Buena Park Conference: 1969
Table of Contents
Three People Jesus Raised From the Dead
Address—E. Wakefield
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Saying 186.
Jesus of Thee, we never would tire the new and living food can satisfy our hearts desire and life is in Thy blood 186.
And you're living for them.
By our hearts desire.
And life is in life.
If such.
That happened Midnight Song.
Our.
Presence spirits raised.
What are the joys that?
'Cause they're they're long.
Eternal.
1St.
The luck within?
And.
Say no staying.
I brought no purse to Trace.
They said no tears to feel, no pain.
But see the.
Face.
To face.
The finding of.
Glory again.
Fulfill the.
Precious word.
And.
Fully.
On to have a Tinder.
Yeah.
Of our Lord.
This morning in the Barber shop there was a there was a copy of Time magazine, which the Barber drew our attention to and it said Is God coming? I think it's sad. Is God coming alive again? Well, there's a there's a verse that I was reading in the 13th chapter of Acts. It says, but God raised him from the dead. What a wonderful thing tonight it is that we have.
A living savior, but God raised him from the dead. I'd like to speak tonight on the three persons that the Lord Jesus raised from the dead in the Gospels when he was here on earth. Three persons that the Lord Jesus raised from the dead. Each of these incidents we have, I believe, many valuable lessons to learn. I think they're very blessed to see.
How God teaches us and these three occasions, many truths in connection with you and with me and our Christian lives. First one, of course, is in the 5th chapter of Mark's Gospel. We will not read the whole thing because we know. I'm sure we all know this very well.
But it's really the end of the chapter.
We start reading from the 35th verse.
On the 35th verse of Mark chapter 5.
While he yet spake, there came from the ruler of the synagogue's house certain which said, Thy daughter is dead, Why troubleest thou the master any further? As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, he sat under the ruler of the synagogue. But you're not afraid, only believe, and he suffered no man to follow him.
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Say Peter.
And James, and John the brother of James, And he cometh to the House of the ruler of the synagogue, and seeth the tumult.
And then that wept, and wailed greatly. And when he was come in, he said unto them, Why make ye this a do and weep? The damsel is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn. And when he had put them all out, he taketh the father and the mother of the damsel, and them that were with him and entereth in with a damsel was lying.
And he took her by they took the damsel by the hand, and said into her, till I Thea Kumai, which has been interpreted damsel, I say unto thee, Arise. And straightway the damsel arose and walked where she was of the age of 12 years. And they were astonished with a great astonishment. And he charged them straightly, that no man should know it.
And commanded that something should be given her to eat what I believe just quickly to look at the earlier verses there. In verse 35 we have man's reason why. Trouble is, thou the master any further, As far as this world is concerned, death made it impossible for anything to be done. They thought, Why trouble us, thou the master, any further? That's what we bring before us. Man's reason then, in the 40th verse.
And they laughed in the scorn that would bring before us man's unbelief. And we notice what the Lord Jesus did. He put them all out and tells us.
And the 40th verse, they laughed into SCORM. But when he had put the mall out, he taketh the father and the mother of the damsel and then were with him and entereth in where the damsel was lying. Here we have the Lord Jesus in the presence of death. You know, it's a wonderful thing to think of this. Many of us here have conducted Funeral services, but the Lord Jesus never conducted a funeral service.
There's no record in the scriptures of the Lord Jesus ever taking a funeral service because death could not be in his presence. He never conducted a funeral service. And here was the Son of God in the presence of death. There he stood, the Son of God. All those who with unbelief were put out. They were all put out. You know, maybe as Christians we have unbelief, don't we? We think?
That God can only do certain things. We sometimes limit God, don't we? I'm sure there's maybe mothers and fathers here, like many of us, whose hearts ache over our children and we just wonder what will happen to these children. What is going to happen? Maybe we limit God and we think how hard it is to see our children going off into the world, giving up and throwing everything overboard and going out into the world. And the devil uses these things to discourage each one of us. Isn't it a fact?
Aren't their parents here? And I speak for myself too. We're discouraged about our children. Maybe.
Some of them don't live up to what we think are the standards, and we get very discouraged. And the devil uses these things to bring more discouragement into our lives if we can. How nice it is to know that Jesus is with us, that he's able to bring blessing to our children if we will, but believe and trust him. And so we noticed this girl was dead.
And all each one of us were Christians. This was our portion, was it not? Once we were dead.
We were dead spiritually. We had no life. But Jesus crossed our pathway. How blessed that was. And our experience that Jesus came where we were, came to the very place we were, where we were in our death. And it tells us here in this first verse. And he took the devil. I took the damsel. Pardon me by the hand. What a wonderful thing this this was personal contact with Christ.
He took the damsel by the hand. Oh, now we have something different. Here was a called hand. A hand that was called in death. And the great hand of Jesus takes that hand. Oh, what a wonderful thing. Now we have a personal contact with this poor dead girl. This is what happened to us, beloved. We were dead. And the blessed Savior reached forth his great hand of power and took our hand.
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And we had personal contact with Christ. Now maybe there's some young person here.
The night Who says what? I don't enjoy the Christian life. Why, when I was a boy in Sunday school, I accepted the Lord. I believe these things, and I haven't got this kind of joy. I don't enjoy the Bible. I don't enjoy prayer. I don't enjoy being at the prayer meeting or the Bible reading. Maybe you've never had personal contact with Christ. Now I speak with respect, and I'm sure you'll forgive me for saying these things, beloved.
But there's many young people, I'm sure, that come to our meetings who've never had personal contact with Christ. They have a sort of a head belief. They were brought up with only natural that the human mind, you know, we know can't enter into these things as we can who have the spirit of God. We know that. But the human mind can grasp certain things like John 316. They can quote that verse in John 524. But have you had personal contact with Christ? Has Christ touched you?
As the Lord touched your heart, as the Lord brought you in the blessing, and so he took her by the hand. And he spoke to her, and said, Damsel, I say unto thee, Arise, he was speaking directly to this girl. Oh, beloved, how wonderful the Lord Jesus has spoken to us personally. He said, I say unto thee, Arise, I notice what happened in this 42nd verse. And straightway the damsel arose.
And what this is the first thing we have and this first instance of.
A resurrection from the dead. We have life and we have walk. This is exactly, I believe, what follows the Christian the Sinner who's who's brought to Christ, the Sinner who's brought to the Lord Jesus and has life in Christ. The first thing he does is he walks. The Lord said to many whom he gave health and raised up from their sickness, take up thy bed and walk. Wasn't that nice? Take up thy bed and walk. He gave that person the power.
That was hopeless and helpless and weak. He gave them the power to stand up and to walk. And saw this dead person who was raised from the dead. He gave her power straight length. Oh, we believed in straightway conversions. We believe a man can be saved instantly. One simple look at of faith, the Christ brings instant life, salvation instantly. Straightway the very voice of Jesus reached her soul.
I say unto thee.
Arise, and straightway the damsel arose and walked where she was with the age of 12 years, and they were astonished. With a great astonishment he charged them straightly, that no man should know it, and commanded that something should be given her to eat. This is exactly the Christian life, beloved. Notice death.
Then life. First life, second walk and the third food. What a wonderful thing. Life.
Work and food. Isn't this exactly what happened to each one of us all? I remember in my own case, the Bible became a new book. The Bible despised. Oh how I had no use for this book. This was a dead book. But I was dead. The book wasn't dead, but I was dead. But all. How wonderful was the Bible. I can see it now in my early days when I first came to Christ.
The Bible beside my bed, waking up in those early morning, that early morning.
In the month of May, when the sun was streaming in the window and reaching for the old book, the wonderful book, the word of God, and each one of us as Christians, we need this. Not only we have the life, but we really know the Lord. We have the life and we can walk for the Lord, but we also need food. And I want to speak to the young Christians in connection with this food. We must have this food just as a baby. There's many young people in this meeting here, I understand.
With young children.
You have to feed those children, and God's children must be fed. And if you don't read your Bible, you'll never groan. Oh, how few have time to read the Bible, you know?
In the days of Pharaoh, if you read the book of Exodus, you know what Pharaoh was a picture of the devil did. He took away the straw from the children of Israel. He took away their straw and said, I want you to make the same number of bricks, but no straw. And why did he say enough? Because he said they are idle.
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They are idle, and that's why they want to go three days into the wilderness to worship their God, their idol. They have nothing to do. This is exactly what the devil has done in this age. And beloved, there's nobody in this room can deny this. There's nobody here in this room can deny what I'm going to say now. There's never been more time for man. There is today. The business hours are shorter. The holidays are longer, 3 weeks a month.
All kinds of long weekends, Saturdays, no business. And yet there's no time to read the Bible. Why? Because the devil says they're idle, they're idle, take away their strong, they have no time. We said this in the Montreal meeting and after the meeting three young men came to me and they said, brother, that's true, we have no time. One of them went so far as to say this, the boys in the college where I go unsaved, young men who curse.
And swear and drink and attend all night parties. They have time for their all night parties. But we have no time, no time to read our bibles. We have no time because the devil is taken away our straw. Isn't this a fact? The devil has taken away our strong There's no time for food, but the Lord commanded that something should be given her to eat. And we have something in this book which is food for our souls, young Christians.
Read your Bibles. Put the Lord first. Now I'm going to say something else that I've been.
A sometimes challenge for saying, but I believe that you put the Lord first, You'll never lose.
You'll never be able to stand before the Lord and say to him, I put you first. When I was down in that world, I put you first. I read your word first, I prayed first, and because of that I lost. I lost a life. God will never, under any circumstance, allow one of his children to ever say those words. He will bless us in the beginning, the first words of the Bible in the beginning.
God seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteous, and all these things shall be added unto you. Young people, you have to study. You go to school, you must do your studies. But put the Lord 1St and your studies 2nd, and God will bless you in this world of reason, this world of doubt, and this world of unbelief, Man's reason. Put it aside and put the Lord 1St and he will bless you. He commanded her to get something to eat.
So we have here life, walk and food. Now let's turn to the 7th chapter of Luke, where we have the second. I think it's very wonderful to see how we advance here in connection with this second man, the young man here, verse 11 of Luke Chapter 7.
And I came to pass the day after that he went into a city called Nain, and many of his disciples went with him and much people. Now when he came nigh to the gate of the city, behold, there was a dead man carried out.
The only son of his mother. Isn't this a beautiful expression? The only son of his mother. Now who does? Who does? This young man, Dead, Of course. The only son of his mother meet at the gate of the city. Beloved. He met the only son of his father. Wasn't this beautiful the only son of his mother? A dead young man comes into contact with the only son of his father. And what happens?
And she was a widow, and much people of the city was with her. And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said unto her, Weep not here was a woman, a widow. You know, Clarence Lundin, our brother, points out that the widow speaks of dependence and the woman speaks of weakness. Here was a woman weak, a woman of dependence. What was her dependence? Her boy, her son. But her son was dead. She had lost her dependence and how weak she was.
And the Lord said to her, weep not. What a strange thing for the Lord to say to a broken hearted widowed woman, her boy lying dead in his coffin, being carried out to burial. Weak knot. Well, is this reason? Will this be a reasonable thing to say? No, But oh, how blessed it was when the Lord came and said to that woman, Weep not. And then it says in the next verse. And he came and touched the beard.
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Say, I suppose the coffin that held this young man its prisoner, he was held in that that coffin. Oh, what is holiness? The unsaved. Maybe in our own families, they're unsaved. What is whole? There's something that's whole in them prisoner. And the Lord touched that. He touched the very thing that held this young man.
Isn't it nice when the Lord touches those things that hold us down, that hold us prisoner? The Lord touched that very thing.
And then it said, It says here in the 14th verse, And they that bear him stood still. And he said, Young man, I say unto thee, arise now what happens? It says in the 15th version he that was dead sat up and began to speak. Well, here's another step. First of all, there was life, and then there was a second there was.
Now walk. And 3rd there was the food. And now he began to speak. What is this? This is so important. Beloved, he confessed and speaks to us, to my soul, or rather of confession. And how many there are among us, I suppose. Right in this room tonight there's young people who've never confessed the Lord. I suppose there's this many who attend our meetings who never confess. The Lord people say. Is that young man saved? Oh, they say. Oh sure, he's saved. He must be saved. He comes to all the meetings.
He's always at the meetings. He's at the conferences. There he is. But he never confessed to the Lord. Here was a young man. He began to speak. Isn't that nice? When the Lord gives us life to speak. Oh, the Devil hates this. The Devil will contest this. He'll fight this. He'll demand that we keep our mouths closed. He'll say, you know you're nervous, You're a nervous type. Just keep quiet. God knows if you're saved or not. But how nice it is to confess the Lord I like to suggest to any young man.
A young lady in this room who have received the Lord Jesus as their savior, and who have got life, and who know they're saved and who have never confessed the Lord to bow your head and ask God to give you courage tonight to confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is your Lord and your Savior. Young boys and young girls, confess the Lord. This young man, He sat up. He had a life. He had been dead, but he had a life. And he began to speak.
And these beautiful words. And he delivered him to his mother. Oh, doesn't this touch our hearts? What a wonderful savior. He doesn't say to this young man. Follow me. He doesn't say to this young man come after me. But he delivered him back to his mother. He gave him back. He knew the Lord knew this woman's aching heart. He knew her dependence on this young man. He knew that this woman, this dear, what a woman needed her boy. And he graciously delivered him back to his mother. What a wonderful savior.
He gave them back to his mother. How gracious, how good, how kind, how loving and how faithful the Blessed Lord was. He began to speak. Oh, isn't it nice when we see a person and we have a case down in New Brunswick down in McAdam. NB If a man it was a drunkard, the village drunk he was called.
All he the Lord met him, the Lord saved them, the Lord delivered them from drink, and the Lord delivered them from tobacco.
And he began to speak, and the very men in the town of Macadam who were afraid of Dave McKay.
Are now still afraid of them, but not for the same reason they're not afraid of them knocking them down with his big fists anymore.
But they're afraid that he might speak to them about Jesus. They're still afraid of them. Oh, he began to speak. Now you began to speak, yet you began to speak about Jesus. Have you had that joy in your soul? Some of us have that today, as we met the Barber in the Barber shop, we found a child of God. And our brother introduced me to a postman who belonged to Christ. And we stood there on the lawn with his mail back there, and we spoke about the Son of God. Oh, this man.
This postman, he was rejoicing on the Lord. He was Speaking of Christ. Or do we speak about Christ that we speak about Christ? What did we speak of? What is our conversation based on the politics of the land? How to make the United States a better country? How to make Los Angeles a cleaner city? Is that our ambition on life? No, beloved, we're not here for that. The Lord has called us out of darkness, into his marvelous light to be a testimony.
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To a rejected Christ, to a Christ, this world is cast out.
You and I are to be a testimony to him to begin to speak. Young boys, young men, you young gospel preachers here speak well of Christ, preach Christ. I was so happy the other day at the conference when they mentioned this, and I say this with respect for not to speak unkindly, to work many of our beloved brethren who use that expression of receiving Jesus Christ as Savior.
How nice it is to give them as full title that he's the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the Lord Jesus Christ. God hath made that same Jesus whom he crucified, both Lord and Christ. And I'd like to encourage the young man here. You know the devil is a real person. The devil is a real person and he tries to keep young men with their mouths closed tight. Has God-given you a gift? What an honor it is. What I say, what an honor it is.
To be able to stand up and speak well of Christ in this poor world. What an honor.
Is there a higher honor? Supposing we had a dozen degrees after our names? That's nothing compared to the honor that God has conferred upon some by His grace to speak well of the man this world cast out and spit upon and crucified. What an honor are we saying? Young men, young brothers, May God help you.
As the older brothers are taken away, if the Lord doesn't come, May God give you courage and faithfulness. Not the soft pedal, the gospel, Not to put the soft pedal on. Some are putting the soft pedal on. Oh, how nice it is to preach the gospel of God's wondrous love. To speak well of Christ. This young man, he got life. He began to speak. Oh, how nice. Maybe there's some young man or some young boy or some young girl in this room tonight.
Who will begin to speak and confess the Lord Jesus Christ.
As their own savior. Now the third is this blessed story in the 11Th chapter of John's Gospel.
And here we have life again, and this time liberty, life and liberty.
We'll start reading with the 34th verse.
The Lord is speaking, and he says, John, 1134 Where have ye laid him? They said unto him, Lord, come and see. Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved them all. Beloved, isn't this a wonderful thing? Behold how he loved us.
Isn't this a beautiful thing? Behold, the Jews said. Behold how he loved him. They knew that the Lord loved this man, Lazarus. And now each one of us who belonged to Christ tonight can say of ourselves, Behold how he loved me. Behold how he loved me. Isn't that blessed? Now these things are not new. But the Bible is such a wonderful book. We can speak about these things. Time again. Behold.
As we look into that looking glass in our homes and look and see ourselves in that mirror, to be able to say, behold, behold how he loved me, or doesn't touch our hearts, behold the wonderful love, the love of Christ, behold how he loved me. And some of them said, Could not this man which opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have died, Jesus therefore again grown in himself.
Cometh of the grave was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. Jesus said, Take ye away the stone, Martha, the sister of him that was dead, said unto him, Lord, by this time he stinketh, for he had been dead 4 days, that is, he was dead past the resurrection thing. One day passed, the third day hopelessly dead. This man was really dead, even the soul.
From the order from that grave would show it was a dead man. He had died. He was really dead. He had gone beyond the resurrection day. Jesus said unto her, Verse 40 said, I not unto thee, that if thou wouldst believe, thou should have see the glory of God. Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, Father, I thank thee, that thou hast heard me.
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And I knew that thou hearest me always because of the people which stand by. I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me.
And when he has thus spoken, he cried with a loud voice. Lazarus come forth in the first case he said, Damsel, I said to the arise. The second case he said, young man, arise, but now he mentions his friend's name. Oh, isn't it wonderful to be a friend of Jesus and all he knows our names. Lazarus, I say unto thee, Come forth, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth bound.
Hand and foot with the grave claws. Now here was a man who had life.
This man had life the very minute that word of Jesus notice he called his name to, I believe, because if he had just said in that cemetery come forth all the graves would have opened. So he distinctly calls this man by his name Lazarus come forth And he that was dead came forth bound notice. Now it tells us here hand and foot. Well, maybe some of us tonight in this room are bound hand. What does this speak of service for the Lord.
Bound hand and foot. We can't walk for the Lord. How many Christians there are like that? They don't even know they're saved. Have you asked them? Are you saved? They say I hope so. If you ask them. Are your sins forgiven? They say. I certainly hope they are. But they never come to the place where they know they're bound hand and foot. How many dear Christians, how many dear people of God tonight are bound hand and foot? Bound by the systems of men?
Bound with the grave clothes. That's what Lazarus was. He was bound hand and foot. I know that we noticed that everything that men could do, the Lord allowed them to do, There was only one thing that they couldn't do, and that is they couldn't give life. He gave life. They could roll away the stone. A man can roll away a stone. A man can undo grave claws. But a man can't give life. And how nice this is And encouraging for we who are Christians in connection with.
Serving the Lord. Maybe there's a young man tonight in this room who's maybe discouraged. Maybe we don't see very much blessing. We read and the press a great blessing. Some preachers get great blessing. Maybe we get discouraged and say we don't see this kind of blessing. There's only one who can give life, and that is the son of God himself. He's the one that gave gave life. He gave Lazarus this life. And he says to he says to them loose him and let him go.
Now where do we get loose, beloved? Well, I believe in the assembly meetings. I believe in the assembly meetings where the Lord Jesus is in the midst. Now do we believe this? Do we really believe? Is this is only a doctrine? It's very easily to take Matthew 18 and 20 and coke that 100 * a year. Do we really believe it? Is it an established fact that when we come into this room on Wednesday night and Friday night, is it a real, true, honest fact that the Lord is in the midst?
There's this only a doctrine that we have some idea we have in our mind that's really not true. We like to say it because it encourages Is it a real fact that when we come together, we come to meet a person, we come to meet the Lord, and if we could really see him as a man in the room, like the disciples did in the 20th chapter of John. And we walked in through that door and looked into the very midst, as it were. We saw the Lord Jesus.
There personally, and we looked at his hands and we saw the nail prints. We looked at his feet and saw the nail prints. We looked at his side and we saw the spear market as we walked in. He raised his eyes and smiled and said, I'm so glad you've come tonight to be with me for this hour. Wouldn't that be a compensation? Wouldn't our hearts rejoice if the Lord Jesus met us and spoke to us like that? Well.
I believe he is in the midst, beloved. I really believe that when we come together, the Lord is in the midst, the Lord is here, the Lord is here in the midst. Do we believe that if we really believe that? Now I know there's mothers and fathers, we all we had children too. We had to have our turns going to the prayer meeting and the Bible reading. One of us had to babysit. Well.
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You have to do that too. And some people have to work at night. But I mean to say, generally speaking, those that are free to refine ourselves, gathered around the person of Christ at the prayer meeting. You know, you go to a Bible reading. There's generally a lot of people there. But when you go to the prayer meeting, the powerhouse, how many missed the powerhouse, the time of prayer? So few seem to come to the prayer meeting and sometimes the prayer meeting lags on and.
I don't say this to be critical, but sometimes at a care meeting, a dozen brothers can all speak. And he was so late there and we're so tired waiting to go home to go to bed. And they talk and talk and talk. But the next night is prayer meeting night. And they're mysteriously quiet. They have nothing to say. Oh, isn't that nice to pray, beloved, We come together to pray, to pray and to lay our requests before our Lord. And to pray. There's so much to pray for, so many things to pray for, Well.
The Bible reading, where the grave clothes are taken off, where we find. I remember, if you'll pardon a personal reference, when I was a young Christian, the boys in the office used to go to the next room, where there was a man who led me to Christ and who knew much more about the Bible than I did. And they said to him, we want to ask you a question if you commit a sin today and you were killed by a car.
Where would you spend eternity? And he said I would spend eternity with the Lord Jesus. Now, I didn't know anything about this. Then they came to me and said, if you were to commit a sin today and die, where would you spend eternity? And I said in hell. Well, they said you fellas better get together. He tells us the next room he'd go to heaven. You tell us you'd go to hell. What's the matter with you? Well, this dear Christian explained to me then.
That if I really belong to the Lord Jesus, I possessed eternal life. I was a child of God. I was saved for eternity and the grave clothes were taken off. How wonderful it is to have those grave clothes taken off. We stood on the street corner in Montreal one night by the grace of God, preaching the gospel, and we said, and we trust the Lord LED us to say it. We'd like to quote tonight from the Roman Catholic Bible John V 24 of those that wonderful verse.
Where the Lord Jesus was speaking when we got back after the after the meeting was closing up, it was a young couple came, I suppose they were in their 30s, young married couple. And they said, oh Sir, we were so glad to hear you quote from our Bible tonight. And I said, isn't that a wonderful verse? And we caught it again. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me has eternal life.
And shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life, they said, Serve.
Those are wonderful words. And I said to them, have you got eternal life? And they said, we hope so. Do you really believe that the Lord Jesus Christ died for your sins? On the cross of Calvary, they said, why, of course we do. We certainly do. Then we said listen to the verse against. And we caught it again. And we said, I can say I have eternal life. Why can't you say that if you really believe in him? And they said, we can't say that, Sir. We prefer to say we hope so. Well, they had the grave claws on them. Maybe there's somebody in this room tonight has the grave claws on. Still, you've received the Lord Jesus. You know you have.
You know you love him. You know he's your savior. You know if he walked into this room, you'd arise out of that chair and say, beloved savior, you died for me. And you'd bow down on his presence and worship him and praise him. But maybe you say, I don't. I can't say I'm saved. I can't say my sins are forgiven. Oh, the Lord tells us and his word that the believer has eternal life. The believer has it. And my sheep hear my voice. And I know that isn't that blessed? You know, there's many of us say these words.
Isn't it good to know the Lord Jesus? And it is wonderful. We can praise God for that. But there's something better than that, something better than that. What is that? You're saying that the Lord Jesus knows me? Isn't that far better than I know him? It's wonderful to know him, but it's more wonderful that he knows me and knows all about me and loves me just the same. What a savior. And so this man, Lazarus, now he gets liberty. He gets liberty. He gets liberty from the very words, the very mouth of Christ.
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And let him and let him go. Now if we just turn to the 12Th chapter, we have another thing.
We we go on now from the from the beginning. And we had death, then we had life, then we had walk, then we had food, then we had the young man speaking. And now we have this man set loose. Now he's loose. And notice what he does in the 12Th chapter of John, this well known chapter, verse one, Then Jesus, six days before the Passover came to Bethany.
Didn't, didn't go to Jerusalem, didn't go to that great city. He went to that little place called Bethany. There he was at a place called Bethany, a place where he was welcome, a place where his friends were. And it tells us again where Lazarus was, which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead. Again it's mentioned this man's name is mentioned in connection with one.
Who was raised? All beloved Saints of God. Do we believe this? We have been raised from the dead, that is to say, spiritual death.
Each one of us have received life through the Lord Jesus Christ. And we've been raised from the dead and honest what it says in the next verse. There they made him a supper. I like that word. They they were all of one mind and one heart for Christ. There's they made him a supper. Mary and Martha and Lazarus, they were together. They were one mind for Christ. How nice it is to see brethren with one mind for Christ. There they made him.
A supper, And that tells us.
But Lazarus, there, they might have a Martha serve, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with them. Isn't this encouraging? This is very encouraging. I think it's very encouraging for the sisters especially and for those who never take part in the meeting. Here was Martha serving. She was serving in the 10th chapter, Luke, in the wrong way, But here she's serving. What was Lazarus doing? He was sitting at the table. What was he doing at that table, beloved? He was enjoying Christ. That's what he was doing.
He was just sitting there and he was looking on that blessed one and he was just enjoying his company. There's many don't take part in the meeting. There's many. Never give out a hymn. There's many. Probably never stand up to prey on the Lord's day. Morning. And the sisters, of course, don't. But you, dear sisters, can't you just be like Lazarus and sit there at the table and enjoy Christ? That's what Lazarus was doing. He was enjoying the company of Jesus. There he was. He had been raised from the dead. I can see him almost.
As he sat there, and his eyes riveted on that blessed man, he had raised him from the dead. He had brought him under the grave. Well might he look upon him an adoration and praise. And well may we, beloved, who have been raised out of a spiritual death on the way to hell, well may we gaze with wonder on that blessed man who loved us and gave himself for us. Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him, Then took Mary a pound of white with a spikenard. Very costly.
If you just notice now the fifth verse Judas is speaking. Why was not this ointment sold for 300 pence and given to the poor all that? Notice the difference? What? How? God valued it very constantly. What did Judah say? 300 pence. That's what he said. Worth 300 pence. Why the Lord had been was soon to be sold for 30 pieces of silver. That's what this world thinks of Christ. 300 pence.
Oh, a young man or young sister here tonight. If you live for Christ, you can't expect the world to clap and applaud you. They'll say you're a fool. They'll say you're stupid to spend your time serving the Lord. The world never puts any value on Christ. 300 pence, that miserable Judas said. Why was not this this ointment sold for 300 pence? But God shows he's a hypocrite. In the very next verse, he said he didn't care for the poor. Judas had no respect or no desire for the poor.
Or do you have any respect for Christ and these people in the world that say, what are these missionaries going to China for?
And Africa for an India for wasting their time. Do they care about the people wasting their time? No. What is their object of enmity? It's Christ. They have no use for Christ. They have no time for Christ. Everything that's done for the Lord Jesus and this world, to the man of the world is a waste of time. It's just a pure waste. They think, oh, how sad this is. But isn't it nice that God said it was very costly? And he tells us?
00:45:24
Then took Mary a pound of ointment. Why, the Lord has even measured the weight of that ointment, he tells us. It was a it was a pound. It was a real pound of ointment. I read someplace. I passed it on. I enjoyed it. About the women in the East, they used to They didn't have hope. Chess like the girls have today. They had a box of ointment, and they kept it beside them wherever they went. And when they found the man who won their heart, they took the ointment and they put it on their head.
As she as Mary did in the in the book of Mark. I think it is the 26th of Matthew.
And on his feet. And when they did that, they showed to that man.
That he had won their heart. Isn't that beautiful? And when Mary did that to the Lord Jesus, she said as much as this. Here's the man who's won my heart, beloved. It's only an illustration. I read it and I enjoyed it. Has he won our hearts? Has he won our hearts? Very costly.
Oh, this dear woman. I wonder what she paid for this ointment. Very costly. God said he appreciated, He appreciated this. God appreciated it, and he's recorded in his word. And the Lord said, wherever the gospel is preached, What this woman's done shall be told. Tonight, in 1969, nearly 2000 years after the Lord said these words were saying it again tonight. The story of this dear woman devoted to Christ who took this very costly ointment.
And poured it upon.
Him. His feet. Notice what it says in this third verse.
Anointed the feet of Jesus. She had to get down right to his feet. Isn't it nice to be at his feet? Mary's always at the Lord's feet. She was there in the 10th chapter of Luke. She heard his word. She heard his word. You know, the Lord made a remarkable statement to Mary that day. Or to Martha. He said that good thing shall not be taken away from her. You know, in glory. When we get there, we're going to meet Mary at Bethany and she's going to be able to tell us.
Exactly what the Lord told her in the 10th salute. It was hers. She was never going to lose it. She was never going to lose it. And I believe from that we learned this, that everything that we really enjoy of Christ down here, we'll never lose it. It's ours for eternity. That was Mary who sat at his feet. And here she's down again at the blessed feet of the Lord Jesus, and it says she wiped his feet with her hair. What does her hair speak of her glory?
And she laid her glory at those blessed feet. She laid that glory of hers that was her glory. But on the presence of that blessed one she found one more glorious. And she laid her glory at those blessed feet, how beautiful those feet were belonged, how beautiful, and marks gospel, to see those blessed feet. And they took that precious Savior through this land, unwanted His path unheard by earthly smiles.
LED only to the cross, those lovely feet of the Son of God, which man dared to nail to the cross of Calvary as much as to say we'll stop those feet, we'll nail those feet to the cross. They won't be able to walk anymore. But all beloved he was raised from the dead, and that blessed one now still walks, and he talks with us, does he not? He walks with me and he talks with me, and he tells me I am his own.
How glorious. They couldn't stop him. He lives, our savior lives. She wiped his feet with her hair and the house was filled with the order of the ointment. How blessed that was. I suppose as those people walked out of that house that day and the door opened and that order went out into the street, they said, what's going on in this house? What's going on here today? These people that walk out, what is this odor that's on them all they would say Jesus is in the house.
Jesus is there, and Mary has taken the ointment and poured it on his feet in his head, and the house is just filled with the order of the ointment. Oh how beautiful this is, and how nice and Lords, they mourning when the breaking of bread meeting closes for us to walk out and have with us that order of the person of Christ still on us. So the world will say, who are these people? They're so happy, they're smiling, they're rejoicing. Who are these people?
00:50:20
In this poor, sad world with sickness and death all around, who are these happy, smiling people?
Or they they're just a few Christians and they've been with Jesus. They've been there for an hour and a half in the company of Jesus, remembering him in death. The house was filled with the order of the ointment. Well, this is very, very precious, is it not? Now we have, we have here worship life, a man who was raised from the dead, a worshiper. Now here we have another step in the Christian life. He's a worshiper. Oh, are you a worshiper?
Are you found here in the Lord's Day Morning? Is that you're accustomed to sleep in Sunday morning?
Are you found here remembering the Lord and death? Are you found here gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to remember Him and death? Are you a worshiper of the Son of God? He's worthy of our worship. How blessed it is. And the last point we have is, is testimony. Here was a man who went from his worship. We have last His testimony. Notice the ninth verse. Much people of the Jews therefore knew that he was there.
And they came not for Jesus sake, only they might see Lazarus also. Again God repeats this whom he had raised from the dead. It's always comes back to this. It reminds the children of Israel how many times God reminded those people that they be delivered from the land of Egypt. And in this case Lazarus again is mentioned whom he raised from the dead. But the chief priests consulted that they may put Lazarus also to death.
Because that by reason of him, many of the Jews went away and believed on Jesus. Here was a man who had life and a testimony. A man with a testimony. How blessed This is why they said let's get rid of Lazarus 2 Isn't that what the world would like to do? And the world is going to soon get rid of us. The Lord's going to come. The Lord's going to come. Men are reaching out for the moon. I was thinking of.
Man is reaching out for the moon. The lesser light. The lesser light was to rule the night. The moon is connected with the night. And you and I are the children of the day. We're not going to the moon, beloved. We're going to the SON. The sun. We're going to the sun. We're going to pass that moon so fast we won't even see it. We're going to the sun. We don't belong to this world. The moon belongs to the world. The lesser light to rule the night. But God says here not of the night. You're the children of the day. Not of darkness, but children of the day.
We're going to the sun. And so the people said, let's kill this fellow. Let's kill this man. What was Lazarus then? He was associated with Christ. What an honor, beloved. He was associated with Jesus and the same world. That said there's no place for Jesus said there's no place for this man. Lazarus, let us kill him because by reason of him, what a testimony or we would covet that testimony, that man would say because of that man, people are going away and believing on Jesus. Is it true of us?
Is it true? Does the world see Christ in us? A hungry, dark, dismal sin, cursed earth with death all around us, War and destruction and misery and man getting darker and darker and the world collapsing all around us? What is the world looking for in Christians? Christ. That's what the world looks for. And you and me and we went to God. They could see Christ. Not religion, not people, sanctimony. It's the long faces, but something in our souls.
Something in our lives, something in our lives that they'll say, these people are real. They belong to Christ. They belong to Christ. He's won them. He's captured them. They're sincere people. They belong to Jesus. He's won their hearts. And so this man was a man with a testimony. And so we have to go back before we stop. We have death. The three of them were dead. They're all dead. But they met Jesus, and they got life, life with a walk.
Life with food, life began to speak of confession. Speaking of confession, then we have liberty, then we have worship, and then we have testimony. The whole Christian life is wrapped up. And these three glorious resurrections from the dead, each one got harder. The 12 year old girl, she had just died. The young man, he was being dead and was carried to the grave. But the last man was dead for four days.
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And maybe there's somebody in this room. You were 12 years of age. You were young.
Your mother and father spoke to you about the Lord. And they said, I feel that this heart is getting soft. Oh, you know, I want to say this. Our time is just about up. You know, some of us, when we get older, we get harder. Oh, let us, let us, beloved, get soft. Let us be soft for Christ, That the love of God may touch our hearts, our children. When they're young, their hearts are tender. We tell them the story of the nails.
We tell them the story of the crown of thorns and they weep. Their little hearts are touched. But when they get older, it's a sad thing. We're ashamed to cry. We're ashamed to have tears in our eyes for the melting story of the love of Christ, the melting story of the love of God. And so these little 12 year olds, when they're young and tender, then they get to be like the young man, 18 years old. If they're not saved, their hearts are getting harder and harder and it's harder to get them up to the Gospel meeting. They say I'm too big to go to Sunday's, so I'm not a kid any longer. I don't want to go to Sunday's school. They're beginning to kick over the traces at 18.
But then when they get to be like Lazarus, Ah, they're dead 4 days. Nothing seems to move them. You tell them the story of the love of Christ and they just walk away. Their hearts are hardened. Is there a boy tonight in this room just like this? Or a girl? You've never received the Lord Jesus. You've come tonight. Oh, what have you got in this world? What have you got? Nothing. Absolutely nothing if you haven't got Christ. And so May God bless his word and may he exalt that blessed one.
Whom we try to present tonight, that blessed Savior, that lovely man who loved us and gave himself for us, might we sing in closing?
#256 Praise the Savior. Ye who know him who can tell?
How much we all am #256?
Can tell how much we owe.
Gladly let us render to him we have.
And arm Jesus is the nameless.
Fits and arms us nothing.
More than nothing harms us.
While wait for us in him.
In him ye sang forever.
He is faithful.
Changing never.
Therefore.
We shall be where we would be.
We shall be what we should be things that.
Are not known are cozy.
Soon shall be.
Our own.
Various Eight Things that point to the Lord's Coming
Address—J. Smith
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 see in this chart on the wall.
The Lord's coming to judge the world.
And the object of taking this up is to bring home to our hearts as Christians that the Lord's coming to take us out of here before he judges it.
Is right at the door before. If these things be so, then how much nearer is the coming of the Lord Jesus to take his people out of here before he sets the place on fire? We've used a sort of a wheel here and the circumference, let us say, represents.
Time passed without defining how long ago, but the hump of the whale towards which everything points denotes.
The Lord's coming to judge the world.
When we have two or three evidences of a thing.
According to scripture it is accepted.
As true.
The mouth of two or three witnesses shall every matter be established.
But if we shall find, on opening the Word of God, that we have at least eight distinct lines of proof that the coming of the Lord to judge the world must be right at hand.
Then there can remain no more ground for the slightest doubt, and it should give our hearts.
To rejoice when we realize that our departure.
To meet the Lord in the air is just that much nearer.
Let us take on, first of all, this line of things, the Church.
Apostatizing.
There was a day and Christendom and that not so long ago when?
Fundamentalist Christendom was basically Orthodox.
The Bible was received as inspired Word of God.
The Lord Jesus Christ was believed on as the eternal Son of God come from the Father.
He was believed on as the one who was born of the Virgin Mary. That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
It Adam there was innocent flesh, and when he fell, and in all his posterity sinful flesh, but in the Lord Jesus Christ there was holy flesh.
That holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
Furthermore.
It was believed and held firmly that apart from the precious blood of Christ.
Which cleanses from all sin. There is no salvation.
For the Sinner without the shedding of blood, there is no.
Remission and on the positive side, the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all.
And beside that, this blessed book holds out to believers the promise of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ to receive them unto Himself, that where He is, there they may be also.
But beyond that, it speaks of a more serious matter of which we hope to treat.
And that is that God is appointed today in which He will judge the world in righteousness.
By that man whom he hath our dance, whereof he has given assurance unto all men, and that hath raised him from the dead.
All these things were held.
Up until not so long ago as fundamental. But beloved brethren and friends, today we are living in a change.
Attitude of things.
In Christendom, toward the Word of God, toward the Christ of God.
Toward the work of Christ, toward his coming again.
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And that is?
That these troves are either being watered down.
Are openly rejected.
Now we are only going to quote a couple of scriptures to bear this out.
There are many, but let us turn to Second Timothy chapter 4 and verses 3:00 and 4:00.
Second Timothy, chapter 4, verses 3:00 and 4:00.
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they hate to themselves. Teachers having itching ears, and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned onto fables.
We see here that because of the state of Christendom.
For this passage does not treat of heathens, but of those who've heard the name of Christ.
Because of the state of the people.
The teachers who are false.
Are made welcome.
Now their sayings are accepted and fables are believed in rather than the truth of God.
This stems, we repeat, from a state of art on the part.
Of the people 40 years ago, there are places in Southern California.
Where we used to preach the gospel.
In the open air, those doors have closed.
If we were to go to those same places today to preach the gospel.
We would find there was number air for it, no one to listen to it.
No turning back two epistles to 2nd Thessalonians also.
And chapter 2.
Let us read from the middle of verse 10 through verse 12.
The 2nd Thessalonians 2 from the middle of verse 10 through verse 12.
They receive not the love of the truth that they might be saved, and for this cause God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie.
That they all might be damned or judged, who believe not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
Because of this attitude of turning away from the truth.
Which we've read about in Second Timothy, we see that unbelievers lay themselves open to being judicially blinded by God and delivered over to judgment.
They receive not the love of the truth.
That they might be saved? Well, what is the love of which the truth of God speaks?
Oh, that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.
That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.
This is the love of God by which the truth of God speaks. Now the time has come when.
They received not the love of the truth.
Might be safe. What then?
Well, if man will not receive the love of the truth.
God's truth then there's only one other thing that he can receive, and that is the devils lie.
And when men and women resist the Holy Spirit to the point where He no longer strives with Him.
For God has said, my spirit shall not always strive with men. Then men and women are given over to satanic delusion.
So that we read continuing on that God shall send them strong delusion.
That they should believe a lot.
Is God unrighteous that he sends strong delusion? No, he is not.
00:10:04
Man is unrighteous because he has refused to believe the truth the love of God brings before him. Man is unrighteous.
And when he persists in an unrighteous course.
He reaches the point where he's delivered over to delusion. God is righteous.
All is righteous that they all might be damned or judged who believe not the truth.
Now what underlies this refusal to believe the truth? We have it in the end of the verse, do we not?
But had pleasure in unrighteousness.
That is, to put it very plainly, they like to sin.
They like to sin.
And they want no bridle put upon.
Well, people who like to sin, who willfully continue in it.
Are going to fall under the delusion and the judgment.
Now I repeat, beloved brethren and dear friends, christening today is in this condition so that as we look at.
This one things here from time past, from Pentecost, let us say, when everything was set up in perfection and we come down through the edges of the church's history, Where do we find ourselves? We find ourselves right here at the hub of the wheel. We find ourselves.
Very near to the introduction of the day of the Lord. His judgments in this world.
Let us pass on to the second line of testimony.
Israel.
Unbelieving. Shall we turn to Isaiah chapter 18, which expresses much in few words?
Although there are many other scriptures to the point Isaiah chapter 18.
To identify these people, let us read verse 7.
First of all, Isaiah 18, verse seven. In that time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of hosts.
Of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from their beginning.
Hitherto the nation meted out and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled. To the place the name of the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion. The last few words here. To the place of the name of the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion, identifies this passage as referring.
To the Jewish people.
And rail there is only one place where Mount Zion is located.
And that is at Jerusalem, and so the people of which this chapter speaks.
Are the children of Israel now going back to the beginning of the chapter.
Wool or whole?
To the land, shouting with wings, which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia.
Senate ambassadors by the sea, even in vessels of bull, rushes upon the water, saying, Go, you swift messengers to a nation scattered and peeled, to a people terrible from their beginning, hitherto a nation meted out and trodden down, whose land the rivers has spoiled.
The history of the Children of Israel since their persistent disobedience and their scattering.
The 10 tribes from the day when the kings of Assyria.
Carried them captive and they're lost to this day among the nations.
Later, the two tribes.
Who, on rejecting the Lord Jesus Christ in the land 19 centuries ago, were likewise scattered among the nations, but have retained their identity until this day? These are the people who have been meted out and trodden down. Who's land, the rivers, is far.
The actual existence of the Jew today as a separate people is a miracle. The Lord Jesus said this generation shall not pass until all these things shall be fulfilled. Referring to the Jewish people, I believe it was King Frederick the Great of Prussia some centuries ago.
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Who was at least a profession Christian Who asked his chaplain to give him?
And one word, a proof of inspiration of the Bible.
And the chaplain promptly answered Your Majesty the Jew.
A Jew. The fact that he exists as a separate people to this day is a miracle.
Now how are these Jews found back in the land today?
Why? Because the time has come when Messiah is about to return to that people.
The Lord Jesus solemnly protested to them that if they persisted in their unbelief.
They would be scattered, and they've been scattered these 19th centuries.
But.
51 years ago.
The close of World War One.
The British General Allen Van His forces entered into Jerusalem and took it from the Turks without a shot being fired.
Then for 30 years.
Palestine was under what is called the British.
Protectorate. Well, whether this is foreseen in the land? Shouting with wings.
We shall not discuss at the present time, but under this protectorate the Jews little by little, whose heart LED them that way.
Return to the left.
In the year 1948, just 21 years ago, the independence of the nation of Israel was declared.
I remember when that took place, but I said to myself.
Have we actually lived? Have we actually been left in the world?
By the Lord to see the very formation again.
Of the nation of Israel in their land, after all the fruitless efforts.
Of The Crusaders during those Dark ages, endeavoring by force of man's arm to restore Palestine.
If not to the Jew, to the ranks of Christians, all in vain, and every other attempt made to return them to the land in vain until God's time came.
And then the Turks surrendered it without even firing a shot.
Well, how did this nation?
Re established in 1948.
How did it?
React.
Was there thankfulness to God?
For this, was there a word utter about?
They're expecting the Lord Jesus Christ, their Messiah. Was there any repentance?
For those centuries during which they had been scattered, and because they had brought the curse upon themselves with these terrible words, His blood be upon us and upon our children. Was there any? None.
Of the country, their leader made this shocking statement.
The arm in which we are trusting is our own right arm.
Imply.
As the prophet Isaiah had said, Chapter 53 one who hath believed our report?
And to whom is the arm of the Lord reveal, implying that they weren't caring about the arm of the Lord.
