Of them that believe in him.
He's a rewarder of them to come to him. You know God is responsive tonight.
He's listening to what you might be saying in your heart. In your heart. You can address him tonight. You can speak to God tonight right where you're sitting and say God, I believe this. I believe that Jesus is the Christ. He's the Messiah.
This man, he hadn't even got that far yet, but he did speak to Jesus and he said, Lord, Remember Me and what Jesus said to him.
Verily I say unto thee, today thou shalt be with me in paradise. That's another word for heaven, Paradise. Jesus said today you'll be with me in paradise. This man woke up that morning, probably if he slept that the night before, he maybe he knew he was going to be hanged that day and didn't sleep the night before. But maybe he did sleep. And I can imagine a Roman guard coming in and kicking him and saying get up.
Time to go hang.
Isn't that a nice way to start the day?
It's a way, a sad way to wake up, but this man.
He started the day in a Roman jail and ended it in heaven.
That's a great way to end the day.
Lord, Remember Me when thou comest in thy Kingdom. And Jesus said to him, Verily I say unto thee today.
Thou shalt be with me in paradise now. Jesus wasn't going to send him there alone.
Jesus said today you'll be with me in paradise. Now let me ask you, my friend, does the prospect of being with Jesus appeal to you at all?
Because many people say I'd like to go to heaven and they don't want the company of Jesus.
Think about that.
Do you suppose God wants anybody in heaven that doesn't want Jesus?
But this man had expressed his appreciation of the Lord Jesus, and Jesus said, today you'll be with me.
In paradise.
And it was about verse 44 and it was about the 6th hour, and there was darkness over all the earth until the 9th hour. Now the Bible doesn't tell us in the Gospels what happened during those three hours of darkness, but we find out elsewhere in the Bible.
What happened? Let's turn to 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians. I'm sorry, Second Corinthians.
2 Corinthians.
Well, as a matter of fact.
You know I've got 2 verses I want to talk about and I can stick them up here right now.
2nd Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 21.
2nd Corinthians chapter 5, verse 21. We'll start with verse 20. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us, we pray you. And Christ said, be reconciled to God, for he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
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He made him to be sin for us.
How did that happen? Turn to First Peter, chapter 2.
And verse.
21.
We'll start with verse yeah, verse 21 for even hereunto recalled, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow his steps. Who did no sin, neither was a guile found in his mouth, who when he was reviled, when he was railed against.
Reviled not against, when he suffered, He threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously, who his own self bore our sins in his own body on the tree. Now maybe you've heard these words before, but they don't sink in. I want to show you what God did behind the scenes in those three hours of darkness. These verses tell us what God did.
But I have found it very effective to show you, to show people.
What God did?
Remember, this man here had confessed faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and during those three hours of darkness.
God took his sins.
And laid them on Jesus.
And Jesus was punished for that thief's sins. And Jesus was punished for my sins because I trust in Christ.
Now let me ask you a question. Do you have the benefit of Jesus dying on the cross?
Did he die for your sins?
And the Bible tells us there were three hours of darkness, and then the darkness was lifted. Why?
Because at the end of that time, Jesus cried. It is finished.
That's not in this gospel either. Turn back to Luke 23 again, please.
Route 23.
Verse 44 now is about the 6th hour. There was darkness over all the earth until the 9th hour, and the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. And when Jesus had cried, with a loud voice he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. And having said this, he gave up the ghost. The three hours of darkness were ended. The work that Jesus came to accomplish was done.
And now God something God saw something else.
On Calvary, he saw two.
Clean men on that hill.
The Lord Jesus Christ.
Clean, holy, fit for heaven, because he was the Son of God and this thief.
With the cross outlined in red.
Fit for the presence of God because the Bible tells us the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son cleanses us from all sin. You know, there's so much more I could tell you. Our time is running out. But I want to ask you a question. We didn't cover all the details of the crucifixion.
But these are details that the world commonly doesn't know about. Let me ask you a question. Which of these two was more fit?
To enter heaven.
The Lord Jesus Christ.
Or that thief who was cleansed by his blood. The answer is.
Jesus work was as perfect as his person and that man was just as welcome in paradise.
As Jesus.
Just as fit for the presence of God.
Now, may I ask you tonight, my friend?
Are you fit for the presence of God? Are you cleansed by the blood of Christ? This is why Jesus came.
This is why he died.