Who is Christ, as chapter 53 abundantly testified.
No, they were not relying in the arm of the Lord in Christ. They're relying on their own right arm. And the history of Israel these 21 years in the land has established beyond shadows of doubt that they are trusting in their own right arm and in their own right arm alone.
00:20:03
Now what is going to happen to Israel back there in the land? Unbelieving.
Granted that about two years ago they scored a tremendous victory over the armies of three Muslim nations, but what is going to happen to that people? Just the opposite of what they think. They are going to be trodden down because they are back there in unbelief. Now notice in our chapter.
Verse five and six. Isaiah 18. Verses 5:00 and 6:00.
For for the harvest, when the but is perfect, the sour grape is ripening in the flour, he shall both cut off the springs with pruning hooks and take away and cut down the branches.
All about us in Southern California, we have extensive a great vineyard.
And the normal procedure is to harvest the grapes in the fall.
And then the pruners go in and ruthlessly cut back the vines to the very stump, but not until after they've taken off the harvest. However, here in verse five we see that the reverse is going to take place before the harvest, before the grapes are ripe. He that is the Lord.
Is going to prune back the vine which is Israel, and take away and cut down the branches.
In other words, this unbelieving nation of the Jews in the land is going to be chastised.
By the Lord for this very unbelief.
It cannot bring forth good for God in its present condition.
Well, who are going to be the instruments to chastise Israel? Well, verse.
Six says they shall be left together to the fowls of the mountains and to the base of the earth.
The fowl shall summer upon them, and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them.
Well, we believe that the fowls of the mountains here and the beasts of the earth represent the nations roundabout, the Muslim nations whom the Lord is going to use to chastise this unbelieving people. And I'll just read without our turning to it, a verse in Zechariah. I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle.
And the city shall be taken.
And the houses rifle and so on.
Jerusalem is going to be overrun again.
By the enemy.
How near we must be in the history of this people to the fulfillment of these things.
Looking back at the chart, Miss Arrow about unbelieving Israel, we're not back there.
When Abraham was separated and the stock of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob began to take root of the earth, we're not halfway through at Sinai. We're not at the time of captivity. We're not at the time of the birth of Christ. But we're right down here at the hub of the wheel, the nation reestablished in the land after 19 years of scattering and in exactly the condition in which the Lord said they would be found.
As full of pride, arrogance and unbelief, ripe for the chastisement that is coming upon them. Now should we turn to another aspect of things, the menacing?
Muslims.
The 83rd Psalm gives us, in just a few verses, an up-to-date picture.
Of the situation today.
Psalm 83.
Let us read from verse.
Three through verse 8.
They have taken crafty counsel against thy people, and consulted against thy hidden ones. They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation. The name of Israel may be no more in remembrance, for they have consulted together with one consent. They are confederate against thee.
Now in verses 6 to 8 we see who these people are that are saying these things, the tabernacles of Edom.
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The I do means whether to this day and the Ishmaelites.
The descendants of Abraham by Hagar, the Egyptian handmaid of Moab.
As the sons of Luck and the Hagarenes Gable. And I'm a sons of Lot and Amalek, grandson of Esau Jacob's brother the Philistines.
From whom Palestine got its name with the inhabitants of Tyre. Asher also is joined with them. They have often the children of Lot.
Not so long ago.
The Muslim.
Leaders of the countries that surround Israel on three sides.
Got together for a general conference to discuss matters of mutual import to them.
But #1 item on the agenda was this. What is to be done about Israel?
And as though.
The leaders had opened the Bible at Psalm 83 and read verse four. They said virtually in the very words that we have here, which are written down 3000 years ago. Come and let us cut them off from being a nation. The name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.
Do young people. What a wonderful thing it is to have in our hands the word.
Of the eternal God.
Who knows the end From the beginning, From eternity to eternity, thou art gone.
God reading the minds of these Muslims 3000 years ago.
Had his summons right down in Psalm 83. Exactly what they were going to say.
In the latter half of the 20th century.
Also wonderful thing to have God's inspired word in our hands.
And being his children by faith in Christ Jesus, and being sealed by the Holy Spirit and having.
The unction of the Holy Spirit we are able to understand these things. They are made good a torso. According to the import of these verses, Israel is going to know no peace from now on. These Muslim nations that surround her are determined upon her destruction.
Of course, things may fluctuate one way or another.
But the trend is certain. God has said it. He's going to chastise unbelieving Israel by the hand of, if not all some of these Muslim peoples. Now it's a remarkable thing that when men of my age were boys studying history in school.
We understood from our history books that the Muslims were.
Mainly.
Nomadic tribes shake care with his little group and another one over there on his sandhill and alongside of his Oasis and date palm and so on. They were disorganized, disunited.
Scattered folk, but look at them today.
Nations highly self-conscious and with ambitious programs that laid out before them, some of them too immensely, immensely enriched.
By the flow of oil from their desert sands and substantially able to make a mark for themselves in this world. Able to buy arms, munitions and wage war against Israel.
So we are compelled to this conclusion that the very fact of these menacing.
Muslim nations marks out the end.
Time when, according to Psalm 83, they would be united with one consent.
One heart to exterminate Israel.
00:30:02
Will they be able to do it?
Only so far as God permits.
The unbelieving in Israel will be cut off and God uses.
Instrumentalities for it, but we noticed in the end of our chapter 18 of Isaiah, we noticed that it said in that time, shall a present be brought to the Lord of hosts? Well, the present we take it to mean the believing remnant of the Jews, those who will receive after we're gone, those who will receive the gospel of the Kingdom.
The preaching of the fact that Jesus the Messiah is coming.
To set up his Kingdom in the earth, the Kingdom is at hand.
And Zechariah elsewhere we read.
2/3 of the people in the land will be cut off and died, and that the Lord will bring 1/3 through the fire for refinement as silver and gold are refined.
We come now to the fourth line of things indicated by this around here.
The Reviving Roman Empire.
Let us look at a few scriptures which define these facts for us.
In the prophet Daniel first of all.
Chapter 7 and we can only read a verse here and there.
Continue to read the entire chapter as you have time.
Daniel, Chapter 7.
1St, 2:00 and 3:00.
Daniel, speaking, said. I saw in my vision by night.
Behold, the four winds of the heavens strolled upon the great sea, and four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another.
Now God, in giving to Daniel the vision of these four great beasts, diverse one from another, was presenting to us.
Under the picture of beasts, the four great world empires, commencing with the Babylonian and then successively the Middle Persian that displaced it and was itself displaced by the Macedonian or Grecian empire headed by Alexander the Great. And finally the 4th and last of the world empires, the Roman, which is described here in verse 7.
After this I saw in the night vision and behold a fourth beast.
Dreadful and terrible and strong exceedingly, and it had great iron teeth. It devoured and breaking pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it, and it had 10 horns.
Now there's something about the word of God that is remarkable.
Because it comes from God.
As its author.
And that is that it looks clear on to the end.
The Roman Empire ceased to be, but we're reading something about it here, which was shown to Daniel that as yet hasn't even taken place, but is about to. In that empire. Verse seven at the end said the beast had 10 horns.
Well.
In past history the Roman Empire has never existed in A10 Kingdom forum, but we read here this beast had 10 horns. So the day is coming when it will be manifested in that way. Now verse eight I consider the horns, and behold, they came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the ruts. Behold, in his horn were eyes.
Like the eyes of a man and a mouth speaking great things. Now Passover to verse 23rd.
Verse 23 Thus, he said, the 4th beast shall be the first Kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down and break it in pieces.
And the 10 horns out of this Kingdom are 10 kings that shall arise.
And another shall rise after them, and he shall be diverse from the 1St. And he shall subdue 3 kings, And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and so on.
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Daniel tells us this much, that the time would come when the Roman Empire would be manifested with 10 kingdoms or kings, and that from among external to the 10 they would come up a little horn, a power which started from small beginnings, but which become greater and greater, until one day.
This little horn would pluck up three of the other horns.
By the roots, as he would subdue 3 kingdoms. And it also tells us that he would be an infidel, an atheist, an ungodly person who spoke against the Most High. Now shall we turn to the Book of Revelation? And the prompt sees this same beast.
Daniel saw only he sees him 5 or 600 years later.
In Revelation chapter 13 verse one, and I stood up on the sand of the sea and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and 10 horns, and upon his horns 10 crowns. Upon his head is the name of blasphemy. Here he is same beast that Daniel saw. There's his 10 horn, and upon the horns are crowned. These kings are now reigning.
And upon his heads, the name of blasphemy. It's the same infidel leader, the head of the revived Roman Empire.
Verse Two. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard in his feet, whereas the feet of a bear.
His mouth is the mouth of the lion.
Now in Daniel seven and the verses we did not take time to read, the first beast was likened unto a lion, the 2nd to a bear, and the 3rd to a leopard. Well, those 3 kingdoms passed on, but the salient feature, the salient features of each of the three.
All will combine at the end in this.
4th being, there will be the majesty and strength of the lion, there'll be the crushing power of the bear, there'll be the swiftness in action of the leopard, and finally, and most solemn of all, the dragon gave him his power and his throne, and his great authority. When this comes to facts, the powers that be will no longer be ordained of God.
They will be ordained.
Of the dragon that is the devil Satan in his crew.
Character the dragon, the one who devours.
And I saw one of his heads, as it were, wounded to death.
And his deadly wound was healed, And all the world wondered after the beat.
The Roman Empire came to an end along the 4th or 5th century.
The gossip vandals came in and destroyed it. When it had become morally corrupt and weak, unable to resist, it ceased to be. It was the imperial head in which it was wounded or slain. But now John sees this deadly wound healed. The Empire is going to.
Reappear as.
An absolute monarchy and autocracy and the dragon Satan the Devil is going to give to this leader his power, his throne and his great authority. The world is going to see such a Kingdom as it has never before said.
And all the world is going to wonder after the base.
Well, people used to say.
How can people all over the world wonder after something that's going on?
In Rome, for doubtless his throne will be there.
Well, the eternal God only repeat knows everything, and from the beginning He knew what men were going to be able to devise in our day.
And that by means of that one eyed monster.
That, morally speaking, is devouring the children of the same in our day. And if you ever let him into your house, you're going to have an awful hard time getting him out. My monster is going to capture that beast there. And by means of these telescars that they're parking up in space and pulling them right where they want them, anybody on the face of the Earth is going to be able to see what's going on most any place else.
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The Word of God is true and to be absolutely relied on, all appearances, all human reasonings to the contrary notwithstanding.
And they worshipped the dragon, which gave power under the beast.
And they worship the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast, who is able to make war with him?
Russia herself, with other elements, with our power, will be worried of that beast.
She won't dare to tackle it.
Now let us notice in verse six that he opened his mouth and blasphemy against God. We repeat this personage as an infidel, an unbeliever, an atheist.
Now turn to Revelation 17 for just a few more details. Revelation 17.
Verse 12 And the 10 horns which thou sawest are 10 kings.
Which have received no Kingdom as yet.
So these did not yet exist in the apostle John's day, but Daniel saw them. God, when he showed him the vision, gave him a comprehensive picture of this being.
But receive power as kings. One hour or a brief space of time with a beast.
These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength onto the beast. These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them.
Now we have stated here in the diagram that their own empire is reviving and may we submit this At the close of World War Two, Western Europe was left and ruined any way you wanted to look at it.
Considerable reviving took place through economic assistance from the United States.
But still things were in a dreadful condition, and there was anything but unity among these individual nations of Western Europe, and they had been separated from one another by racial differences and by international boundaries, by high tariff walls, by custom.
For innumerable centuries.
Well, a Frenchman, name is John Monet, got to thinking about this matter. An economist and Ben and Sarah still living and he can see the idea of helping to pull themselves out of the chaos.
By forgetting their enmities and getting together. So he sold the idea to the French and the Germans, who of all people were pitted against one another in carnal strife the last 100 years.
That they should take Francis Cole and Germany's ire and make steel.
Well, it went over and it was tremendously successful, Tremendously successful. So he said, well, it works with coal and iron put together to make steel. Let's trade another commodities too. And this became rapidly extended until finally in the Treaty of Rome in 1957, at Rome there were Six Nations, including western Germany and France.
Who subscribed to what is known today as the European Common Market?
And there's a nine man Commission which heads up this European Common Market and has its present headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. Now there's a significant thing about the nine man Commission that each and every one of the Six Nations subordinated their national sovereignty to the decision of those nine men.
The nations at present are western Germany, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Belgium, and Holland. Now England has been wanting to come in for a long time, and England forms a part of the old Roman Empire. But Mr. De Gaulle steadfastly refused to give his assent to the admission of England. Well, he removed himself two or three weeks ago.
From consideration.
And already.
George Pompidou Pompidou, who is candidate for election in his death, has announced publicly that he is not going to continue De Gaulle's policies and he has spoken about United Europe. And just the other day the Premier of England made the public announcement that they are applying for membership.
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European common market at the earliest possible moment and that it is a necessity that there be a united.
Europe.
In fact.
One of the members of this Commission.
Said years ago, Let people not be mistaken. Our primary objective in the European Common Market is not.
Economic but political the United States of Western Europe.
Spain would like in Portugal probably and with England that would make 9 and if we should add Switzerland or Austria, there you have 10. In any event, the word of God is clear there will be 10 kingdoms in the revived Roman Empire, and we are just so close to it that if the Lord took us Christians home today, tomorrow.
You could have the United Nations of Western Europe. We're just right there.
And it's not stretching the imagination to see one man out of that nine man Commission.
Get control of the whole thing, and what up three of the kingdoms? Take the power over the tent. This is what the Word of God marks out before us, and the present kind of things is unquestionably toward the consummation of this very thing. Of course, they're not calling it in so many words.
The revised Roman Empire, but that's exactly what.
Is in embryo before us right now.
Now, just a little resume.
We'll see #1 The Church apostrophe and that it awaits judgment.
The hands are lost.
The Gentiles could be cut off with their own places. We have seen that unbelieving Israel is in the land, in unbelief, awaiting judgment.
We have seen that the Muslims, who are nothing but a roving bands of people, are now not only nations, but they are in a confederacy with one thing before them, to exterminate the Israelites.
As the Word of God said 3000 years ago and we have seen that the Roman Empire is an embryo forming before our very eyes.
Now none of these things can come to the climax until we're gone.
The Lord is going to take His redeemed ones out of the world before these things come.
To the climate, but they're already on the verge.
Of the climate. So where are we?
We should be on the tiptoe of expectancy, brother, listening for that show.
Have causes harm. Now passing on to.
The arousing Orientals while we're in Revelation just turned back to chapter 16 and.
Verse 12A. Short notice but quite sufficient, Revelation 1612 Says.
And the 6th Angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates, and the water thereof was dried up.
That the way of the Kings of the East might be prepared.
The oriental menace has been.
A subject that statesman have considered for a long time, but now?
Things are shaping up.
For the realization of the invasion.
From the audience for centuries the underprivileged Orientals, the Chinese, Japanese and other nations.
Those in the East Indies have been exploited by the farmer.
By the white man.
And now these people are aroused and they're resentful.
And as much as in them as they're going to drive the last white man out of the confines of the Orient.
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Not only so, but they number over 1/3 of the population of the whole world, and they now have military resources that are fearful, for example.
Red China has the atomic bomb has already exploded 1/2 a dozen test bombs, including one of about 3 million tons of TNT of potency and that they're in the manufacturing process and.
When the Lord no longer stays there in hand, they're going to start sprinkling those around.
That the way of the Kings of the East might be prepared the influences today.
That are holding back, restraining their invasion of Palestine are spoken of here under the figure we take it of the river Euphrates, which is a natural barrier between the Near East and the Orient. Well, these influences that restrain today are going to be removed. The obstacles to the invasion from the Orient will be removed and then this time.
Will come in.
What is their objective Palestine and the riches that are there?
And there and round about. But what will her end be?
We take it from the verses that follow that the Lord Himself will deal with those Oriental horrors.
The very fact that in our day and at this moment and in the last few years.
The Orientals have been so signally aroused and are armed.
And have resources.
And are resentful.
All of these things contribute to sharks that the time is right for them to come. Now pass on to the sixth line of things here, Russia preparing. Let us turn to Ezekiel chapter 38.
Ezekiel chapter 38 I'm going to read.
With a little variation.
In verses two and three, Son of man, set thy face against God.
The land of Mega and as Mr. Darby's version renders it.
The Prince of Rush, Meshach and Tubal, and prophecy against him. And say thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I am against thee, O God, the Prince of Rush, Meshech, and Tubal, I will turn thee back and put hooks into that jaw, and so on. Now Russia's allies are named here in verse five and six.
Persia, Ethiopia and Libya with them. All of them with shield and helmet.
Gomer and all his bands the House of the Garment of the north Quarters and all his bands, and many people with the.
Well, start for a moment.
May God is Russian, it's the ancient name of that people.
Some years ago, our brother Christopher Willis told me that he had seen in Shanghai, China, a piece of pottery imported from Russia, and the trademark or stamp on it was Megaw.
The ancient name of the Lamb.
Those who understand languages tell us that these words rush, the Prince of Rush, Meshach and Tubal.
These English words that we use correspond to Russia.
Moscow and Tow Balls, which is a large city in Siberia.
So.
The one to whom Ezekiel addresses this word of the Lord is unquestionably Russia and its leader.
Now, many years ago, our brother Eric Smith met up with a Russian silk merchant.
In Bolivia they fell in a conversation and before long, our brother.
Understanding that he was a Russian, started to read to him Ezekiel chapter 38 and 39, and he hadn't got very far before the Russians stopped him, interrupted him stop.
That is the destruction of my people.
Non converted Russian silk merchant recognized as the word of God was read.
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That it was talking about the destruction of his people.
Now we read here.
How Ezekiel wrote down 2500 years ago.
What the Russian leader was going to think about.
And what he proposed to do again we repeat, only the eternal God knows the future, knows the end from the beginning. Verse 10 Thus saith the Lord God, it shall also come to pass that at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt think an evil thought, and thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages, I will go to them that are.
That dwell safely, all them dwelling without walls and having neither bars nor gates to take a spoil.
And to take a prey for How will this come to pass?
We believe in this way, the land of which the Russian leader is going to speak, the land of on wall villages and those that dwell safely without walls and neither bars nor gates, refers to the saved ones of Israel who come through the great tribulation and are restored in their land under.
The Christ, the Messiah.
All the enemies having been judged, the Muslims will have been judged to the Lord directly or providentially. The Roman Empire will have come to its end when the Lord takes the beast and the false prophet Revelation 1919 and he throws the two of them alive in the lake of fire, and by the sword that proceeds out of his mouth, His word he annihilates.
Their army. That will be the end of the greatest empire the world has ever seen, and the Lord will be the one that puts an end to it when man lifts his hand up to fight against Almighty God.
Against the Lord coming out of heaven.
Maybe men by this time will be so insensate they'll put warheads on their space vehicles and head up into the heavens to fight with the Lord. The Roman Empire will be destroyed. These oriental hordes that have come across when the obstacles to their invasion are removed to seize upon all the riches of that land, they will have been destroyed.
So that Israel will be restored in the land. No locks, no bars.
No walls around the villages, all dwelling in peace. And Russia, who has always played a waiting game and has sat back and watched, restrained by that mighty power over in the West, the power of that Roman emperor actuated by Satan. Russia marks time. She quits growling so loud, pulls her claws in and sits there and wait.
Now she takes a look down at Palestine. Why look?
I don't know how it happened, but all these hosts have disappeared.
There's nobody left down there to fight with me, Those people. I'm going to army, any Navy, any Air Force.
Why? All I got to do is go down, take possession so.
So Russia will go down with all our hearts and all our lives to take the land of which the Lord said it's mine.
And without reading the Jennifer's.
We see in Ezekiel 38 and 39 that's terrible destruction.
That comes upon the Russian horse, five out of six slams.
6 Fair.
And so fearful will be the slaughter that will take seven years to bury the bones of death.
And they won't need to gather fuel out of the forest for their fires for seven years. They'll use the weapon.
Over immediately, somebody will say.
Why combustible weapons in the 20th century?
Menu Still they don't use what? Oh, wait a minute, we're reading the Word of God, the eternal God who knows the end from the beginning. A few years ago, a man perfected a process by which wood can be hydraulically compressed and usable, where it has the strength of steel and the flexibility and the lightness of wood.
And it's being used commercially today even to make gears that have to endure tremendous way.
Those weapons are going to be combustible.
Well, they're made out of wood or straw or what They're going to be combustible weapons. God's word.
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It tells itself, all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding. Let God be true, but every man alive.
Lord only remain two things to consider.
Are the most solemn of all because they touch each and everyone of us here more or less directly.
Before God destroyed the Anatolivian world with a flood, he looked upon it and he pronounced it full of violence and corruption.
Those two principles of evil, violence and corruption.
Now the Lord Jesus and His day said, as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days.
Of the Son of Man, that is. When I come to judge the world, I'm going to find it violent and corrupt.
Now something is that this violence and corruption has erupted.
More right in these enlightened professing Christian lands and among him.
The morality that existed up to a while ago in this country is vanishing.
Is almost gone.
And each and everyone of us, and particularly those of us who are young.
And full of them, and bigger and vitality and life, and with everything before us in the world, each and every one of us is exposed to the strongest of temptation to give way to the time of wickedness that is sweeping everything before it.
Even to men who call themselves Christian leaders advocating promiscuous immorality.
It is shrunken.
And as a brother, very old and respected of mine has said more than once.
The state of the Church is always affected by the state of the world around.
And this tide of iniquity that is sweeping the world and professing Christendom in particular.
Is having its effect.
In our own right, we don't have to sit down and recall things to memory very long before we have to bow our heads in view of what has come in among us.
The favorite people of God.
Long years ago, a Christian wrote a good hymn, Yield not to Temptation.
For yielding instead.
In the Psalms we read Enter not into the path of wicked men.
Avoid it passing up by a turn from it and pass away. Let us learn to say yes in the fear of God to the Lord. If you love me, keep my commandments and to say a resolute no to the world. I belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm not walking with you and you're talking with you, I'm walking with my love.
And his promise is sure he giveth more grace.
And he is able to keep us not only from falling, He is able to keep us from even and the abounding violence.
That is, in the world that is multiplying before our very eyes so fast that the powers that be are at a complete loss. They don't know what to do.
It's engulfing everything. We repeat that our Lord Jesus said that when He came, this is what would be happening. As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man. But those days haven't arrived yet. And yet these things are here, and they could hardly be worse.
Than they are.
So, beloved brethren, summing it all up.
We have 8 different lines of testimony to the fact that the coming of the Lord to judge the world is right at hand.
8 witnesses to one and the same thing. 8 evidences that we are at this time. We're not in time past 3000 years ago, or 2000 years ago, or even 50 years ago. We are here for every one of these things is right.
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At the climate and before this can take place.
The Lord is going to call out his redeemed people, everyone who has been redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, at the large descent into the air, at the voice of acclamation.
At the sound of the Archangel and the trump of God, anyone is going to be caught up, dead, raised, living, transformed to meet the Lord, not on this polluted earth, to meet him in the air and to be forever with the Lord.
Well, suppose it took place right now. How is it really?
Am I personally happy as I think of the Lord's coming, that there's nothing between me and the Lord right now? They would make me say, Lord, wait a minute or wait clock. I've got something to square with that brother over there. That sister and I, we, there's friction between us or there's something in my life that isn't quite right and I haven't said it right.
Wait 5 minutes Lord, till I get it straightened out. Would it be that way with us or are we free from everything?
That would make us hesitate for a second to say Even so, come.
Oh Lord Jesus.
What a wonderful truth it is, the early Saints. They turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God and the way for His Son from heaven.
And what a powerful.
More of it is to be living momentarily for the largest the fact that he's coming again because he loves me and he wants me and he's taking me out of the world anymore to build himself.
Colossians 4
Address—C.H. Brown
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Into the 4th chapter of Colossians masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal, knowing that he also have a master in heaven.
Continuing prayer and watch him the same with Thanksgiving, with all. Praying also for us, that God would open unto us the door of utterance to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in bond.
That I may make it manifest as I ought to speak.
Walk in wisdom toward them that are without redeeming the time.
Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with thought, that you may know how you ought to answer every man.
All my state shall take a gust. Declare unto you as the beloved brother and a faithful minister and fellow servant in the Lord.
Whom I have sent unto you for the same purpose, that he might know your estate and comfort your heart.
With an estimates. A faithful and beloved brother who is one of you.
They shall make known unto you all things which are done here.
Aristarchus, my fellow prisoners saluted you and Marcus, sister son to Barnabas, touching whom you receive commandments. If you come unto, you receive him and Jesus, which is called justice.
Circumcision. These only are my fellow workers under the Kingdom of God.
Which have been a comfort unto me.
Effer Fraz, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, deludeth you all was laboring fervently for you in prayers, that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God. For I bear him record that he hath a great zeal for you, and them that are in Laodicea, and them in Hieropolis.
Luke, the beloved physician.
And Demos, great, you salute the brethren which are Laodicea in Memphis, and the church which is in his house.
And when this epistle is read, among you caused that it be read also in the Church of the Laodicean.
And that you likewise read the epistle from Laodicea and say to Archaeus, take heed to the ministry which thou hast received in the Lord, that thou fulfill it.
The salutation by the hand of me, Paul. Remember my bonds. Grace be with you. Amen.
As much as this is the last chapter.
Have to be well to go back over the other chapters just in a little review first.
Make the connections and also to.
Bring it to our minds again.
Finding the book of Colossians that.
The believer is seen here on Earth.
He's seen as taken out of his position of sin and.
He's seen as risen with Christ.
Now this, this epistle was written, no doubt, at the same time as this.
As a pistol through the Ephesians believe in two problems.
But in Ephesians the apostle has a different line of things before him, because he speaks of predestination.
Speaks of the ceiling of the Spirit.
And.
More of that which has to do with that side of the truth, the mystery where we're all gathered into one body and the practical effects of it in the 4th chapter.
Now most of these things are not seen in Colossians because the believer in Colossians is not seen as seated in the heavenlies yet. He's just seen risen, but he's still down here visions. He's seen as seated in the heavenly and he's sent down here on a mission, so.
The apostle then speaks of their hope, which is laid up for them in heaven.
They're looking on to the rest. So it's a wilderness epistle, something like Hebrews.
The hope which is laid up for you in heaven.
It begins by commending them in various ways, as he always does when he can command anything.
And he notices the fruit that's seen in their lives.
Having believed through the ministry of Epifras, probably he highly commends Epifras. Now whether Epifras was in prison with him or not, we don't know, but at least he was near the Apostle.
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And the apostle knew a great deal about Epifras. He wasn't in prison with him. He visited him no doubt often.
And Epifras was the one who was used, no doubt, to bring the truth to these Colossians Saints, because the apostle had never seen them.
This time.
And so the apostle is writing to them that he might.
As he says in another epistle, in part from spiritual gifts to them, something that is received by revelation from God that would build them up in their most holy faith, would comfort them because they had just come out of heaven them.
But at the same time.
All through this epistle there is the suggestion that possibly.
There's a line of things creeping in whereby the mind was working. Philosophy, vain deceit.
And so from the very start, he brings in that line of truth that would encourage them and turn them away from the reasonings of men.
So one of the first things he mentions is that in his prayer for them is that they might come to the full understanding of God's will.
The full understanding of God's will.
Wisdom to because we need wisdom as we go through this world.
But also that they might come to the to a fuller.
Measure of the true knowledge of God.
Now in the end of the second chapter we find that there were things introduced that were not the true knowledge of God.
And so his desire for them is that they might come into this.
In a fuller way into the true knowledge of God.
And then he begins to set before them.
What their blessings are.
And that they're to give thanks to the Father because he's made them fit me. We're having.
And that meekness was brought about at Calvary's cross.
Their sins have been forgiven through that precious blood that was shed, forgiveness losing them from all the guilt that attached to them, and heathen their wickedness before they were saved.
And then he speaks of an inheritance, the Kingdom. I suppose the only epistle that gives us any suggestion that we.
That the Lord Jesus is King, but he is.
But in Revelation, he's spoken of as King of nations.
He's never spoken of really as King of the Saints, although he is the king.
And we must own that he is.
But it's hardly right for the.
Queen to speak of her husband as the king exactly, unless it's been a formal way. And so we don't speak of the Lord as our King exactly, although he is that. No, we speak him as our Lord. And so that's the title that's before us in this whole epistle. The Lordship of Christ, he's Lord.
And that's the subject the apostle now takes up in the first chapter. And more in detail, he shows that he's the first born in two ways. He's the first born because he's the Creator.
He created all things as God, but now he's going to take it as man and he's going to have the preeminence and everything.
Also, these are the first born out from among the dead.
So in this he's head of the church and he takes the preeminence in all creation connected with these two.
Parts of his title as first born.
Then we see following this that.
The person of Christ.
The fullness of the Godhead is pleased to dwell in it.
The man Christ Jesus, he's made peace through his blood. So having made peace.
Is going to reconcile everything in heaven and earth.
But he's at this you hath he reconciled.
This is not a future event. He's laid the groundwork for reconciliation.
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For heaven and earth but you hath he reconciled. What a comfort then to these Colossians Saints, as well as to ourselves.
So then we see reconciliation 2 parts, just like we see the first born two parts.
Now the next thing that he brings before us is His ministry. His ministry has two parts. Also, he He's the one who brings the gospel to every creature that is not personally, of course.
But he's the one who was given the revelation of this gospel of the glory.
And it's to every creature through the whole creation.
But also he's been given the revelation of the mystery.
Now the mystery is not spoken of quite the same way in Colossians as it is in the features.
Here it's spoken of as Christ in you.
The hope of glory.
Christ in you the hope of glory.
That's the 27th verse of the first chapter. Now the apostle.
Is in closing this chapter, he's warning.
And teaching.
For the purpose that he might present every man, perfect or mature or full grown in Christ Jesus.
What a foundation for the soul to rest on now as we have in the first chapter.
What security for the believer?
Is connected with Christ in this wake, the one who has the inheritance, the one who restores all things, reconciles all things.
The one who is the head of the church.
And now it's Christ in you, the hope of God. When the 2nd chapter we have more of the subject of assurance in the first chapter is to bring them to the to the full knowledge of His will and to the true knowledge of God.
But in the second chapter it's to have the assurance of it to be rooted and to be built up and to be established. Now to be rooted, of course, is to see ourselves as the separately connected with the Christ in one body.
Christ in you the hope of glory.
To be built up is to see the Lord Jesus, that in Him we have every supply.
Nourished by bands and so on, as it says, but still it's in Christ.
A man, the man Christ Jesus, were built up in him. We have everything in him.
To be established would more be the.
The effect of it?
As seen in the believer as he walks down here in the good of this truth.
Obedience to God's will.
So then it's the assurance in the second chapter. Assurance in our souls.
Now, in the second chapter, there are three warnings.
The first one we noticed in the.
Second verse.
Rather in the fourth verse, but it's just after the expression in in whom I hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. That's the mystery of God. There we find all the treasures of mystery, of knowledge. And now he warns them anywhere, deceives them, beguile them.
But we have another warning now in the 2nd and the 8th verse, the second warning after he speaks of being rooted and built up and established because of the position we're in, Christ in US.
Nicest beware lest any man leads you away.
Deceive you and lead you into something else.
Because.
In him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. In the human body all the fullness of the Godhead dwell.
Christ of perfect man at God's right hand. Now that word fullness could become translated completeness. That is, there's nothing lacking is the thought and then he speaks now of.
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Through his death.
Circumcision not made with hands.
We have put off the body.
Notice in the.
11Th verse. Body of the Flesh.
So we have following it, resurrection, three things brought together now.
In the first chapter we have all guilt removed through his blood, forgiveness of sin. Now we have the body removed, the body of sin, body of sin.
That's taken up in Romans, the 6th chapter.
And to the doctrine of it. But then we are risen.
We have a new life.
Now that new life doesn't depend upon.
Anything that the flesh can perform.
At all.
That new life is Christ in you, The hope of glory, that's the new life.
Not in the flesh. We're not any longer in the flesh. It's Christ in you.
The other practical consequence, of course, is the excitation to walk and the good of this, as we have earlier in this chapter. Now he speaks of having forgiven you all. It's really offensive because he's speaking to gentiles.
Gentiles offended the Jews trespassed the law.
So he's forgiven all this, but the next verse would suggest that.
As we were noticing blotting out the.
Handwriting of ordinances that was against us.
The illustration we had in the Old Testament of the daughter or the wife who made a vow.
And she was not able to perform this vow. If her husband heard it, he could make that vow void, but if he did so, he would have to bear the full responsibility for it.
She would go free from the vow, but he would have to take the responsibility.
I believe that's what we have here, the signature that Israel had put saying all the Lord has spoken, we will do.
It's now nailed to his cross.
She was not able to perform it, nor could you or I perform it.
The law or all the ordinances of it, you couldn't perform it. And so it says, blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to to us and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.
Well, what a place of liberty we're in then.
What assurances brings us?
Here on earth, going through a wilderness.
Christ in you the hope of glory. That's the end of the road that's in view.
And now he speaks of the position he's taken above all principalities and powers.
All authorities, because he spoiled them. He made a show of them openly at the cross, triumphing over them.
In it the 16 first, it's the Jewish line of things.
Whereas in the 18 first we have more of the reasoning.
Of the Gentiles and the philosophers and so on.
Which is particularly applicable to the Saints of colossi.
They're both out of order, whether it's the outward ordinances, keeping of days.
The ordinances of the law, whatever they are, it's a man who is in the flesh.
That this was given to not a man who's risen, but a man who's in the flesh.
So they they do not apply to us any longer. They never did to the Gentiles.
Now the reasoning, the philosophies of men, the intruding into.
The things they haven't seen, the worshipping of angels.
All these reasonings in connection with spiritual things have no place because.
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Were complete in Christ. We don't need anything else.
I believe that's what we have here and that's what gives the assurance to the soul.
That we are complete.
Year complete in him.
Now in Ephesians we find that the church completes what's spoken of there as the man.
Christ is the head and the Church is his body.
But here a year complete in him Christ forms the completeness here because of the subject.
He brings in the completeness of everything in his person. We don't need anything more.
We should never allow our minds to reason and spiritual things because.
There's never intended to be used for that purpose.
Where there is a known revelation from God.
Where would reasoning come in if God has revealed himself in His Word? He's made known his mind.
The new man loves to obey.
The flesh rebelled.
So there's no place for reasoning here.
If we find everything in Christ as to approach to God.
What will ordinances do?
They have no place, do they? They're set aside.
So whether it's philosophy? And now he warns again.
18 First, let no man beguile you of your reward.
Because there's a danger of their turning away from these things.
That they had in Christ, and substituting that which the flesh, the religious flesh, loves because it exalts the flesh.
Or the mind loves because it exalts the mind, the intelligence, as men say.
What is real intelligence if it isn't doing the will of God?
And that's what's encouraged here. That's real intelligence to do the will of God.
To seek from His word that which He's given us as our instructions.
The believer loves to do that.
So it sums up then in the 19, first holding the hat, the head.
Christ the head. It isn't so much here the subject of the body, although it's mentioned in the mysteries connected with the body.
As we notice in the next chapter, it's more than the subject of the individual life of the believer. We're risen.
The individual life.
Now we notice that as we go into the review the third chapter for a moment.
Now, being risen with Christ, we are to set our mind on things above. Why? Well.
You're dead and your life is hid with Christ in God. So it's a question of our life, you see, risen with Christ. It's the individual life of the believer that's brought forward for the moment here in stress.
Now that life that we have is hid with Christ. In God, Christ is hid.
He's not seen by man or angels today. He's passed through the heavens where no created being in.
He's passed through it all. He's beyond it all. Just think of it, brethren. Christ has passed through the heavens, way beyond principalities, authorities, powers. He's above it all, dwelling in unapproachable light and sits beside the Father in His throne.
He's here now. Our life is hid there. That's where our life is hid. Says so. What a consolation for our hearts then. Now, isn't it only right we set our affections where our life is. You know, when Elijah went up, Elijah asked him for a double portion of his spirit.
He said if you see me when I go up, it will be granted you what is meant for this.
Yet man, it means if there was the energy in type of course.
To have the eyes fixed on an exalted, glorified Christ, then he would have that double portion of the Spirit. Well, you notice that he said it's a hard thing.
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That if you see me when I go up, it will be granted to you. It's a hard thing. Why is it such a hard thing?
Because of all the powers that are raid against us, that's why.
All the enemy's power.
Against us and the flesh that's still with us.
That resist the spirit, fear it against the flesh. It's a hard thing.
And what is it then that delivers enables 1 to enjoy that portion of the Spirit?
And we've gone up.
That your affections and things above.
Now, are we going to occupy our time with the things of this world? And then the last moment, perhaps a few minutes, we can slip over and read our Bibles, a verse or two or a calendar verse. Is this the is this the way to set our affections on things above?
Most of the printed matter you know that's available today is trash.
Now I know there's some things that are necessary for business.
Renewed.
But surely most of its trash and all how many hours sometimes we may spend in things that are absolutely worthless.
We may leave any moment.
To a better land now are we? Are we really in the enjoyment of these things? Have we set our affections on things above where Christ sitteth? Our life is up there now. What's the next thing? When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall we also appear with Him in glory?
Go to Prospect.
And although we are seen now as on the earth, we are not seen as seated up there.
Still in Colossians, our life is up there.
So it's equivalent to the same thing.
Life is there, and when he comes forth from there, we'll come forth too, because in the meantime, we're going to be caught away.
Before he appeared and then when he does appear, we'll be with to appear with him. Now the expectation mortify your members which are upon the earth. You can't put yourself to death, you know.
Now that was done at the cross. As far as in God's sight, we're dead already.
Man's will cannot set his own will aside.
And so he has to take the position of being dead.
Ye are dead in God's sight.
Your life is hid with Christ and God, but ye are dead now. Mortify.
Your members, which are upon the earth.
And then he names all of these things.
Now down later in the chapter we noticed that.
He addresses the Saints as.
In the 12Th verse put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, vows of mercy, and so on.
The basis of his exhortation is the position they're in.
He doesn't say, you disobedient children, I'm going to exhort you. He doesn't say that.
He exhorts them on the basis of where they are in God's sight.
But an encouragement for us Well, in the 15th verse of the third chapter, then we have the peace of Christ presiding in the hearts. In the 16th, the word of Christ dwelling richly in all wisdom. Let it, let it.
Now this 16th verse then, is the key to the exhortation, because there will there'll be no power to carry out these expectations practically in our lives unless the Word of Christ is dwelling richly in our hearts.
We may mean ever so well, but the flesh will take over.
Because the only power that we have now is the power.
In connection with a risen, exalted Christ.
We get all our nourishment from our head and it's through the Word of God by the Spirit.
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So unless the word of Christ dwells richly.
As it says here in all wisdom.
And also.
In psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord, you notice all this comes before these expectations. We have the word of Christ dwelling richly in the heart, the peace of Christ presiding.
And now?
The grace.
Singing with grace in your heart. What a way to start off the Christian life. What a way to start the day.
This is the way of power.
For the believer.
Not just to start the day, but have you ever come home tired and discouraged because of the problems you've had and dropped your knees just for a moment? Presence of the Lord. Get up singing.
Try at the sea.
Oh, how the Newman loves to resort to his dwelling place.
The many things that hinder it, but the Newman loves to resort to this.
He loved it.
And it's our constant privilege.
Go back and back again.
And then it says.
Wives submit. Husbands love your wives. Children obey.
Fathers provoke, not your children. Servants obey.
And the chapter closes with knowing that of the Lord you shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for you serve the Lord Christ. Now this brings us back to the Lord again as the object.
He's the one that's going to reward in that day.
So it's the Lord then?
In the following chapter.
Yeah, I sent you the state of the Masters as well.
You've spoken to the servants to obey that. The masters aren't going to fill their part too.
Give unto your servants that which is just and equal, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven now. The Lord Jesus, when He's here, didn't try to change anything except man's heart.
The apostle didn't either.
He didn't say to those who had slaves. Now you get rid of your slaves.
No, he told them to be just and equal in connection with their dealings with their slaves.
He did speak rather firmly to Philemon about it, and I suppose the result was that an estimates was set free.
Because we have an estimate delivering this epistle.
There's another They must have been set free.
However, the apostle wasn't trying to bring in a reform in the next with slavery.
But he he wanted them to know how they should act.
Under these conditions in which man found himself.
And the believers place is not to try to reform this world as to change things here.
If he individually can get out of a situation that isn't according to God's mind, that's one thing. But this isn't our business to reform this world.
But still there is a certain conduct expected of the Christian, whether he is a servant or whether he is a master.
And that's righteousness.
And also to give a testimony of the character of God by his manner of life.
Not only are we to set forth what the truth is in words, but we're to set it forth in practice.
And so he exhorts to prayer in the second verse.
But then in the third verse, he exhorts them to pray for him.
In connection with that which he has on his heart is a burden the telling forth of the mystery Christ in the Church. The apostle was in prison. Every door was closed, it seemed.
That the apostle wasn't discouraged.
He wanted the Saints to pray for him that there might be opportunities still.
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The telling for this mystery.
How easily we become discouraged because everything doesn't go just as we expected.
Because the door doesn't open wide ahead of us here, the apostle was closed in in every hand.
Could have been in an inner present even.
Probably what the dungeon.
Yet he wasn't discouraged. No, discouragement is not faith.
It's simply the flesh, that's all.
In the light of all the truth that we have had in Colossians, have we any right to be discouraged?
No, he tells him to walk in wisdom toward them that are without redeeming the time, and that their speech should always be with grace.
Seasoned with salt.
Needing wisdom As we go through this world, we're to walk in wisdom.
Supposing that they were filled richly with the word as in the previous chapter.
There wouldn't be any wisdom outside him there would there be any wisdom unless we were on our knees.
If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally.
Without prayer, we wouldn't have wisdom no matter how much we read the Word.
Because it's the Spirit of God that makes it good to us.
And so the speech with grace, seasoned with salt.
Now this is rather a delicate thing, isn't it?
You know, Salt would suggest that which would reach the conscience of the one who you were speaking to.
But here to speak to him in grace.
At the same time seeking to reach the conscience.
Now this couldn't come about unless the Spirit of God was behind it.
And so the believer is supposed to be in such a state where this could be.
He's filled richly with the word itself.
Then walking in the good of it wisdom.
His words would be with grace.
And why does it say this?
Well, you remember in Luke the 4th chapter when the Lord was ministering in the synagogue, they wondered at the gracious words that came from his lips.
So the apostle here is taking up this line of things that the believer has the same life and expresses itself in the same way.
Great.
But at the same time the Lord could say, Except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. That's the song.
Gracious and yet soft.
The apostle is beginning to commend different ones here, and you'll notice the difference in the way he commends them.
He speaks of Technicus, the one who delivered this epistle with the Methodist.
He's going to tell you all about my affairs. The apostle doesn't write any details about his own personal affairs here. He lets the ones who delivered the message tell them personally.
But he speaks of him there as a beloved brother.
And a faithful minister.
And fellow servants, but in the Lord.
Now there is a difference between the expression in Christ and in the Lord.
Every believer is seen as in Christ.
But when you speak of one as being a a fellow servant in the Lord supposes that he's subject to the will of God in his way. Now that is not true of every believer.
Sad to say, it isn't always true.
We are always free to speak of what is in Christ.
But when you speak of service.
As here, the apostle carefully notes that it was in the Lord.
Now not only was he to tell them about the affairs of the apostle, but he was to bring back a report of their state.
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That was searching, wasn't it?
And also he was to comfort their hearts.
Well, the only way that one could comfort the hearts of the Saints would be in the enjoyment of that comfort themselves. The apostle could speak in Second Corinthians of comforting with the comfort that he had received of God.
Otherwise it's human comfort and it doesn't amount to very much unless it has this.
Touch of the Spirit in it. The Newman.
Now he speaks of an estimate. The runaway slave. Here he is.
With he's a beloved brother, but he's a faithful and beloved brother, but a change has come into the life of an estimated the power of the gospel of Christ who is one of you. He must have been connected with that assembly. Now he may not have been directly at philosophy. He may have been at Hieropolis or Laodicea because you'll notice that.
Archivists in the 17th verse.
As mentioned, but he is probably not in the assembly's. Colossi must be in an assembly nearby.
Mentioned in the book of Philemon as being in that assembly, I believe.
Unless he had moved.
Now together, these two would make known all the things that are done there in the prison.
But here's a fellow prisoner, Aristotle, a man that's in the prison with Paul for the gospel.
We don't hear too much about Aristarchus and why he's in prison, but he's there.
Marcus is mentioned. Marcus the one who went home.
It didn't continue in the work.
The one who caused difficulty between Paul and Barnabas.
Now the apostle is telling them to receive him. He commands him.
Later on, in Second Timothy, we learned that the apostle has a special commendation for his work.
And then we find that he's the one that wrote the Gospel of Mark.
Though there's a restoration here. Encouragement.
In the reading of this part of Colossus.
He named these first group, this first group as being a comfort to him. I suppose that they had visited him in the prison, seen to his needs. They'd been a comfort.
Now he brings in Epifras. Epifras was the one who had brought the gospel to the Colossians Saints.
We don't hear much of Epifras, we don't hear about him as being a mighty speaker anything of that time.
He was just one of you, it says. Just one of you. Perhaps he belonged to the assembly at philosophy. I suppose that's the case. He's one of you.
But he was staying with the apostle while these other messengers brought this letter to the church.
And the apostle is telling what he's doing.
A servant of Christ saluted you all was laboring fervently for you in prayers.
That you might stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.
Well, have you seen someone converted and then you forgot all about them?
Epifras had seen the Saints converted under his ministry in philosophy.
And now he laborers continually, fervently in prayer for them, that they might stand in all the will of God.
He is praying that they might do the very things that the apostle has been opening up in this letter.
The will of God.
That stand perfect in it and complete in it, or filled as this audience in all the will of God.
And that's what we need, isn't it? Not just part of the truth, but we need all of it.
All of them, not any part of it.
Don't set aside any part of the truth, Old and New Testament. We need it all.
He speaks of Luke.
As the beloved physician.
Not just a physician, he's the beloved physician. Paul has reason to say this.
00:45:05
Because all the way through the loop you'll see marks.
Of Luke.
As a companion of the Apostle and his wandering in and out among the various places of his ministry.
In the book of Acts, I should say.
Luke is there. He's not mentioned by name, but you can trace it. And he says we are us because he's the writer of that epistle.
Damon Damon St.
Nothing beloved about it is there?
Why? Because in the next epistle, the next time demons is mentioned, demons have forsaken me. There's a decline now.
Zamus was mentioned as a fellow servant at one time.
But now it's just demonstration.
There's a distance here, and soon it's going to widen. And demons hath loved this present age.
Just what his trouble was, we don't know.
That he left the testimony the apostle was setting for.
He didn't want to go on with it. Perhaps the persecution, the reproach.
Connected with it, turned him aside, whatever it was. Dimas greets you. Is all he says.
We find that.
******* here adds a church in his house, common custom in those days.
We don't know just how many of the churches were otherwise, but we know that many of them were in a House of one family.
The apostle desires this epistle be read to the other assemblies.
Nearby.
Because the truth of God is for all the Saints.
It's true, there was a special time for the writing.
Under the special circumstances and state of soul of each assembly, like Galatia for instance.
But we all need all the truth of the New Testament, and so the apostle.
Watch this epistle to be read in the Church of the Laodicean.
And that they were to read the epistle from Laodicea. Now we don't know what that epistle was. It might have been the epistle.
To Ephesus.
And then the expectation for this one man to remember and take heed to the ministry.
Which he had received in the Lord, In the Lord.
Now, it doesn't necessarily mean that it wasn't.
He wasn't serving, but the apostle emphasizes here the fact of the Lordship of Christ, which is characteristic of this epistle.
And it might be possible to be serving, but not in the sense of complete obedience to the Word of God.
We might introduce our own thoughts into our service.
That archibus was to take heed to the ministry which he has received in the Lord, in the Lord, and that he would fulfill it.
The apostle signed this letter, although it was written no doubt by another, because he seals it with the authority of an apostle.
Three Windows of Scripture
Address—P.L. Johnson
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I'd like to read 3 passages of scripture, The 1St in Joshua, book of Joshua, chapter 2, second chapter of the book of Joshua.
And Joshua the son of Nun sent out of Chittim two men to spy secretly saying go view the land, even Jericho. And they went and came into an harlot's house named Rehab and lodged there.
And it was told the king of Jericho saying, behold, there came men in hit her tonight of the children of Israel to search out the country.
And the king of Jericho sent unto Rahab, saying, Bring forth the men that are come to thee.
Which are entered into thine house, for they become to search out all the country.
And the woman took the two men and hid them.
Now in verse 8.
And before they were laid down, she came up under them upon the roof, And she said unto the men.
I know that the Lord has given you the land and that your terror is fallen upon us.
And that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you, for we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you.
When you came out of Egypt and what you did under the two kings of the Amorites that were on the other side, Jordan.
Zion and AG, whom he utterly destroyed. And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt.
Neither did there remain any more courage in any man because of you. For the Lord your God, He is God in heaven above.
And in earth beneath. Now therefore I pray you swear unto me about the Lord.
Since I have showed you kindness, that you will also show kindness unto my Father's house.
And give me a true token.
14.
And the man answered her, Our life for yours, if you utter not this our business, and it shall be when the Lord hath given us the land, that we will deal kindly and truly with thee. Then she let them down by a cord through the window, for her house was upon the town wall, and she dwelt upon the wall. And she said unto them, Get you to the mountain, lest the pursuers meet you, and hide yourselves there three days until the pursuers be returned.
And afterward, may you go your way.
And the man said unto her, We will be blameless of this thine oath which thou hast made us swear. Behold, when we come into the land, thou shalt bind this line of scarlet thread in the window which thou didst let us down by, and thou shalt bring thy father, and thy mother, and thy brethren, and all thy father's household home unto thee.
And it shall be that whosoever shall go out of the doors of thy house into the street, his blood shall be upon his head, and we will be guiltless. And whosoever shall be with thee in the house, his blood shall be upon our head, if any hand be upon him.
And if thou utter this our business, then we will be quit of thine oath which thou hast made us. And she said, according unto your words, so be it. And she sent them away, and they departed, and she bound the scarlet line in the window.
20th chapter of Acts.
Acts 20.
Verse 7.
And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread.
Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the Morrow.
And continued his speech until midnight and there were many lights in the upper chamber where they were gathered together.
And there sat in a window a certain young man named Eutychus being fallen into a deep sleep.
And as Paul was long preaching, he sunk down with sleep, and fell down from the third loft, and was taken up dead. And Paul went down and fell on him, and embracing him said, Trouble not yourselves, for his life is in him.
When he therefore which come up again, and had broken bread and eaten, and talked a long while, even till break of days, so he departed.
And they brought the young man alive and were not a little comforted.
Daniel, Chapter 6.
We'll just read from verse 10.
Few verses here.
Now, when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house.
And his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed and gave thanks before his God as he did before time. Then these men assembled and found Daniel praying and making supplication before his God.
00:05:07
Just those two verses in Daniel. Perhaps you noticed as we read these three portions.
That we had.
A window brought before us.
And all three passages. And I'm not saying that these are the only three occurrences in scripture where we have windows brought before us. I know it is there are others. But I would like to link these three windows together connected with these three persons.
For our instruction here to hear this afternoon, we have the window of rehab.
And we had a window that we might connect with a young man named Eutychus.
And then we have a window in connection with Daniel Rahab's window, the window of Utica's and Daniels window. And these three windows, I believe, would bring before us something that God would have us to be exercised about as those who belong to the Lord Jesus Christ.
You know, the thought of a window itself.
It has you might say A2 fold application.
A window. If you're inside a house, you can open a window to let in from the outside.
What is there inside the house?
But a window is also something through which you look to the outside. In other words, it has to do with your outlook.
And we might say that in these windows that we have brought before us, we have these two aspects. We have, first of all, in rehab, the true outlook of the child of God as set forth in Scripture.
And in the window in connection with Eudicus, we have there the window as being that through which something from the outside might be brought into the room.
And in Utica's case, it would be something that is detrimental, as we shall examine more in detail.
And then in the case of Daniel, we see there that the window there would indicate.
Where Daniel's heart was, what his desire was.
We might say that the window of rehab would give us the proper direction.
That the Christian is to be looking.
And in the window of Eutectus we have the danger that besets every Christian here in this scene, and in the connection with Daniel, We might say there, that his window would give us what should be the desire in the heart of a true child of God, in the midst of a of a great mass of false profession, and in the ruin and failure of the church.
So let us turn first back to Joshua and consider the window of rehab.
We all start.
As rehab does here in this story, and I don't want to imply when I say story that it's just something fictitious. We know of course that it is a true story, a true happening which God has recorded. Not that we might just have a little Bible stories, you know, to print and for children to read these occurrences in the.
Old Testament are written for our learning at the present time.
We find many wonderful principles of God's ways and God's dealings with man in the Old Testament occurrences. We, most of us here this afternoon, I'm sure, if not all, are familiar with the story of rehab. We know that here the children of Israel have gone through the wilderness across the Jordan and they're about to enter into the Promised land.
And the first obstacle.
That they would come across as this city of Jericho and it is destined for judgment.
It's going to be overthrown, and here is a woman who is a Sinner in this city. Not only is she personally guilty as a Sinner, but she's in the very place of judgment itself because the city of Jericho is about to be destroyed. First of all, we see here in the rehab the condition of every individual.
Apart from salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ.
All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
It isn't that everyone is a rehab.
00:10:01
That all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And the result of that is that everyone is exposed to the judgment of God. And if there is anyone here in the room this afternoon who has not come to the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior.
If you have still rejected Christ putting off the salvation of your soul for one reason or another, you're just like this woman. Rehab a Sinner and in the place of judgment and God's judgment is going to fall.
You know, I like to contrast rehab with the inhabitants of Jericho. Notice what she says in verse 10.
For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you, and what you did under the two kings we have heard.
Who do you think that we refers to? Well, I'm sure it refers to a Rahab in her household, but perhaps two to all the inhabitants. This was something that went through the whole city how God had.
Judged those who were enemies of his people, and they knew they were in line for that same judgment. They had heard of judgment.
But it's only Rahab who had faith to believe.
That God was a God of love and grace and had faith to believe that.
This report, perhaps, was truly going to take place.
Notice in verse nine. And she said unto the men, I know that the Lord hath given you the land.
Well, if you ever wondered how rehab knew that, how did rehab know?
Rahab knew because she had faith. You know, this is the only way in which we can really know the things of God is by faith, not by experience nor by external proofs, but by faith. The report had gone out that God was leading this people out of Egypt through the wilderness into the land of Canaan, and He had given them that land and all of those who were outside of that nation were going to be judged and were were to perish.
That's the report that had gone out.
And no doubt there were many in that city who heard it and scoffed about it. Perhaps there were others in the city.
And thought, well, this won't happen for a long time yet.
And for various reasons they were not excited about it, or even disturbed. But rehab. Before these spies ever came to her house, she was undoubtedly already exercised and disturbed about the coming judgment upon all the inhabitants of her city. I wonder if there's any in the room this afternoon who have sat under the gospel so many times and have heard it over and over again, and in your heart.
I don't say with your mouth, I don't believe if I stood at the back of the room after the meeting and spoke to everyone in this room, even the young ones and asked them say do you believe the Lord Jesus is coming in judgment?
I doubt if there'd be anyone to say no, I don't believe that, but there's such a thing as saying things with the mouth and not really believing them in the heart.
Do you really believe that Jesus Christ is the Savior, your Savior? Do you really believe that He suffered for your sins on Calvary's cross?
And you know that you are safe from coming judgment.
That all of your sins are washed away, and that when he comes in flaming fire.
Taking vengeance on them that know not God, and those that obey not the gospel.
That you will not be among that number, but you will have been already caught up with all of those.
Who belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, I want to put that word in. I think it's necessary because we often find in a in an audience of this size that there are those who have been going along.
And not doing anything outwardly to indicate that there are unbelievers. But what about the heart? God looks upon the heart and the Lord knows your heart. But I trust that we would all be as rehab who has received the message of God.
And incidentally, you know, in the New Testament we have rehab referred to well more than twice, but two times I'm thinking about.
Once in Hebrews 11, where it says by faith she received the spies, they're called spies.
And in James chapter 2, we read there that she received the messengers and sent them out another way. These men are called spies in Hebrews Chapter 11, and they're called messengers and James.
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And we might say that the Gospel has this to these two aspects. To us as spies, they were harbingers of coming judgment, of harbingers of judgment.
They announced the fact that judgment was going to fall upon that people, and she accepted that.
She acknowledged that the nation was due and headed for judgment.
As messengers, they brought.
A way of escape.
A way of escape, and that's what I had, especially before me in connection with the window. But we find that the way of escape from judgment.
For rehab in all of our household was through that window where the scarlet cord was bound. So as spies they had to do with coming judgment, and as messengers they brought the glad tidings of a way of escape. Oh, that's what the gospel tells us. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men.
That's true.
The wrath of God is revealed, but also the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation unto everyone.
That believe? Well, I believe these words are important. I believe they're important enough for each and everyone in the room to pay attention to.
That we might take heed to the word of God.
Well, this wonderful way of escape has been made through the window of rehab, but now notice.
Rahab was a woman here in this city.
In connection with this, when it was headed from judgment and she remained there even after she had believed the message that was brought by the spies, but her outlook was changed. Her outlook was changed. She was no longer looking out to that city for what might be enjoyed or what might be gained from the benefits of living in that city.
Now all of her hopes and her and our entire outlook was connected with that window.
Isn't that right? When those spies left, they said, now this. You put this cord in the window.
And her whole hope and everything was connected with that window, no longer with the city.
She had given up that city now as as headed for destruction. She had no hopes in connection with the city, but her hopes were in connection with that window.
Doesn't that remind us of a verse that I want to read in the first chapter of First Thessalonians?
We could quote it, but I'd like to turn to it.
We see here that this is characteristic of every child of God.
Verse 10, or rather verse 9.
For they themselves show of us what manner of entering, and we had unto you, and how ye turn to God.
From idols to serve the living and true God and to wait for his Son from heaven. But isn't that sort of like rehab?
He had been turned to God now from idols. She had been turned, as it were, from the city in which he had been living and where she had had all of her business to do.
Her whole life and everything was centered in that city heretofore. Now these messengers come, these spies come, and her faith lays hold of the message. So she has turned from that city now to look out through the window. And all of our hopes and our expectation is from that window. And so it is with the believer. We've been turned to God from idols.
No longer is our life in connection with this world.
I'm not saying that we're not here physically here, just as Rahab remained there in the city.
She was still there, but she was, she was not there as far as her expectations and hopes were concerned. She wasn't seeking anything from the city anymore. And so these Thessalonians, they returned to God from idols. Well, I had, especially on my heart this afternoon, Not exclusively, but I might say in one way, chiefly the young people in our midst.
As there are so many and I believe this is very important.
That all of our hopes and our expectations that they should be heavenly and not in respect to this earth and this world and prospects down here. This is not to say that God is unconcerned with our circumstances in this world. He is, He is concerned of how we get on. He's concerned with our health.
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He's concerned with our work, He's concerned with our home life. He's concerned with all of the affairs. And the proof of it is that we have detailed instructions in the word about them. You know, it's amazing. In the Word of God, we're told just how we're to work, how we're to play, how we're to be in our homes, how we're to be among those in the world, how we're to be in the gathering of the Saints, why everything is set out in great.
The mind of God is told by showing how concerned he is with our circumstances in this scene. And yet we know that our connections are heavenly. Our connections are now with God. We have another verse in Philippians that says our citizenship is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Savior. Well, I'd like to ask in the room this afternoon and especially again I say the young people.
What? What are you looking for as to your hopes and expectations?
Are you looking for something great in this scene? I mean by that. A great time, a great a name, a great popularity.
Are a very comfortable living the luxuries that this country affords and things of that nature, or is it that you're passing through them with a desire to honor the Lord, knowing that your calling is heavenly, that you're connected now with a window to the outside?
Though you're still in the world, you're not of the world, and if you're no longer, as it were, looking to the City side of things, that is this world and what's going on here.
But your eyes are turned toward through that window to heaven, where our citizenship is and where we're looking for the Savior.
That's what we're looking for, and God has called us to the obtaining of the glory of the Lord Jesus.
Oh what a wonderful outlook. Is ours to be turned from idols?
All of the idols that men value in this world, all of the things that men pursue a whole lifetime.
And you know, I think this is important too. You find that they're individuals that have such a burning desire.
For various things in this world that they pursue them vigorously for a whole lifetime, it becomes an idol.
I trust that the young persons will not be ensnared in that to be turned from idols to God if there is a burning desire and an ambition which is normal to young people, and it should be.
It should be an ambition and a burning desire to be for the Lord for the little while that we're here.
And to be occupied with those things that will make us more acquainted with our heavenly portion. Well, we see here that the window of rehab turns us, as it were, from the idols of this world to God, the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven. Now turn to the 20th of Acts.
Here we have the window of Euticus in Acts 20. We might connect the truth of the gospel with the window of rehab. And I would say too, in passing that when we speak about what characterizes a child of God, we're speaking about the way the Christian is presented in the Scriptures.
You know, it's most important for us.
Have God's viewpoint of things in order that we might have a standard by which all things are judged and we.
I'm not saying that this is necessarily the average.
Condition of things as far as Christians are concerned, but God's thought of a Christian.
A child of God is that he has turned completely away from the idols of this world to God. He's brought to God and let me quote another verse that that is in connection with this Peter tells us that Christ has suffered for sins, the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God.
You ever thought of what that means? It doesn't mean he suffered for sins, the just, for the unjust, that he might bring us to heaven.
I didn't know what that means. It means that he might bring us to God. That's now that doesn't mean bring us to God when we die or when the Lord comes. It means that we're to be brought to God now that the Christians life is all lived in reference to God as his Father in God's will. It is never contemplated in scripture that a child of God.
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Would ever get up and enter on any day of his life.
Without due consideration for the will of God, that's what it means to be living to God.
And brought to God is you have to do with God in everything you do, what you wear, what you eat, and where you go. God is in all of these things. You're brought to God. The Lord Jesus died for that. The Lord Jesus didn't die merely that he might take you to heaven one of these days. It's true, wonderful as that is, and more than we ever deserve. But the Lord Jesus died that he might have a peculiar people, that is a people for himself here in this world.
As you go about in this world.
And if you were to go among your neighbors and your associates at work or school who do not know the Lord, you'll never find them considering the will of God.
They never think of what God would have them to do. In fact, they don't care and they're opposed.
But God wanted a people here in this world for himself. He wanted those who would be living to Him.
And with reference to him to be his people. And that's why the Lord Jesus Christ suffered for sins that just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.
So we've been turned to God like rehab. That's the window that connects us with what is outside. How wonderful it is to have that connection. And now then here in the 20th chapter, I would connect this with the truth of the assembly.
The truth of the Church.
Well, we find here that the one who is prominent is Paul, though it is that they came together to break bread on the first day of the week. All discourse to them, and we see in verse eight that there were many lights in the upper chamber where they were gathered together.
You notice the emphasis here is and two things, or three we might say. One is that there were many lights, there was a well lighted place. Another is it was in an upper chamber and the other is they were gathered together. It has to do with the gathering of the Lord's people.
This is equally.
In connection with the sufferings of Christ as our personal or individual salvation.
We read in John 11 That the Lord Jesus was to suffer for that nation Israel, and not for that nation only, but that he might gather together in one. The children of God who were scattered abroad gathered together.
That wonderful chapter in John 10 of the Good Shepherd giving his life for the sheep. How many have?
Use that.
Gospel and how many times we have rejoiced in that individually and say, oh the Lord Jesus loved me and gave himself for me. But in that same chapter we read not only of individual personal salvation. I am the door by me if any man enter in that individual, is it not?
Many men enter in. So we have the individual salvation there, but also we have the Lord saying.
Other sheep I have which are not of this food, them I must also bring.
And there shall be one flock.
And one shepherd there we have the gathering of the Lord's people not only coming in individually through the door of salvation in Christ, but that he should gather together in one so that there would be the one flock and one shepherd. Now that's Pauls ministry. Pauls ministry is in connection with the truth of the assembly, the church. And we might say that it's heavenly calling, it's heavenly destiny, and it's unity.
Well, the many lights were there.
I like to think of this as the light of Christianity.
We know that the word light is used very frequently in the New Testament. It's almost characteristic.
Of the New Testament writers, this word light, everyone of them, most of them rather use it. John, of course, more than others, heard a light.
Because it's a, it's a very suitable.
An appropriate figure for all that has been brought to our souls.
Through the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ revealing the Father and accomplishing that work on Calvary's cross.
And we might say, in short, the whole of Christianity is characterized by light.
You know the Apostle Paul.
When he was stricken down on the road to Damascus, he speaks of it that he saw a light from heaven.
And then as he's recounting that later on, he speaks of it as a great light from heaven.
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And then the second time he refers to it, I believe in Acts 26, he speaks of it as a light above the brightness of the sun.
But in every case it was, it was thought of a light, a great light, and a light that eclipsed even the natural light of the sun. Oh, I think there we have a little picture of the blessed light that has been brought to us in Christianity through the Word of God, of course, revealed here in the New Testament in connection with the 1St and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, the writings of the apostles and prophets of the New Testament, the wonderful truths of Christianity.
And you know, it's a blessed thing to have such a light.
I wonder if we appreciate really the light that we have, appreciate the light that we have. You know, sometimes events occur in this world that strikes fear and terror into the hearts of individuals who do not know God.
They are completely in the dark.
And all, how blessed to be a child of God, to have the light of God's word and the light of Christianity. Just think of all of the dead end schemes you might say that man is undertaking today. Think of all of the problems he's faced with. Think of all of the committees and all and everything they're doing to try to solve all of the riddles of this world and try to set society right. Try to clean up this thing.
They make advances in one area, they find that worse things break out in another. Think of having to cope with all of these things. I've often thought how simple the Christian's life is. He doesn't get all involved with all of these complications because it's endless.
The child of God has the light of God's love and grace in His precious Word for his pathway, and he can go through it simply in obedience to the Lord, enjoying the Lord, knowing that He has in heaven a better and an enduring substance. That doesn't mean that one is calloused and indifferent as to the state of things here. That's not the point. The Lord Jesus was the most unworldly of anyone whoever walked through this scene.
He never once took part in the projects of this world.
He never once took them up, and yet there was none, I'm sure, who sympathized and entered in more greatly with the sufferings and the ills of man than the Lord Jesus. He felt them keenly, and no doubt He was compassionate. And we as Christians are called upon to do good unto all men, especially unto them who are the household of faith. But never are we called upon to be occupied with the schemes of this world. We have the light of Christianity, and it's in an upper chamber.
You might say that it's in a on a higher level. That doesn't mean a holier than thou.
You know Satan has many trips.
In his bag of tricks to try to terrorize Christians.
He tries to lead them away with his Wiles, and he seeks to terrorize them as a roaring lion.
And I've often thought one of his ways is, is by coming around and trying to say to a Christian or a believer who's seeking to walk in separation from the world with that taunt that oh, you think you're better than others and you're holier than thou. That isn't the point at all. It isn't a question of a holier than thou. It's a question of this that God has revealed to us in this precious book, truth that is so far elevated above this scene, it is not according to the philosophies.
Man. The reasonings of man, it isn't according to his sociological thoughts.
It's the divine revelation of God, and it separates us in spirit and in attitude and in habits.
From this world, it's an upper chamber, it's light and it's heavenly.
And as I say, it has to do with the gathering of the Lord's people. This is a sort of an epitome of the ministry of the apostle Paul.
The light of Christianity and in its heavenly and separating character, because, you know, the word of God, makes very plain that Christianity separates from the world.
You can't read very far in the New Testament without finding that.
The Lord Jesus gave himself for our sins in Galatians one in order that He might deliver us from this present evil world, not make us comfortable here.
But to deliver us in this present evil world, I remember reading one time in a Roman historian.
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And about the this historian Rd. I think in about the 3rd century.
He was a heathen and he made mention about the Christians. Very little he said about the Christians, but he did say this.
In respect to the persecutions that were taking place at that time.
He said the leading charge that the state had against the Christians was that they were haters of mankind. Now that may sound strange.
And but if you went on to read, you'd find out what he meant. What he meant was they didn't take part with all of the affairs of the Roman state. They were separate. And this was one of the reasons why they were hated by the Romans. The in those days, they were a separate people. They were a people who had turned to God from idols and were waiting for his Son from heaven. Well, we know that it didn't always continue that way.
And here in this window.
Of Euticus we have a little picture.
I feel of how the church has fallen from the ministry of the Apostle Paul.
You see, the apostle here is ministering, preaching the word in this room with many lights, and there's a young man in that window and he's not very interested. He's asleep.
Or is that also has a very practical application, does it not? We find sometimes that the young persons are not very interested in truth in connection with Paul. They're content to say, well, I believe Jesus died for my sins and I'm saved, and that's as far as they want to go. They're not very concerned about the heavenly light of Christianity and the gathering of the Lord's people.
But I feel that we do have here a little picture of the church in its fall from Pauls ministry and it has done that.
It has done that. When I speak of the church now, I'm talking about the church in its responsible aspect. As the House of God said. Here is a witness and a testimony to God, The church in its profession. We know, of course, that in the word of God there is a distinction to be made between the true church, the body of Christ, and the church in its profession. Professing aspect which includes all the.
The persons who profess to be Christians.
I'm talking about the church in its professing aspect.
We see and we know that it has fallen.
Turn to Second Timothy, chapter one.
This occurred very early.
In the history of the church, verse fifteen of Two Corinthians 1.
Or rather second Timothy.
Two Timothy 1:15.
This thou knowest that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me, of whom are fabulous and homogeneous.
All they which are in Asia, you know that takes in quite a territory.
The assembly of the church at Ephesus was there.
And the church at Colossi.
And Laodicea.
There were a number of assemblies, number of churches there, and he's not saying here that they all became apostates and took up some Oriental religion or something like that, he says. They turned away from me.
He didn't say they turned away from Christ. They never gave up the profession of Christ. He doesn't say they're false professors even.
They might be true children of God, but the point is they turned away from Paul. Just like Eudicus, he wasn't interested in Paul's ministry and he fell asleep and the result was that he had a fall. He fell down from that window.
So the church, the professing church, has departed from the ministry of the Apostle Paul. The truth of Christianity as contained in the writings of the apostle. And in its place we find that man's organization.
And man's ways of doing things has replaced it.
Now then, to come to the point of the window at you. With that Eudicus was in.
I feel that the window of Eudicus would bring before us the danger of coming under the influence of outside things.
You see, that's where you because he was perched on that window there and as a figure, I believe, of one who would come under the influence of outside things, things outside Christianity.
True Christianity. I don't mean Christendom. There's a difference, you know, between Christianity.
And Christendom. Christianity is the truth of God as revealed in the New Testament.
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Christendom is what the church in its profession has has become as the great house filled with vessels under honor and under dishonor. There's two different things. Christendom has really turned from Christianity and has taken up with philosophy and man's reasoning and man's ways. But Christianity brings us to God, gives us God's fault and God's ways.
Well, the danger is of coming under the influence of those things that are outside Christianity.
Outside Christianity. And yet there can be things outside Christianity and still in Christendom, and that's the figure I believe with many.
It can be outside the true Christianity, but still within the confines of Christendom. Professing Christianity, at least Christendom.
That which is not accordance to the mind of God as found in the Apostles writings. It's all about us.
We find it on every hand today, those who might even preach the gospel.
And you know, in Second Timothy, when he says about those who turned up, there is no hint or indication at all that they gave up the gospel.
Absolutely no indication, even with Demas.
That Demas hath forsaken me, not Christ, you find all the way through Second Timothy. It isn't people giving up Christ.
They are those turning from Paul and from the truth. They may still have a measure of the gospel.
But are they going on with the heavenly light of Christianity and the gathering together of the people of God?
Or are they simply individuals often following this man and that man?
Well, this is not according to the truth of Christianity. There may be Christians doing it.
But it's not according to Christianity, and the danger is coming under the influence of those things and being LED astray.
From the truth of Christianity turn to Colossians chapter 2. We have a danger of warning there, given to us by the apostle.
Verse 8.
Colossians 2 Beware lest any man spoil you.
That word spoil here means that make a prey make a prey of you.
Through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
You see the apostle in his ministry, those many lights in that upper room speaks to us of the ministry of Christ and Christianity.
And that's what Christianity is. It's in connection with the person of Christ and his work.
Well now, he says, lest any man should spoil you, or make a prey of you will the real danger of Eudicus window.
Is that we might be robbed and spoiled of the truth of Christianity.
By coming under the influence of all of these extraneous things that Christendom has brought in the glorification of man, the making much of a man's ability as speakers and as singers and man's organization and man's salesmanship, we find these things all in connection even with the gospel that we don't find them in the Word of God, in connection with Christianity.
Paul says when he came to Corinth he did not come with wisdom of words. Purposely he says I don't want your faith to stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
You see, in Christianity, it's not the wisdom of man, it's not training, it's not an eloquent speaking, it's not getting persons in the right mood, it isn't using a certain amount of pressure and salesmanship. No, it's the simple presentation of the word of God. It's Christ. Now we can be robbed and spoiled of what true Christianity is through becoming under the influence of these things that are outside.
Outside. Well, you know, I think of the early disciples on the.
Resurrection Day, when they were gathered in that upper room where the doors were shut for fear of the Jews, they shut the doors.
When I hear Utica's in an open window.
He wanted to have everything open. He wanted to be, as it were, inside and outside. He was in connection with those inside, all right. He was there in connection with them, but He was under the influence of what is outside and the result was he fell. The result was he fell. These things outside will not help us in going on with the truth of the assembly is gathered to the Lord's name.
Whatever God might use in the way of the gospel, we can be thankful for. As the apostle says, that's one thing.
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But to come under the influence of them and to be occupied with them will only lead.
To our being, as it were, falling, being LED astray from the truth of what Christianity is in its heavenly and separating character, elevating character and gathering character and.
I think if we would examine so many of these great evangelistic efforts that are going about.
You will not find those features in them at all. You'll hear nothing about the separating character of Christianity. You'll hear nothing about the heavenly character of Christianity or the gathering together in one under the one shepherd. In Christianity. You might hear the truth of the cross.
And you might hear how sinners can be saved, for which we thank God. I say again, But to come under the influence of these things will rob us.
Of the real true character of Christianity. And Paul says beware.
Lest any man spoil you.
How shall we turn to the book of Daniel?
Just briefly. Daniel 6.
Here in Daniel's window.
We might say that the circumstance here is that the people of God have gone into captivity.
Daniel was carried away captive by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.
This was the result of the failure of the nation.
So they were scattered, carried away captive into a foreign land. Things are in ruin.
Jerusalem. The center had been destroyed, the temple destroyed, the city burned. All was in ruins. But we find here that that Daniel had a window.
And the window was open and outside influences that were evil or destructive. But here it was a window open to show that his desire was still toward the place.
Where God had put his name, the divine center.
And I would suggest that here in Daniels open window.
We would have brought before us the fact that even though we are in a day of ruin and failure and the Church is scattered.
They are true members of the Body of Christ, scattered throughout all of the various sects and denominations of Christendom.
It is not as it was in the early days.
There is scattering and ruin and failure, and yet the truth of the divine center remains.
The truth of there being one flock and one shepherd. The truth that there is one body.
Is still with us today as it was on the day of Pentecost. It's never been altered. There is one body.
The one flock with the one shepherd, and there is the one center.
No doubt the Lord Jesus had this in mind in Matthew 18 verse 20 when He says, For where two or three are gathered together unto my name, there am I in the midst of them.
You know, in the Day of Pentecost.
I forget the exact figure now, someone may have to correct me. Was it 3000?
See, it was a large figure, quite a number, and if you go through the book of Acts, you find that when the apostle went around.
Generally speaking, there were many who were converted multitudes. That's quite different from two or three, isn't it?
Why did the Lord say two or three? Then why would the Lord pick that number?
Are three? Why not just say where there are those gathered together under my name? But he says two or three.
I feel that the Lord in his wisdom and in His grace.
Was making provision that the divine center might be maintained right down to the very end.
Till his coming for his own, for he well knew that during the.
Sojourn of the Church on earth. It would become so scattered and in ruin and failure that it might be that only two or three in any locality would have the faith to depart from all of the organizations of men, and to gather simply under the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
That means His name is the center of gathering. Not some mission, not some doctrine, not some ecclesiastical form of gathering, but His name, the truth of Christ, as we have seen already, Christ in Christianity. Now turn back to Jeremiah chapter 3.
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There is a very interesting verse there that we want to connect with Matthew 1820. Daniel's window brings before us the divine center.
Though the city was in ruins, Daniel still recognized Jerusalem as the divine center.
He didn't say we're living, I'm living in a day when Jerusalem has failed and in ruins and so God has removed his center or there is no center. He said there is a divine center there in Jerusalem, and He opened His window toward it. God would have us to have our desire toward that as well. Now, of course, this doesn't refer to the church in Jeremiah 3. This refers to the time of Israel's restoration.
Verse 17. At that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord.
This is future and on earth, and all the nations shall be gathered unto it.
To the name of the Lord, to Jerusalem.
Now you can see the passage here. Obviously the thought of being gathered to the name of the Lord.
Means that that name becomes the center.
They may not all all of the nations come to Jerusalem.
But they all be gathered unto it. It will be the center which they will acknowledge and own no other center on the face of the earth but Jerusalem.
So I would connect this with Matthew 1820. Today God Center is where two or three are gathered together unto not really gathered in my name. I know the King James has that, but the preposition there signifies unto or two as a center, not merely gathering. As Christians we know that every professed Christian on the face of the earth, if they gather or assemble, always assemble in the name of the Lord Jesus.
I've never heard.
Of a so-called Christian group gathering in the name of Buddha. That's true.
They gather in that name, but that is what that verse means. It's having his name as the center of gathering.
Not merely just gathering as Christians, but gathering to him as the center. Not to man or to some organization or to some mission, some doctrine, some truth, but the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's Daniels window, having it open to the divine center with a desire to to be in the place where he has placed his name.
And while we're on the subject, I'd like to mention too about a Matthew 1820. This is not to say that the Lord is not with all of His people, wherever they are in any circumstance.
We must learn to distinguish in the Word of God always the context.
You cannot take verses of Scripture out of its context and put them against each other, or even put them together.
In Hebrews 13, when he says, I will never leave the nor forsake thee, this is an unconditional promise.
To all of the Lord's people, wherever they are.
Wherever they are gathered or wherever they are scattered.
Whatever they are in association with, the Lord is always with His people.
But Matthew 18, the context definitely shows it has to do with the place where His authority is, the place of His authority. It's in connection with the whatsoever is bound on earth is bound in heaven. And if any two of you shall agree, it has not just ordinary prayer, but has to do with the administration and the assembly. And then he says, for where two or three are gathered together under my name, they have all of the authority of the Lord in their midst.
Oh yes, the Lord is always with his own and he'll bless his own wherever there is individual faith, wherever there is individual piety and godliness, the Lord will bless Wherever his word is presented. He cannot do anything other than honor His word. No matter how unfaithful man is. God abides faithful and if the gospel is preached, the gospel it will work and souls will be saved, but that doesn't mean that the Lord's authority is found there it.
The Lord is there and blessing, it's true, but the Lord's authority is found in the midst of the two or three gathered together.
Unto His name there am I in the midst of them. It is to be distinguished, as I said, from the the promise of being with all of His own. This is Daniels window recognizing the Divine center still in a day of ruin and failure. Well, God would have us to be, you might say, to have.
Instruction from all three of these windows we won't rehabs window to give us the proper outlook toward glory.
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Our backs turned on the world, and our faces turned toward heaven, from whence we look for the Savior. And we want to have Daniel's window too, with a desire and a heart for God. Center where he has placed his name, and seek to go on there and then to be careful about the window of Euticus, that we do not come under the influence of things that are outside.
But just one more thought about Utica before I close. I like to think of it this way, too, in a practical way. Euticus, we read, was a young man.
And we find very often that young people.
Young women as well as young men.
Get under the influence of things that are outside.
Outside the assembly.
Outside of what is God's will. But you know, when Eudicus fell and Paul went down, he said now trouble not yourselves, his life is in him. I've often thought of that as a comforting thing. Eudicus had a life and he was restored. That's wonderful. And I believe that sometimes we, we know that young people, they may come under the influence of things outside.
But if the truth is presented.
No, Paul kept on ministering even after he Utica spell. We read that Paul went back up and he continued.
They didn't give up Paul's ministry. They didn't say, well, now Eudicus wasn't interested in this and he fell. So therefore we're going to have someone else speak. We're going to have another ministry. No, they continued with the same truth, but he was restored. And I feel that we can go on this way to continue on in the truth that the Lord has given us from His word as to gathering to His name outside the camp.
And in separation from the world. And it may be that some of the young for a while are not too interested.
But we looked at the Lord, where there's real life. If God had worked, God will work.
And they will be restoration and perhaps to enter into this truth more fully.
As time goes on, well, may we learn from these few windows that we've had brought before us.
That the Lord's heaven.
Three Resurrections from the dead
Address—E. Wakefield
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Morning in the barbershop there was an.
There was a property of Time magazine which the Barber drew our attention to and it said is God coming? I think it said is God coming alive again?
Well, there's a verse that I was reading in the 13th chapter of Acts. It says, but God raised him from the dead. What a wonderful thing tonight it is that we have a living Savior, but God raised him from the dead. I'd like to speak tonight on the three persons that the Lord Jesus raised from the dead.
In the gospel, when he was here on earth, three persons.
That the Lord Jesus raised from the dead. Each of these incidents we have, I believe, many valuable lessons to learn. I think they're very blessed to see how God teaches us and these three occasions, many truths in connection with you and with me and our Christian lives. First one, of course, is in the first chapter of Mark's gospel. We will not read the whole thing.
We know, I'm sure we all know this very well.
But it's really the end of the chapter.
We start reading from the 35th verse.
On the 35th verse of Mark chapter 5.
While he yet spake, there came from the ruler of the synagogue's house certain which said, Thy daughter is dead. Why troubles thou the master any further? As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, he says under the ruler of the synagogue. But you're not afraid, only believe.
And he suffered no man to follow him, save Peter and James.
John the brother of James, and he cometh to the House of the ruler of the synagogue, and seeth of. And then this wept and wailed bravely. And when he was come in, he said unto them, Why make ye this ado, and weep? The damsel is not dead, but sleepless. And they laughed into scorn when he had put them all out.
He take it the father and the mother of the damsel, and them that were with him.
And Andrew at the end where the damsel was lying, and he took her by, they took the damsel by the hand, and said unto her.
Till I see a cumai which has been interpreted damsel, I say unto thee, Arise.
And straight where the damsel arose and warps, for she was of the age of 12 years.
And they were astonished with a great astonishment, and he charged them straightly that no man should know it, and commanded that something should be given her to eat. Well, I believe just quickly to look at the earlier verses. There verse 35 we have man's reason why trouble is out of master any further.
As far as this world is concerned, death made it impossible for anything to be done, he thought. Why trouble us, thou?
The Master any further that would be bring before us man's reason then in the 40 is 1St And they laughed in the scorn that would bring before us man's unbelief. And we notice what the Lord Jesus did, He put them all out and tells us.
In the 40th verse they allowed him to storm, but when he had put the mall out, he taketh the father and the mother of the damsel, and then we were with him and enters in where the damsel was lying. Here we have the Lord Jesus in the presence of death. You know, it's a wonderful thing to think of this. Many of us here have convective Funeral services.
But the Lord Jesus never conducted a funeral service.
There's no record in the Scriptures of the Lord Jesus ever taking a funeral service because death could not be in his presence. He never conducted a funeral service, and here was the Son of God in the presence of death. There he stood, the Son of God, all those who with unbelief were put out.
They were all put out, you know, maybe as Christians.
We have, we have unbelief. Don't we think that God can only do certain things?
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We sometimes limit God, don't we? I'm sure there's maybe mothers and fathers here, like many of us. It was hard ache over our children and we just wonder what will happen to these children? What is going to happen? Maybe we limit God and we think how hard it is to see our children going off into the world, giving up and throwing everything overboard and going out into the world and the devil uses these things.
To the start as each one of us that isn't the fact aren't their parents here. And I speak for myself too.
We're discouraged about our children. Maybe some of them don't live up to what we think is are the standard.
And we get very discouraged and the devil uses these things to bring more discouragement into our lives if he can. How nice it is to know that Jesus is with us, but he's able to bring blessing to our children if we will but believe and trust Him and so.
We noticed this girl was dead.
And all each one of us were Christians. This was our portion, was it not? Once we were dead, we were dead spiritually. We had no life, but Jesus crossed our pathway. How blessed that was. And our experience that Jesus came where we were, came to the very place we were, where we were in our death. And it tells us here in this 41St verse. And he took the devil. I took these dams. Oh, pardon me by the.
What a wonderful thing this is. This was personal contact with Christ. He took the damsel by the hand. Oh, now we have something different here with a called hand, a hand that was called and death. And the great hand of Jesus takes that hand. Oh what a wonderful thing. Now we have a personal contact with this poor dead girl. This is what happened to us, beloved. We were dead and the blessed Savior.
Reached for his great hand of power and took our hands, and we had personal contact with Christ.
Maybe there's some young person here tonight, but he says that I don't enjoy the Christian life. Why? When I was a boy in Sunday school, I accepted the Lord. I believe these things that I haven't got this kind of joy. I don't enjoy the Bible. I don't enjoy prayer. I don't enjoy being at the prayer meeting or the Bible readings. Maybe you've never had personal contact with Christ.
Now I speak with respect, and I'm sure you'll.
Forgive me for saying these things, beloved, but there's many young people I'm sure that come to our meetings who've never had personal contact with Christ. They have a sort of a head belief they were brought up with only natural that the human mind, you know, we know can't enter into these things as we can who have the Spirit of God. We know that. But the human mind can grasp certain things like John 316 that can.
Verse in John 524 But have you had personal contact with Christ? Has Christ touched you? Has the Lord touched your heart? Has the Lord brought you into blessings? And so he took her by the hand, and he spoke to her and said, Damsel, I say unto thee, arise. He was speaking directly to this girl. Oh beloved, how wonderful is the Lord Jesus has spoken to us personally.
He said I say unto thee, arrive. I notice what happened in this 42nd verse. And straightway the damsel arose and walked. This is the first thing we have and this first instance of of a resurrection from the dead. We have life and we have walk. This is exactly, I believe what follows the Christians, the Sinner who's who's brought the Christ, the Sinner who's brought to the Lord Jesus.
Has life in Christ. The first thing he does is he walks, the Lord said to many whom he gave health and raised up from their sickness. Take up thy bed and walk. Wasn't that nice? Take up thy bed and walk. He gave that person the power that was hopeless and helpless and weak. He gave them the power to stand up and to walk and saw this dead person.
Who was raised from the dead? He gave her power. Straight wing. Oh, we believe in straightway conversion.
Believe American be saved instantly. One simple look at her face of Christ brings instant life. Salvation instantly. Straightway the very voice of Jesus reached her stone. I say unto thee, Arise. And straightway the damsel arose and walk where she was at the age of 12 years. And they were astonished with a great astonishment. They charged them straightly, that no man.
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Should know it and come out of something to be given her to eat. That is exactly the Christian life beloved. Notice death, then life hurt life, second walk and the third food. What a wonderful thing life, walk and food doesn't. That's exactly what happened to each one of us all I remember.
In my own case, the Bible became a new book.
The Bible, the surprise. Oh how I have no use for this book. This was a bad book, but I was dead. The book wasn't dead, but I was dead. But all, how wonderful was the Bible? I can see it now in my early days when I first came to Christ. The Bible beside my bed, waking up in those early morning at early morning in the month of May.
And the sun was streaming in the window and waiting for this. They all booked the wonderful book, The Word of God.
At least one of Christians. We need this. Not only that we have the life, but we really know the Lord. We have the life.
And we can walk for the Lord, but we also need food. And I want to speak to the young Christian and connection with this food. We must have this food just as a baby. There's many young people in this meeting here. I understand with young children you have to feed those children. And God's children must be fed. And if you don't read your Bible, you'll never grow.
All how few have time to read the Bible you know?
In the days of you read the book of Exodus, you notice what Pharaoh was a picture of the devil there. He took away the straw from children of Israel, took away their straw and said, I want you to make the same number of bricks, but no straw. And why did he say in that? Because he said they are idle. They are idle.