People make a great deal of the sufferings that Jesus suffered before the cross. There's been movies made about it and they picture that and it's terrible, but they can't picture this. They don't know about this.
00:40:11
But now you do. What are you going to do about it? Well, you know all the Bible tells us, and we don't have time to read about it. All three men were taken down from the cross that day.
And I'm sure the crosses themselves I'm sure were taken down.
Because they would probably be used again.
But I have up here 2 tombstones.
I don't have a third tombstone for Jesus because he's not here. The Bible tells us that Christ died for our sins. He was buried and he rose again the third day. According to the Scriptures, Jesus tonight is alive, and he's willing to do for you what he did for that thief to make you fit to be with him in paradise.
Well, that thief, now, he, I doubt that he ever had a tombstone, but he had a future. Everybody has a future.
And we know where he is tonight.
Thief is with the Lord Jesus.
And we assume that the other thief is not.
Remember the Bible says after death, the judgment, the wages of sin is death. Everyone of us has a future tonight. And my question for you is.
Where are you going to spend eternity?
The thief on this side here.
Was privileged. He recognized it. He was privileged to die with Jesus.
And tonight, he's honored to live with Jesus. And that's true for everyone here tonight.
The apostle Paul said, I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live. Not I, but Christ liveth in me in the life which I now live in the flesh. I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. That thief was privileged to die.
With Jesus. Do you identify with Jesus dying? Are you willing to recognize him dying for you?
Do you identify with his death? Then your privilege. If you're privileged to die with Jesus, you're honored.
To live. Excuse me, You're honored to die with Jesus. You're privileged to live with him.
Now God wants us to enjoy eternal life, the life of heaven. Right now it belongs to those that believe. Remember that verse. For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever belief in Him should have.
Everlasting life.
Now he that hath the Son hath life. The Bible tells us, The Lord Jesus said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me.
Shall not come into judgment, but is past from death to life.
Do you enjoy that life with the Lord Jesus tonight, or do you identify with a thief?
Who rejected Jesus?
And is rejected forever.
Remember I said that the heart of God is open? We sang. The gates of heaven are open wide. Let's close with just the middle verse of number.
3.
#2 I'm sorry #2 on the hem sheet.
Come, the Father's house stands open with its love and light and song.
And returning to that father.
All to you may now be long from sin's distant land of famine.
Toiling.
The midday sun.
To a father's House of plenty and the.
Father's welcome. Come. I'm going to read the third verse. Listen carefully. Come.
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For night is gathering quickly, Or the world's fast, fleeting day. If you linger in the darkness, you will surely miss your way. And still waiting, sadly waiting till the day its course is run. With his patience unabating, Jesus lingers. He waits for you.
Come.
Let's pray.
Father, we thank you for those that during this meeting have been praying.
That thy word would Pierce heart and conscience.
We thank you for this beautiful story.
This wonderful love, this matchless grace, this great salvation.
And we pray for any soul here who is so blind and so hard.
And so deaf.
And so confused as to refuse it.
Our Father, we ask God mercy for that soul, if there's any soul here tonight that is hesitating.
To decide for Christ tonight.
We pray that soul may have no rest.
Until he or she says yes to Jesus.
We thank you for this time together. Ask your blessing in Jesus name, Amen.
Discovering Your Gift
Talk—Sam Doak
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
So I'll keep this pretty short. There's just one thing that I wanted to talk to you guys about.
That's kind of been on my heart and we talked about it a little bit today about spiritual gifts.
SO11 portion I wanted to kind of start out with and I have one thing on my heart and I want to kind of preface it with.
A fact, and that fact is talked about in Romans 12, and you guys don't have to turn to it.
But that Romans 12 talks about the body of Christ and it makes the the analogy of the body of Christ being like an actual body. And so that's really interesting to read. You know, we've all probably been in a meeting that studied it. You know, there's the application of the hands not doing the feet job, but everything has an important purpose. So obviously, you know, we know that each person has their own gift.
Or talent. OR it might be a life experience that they bring to the table that nobody else really has.
Some are more obvious, some are less obvious, but that's kind of I want to start our talk really quick off the baseline that each person here and each person in the body of Christ has a unique.
Skill set that they can use to benefit others and to serve the Lord.
So I wanted to talk about how to identify your spiritual gift.
And the first thing that I wanted to say is if you guys haven't done this already, and I honestly feel like a hypocrite standing up here because I can't say that I know for sure what my spiritual gift is. I've done these things and, you know, I have some idea of, you know, the things I'm good at and the things I enjoy.