And that's why they want to go 3 days into the wilderness to worship their God, their idol. They have nothing to do. This is exactly what the devil has done in this age, in Beloved. There's nobody in this room can deny this. There's nobody here in this room can deny what I'm going to say now. There's never been more time for men. There is today. The business hours are shorter.
The holidays are longer, 3 weeks a month, all kinds of long weekends, Saturdays, no business.
And yet there is no time to read the Bible. Why? Because the devil says they are idol. Their idols take away their strong, they have no time. We said this in the Montreal meeting and after the meeting three young men came to me and they said, brother, that's true, we have no time. One of them went so far as to say this.
The boys in the college where I go, unsaved young men who cursed and swear and drink and attend all night parties, they have time for their all night parties. But we have no time. No time to read our Bibles. We have no time because the devil is taking away our strong. Isn't this a fact the devil has first drawn? There's no time for food, but the Lord commanded that something should be given.
And we have something in this book which is food for our souls. Young Christians, read your Bibles, put the Lord 1St. I'm going to say something else that I've been sometimes challenged. We're saying, but I believe if you put the Lord first, you'll never lose. You'll never be able to stand before the Lord and say to him, I put you first.
When I was down in that world, I put you first.
I read your words first, I prayed first, and because of that I lost.
I lost the life. God will never under any circumstance allow one of his children to ever say those words. He will bless us in the beginning, the first words of the Bible. In the beginning, God, seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteous, and all these things shall be added unto you. Young people, you have to study, you go to school, you must do your studies, but put the Lord first.
And your studies 2nd. And God will bless you in this world of reason.
This world of doubt and this world of unbelief, Man's reason put it aside.
And put the Lord 1St and He will bless you. He commanded her to get something to eat.
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So we have here life, walk, and food. Now let's turn to the 7th chapter of Luke, where we have the second. I think it's very wonderful to see how we advance here in connection with this second man, the young man here.
Verse 11 of Luke Chapter 7.
I cannot pass. The day after they went into a city called Maine, and many of his disciples went with him, and much people. Now when he came now to the gate of the city, the whole there was a dead man carried out.
The only son of his mother. Isn't this a beautiful expression? The only son of his mother. Now who does? Who does? This young man, that of course, the only son of his mother meets at the gate of the city, beloved, he met the only son of his father.
Wasn't this beautiful? The only son of his mother, a dead young man, comes into contact with the only son of his father. And what happened? And she was a widow, and much people of the city was with her. And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said unto her, weak not here was a woman a widow.
You know, Clarence London, my brother, points out that the widow speaks of the penance and the woman speaks to weakness.
Was a woman weak, A woman of dependence? What was her dependence? Her boy, her son? But her son was dead. She had lost her dependence and how weak she was. And the Lord said to her, weak not. What a strange thing for the Lord to say to a broken hearted widow woman. Her boy lying dead and his, his coffin being carried out to burial. Weak not.
Was this reason? Is it? Will this be a reasonable thing to say? No, but.
Oh, how blessed it was when the Lord came and said to that woman, sweet not. And then it says in the next verse, and he came and touched the beard. That is to say, I suppose the crossing that held this young man a prisoner, he was held in that that coffin. Oh, what is holiness? Is it not the unsaved maybe in our own family.
They're unsaved. What is told there's something that's holding them prisoners.
Touch that he touched the very thing that tell this young man.
Is it nice when the Lord touches those things that hold us down, that hold us prisoners? The Lord touched that very thing. And then it said, It says here in the 14th verse. And they that bear him stood still. And he said, Young man, I say unto thee, Arise now what happens, It says.
In the 15th version, that was dead. Stand up and began to speak. Oh, here's another step. First of all, there was life, and then there was. Second, there was.
The walk and 3rd there was there was a food and now he began to see what is this? This is so important, beloved, he confessed. A big charge to my soul, or rather a confession. And how many there are among us, I suppose right in this room tonight there's young people.
Who have never confessed? The Lord, I suppose there's many who attend our meetings who never confess. The Lord people say, is that young man saved? Or they say, oh, sure, he's saying he must be saved. He comes to all the meetings, He's always at the meetings, he's at the conference. There he is, but he never confesses. The Lord here was a young man. He began to speak.
Isn't that nice when the Lord gives us life to speak? All the devil hates this.
The devil will contest this. He'll place this. He'll the man that we keep our mouths closed.
He'll say, you know you're nervous, you're a nervous type, just keep quiet. God knows if you're saved, you're not how nice it is to confess the Lord. I like to suggest to any young man or young lady in this room who have received the Lord Jesus as their Savior and who have got life and who know they're saved and who has never confessed the Lord, to bow your head and ask God to give you courage.
Tonight to confess with your most.
That Jesus Christ is your Lord and your Savior. Young boys and young girls, confess the Lord. This young man, he sat up ahead, right? He had been dead, but he had life. And he began to speak and these beautiful words, and he delivered him to his mother.
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Oh, doesn't this touch our heart? What a wonderful savior. He doesn't say to this young man, follow me. He doesn't say to this young man, come after me. But he delivered him back to his mother. He gave him back. He knew the Lord knew this woman's aching heart. He knew her dependence on this young man. He knew that this woman this year, what a woman needed her boy. And he graciously delivered him back to his mother. What a wonderful savior.
He gave them back to his mother. How gracious, how good, how kind, how loving and how faithful the blessed Lord was. He began to speak, Oh, isn't it nice when we see a person and we have a case down in New Brunswick, down in McAdam, NB. But man, it was a drunkard, the village drunk he was called.
All he the Lord met him the Lord.
The Lord deliver them from drink, and the Lord delivered him from tobacco, and he began to speak. And the very men in the town of McAdams who were afraid of Dave McKay are now still afraid of them, but not for the same reason. They're not afraid of them knocking them down with his big fists anymore, but they're afraid that he might speak to them about Jesus. They're still afraid of them.
Oh, he began to speak. You began to speak. Yes, you began to speak about Jesus.
You have that joy in your soul. Some of us have that. Today as we met the Barber and the Barber shop, we found a child of God. My brother introduced me to a postman who belonged to Christ, and we stood there on the lawn with his mail back there as we spoke about the Son of God. Oh, this man, this postman, he was rejoicing in the Lord. He was Speaking of Christ.
Or do we speak about Christ? That we speak about Christ? What are what are we speaking? What is our conversation based on the politics of the land?
How to make the United States a better country? How to make Los Angeles a cleaner city? Is that our ambition on life? No, beloved, we're not here for that. The Lord has called it out of darkness into his marvelous life to be a testimony to a rejected place to replace. This world is cast out. You and I are to be a testimony to Him to begin to speak. Young boys, young men, you young gospel preachers here.
Speak well of Christ. Preach Christ. I was so happy the other day at the conference when they mentioned this. And I I say this with respectful other not to speak unkindly, to bless many of our beloved brothers who use that expression of receiving Jesus Christ as Savior. How nice it is to give them this full title. He's the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the Lord Jesus Christ. God hath made that same Jesus.
Whom he crucified, both Lord and Christ. I'd like to encourage the young man here. You know, the devil is a real person. The devil is a real person. And he tries to keep young men with their mouths closed tight. Has God-given you a gift? What an honor it is what I say. What an honor it is to be able to stand up and speak well of Christ in this poor world. What an honor is.
We had a dozen degrees after our names. That's nothing compared to the honor that God has conferred upon some by His grace to speak well of the man this world cast, said, and spit upon and crucified. What an honor we think. Young men, young brothers.
May God help you.
As the older brothers are taken away, if the Lord doesn't come, May God give you courage and faithfulness. Not to soft pedal the gospel, not to put the pedal on. Some are putting the soft pedal on. Oh how nice it is to preach the gospel of God's wondrous love has to speak well of Christ. This young man, he got life, he began to speak.
Oh, how nice. Maybe there's some young man or some young boy or some young girl in this room tonight.
Who will begin to speak and confess the Lord Jesus Christ as their own Savior? Now the third is this blessed story in the 11Th chapter of John's Gospel.
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And here we have life again, and this time liberty, Life and liberty.
We'll start reading with the 34th verse.
The Lord is speaking and he says.
John 1134 Where have ye laid him? They said unto him, Lord, come and see. Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, behold how he loved them all. Beloved, isn't this a wonderful thing? Behold how he loved us. Isn't this a beautiful thing? Behold the Jews that behold how he loved him. They knew that the Lord loved.
Man, Lazarus, and now each one of us who belong to Christ tonight and can say of ourselves, behold how he loved me, behold how he loved me. Isn't that blessed? Now these things are not new, but the Bible is such a wonderful book. We can speak about these things time again. Behold as you look into that looking glass in our homes and look and see ourselves in that.
Be able to say, Behold, behold how he loved me, or doesn't touch our hearts. Behold a wonderful love, the love of Christ, behold how he loved me. And some of them said, Could not this man which opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have died? Jesus therefore again grown in himself, cometh of the grave with a cave.
And a stone lay upon us.
Jesus said, Take ye away. The stone Mars of the sister of him that was dead said unto him, Lord, by this time he stink of for he has been dead 4 days. That is, he was dead past the resurrection day. One day passed the third day hopelessly dead. This man was really dead.
Even if all.
From the order from that grave would show he was a dead man. He had died, He was really dead, He had gone beyond the resurrection thing. Jesus said unto her, verse 40 said I not unto thee, that if thou would believe, thou should have see the glory of God. Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid, and Jesus was up his eyes and said.
Father, I thank you that thou hast heard me.
And I knew that Thou hearest me always, but because of the people which stand by, I said it, that they may believe that Thou hast sent me.
When he has thus spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. In the first case he said, Damn the lie Santa, they arrived. The second case he said young man arrived, but now he mentions his friends name. Oh isn't it wonderful to be a friend of Jesus and all he knows our names. Lazarus, I say unto thee, come forth.
Lazarus come forth, and he that was dead came forth bound.
Hands and foot with the grave. Pause. Now here was a man who had life. This man had life the very minute that word of Jesus. Notice he called his name too, I believe, because if he had just said in that cemetery come forth, all the graves would have opened.
So he distinctly calls this man by his name, Lazarus, come forth, and he that was dead came forth bound. Notice now it tells us here hand and foot. Well, maybe some of us tonight in this room are bound hands. What does this speak of? Service for the Lord, Bound hands and foot. We can't walk for the Lord.
How many Christians there are like that? They don't even know they're saved.
If you ask them, are you saved, they say, I hope so.
If you ask them, are your sins forgiven? They say I certainly hope they are.
But they never come to the place where they know they're bound hand and foot. How many dear Christians, how many dear people of God tonight are bound hand and foot, bound by the systems of men, bound with the grave clothes? That's what Lazarus was. He was bound hand and foot.
I know that we noticed that everything that men could do, the Lord allowed them to do. There was only one thing that they couldn't do, and that is they couldn't give life. He gave life. They could roll away the stone. A man can roll away a stone, a man can undo grave clothes, but a man can't give life. And how life? This is encouraging, for we were Christians in connection with.
00:30:11
Serving the Lord. Maybe there's a young man tonight in this room who's maybe discouraged.
Maybe we don't see very much blessing, we read. And the press a great blessing.
Some some creatures get great blessings. May we get discouraged and say we don't see you this kind of blessing. There's only one who can give life and that is the Son of God himself. He's the one that gave gave life. He gave Lazarus this life and he says to he says to them, loose him and let him go.
Now where do we get loose beloved? Well, I believe in the assembly meeting. I believe in the assembly meetings or the Lord Jesus is in the midst. Now do we believe this? Do we really believe is this is only a doctrine and pretty easily to take Matthew 18 and 20 and poke that 100 times a year until we really believe it is. It has established fact that when we come into this room on Wednesday night and Friday night.
Is it a real, true, honest fact?
The Lord is in the midst. There's this only a doctrine that we have some idea we have on our mind if we do not true, we like to say it because it encourages is it a real fact that when we come together, we come to meet a person, we come to meet the Lord and if we if we could really see him as a man in the room like the spiritualist did in the 20th chapter of John.
And we walked in through that door and looked into the very midst, as it were. We saw the Lord Jesus there personally, and we looked at his hands, and we saw the nail print.
The seat inside the Nail Prince, they looked at his side and we saw the fear market as we walked in. He raised his eyes and smiled and said, I'm so glad you've come tonight to be with me for this hour. Wouldn't that be a compensation? Wouldn't our hearts rejoice if the Lord Jesus met us and spoke to us like that? Well, I believe he is in the midst, beloved, I really believe that when we come together.
The Lord is in the midst. The Lord is here. The Lord is here in the midst. Do we believe that? If we really believe that, now I know there's mothers and fathers. We all, we had children too. We have to have our turn. Going to the prayer meeting and the Bible reading. One of us had to babysit.
You have to do that too. Some people have to work at night, but I'm in the state, generally speaking, those that are free.
Do we find ourselves gathered around the person of Christ at the prayer meeting? You know, you go to a Bible reading. There's generally a lot of people there. But when you go to the prayer meeting, the powerhouse, how many missed the powerhouse, the time of prayer? So few seem to come to the prayer meeting. And sometimes the prayer meeting lags on. And I don't say this to be critical, but sometimes at a care meeting, a dozen brothers can all speak and keep us so late there. And we're so.
Waiting to go home, to go to bed, and they talk and talk and talk. But the next night is prayer meeting night and the mysteriously quiet. They have nothing to say. Wasn't it nice to pray, Beloved? We come together to pray, to pray and to lay our request before our Lord and to pray. There's so much to pray for, so many things to pray for. Well, the Bible reading where the grave clothes are taken off.
Where we find I remember your pardon the personal reference when I was a young Christian, a boys in the office.
Just to go to the next room where there was a man who led me to Christ and who who much more about the Bible than I did. And they said to him, we want to ask you a question. If you commit a sin today and you were killed by a car, where would you spend eternity? And he said, I would spend eternity with the Lord Jesus. Now I didn't know anything about this. Then they came to me and said.
If you were to commit a sin today and die.
Where would you spend eternity? And I said in hell. Well, they said you fellas better get together.
He tells us the next room, He go to heaven. You tell us you go to hell, What's the matter with you? Well, this dear Christian explained to me then that if I really belong to the Lord Jesus, I possess the eternal life. I was a child of God. I was saved for eternity and the brave clothes were taken off. How wonderful it is to have those brave clothes taken off. We sit on the feet corner.
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Home one night by the grace of God preaching the gospel and we said, and we trust the Lord let us to say it. We like to call tonight from the Roman Catholic Bible, John 5 verse 24 of those that wonderful verse where the Lord Jesus was speaking. And when we got back after the after the meeting was closing up, it was a young couple came. I suppose they were in their 30s young married couple and they said, oh Sir, we were so.
Hear you quote from our Bible tonight. And I said, Isn't that a wonderful verse? And we put her again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me has eternal life, and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life. They said, Sir, those are wonderful words. And I said to them.
Have you got eternal life? And they said we hope so.
Do you really believe that the Lord Jesus Christ died for your sins on the cross of Calvary? They said, why, of course we do. We certainly do. Then we said, listen to the verse of games and we caught it again and we said, I can say I have eternal life. Why can't you say that if you really believe in him? And they said, we can't say that, Sir. We prefer to say we hope so. Well, we had the grave clothes on and maybe there's somebody in this room tonight has the grave.
Until you receive the Lord Jesus, you know you have, you know you love him, you know he's your Savior. You know if he walks into this room, you'd arise out of that chair and say, beloved Savior, you died for me, and you bowed on his presence and worship him and praise him. Maybe you say I don't.
I can't say I'm saved. I can't say my sins are forgiven. Oh, the Lord tells us and his word that the believer has eternal life, the believer hasn't. And my sheep hear my voice and I know that. Isn't that blessing? You know, there's many of us say these words. Isn't it good to know the Lord Jesus? And it is wonderful. We can praise God for that. But there's something better than that. Something's better than that.
What is that? You're saying that the Lord Jesus knows me? Isn't that far better as I know Him? It's wonderful to know him, but it's more wonderful than he knows me and knows all about me and loves me. That's the same. What a savior. And so this, this man Lazarus now.
He gets liberty, he gets liberty, He gets liberty from the very words, the very mouth of Christ.
A little Sam and let him go. Now if we just turn to the 12Th chapter, we have another thing.
We go on now from from the beginning and we had death, then we had life, then we had walk, then we had food, then we had the young man speaking and now we have this man that loose. Now he's loose. Notice what he does in the 12Th chapter of John, this well known chapter verse one then Jesus.
Six days before the Passover came to Bethany.
Didn't, didn't go to Jerusalem, didn't go to that great city. He went to that little place called Bethany. There he was at the place called Bessemer, a place where he was welcomed, a place where his friends were and and tells us again where Lazarus was, which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead.
Again, it's mentioned, this man's name is mentioned. The connection was one who was raised. All beloved Saints of God, do we believe this?
We have been raised from the dead, that is the faith, spiritual death.
Each one of us have received life through the Lord Jesus Christ, and we've been raised from the dead.
And only what it says in the next verse. There they made him a supper. I like that word. They, they were all of one mind and one heart for Christ. There they made him a supper. Mary and Martha and Lazarus, they were together. They were one mind for Christ. How nice it is to see, brethren with one mind for Christ. There they made him a supper.
And that tells us.
But Lazarus, there they met us having a Martha serve, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with them. Isn't this encouraging? This is very encouraging. I think it's very encouraging for the sisters especially and for those who never take part in the meeting. Here was Martha serving. He was serving in the 10th chapter, Luke in the wrong way, but here she's serving. What was what was Lazarus doing? He was sitting at the table. What was he doing at the table, beloved?
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Enjoying Christ that's what he was doing he was just sitting in there and he was looking on that blessed one and he was just enjoying his company. There's many don't take part in the meeting. There's many never give out a hymn as many probably never stand up to prey on the Lords day morning and the sisters of course don't but you dear sisters, can't you just be like Lazarus and sit there at the table and enjoy Christ. That's what Lazarus was doing he was enjoying the company of.
There he was. He had been raised from the dead. I can see him almost as he sat there and his eyes riveted on that blessed man. He had raised him from the dead. He had brought him under the grave. Well, mighty look upon him, an adoration and praise. And well may we, beloved, who have been raised out of a spiritual death on the way to hell.
Well, may we gaze with wonder on that blessed man who loved us and gave himself for us. Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him, then took Mary a pound of wine from the spike in our very costly.
If you just notice now the fifth verse Judas is speaking. Why was not this ointment sorrow for 300 pence and given to the poor? Oh that notice the difference what? How God valued it very constantly. What does Judah say 300 pence? That's what he said worth 300 pence. Why the Lord had been assumed to be sold for 30 pieces of silver. That's what this world thinks of Christ 310.
All young men or young sister here tonight, if you live for Christ, you can't expect the world to clap and applaud you. They'll say you're a fool.
Say you're stupid to spend your time serving the Lord. The world never puts any value on Christ.
300 pence that miserable Judah said, why was not this this ointment so for 300 cents, but God shows he's a hypocrite. In the very next verse he said he didn't care for the poor. Judas had no respect or notice there for the poor, nor do you have any respect for Christ.
And these people in the world that say what are these missionaries going to China for an Africa for an India for wasting their time?
Do they care about the people wasting their time? No. What is their object of enmity? It's Christ. They have no use for Christ. They have no time for Christ. Everything that's done for the Lord Jesus and this world to the man of the world is a waste of time. It's just a pure waste. They think, oh, how sad this is. But isn't it nice that God said it was very costly?
And he tells us.
Then took Mary a pound of ointment. Why the Lord has even measured the weight of that ointment. He tells us it was a it was a pound. It was a real pound of ointment. I read someplace I pass it on. I enjoyed it about the women in the East. They used to they didn't have hope chefs like the girls have today, they had.
A box of ointments, and they kept it beside them wherever they went, and when they found the man who won their hearts, they took the ointment.
And they put it on their head as he, as Mary did in the in the book of Mark, I think it is the 26th of Matthew.
And on his feet. And when they did that, they showed.
So that man.
That he had won their heart. Isn't that beautiful when Mary did that to the Lord Jesus?
He said as much as this. Here's the man who's won my heart for love. It's only an illustration. I read it and I enjoyed it.
As he won our heart, has he won our heart Very costly, all this dear woman. I wonder what she paid for this ointment. Very costly. God said he appreciated, he appreciated this. God appreciated it. He's recorded in his word and the Lord said wherever the gospel is preached, what this woman has done shall be told tonight in 1969, nearly 2000 years after the Lord said these words were Spain of the game.
The story of this dear woman devoted to Christ who took this very costly ointment.
And poured it upon him, his feet. Notice what it says in this third verse.
And noise is the feet of Jesus. You have to get down right to His feet. Isn't it nice to be at His feet? Mary's always at the Lords feet. She was there in the 10th chapter of Luke. She heard His word, she heard his words. And you know the Lord made a remarkable statement of Mary and that day or to Martha, He said that good thing.
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Shall not be taken away from her, you know, and Glory, when we get there, we're going to meet Mary A Bethany and she's going to be able to tell us exactly what the Lord told her in the 10th salute. It was hers. He was never going to lose it. She was never going to lose it. And I believe from that we learned this problem, everything that we really enjoy of Christ down here will never lose it. It's ours for eternity.
I was married who sat at his feet? And here she's down again at the blessed feet of the Lord Jesus. And it says she wipes his feet with her hands. What does her hair speak of? Her glory? And she laid her glory at those blessed feet.
He laid that glory of hers, that was her glory, but on the presence of that Blessed One.
She found one more glorious, and she laid her glory at those blessed people. How beautiful those feet were, beloved. How beautiful and marked gospel to see those blessed feet. And they took that precious save your previous land unwanted, his past unheard by earthly smiles.
LED only to the cross, those lovely feet of the Son of God. Which man dares a nail to the cross of Calvary? As much as I say we'll stop those feet, we'll nail those feet to the cross, they won't be able to walk anymore. But all beloved, He was raised from the dead, and that blessed One now still walk. And he talks with us, does He not? He walks with me and he talks with me, and he tells me.
I am his own. How glorious.
They couldn't stop him. He lived. Our Savior lived. He wiped his feet with her hands and the house was filled with the order of the ointment. How blessed that was, I suppose as those people walked out of that house that day and the door opened and that order went out into the street, they say, what's going on in this house? What's going on here today? These people that walk out, what is this odor that's on them? Or they would say.
This is in the house, Jesus is there and Mary's taken the ointment of poured on his feet in his head and the house is just filled with the order of the ointment. Oh how beautiful this is and how nice on Lords Day morning when the breaking of bread meeting closes for us to walk out and have with us that order of the person of Christ still on us. So the world will say, who are these people? They're so happy.
They're smiling. They're rejoicing. Who are these people in this poor, sad world with sickness and death all around? Who are these happy, smiling people?
Or they've been just a few Christians and they've been with Jesus. They've been there for an hour and a half in the company of Jesus, remembering him in death. The house was filled with the order of the ointment. Well, this is this is very, very precious, is it not? Now we have we have here worship life, a man who was raised from the dead of worshiper now.
Here we have another step in the Christian life. He's a worshiper. Oh, are you a worshiper?
Are you found here in the Lord today morning? Is it your accustomed to sleep in Sunday morning you are you found here remembering the Lord and death? Are you found here gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to remember him and death? Are you a worshiper of the Son of God? He's worthy of our worship. How blessed it is and the last point we have is.
Is testimony. Here was a man who went from his worship. We have last his testimony.
The ninth verse Much people of the Jews therefore knew that he was there.
And they came not for Jesus sake, only they might see.
Lazarus also again God repeats this, whom he had raised from the dead.
It always comes back to this. It reminds the children of Israel how many times God reminded those people that they be delivered from the land of Egypt. And in this case Lazarus again is mentioned, whom he raised from the dead. But the chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death because of by reason of him. Many of the Jews went away and believed on Jesus. Here was a man who had life.
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Testimony. A man with a testimony. How blessed. This is why they said.
Let's get rid of Lazarus too. Isn't that what the world would like to do? And the world is going to soon get rid of us. The Lord's going to come. The Lord's going to come. Men are reaching out for the moon. I was thinking of a man is reaching out for the moon. The lesser light. The lesser light was the rule of light. The moon is connected with the night, and you and I are the children of the day. We're not going to the moon, beloved. We're going to the SON, the sun.
Going to the sun, we're going to pass that moon so fast we won't even see it. We're going to the sun. We don't belong to this world. The moon belongs to the world. The lesser light to rule a night. But God says here, not of the night, you're the children of the day, not of darkness, but children of the day. We're going to the sun. And so the people said, let's kill this summer. Let's kill this man. What was Lazarus then? He was.
Associated with Christ. What an honor, beloved, He was associated with Jesus.
And the same world that said there's no place for Jesus, said there's no place for this man Lazarus. Let us kill him.
Because by reason of him what a testimony or we would cover that testimony that men would say because of that man people are going away and believing on Jesus. Is it true of us? Is it true? Does the world see Christ on earth, a hungry, dark, dismal, thin purse earth with death all around us, war and destruction and misery and man getting darker and darker?
And the world collapsed in all around us. What is the world looking for?
And Christians, Christ, that's what the world looks for. And you and me and we looked at God, they could see Christ. Not religion, not people, sanctimony, it's the long faces. But something in our stalls, something in our lives, something in our lives that they'll say these people are real, they belong to Christ. They belong to Christ. He's won them, He's captured them.
They're sincere people. They belong to Jesus. He's won their harm. And so this man was a man with a testimony. And so we have to go back before we stop.
We have that three of them were dead. They're all dead, but they met Jesus and they got life, life with a walk, life with food. Life was began to speak of confession. Speaking of confession, then we have liberty, then we have worship and then we have testimony. The whole Christian life is wrapped up and these three glorious resurrections from the dead. Each one got Harter the 12 year old girl she.
The young man, he was being dead and was carried to the grave, but the last man was dead for four days. And maybe there's somebody in this room 12 years of age. You were young, your mother and father to you. But the Lord and they said, I feel that this heart is getting soft. Oh, you know, I, I want to say this, our time is just about up. You know, some of us, when we get older, we get harder.
Oh, let us.
Let us, beloved, get soft. Let us be soft for Christ.
Love of God may touch our hearts. Our children, when they're young, their hearts are tender. We tell them the story of the male, we tell them the story of the crown of thorns, and they weep. Their little hearts are touched. But when they get older, it's a sad thing. We're ashamed to cry. We're ashamed to have tears in our eyes for the melting story of the love of Christ, the melting story of the love of God.
And so these little 12 year olds, when they're young and tender, then they get to be like the young man.
18 years old. If they're not saved, their hearts are getting harder and higher and it's harder to get them up to the gospel meeting. They say I'm too big to go to Sunday, so I'm not a kid any longer. I don't want to go to city school. They're beginning to kick over the phrases at 18, but then when they get to be like Lazarus.
They're dead 4 days. Nothing seems to move them. You tell them the story of the love of Christ.
And they just walk away. Their hearts are hardened. Is there a boy tonight in this room just like this, or a girl? You've never received the Lord Jesus, You've come tonight. Or what have you got in this world? What have you got? Nothing, absolutely nothing, if you have Christ. And so bless his word, and may he exalt that blessed One when we try to present tonight that blessed Savior, that lovely man who loved us and gave himself.
Gospel
Gospel—P.L. Johnson
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I want to read in First Timothy chapter 2.
One Timothy Chapter 2. We'll read the entire chapter in order to have the context before us.
I exhort, therefore, that first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving us thanks be made for all men, for kings, and for all that are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.
For this is good and acceptable in the sight of 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 man, the man Christ Jesus.
Who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time?
Whereunto I am ordained a preacher and an apostle, I speak the truth in Christ in line on a teacher of the Gentiles, and faith and Verity.
I will therefore that men pray everywhere.
Lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting.
In like manner also that women adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with broided hair or gold or pearls or constantly array, but which becometh women professing godliness with good works.
Let the woman learn in silence with all subjections.
But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor do you serve authority over the man, but to be in silence.
For Adam was first formed, then Eve, and Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.
Notwithstanding, she shall be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety.
We have an unusual expression found in this first epistle of Timothy.
A title given to God that when I say unusual, it's not bound to frequently in the word of God, but it's not unusual in the sense that it gives a false or we might say a little known impression of God. It really is an expression that gives his character and attitude toward man. In verse three we read of God our Savior.
Like to bring before us this evening something in connection with this thought of God, our Savior. We might say the Savior God.
The Savior of God. You know, there are those who feel in their hearts and there might be those in this room this evening who think of God more and the aspect of a helper.
One might say, well, doesn't God want to help man? Yes. But he's not presented as the help of God. He's the Savior God, and there's a difference.
We know that it is a common saying for man to say that God helps those who help themselves.
And so they think of themselves working along with God to attain their salvation, or at least attain the betterment of man that we find in Scripture that God is not presented as a helper. It isn't that he comes along as a crutch for God, for man to use in his betterment. God is a savior, God.
It's a very humbling thing, but wholesome for one to be acquainted with the way that the Bible, the Word of God, presents man. A picture of man is not a very pretty picture. We know that the object of man is to beautify things in this scene, to sort of cover up the ugliness of sin and what man really is.
That we find in the word of God that it's not a very nice picture that is presented.
Of man in all of his sin and degradation. The Bible is very faithful. You know, there are those who attack the Bible on the ground that there are things written in it that should not be spoken of in in company, so to speak. I remember a man saying one time he says that he was an infidel or he claimed to be. He was speaking against the word of God, was talking about the word of God.
And he brought an indictment against it. As to some of the things recorded, well.
You know, God is very faithful and God presents things just as they are. And I am sure that in the reading of the Word of God we find what man is and it's not, as it were, covered up, not tried to be glossed over in any way. We see that man is one who is sinful.
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One who is unclean, one who desires his own will. And in fact, everything that we read in the law that God said that man should not do, they're the very things that he finds he wants to do. It's a real discovery to the soul of any individual when he comes to the conclusion.
And sees that the very things that God says he ought not to be are the very things.
That he likes is his nature goes after them, and the very things that God says one ought to be.
Are the three things that one does not desire to do or to be that's really the nature and character of man. Well, in contrast to that we have God spoken of in the first chapter of Timothy that I'd like to just refer to to a moment.
The.
Where we have God spoken of in verse 11 according to the glorious gospel of the Gospel of the glory.
Of the blessed God.
The gospel of the glory of the blessed God we might speak a contrast this with man man we know is is a in a sense of miserable creature, a miserable creature, and he might have a little fleeting glimpse of happiness in some farmer fashion through this scene, but by and large, life is made-up of.
Much problems and sorrows and difficulties.
And if one could look over this world tonight.
And not wouldn't have to go very far. I don't think you would have to go beyond the confines of Los Angeles vicinity to find that there is far more evil and unhappiness and sorrow and wickedness and misery than there than there is of joy and happiness.
Man is in a very miserable condition and coming right down to the individuals in this room here this evening.
If you are without the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, I know you are not happy down in your soul.
And everyone in this room who is a child of God can tell you the same thing. But we know that there is no real peace nor joy apart from the knowledge of the love of God as revealed through His beloved Son, and the knowledge that one is really loved of God and a child of God, an object of his love and care, knowing that regardless of the circumstances, regardless of the pathways.
One can be assured of the love of God and the care of God all the way through this scene. And he saves under the uttermost all of those who come unto God by Him, the Lord Jesus. He's the one who will see us all the way through into the very presence of God. What comfort, what peace, and what joy. But this is not in the heart of one who knows not the Lord Jesus, his Savior. And he's miserable.
But here we read about the blessed God.
One in whose presence there is nothing but fullness of joy.
One in whose presence there is nothing of all of that to causes sorrow and sadness that would detract for one moment from from absolute and perfect happiness and joy. That's where he dwells. And that's the, you might say, the condition and circumstances of his of his presence. Let this bless it God. And the most wonderful thing is that he has come out now as the Savior God.
To save you from all of your misery.
To save you from a life of sin and a death in sin.
And an eternity.
In punishment for those sins, the Savior God, the one who dwells in that blessed place of the glory above, the One who knows what real joy, knows what real happiness is, knows what real peace is, knows what real rest is. It's all found there in His presence. He comes out now into this scene as the Savior of God and invites one and all.
Everyone, all men, boys and girls, women and children, everyone invites them all to come.
And to enjoy the blessedness of His presence with Him forever. And of course, there is a way.
And there's only one way, and that's what we have in this passage that we read now. Notice here in the second chapter.
The first few verses that we read where we have the Savior God brought out.
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We see that his desire is that all men.
Should be saved. This is the desire of the heart of God.
The key to this portion is in that fourth verse.
Who will have all men to be saved?
This is the disposition of the heart of God toward man.
Have you ever wondered why it is that man does not have real confidence in God? I have no doubt that what this was introduced into human nature by Satan in the garden when the question was raised as to the love of God. We know that Adam and Eve were placed in that garden and they had everything for their life. There wasn't one thing lacking that was for their good and blessing.
There wasn't anything to marry either. No toil.
No tears, no sweat, nothing. There was only that which would minister to their good and blessing.
And there was only the one test, of course, as to the knowledge, that tree of the knowledge of good and evil that they were told not to eat.
Well, Satan comes and raises a doubt in a question as to the love of God, and he insinuates.
That, after all, God was depriving them of something that was for their good.
That if God really loved them, why would he deprive them of that fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?
Insinuating that God wasn't really for them and he wasn't a God of love and grace.
Well, now that thought has been sewn into the into human nature, the heart of man and rightful This very day one finds that no matter what country you go to, no matter what part of this country or foreign countries, unless one has turned to the Lord Jesus Christ has been converted.
And is a saved soul we find that same attitude of distrust.
Of God and fear of God not really knowing the disposition of the heart of God, thinking that God.
Is a demander.
Looking upon God as one who is seeking to deprive man of that which he really wants to do, which he thinks is for his good. Oh, here we have the disposition of the heart of God. If you want to know what God thought is, it's all men. It's this God's desire is that all men should be saved. God desires that everyone in this room here this evening be saved. He's not against anyone.
God is not against anyone. He desires that all men be saved. Well, someone might say, well, why aren't they all saved?
Oh, as far as God is concerned, He has opened the way, and the disposition of his heart is that.
All may come, and he would have all to be saved. But turn back to Matthew's Gospel.
Chapter 23 We see here why it is that all are not saved in fact.
In Matthew's Gospel we have these in Matthew 23 verse 37.
We have these two things combined.
The attitude of the heart of God is expressed here in the person of the Lord Jesus and also.
Sad to say, the attitude of the heart of man.
Old Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathers their chickens under her wings, and ye would not.
God will have all men to be saved, but why aren't they saved? If you're here tonight unsaved, if you're here tonight without Christ and you cannot say that you are going to share this blessedness with the blessed God, you do not have the assurance of your own soul salvation and in eternity with Christ and the God the Father in heaven.
It is not because God is unwilling that you should be saved, just as the Lord Jesus here said. How often I would have gathered.
All he would have gathered all of the children of Israel there. He would have gathered the mall. He would have loved to have had everyone of them as his own true disciples. But the difficulty was they would not. Man has a will and you have a will. And I'm going to say this to everyone in the room, young people. If you are not the Lord, if you cannot say you're saved, it's because of your own will.
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It's because of your own will. It is not because of any unwillingness on God's part. It's because you just will not.
I can't say why. Oh, it's sad to think that there would be those in their hearts that just will not believe.
They will not come to Christ. Maybe so when the Lord Jesus was here, how often he would have gathered them?
But he says he would not. And the disposition of the heart of God tonight and one marvels at.
That the disposition of the heart of God tonight is still. That He's not willing that any should perish. He still would have all men to be saved. He would have you to be saved.
How many times perhaps the Word of God has spoken to the heart and conscience of an individual, only to have that individual in their heart say I don't want it, I'm not going to have it. And to think of the grace, the long-suffering mercy of God that he would allow that same individual to come back and hear the gospel again.
01 Marvel. And yet one has to confess that it was perhaps true of many of us.
That we heard the gospel before we really came around with our own wills. I don't say that that it was a self willed act, but when our wheels were broken down and we were willing to humble ourselves in the sight of God and take the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior, you won't indeed let apart from salvation in Him.
Not only is it that we would be lost for eternity, but we would have nothing before us but a life of sin and misery in this world, and you can be sure of that.
Wonderful blessed thing it is to be saved when one is young.
Not only that one is saved for eternity, but to be saved for a life down here.
Saved from the pollutions of this world, from the moral corruption, from all that's in the human heart. And the word of God is very plain about that too, you know, And it speaks of my heart and your heart. There is no difference. Regardless of the home into which you were born and in which you were brought up, you have the same heart, the same human heart that is found in the, in the worst, most disrespectful Sinner.
In the city of Los Angeles, the same heart. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked far from within. Out of the heart of man proceed all of those evil things that the Lord spoke about. They proceed out of it. And one who is without the Savior, he is without restraint.
He is without anything other than that wicked, evil heart. And to think of the light.
That one would be LED off into with all of those things characterizing the life, a life of unbelief, a life of sin, of life of having to bear your own burden and your own sorrows and all of these things. I I feel that it is a wonderful thing to be saved while one has a perhaps a few years to live in this life.
Not only that, when he saved for eternity, but saved now to know the blessedness.
Of what it is to have the knowledge of forgiveness of sins, and to have the knowledge of God.
Well, he says how often I would have gathered, but you would not.
And the disposition of the heart of God is this very night that He is, that He would have all men to be saved. But there is a matter of the individual himself making that choice. God is allowing that choice. You know back in First Timothy 2 when it says here that He will have all men to be saved.
This is not an expression of his will in the sense that he's going to see to it that every man gets saved.
That's not true.
Actually, the translation here should be who wishes or who desires.
That all men be saved. This is not the expression of His will.
We know that that which he had willed will come to pass, but this is Speaking of the disposition of his heart toward everyone in this world.
That's why we're told here that we're to pray for all, pray for all men. There is no one beyond the reach of the Spirit of God working to bring salvation to that soul. I mean, as far as God is concerned, it's, it's open, everyone can come. It may be that one becomes so hard.
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Through a constant rejection and repeated rejection of the gospel, and one may become so hardened by the deceitfulness of sin and so calloused that it is in a practical way almost impossible and all. What a sad condition that is. But the way is open from God's Son. And so we pray for all men. We pray for all men. We're told here now there's also an expression in connection with the alls in First Timothy 2.
He will have all men to be saved, and so we are to pray for all men, and it's because we read in verse six that Christ gave himself a ransom for all.
He gave himself a ransom for all.
What? You see, we couldn't pray for the salvation of all if a ransom had not been given for all.
The ransom has been given for all men.
And there is no one who will ever be able to say that there was number provision made for my salvation.
I couldn't be saved because there was number provision made for one like me. That isn't true. The provision that God makes for the salvation of those of us who believe is the same provision that has been made for all men. That is the ransom price has been given. The Lord Jesus Christ gave himself a ransom for all.
The claims of the throne of God have been met. He is the propitiation not only for our sins.
But He is the available propitiation for the whole world, a ransom for all. And when one by faith laid hold upon that, He can say that my sins are forgiven, my sins are washed away, all of my guilt has been removed, the price has been paid, and one can accept it for himself. But we see that a ransom has been given for all.
Oh, this puts it entirely the responsibility on the individual, does it not?
And so much so that when one stands, one who has rejected the gospel of the grace of God, this offer of mercy.
By the Savior of God, when one stands at that great white Throne judgment, there will be no.
Excuses.
To the effect that God did not make adequate provision for your salvation.
I'm reminded of an incident in the Gospel of Matthew when there was a ruler who made a marriage feast for his son.
And everything was provided at this feast, all of the food.
And not only that, but there were wedding garments provided so that all of the guests who were invited to come to this wedding piece.
Were provided with a suitable garment.
And you will recall that when this ruler went out to view the guests.
Saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment, and he went to speak to him. He knew, of course, that there had been provision made of a garment for everyone who came. And he went to speak to the man and he asked him why he was there without a wedding garment. And you recall the answer of the man. He didn't give an answer. He was speechless. And why was he speechless? Because he knew.
A garment had been provided, but he just refused it. He didn't take it.
He had no excuse to give and as if to say, well there was number garment provided for me.
That's a picture, I feel of those who reject the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior. They will never be able to say, no one will ever be able to say that there was no provision made for his or her salvation. You know, it's a wonderful thought, isn't it? To think that with all of the persons that who are living in this world, that God has taken part of you.
And God has taken fault of me, and he's made a provision for my soul salvation.
He's made provision for me. Sometimes we are touched when we find that an individual has taken the thought for us.
As to meeting our physical needs, maybe we had need of something and we find that a friend or some individual took part of what we had need of and provision was made. And we say how thoughtful. Well to think that this blessed God has had you upon his heart and He's made provision for your salvation. He's made provision for your happiness. He's made provision for your peace, for your security, for your joy, for your future.
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Your eternity, all in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He thought of you and he's taken into account what you needed, and he knew what you needed, as well as knowing what I needed. We needed a savior. And so he has sent the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ God manifest in the flesh. He has come forth as the Savior God, and he's given himself a ransom for all. Oh, I like to think of the breadth of this.
I like to think of how unrestricted this is for all.
It includes everyone, even the young children, the older ones. The great Sinner so-called are the little sinners are the self-righteous. Whatever ones circumstance or condition is why the ransom has been given for all.
And verse four he says, who will have all men to be saved?
And to come to the knowledge.
Of the truth.
Turn over to the.
2nd Fistula. Thessalonians.
2nd Thessalonians 2.
We have a very serious consideration here.
And I feel inclined to take this up, for it applies especially to those who have lived in these lands where the gospel has been preached.
And we read in the second chapter of a time that is coming after the true Saints, the believers, true believers, the Saints of God, are taken out of this world, and they will be revealed a man who is called here for that wicked 1 The Antichrist.
And he's going to come with all power and signs and lying wonders.
And verse 10.
And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish.
He's going to deceive a lot of people, those that perish and why are they going to be deceived? Because they receive not the love of the truth that they might be saved.
We had in Timothy that God will have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.
It has been revealed now the truth.
The truth not only of man's condition, but the truth of God's love and of God's grace.
In the gospel of his grace and God would have all men to come to the knowledge of this, but here we read of those who.
Did not have any love for the truth.
And in verse 12 That they all might be damned or judged.
Who believe not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
Well, we see why it is again that there are those who do not come to the knowledge of the truth. And why is it? It's because they did not have the love of the truth in their hearts. It's the will that is involved, the will that is involved.
And the result here is that they are left behind when the Saints of God are taken out of the world at the coming of the Lord Jesus for his own.
These are left behind for judgment. These are left behind to be deceived.
And eventually perish in the judgment that overtake this world, because they received not the love of the truth.
Now you'll notice here it doesn't say that they did not receive the knowledge of the truth.
This is Speaking of those who have heard the gospel and they know the way of salvation.
But they do not receive the love of it in their hearts. Their wills are not moved.
They still say I will not have no desire for it and the result is they are left behind well.
Even with this, it does not detract from the thought of the of the disposition of the heart of God.
That he is the Savior God.
I wondered, have you ever thought sometimes in your heart that have you ever thought, what is God like? Maybe some of the children have thought of that at some time or another. I suppose that has come into the minds of every child, just what his God like. Oh, I suppose that perhaps the leading thought in the hearts of many would be, well, he's, he's great, He's mighty.
Why he made the world.
It's sad that even some deny that elementary truth.
But they would acknowledge that he made the world. He's great and he's mighty and he's powerful.
But when we find him coming out and really revealing himself, he doesn't come forth in those characters at all. He comes forth.
And the character of the Savior, God, the one who has, who has you and me upon his heart, who is concerned with you, who is concerned with boys and girls, who is concerned with every soul in this world and their good and blessing.
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Thou verse 5.
There is one God.
And one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. This is the one who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. A testimony that in its own times is literally what it is for. A testimony in its own times. And this is the testimony of the present day in which we live. Isn't it a wonderful testimony?
You know, we're living in the most privileged time.
Of all of God's creatures who have lived on this earth.
And man has not been here as long as some of the unbelieving scientists want to tell us It isn't true, but he's been here quite a number of years.
But with all of the centuries before the work of Christ on the cross and the full revelation of the heart of God.
Though there were men blessed of God in their souls, men of faith, and there we're going to see them in the glory as a part of the heavenly company, not a part of the church.
But a part of the heavenly company, we're going to see them there. Yet they were not living in such a blessed times as we are in the present age, since God has been fully revealed in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Oh, how wonderful the testimony. The testimony is now that not only is there one God.
But there's a mediator now. In the Old Testament, we had the testimony of the one God.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. This is the testimony of the Old Testament Scriptures. There is one God.
The true living God and Israel as a nation was called out to bear witness and testimony to that fact.
Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God. That was the testimony.
I committed to that, people. That was the testimony of the Old Testament. There is one God, but that's not the full testimony of God in Christianity.
The testimony of God in Christianity is that there is a mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, that this one God has come forth now as the savior God and as the mediator and becomes the way whereby man can be brought into God's holy and blessed presence. God fully revealed, God told forth in the mediator, so that now there is no.
Reason to inquire.
As to what God is like, God is fully revealed in this precious word. If you want to know what God, read the Word of God.
Read the word of God and study the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He that has seen me, he could say has seen the Father. I and my Father are one. I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father, but by me. There is no knowledge of God apart from the person of the Lord Jesus. Now that's true.
You will never know anything apart anything of God apart from Christ. He is the one who has declared Him.
He has told him forth.
Now the Jews in their day.
They tried to bypass the Lord Jesus to get to God.
They would reject him, but they claimed God is their father. But oh we find the Lord Jesus would not allow that. Why? He says you do not have God as your father, your of your father the devil.
They could not reject the Lord Jesus and have God as their Father. They could never come to God apart from Him. And you never know God apart from the Lord Jesus. God is represented, we might say, are told, for declared in the person of the mediator. And this mediator is indeed God himself, but it's God and man and one person, the Lord Jesus, the man Christ Jesus.
Well, now, this wasn't known in the Old Testament. This is the blessed testimony that God is giving now.
Aren't you glad that you're living in this day? Isn't it a wonderful thing that such a testimony can be declared to you this evening?
Well, do you believe it? You believe that not only is there one God, but that there is one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all. Do you believe that He is the way, the truth, and the life, and the One to whom you can come to the Father?
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In Him do you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as the one who will bring you to the Father? Well, this is the testimony that is going out at the present time. One God belongs to the Old Testament. The one Mediator belongs to the new. Turn back to Job.
The Book of Job, Chapter 9.
And we see one there who was a righteous, upright man, but he didn't have the knowledge of this wonderful testimony that we have. He didn't have the testimony given to him that is being given to you.
There is a principle in the Word of God, and it is a human principle in one sense. That is, it's it's operative in the human sphere, just among men generally. That privilege always carries with it responsibility.
Now I know that being overturned today, there are many who want the privileges without the responsibility. But you can't do it. It won't work.
And this country is finding that out, that it just will not work. That's a that's a principle.
That cannot be violated.
Cannot have privilege without responsibility going with it.
And so those of us who are living in this day, even the children here tonight, have in one sense a greater privilege than Job had. Though Job was a man of God, Job was a man of faith, and he was a righteous man. But their children in this room that know something that Job did not know, they know about a mediator that he knew nothing about.
I might say too, in passing, that one of the saddest features of Christendom today.
Is that not only?
Has it given up the?
Truth of Christianity The distinctive truth of Christianity, but it is rapidly even giving up the truth that was known in the Old Testament of there being one God.
Even giving that a sinking lower than the testimony of Israel.
Oh, how sad. That's Laodicea. Well, now in Job 9.
Job is Speaking of.
His own wretchedness in contrast with God.
In God's power, so he says in verse 32, Speaking of God, he is not a man as I am.
Jobe recognized this, that God was not a man as I am. They were not only quality.
They were not in a common standing. He is not a man as I am, that I should answer him and we should come together in judgment. Now you know two individuals in this world, if they are.
At disagreement if they're conflicting claims.
Where they can come together and seek a reconciliation on sort of equal terms.
Because a man is a man, the boy is a boy and a girl is a girl and there can meet together on equal terms.
But don't be saying here, well, that isn't true of God. God is far greater than I am. I can't come together with with God and and as it were, give my argument or my complaints and come together with him in judgment. No, God is greater than that then verse 33. Neither is there any days.
Are as one is translated at umpire. Mediators relieve the thought. Neither is there any days man between us that might lay his hand upon us both. There is there is none who could represent both sides, man and God.
Of course not, because all of his fellow men were just like him.
Joe couldn't look to any of his fellow men and say, well, now there's a man that can be a go between between me and God. He is capable of entering into my side of the of the issue, and he's also capable of entering into God's side. No, there was no man on earth, there was none who could be in this in between place to represent both and as it were, bring them together. But he longed that there might be one because he saw this great gulf, as it were, between himself.
And God, well now the wonderful thing today in God's testimony to you this evening is this.
That this day's money or this mediator, that job long, far has come and it's the man Christ Jesus, a man who can represent man as it were, stand in man's place and yet he is God over all, blessed forever. He's that blessed God. He's the Savior God who has come down and he's come down in manhood and he's gone to Calvary's cross.
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And there, on the cross of Calvary, he gave himself a ransom for all.
So that now there is this mediator between God and man. There is the go between. There is one who is it where represents both and brings them together. But here there's only one. We might say that we can thank God that he has provided a mediator.
Joe belonged that there might be one. Now we can say God has provided 1.
But only one. Only one.
There is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.
For there is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.
He has given one, but only one, and one cannot bypass this. Otherwise there is no mediator at all between one soul and God. Well, isn't that a wonderful testimony that we have given to us even in this room this evening? Something that Job knew nothing about?
Now revealed, it's the testimony that is going out. It's the testimony that we bear here as Saints in this scene to the world, that God's disposition toward the world is one of love and grace.
Who would have all men to be saved, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance?
And the testimony to 1:00 and all that, a ransom has been given for all.
Well, the Apostle Paul says he's been ordained a preacher and apostle.
To minister this testimony that is going out at the present time. And it's our privilege as the Saints of God, those of us who know the Lord, to bear testimony to the truth of this blessed God who is the Savior God, to bear testimony to Him that we are saved and have been brought to the knowledge of the truth.
The thought here is, you see that man is down here groveling in misery because of his own will.
All of the misery and all of the chaos.
Everything that is detrimental to man's joy, peace, and happiness is the result of the human will. That truth that may sound enormous, but that's true. It's because of the human will operating in opposition to the will of God that is brought in all of the chaos and everything. So God would have you to be saved.
He would have you to be saved from all of that in the knowledge of the truth.
The knowledge of salvation and that there might be those here in this scene.
Who are for himself bearing testimony to himself that there is one God and that there is one Mediator. That God has been fully revealed, and that God is sending out His message to all. Well, the remaining part of the chapter which I just mentioned, for it is in connection with the testimony that we have verses 9 or verses 8 through 15. One may have wondered sometimes, why are these verses brought in, in connection with what we have in the first 7?
It is, I believe, in this respect, that it is our privilege to bear testimony to this God. To save your God, we bear testimony to Him. Now as far as the men are concerned, the testimony is carried on in a public and vocal way. I will therefore that the men it should be prayed.
That is, the public and vocal part of testimony is taken on the part of men that women have their part too, as we see in the verses 9 through 15. They have their part. It may be more, you might say subdued, and it is in quietness, but it's still a part in this testimony and showing by the deportment and behavior that they too belong to the Savior God and bear testimony to Him. It's the privilege of every child of God to bear testimony.
Whether they it's done in a vocal way by the man or whether it's done in this quiet way on the part of those who are women and believers on the Lord Jesus Christ. It isn't necessarily going out into mission fields, though if God sends out, that's all right. That's what we know. His ways are various for all of his people. It isn't necessarily going out and doing some great works of that sort, but bearing testimony here in in daily life, day by day bearing test.
To the fact that God has been fully revealed and we show it in our walk and waves as well as what his voice on the part of the men. Well I would just like to say in closing again to each and everyone in the room.
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That here we have in this wonderful testimony that is going out at the present time, the disposition of the heart of God toward you, and I'd like to fight for you to think of it that way.
That God has you upon his heart.
And he has provided.
He has provided a means for your salvation that you might be delivered.
From sin and from sin, and that you might be brought to Himself with a knowledge of the truth, and that you might dwell with Him eternally in all of the blessedness of that place where He is in His own holy and blessed presence. This, of course, depends entirely on the work of the Lord Jesus Christ and that ransom that He gave. Can you say that that ransom was for me?
It's not enough to say that it was for all as we sang in our hymn, Christ is the Savior of sinners.
But we need to bring it down personal. Christ is the Savior for me.
Remnant Testimony
Address—P.L. Johnson
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Turn again to Ezra.
Well, we'll read from in verse chapter 4 a few verses in this chapter, chapter 4 and verse one. Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity builded the temple under the Lord God of Israel.
Then they came to Zerubbabel and to the chief of the Fathers, and said unto them, Let us build with you.
For we seek your God as he do, and we do sacrifice unto him, since the days of is our head. And king of Asher, which brought us up, hit her. But Zerubbabel and Joshua and the rest of the chief of the fathers of Israel said unto them, You have nothing to do with us to build a house unto our God, but we ourselves together will build unto the Lord God of Israel.
As King Cyrus, the king of Persia hath commanded us.
Then the people of the land weaken the hands of the people of Judah and trouble them in building.
And hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose. All the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Duras, king of Persia.
And in the 9th chapter.
Chapter 9, verse one.
This is a little later on in the history of this remnant, when Ezra himself returns to the Jerusalem. Now when these things were done, the Princess came to me, saying, The people of Israel and the priests and the Levites have not separated themselves from the people of the land, doing according to their abominations, even of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians.
And the MRI for they have taken of their daughters for themselves.
And for their sons, so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of those lands.
Yeah, the hand of the Princess and rulers hath been chief in this trespass.
And then let us read in the prophet Hagar.
Haggai, the first of the post captivity prophets.
Hi God, Zechariah prophesied to this remnant.
We have them mentioned in the book of Ezra is prophesying during the days of this remnant. And the first chapter of Haggai, verse one in the second year of Darius the king in the sixth month and the first day of the month came of the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet under rubble, the son of Shell Hill, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josadeck, the high priest said.
Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts saying.
This people say the time has not come, the time that the Lords house should be built. Then came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet saying, Is it time for you, O ye to dwell in your sealed houses, and this house lie waste. Now therefore, thus saith the Lord of hosts, consider your ways.
You have so much, and bring in little ye, but you have not enough. You drink, but you're not filled with drink. You clothe you, but there is none warm. And he that earnest wages, earnest wages to put it in a bag with food. Thus the Lord of hosts consider your ways.
Go up to the mountain and bring wood and build the house, and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the Lord. He looked for much and loath came to little, and when you brought it home I did blow up on it. Why, said the Lord of hosts, because of mine house at his waist, and you run every man unto his own house.
Then in the second chapter.
Haggai, chapter two in the seventh month and the one and 20th day of the month came the word of the Lord by the prophet. Haggai saying.
Speak now, it is a rubble, the son of Xiao Hill, the governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of John today the high priest, and to the residue of the people saying.
Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory?
And how do you see it now? Is it not in your eyes? In comparison of it is nothing.
Yet now be strong or derivable, saith the Lord, and be strong, O Joshua son of John, today the high priest, and be strong all you people of the land, said the Lord, and work. For I am with you, saith the Lord of Hosts, according to the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt. So my spirit remaineth among you. Fear ye not for thus saith the Lord of Hosts. Yet once it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea in the dry land.
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Shake all nations and the disaster shall come and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of Hosts.
The silver is mine, and the gold is mine set the Lord opposed. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the farmer, saith the Lord of hosts. And in this place will I give peace, says the Lord of hosts.
Well, we turn back to Ezra. I read these passages in the Haggai because it gives us.
To see.
Something of the condition of this remnant that called forth the ministry of the Prophet Haggai.
The moral condition into which they lapsed.
Because I had it upon my heart this evening while we've been speaking about remnant testimony and the features that belong to it, we find in considering further in this book of Ezra, we see some of the.
Dangers that beset such a testimony and we see how that Satan.
Works in order to hinder.
A testimony being raised up to the truth.
Of the gathering center and rebuilding the House of God. Because that's what this rennet was doing. You know, they were going back and reclaiming the divine center of Jerusalem.
And they were going back and rebuilding the house. Not the city as yet, but the house.
And Satan was very unhappy about such a thing as Satan doubtless is unhappy as to any testimony that might be rendered in any form to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ today, and certainly to to see those who would, as it were, reclaim the divine center in gathering to the Lord's name alone and seeking to.
Carry out the principles of the Church of God.
And to exhibit those moral and spiritual features that belong to the assembly as as established by God in the word. Why Satan is going to stir up opposition or he's going to try to bring in things to hinder such a testimony as we know as a fact, it has occurred. You know, I've often thought that perhaps we feel.
That since the day in which we live is a day of weakness as far as the testimony.
Of those gathered to the Lord's name by number stretch of the imagination, can one say that the testimony is is a large and imposing by and large it's small companies here and there, and even those that are considered rather large companies are not large as far as the world standards are concerned, very weak and and small and feeble and perhaps we're inclined to think that because we appear to be so weak and are weak we.
Fast and so insignificant that Satan is not concerned.
Well, I believe that as long as there is any testimony, however feeble.
Any testimony at all to the truth of the assembly?
And where there are those seeking to gather on the truth of the assembly to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, they will be the objects.
Of the attacks of the enemy, and we know that the enemy works along certain lines. Satan really doesn't bring out anything new. He works along the same lines that he's worked from the very beginning and seeking to spoil any testimony for Christ. We will never get to the place in this scene where we will no longer be attacked by the enemy.
He will always try to spoil the testimony in some way, in different ways.
If it's not by division, it will be by looseness. If it's not by looseness, it will be by legality.
It will be some form or fashion that he will want to get us off of the line of the truth are to be.
Unbalanced at the things in some way, he's going to try to attack the testimony to hinder it, and we find that this is just what happens to this little remnant that returned. It wasn't long, just as soon as they began building the house.
That we read in the chapter 4 when these adversaries.
Of Judah heard that the children of the captivity build in the temple as soon as they heard of what was going on in the temple, the House of God being built.
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Then we find that the adversaries were stirred up to come in and to seek to hinder it in various ways. Well, now before we do that, I'd like to touch on a point that we didn't get into last night, or we just mentioned it, but I'd like to speak a little further on. In Chapter 3, we mentioned how that in chapter 3, they gathered is one man to Jerusalem.
And the first thing they did in verse three is they set up the altarp on his basis.
And then after that, they laid the foundation of the house and began to build.
Well, this speaks to me of the fact that those who would seek to bear a testimony, remnant testimony, to the truth of the assembly in our day would follow this pattern. First of all, we would be clear as to the principle that governs the fellowship of the assembly, as the as we had endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit.
On the ground of the one body.
And at the divine center of Jerusalem. And then after that we see they set up the altar.
They restored, you might say the they restored worship, first of all.
That was the 1St order of things was to set up the altar where the offerings could be offered to the Lord. That was the first thing that was done. Well, I believe that God would have us to enter into the truth that we have in the New Testament in respect to to worship and praise. And we see that that was the thing that.
That really brought the disciples together on the first day of the week in Acts 20 and verse 7.
Was to break bread. When the disciples came together to break bread, first of all there was giving the Lord his proper.
Place and giving him of the worship and praise of which he was due. And then after that they began to build a house.
In other words, they we can apply this to the restoration, you might say.
In a practical way, in seeking to carry out all of the truths found in Scripture in respect to the assembly or the church.
As to its ardor, as to the place given to the Holy Spirit in Christ his head.
As to its Pilgrim character, as to it being a heavenly company on earth with a heavenly destiny?
Though on earth it is really of a it's a heavenly origin with a heavenly destiny and of its proper place as being a testimony to God and the Lord Jesus Christ, the vessel bearing His truth.
And seeking to act as the assembly in this scene. Now turn to the 6th chapter in connection with their offerings upon this altar.
I want to point out something that is very significant.
This, of course, is after the house was built.
In verse 16 of chapter 6 and the children of Israel, the priests and the Levites, and the rest of the children of the captivity.
Kept the dedication of this House of God with joy.
And offered at the dedication of this House of God and 100 bullocks, 200 rounds.
400 lambs. You know, if we contrast this with the dedication of the Temple when in Solomon's day we see how small this was in comparison. I think if I remember correctly, Solomon offered 120,000 lambs at his dedication, but here we had 400 lands.
Small and insignificant in connection, but still they offered it in dedication and for a sin offering for all Israel. 12 egos according to the number of the tribes of Israel. Now notice that when they made an offering here, they sent offering. It was for all Israel, not just for this remnant.
Now we know, of course, that this remnant constituted a very small portion of the nation, very small portion. But when they dedicated this house, they didn't say, now this house belongs to us. This is our house.
No, they recognized that it was the House of God and it belonged to the whole nation.
They recognized that while the whole nation wasn't there in order to take part in this dedication, if it's only a part of the nation, just a remnant, yet they acted for the whole nation. They offered an offering as if the whole nation were there.
Though they were not the nation, they acted on behalf of the nation. You might say they acted just as if they were the nation.
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Though of course they recognize that we're not. And I think this is an important point for us to lay hold upon to as we would seek to bear testimony as a remnant testimony to the assembly. I have emphasized over and over, which I think is important to emphasize, that no company of the Lord's people anywhere at any time today can say that we are the church. We are the assembly.
You cannot say the Church of Christ meets here.
You can say that there are those meeting here who seek to answer to the truth of what the Church is.
And they want to bear testimony to the truth of the Church of Christ. But you can't say the Church of Christ meets anywhere.
No one can take that place. Just like this Remnant could not say we are the nation.
But yet at the same time, just like this remnant here could not say they were the nation, yet they acted.
For the nation, they acted as if they were the nation, assuming or arrogating to themselves that place.
But they recognize the fact that we're in the place where the nation belongs. We're at the divine center where the whole nation was gathered in the beginning.
And they recognized that what they did, they did on behalf of the whole nation.
They offered here for all of the 12 tribes of Israel.
Well, I believe God would would have us to recognize that if we gather to the Lord's name, truly gathered to the Lord's name on the ground of the one body and seeking to bear testimony to the truth of the Church of the Assembly. In these days, while we cannot say we are the church in Buena Park, no one can say that. Yet on the other hand, I do believe that God would hold us responsible to act for the church.
In the locality where we are, as gathered on the ground of what the Church is, the Lord would hold us responsible.
To act as if we were the church. I don't want to be misunderstood.
We know that every child of God is a part of the Church of Christ and there are many of our beloved brethren, members of the body of Christ, who are not with us. But as far as the principle of our gathering it is, is concerned, the principle I believe would be that we act as if we were the church that is in a responsible way, just like here, this little remnant, when they offered a sin offering, they didn't say no, we're just going to offer it for us. They said no.
We're in the place of the nation now, and you know this, this remnant was held responsible for the nation.
Those Jews who were on earth when the Lord came, and who were responsible to receive their Messiah.
Where the descendants of this remnant, the 12 tribes, were never gathered and have not been gathered.
The nation as a whole has been scattered ever since the 10 tribes were carried away by.
The king of Assyria. They've never been regathered. The nation as a whole has never been.
Regathered, and we find that this little remnant, though they did not constitute the whole nation.
Yet they were held in that place of being responsible for the nation Israel and the things that God has to say that He has, you might say that He has against that nation.
Why really it's it's things that he has against this little remnant because they were in the place.
Of the nation, when they returned back from the land of the captivity to the divine center at Jerusalem, though they did not constitute the nation in its in its entirety, they took the place of being the nation and they were in the place of responsibility that belonged to the nation and they recognized it. So they offered a sin offering for the whole nation of Israel, for all the 12 tribes. Well, I believe that this is true.
That today though, we cannot and we do not claim to be the Church of God.
Yet we would desire, and we trust, according to our understanding of the Word of God, that we are gathered.
On the ground of the assembly, seeking to walk in the light of the truth of the Church of God is revealed in Scripture.
And as such, God holds us responsible to act for the church. And this is true wherever there are those gathered to the Lords name and the ground of the one Body, seeking to give expression to the truth of the assembly and bearing remnant testimony. We can't say that that in any place they constitute the whole church there, but God would hold them responsible.
You know, I mentioned last night about the unity of the Spirit and how that this is one of the features that belong to the Church in the beginning.
And it's one of the features that even though it's a day of ruin and failure, that God would have us to carry out today.
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One time I had a man say to me, and he was a Christian too. He said to me, he says, you know.
You're not trying to keep the unity of the spirit. You people over there where you are gathered, he made this accusation. He says. You believe in a unity of an address book.
What he said, he said I believe in the unity of the Spirit, and what he meant was that he felt free to go.
Wherever he traveled, whatever city he went to, he said when he went to that city, he bowed and he asked the Lord to guide him to a group who were gathered scripturally. And the Spirit of God would lead him. And he might go to one group here in this city and another group, another place and another, another that had no connection, one with each other. And he thought that was the unity of the Spirit. And he said, you believe in a unity of the address book.
Well, now that that may have had a very.
High sounding expression, but when you examine it, actually what he was, what he was advocating was independence.
Not unity at all. That is, he wanted to be free to go and patronize.
Any group that he felt was worthy of his presence, in other words, he was, he would put his stamp of approval on this group in this place and his stamp of approval on this group in another place by saying he thought that they were so gathered properly and and he would go there. It's really independency of an extreme character. So I trust it will never be frightened by such an expression that we are keeping a unity of an address book.
You know when the apostle Paul said to?
Barnabas in Acts 15, he said, Let us go again unto our brethren in every city where they we have preached the gospel, and see how they do. Well now he knew where those brethren were.
Now, he didn't have a printed address book, I know, but he had an address book in his mind.
He knew just where those brethren were. There were definite places they had to go. They knew when they went to Purga. They knew they were brethren there. They knew when they went to Antioch, they were brethren there. They knew when they went through the regions of Galatia why there were places where their brethren who had been saved and gathered, they knew where they were. They had an address book in their minds. They knew just where they were and when he went.
Through the different areas we know like when he comes, it came to Troax.
And on the first day of the week they came together to break bread, when he came to true, as he knew they were brethren there, and he knew where they were.
You see, they knew where they were in every place. You say, well, of course, in those days, why all they believe were together. It's true that in those different cities, why the Christians were together and going on happily. But what I believe we can say today is this just like this little remnant.
We know that they are in other places. Their place is scattered around in this country and elsewhere, too. There are those who are not, of course, exactly like those in Antioch in those days that were constituted the whole church. But there are those who are gathered on the ground of the assembly in these various places. They're gathered to the Lord's name, to the divine center. They're gathered on the principle of the one body. They're endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit.
They're seeking to bear remnant testimony to the truth of the assembly.
In a day of ruin and failure. So the address book, of course, is just a matter of convenience to assist us in finding where those.
Disciples are gathered, you know, when the apostle Paul was going, making his way toward Jerusalem.
That last journey before he was taken prisoner. We read there in one place that when the ship.
Landed at this a certain place. The name escapes me right now. It says that they they searched and they found disciples. And when they found the disciples, why they had fellowship with them, of course. Well, that's the thought of an address book is that we might have the convenience of having the addresses of those whom we recognize likewise with us.
As gathered on the ground of the one Body, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit and bearing remnant testimony.
Not that we would say or even imply in any way, form or fashion.
That only those whom we speak of as so gathered are a part of the church. We wouldn't say that at all. You might look into the address book and you find the address of a meeting in Denton, TX, but I can tell you that that meeting is not the church in Denton.
I know there are other things there. There are those who are loved to the Lord and belong to the assembly.
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Just as much as those who are gathered. But they're not all gathered. It's just like this little remnant here. They did not constitute the whole of the nation.
But they were on the ground that belonged to the nation and they recognized.
And I think we should recognize that too. You know, we are gathered to the Lord's name and we're at the Lord's table. Sometimes we've heard expressions and different ones raise the question about who has the Lord's table. Personally, I don't think anyone has the Lord's table. I think the question of being at the Lord's table, it isn't in the possession of any brethren or anything of the sort, doesn't belong to us. It belongs to the whole Church of God.
And when we gather to remember the Lord at the Lord's table, we.
We recognize and we own in that very loaf. It is before us that we are one with all of the dear Saints of God on the face of the earth.
And they all, with us, constitute the Assembly. We are not the Church in its entirety.
We may be gathered on that ground, just like here when they offered the sin offering for all Israel.
Offered the sin offering for all Israel. Well, God holds us responsible for this, you know, so that as I say, we cannot claim to be the church, but we act on the principles that belong to the church so that we we we do not act in a, you might say just a local or sectarian way that we recognize the unity of the Church of God on earth.
Well, back to chapter 4. I believe these are some of the features that are involved.
Remnant testimony.
While there are things that we cannot restore.
Works of power and authority.
And we can't go back and regather everything it was in the beginning.
Still, these principles that govern the Church, govern the Church in the beginning, we can seek to carry out today.
Well now then, the enemy gets busy. And here I thought we might have some practical words.
In connection with the dangers that confront the testimony, First of all, the enemy wants to hinder the word because you will notice in verse when the adversaries of Judah, now they were adversaries, but they didn't talk like it in verse two. They come and they stay in the middle of the verse. Let us build with you. They wanted to join themselves to this work, but they were adversaries. They were not true.
And you know, sometimes I, I suppose.
Being a small in number, there's always of course, the.
The latent desire in the heart to see larger numbers. And we'd be very happy to have a number to come and want to join with us and build with us. But you know, just like these here, this little remnant they had to consider, they didn't just welcome them with open arms and say, Oh yes, come on and help us build. They didn't say that.
No, we see here, even though they claimed that we seek your God as you do, and we do sacrifice unto him.
They claim to be one with them, but in verse three is derubable and Joshua and the rest of the chief of the fathers and Israel said to them, you have nothing to do with us to build a house into our God. That may sound very ungracious.
That made appear to be a very ungracious why wouldn't they let them join with them?
Well, you know, there is, there is.
The sense in which Satan would seek to hinder the work of the Lord and to spoil the testimony by bringing in those who are, who are not supposed to be there, and who are really adversaries.
We need to be careful with that too. Satan would want to join himself to the work. One might think that's a strange thing to say, that Satan would want to join himself to the work of the Lord.
Well, he does, but not in order to further the work of the Lord, but to confuse things and to bring in confusion and to to bring in things that are not right and things that are not true. You remember in the 16th of Acts, when Paul and Silas were in Philippi and the Lord was working there and souls were being converted, there was a woman who had a evil spirit.
A demon and this woman.
Followed Paul and Barnabas and them many days, saying, these be the servants of the Most High God, who show unto us the way of salvation.
Well, it sounded if she was giving testimony to the Lord, doesn't it?
And one standing around about might say, well, now there's a there's a woman that really loves the Lord.
There's a woman that ought to be with Paul and Barnabas and and because she's giving testimony to the Lord, but she was doing that under the power of a demon. And Paul by the Spirit recognized that and he rebuked the demon and came out of her. Well, you know one thing. Notice one thing when she says these be servants of the Most High God. She didn't say these be servants of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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And there I believe we find it often when Satan seeks to.
Enter into spiritual things or the things of God, and when he seeks to get into the realm of Scripture, he always misuses it, as he did when he was with the Lord in the wilderness. You know he misquoted the Psalm in respect to the Lord being kept. But here we say we see that this woman who had the spirit of a demon.
Says these be the servants of the Most High God. Well, actually the name.
Refers. It's the name that belongs to God in respect to his to the Millennium, the Kingdom. It has reference to that time when he's going to reign over this world and when everything is going to be ordered of God in the world. That name doesn't really apply. He is the most high God, it's true. But the testimony that the the Saints of God bear today, the testimony of the church is to the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is not to God as the Most High God, you see. So that connects him with his earthly purposes and counseling.
With what's going to take place in the coming Kingdom, whether those you know who want to go around today with a Kingdom testimony, I have no doubt that that's a work of Satan and they they proclaim the gospel of the Kingdom. Well, the testimony today is to the Lord Jesus Christ, of course, is the one who suffered upon the cross and the one who is rejected and now glorified at the right hand of God as the one who is calling out from the world a people for his name.
World. He's not setting the world right. This is not the testimony of God today that God is setting the world right.
And preparing a people for our unearthly Kingdom. The testimony today is that he's calling souls out of this world to share the heavenly glory with the Lord Jesus.
And he's leaving the world to go on in its own way until he intervenes, of course, in judgment. Well, that Satan wanted to join himself with the work there, but Paul wouldn't allow it. Just like here we see that this remnant, they said, no, you can't build with us, even though they wanted to join. Now, why do you think it is? It's because they knew. They knew the association to these people and they knew their origin. Turn back the second King 17.
Second King 17 You see they mentioned here that they do service unto the same God that the remnant was since the days of Ezar Haddon king of Assyria, which brought us up, hit her. Now in Second Kings 17 we see where they came from and how it is they got connected with the Jewish religion.
In the 17th chapter the 10 tribes have been carried away into captivity and in verse 24 we read that the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon.
And from Kutha, and from Ava, and from Haman, and from Sea for faith, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel. And they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities there are.
And so it was at the beginning of their dwelling there that they feared not the Lord. Therefore the Lord sent lions among them, which slew some of them. Now you see, these are.
A gentile heathen brought in to replace the 10 tribes who were carried away into captivity.
And of course they worship their heathen gods, and the Lord brought in the alliance his judgment upon them. Will they complain to their king? And they said that it's because we do not know the worship of the land. So we read in verse 27 that the king then commanded that one of the priests should be brought into those people, and they should be taught the manner of the God of the land.
So they brought one of the priests, and he taught them.
In verse 28, the end of the verse and taught them how they should fear the law. But keep in mind they're just they're just heathen.
Read in verse 29 and 30 and 31 how that even though they were taught by this priest to fear the Lord, that is, they were taught the external rights of Judaism.
Yet they made gods of their own nations, and each one from the nation which they came, they they made their gods. In verse 30 and 31 we read that. So the result is in verse 32. They feared the Lord, and made unto themselves the lowest of him of them, priests of the high places, which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.
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Now verse 33, they feared the Lord and served their own gods after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from them. Well, doesn't that remind us, isn't that a picture of what we have today in Christendom, those who have the form of godliness that deny the power thereof?
That is, they have the outward forms of Christians. They have been baptized and they profess the Bible. They don't profess the Quran or any of the other holy books of the different religions. They have all of the externals that belong to Christianity so that they look like that. But they have gods of their own. They have their own doctrines, their own practices.
Not derived from the word of God, not found in the word of God, but coming from from their own.
Their own philosophies or intellect coming from themselves. It's really.
Idols brought in though they have you might say they feared the Lord.
But they're serving their own God. This is pretty much the state of Christendom today. Well, just that this is the origin of that group that wanted to come and help build the house.
They said, now we seek God just like you do. Just like there are some who might say today why we're Christians just like you are. Well, it's real questionable. But what are they connected with? What are they connected with? Well, that's what they listen to the remnant. Look at these people. And they said no. They didn't even dispute the fact that they were seeking the same God. They didn't dispute that. They just said no.
You leave us alone. We'll build ourselves. We'll go on ourselves building.
The way God has shown us to build and they would not allow them to join with them because they knew.
Of their connections, they knew of their associations, and they knew that they would bring in these these gods of the nations that they were worshipping along with the outward farms of the Jewish religion. Well, God would have us to be careful of that too Satan can bring in.
Though things that are connected, you might say they are they have a Christian connection, but are they really according to the mind of God? Are they connected with the.
With the wage and habits of Christendom? Or do they come from the Word of God? Well, you might say here that one of the ways in which Satan seeks to hinder the testimony.
Is by imitating it and joining himself to it so as to corrupt it. Not necessarily. They didn't want to come and tear down this temple. They didn't want to destroy it. They just wanted to join with it. But it would have been to corrupt the testimony. Now then we read in verse four that the people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah.
And they trouble them in building and they hired counselors against them. Here we have active opposition now not only a subtle trying to join themselves to the works so to so as to corrupt it, but here we have actual opposition to them seeking to hinder it. Well, this is another way we know that Satan is always comes in that twofold character as.
In the form of corruption and violence, he comes as the serpent, in a subtle way as the corrupter.
And if he doesn't succeed in that way, then he comes as the roaring lion seeking to destroy. So there, there's both farms here. We see the subtlety of trying to mingle themselves in with the work so as to corrupt it, and then not succeeding in that. Why they turned in an open in an open way to be an adversary and trouble them in building and try to stop the work. Well, you say, if you know about this little history of the remnant, you say the work did stop.
Well, it's true, the work stopped.
But the work did not stop because of these adversaries. It might appear at first reading here in the book of Ezra. If we were to read on in the in this 4th chapter, it would appear that the work stopped because of the decree of the king of Persia. When these adversaries in the land wrote to the king of Persia and demanded that something be done in order to stop this work that was going on. We know of course that the King of Persia did issue a.
Saying that the work should cease and desist, and it might appear that that's the reason why the work stopped, but it isn't really so. The reason the work stopped is because the hands of the people were weakened and they were weakened because they were taking up with the ways of the people. You might say they refused them religiously, but they were mingling with them socially. Turn to the 9th chapter that we read here. In the 9th chapter we see what had been going on for a good while when.
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Himself comes back to the city. He finds here that the people have not separated themselves from the people.
Of the lands, and in verse two, they have taken of their daughters for themselves and for their sons.
And so forth. And they've mingled with the people of the land. There was this lack of separation.
Satan had broken down this this wall of separation. They had refused these people religiously. They wouldn't let them come and join with them in the building of the house, but apparently they had joined with them socially and they were doing according to their abominations and they've taken their daughters and so forth. The wall of separation was broken down and the result was this was a weakening of their hands.
And This is why the work really finished or stopped at this time.
This is why the work was was stopped. God allowed, you might say, that circumstance of the decree of the King, to just bring to light the real state of the people.
And you know, this is one of the ways in which remnant testimony to in our day can be hindered.
We might refuse the world religiously, you might say, but then if we take up their ways socially and in a private way, this will weaken the testimony. It will weaken the testimony. And Satan would like to introduce those things in the midst of those gathered to the Lord's name. And so that the result will be would would would be of weakness, and that the work of the building of the House of God would cease and desist.
Because that's what happened. Now turn to the book Prophet Hagar Haggai. As I said, I read this because it shows the state of the people.
That caused the work to cease. If we had gone to read in the Book of Ezra, we'd find that when the work stopped.
The Lord then raised up the prophet Haggai and Zechariah to prophecy, and a result of their prophesying the work was resumed.
And the work stopped, as I say, because of the moral condition of the people.
Not really because of their adversaries. It was because they the separation had broken down and they had taken up with the ways.
Of the world now in Haggai one we see the difficulty was here in verse two they were saying.
The time has not come, the time that the Lord's house should be built.
Well, they just, they just lost interest, they lost interest in the work of the House of God because they became interested in the affairs of the people of the land.
As they took up with the abominations of the people of the land, and as they became occupied with their ways and settled down with their ways and mixed in mingled with them socially.
Why? It sort of took away that zeal that they had for the Lord's house and they were saying, well, the time isn't come. It's it's not the time to build the House of the Lord.
This isn't the time to do it. Well, we I'm sure that we can recognize right away.
How that this is a great danger to us too, and we find that when we.
If we do get occupied with the things of this world and we get in a social way connected with those of this world, we find that our interest in connection with the things of God and the assembly and the little assembly and seeing it going on and prospering for the Lord's glory, why we find that our interest in that is affected.
And it's not quite so keen as it was, you might say the edge is taken off of these things that it was with the people here.
And in verse four we see they were occupied with their own things, their sealed houses.
They were occupied with their own personal prosperity, you might say, to the neglect of the House of the Lord.
But notice what he says.
In verse 9.
The trouble was why, saith the Lord of hosts? Because at the end of the verse because of mine house that is waged, and you run every man.
Unto his own house.
Well, this certainly, I'm sure that it doesn't take much comment for us to see how that these things all are very, you might say, grave dangers that confront those who would seek to bear testimony in a remnant way to the truth of the assembly in these days. These are the ways in which Satan would want to come in and hinder, first of all, by trying to join himself to the work to corrupt it, and then secondly, by having open adversaries.
That oppose and do all they can to hinder the progress, and then to bring in discouragement.
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I'll rather hear more than discouragement bring in occupation with one's own things, and taking up with the worldly practices and worldly pursuits, and settling down in this world to the neglect of the things of God in the House of God, and the furtherance of the Lord's testimony in the gospel too, and in the furtherance of the welfare of the Saints, and the truth of God in general.
Now then, in chapter 2 of Haggai, we have another thing, as I've mentioned some of these hindrances.
To remnant testimony here in the second chapter of Haggai, we might say the hindrance here is discouragement. He says in verse three, who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory, and how do you see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison if it is nothing you see there was a there was a danger of their saying of looking upon this work as being so insignificant in comparison to.
Temple that was built in Solomon's day as to despise the littleness of it, as to feel that it's just, well, what's the use of working in this, in this house? Because after all, it's, it's so insignificant and small and it doesn't amount to anything. Well, I feel that this is one way in which Satan can work too, to hinder us in going on and bearing testimony to the Lord.
Is by bringing in discouraging thoughts.
And being discouraged because of difficulties along the way, and being discouraged too, because, as we read in the Word of God in the early days, of how strong the testimony was. And not only that.
As we hear sometimes of those in days gone by, and as we read of those last century, how God worked in power by His Spirit.
And how that there were souls gathered out?
Why? By the thousands?
And how that as the families would move out to new places, you know, the Spirit of God would be working and soon it'd be a little testimony raised up there to the truth of the one body.
And it seemed that that such power was going out, that why it was going to be such a wonderful work. And now we're living in days when there's been much division, there's been scattering and there's weakness. And many have given up and say, as it were, well, now there's really not much point in keeping this thing up. There's such weakness and failure in comparison to what it used to be.
Well, that's what he says here. Which one of you saw this house in her first glory? How do you see it now?
Is it not in your eyes, in comparison of it as nothing? But then he encourages them, and he encourages them by telling them that in verse five or in verse end of verse four. For I am with you, saith the Lord.
According to the word that our covenant with you when you came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you.
Fairly enough. In other words, we might say he encourages him by saying this. It is true.
In comparison, if you make the backward look, he says to Solomon's temple and compare this house that you're building with with Solomon's temple.
Why? It's nothing. It's nothing in comparison to that. But he says.
I am with you. You still have my presence.
And my word is with you, you still have my word. And he says, my Spirit remaineth with you. You still have my spirit. Well, now it's true today that where two or three are gathered together under my name, there am I in the midst. Just as true as 1828 or 1878 are just as true as the 1St century. The Lord is in the midst of the two or three gathered to His name and His Word. It's the same word they had last century, the same Bible.
It's the same word they had in the 1St century. We have the same blessed light from God in his word that they had been. In fact, we have an advantage. We have, you might say the accumulated ministry of many years to help us understand this word and we have it today. And his spirit remains the the church is the habitation of God by the Spirit and he's still here, the Spirit of God and we have these things even though.
In comparison to what the Church was in the beginning.
Or even what the testimony was last century. It is as nothing in comparison to these things. We still have the Lord.
And his Word and his Spirit remaining among us, well, it's not enough to encourage us.
Is that enough to encourage us to go on with a remnant testimony seeking to maintain the truth that have been restored in connection with the assembly, that the Lord even goes further than that? And he says in verse 9 about the future glory of this house. Now He says the glory of this latter house. It should be. I'm going to have to change the translation as it should be from the original.
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It isn't the glory of this latter house, but it is the latter glory of this house.
Shall be greater than of the farmer, saith the Lord. In other words, what he is saying here, this house that you're building on.
As far as God looks upon it, it's the same house that Solomon built. It's the continuation of that. And he says now go on and look into the future and there's going to be a future temple. Of course, this has has reference to the Jewish temple. There was a temple built in Solomon's day and destroyed, and now the temple is being rebuilt here by this remnant. And then there's going to be a future temple that the Lord himself will fill in his own glory.
In the in the Millennium, in the Kingdom. And he says to this little remnant now look forward to that coming glory.
And this house that you are working on, this house that you are building on, is going to be the house that the glory of the Lord is going to fill in the coming days.
So we might say today, in respect to the assembly, God would have us to have a forward look.
The assembly of which we form, part of which every member of the Lord Jesus Christ is in the assembly which today is in such ruin and failure and is scattered and divided, and which you might say, those who are seeking to give expression to the assembly are so weak and insignificant and failing.
But that same assembly is going to be presented to Christ in glory, a glorious church without spot or wrinkle or any such thing.
You might say that that Church which we form a part of, in which we seek to give testimony to at the present time.
Now it is it is set forth in weakness and failure, but we read in the Book of Revelation, chapter 21.
That it has the glory of God and all of the glorious perfections of Christ.
Are going to be seen in that church. Paul speaks in Ephesians 3 of glory to God through the church.
Throughout all ages, world without end. Think of that. Glory to God through the church.
The Church, the assembly, which we would seek to give expression to and bear testimony to in a day of ruin and failure.
Is going to is that to which God will have glory throughout all ages, world without end, and it's going to shine as his reflection. Well, God would have us to to look forward to that and have that before us rather than as it were, just looking behind at the at the backward view. We should have the backward view to keep us humble and to give us to realize that we can't be puffed up and boastful.
And that we must be very loving and kind and patient with all of our brethren in Christ, wherever we find them. Because after all, I'm sure.
That our own failure as a testimony has been a hindrance and a stumbling block to many. So God would have us to look back, but then He would not have us to be occupied with that. He would have us to look forward to the coming glory when the whole church there will shine as His reflection. Now this is what we're a part of, and this is what we seek to give testimony to and to bear witness to the church which Christ loved and gave Himself far, and which He's occupied with at the present time.
And which is going to present to himself in glory a glorious church, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. Well May God exercise us as to these features of the remnant, and to see too, that there are these dangers, and that Satan would want to spoil it in any way that he can, that these might exercise us as well.
Colossians 3:9
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Colossians 3 and verse 9.
Lie not one to another, think that ye have pull off the old man with his deed, and have put on the Blue Man, which is renewed his knowledge after the image of him that created him.
Where there is neither Greeks nor Jews, circumcisions are uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythians bombed or free, but Christ is all and involved.
Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering.
Forbearing one another and forgiving one another. If any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And above all these things put on charity, which is a bond of perfectness.
And let the peace of God rule in your heart to the which also ye are called in one body, and being thankful.
Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another, in psalms and hands and spiritual songs, seen with grace in your heart to the Lord.
Whatsoever ye do in Word or deed, do all of the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.
Why submit yourselves unto your own husband, as it is fit in the Lord husband. Love your wives and be not bitter against them.
Children obey their parents and all things, for this is well pleasing unto the Lord.
Fathers for both, not their children to anger, lest they be discouraged.
Servants obey it all things your masters according to the flesh, not with I service as man pleasers, but in heart during golf, and whatsoever ye do, and heartily unto the Lord, and not unto men.
Knowing that on the floor he shall receive the reward of the inheritance. For ye serve the Lord Christ, but he that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he has done, and there is no respected person.
I suppose that we are agreed the 1St 8.
Names such things that come from the old nature, the fallen nature.
Cannot doubt that I believe that this word anger in this place.
In this place the word anger would have to do with that which should emanate from the old nature. Now we do have the word used a couple of times where it'd be even of the new nature, but in this case, in most cases it is the activity of nature, like the fruit in the 5th of Galatians.
I should say the the works of the flesh in Galatians 5.
Anger.
And wrath and malice. And blasphemy.
And filthy communication.
Told to let no corrupt communication proceed out of her mouth, but that which is.
Good for edification.
Quite nice brother around. And Ephesians.
The 4th chapter where we have a similar recital, we have the.
Opposite object put before each one, don't we? Ephesians 4 and the 25th verse.
Wherefore putting away lying?
Well, that's what we're told in Colossians. Why not? But here we're told something more.
But putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. And the following verse be angry and sin not.
00:05:03
And the 28th verse led him that stole steal no more, but rather let him labor working with his hands.
That he may have to give to him that needed. And the next verse which you quoted, No, that no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good for the use of identifying.
Our faithful Lord of God is it not only reproves the works of darkness and our tendency to drift into them.
But it gives us a positive and a more suited occupation to replace that which the old nature was so prone to display.
While they're in Ephesians 4 and these verses here may we?
As it were back up to verse 22 and commenced there to bring out also another line of truth that's going to be before us in the first verse is read this afternoon was verse nine of Colossians 3. But let us look at verse 22 in Ephesians 4.
And may I read it in the other translation which will make this difference?
Show that it's in the past tense as having been accomplished, and not in the present tense of an exhortation of something for us to do.
Now I'll read it in the other translation, namely.
You're having put off. That's in the past tense.
They have put off.
According to the former conversation, which means manner of life, the old man, now it's in the past tense.