But you know, I'm not speaking to you from a pulpit. You know, I'm, I'm with you guys. So this is more of an encouragement to myself as well as to you guys to seek these things out for yourself. So.
The first thing that I think is really important to do, or it's not really necessary always, but something that's really interesting to do is to do some research, read, read some passages. You can look online and read some ministry, but list out all of the gifts that you can find that you can think of. And it's really interesting to do that because when you start to list out a whole list of different gifts.
The list gets really really long and often I found that.
For not, not that I've done that a lot, but when I've done that, you really realize that some of the things that are considered gifts you don't really think of as gifts, You know, like, you know, hospitality. You know, we think of talents and gifts as, you know, the like teaching and you know, talents might be like a high level of performance in a sport or something like that.
But when you start to look at what the Bible says about different skills and talents and gifts that can be used for the Lord and the different stories.
Of people that use what they had for the Lord, it might be, you know, it might be financial means that you have that you're a wealthy person and that's something that you can use for the Lord. So when you start to list out all of the different things that we can use for the Lord or all of the different gifts.
More often than not you'll be able to see, OK, you know what that is actually something that I excel in that I didn't really think of before. And so that I found that very helpful in just kind of listing them all. So just four, four things that.
I think would be really, really helpful when you're trying to identify what each person's gift is or something that they excel in that they can use to serve the Lord. Number one would be just prayer.
Being active in prayer, the Lord wants us to know what our gifts are and to walk in them, to use them for him. So that would be absolutely the number one thing that I'd recommend starting with. Ask the Lord to show you what your gifts are.
Ask the Lord how you can use what you have. Even if you don't know what it is, ask the Lord to help you find that out and how to apply it.
Matthew 7, Seven. Ask, and it shall be given unto you. Seek, and ye shall find. So the Lord and you are on the same team when it comes to finding out what your gift is. So the first one is prayer and asking the Lord what your gift is. Another thing #2 asking others.
I'm a very critical person of myself.
I think everybody here would agree that, I mean, unless you're a narcissist, people are pretty, pretty negative about themselves. Just as a general rule, it's, it's a natural thing, but it's very easy to see what other people are good at. And so when you go to your friends or maybe an acquaintance or something, ask your friends and maybe your family what they think something that you're gifted in is because they're often a lot more forgiving than you are with yourself.
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So asking others would be #2 The third thing.
Is I've found that the things that I feel are a gift I'm a very relational person, so I like building relationships and getting to know people well and understanding, you know, challenges they might be facing. I do it for work and I try to do it, you know, throughout my life. I.
I found that the things that I enjoy doing I'm often better at than things that I don't enjoy doing. And that'll take us to our our last, our last point. But the Third Point would be things that you look at, things that you enjoy, things that you really just are naturally find enjoyment in doing. That'll make first of all, it'll make doing it more enjoyable. It'll make you naturally better at it. But often we find a crossover and what you're really good at and things that you.
And then the 4th and final thing, I mean, I'm sure there's others others could add to this, but.
The last thing would be to practice it. So when you have an idea, I mean, for me, when it came to, you know, figuring out what to do after, after I got out of out of college or just different things, I just tried a lot of different things. And when you try something and you fail, you say, OK, that's maybe that's not it. And that's totally OK. So trying, just just trying different things. Maybe you have an idea. You say, maybe I'm a, you know, maybe I have a gift of hospitality and you get people in your home. You're like, actually, I really don't like this. I'm not hospitable.
Maybe that's not your gift, but just trying different things, trying to identify, hey, you know what? That is something that I'm really, really on fire about. You know, it could be using the resources that you have. Maybe you, you know, maybe you have, you know, a pick up and you can go help people move stuff. You know, everybody with a car needs somebody to pick up. They'll all complain until they need something or whatever it might be that you have that somebody else maybe needs. Those are all different things that you can use for the Lord.
So practicing, so when you have an idea of what your gift is really practicing any skill, you know, we all, we all kind of know the analogy here, but any skill that people are good at, they've gotten there by practicing. So when you have an idea of something that you think might be, you know, a, a spiritual or a natural gift, practice it, do it a lot. That's when the Lord's really going to start to fine tune that in you. And then you'll get a sure grip of it. And then you'll be able to be really, really.
Lord.
Outline of Ephesians