The old man has been once for all dealt with.
The old man according to the way scripture reads.
We'll look at that after a bit now in Romans 66.
But here in the 22nd verse, it's in the past tense, having put off.
That is the old man.
Then in verse 23 and being renewed.
In the spirit of your mind.
And your having put on the Newman.
Yet we're not told then to put off the old man. We're not told to put on a new man. We're.
We are told, though, that we have put on a Newman which, according to God, is created in righteousness and true holiness, or truthful holiness, or righteousness and holiness.
Wherefore.
Having put off falsehood, speak every man truth with his neighbor.
For ER members, one of another.
Lovely, isn't it? Now here is a positive command to be angry.
The new nature.
B.
Angry.
And sin not.
In other words, it is such there is such a thing as having the devil at your, at your screen door, at the front door, will say.
And we're not to give any place to him whatsoever.
We are to be angry under such circumstance and to not not to yield.
Not laid down to the enemy in that way in the days of Joshua.
He had power with God.
So that he could enlist the power of.
Of light against the power of darkness, you might say by saying sun stand still.
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And for a period of nearly a day, 23 hours or so.
The sun stood still.
In the IT worried the enemy. The enemy was bested, they were conquered. There was power in Joshua and enlisting God's help. The Kingdom of light was against the Kingdom of darkness, and the enemy was bested. And so in that sense, we're told to be angry. We're also told to.
Neither give place to the devil.
1St that's anger in connection with.
The dishonor of the Lord. It wouldn't be right though for.
Anything that affected you or me?
To be angry? No, I don't say that. We may not be. It's a flesh acts. But it wouldn't be right and scripture does not allow for that.
But to to take.
Like Joshua at the interests of the Lord and the anger against Satan and his even his insinuations as to the person of Christ. Well, the the anger rises in that it's it's because he's been been dishonored. It isn't the fact of of any personal thing against another person. And so we're not to let the sun go down and hold a grudge or anything like that.
In the days of Joshua.
The Word of God, over and over and over again, had told them they were to consume their enemies. Utterly, utterly consume their enemies.
And.
We must ever.
Maintain a righteous indignation.
At anything of that sort and give no place to it whatsoever, and not be worried, but to weary the enemy by the power of the Kingdom of light. In other words, it's it's not merely permission to be angry, but it's a command. It will be angry.
It was only perfectly displayed, I believe in the Lord Jesus whose moral glory and all these things could not be hidden. They came to the Lord Jesus and said sadly not well, that thou art a Samaritan and hasta devil. Now the Lord replied immediately to that double accusation, said we not well that thou art a Samaritan and hast the devil. The Lord's reply was, I have not a devil.
The one was a personal insult, which he left alone completely. The other attributed the power of his ministry to the power of Satan, and this he would immediately correct. Well, I believe that has been brought out, that we, beloved brethren, ought to be very specially on guard in a day like this, concerning that which would be so derogatory to the person of Christ, the work of Christ, the authority of this precious Book, and.
Of God, I hope we do feel angry. We ought to feel angry, and although I have no doubt there is the need of our being warned lest we hold a personal grudge, yet that which I see in the statement, Let not the sun go down upon your wrath, seems to indicate that there is a danger that we become.
Accustomed to that which is so blasphemous against the person of Christ.
Work in a factory and the man beside me is a blaspheming so-called Jehovah Witness. Well, I worked with him for a while and I find that he's very kind and hard and willing to help me out in my problems at work if I am not watchful. I let the sun go down upon my wrath. I overlooked those blasphemous tendencies because I find something rather pleasant about this man.
And I'm afraid that because we see and hear continually around us.
That which is totally opposed to the Word of God, the truth of God and the person of Christ, that we're in danger of letting the sun go down upon our wrath and we don't feel that which we ought to feel when the Word of God is mocked in the person of Christ is attacked. There was a an opposite case to Joshua's. I think I have it here before me.
00:15:12
In the last verse of Second Chronicles 18.
I believe I have it.
The battle increased that day.
How be it the king of Israel?
Stayed himself.
In his chariot against the Assyrians until the evening.
In other words, he was able to put up a pretty good appearance that far, and about the time of the sun going down, he died.
Vested by the enemy in that case.
Now.
I'd like to also read Mark chapter 3 and verse five in particular.
Where the Lord Jesus in the synagogue is being watched by the Pharisees on the Sabbath, Those hard hearted enemies to the Lord.
And.
The Lord.
Said in verse.
After saying to the man withered hand stand forth.
In verse 4, Mark 3/4, he said unto them, Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath days, or to do evil, to save life or to kill? But they held their peace, and when he had looked round about on them with.
Perfect anger with anger.
The Lord Jesus Christ.
He was distressed, being grieved.
At the hardness of their hearts.
One instance where we see the word anger rightly used in a holy way.
It's a natural thing for the Pardon me, you are not finished. You go ahead, dear brother. I was just thinking of this expression. Lie. Not one to another was a natural thing among the heathen. They knew nothing else. We see examples of it in the time of rehab and so on. It just seemed to be the custom to the lie. And it is. It is so with the natural man. Not always. There may be some.
With in a as a result of Christianity.
Been other than not saying they have.
Ways about them that commend them. But in general, I believe this is what characterizes the natural man. The first thing a person does to defend himself is to lie himself out of a difficulty. And so it is.
We we need to remember this, that there are certain tendencies that unless we're exercised before God.
They'll come out, they'll show themselves and we don't think it's too bad. Sometimes when you say something, it isn't quite.
The right color, but it's a lie.
Now the opposite of this.
In the 10th verse is and have put on the Newman, which is renewed in. I believe this should read full knowledge, isn't it?
This takes us back to the first chapter.
Not to refer to it exactly more than just.
By the way that it's in contrast with the mind.
Working on its own.
God has provided in Colossians one the full knowledge of God when Paul was given to complete the scriptures as it were the mystery Christ in the church.
And so we have now a completed record. We have the full knowledge of God. Now this should exercise our hearts because it's only in a sense of this that the truth can go out in grace and love as it should.
And instead of lying to one another, there will be just the opposite result if there is the full knowledge of God. Because in Ephesians we learn that the Lord calls upon them to forgive one another even as Christ has forgiven you. That's the measure, that's the way.
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And so the full knowledge of God then brings us to an understanding of how we should act. It's a wonderful thing, you know, to know you're saved.
Here we have that, which brings us not to reasoning.
No.
Not the mindset on things here or on man's intelligence, but we we derive all of our intelligence from the one who's on high. But through the Word is the Spirit of God opens it to us. And the result is that our ways will be in keeping with Scripture if we're exercised by these things.
I was wanting to.
Say a word on our verse.
9.
As to the last part.
Part of the verse.
We just pointed out there in Ephesians 422 That there in it, I believe the correct translation is in the past tense. I mentioned that this morning. I want.
Saints to see this that as to the old man truth itself.
Scripture ever puts it in the past tense and it carries you back to the cross of Christ.
Now.
Our verse 9 puts it having put off the old man. Now that's past tense. That was back at the cross when the Lord Jesus Christ substitutionally took our place. He was made sin.
Now in Romans chapter 6 and verse six we get the first time at this old man. Truth is brought before us.
Romans 6 and verse 6.
Knowing this, that our old man, it should read, has been crucified.
We are never told.
To put off the old man in the correct translation.
Nor to crucify the old man. Were never told you, because it was done long before I was born.
In God's purposes and the cross of Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ was cut off in my stead, and that took care of the old man.
Romans 66 Knowing this, that our old man has been crucified with him.
Body of sin might be unknown.
Now in we read this morning in Colossians 211 how this circumcision took place at the cross of Christ, he himself being cut off.
I think these four scriptures all show that it's in the past tense and done once for all. It's related to circumcision. Truth in the days when they first went to Gilgal and crossed the Jordan. What were you going to say about the deeds then?
Brother, what the deeds the last of that verse that you thought? Well now.
All of what I was as a fallen Sinner, Son of Adam, child of Adam.
With all my deeds was once dealt with.
Now we have the other Guild. All truth of needings go back continually, but that has to do with the old nature.
As the Lord says, I will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. We have three enemies as long as we're here.
The old nature, the flesh, the world.
And the devil.
And therefore, as long as this old nature is in us, we do have truths like Colossians 35 put to death the deeds of the body, and it names those filthy things of the old nature. That's the way Scripture reads.
00:25:02
I first enjoyed this many years ago in Rossiers book on judges. He puts it very clearly.
I believe it's the thought of the garment that's just guarded to be put off. I believe that's the real illustration of this. It's it's to be done with and put off. That is the deeds. The deeds should be.
A present, continuous thing without reoccurring. I believe anyone knows how brother Paul Johnson here understands what I'm talking about. It's a continuous, permanent thing that an act to not be. It doesn't look upon as though it has to be repeated, but actually.
As long as they have the old nature in us, we're going to find out that we have to.
Keep nipping it every time it shows itself.
In the 5th chapter of Galatians, which might come in little handy.
Relations, Chapter 5.
We're talking about the Newman and the old Man.
In the Gospel of John.
3rd chapter.
Nicodemus.
The Lord told Nicodemus.
Which is flesh is flesh.
And as long as we're in this Tabernacle.
And there's a round of reflection in the Galatians Chapter 5 we might begin.
Verse 15.
But they feel tired and devour one another.
Take heed that she did not consume with one another.
This I say then walk in the Spirit, and he shall not.
Fulfill the lust of the flesh. Now the next verse is the one I had in mind.
The flesh lesseth against the Spirit, the spirit against the flesh. These are contrary 1 to another, so that she cannot do the things that you would.
The flesh is in every believer, and so those that those that are Christians are born of the Spirit. So we have both.
And that they continually fight against one another. Which one are we going to give in to? If we're going to give in to the flesh, we're going to get in trouble.
Flesh can only produce things that are for this world and that are natural to the flesh.
If we walk in the spirit, we produce things that are in this book here, and that's what we're here for, is to walk in the Spirit, isn't it?
John chapter 3 that you mentioned.
In John chapter 3 you mentioned, we get that little verse that tells us that which is born of the flesh is flesh. Now that speaks of the nature.
Of the nature. Of the nature.
And that which is born of the spirit is spirit that speaks of the nature.
Within.
Galatians 5 we have the Christian who's indwelt by the Holy Spirit.
And.
Having a new nature.
A nature that is all together and always dependent.
Dependent thoroughly, and always fully dependent upon the power or the strength of the Holy Spirit.
Now the new nature cannot war against.
The old nature, The old nature can war against the new nature. The only way of overcoming is by walking in the spirit, as verse 16 tells us.
If.
We're told to walk in the Spirit. Notice that, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.
So the power of the new nature is the Holy Spirit.
00:30:02
In our 11Th verse of our chapter we have three things here mentioned. We have that which would be.
More of a national thing, first of all.
Greek or Jew?
And then we have that which would have to do with the.
Traditions, or what we might say.
A religious line of things. Circumcision or uncircumcision.
And then social distinctions, barbarian, Scythian, bond are free. Now all this is set aside, and Christ is all and in all.
So the believer is really set free from everything.
He finds everything in Christ. He's set free from all of these things that go along with either nature or natural religion, and he's a free man.
I believe we have that here.
Christ is everything is the point here now. God had created Adam and there was his race, and the entire race had fallen and become of absolutely no worth whatsoever.
Man is a breathing shame. That's what Mephibosheth means.
And when we look upon everything of the old creation related to Adam, sinned through the enemy, Satan, that old serpent, and so on, sin has come in and ruined it all and all together.
Now only.
In the new creation that God.
Creates us a new new creatures in Christ.
And in Ephesians 210, I don't know if I can quote it right, but.
Ephesians 210 gives us the truth of it, for we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus.
Wonderful and in James 118 is it that we are a kind of a first fruits that or is that that?
No, he begat us again.
Of His own will begat He us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of His creatures, so that only as being in the new creation in Christ risen.
Have we that life?
That is pleasing to God, and it is his own.
It is his own production.
What is the thought of first truth? Well, James is writing to the.
12 tribes that are.
Last letter you might say to the nation of Israel.
And.
In connection with that verse first fruits he first speaks about of his own will He begat us, gave us new life, a new nature, so that we are the new creatures, and according to other truth we are new creatures in Christ. Well.
To be thus.
We are.
A kind of a first fruits. Now the Lord Jesus Christ is spoken of as the first fruit.
And we are a kind of a first fruit that are begotten of God.
Have you another thought better? Well, I was just thinking of the broad aspect of first fruits and not specially in James, but in its general thought that.
It's that which is taken out of the old to start the new. Now the Lord Jesus came down into this world. It's a precious thought, and he took part. It speaks of Abraham's seed really in Hebrews, but we'll say in man's race in that general sense.
00:35:15
Set apart now he died, the whole race is under condemnation.
But when the Lord Jesus died, he rose again, and he rose as man, but in a life that could never fail, in a life that never could be corrupted. And so he became a part of the old, as it were, for the moment, and then to start the new order of things. And so, brethren, it's an entirely new order. It's man, but it's a new order of things entirely.
He became man He died.
That cord of wheat fell into ground and died. It bore a new crop. That's incorruptible. Everything else goes. Adam's race goes completely but the new order of things to which the believer belongs.
The Christian is a sort of a first fruits as it were. Now in that sense we have a verse in Romans, the 8th chapter I'd like to read. I don't want to get off the subject but just this far to notice this because I think it's a lovely thought.
In the eighth of Romans.
The 19 verse.
For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.
Now that chapter is Deliverance, the 8th of Romans, Deliverance which takes in even the creation.
But no deliverance will come until the Lord Jesus has his place with his bride and.
So in that sense, too, the Church with Christ is a sort of first fruits of the new order of things.
Right.
One thing I trust the Saints we ought to appreciate.
A very careful and important distinction, that is.
If I'm if I'm not mistaken now brother and I want to be corrected, I wouldn't dare want to make a mistake here.
I do not believe he he uses any material whatsoever of the old.
He uses persons.
That were sunken in sin. He uses persons, and he sets aside the entire old thing, and he brings in an entirely new thing. I think in your last words you were endeavoring to emphasize that. Most important, I believe he's not patching up or adding to or using anything of the old.
Now except the corner wheat fall on the ground and die.
But that death has to do with the entire thing, death completely setting it aside. And then he introduces a life. We have resurrection life in Christ.
I wondered if that's quite a word of God refers to Isaac as being Abrahams only son. Even in Hebrews 11 Isaac is referred to as Abrahams only begotten son. This used to puzzle me quite a bit. I thought. Of course the scripture had full liberty to use such terms even if I couldn't understand them, and I just took it that way.
We knew, of course, that Abraham had Ishmael as well.
So that only God could refer to Isaac as Abraham only.
Begotten Son. And I used to say to myself, where does Ishmael enter into this picture? And it was a great delight to me to feel that this was just an illustration of what has just been spoken of. Ishmael has been so completely.
Satisfied and written off that Isaac is referred to as though Ishmael just didn't exist anymore at all.
Eyes extends before Abraham as his only begotten son.
And you and I don't stand before God this afternoon as partly fallen sons of Adam patched up, and partly children of God. That which we were has been written off and done with forever, and we stand now. And that which is so new that I believe perhaps we can see a picture of it in Isaac with Ishmael out of the picture.
00:40:09
Amen.
A little thought too, that used to trouble me quite a bit in a practical way in connection with the application of these very things that are spoken of. I'm sure the beloved young people who know the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior have felt this within them and have felt something of what has just been spoken of by our dear brethren.
And I will remember when I was going to school and certain things would be suggested that sounded quite attractive and interesting to me.
And it was suggested that I might attend or participate or something of this kind.
Well, shall I say, simply because of my upbringing, the feeling of my father's hand on my collar, a good deal of the time I would say no thanks, I don't want to.
I guess that wasn't a very complete answer, but it seemed to keep me out of these things anyway.
But it left me feeling rather odd. I felt I hadn't been very truthful. I felt I had said no thanks, I don't want to, whereas in reality I did want to. Now, did I tell a lie? Was I entitled to speak as I did? Well, I tell you, when it came to a wonderful truth of the latter part of Romans 7, I felt so greatly relieved.
I thought there is something inside there that says, yes, you do want to, but I'm perfectly entitled, brethren, to recognize that as a voice from the dead.
And to answer on behalf of the Newman, by the grace of God, even as Paul says, I delight in the law of God after the inward man. So I believe that we are entitled to turn to those things which are put before us which we know very well would not meet with the approval of the Lord Jesus.
And say no thanks I don't want to in the eye that says I don't want to.
Is the new man that stands before God.
Now the Christian. The Christian has pardon me for saying this every once in a while. The Christian has two distinct natures.
And the allowance of one disallows the other. If I cater to the flesh, I'm going to grieve the spirit and defeat my going on in the enjoyment communion in the spirit and and vice versa.
I sometimes said.
That we can very easily quote not.
My will but thine be done.
But oh, how frequently and how easy it is to turn that around in practice when we want to have our own way and to.
And do as we list, as we say, and we turn it around as much as to say not thy will, but mine be done. I say in practice, I don't think the Christian intentionally, intentionally or deliberately, you know, we do these things, but all when we get careless in our lives.
I know it that I there's a will, there's a flesh in there that wants.
To do its own will.
Had a wonderful and heart cheering truth for us to be reminded that.
If any man sin, we have an advocate for the Father, even Jesus Christ the righteous.
And so we we know our misbehaviors.
We know our tendencies, our failures, and indeed we well know what this old nature, how forceful it still is in US.
But we have had before us already the remedy, and that's to be occupied with Christ. Yet if we fall from the pathway and carelessness, there's a real material difficulty in occupying ourselves oftentimes with Christ. Perhaps some of us know what it is to have been dull apart, and pick up the Word of God and find it has no real.
00:45:01
Conveyance of a message to us because we're so dull, but still we have that one up above the limit that is an advocate for us.
We still the old man has been taken care of through grace. Positionally, we're still his. We're not in jeopardy as to eternity, but we have marred the communion and the pathway. It now is no longer happy. But if we remember this lovely verse, the Advocate above, Jesus Christ the righteous.
If we dwell on it and think on it, does it not then provoke us to that point where we make confessions?
Of that error, where we humbly acknowledge being away from the past through our shame and to the dishonor of the Lord, and sometimes the grievance of our brethren, And how quickly and readily He restores us, when even in the feeblest measure, we prove something of this.
He's the most gracious God and the most gracious Savior.
Do not reconcile his own to him.
When we have failed in the pathway, and may we not be discouraged, Dear young people, we've spoken here.
Lovely truths, and yet sometimes one.
Wonders if perhaps even these truths are discouraging to us, that we feel we don't rise up to them, we're not equal to them.
But God is gracious to us in the measure in which we walk in the good of His Word. When we desire to walk in His truth, and recognizing our faults, we readily and promptly confess and express them to Him in our prayer. There's a remedy, and it restores us again to the past.
In verse 12, I'd just like to call attention to the way in which the exhortation is put.
And following up what you've said, Brother GAIL, because I believe this is the natural result of the soul in restoration.
Is not occupied with self now, but with others. We learn in the Epistle of John that the way to express our love for God is seen in the way we act toward our brethren.
And that takes us to this 12Th verse. But now the exhortation is this way.
Put on therefore.
Bowels of mercy? No, no. What does it say? It says as the elect of God.
Holy and beloved.
Now, brethren, when we exhort one another.
Are we able to admonish one another? Do we see one another in this light as the elect of God? Do we see them as holy and beloved, or do all we see is there? Do we see only their faults? I believe we have a principle here, and I believe it's important to notice that.
To to see every member as God sees them now. It's one thing to be in a position, it's another thing to fail.
But we still are in that position. Even though we fail, we still.
Are holy and beloved. We still are the elect of God. And so we must remember that when we look at our brethren, that if we think of their failure, we must remember that they're a part of the body of Christ. We must regard them as such. And if we're going to be a help to them.
We'll have to do as the Lord Jesus put on the town and gird himself and take the low place.
Because oftentimes there's an attempt to.
Be a help to others and to take a place as though we were higher than they are or that we were better spiritually than they are, which certainly doesn't bring any good results. I think it's very instructive to see how that the apostle opens his letters, commences them, and how he closes them.
Connection with your remarks.
Go back to the first chapter and the second verse, and there he as he opens this letter, he addresses it to the Saints, unfaithful brethren in Christ, which are a colossi, all he sees in them.
00:50:11
The Spirit of Christ.
He sees them as Saints of God by calling. He seems their faithfulness, even though he warns them all the dangers, as we have noticed in the Epistle. But he addresses them as Saints and faithful brethren in Christ. I'll take the opening words of the Epistle to the Ephesians. Take Corinthians.
Take all the apostles letters.
In which he addresses the dear Saints of God, with the exception of Galatians. Oh, I believe it's very, very instructive and becoming to us to have that same Spirit and see Christ in one another. And when we enjoy that, we'll enjoy the manner in which the apostle closes his letters.
I've enjoyed it very much. I pass it on for the young people to meditate upon.
This verse 12.
Really gives you.
As it were the character of Christ himself to be.
To be lived by you and me.
So he says put on therefore.
May I drop back to verse five, the opposite truth?
Mortifier put to death. Therefore now in that case, it's the all the activities of the old nature in verse 5. Now in verse 12, it is really the character of Christ, is it not but on therefore as the elect of God, holy and beloved.
Bowels of mercy sets compassion, kindness, humbleness or loneliness of mind, meekness and long-suffering. Now, is that not the new nature and the nature of Christ?
In character and in practice.
How easy it would be for us to display these things if we were a little more conscious of the fact that we were elect of God.
Why am I in the possession, and perhaps in some little measure in the enjoyment of these wonderful things? It is altogether the matchless sovereign grace of God from beginning to end, and I suppose a sense in our own soul that we are elect of God poorly and beloved from that starting point. How easy it would be for us.
To look around with vowels of compassion and love and forgiveness and tenderness.
Toward all our brethren, How could we ever find it in our hearts to the short, in any of these things, if our souls were really in the enjoyment of that which is our portion, and of the sovereign electing grace that made it our portion?
The because I believe it's both the measure and the motive. At least that's the way I see it in the end of verse 13.
Both the measure and the motive of our conduct toward our brethren should be the unlimited, immeasurable love and kindness and forgiveness that has been shown towards us. Seems to me that thought of election is really very humbling and very beautiful.
Putting off the old man and putting on the old Newman. The old man has been put off. But because we are new creatures in Christ, there are those things that are becoming for us to do. Isn't that what we had before us?
Activities of the old man and put on the activities of the Newman.
I suppose what our brother is saying to us.
Is an effect that we discern, perhaps?
Some error in which we've allowed the old nature to.
Be active in it. And our conscience bothers us. We wish to correct this. And he, our brother Alarcon, says it's an error for us to think we can correct this, which has been allowed to the old nature by merely seeking to get into the power of the new nature we need to put away.
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That which the old nature allowed first. I think we all agree with this. Do we not least to do evil, learn to do well?
Yes, the.
The.
Getting careless.
Getting out of Communion?
And.
Having a guilty conscience. And also there's such a thing as having a sense in our hearts.
Not having a good.
How is it? Well, a favorable heart toward God. That's first. John 3 verses about 20, for instance.
That's it exactly. You see there. It's a matter of the state of the heart. If my heart gets careless, I feel it.
Well, not at ease, but I feel uncomfortable, I'm out of communion and so on. I think there's that.
But we get careless, we'll say, in the heart and the conscience. Then what?
All God by the Holy Spirit would work in us to to to humble ourselves in his presence, to judge ourselves thoroughly about it and to confess it. And that is the route to restoration. And don't fool yourself by thinking that you're going to get any other route.
God will carry us by that route for restoration. It's all through the Word of God. I'd like to read one person, one chapter of Matthew.
Matthew Chapter 11. This is the Lord Jesus speaking.
Verse 29.
Take my yoke upon you.
And learn of Maine.
Learn of me.
Are we learning?
Learning something this afternoon that pleases the Lord Jesus.
Let me close on and say.
For I am Nick and lonely at heart.
Whether it takes meekness and loneliness to learn what we've been going over.
And that's something that we haven't got very much of his meekness.
The children of Israel.
Before they started their journey to the wilderness.
Said the reason I lead you through the willingness is to learn something. The first thing that they have to learn is humbleness.
The next thing they have to learn is what was in their heart.
And the other thing was to prove them and see what's in their heart, those three things that was necessary.
And if we learn some of those things, it won't be hard.
To put off the flesh.
We learn what the Spirit would have to steal, what the Spirit, what the Spirit teaches us.
Take my yerk upon you and learn of me. The Lord teaches us what to do, but we have to be in the state and condition.
To learn it.
I believe that verse 12.
As you say, is the result of what we have in verse 11.
I believe the right translation is Christ is everything.
It isn't just an agreeable social climate that's before us here.
It isn't just making ourselves agreeable to others. These are things that are learned in the presence of God. They're the the result is that which comes out the scene of a new nature in the believer.
It isn't true of the world now there may be a certain amount of.
Agreement.
There might be a certain amount of.
Things in which you can go on and the the world is.
Will go on together, even in a nice way. But that isn't what we have here. It isn't just getting along, In other words, it's a question of what we find.
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With this one object before us, the hope that is laid up in heaven and is occupied with him.
This will be the result in the life of the believer. It's the Spirit of Christ. It's the life of Christ that's seen in the believer as the result.
In this 12Th verse.
The fruit of the Spirit, yes.
I suppose that the Spirit isn't mentioned though in Colossians so much, possibly once, and it's more the thought of of our hope which is laid up in heaven. It is the work of the Spirit, I'm sure, but it's really fixing our eyes on Christ and on heavenly things, and this is the result.
This is verse 13 written to believers.
What would you think?
I'm sure it is, brother.
Well then, is it that they we need this exhortation?
Yes, often these expectations that we get are both for old and young. Keep this in mind, some of us older ones need these exhortations more than the younger ones. Sometimes the younger ones will follow if they see these things and the older ones.
There is perhaps a danger that we might pick out some of these things that are mentioned here and think they sound very fine and even.
Have a dreadful thought entertained that we would like to seek after what he's spoken of here. Kindness. I would like to be considered a kind brother. I would like to be considered a humble brother or a meek brother. I think there may be just a little danger in this direction that we read these things that are so acceptable to God and so pleasing to the Lord Jesus.
And we think now, how shall I go about developing this in my life?
What a sad object that would be. We would end up either proud or discouraged, one or the other. If we set out to attain to any of the things mentioned here, even if it be humility, we would end up either proud or discouraged, depending on whether we think we have gotten along well. I believe, as our brother London remarked, that it is having the Lord Jesus Christ before us.
That causes these things to be displayed in our life. Without our having these things before us as an object, there is always a danger with us. I greatly fear that we have in mind our own reputation.
He had none. He made himself. He made himself of no reputation. And if you'll forgive a quotation, occupation with Christ will keep us humble and happy. Humble because we're so little like Him, and happy because He loves us so much.
And I believe that's true.
If you and I want these things to be displayed in our lives, let us not seek after them, because just as surely as we do, they will become objects for a reputation. But in walking in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ, these things in their proper balance will be displayed always. I'm sure that in the life and testimony of the Lord Jesus we can see that perfect balance.
There were times, undoubtedly, when a casual observer would think that the Lord was perhaps.
Lacking in gentleness because of the way in which he answered, I said. Casual observer. But his ways were perfect, and I believe that if we walked in his presence, there would be displayed in us also each in their time those things which are mentioned here.
What I read in Ephesians 4.
Related truth to what we have in our verse before us.
Ephesians 4. I just read 2 verses. Let me see 1-2 yes, 2 verses.
I therefore.
Oh, verses one and two. Thanks. I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the calling. I'm going to read it instead of location. It's really the same word.
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As you get from the end of the verse, virtually the same word.
That we walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye are called. I want to read the second verse, but make a remark on the first one.
Are we not living at the tag end of this long church age and at the bad end of it? Not the best end of it, The bad end of it.
Is all around us and the tendency is to live like the world.
And is it not true?
That if you ask most of us, you and me, that we had hardly recognized what really is Our Calling.
Our heavenly calling, brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling.
We have the heavenly hope of waiting for the Lord Jesus because our citizenship, our Commonwealth, is in heaven.
And.
If my soul could be freshly enjoying and living in the good of that calling on high, too soon, soon, very soon will be called on high with resurrection bodies to be with it, with and like the Lord Jesus, the Lord of glory.
But this is so important.
Over and over again. I think 9 times.
The apostle says I would not have you to be ignorant.
And the 13 times.
Know ye not? Do ye not know?
All brother who are living in days when we seem to be getting by with a possible not even knowing Our Calling or that anyone else would recognize that we have a heavenly calling. It's very, very important.
But in connection with it.
In verse 2, with all loneliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another.
In love, divine love, we're in love, in the love of God and in the love enjoyed by all of us that are born again. By this we know we fasten death and life because we love the brethren. We're in love. Wonderful to be in love.
In this special way that really counts for eternity to be in love.
Well, this is related to our verse because we read it now, verse 13 forbearing one another.
In other words, holding self back and regarding and respecting one another.
We are members one another, we love one another, we help one another, we serve one another, we pray for one another, we have fellowship with one another, and so on. Now here it is.
Forbearing one another and forgiving one another.
Now that is the attitude of the new nature in exercise, in practice, forbearing one another and forgiving one another.
Now, if any should have a complaint, notice how different I read It is not even a quarrel.
It's a complaint. I think the Pharisees criticized Him because they ate without washing their hands. They had a complaint in Mark. I could turn to the verse. It's in Mark 7, verse 2, the same word, a complaint. Just think of just a complaint against some little thing.
Now when the Saints try to use this verse to cover all kinds of things.
All it is a careless misuse of Scripture. It has its own place. It's a very, as it were, light matter. It's a complaint. A complaint, not a continuous program of hatred and malice and things like that. But in this case, it is a a complaint.
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That there be a forgiving spirit and a readiness to for bear and all that. Even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.
All these things remind us, brethren, that as we walk together on the pathway to glory, we are going to find intrusions.
As to personality conflicts.
Irritability. Sometimes we wish they weren't there, but we know they're there. Sometimes we cause them, sometimes we are.
The ones who are irritated.
And how gracious God is that He has been faithful in giving these exhortations to us, that we might present a testimony of that body that He is raising up, walking in harmony together in spite of these differences of personality which often are so very marked amongst us.
One has thought how?
We have a tendency, brethren, to think of these Scriptures in connection with our own company, but this is addressed to the whole Church of God. This is to all believers everywhere, and as we meet Saints of God, they may not be walking as we are in the same.
Meeting Hall and may not subscribe fully to what we have, but what a joy it is to meet those who are of like precious faith and to seek to enjoy the things of God with them rather than get in a conflict with them. I believe we have that involved in here too. The world is reading us. We are the official written on the fleshly tablets of the heart that the world sees.
Rather, what a travesty it is on our profession when we are found.
In disharmony and confusion among the Lord's people.
So God has through the Holy Spirit in His Word and joined us here and elsewhere over and over again.
To know and prove this spirit of forbearance, of love, of kindness, of gentleness, and what has been brought before us is the key to it indeed, is having Christ as the object. And if my eye is on Him, if my devotedness is to my Savior and to the Word of God, I'll have little time.
To be occupied with the failures that I may sense or think or imagine in others. I'll see more of what is in me That is a myth, and there will be greater.
Greater demonstration of these attributes that we are called upon to display.
This 14th 1St gives us the finish of the clothing, doesn't it? We hear about being clothed with humility. Well, that's a wonderful thing, but we started out by.
Putting off certain things like clothing that we're not in keeping with Christianity.
Now we find that there are certain things that adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in the Christian, the clothing, but now we put on the person says, well, I'm not dressed until I put my hat on. And so this 14th verse and above all these things put on charity or love, which is the bond of perfectness.
Now this tops it all off. It's the really the very nature.
Of the believer. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
And so the Christian puts on then love, but not.
Only in the sense that he has it in his nature, but now in practice.
He applies this now if we don't love our brother, if we hate our brother, John says. There's evidence there that you don't have the love of God. We hate our brother.
And so we put on this now that completes the clothing here, that we see the believer now closed, as it were, with the result of being occupied with Christ, and his ways are in keeping with it. It's his outward character that's seen before the world.
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Not as a result of that, which would bring pride in trying to do this or do that, but the result of proper occupation with Christ and reading the Gospels, reading the epistles.
Uh, reading the gospel to warm our hearts as we as we see Christ in them, and reading the epistles to instruct us in doctrine as it should be.
Why? In connection with your thoughts, the verse love covereth the multitude of sins indeed.
All in writing the 1St chapter to the Philippians repeatedly speaks of his his love toward them all is really quite impressive in that first chapter how often he says I long after you all well, I'm sure he wouldn't say that unless it were absolutely true and I have pictured perhaps the.
Philippian Jailer might have been there to have heard that chapter read for the first time and must have made quite an impression on him to read from the pan of the Apostle a very man whom he had treated so cruelly.
That he longed after you all. If you would permit me, Brother Gill, I would like to quote what your father said about that quite a few years ago. One time we were having a reading on this very topic and he was listening very intently without saying anything until we reached what seemed to be the point where we were.
Almost congratulating ourselves on doing a pretty good job of loving one another very, very much.
And then he spoke up, and these, if I remember rightly, are his very words. They just hit me so hard and impressed me so much I clenched them right there, He said. Brethren, the measure of divine love operative within the soul, it can be judged by the affection you bear toward the most ugly and cantankerous brother within the sphere of your acquaintance.
I tell you, there was real silence when he finished that, and I thought it was so searching and so needful.
I may content myself into feeling that I do rather well with this cloak of charity and look around the assembly and love all my brethren. All but that one whom nobody can get along with anyway. Well, your Father would say that's the measure of divine love. You love the rest of them because they're more or less compatible, but the one who is so hard to love?
Reveals the measure of divine Love operative within the soul. It's searching.
Just one more word in connection with forgiving.
Before we forgive anyone, it's.
Nice to confess our fault. If I hurt your feelings, if I step on your toe, I say forgive me.
I own and I own and confess that I stepped on your toe, didn't I?
It says if we confess our sins.
Lord is willing to forget, Confess your faults 1 to another. It's a very, very good thing.
And we feel so much better.
It's for our brother that we that we hurt one another. We feel so much perished. But it comes and says I've done, I made a mistake, I've done, I've done you wrong. Will you forgive me?
The forgiving is much easier.
By owning and confessing our sins first.
That's what the Lord asked us. We might just turn to a verse in the first in the Epistle of John in closing.
1St Chapter Where is the pistol of John?
And the ninth verse.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and the Clintons from all unrighteousness. Confession comes before forgiveness.
If we hurt our feelings with one another, let's own our wrong and it's much easier to forgive that way and just take a cover up.
We're not to wait for another to confess. No. Never before we forgive it. It's nice to do that, Yes. How about Luke 17? Three brother.
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Read it.
To yourself, If my brother trespassed against the rebuke him, and if he repent, forgive him. And if he trespassed against the seven times in a day and seven times in a day, turn again to be saying, I repent, thou shalt forgive him.
Wouldn't that suppose?
That you're doing him good by.
Expecting a real confession.
It'd be better for his soul than to just gloss over it and forget about it. And. And yet there may be.
Continue to be there. I believe it is calling for a real work and it be a benefit for that brother to really produce, you know, a broken down confession. I think it calls for nothing less than this verse. It's for his own good. If I love him, I'm praying for him. I'm seeking and do everything if possible to encourage.
Come to it. But it is not to just simply Passover the thing.
Surely because it says.
If thy brother trespass against the rebuking.
And if he repent, forgive him, that'll be good for his soul, for him to confess. And how we're waiting happily and quickly.
To to forgive him. Oh my God, Oh my, what a wonderful thing it is to be able to throw your arms around the brother that has been.
Frank enough and upright enough to own the thing that has been distressing.
Ark of the Covenant
Address—A.C. Hayhoe
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Like you to turn with me, please, first of all to the Epistle to the Hebrews. Hebrews Chapter 9, verse one. Hebrews 9, verse one. Then verily, the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service.
And a worldly sanctuary, for there was a Tabernacle made the first, wherein was the Candlestick and the table, and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary, and after the second veil, the Tabernacle, which is called the holiest of all, which had the golden sensor.
Now this is the part I would like to speak about.
And the Ark of the Covenant overlaid round about with gold.
Wherein was the golden pot that had manna and Aaron's wrought that budded?
And the table of the covenant we read about 3 ark.
In the word of God, I suppose, when the ark is mentioned, we first of all find ourselves.
Generally thinking of the ark built in the days of Noah for the preservation of his own family and for anyone else who was willing to hear that message.
Sad story that although they heard it faithfully told, it was rejected. Then we also read of that little individual arc in which Moses was placed and rested upon the waters of the river Nile.
But in this 9th chapter we read of yet another ark, an ark in which there were three things. And this is the picture that is before my soul tonight, the contents of the Ark of God.
The tables of stone, the golden pots that had Manor and Aaron's rod that budded. I'll read that fourth verse again.
Hebrews, Chapter 9, verse 4.
Which had the golden sensor and the ark of the Covenant overlaid round the boat with gold, wherein was the golden poppin head manner and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the Covenant. You know, everywhere the children of Israel went in their journey, they carried with them. The Tabernacle they carried with them.
This ark of God.
With its remarkable content.
Notice please the three things.
There was Aaron's rocket butted, the golden pot that had Manor and the table of the Covenant, and every footstep of their journey through the wilderness they were always accompanied by this precious and solemn piece of furniture, that which spoke of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You remember that when this was first given.
Moses had been called up to Mount Sinai, and there, amid all the thunders and the lightnings and the quakings of Mount Sinai, Moses received the 10 commandments written with the very finger of God on two tables of stone.
When he came down from the mountain with those two tables of stone, but upon reaching the bottom of the mountain.
He became aware of frightful sin and disobedience in the camp of Israel, and he knew that if he walked into the midst of the camp of Israel carrying these two tables of stone, there would be but one result. The holy and righteous anger of God would burst forth upon that disobedient people, and a full blaze of acclaimed of that law would have been felt among them. And he took.
Those two tables of stone and break them in pieces at the foot of the mountain. Now there are times in reading God's precious word when I stop and say to myself now if I had never read this account before.
How bewildered, how puzzled I would be to get what God might do next. Have you ever done that? It's quite interesting. Of course, having heard it from my boyhood days, having read it for myself, I find myself quite aware of what's going to happen next.
But if I see Moses standing there with the broken remains of the 10 commandments at his feet, I found the revelry coming from the camp and the voice of God calling him to come back up again to Mount Sinai, what would I expect to happen? I think this would be my conclusion. I believe I would say, well, one thing I know that God will not be able to give those 10 commandments over again.
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You have to cut them down to nine or eight or seven. He'll have to make them less severe and less demanding.
I can't see any way where by those 10 commandments which now lie broken at Moses feet.
Could ever be carried into the midst of a people like Israel, but God had a way you and I never would have thought of that way. God wrote again all those 10 commandments every one of them not one of them was toned down. Not one of them was left out and those two tables of stone containing the law of God where this time placed within this beautiful and holy ark with its covering of.
Feet sprinkled with blood, and there it stood in the mid of the camp of Israel. I believe it speaks of the matchless mercy of God's loving heart toward rebellious sinners like ourselves that have found a way whereby not at the expense of the righteous and holy claims of His own throne, but having.
Vindicated and glorified the claims of His own holy throne. Now you and I.
Who once were far off and stood in fear of ever meeting him, can now look up into the very faith of God with perfect confidence. But we know that the One whom God sent into this world has actually given Himself and taken our guilt upon himself, shed His precious blood.
That we might be redeemed. Or before I go any farther in the subject, that's on my heart.
I just must pause, for I feel at a responsibility every time the Lord allows me to privilege of speaking from this precious book, that there might so easily be someone here who doesn't yet know the Lord Jesus as your Savior. You beloved parents have brought your children up tonight, and I'm thankful to see it.
I thank God to see every boy and girl that's here and all of their young people who are here.
But all I want to ask you right now, if the Lord Jesus were to come this very evening before this meeting comes to a close, would this front row be completely vacant and will now speak of the 2nd row and the next row right back to the row where you're sitting? Would that row be completely vacated?
Would you be gone? Would your seat be empty?
Or would you be left behind?
Oh, I tell you this, when I think of what God has done, when I think of the mighty work of the Lord Jesus Christ, when I think of the near coming moment when the Lord Jesus is going to call his redeemed home to share it all the joy of that eternal home. And I think of what it would mean to be left behind in my own memory trembles as I recall how this used to.
Trouble my own soul.
I look into the faces of these who are gathered present tonight. And before we go any farther, just let me ask you, if you have not yet received the Lord Jesus as your Savior. If you have not as yet thanked God for that most wondrous gift, will you not do so tonight? It doesn't have to be a gospel meeting night after all, does it? And one thing more, if you have accepted the Lord Jesus and your Savior.
Quietly, perhaps with no one hearing a word. Have you ever told anyone? Have you ever in all your life told anyone? I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is my Savior. You know. Back home a young man shook my hand as he went out the door. He had been to meeting a good many times before. He was at all the meetings and I thought he was really the Lord. But this night he was.
Quiet young man, and still is.
A father now of a family that sits in meeting with him.
He shook my hand and then gave it a little extra squeeze and said I would just like you to know.
That I have accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior.
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Well, you know, that brought very, very real joy to me. But I'll tell you where there was a much greater joy than in my heart or even in his.
And that was in the heart of God himself, who sent the Lord Jesus in order that that dear young man might know the joy of being redeemed. Well, you know, his Father was out to the same meeting. His father had been a faithful man of God for many years and still is.
And his father was one of the last ones out of the meeting room that night, and I was still standing at the door shaking hands.
And as his father came out, I said, a little word of encouragement tonight, brother, He said, what's that? I said a young man, one of the first to go out, just told me that he had accepted the Lord Jesus as his savior. Oh, he said, how nice. It's so good to hear of someone being brought to know the Lord Jesus. And his face lighted up so brightly. By the way, he said, who was it? I said, it was your own oldest son.
Well, you know, I've never seen the light of heaven, but I got pretty close to seeing it that night.
The sunshine that lit up that dear Father's face.
Knowing that his son's lips had been open to confess the Lord Jesus, is there anyone here who has never confessed the Lord Jesus? Why not this very night? Well, now, the two things that accompany the tables of stone in this ark are to me, very, very interesting. There was a golden pot containing Manor. And there was.
Aaron's Rob that butted. Now I trust I may be given the liberty to apply these.
There may be others who would see different things from them, but I love to see in the golden pot that had manna which followed the children of Israel all through their wandering, the wondrous faithfulness of the grace of God that met their need all through those 40 years of their wandering. Well, you know, if it had not been for that manner, what would have become of that great company?
2 million people we might get.
Wandering through the wilderness for 40 years and by the grace of God.
The faithful, ever present grace of God, their needs were met, and they carried with them, as an emblem of the grace of God, every step of the journey, this golden pot that had manner, that very food from heaven.
That in God's wondrous grace had met their knee. And I believe it was very wondrous grace because I'm pretty sure as you and I read the story of Israeli history, we can't very well say, well, they deserve dog blessing. They were so grateful for everything he did for them. Is that the way the story reads? It just seems to me that they did more murmuring and complaining and thought.
Than anything else. And yet he didn't forsake them. He looked down upon them and he fed them.
In his matchless grace all there is a tender note in the second chapter of Jeremiah and the second verse.
Years after they had taken that long wilderness journey, the Lord says to his servant Jeremiah, go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem. Thus saith the Lord.
I remember thee the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness. Isn't that a beautiful thought the Lord sang so many years after. I remember thee the kindness of thy youth.
The love of thy espousal when thou wentest.
After me in the wilderness. I say again, if we were to read that story, we'd find ourselves hard pressed to find much evidence of that. But God could see it and never forgot it. The kindness of our youth. Could I just pass that verse on to you?
As something you and I might covet.
Wouldn't it be a real joy to your heart if the Lord were able to say that to you in a day that's coming? Just think of what it would mean if you were able to stand face to face with the Lord Jesus in that day and hear him say, I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth. All beloved, that is a good time to give your heart to the Lord Jesus.
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That is a good time to serve him wholly and fully.
The kindness of value, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, is this true of you? Is this true of me? Oh, what joy it brings to the heart of the Lord Jesus when something of this can perhaps be seen even ever so feebly in the life of his own. He never, never forgets it. And years later he says to Jeremiah, Tell him that I've never forgotten.
Well, I say once again, I believe this golden pop containing manner carried through all the wanderings of the wilderness is a marvelous reminder of the grace of God.
Let's turn to 2nd Corinthians.
And we'll find a little text there in connection with that grace of God.
One that has been a very great comfort to many. 2nd Corinthians 12 verse nine. And he said unto me.
My grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. You know, beloved, we might as well admit the truth of it. We'd like to get along on our own steam and on our own strength, not be dependent on grace.
We feel, somehow or other, that it would be much more satisfying to us if we could start out on our own and not have to fall back upon that which Paul exalts so much here. And because of that natural tendency with us, God sent this infirmity into the experience of the beloved apostle in order that he might know.
The wonder of that matchless grace, and having known it, how delightfully he rest in it and thanks God for it.
And dearly beloved, it is because he loves you so much and loves me so much.
That he have spent into all our lives that which makes us conscious that our own supposed strength, our own resources, our own wisdom, cannot seem to solve the difficulties of the day. And in our need, in our weakness, in our helplessness, and in our ignorance, we can come to the one who answered Paul in his marvelous language and find he'll do the very, very same for you.
My grace is sufficient for these, for my strength.
Is made perfect in weakness. What was it that brought this about? What was it that taught this wonderful lesson to the Apostle Paul?
There was given to him a thorn in the flesh.
A messenger of Satan to buffet me. Notice he includes Satan in that statement, I believe. As in the case of Job, so in the case of Paul, the eye of Satan rested upon that man, and he found it a great delight to bring into Paul's experience that which was a thorn in the flesh. But to whom did Paul turn, no matter what the apparent source may be?
Paul knew that above all, that was the hand and heart of God.
And so there he turns with his problem, and from that source he finds the answer, which brings him complete contentment.
My grace is sufficient for Thee. May I just pause here to say that I feel that This is why we know so little of the wondrous grace of God, because we are so very, very much inclined to look around at the natural causes for the circumstances that befall us along the way.
Suppose my neighbor bumped into my car and did quite a bit of damage.
I might not say it out loud, but I just might have a few thoughts that I might kind of keep to myself concerning my careless neighbor and his inefficient driving. I would more than likely feel that he was 100% to blame and that it was just what the world calls our pure and simple accidents.
And suppose one of my brethren caused me some embarrassment.
False accusation, if you wish. What shall I do now? Shall I turn to my brethren and begin to get a sour feeling toward them? This, I believe, is a lesson that we ought to learn right here, that those things which come into our lives, no matter what the apparent source may be. And I believe Paul knew that the devil had his hand in this. The messenger of Satan debuffed me.
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But he knew where to turn.
If lightning struck the roof of my home, I couldn't blame my neighbor for that.
I couldn't blame my brethren for that. You might at last find me looking up and saying, I wonder what the Lord is trying to teach me now.
And He was trying to teach me just as much in those other circumstances. He was trying to teach me even as He tries to teach you. Beloved, the matchless grace of His heart, the grace that has picked you up and redeemed you, is the same matchless, wondrous grace that He has pledged will care for you all the way through the journey.
Now we read also in Hebrews.
Very familiar scripture. Hebrews 4. I believe it is Hebrews 4, verse 16. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Grace to help in time of need. All dear Saints of God, when I think of the times of need that beset God's people as they went through the wilderness.
And I have a hand of God pledged to care for them and to keep them.
And how they carried with them day by day, that golden pot containing manna.
Ever continual emblem of the wonderful grace of God. I feel sure that in every life represented in this room tonight, there have been circumstances that would be difficult indeed were it not for the grace of God that has stood you in good stead in the midst of those really trying and very difficult circumstances.
You know, when we turn anywhere else, we're sure to find that which is.
A disappointment. You know as well as I do that the children of Israel where?
Dissatisfied with God's provision? Is that not true?
Take a look at the Book of Numbers and I believe we'll see that. And the language there I think is.
Very significant.
The 11Th chapter of the Book of Numbers.
And the fourth verse and the mixed multitude that was among them fell a lusting. And the children of Israel also wept again, and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt freely, the cucumbers and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions and the garlic. How many different kinds of food is that?
It's worth taking a look at that verse and counting it for yourself, and then I think you'll remember.
There are six kinds of food mentioned there, and we're not too surprised at that, are we? It's not this just exactly what the world offers when you and I perhaps might find ourselves hiring of the rich and wondrous heavenly food that He has given us to meet our need. They fell a lusting this manner that was so abundantly provided for them.
Didn't fully satisfy them, sad to say, and they fell a lusting after the things that they had once eaten in Egypt and they recounted them.
Fish.
Cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. Six different kinds of food. I suppose that's the best number that man can present. Falling 1 short of dog. Perfect number. And I believe we find it very often associated with the very best of man's efforts, the number six.
I think there's something else very significant also about this.
Notice that the first three that are mentioned are just a bit different than the last three.
Fish cucumbers and melon.
Now we've all enjoyed these three things. At least I expect we have.
I enjoy them myself, but when you compare them with the last three you can see a remarkable difference.
The last three are much stronger, aren't they? They have a flavor that lingers for a long time. It flavors everything else you eat 4 hours after.
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And it also betrays to everybody else around what you've been feeding on, isn't that true?
But the devil doesn't start us off with that kind of thing. He starts us off with that which just doesn't seem so bad. Fish, cucumbers and melons. They don't seem to be nearly as uh.
As much of a class as the leeks, onions and garlic.
And I believe, and I just must lay my hand upon my heart as I say it, that the wonderful provision of the grace of God that will care for us every step of the journey along the way has been put at disposal. We have the Word of God, We have the Spirit of God indwelling us. We have the Son of God risen at his own right hand, up there in the glory of our High Priest and ever as our Advocate.
We have, I believe, a wonderful privilege.
At the Samaritan presented to the wounded man, he brought him to the inn, and he would like to do the same to you. He doesn't just put you adrift to fend for yourself and to end up in the Church of your choice. He will, if you will allow him the joy and privilege of guiding you. He will bring you to the end where shelter and nourishment and fellowship will be.
For you and the promise of that loving care until the moment when he who picked you up and redeemed you will come again to take you away to be with himself.
All beloved brethren, pardon me for saying this, but it does break my heart sometimes to see those who have had such wonderful privileges, who have been brought up under the sound of God's precious Word at home and in the meeting.
And they first try the fish and then the cucumbers and then my garlic, and then the leek and the onion, the leaks the onions and the garlic, and pretty soon their appetite is lost and gone for those things that they once enjoyed.
A wonderful provision that God has made for us.
I hope I may be forgiven for speaking.
Of myself.
The Lord knows that these appetites never fade away. They're there continually. They need to be kept, as we were reminded in the meeting, in the place of death.
But I'll tell you, brethren, I want to thank God.
And to thank God publicly for those dear brethren who cared enough for my soul that when they saw me going after these very things, they would speak faithfully and lovingly and tenderly to me. I remember when I was a young man in Ottawa.
Aye, well, the dear brother there.
His name was Brother Watson.
And he kept the thought of an eye on all of us young people. He was as Irish as they come, and we didn't know whether to take him seriously all the time or not. And I know this will sound very strange to you, but in those days going away to college was considered just about the most dangerous and wicked thing that anybody could ever do. Nobody in my age group ever dreamed of going away to college. And when finally I felt this to be what the Lord was.
Thing for me.
I tried to keep it a secret but this old man found out about it and he came to me after meeting.
He said. Albert, what's this I hear about you?
And I hung my head, he said. Is it true that you're going away to college?
And I said, well, yes, Brother Watson, I suppose you'll be coming back with some fancy letters after your name. Oh, no, no, I don't think so, Brother Watson.
Just want to study something that I might be able to use in making a living.
Well, I hope you do. I hope you come back with some real fancy letters after your name. I was so surprised. I didn't think this was the advice I'd get from that dear man of golf.
He said. Albert, I hope you come back with OMGB after your name.
I said, what does that mean? Go home and read the book of Daniel, he said. And I found it there.
Old man greatly beloved.
I cherish the counsel of that dear old man. He set me to work reading God's precious words, the account of Daniel that our brother Ralph Lewis brought before us, surrounded by everything that would have tripped up so many of us. And he has this commendation in that book. Oh man, greatly beloved. Oh my dear friend, when I see the matchless grace of God that picked us up in the first place.
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When I see the matchless grace of God that meets the problem that Paul was confronted with. When I see the invitation in the Word of God that you and I are privileged to get down on our knees and pour out our hearts before Him and seek grace to help in time of need. How thankful you and I ought to be for this provision. And May God spare us ever from turning from that which He has provided, that which He delights, to put it out.
To turn again to the things that are spoken out here, this is a digression, but just turn to Deuteronomy chapter 8 because it seems almost necessary to complete the picture. Deuteronomy 8, verse 8.
In this verse, the Lord describes the land to which they were traveling and the wondrous fruit of that land.
A land of wheat and barley and vine and fig trees and pomegranates. A land of oil, olive, and honey.
Would you care to count them?
That's what you would expect.
I just couldn't believe it if it had stopped at six. But it doesn't. There are seven there.
A land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and pomegranates and oil, olive and honey. And not one of them ever touched the soil of this earth. What a contrast. Fish, melon, cucumbers, leeks, onions and garlic. There they came. Every one of them came from down there.
But these fruits of the land to which they journeyed came uplifted from the earth. Oh, I say once again, the privilege that is ours along the way to enjoy, to partake of, and to thank God for that wondrous provision of grace that will last us until the moment we step into the courts of glory itself, should fill our hearts with deep praise and Thanksgiving.
Well, now, the Golden Pop at Atlanta was only one thing accompanying.
The two tables of the covenant. There was also Aaron Rod.
That but it.
There are various beautiful thoughts connected with that, Robert budded.
And the one that I would like to emphasize tonight is.
I would like to liken this rod to the government of God.
I hope you.
Realize the thought behind these two statements, the grace of God.
And the government of God, everyone of us who knows the Lord Jesus as our Savior is continually shadowed over and sheltered by the matchless, unfailing grace of God. It will accompany us, beloved, until that moment when we see his face is that grace were withdrawn from a where would we be? And we, I trust, thank him continually for that great.
But what do we know and what do we speak of the?
Government of God, do we wish it didn't exist? What kind of home, what kind of family would it be in which there was number government in which the father and head of that home completely ignored his responsibilities as father and head in that home? I think I've been in such homes.
And it's not a very pleasant experience.
And God, who loved us, and who has redeemed us at such infinite cost, finds great delight in calling us His children. And I trust and I believe that you and I also find it our delight to look up into the face of Him whom once we dreaded, and address Him as our Father. But does the Word of God not tell us? Scourge us every son whom He receiveth Again, let's turn back to the Epistle to the.
Bruised Hebrews, chapter 12. Remember that.
This rod, which was so often in the hand of Aaron the priest, was that which was laid up before the Lord and put in the ark at the time of the rebellion of Cora and Dathan and of Byram. And because of its association with that disobedience, I see in it for myself a picture of the.
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Government of God. Now here we notice in Hebrews chapter 12.
Verse five. And ye have forgotten. The exhortation which speaketh unto you is unto children.
My Son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him. For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If he endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons. For what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not?
Verse 11 Now no chastening, for the Presence seemeth to be joyous, but grievous.
Nevertheless, afterward it yielded the peaceable food of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. I feel very sure that every one of us here tonight who know the Lord Jesus as our Savior has been conscious of.
The hand of God in government upon us in our life.
And I believe that if we were more conscious of this, the voice of God would not need to be so.
Felt, severe as it sometimes is, I feel that the things which befall us are often loud and noticeable because we have paid little heed to the still small voices which we heard before and shrugged off as being part of the normal circumstances of everyone who passes a long life journey. Oh, I believe it is true, dear St. of God, that not one thing happens in your life.
Mind without the perfect overseeing wisdom of God directing it. Now I'm a father, and I know that as a father I would never, never, never bring into the experience of my children that which would cause them needless grief or pain or sorrow of any kind. But I'm lacking in wisdom toward my family. I'm lacking in the power to control the circumstances that.
Call them. I remember one time a young man came to my home with one of these wonderful programs whereby you sign your name and pay a certain amount and you are immediately set free from many fears or anxieties as to what might befall you or your family in years to come.
And I felt it only right that I should listen to all he had to say. And when he was done, I said my father.
Lived in Ottawa. He's rather an old man, But I said, I'm going to ask you please to suppose.
That my father has perfect wisdom has never made a mistake, nor could he ever make a mistake. That my father also has perfect power.
And he controls all the influences of the universe that my father has. Perfect wealth, and all the possessions of the earth are his to dispose of as he will.
That my father loves me with a perfect love, thinks about me continually with a love that couldn't be any greater than it is, and one thing more, that my father has perfect wisdom. I said. How would my father feel?
If I find this paper.
Well, he said, I guess your father would be insulted. Well, I said, I have a father just exactly as I have described him to you, and he loved me with a perfect love. His wisdom is perfect, His power is perfect, his resources are perfect. And I love to open the hymn book and sing My times are in thy hand.
Father, we wish them there. I must bow my head and sing it only as a prayer. But all, beloved, thanks of God when I read the discipline, that in the hand of God.
When I think of a government of God and the purpose of love that is behind it, I realize as a father myself how precious is the fact that the very God who loved me and redeemed me at such infinite cost, who has pledged Himself that my every need will be lovingly met all the way through the journey, has not only the golden pot that had mannered.
But has also the Rob to accompany me along the way.
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I remember visiting a dear sister back home, greatly afflicted, and she didn't seem to know the cause of that affliction, and certainly I didn't know it either on her behalf. But we quite often had prayer together and she would say, Albert, the hand of the Lord and the rod of the Lord are still upon me. And I don't ever ask him to take it away, but I ask him to teach me the lesson that he has for me to learn in it, and if he's pleased, to leave it with me.
Calls me home. That will be alright too. I feel I should just turn aside for a moment to say this.
That these things which are allowed in our lives are by number means always.
A matter of actual discipline. I'm sure it has been pointed out before, and I think it's worth remembering that we can see circumstances most definitely allowed and sent of God which were not for discipline because of some waywardness or disobedience. I think we can see in the case of Joe, the very happy picture of a man whom God had richly blessed.
But I wonder if I could put it this way. God looked down at Job and said, Job, I want to bless you even more.
But there's something in your heart that you don't know, is there?
Until this is brought to light and is thoroughly Dutch, I can't bless you as I want to bless you.
And you know, in getting near the end of the book of Job, we see that which was in Job's heart finally come out, and he's more or less caught in the act, isn't he? Lord suddenly brings to Jobs attention what's coming out of his heart and his lips. And poor Job, he bowed his head and laid his hand upon his mouth and says, Behold, I am via without any qualification at all, he completely condemned himself in the presence of God.
He prays for those who had falsely accused him, and we find our blessings of God are poured out. Well, that hand of discipline was pretty severe. He lost seven sons and three daughters in one day. I call that pretty severe. He lost all his possessions. He lost his health, and he had to sit there and listen to his three friends tell him what a miserable hypocrite he was.
That was a lot to go through for anyone, man, and it wasn't because Job had been a wicked and disobedient man.
But Dawn had a purpose. God loved that man, and God wanted to bless him even more richly. And I can only say this, no matter what your circumstances are to night, or what you or I may find our circumstances to be in the days to come, I know this, that it is a heart of perfect wisdom and love.
That plan those circumstances for us, I think some of you may know that our dear boy some years back was.
Very, very nearly taken from us. We were called into a hospital to say goodbye to him. And it was pretty hard to say goodbye and walk out and leave him there. And I came home and found a letter from our brother, Ch Brown. And in that letter he said this and it's never left me. He said, Albert, remember that every circumstance in our life is carefully.
Weighed out.
In the balances of the sanctuary before it's passed on to us. That was too good to forget.
Remember that every circumstance in our life is carefully weighed out in the balances of the sanctuary before it passed on to us. Well, a second case of that which might be considered very real infirmity and trial, was laid upon the Apostle Paul. There was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan, to buffet me.
Lest I should be exalted, not because he was exalted, but lest I should be. There was a a type of prevention involved, we would say, in that form of discipline.
And then again we find in the 15th of John every branch in me that beareth fruit, He purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Oh, the love that is behind all this. And then as we get in Hebrews 12, the actual rod of discipline, because of our own disobedience.
Now, if there's any hard searching to be done about this, let it be done concerning my own situation and not somebody elses. I never have any right, do I, to look around and say I wonder what that brother has been up to or that sister. No, it's for me in the presence of God to bow my head and seek to learn the lesson that He has for us.
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But the grace of God, beloved, and the government of God go together day by day, and we'll go together until the end of the journey. Turn over, please, to 1St Kings chapter, chapter 8, verse 6.
And the priests brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord unto his place, into the Oracle of the house, to the most holy place, even under the wings of the cherubims. For the cherubims spread forth their two wings over the place of the ark of the cherubims, covered the ark and the stage thereof above. And they drew out the stage, that the end of the stage were seen out in the holy place before the Oracle, and they were not seen without.
And there they are.
Unto this day there was nothing in the ark, say the two tables of stone which Moses put there at Horeb, when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel when they came out of the land of Egypt. That's rather surprising, isn't it?
Here at last the wilderness wanderings of God's beloved people are ended. They have crossed the Jordan. They have entered the land. The ark is set down at last in its resting place in the very land of God's appointment. And what is found in that ark? Nothing but the two tables of stone that which spoke of Christ Himself.
In all His Majesty and His Holiness dwells there.
But there is no further need of the grace of God or of the government of God.
They're not needed anymore. They're not found in the ark when it set down in the temple, in its glorious resting place. Oh, I love to think of this dear child of God. Here we are along the journey, privileged by God's matchless grace from day-to-day, to learn that which we cannot and will not learn when we reach home. Oh, there's much that will unfold before our gaze when we see the Savior's face when we enter into the uncreated.
Of his own. Oh, what a revelation it will be. But there are some things that can only be revealed to us down here, and I believe that the grace of God and the government of God are among them.
I believe that you and I will not learn anything further of the dawn of all comfort. I will be no need for our comfort up there. A God of all encouragement, the thought of all hope, the God of all patience. These things are wonderful and happy privileges that are hours along the way. And just to think, beloved, but not for one step of that journey.
Where either one or the other of those two things lacking in Israel's experience.
Nor lacking in your the grace of God to meet your every need every day of your life. And if you and I ever feel a little extra need of grace, we know where to go for it. Come boldly under the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help. Do you feel the need of it sometimes? I know you do in time of need.
And I'm sure that these circumstances which are chosen by his wisdom and his love in order that we might learn more of.
The encouragement that is to be found in him will be a precious and a wonderful memory up there.
Because I'm sure you noticed in reading this that these staves were no longer needed. I'm quite sure you've pictured the ark. Perhaps we could even call this the ark with a long pole on either side, carried on the shoulders of the priests as they went through the wilderness journey. And we may set that ark down for the last time. They drew out those days they were not going to be needed.
Anymore their wanderings were over, so they just threw the staves away.
I don't know. They didn't. They were told exactly where to put those stables. They could be seen.
In the holy Place, wouldn't that be just a pretty happy experience to be able to go in and see that ark and see the ends of those days and say, I remember when we used to wander through the wilderness and fame accompanied us day by day as we wandered through the wilderness. Oh beloved, I thought, O kindly, your face is here tonight in Buena Park. You and I are going to have some pretty wonderful memories when we get home. Yes, we are.
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It's a it's a an exceedingly happy thing to me.
To come out here and to see yours again. Graft your hand as women and sisters in Christ. These things are going to be memories that will be real and practice. I believe forever that all the memory will crown all other memories they'll obtain. God will be the memories that I see in the picture of these two staves drawn out from the Arkansas, each in their appointed place where they could be seen.
When you reach home. When I reach home.
And look into the face of the Lord Jesus Christ, my Father used to say.
The first thought that will rush through my mind when I see his lovely face will be.
This man for me to die. I don't know whether any of you heard him say that or not, but I heard him say it so often that when I saw him laid out, those words came immediately to my mind.
The first thought that will rush through my mind as I see his lovely face will be this man for me and die now as he had saved me as by his wondrous grace he did many years ago and taken me immediately home. It would have been a wonderful joy. I would have seen his face already for over 40 years.
But I really feel that in his wisdom and His grace, He's left me here for a purpose that will enrich my experience up there in the glory. Surely during those years, by His wondrous grace, we've learned something of the meaning of the golden pot of manna and of Aaron's robbed and budded, and surely the rods that carried that.
Ark through the wilderness bore with them many wonderful memories of God's faithfulness.
Just a little example, the same dear sister back home that I spoke about ended up her days in a wheelchair. It was over 80 years of age and I used to visit her very often.
And she was always, of course, wanting the Lord to come and take her home.
01 day I had just attended the funeral of our Mrs. Anderson. She was 95 years of age and called with joy into the presence of the Lord.
But on the way home from the funeral I called on our dear sister in her wheelchair and she said, have you just come from Missus Andersons funeral And I suggest sister.
Why didn't the Lord stop on the way by and take me to now? She's up there with the Lord and I'm still here.
I said, you mean she's going to be in heaven a little longer than you are? Well, of course he's there and I'm here. And I said, sister, could you add a few weeks onto one end of eternity and make it a little longer?
Oh no, of course not, he said. I'll be there just as long as she will. I said yes you will. You'll be with the Lord just as long as Missus Anderson. And there's this thought for you to remember that each day the Lord leaves you, here is that much more opportunity to learn more and get more of His loving provision of grace towards you.
And of the purpose of his wisdom in the rod that he has put upon you.
And that dear sister rejoiced in that she's gone now into the presence of the Lord Jesus, and with exceeding joy too. Oh beloved faints of God, we're all going to see His face soon. In the meantime, we have accompanying us all the way through the journey the golden pop that had man of the matchless grace of God that knows our needs before ever we can see them.
And Aaron's robbed it budded the faithfulness of his love that would often withhold you and withhold me from those things which would.
Lead us astray. Oh, why does he have to use the rod so often?
You know the answer to that.
I remember one time when I was a young fellow in that wayward St.
Just seemed to get hold of us sometimes. Was pretty strong.
And I was planning something that really left me with a troubled conscience and trying all the while to persuade myself that there really wasn't anything wrong. I could go ahead and do. Anybody else would do the same thing. Just because I was eighty. Hey, ho, son was no reason why I should be deprived. And so on.
Just to make my conscience feel a little bit better at the last minute, I went up to my room. I didn't pray, but someone had given me. Instead of a daily calendar, it was an affair about like this, with a window in the front, and behind that window there was a scroll of text.
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And each day I would turn a little knob and a new text would come up, or you would turn the other knob and the text would go back down again.
I thought, I'm going to turn up. I was all ready to go out.
I'll turn up.
And see what the next text appears behind that window and I'll take it from the Lord.
I turned the knob and it said stop, turn back.
You know, it wasn't a verse. I'd come to the end of the role. But I tell you, I know, I know, I know that that was, that was the good hand of the Lord upon me that evening, a good faithful hand of the Lord upon me that evening. I don't regret now what I missed that evening. I squirmed a little bit when I saw what was written there.
And you know the same thing.
The Lord loves you so much, so much that He meets all your need and promises to do so until He has your home. But in the meantime, if you feel that rod once in a while, remember the hand that hold that hold that rod was nailed to the because He loved you so much.
And He has a purpose of blessing in it. But when you reach home, the rod will be gone forever. The pot of manna will be gone forever. But what precious memories will be ours as we look into His face up there in the glory, and praise Him for ever, for the grace that made us His, and it preserved and kept us until He had us home.
These things always in Remembrance
Address—A.C. Hayhoe
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Like you to turn with me, please, first of all to the Second Epistle of Peter, chapter one.
Beginning at verse eight, Second Peter one verse 8.
For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you, that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and have forgotten that he was once purged from his old sin.
Wherefore the rather brethren, give diligence to make your calling and elections sure.
For if he do these things, he shall never fall.
Verse 12 Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things.
Though ye know them, and be established in the present truth.
Verse 15. Moreover, I will endeavor that he may be able, after my decease, to have these things always in remembrance.
It's not my intention to speak on these verses at all.
I simply read them as, shall I say, an apology for that which I feel laid on my heart this afternoon.
I trust of the Lord, for I assure you that you will find it nothing new whatever.
You will find it to be that which you have heard and read and meditated on before today.
But as I read these scriptures and see how the whole soul of God's servant Peter.
Was involved in this solemn responsibility of putting before the Saints of God those things which were real to Him.
He warns them after that which they lack, if they are short in these things, of that which will be their blessed portion, if they're in the enjoyment of these things. And he says as long as I am among you, I want to remind you continually of these same things.
Though ye know them and be established in the present truth, you're not going to learn anything this afternoon. You're going to hear that which you know already. But I take this as an encouragement, Beloved Saints of God, as we open this precious book and read that which we already may know and know quite well, we find it so helpful, so encouraging, so refreshing to our souls.
To go over those very things which we have known for many years.
Even made the express desire that after he was gone.
These things, not something new, but these same things might continually be ministered to the Saints.
I'd like you to turn then, please, first of all, to one verse in Exodus.
Chapter 29.
Exodus chapter 29.
Verse 29.
And the holy garments of Aaron shall be his.
Son after him, the holy garment of Aaron.
Shall be his son after him.
That which I feel laid on my heart, I approach with embarrassment and with fear.
Because I believe, dear Saints of God, that this precious book that is open before me presents to us.
I wonderful desire in God's heart we have had brought before us in these meetings the love of God's own heart displayed to us so perfectly, so fully in the sending of his own beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, whom I hope you know as your Savior. But all can we ever fathom the love of God's heart?
Over and over again, in the precious Word of God, that love is revealed.
And the purpose of God in love is made known to us, and I believe that we find it to be.
The delight of God to bless in family, to bless in families, and this is very, very often emphasized in the Word of God and when this Scripture first came to my attention.
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It searched my heart deeply for I stand here as a son as well as a father. And in Speaking of the relationship of son, I think I must say I do so is embarrassment because it will mean.
Reference to the way in which I was brought up and my dear parents are now with the Lord.
And Speaking of the responsibilities that are mine as a Father, I do so with fear and with trembling, but I can speak with the authority of God's Word.
The holy garments of Aaron shall be his sons after him. What else did he have to leave?
Aaron was a priest. Aaron was a Levite. Aaron had not won possession on the face of the earth. No flocks, no herds, no possession of any kind except the holy garments which he wore from day-to-day. And these?
With a heritage he left to his son.
May I look solemnly into the faces of the dear fathers who are here today.
And permit a son to speak to you.
A son who was privileged.
To witness these holy garments.
I thank God to be able to say this.
Privileged to witness these holy garments. Garments are those things that are very close to us.
Things that are very much in evidence to those around us. And it's an exceedingly searching thing that burdens my heart this afternoon.
For as I look around upon this company, I know that there are.
Burden and sorrowful and weeping hearts here today, and my own is touched with fear as I broached this subject, but I believe it's a solemn and wonderful and precious statement we have here. The holy garments of Aaron shall be his son after him.
As our beloved children look upon us, do they see us leave our Christianity at the meeting room?
And come home to live an entirely different life before them in the home.
We're going to look at some other Scriptures that may bear on this, but its beloved brethren is a very precious promise and a very searching and solemn responsibility that Aaron.
Had the responsibility to privilege the joy of leaving to His Son those priestly garments which He himself had worn? Would you turn, please from this passage to Deuteronomy Chapter 11?
Deuteronomy Chapter 11.
Verse 18. Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart?
And in your soul.
And bind them for a sign upon your hand that they may be as frontlets between your eyes.
And ye shall teach them your children, Speaking of them, when thou fittest in thine house.
And when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt write them upon the doorposts of thine house, and upon my gates, that your days may be multiplied, And the days of your children in the land which the Lord swear unto your Father to give them as the days of heaven upon the earth.
Doesn't that have a wonderful ring?
Just let me read it over again as the days of Heaven.
Upon the Earth isn't that grand? I think it's worth underlining.
The days of heaven upon the earth. I've been in and out of many homes, and I have witnessed this in some of the homes that I have visited. The very days of heaven upon the earth. I know, and it's most evident to all of us, that this is an earthly promise to an earthly people, promising them long life and the blessing of the Lord.
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Down here, but with that very happy description, the days of heaven upon the earth, I want to emphasize that because the Lord. I believe as we go over these verses slowly, we need to be reminded that the purpose of God in the instruction given is.
Our happiness, Oh dear Saints of God, He wants you to be happy when you take John's gospel and you turn page after page and read.
Desire that our joy might be full.
Over and over the Lord Jesus presents that happy expression that your joy might be full. And we find ourselves, do we not, sitting down and thinking, well, if this circumstance and that were changed a bit, then my joy would rise much higher than it is now.
Forgive, please. A quotation that you'll immediately recognize, but I heard it more often than you did.
Happiness is a state of soul, not a question of circumstances.
Have you ever heard that before? I suppose there's a generation here that haven't heard these things that I heard since my boyhood days. But I know that's a true statement. And in going in and out among the homes of the Lord's beloved people, how I have seen it all, the radiant joy and happiness that I have seen in the continent and the home and the life of some of those.
Whose circumstances you and I would not envy for one moment.
And yet they have the joy of the Lord in their souls, and it shows to all around. Let us remember that I say again as we go over these verses slowly, that the purpose of God in bringing it before us is because He wants you to have personal happiness, that He wants you to have a happy home and family. Now let's go back, shall we, to verse 18.
Therefore shall he lay up.
These my words.
Beloved, forgive me again, I said. This would be embarrassing.
But this book was beloved, much beloved, in the home in which I grew up.
Greatly beloved, continually referred to. It seemed to be woven into the topics of conversation day by day. And when I read this word lay up, it's not something that happens suddenly. You don't wake up all of a sudden one morning with a good knowledge of God's precious word laid up within your memory or your heart. And I'm going to look at everyone here who is able to read and recommend to you that you.
God precious Word, regularly, daily, and in an orderly fashion.
I won't ask this for one moment, but if I did, I wonder what I would see.
How many could raise their Bible and say I have read God's word?
From my first word of Genesis to the last word of Revelation without missing anything.
I wonder what I would see if I asked for this to take place.
You and I cannot lay claim to laying up the word of God in our heart and soul unless we read it.
Read it with diligence, read it with prayer, and I can say you'll find yourself reading it with delight. To lay up these my words in your heart. Isn't that grand? The heart seems to me in God's word to speak of the affection and know how lovely it is to see someone who reads this precious, precious book because.
The affection of their heart yearns for more and more of the preciousness and the loveliness of Christ.
And to discover in this book not the boundaries beyond which I will be transgressing, but rather those things which will play the one who loved me with a love that is stronger than death.
When young believers come to me and say, is there any scripture against this? Is there anything to condemn that? I am reminded of what our dear brother HF Clawson told us in Montreal quite a number of years ago. He had a large piece of construction paper, and on one side he had.
A square drawn, and inside that square number of scattered dots. And he likened this to the people of God in the Old Testament who were kept in.
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By definite boundaries, laws beyond which they dare not go. And if they went off in this direction, they soon found a law which forbid them going any farther. And he pictured this to us in some detail. Then he turned the card over, and on the other side.
He had one prominent black dot in the middle, no boundaries to be seen, and clustered right near that black dot. Quite a few smaller dots, some farther, some farther, till somewhere dangerously near the edge of that piece of paper. And he reminded us that now it is our happy joy and privilege to remember that we have one who?
And who gave himself for us, who has put into our hands his most precious book, which doesn't bind us in with the laws and the restrictions of the Old Testament, but presents to us one who loved us with a love that took him to the Cross of Calvary to Redeemer?
And the most is implanted in your heart and mind by His grace to live.
To please Him, you do want to please the Lord Jesus, or you are not born again.
You do want to please the Lord Jesus or you have no new life within you.
All, my beloved friend, I believe it's a solemn, solemn thing to realize that there are altogether too many who have this precious and this wonderful book and have had it since the days of their childhood. And they can perhaps quote as that many of its passages. But is there really any affection in their heart for the person of the Lord Jesus Christ as we listen to the conversations that take place between?
Do we find an indication that there is a real love for the Lord Jesus Christ, all God granted? It may be more so that this precious word may be laid up in our heart, and that the reading of God's precious word may stir and quicken the affection of our heart. The next thing is the soul.
I believe it's generally considered that the soul is the seat of the appetites and the desires.
Are you willing, and am I willing, that this also shall be under the authority and the control?
Of God's precious word. Do I read it with that in mind, that it may actually have its powerful and constraining influence upon my very heart and soul? I say it's a very, very searching passage to read, and yet it brings with it such wondrous blessings. And it was given to us because He loved us.
So much and again, I would encourage each and everyone to make it your daily habit to read this precious Word of God and allow it to reach into your very heart and soul.
So that your affections are governed by.
This precious book.
That in all things he might have the preeminence.
In all things, you know. I don't say this to make anyone smile, but I believe perhaps it's a practical consideration.
I was talking to a young man far from here who told me that he was never going to get married because he didn't feel it was at all right to take a measure of the love that belonged to the Lord Jesus and bestow it on his wife, and thereby have that much less to bestow on the Lord Jesus.
He was very, very sincere about this.
And I asked him what would become of a man who, having married a wife and perhaps finding four or five children to grace that home, now had to take the affection that belonged to his wife and divide it thinner and thinner still among the children who came to bless that family.
All he said it doesn't work that way, does it? And I said, no, indeed it doesn't. Nor does it mean that your affection for the Lord Jesus is in any degree lesson, nor that he has any less of preeminent place because he has given you by the grace of God, a partner who also loves the same precious Savior and wants to please him. I just passed this on to you dearly beloved young people, because I believe that.
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That God in wondrous grace has put before us in this precious book all the affections proper to them.
'Cause us, I believe to look up with increasing gratitude to the One whoever put these affection within our hearts. They're not natural to us. Naturally we were hateful and hating one another. Or how beautiful to see the heart and the soul governed and controlled by the Word of God. Now notice it seems to become more practical.
Bind them for a sign upon your hand. First of all, that which cannot be seen, that which is within, is controlled by God's Word, the heart and the soul, and then we find it very word bound upon our hands, that that which we do is controlled by the direction and the wisdom of the Word of God. Is the Bible really that up to date?
Surely you can't take a book written this long ago.
And use it to help you in making decisions concerning what your hands might do in 1969. Yes, thank God, there's nothing that ever needs to be added to this precious book. And it has impressed me very, very much in visiting in other lands where their language and culture and custom is so totally different from that which we are accustomed to.
To find this same book.
Contains all the light and wisdom needed in order to live to please the Lord Jesus according to the pattern of this book in any nation under heaven. All. Let us just look at those hands of ours and realize that they have been, as we've just been told, redeemed.
You're not your own, you're bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body.
I'm going to repeat what I may have mentioned before.
The occasion when a young man traveling over in England entered one of their trains. The trains over there are different a bit to our own here. They're not made-up of 1 long continuous coach, but rather in each coach there are compartments in which there are usually about 6 passengers. Well, when this young man entered the compartment, there were already three young men in that compartment.
And no sooner did he sit down and the train begin to move than one of the three young men reached in his pocket and pulled out.
A deck of cards.
And he shuffled them and handed some to one, and handed some more to the second, and offered some to the newcomer. And the newcomer sat there with a happy smile with his hands folded, and he said no thank you, I don't have any hand.
Well, of course. The one who was offering the card looked at him in bewilderment. He could see what appeared to be a perfectly normal pair of hands. Well, he said, maybe I ought to explain these hands don't belong to me. Well, that didn't help the matter at all. It still sounded just as bewildering as before. So he went on to explain further. He said, I am redeemed with the precious blood of Christ. I am not my own. I am, but with a price.
And I just don't believe it would please the One who redeemed me if I took these hands and used them for such a purpose. He didn't hunt all the way through the Bible to find a verse that condemned the use of those things. He knew that was redeemed with the freshest blood of Christ and in a desire to live to please that One who redeemed him at such infinite cost that he could well fold his hands, not with a frown of disappointment, but with a smile of real gratitude that he was.
With the precious blood of Christ, not only the hand, but the.
Eyes, the affection, the very appetite, that which we do. And our eyes perhaps would look outward to that which is even beyond the things that we can grasp. And in what direction are your eyes and mind turn, beloved friends?
Are your eyes and mind governed and controlled by this precious book, the Word of God?
May I just remind you again that that which we have here in verse 18 is the preparation.
In a home.
For bringing up a family, isn't this pretty searching?
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The heart, the soul, the hand, the eyes. And you can't hide these things from your family.
Bells no. It will show. They can tell, beloved, whether these things.
Are real to you or not?
And I believe as this fourfold charge was laid upon the fathers in Israel.
That it ought to be felt very, very, very solemnly by everyone of us. Now the next verse, says, Angie, shall teach them.
Your children, isn't this a happy privilege? And isn't it a very continual responsibility to that which has brought joy and happiness to us for the grace of God? Oh, do we not desire the same thing for our dear children?
But what can we expect if our heart is not controlled by the Word of God?
What can I expect?
If the appetites and the desires that are natural to me.
Are not controlled by God's precious word, nor my hands engaged in those things which redeemed hands are free to use to the glory of God.
And if my eyes turn away to those things which would only distract me from the loveliness which is in Christ Jesus, and then to turn and teach them to our children, all beloved, it's embarrassing and it's a serious matter, but here it is in God's Word, and I dare not shrink from what it says.
We shall teach them your children, Speaking of them, when thou sittest in thine health. Are we so busy now, is our timetable so taken up, that we don't have time to sit down in our house with our children and with the precious word of God?
And when we do so to the children have the feeling that Dad's just trying to get this over with because he's got something else on his mind anyway, and get this reading over with because there are other responsibilities much more important than this quick little reading in the morning or in the evening.
All dear fellow believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, this precious book that He has given us, with all its unfolding of His loving heart, with all its wisdom, and with the glorious hope that it puts before our souls, surely should be worth more to us than anything else that might intrude upon our timetable.
Speaking of them, when our fittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way.
Precious memories come back to me as I read this.
Speaking of them.
Forgive another quotation.
We ought to read the Word of God until we become so saturated with it that our very thoughts are formed in the wisdom of Scripture.
May I please just say this?
That there were many, many times when this rebellious son right here wanted his own way very, very much.
And I would present what I wanted very, very much to my father.
And he would answer me.
In the language of Scripture.
You can argue with your dad, but you can't seem to argue against the word of God.
At least I didn't have the heart to and when the answer was interwoven with the wisdom of God's Word.
It seemed to be just what this stubborn heart needed. Oh, I can remember. Yet on one particular occasion there was something so educational and attractive to be coupled with something that we naturally felt was out of place for the believers. And so the easy conclusion was, well, we'll attend until that commences, which we wouldn't approve of. And then of course.
We'll come right home.
The answer was he that trusts us, his own heart.
Is a fool.
That's a pretty straightforward answer. He to trust us, his own heart is a fool. Would I not be trusting my own heart to have a courage to pack up and leave when these things began, which would be quite a novelty to a boy brought up the way I was brought up?
I wouldn't want to just stay around for a little while and see what this was all about. And then perhaps just a little while longer to trusting my own heart, I would find out what a fool I was.
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Let me remind my own heart, for these responsibilities still weigh heavily upon my own shoulders. And I say it with fear and inward tears, that I mentioned what I speak up today. I can mention my memory that that which lies ahead, the Lord alone knows.
But here is the wisdom, here is the promise from his own loving heart, who so earnestly.
Desires your happiness and blessing.
May I turn a moment from perhaps addressing parents to addressing children who are being brought up as.
By the grace of God, I was brought up.
May I remind you that someday I believe you will thank God for it. You'll thank God for the many times you saw your father and your mother on their knees and you knew they were praying for you. You heard your very name come from their lips in prayer. And when you so much wanted your own way. When you were the only one of a group that wasn't permitted to take part in this or that.
You felt your parents just didn't understand you, they had forgotten all about their own youth, and all such thoughts went through your mind as they did through my own.
Lot of young people. I stand here and thank God.
That I was preserved by His grace and through the firm hand of a praying father and mother.
From those things which would only have brought sorrow and disappointment to me.
Speaking of them, when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest, by the way, you know the Bible is the most wonderful book.
As we walk by the way and see the handiwork of God, the wisdom and the skill, and shall I say the thoughtfulness with which His hand has wrought, it makes a never ending topic of conversation.
You can know when we were down in Oaxaca, every time we left one village to go to another, they would all gather together and they would sing so lovingly and so heartily. I will lift up mine eyes under the hills, from whence cometh my help, My help cometh from the Lord that made heaven and earth. They would sing that song through, if their tears would permit them to do so.
And oh, it's made the hills of Oaxaca very precious to me.
Right, look around and see those hills and I would think, from whence cometh my health from these hills All my help cometh from the one that made heaven and earth. Why the sight of those hills that existed so long before you and I were born just turned our thoughts to the one who made them. The little flowers that bloom, all the beauty, the majesty, the thoughtfulness that is behind it all.
I hope I'm not digressing too much in these practical things, but I can still hear the comment that would so often be made at the table as an exceptionally nice meal was set down in front of us.
You know, children, we ought to be so thankful there's no nourishment either in the color or in the flavor of this food that you're eating. If it all looked the same, it all tasted the same, it could nourish your body just as well. But here are these nice mashed potatoes. Here's this lovely roast beef. Here are these peas and these carrots. And they look so attractive, and they each have their own taste.
And generally considered to be very pleasant. Why did God give us such variety?
And the ability to recognize these colors and flavors and to enjoy them. Why?
Just to sit down there and eat the way an animal would eat. All I tell you. Somehow or other conversations such as this caused our hearts to look up in gratitude to the one who had been so kind and so thoughtful in everything that we saw all around us. When thou walkest by the way.
To see the beauty of God's handiwork in creation and to be able, as we walk along, to realize that the loving eye of Him.
Who put all their beauty around us is looking down upon us as we walk along the way. Oh, that's been a precious thing to me. And some hours that would otherwise be pretty lonely to think that the eye of him who created all things.
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Is looking down at me wherever I may be, and looking down at you. Oh, beloved, I tell you, it's a grand thing to be a Christian. And that doesn't mean simply to have your sins forgiven and know that there's a corner of heaven where you're going to find yourself at home. It means that there's a Savior who loved you enough to die for you.
It means that there's a Savior living in the glory at this very moment who wants your joy to be.
Wants your home to be a happy home, once your family to be a rejoicing family sheltered by the precious blood of Christ, and once every one of us to look up day by day with the eager anticipation of soon hearing His voice.
Grandma, citizen, land, house, when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou rise of stuff it. Dust doesn't seem to leave any time out at all, does it? It just seems as though the Word of God belongs in all the experiences of the believer, and so it ought to be.
Thank God, beloved brethren, if you and I are found at the Bible reading, and at the prayer meeting, and at the remembrance of the Lord and at the gospel meeting. But what about the rest of the time?
I was in the office of a professional man a long, long way from here. Not one single person in this company knows who this is at all, so please don't try to even guess. But he didn't know. I was in the reception room, he was in his consultation room, and he was really telling somebody off in pretty vigorous language, and his voice was rising in greater and greater heat of anger.
I didn't know whether I ought to walk out to save embarrassment or not, but presently the door opened and out he came.
With the other gentleman who'd been with him, and he saw me sitting there.
And when he got this third party out the door, he turned to me. He said Christianity is one thing, in business is another.
I was very sorry to hear him say that.
Christianity is one thing and home life is another. Is that true? Christianity is one thing.
School is another. Is that true all? I believe that this precious book, with all its precept and wisdom can be taken by you into every area of your life. And if you perchance are in some occupation or situation that you cannot feel at home with this precious book, you're in the wrong place. I say again, you're in the wrong place.
Simply because I've traveled a bit, I get asked quite often to speak when I get back home in places that I personally just don't feel the free to speak in.
And when they will ask me now would you come and give us a talk on such and such a trip you've taken? I usually say, well, I'd be glad to, on condition that I could bring along my Bible and hold it in my hand while I speak.
Well, I have to consult someone else about this too, so I'll let you know tomorrow. I've never heard back from any of them. They just don't seem to want someone standing up there with a Bible in his hand. And I do recommend this to you, dearly beloved brethren and sisters in Christ, and dearly beloved young people, as we see in this little passage in Deuteronomy the place that God's Word ought to have in our life and our heart.
Don't ever let yourself be found where you would not wish to bring this precious, precious living book. And we don't live to ourselves. We don't die to ourselves. The attitude that we take in these matters has a profound effect upon others.
I remember one time they came to our particular town in Canada to find a new branch of one of these well known.
Societies.
Service clubs as they call them.
And they came to me and asked me if I would be interested. They said their particular activity was concerning young men, and they knew that that was somewhat of an interest of mine.
Well, I didn't like to cut them off too promptly, so I asked for a little further information, all the while wondering what I might say.
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And finally I asked them the same thing. I said, what do you what day do you have your regular scheduled dinner meeting? Well, every Wednesday at noon, I thought. Well, I'm free Wednesday at noon.
One question, would I be free to bring my Bible with me to this dinner on Wednesdays at noon?
And you know, they made it quite plain to me that that Bible of mine would be totally out of place and unwanted. They didn't even wait till tomorrow to tell me that it just wasn't wanted.
So they went out again. And, you know, I didn't know the sequel to that story until we were having a Bible reading in the assembly at home a couple of weeks later. And one of the brothers in town who is a businessman said, oh, by the way, they're starting a new branch of such and such a service club in the town. And they have approached me to see if I would be interested in being an active member.
He said. I didn't know exactly what to say to get out of it, so I asked them who they already had among their members.
Though they read off quite a list of names came to the end and said, and we think we're going to get hey ho, the optometrist to sign too. He said that's fine, I'll sign my name right under his.
But that's the way he lasted with it. You know, I just mentioned that, beloved brethren, to show you that we do not live to ourselves, that if the precious living Word of God is effectual, beloved Saints, in this heart of mine, as it ought to be.
As we had together with the dear young people.
Draw me.
We will run after thee. There is no harp that's ever drawn after the Lord Jesus. But what it has its happy effect on others.
And we read the sad contrast where Peter says I go fishing.
And immediately the answer is, we also go with thee.
Oh, beloved friend, which is it? As we read this portion of God's word and see the claim of that word over us for our good, and for our happiness, and for our blessing, and for the welfare of our families, what shall we do? Shall we dare to suggest that these claims are too much, that this is going to restrict us in some way or another?
Restrict us. I shudder when I hear that word, and yet I've heard it.
From the lips of those who are truly the Lord, there is something about.
The claims of Christ that they find restricting, and they shatter at the word separation as though it had a ring of legality about it.
We were at a very beautiful wedding the other day, at which I heard the same words repeated that have so often been repeated before. As the young lady stood waiting to slip her arm through that of her expected bridegroom, she was asked a very talented question.
Do you promise that forsaking all other.
You will cleave to him only so long as he both shall live.
Have you ever heard that question before?
I heard it addressed to a young lady 27 years ago and she said yes. She said I do. And you know, I don't believe that in any of these cases that I have witnessed, has there been any hesitation or thought of the legality involved in that? The privileges and whatnot that are going to be abandoned forever, forsaking all other cleave to him only so long as he both shall live I.
Of that, may I put those words to you this afternoon here God has opened up his heart and said, I love you very much. I want you to have fullness of joy.
And I wanted to be in your families, too.
And here is what I am going to put before you, the word of God.
With all its light and wisdom and blessed story of love revealed, hidden in the heart and the soul. Seen in the activity of the hands and in that which we seek after, talked over with our dear children. Not just once or twice, not just in order that they might know a verse for Sunday school. A fine thing to do, but just a topic woven into the conversation of every day.
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What a memory. Well, now it says here in verse 20. And thou shalt write them upon the doorposts of thine house. I like this.
It seems that the house itself is recognized and stands out from others as a home where the word of God.
Is love and reverence. Would you like that to be the testimony of your home?
Dearly beloved parents, is it not true, and I speak with my own hand accusingly on my heart, is it not true that we have ambitions for our home and our children that we need to judge before God? I heard my father say to us quite a good many times.
Son, I would sooner see you sweeping the streets of the city of Ottawa for a living and pleading the Lord and making the biggest income in the province. I would sooner see you sweeping the streets of the city and living to please the Lord and making the biggest income in the province. And you know, as God gave us a family.
And the memory of those words came back to me.
They challenged me till I didn't know which way to turn.
I felt I couldn't honestly say such a thing. I felt that God knew that desire, the wretched wrong desires that were in my heart. We like our children to be popular. We like them to be pointed out. We like them to excel in this or that. Am I the only person that has to make such a confession? Is your desire Is my desire that they might live for the glory of God?
If this precious book might mean more to them than it's ever meant to us.
And that the precious claims of the Lord Jesus might lay hold of their hearts in a deeper way than it ever touched our own. Oh, if those ambitions of yours and mine are to see them advance in this world, will live to regret it. Will live to regret it. I've seen it happen again and again. Ambitions raise those children higher and higher in the esteem of their.
Fellow classmates at school until.
The charm of it all takes them completely away from the joy that has promised us here in these passages. Thou shalt write them upon the doorpost of fine house. I was standing on the front porch of a home some time ago with a dear old man, and a couple of little girls walked past and I saw them looking over the dear old man, and he smiled and waved to them and they went past and he hung his head. He said Maybe I shouldn't tell you.
But do you know what I heard one of those girls say to the other? When she passed this home a while ago? She plucked her little playmates coat sleeve and pointed to his house and said that's the home where they love Jesus and talk about Him.
Is not a nice testimony for a home the word of God bound upon the doorpost of such a home? Is that your home? If the Lord leaves us here, will that be the memory your children will take forth from the doors of your home? A home where the Lord Jesus was loved, where His praises were sung continually?
Where his word was read with glad submission. I say again, beloved, will this be the memory that your children will take with them?
When they walk out one day from the front door of that home to set up a home of their own, bound upon the doorpost of the house and upon my gates, I suppose that's a little farther out, perhaps a little more public testimony. But this comes last. It begins in the heart. It works its way through the soul.
The hand, the eyes, is given to the children in such a precious and continual and natural way.
And then our whole house is characterized by it. And finally the gates, public testimony, and then the wondrous promise of the Lord, the days of heaven upon the earth. O beloved, I told you at the beginning, and it was an embarrassing and a very frightening thing that I had before me today. It's the responsibility of parents in homes today.
It's a big responsibility and I I don't think we realize.
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What a difficult world our dear children and young people are facing. But if they're hedged about with the Word of God, they're well protected.
You know, the very last verse of the Old Testament.
I will turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse. It just seems to me that last picture.
When things are so dark and so indifferent and so evil, as though those fathers were just putting their arms around their children, that there might be found for them a bulwark against the evil that was in that day so dark. Let me go back again, please, to that verse in Exodus 29. The holy garments of Aaron shall be his son.
After him.
Now mind you, there is no father here or on the face of the earth.
And would ever think for one moment.
Of pointing to his children as though God had rewarded his faithfulness.
Every father and every mother would have to own in all honesty, with their heads bowed lowered, with the tears running down their cheeks, that the blessing of the Lord upon our children is sovereign, matchless, undeserved grace.
And I own it before you.
Sovereign. Matchless.
Undeserved grace. But do we have a promise or do we not? Yes, beloved, we have a promise of God.
From the day that little one was given to us, we have the promise of God. May God grant that we shall lay hold upon these promises and display before them in our own life and testimony the fear of the Lord.
And the joy of the Lord, May I repeat that, please the fear of the Lord.
And the joy of the Lord, for I believe they go together. I guess a lot of folks considered my dad to be a very legal man.
I don't think he was.
I'm prejudice of course, but I don't think he was. I think I have observed this in.
Going in and out among the Lord's people now, there's quite a distinction between the fear of God.
And legality.
A legal man is not a happy man. Do I not speak the truth? A legal man is not a happy man. But a man who walks in the fear of the Lord is a happy man. He may have a conscience about the same thing that the other man abhors, but his conscience is governed by the joyful control of the fear of the Lord in his life. And I truly believe your Saints of God.
That that which our children will remember if we walk with God in this.
Of the Lord, and the joy of the Lord was the character of the home in which they grew up. And this we earnestly seek, with God's help, may be true of the homes and families represented here. Oh dear boys and girls and beloved young people, you can buy only realize what a treasure we have in this book and how needful it is for you and for me to read this precious book.
Prayerfully, earnestly, and I.
Hardly know whether to say this or not, but I sometimes recommend reading it on your knees.
I was traveling with a young man some time ago, and each evening before we retired and this young man got his Bible, opened it with such loving reverence, and knelt down and read for a good long time on his knees. He didn't do it just to show off in front of me either. I knew him well enough for that. He had formed the habit of reading God's Word on his knees, and it shows in his life.
The young man that walks in the fear of God.
And bears a testimony of real joy among those who know him well. Oh, May God grant that it shall be true, and that the holy garments of Aaron may, by the grace of God, be handed down from father to son.
Bringing up the Ark
Address—G.H. Hayhoe
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Could we turn tonight to First Chronicles chapter 12? First Chronicles chapter 12?
And verse 38. Then I'd like to read the 13th chapter and.
Also parts of the 15th chapter.
First Chronicles 12, verse 38. All these men of war that could keep rank came with a perfect heart to Hebron to make David king over all Israel, and all the rest, and also of Israel were of one heart to make David king. And there they were with David three days, eating and drinking, for their brethren had prepared for them. Moreover, they that were nigh them even unto Isakar and Zebulun and Napoli.
Brought bread on answers, and on camels, and on mules, and on oxen and meat meal cakes of pigs, and bunches of raisins, and wine, and oil and oxen, and cheap abundantly. For there was joy in Israel. And David consulted with the captains of thousands and hundreds, and with every leader. And David said unto all the congregation of Israel, if it seemed good unto you, and that it be of the Lord our God, let us send abroad unto our brethren everywhere.
That are left in all the land of Israel, and with them also to the priests and Levites, which are in their cities and suburbs, that they may gather themselves unto us, and let us bring again the ark of our God to us. For we inquired not at it in the days of Saul, and all the congregations said that they would do so. But the thing was right in the eyes of all the people. So David gathered all Israel together, from shy ***** of Egypt even unto the entering of hemisphere.
Ark of God from courageous theorem David went up, and all Israel to Bala, that is, encourage us Urim which belongs to Judah, to bring up France, the ark of God the Lord that dwelleth between the cherubims whose name is called on it. And they carried the ark of God in a new cart out of the House of Abinadab and Aza and Ohio Dre the cart, and David and all Israel played before God with all their might, and with singing, and with harps, and with salt trees, and with.
Rosen and with symbols, and with trumpets. And when they came under the threshing floor of China, other put forth his hand to pull the ark, for the oxen stumbled, and the angle of anger of the Lord was kindled against us, And he smiled him, because he put his hand to the ark, and there he died before God. And David was displeased because the Lord had made a breach upon us. A wherefore that place is called.
Perez Aza to this day. And David was afraid of God that day, saying how shall I bring the ark of God home to me?
So David brought not the ark home to himself, to the city of David, but carried it aside into the House of Obed Edom the Gittite. And the Ark of God remained with the family of Obed Edom in his house three months. And the Lord blessed the House of Obed Edom and all that he had. Now the 15th chapter.
And David made him houses in the city of David, and prepared a place for the ark of God, and pitched for it attempt. Then David said, None ought to carry the ark of God but the Levites, for them hath the Lord chosen to carry the ark of God, and to minister unto him forever. And David gathered all Israel together to Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the Lord unto his place, which he had prepared for it. And David assembled the children of Aaron.
And the Levites.
And.
The 12Th verse. And said unto them, Ye are the chief of the fathers of the Levites. Sanctify yourselves, both ye and your brethren, that you may bring up the ark of the Lord God of Israel, under the place that I have prepared for it, or because you did it not. At the 1St, the Lord our God made a breach upon us, for that we sought him not after the due order.
So the priest and the Levites sanctified themselves to bring up the ark of the Lord God of Israel.
And the thief of the Levite bear the ark of God upon their shoulders, with the staves thereon.
As Moses commanded, according to the word of the Lord, and David spake to the chief of the Levites, to appoint their brethren to be singers with instruments of music, Saul trees and harps, and symbols sounding by lifting up the voice with joy.
And the.
23rd verse in Barakaya and Elkanah where doorkeepers for the Ark, and Jebaniah and Jehoshaphat and Nathaniel, and Amosia, and Zechariah and Benny Ayah and Eliezer. The priest did blow with the trumpets before the Ark of God and Obed Eden and Jehaiya were doorkeepers for the ark, though David and the elders of Israel, the captains over thousands went to bring up the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the House of.
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Freedom of joy. And it came to pass, when God helped the Levites that bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord, that they sacrificed 7 bullets and seven Rams. And David was clothed with a robe of fine linen. And all the Levites that bear the ark, and the stringers and the and Shin and I are the master of the song with the singers. David also had upon him an effort of linen. Thus all Israel brought up the ark of the covenant of the Lord with shouting.
And with the sound of the corner, and with trumpets, and with cymbals making a noise, with salt trees and harp. And it came to pass as the ark of the Lord came to the city of David, that Michael the daughter of Saul, looking out at a window, talking, David dancing and playing, and she despised him in her heart. So they brought the ark of God and set it in the midst of the 10th, and David had pitched for it, and they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before God.
And when David had made an end of offering the burnt offerings and the peace offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord, and he dealt to everyone of Israel, both man and woman, to everyone, a loaf of bread and a good piece of flesh and a flag and of wine.
Well, I thought of this little portion, brethren, because in the end of the 12Th chapter here it reminds us of what has taken place in the last three days. Here it tells us that all the different tribes of Israel had come together to make David king over all Israel, and that they were one heart to make David king. And it even tells us that they there they were with David three days, eating and drinking.
Or their brethren had prepared for them. Well, I believe this has been the experience of many of us who are here tonight.
That is, we have enjoyed these happy 3 days, and we have thought to give the Lord Jesus His rightful place, the true David, the Lord Himself. And as we have been gathered together, we have been occupied with him, and we have been fed too, just as these people were fed abundantly, and the Lord used their brethren for this purpose too. Well, what a very, very happy occasion it is.
But I believe the lesson that perhaps we can learn is.
That there is often a great danger after such very happy occasion and that we sort of dwell on an experience and that we're not really before the Lord for his guidance in our pathways. So it was when the when the Lord took Peter, James and John up on the Mount of Transfiguration. That was a very wonderful experience, I suppose perhaps one of the most wonderful experiences.
In the lives of those three men.
But when they came down from the mountain, it tells us that they were not able to cast the evil spirit out of that boy. And when they found out how very weak they are were, they asked the Lord. And he said, this kind goeth not out, but by prayer and fasting. And so let us bear this in mind, that we can have very, very happy occasions in our lives.
Where we're occupied with the Lord Jesus, where we're seeking to give him his rightful place.
We are enjoying what our brethren have prepared for us both temporally and what He ministers to us spiritually.
But this will never, never be a substitute for communion with God and with the importance of making His Word.
The guide for our pathway and I believe we learned this a great lesson here and I trust it will be a lesson to each one of our hearts. For just like Israel in another instance, they had a great victory, a jury call, such a great victory that they thought they were well prepared to meet the next conflict. And when they went against that little city of AI, they were defeated before the men of AI and they found out that the real reason was that they.
I have not been back to Gilda. Now what did this place Gilda represent? Well, and perhaps, to make it most simple, it was a place of circumcision. But shall I put it this way? It was the place where they lifted the knife upon self before they started the conflict of the land, And it pictures to us self judgment.
That is, we need to be constantly before God, for even the joy of Christian fellowship will never, never be a substitute, I say, for communion with the Lord.
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And after each victory, we need to get back to the place of self judgment and recognize that self can never be trusted in the best circumstances any more than in the world, because self has been utterly condemned before God. And it must always be kept in the place of death so that the Lord can lead us in victory by Himself being the leader, and by His word being our.
Well, I believe we see this lesson brought before us. Don't notice the way this 13th chapter begins.
And David consulted with the captains of thousands and hundreds and with every leader. Surely this was a very broad minded thing to do.
He wasn't just going to follow his own ideas. And so he gets the advice of the captains of thousands and hundreds and every leader. He didn't miss one. He had plenty of advice because these men were famous men, leaders of the people. But what was a mistake?
Was it that he went to these people? No, I wouldn't say that. But the important thing was that he did not go to the word of God. And you know, brethren, we might go to the opinions of men, we might go to the opinions of godly men. We might go to the opinions of great leaders in Christendom and say, what do you think should be done in this or that? And we might get.
An opinion from men.
That was not according to the mind of God. And David must learn that it was not by going and consulting all these men that he was going to get the mind of God. It was to go to the Word of God. It was to make the Word of God the guide for His pathway. And so each one of us can ask.
Have we just gone around and asked the opinions of others in certain things? Are we satisfied because of the meaning?
Have listened to that ministry which has shown us the exercises of heart of our brethren. Well, the Scripture says prove all things.
Hold fast that which is good. And how can we prove all things? Do we have a sure measuring stick that we can go by? Yes, the Word of God lives and abides forever through the lawn to the testimony. If they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.
Preached at Berea, he was very pleased that the people didn't accept his word.
It says they were more noble than the others because they searched the scriptures daily.
To see if those things were sold and nothing would make me more happy than if you should say, well, brother Hayhoe, I'd like to get it from the word of God. I'd like to have it from him. The Lord Jesus when he was here said, and they shall be all part of God. They shall be all part of God. In reality, we never have truth for our own souls until we have received it in communion with God. Now I don't say.
May not use others. I'm indebted to others for things that I have learned, but I can say this, that the only things that have really been made my own have been the things that although I've learned them through others, they have pointed me to the scripture and I have received it from the scripture. Hello God may use an instrument, just like when those disciples were sent to find the place where the Lord wanted that last Passover and His supper to be prepared.
Now they were to find a man bearing a pitcher of water for her burnt man would represent to us the Holy Spirit of God. The water would represent to us the the word of God. But what about the picture? Well, where are some pictures? Gideon told his man they were to put a light in an earthen picture. And Paul said, We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the Excellency of the power may be of God and not of.
And so God may use an instrument, but they didn't follow a man with an empty picture. They followed a man bearing a pitcher of water, the man that had that picture of water. And tonight I trust that God will speak to your heart and to mine too, through His precious words.
And if this is so fine, just the earthen vessel to bear the pitcher of water and the Spirit of God must apply it to make it your very own. So I quote that scripture again. It's been impressed on my mind a good deals late. They shall be all part of God in these days. It is so important that we should get the truth of God from God himself through his word by the Spirit.
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Well, it tells us here that David said unto all the congregation of Israel, as it seemed good unto you.
And that it be of the Lord our God, let us send abroad unto our bread, and everywhere that are left in all the land of Israel, and with them also to the priests and Levites.
Which are in their cities and suburbs, that they may gather themselves unto us, and let us.
Bring again the ark of our God for us, For we inquired not at it in the days of Saul.
Here was an excellent desire. It was a desire that was produced in their hearts by the Lord. We must say that it was a desire that was very pleasing to God. But it's possible to have a good desire and yet not to do it in the way that God wants it to be done. God not only wants work to be done, but He has a way that He wants it to be done. He not only wants us to gather in His presence as worshippers.
But He also wants us to gather in a way that is according to his word.
And so it was almost wonderful and noble desire to bring up the ark of God that had been forgotten for all those years.
Since the time that the ark had been carried down to the country of the Philistines, it had been forgotten. This was a great desire, a good desire, but they hadn't gone to the Word of God. David had not thought the mind of God through His Word. And you know there are many, many Christians in this day, and they desire to worship the Lord. They desire to serve the Lord.
But they say I think this. I've asked the advice of a good number of people.
I've asked them real leaders in Christendom, and I read a lot of good books and I think that we should do this or that. Oh, dear friend, have you searched the word of God? Have you turned in simple place on your knees to learn what God has to say about the subject? It's not enough to have a good desire. It's not enough to do a good thing.
But to be pleasing to the Lord, it must be done in a way.
That is pleasing to him. It tells us in Second Timothy, Chapter 2. If a man also strives for the masteries, yet is he not crowned except he strives lawfully, What does it mean to strive lawfully? Well, perhaps some of you have run in the race. You've taken part in some race. Didn't you acquaint yourself with the rules? Didn't you watch carefully where the starting place was and what the sound was?
That you were to listen for when you started, and weren't there certain rules that you had to abide by? And even if you came in first, if you'd broken one of the rules, the judge would say disqualified, disqualified. Great disappointment. You put a lot of effort into it, but it wasn't according to the rules and you were not crowned. You didn't receive the reward. And is it possible for a Christian to put a great deal of effort?
Life to spend a lot of time in what he might call the work of the Lord and yet not have the instruction from the word of God that would show what is pleasing to him. Oh, I believe it's so important in these days as as David said, when in the 15th chapter he brought up the ark according to the mind of God, he said.
Before we thought brought the Lord after the due order.
God had a way, He had a way that he wanted of that art to be carried, and only his way was acceptable and pleasing to him. And so I would say to each young person and to each one who is older, read the Word of God. Acquaintance yourself well with the mind of God, as it says. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.
That is only as we are before the Lord, humbly seeking His mind and will, can He direct us through His word. So I say again, this was a good desire. Perhaps we could say the desire was specially produced in their hearts by those happy 3 days. And I believe as I look on the company here tonight, that there are some, perhaps some young people.
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And there has been such a desire produced in your heart.
And just say, well, I have felt a little different in these last three days and I do want to please the Lord. I can remember as a young person when I went to a conference, the effect that it had on me, occupied with my work and other things. It was a special treat to come together for three days. My husband returned home, as I hope each one here has felt after the days. And he said, I want to please the Lord more. I want to live for him more. And this was what?
Happened here. David had forgotten about the Ark of God, The people had forgotten about it, the captains had forgotten about it. But now this lovely desire was produced into the in their heart by those three days together. But that was not enough. There needed to be a turning to the Word of God to discover his mind, and there was no substitute for this.
And so on the fourth verse and all, the congregation said that they would do so, for the thing was right.
In the eyes of all the people, you know, we hear a common expression in the world. Well, you can be pretty sure that the majority is right when when there's a great number of people that love the Lord, that want to do a thing in a certain way, How could it be that a few would be right? And that majority who love the Lord and want to please the Lord could be wrong.
This this crowd wanted to do what was right. They wanted to please the Lord, but they had made this one omission.
They have not served the mind of God through His Word. They had not sought the mind of God through His words. And so it was right in the eyes of all the people, but it was not right according to the word of God. It was not right according to the Word of God, but in the eye of all the people it was.
So they had a great assembly. It says David gathered all Israel together from shy ***** of Egypt, even unto the enduring of he must to bring the ark of God.
Some courageous Jerome so tells us that they went down.
And they went through quite a bit of work. I can just imagine that the people that made this cart to carry the ark of the Lord.
Really.
Did it very conscientiously, and I expect if we could have seen that card, it was a masterpiece of workmanship. I'm quite sure that these people having a heart for the Lord like this didn't do it in our slipshod way. I'm quite sure they did it according to the very best of their ability. But where did they get the idea? Where did the idea of making a cart come from? Had this ever been taught in the Word of God?
Had God ever told his people that he wanted them to prepare a cart to carry the ark of the Lord?
Oh no, that somebody else had done it before and it had seemed to prosper. So surely that was a good precedent. The Philistines, when they sent back the ark of the Lord, had made a new cart. And so wonderfully had God intervened that after they had made this new cart and decided to send the ark back to Israel.
That they tied up the calves at home and put oxen to the cart.
And they said now.
If the oxen carried that ark back to the land of Israel with their calves tied up at home, we'll know that this is of God. Well, this must have been a God, because certainly oxen would never go in the opposite direction with their calves tied at home, with no one to guide the cart unless God did it. This was contrary to nature.
Yes, God did it, but we have to remember something. These were the Philistines. These were not the people that had the word of God. These were not the people that had in their possession the oracles of God. And you know, let us bear this in mind, brethren, God may prosper things in the in the pathway of people who are not acquainted with the word of God.
And who are not taught like some of us have been taught, but.
For us, we have a special responsibility, if we profess to go by the Word of God, to follow its instruction. We're not to copy the philosophy. We're not to copy what God may allow to prosper in the world, and what God may allow to prosper in those who are perhaps only babes in Christ. He will not allow to prosper with those who have His Word within their possession.
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Don't use it all. There's a difference. We see something of this principle.
In connection with the early days of the church, you know that when God.
Save the people from Israel. They were slow to give up.
Those old habits that they had had as Jews. And God was patient. God was patient.
They had gone on with a God-given religion. They had carried on the temple and all its ritual and sacrifices according to the mind of God.
But now the Lord Jesus had been crucified. He had died, He had risen again, He had gone back on high. The Spirit had come down.
But that nation was slow to learn the things of God, and God was patient. He waited almost 40 years. From the Day of Pentecost until the destruction of the temple in the year 8070 was almost 40 years. 40 years is a period of testing in the Scripture, and God waited that long for those people to be delivered from that thing.
And you know, God is very patient. And so James, when when Paul came up to Jerusalem.
James said to Paul, Dicus, brother, how many thousands of Jews there either believe and they are all zealous of the law. So he said like this, Paul, you should go along with them because God has saved them and they're still going on with the law and there are thousands of them and now you should just go along with them. Well, God was patient with those Jewish believers just recently saved out of Judaism.
But God had made known much more.
To his servant Paul, and he was more responsible. And you and I who have the word of God, I say in our hands, many of us professively gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't need to copy what's about us when we have the living instructions of the Word of God. God may allow certain things to prosper in those who have not yet been instructed in the truth of God.
Maybe their hearts are more loyal to Christ than some of ours.
But that wouldn't do for us. We have the word of God-given to us, we have His instruction, and many of us have heard these things. And so the idea of making this new card came from the Philistine. God had prospered when they did it because they didn't have the oracles. They weren't instructed. They were walking up to the light they had. But it was different when those who had the scriptures should turn.
And copy the Philistine. That was not the mind of God for Israel and David, their leader ought to have known better.
Well, it tells us here in the eighth verse. And David and all Israel played before God with all their might, and was singing him with hearts and with salties, and with timbles and with symbols and with trumpets. Yes, there was great joy, and often till there's great joy and great rejoicing. And yet perhaps.
We haven't been sufficiently before God about his word. We can see them.
Those happy 3 days was not sufficient. It was not a substitute. Should I say her communion with God and for the guidance of His Word, following the philosophy was not to be a president. The great joy that was present there was not sufficient to show that they had the mind of the law. Again I say to the law and to the testimony, If they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.
All that is present, be earnest to seek the mind of God through His Word.
And even though it may seem there are only a few, to have the word of God for our pathway is of all importance, and to be in the presence of the Lord in that day, and to have him tell us that He was pleased with obedience above everything else. Has it ever struck you how often in the New Testament it speaks about doing the will of God?
During the will of God. Why? Because that is the most important thing that we should do.
The will of God. It's not how much we accomplish, it's not whether we can say there are thousands of beliefs.
To do the will of God, leave the others with the Lord. They may be walking up to the light they have, but we're responsible when God has given us His word and made known His truth to us to walk in it. The Lord Jesus said if you know these things, happy are ye if ye do them, happy are ye if you do them well. Everything was going fine up to this point.
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And then in the ninth verse, and when they came under the threshing floor of Chidam.
Either put forth his hand to hold the ark, for the oxen stumbled. Well, was this just an accident? Oh no, it was not an accident. And God allowed this to take place to show that this was not according to his mind. It was not according to His word. The oxen stumbled. It wasn't the oxen that were supposed to be the ones who were to carry the ark.
No, it wasn't supposed to be two men as A and a higher.
These men certainly were given quite a place of prominence, weren't they? And in men's plans, it's always.
In the plans of men, it's always prominent for men.
You know, I've asked and said you can make a simple test of any doctrine presented by asking this question. Does it exalt man? How does it exalt Christ? If it's the truth of God? It exalts Christ because the Scripture says that when the Spirit has come, he shall glorify me. And these two men must have felt very important.
Driving the car and that they were necessary to study.
The ark but that that arc which was a symbol of God's presence among his people that aren't as it tells us that the name of the Lord was called upon it. Did it need the hand of other to study it? Oh no. Oh no, I didn't need the hand. If we walk in the truth, God will maintain his own glory. God will maintain his own glory.
And it's our responsibility to walk in the truth. And when we do and why, God will see to it that His glory is.
Maintained Well, there was an interruption in all this fine things.
What happened? Well, the oxen stumbled as it put forth his hand to study the Arkansas. There has been an instance where a man in trying to defend the person of Christ, he actually fell into that doctrine and trying to do it. You know, we don't need to take the position of being defenders of the truth. We're told to contend for the truth that we're never told to be defenders.
We're told to give it out, to to speak the truth in love.
But God will take care of that. Our part is to faithfully and earnestly minister it by leave the truth of God where God has set it before us in His Word. Shall I put it this way? Which things also we speak not in the words which man's wisdom teach us, but which the Holy Ghost teach us. It's a grand thing to stand by the word of God.
Too often when we introduce our own thoughts, it's just like putting our hand out to study it.
But when we take the very word of God, we're sure we have the truth of God, and especially when it has to do with the person of Christ. I I just like discussions about the person of Christ. I like to hear clear, plain statements of what the Scripture says about the person of Christ. There's always a danger when we start to and shall I say dissect or.
By our own attempt to study the person of Christ. All it is study, it's the truth of God.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The fame was in the beginning with God.
Well, tells us here that David was displeased. You know, we always get displeased on our own plans are upset.
This is a something that often discovers that it is our plan.
You know, I feel this, brethren, that when we're seeking to please the Lord in obedience to His Word, the Lord gives a quiet peace in the heart. And even when difficulties arise, God gives a certain peace in the heart that maintains us. But I find for myself that when I have a plan and I'm anxious to carry it out and the plan is disrupted.
I usually get upset. I I feel like David, I get displeased and poor David, he actually was displeased with the Lord.
And sometimes we can be displeased with the Lord because he interrupted our plan, but if we're doing His plan, then whatever He allows to take place, He will sustain us. He is faithful. When Paul was cast into prison for preaching the gospel, he could sing within the prison. He wasn't displeased in the prison.
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At the last, when he went up to Jerusalem without the mind of God.
He was quite displeased when he had to stand before the high priest and he called him a whited wall. You know, whenever we do something in our own will, even in spiritual things, we get displeased when God allows an interruption. This ought to exercise us. David was displeased and so the ark was taken aside, and it says in the 12 first. And David was afraid of God that day.
Saying, How shall I bring the ark of God?
Harmed me. He was afraid. And brethren, it says, let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. We ought to be anxious to serve the Lord, to worship him in a way that's according to his mind that is pleasing to him.
But is there something else that came out of this that was very good? He said, How shall I bring the ark of God home? How shall I do it? Following the advice of the captains and leaders and all Israel, following the example of the Philistine having two men prominently out there driving the cart, This had all broken down. It all failed. How was he to do it?
Well, he had a book that told him how he had a book.
Notice the 15th chapter.
In the 15th chapter in the first verse, David made him houses in the city of David, and prepared an ark for the a place for the ark of God, and pitch for his attempt. And David said, None ought to carry the ark of God but the Levite, For them hath the Lord chosen to carry the ark of God, and a minister unto him forever. And again in the end of the 15th verse.
As Moses commanded according to the word of the Lord.
I guess he said, How shall I bring the ark of God home to me? Was he going to get the answers in the Philistines? Is he going to get the answer from the captains, the leaders? No, He turned to the right source this time. He went to the word of God. He went to the commandment of the Lord. Had the Lord made known his mind about how the ark was to be carried? Yes, he had. He had said that the ark was to be carried upon the shoulders of the Levites.
And when God said that no other way was acceptable, oh, isn't it blessed that God has given?
Instruction in his word about such important things as these. And David didn't go and ask their advice. He went and boldly, and yet, shall I say, humbly told them why? He said, I know now how it's to be done. And he told him what the Lord has said. Oh, how blessed it is to be able to say, well, I learned that from the word of God.
The scripture says this, the scripture says that, and I have his word giving me instructions.
In this matter, and this is so important for us in days like this, we're living in days like the end of the judges.
Every man did what was right in his own eyes. People say, well, our church does it this way.
Others say our church does it that way. How does your group do it all? What does the word of God say? What does the word of God say? All? May the Lord give us the same thing, the same spirit that we see with David. David said none ought to carry the ark of the Lord but the Levite, and so now he disposes of that cart that had been made.
We don't read any more about these two prominent men. Can't you picture the occasion this new car?
And these two men up there driving it, everybody knew all about who they were. They were, they were the prominent ones. I would say they were probably more noticed than the ark itself out there and driving it while the ark was being pulled behind, they were in the place of prominence. But now when he gets together, the priest were not even told who the men were that carried it. We're just told of a group of men.
And it says here.
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It says here.
About the ones in the 24th verse and the ones that blew with the trumpets told about who the ones were, who were the doorkeepers and all it says in the 15th verse is, and the children of the Levites bear the ark of God upon their shoulders. You say, well, who was it that did it? God hasn't told us.
That was not the important thing. The important thing was the Ark. The important thing was the Ark.
And your friends and the important thing is the glory of Christ. The important thing is not who does the fear of us. The important thing is not who gave out to him. The important thing is not who it was that went forward to break the bread. The important thing is that the Lord should get the glory that He should be the one were there to be occupied with him, were there to give honor and glory to that blessed One who alone is worthy and so.
When they assemble the children of Arum and the Levites and the place.
Was prepared for. It doesn't tell us that the place was prepared before, but now?
When they have thought, the mind of the Lord is a place prepared for it. And when you and I seek the mind of God through His Word, we find that He has a way and He has a place. He has a way and He has a place. And you and I can learn these precious things in His blessed book. Well, it tells us here in the 13th verse.
That David turns and he owns his mistakes.
He tells these Levites to that they were to carry up the ark and it says.
In the 13th verse for because ye did it not at the 1St the Lord our God made a breach upon us or that we sought him not after the due order. Yes, he he recognizes that God had had to speak because they hadn't done it in the way that he had said. They acknowledge that and it's a good thing when we humbly acknowledge before the Lord when we've been walking himself well.
There are two things that we should do. We should speak his mind.
But we should also be humble. So perhaps they should notice the 12Th verse. And said unto them, Ye are the chief of the fathers of the Levites. Sanctify yourselves, both ye and your brethren, that ye may bring up the ark of the Lord God of Israel under the place that I have prepared for it. Sanctify yourself. Yes, there's practical sanctification.
There's that walking in a way that apart.
For the Lord. So they were to sanctify themselves. We don't read the other sanctified themselves.
We're not even told that they were Levites. I doubt if they were. It was all a human plan. But not here. And every believer is a priest. Yes, we had it in our meetings so sweetly it says that we're a holy priesthood to OfferUp spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. But we need to sanctify ourselves. That is to.
Judge those things that are not pleasing to him.
To do.
This server according to his precious words, and so it tells us in that end of that fifteenth verse, as Moses commanded according to the word of the Lord. Well, what a happy change has taken place here. They have sought the mind of God. They are doing it according to His will.
And perhaps I could put it like this when the ark was upon their shoulders.
By the man we saw to speak heaven and the ark was in full view. That's what God wants. He wants the glory of His Son. If you had been walking down the street that day, you might not have even noticed the men who were carrying it, because with the ark on their shoulders, there it was lifted up above their heads. And brethren, the person of Christ, the glory of Christ is above our heads.
It says in Matthew Chapter 11 no man nor the son.
Not the Father. Never try to understand the mystery of the person of Christ. That's beyond us.
Never try to plan our own way of approaching to his presence. It's given to us in the word and even if it's beyond their understanding why he should have planned it in a certain way, let us follow his plan. What a happy occasion this was. I say again, I don't know who carried the ark. I just know they were Levi and as priests we have the privilege of exhausting the Lord Jesus that the true words of this.
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And we present Christ to God.
The loveliness of his person and his work.
And so there were these singers, and then it tells us something else that they didn't have before. And the 23rd version and Berekaya and Alcana were doorkeepers of the ark. Why does it tell us this all? Because the enemy is always opposed when things are done in God's way. People say, oh, well, you go here, you don't have nearly as much trouble as with those that are gathered to the Lord's name.
You escape a lot of trouble when you when you go to a place where.
They're not gathered as brethren to the name of the Lord Jesus. That's much trouble among those guided to the Lord's name.
Yes, they didn't have doorkeepers till they tried to do it according to the mind of God. And there needs to be doorkeepers. There were doorkeepers as well as singers. And if we're going to go on in a way that's pleasing to God, we'll find that the enemy will always oppose whatever is of God. But God in his goodness has not only told us how to gather, He's given us instructions.
Holiness, become us.
Thine house Ohio God forever. So there were doorkeepers for the ark. Well, then it goes on, and it tells us.
In the 26th verse, and it came to pass when God helped the Levites that bear the ark of the coming of the Lord, that they offered seven bullets and seven Rams. In this lovely God helps the Levite, they didn't stumble, they didn't stumble. Why all the Lord's able to keep us from stumbling?
The Lord Jesus is rightful place, but if we're trying to do things in our own way.
I'm very liable to stumble, and the plans that we try to workout are very liable to fail too.
But isn't this lovely? The Lord helped the Levites and all. We're a poor feeble folk, a little company gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus. And what is it that keeps us going on whilst only the Lord's keeping grace? It's only His keeping grace. And isn't encouragement. It's an encouragement to my heart, brethren, to know that He has said to that people company in Philadelphia. He said, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it.
He has told us that he's going to give us the privilege of remembering him until he comes. What is it that's keeping us? Certainly not because we're such wonderful people. It's because the Lord is faithful. And did these people at the end give any credit to themselves? Did they go and shake their hands? The ones that carried the heart and said, oh, you did a good job, this is wonderful.
Now when they got there, it says they sacrificed 7 bullets and seven rounds.
Through the Law we gave Him all the glory, and if He has kept us until this day, it's all glory to Him. No credit to ourselves. We would have stumbled if it wasn't for His keeping grace. And so how blessed to speak in our simple and feeble way, to follow His word, to go on in that path that He has marked out for His confidence that He is faithful. He's the captain of our salvation.
Bringing many sons to glory and these 7/7 is the perfect number. They offered the seven bullocks that is the highest.
Form of the burnt offering and the seven rounds at the ram of consecration and so they gave the Lord the glory and it tells us here that there was great rejoicing and David was dancing before the Lord Oh yes it's his heart rejoice. He didn't he didn't get upset here he didn't get troubled and even when.
Michael, a daughter of Saul, looked out at the window and despised him in her heart. He didn't get angry about it. Why? Well, he had the confidence that he was doing God's will. He he had the confidence. And it says, let us go forth therefore unto him, without the camp bearing his reproach. Paul's daughter didn't despise David when they had the new car.
I don't know that was quite all right with her, that that scheme came from the Philistines.
And that was quite acceptable to her. But she did despise David when the ark was brought up in God's way. And there's a reproach and we speak to simply follow his words. You know that everyone here knows it. There may be some who are not gathered to the Lords name.
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You know that there's a reproach in saying, well, and just gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, what's the name of your organization? Well, we don't have a name. We just gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus. Well, who's your leader? Well, we don't have any leader except the Lord. Well, Michael looks out at the window and she despised David in her heart. How can you rejoice over this? And you say, well, what joy do you have in meeting in that simplicity?
The joy.
Of the Lord's approval, the joy of doing his will, the joy of giving him the place that due to him, what a privilege may be, value it, may be walk in it. Well, there's a happy ending to this that I'd like to call attention. These first three verses of the 16th chapter.
So they brought the ark of God and set it in the midst of the 10th of David had picked for it and they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before God. Burnt offering is we've often noticed, is what the work of Christ is to God. The peace offering could be called the communion or fellowship offering. They have this sense now in their souls that they were had fellowship with God.
Now it tells us about the Lord's Supper, that the bread which we break, is it not the communion or fellowship of the body of Christ?
The cup is the communion of the blood of Christ, and so he can have fellowship with God in connection with the way we gather, according to His Word and according to his mind. Though they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. And then David came down after this and he blessed the people in the name of the Lord.
And then it says in the third verse, And he dealt to everyone of Israel, both men and women.
To everyone, a loaf of bread and a good piece of flesh and a flag and of wine. This didn't take place at the end of the three days of eating and drinking. This didn't take place when the Lord had smitten other. But it did take place when the Lord had made known his mind and they had sought to carry it out. Well, I just suggest this little thought in connection with it.
That they had something that sustained them when they left.
In the first instance they had the memory of three happy days, but in this instance they had something that they carried away.
Something that they carried with them when they went to their homes. And I hope each one of us, as we perhaps leave some to go to home, even far away, that we'll have this experience that we'll carry away a loaf of bread. That is the food that the Lord supplies. The bread perhaps would speak to us of the Lord Jesus.
And his blessed pathway here and then that good piece of flesh.
Well, that we have learned more of himself, it says, you know, that strong meat belongs to them that are a filet even to those who by reason of use have their sentence exercise to discern both good and evil. So that the strong meat speaks to us of having learned more of the mind of God through His word, and discerning His mind. Then we walk in the good of it. We walk in the truth, in other words, and then the last a flag in the wine.
What's this? Oh, that's a joy the Lord gives and all. There is a joy and peace in walking according to His Word and communion with the Lord. And I trust that each one of us will carry away something that will answer to this in our soul. It's nice. It's not often that we read this to every man, to everyone of Israel, both man and woman.
It seems to me there's something very personal about this little added touch that's given here.
That there was something for both the men and the women. You know, I trust that each one of us, as we leave, that we'll carry away something that has made the Lord Jesus more precious to us, that has made His mind more clear to us, and that has given us that joy that only comes in communion with Him and in walking in obedience to His Word. Again, I would repeat that verse if you know these things.
Happy are ye?
If you do them.
The Unchangeable Love of God
Address—C.E. Lunden
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2nd chapter of Esther. If you'll be patient with me, I'm going to read from several chapters just a little bit.
Altogether won't be much more than one chapter. So we can get the connections starting with the fifth verse of the second chapter of Esther. Now in Shushan, the palace, there was a certain Jew whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jerry, the son of Shemia, the son of Kish of Benjamin.
Seventh Verse. And he brought up Hadassah, that is, Esther, his uncles daughter, for she had neither father nor mother, and the maid was fair and beautiful, who Mordecai, when her father and mother were dead, took for his own daughter.
So it came to pass when the King's commandment and his decree was heard, and when many maidens were gathered together unto Shushan the palace.
To the custody of Haggai. That Esther was brought also unto the King's King's house. To the custody of Haggai, keeper of the women. Verse 17.
And the king loved Esther above all the women, and she obtained grace and favor in his sight more than all the virgins.
So that he set the royal crown upon her head and made her queen instead of Vashti, verse 21.
In those days, while Mordecai sat in the King's gate, two of the King's chamberlain's big fan and Tyrish of those which kept the door, were wroth, and sought to lay hand on the king of Asuerus. And the thing was known to Mordecai, who told it unto Esther the queen, and Esther certified the king thereof in Mordecai's name.
Chapter 3.
After these things did king promote Haman the son of Amada the aggregate for a malachite, and advanced him, and set his seat above all the Princess that were with him. And all the King's servants that were in the King's gate bowed, and reverence Caiman, for the king had so commanded concerning him. But Mordecai bowed not, nor did him reverence. Verse 8.
And Haman said unto King of Hazueras.
There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people of all the provinces of thy Kingdom.
And their laws are diverse from all people. Neither keep they the King's laws. Therefore it is not for the King's prophet to suffer them. If it pleased the king, let it be written that they may be destroyed.
Chapter 4. Verse 13.
Then Mordecai.
Commanded to answer Esther, think not with thyself that thou shalt escape in the King's house more than all the Jews.
Thou altogether hold us thy peace at this time. Then shall their enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place.
But thou, thy father's house, shall be destroyed, and who knoweth?
Whether thou art come to the Kingdom for such a time as this?
Then Esther Badham returned Mordecai this answer.
Go gather together all the Jews that are present in Shushan and fasti for me, and neither eat nor drink 3 days, night or day. I also and my maidens will fast likewise, and so will I go in under the king, which is not according to the law. And if I perish, I perish.
So Mordecai went his way and did according to all that Esther had commanded him. Now it came to pass on the third day that Esther put on her royal apparel and stood in the inner court of the King's house, over against the the King's house. And the king sat upon his royal throne in the royal house over against the gate of the house. And it was so, when the king saw us to the queen standing in the court, that she obtained favor in his sight.
And the king held out to Esther the golden scepter that was in his hand. So Esther drew near and touched the top of the scepter.
Then said the king unto her, What wilt thou, Queen Esther, and what is thy request? It shall be even given thee to the half of the Kingdom. And Esther answered, If it seemed good unto the king, let the king and Haman come this day under the banquet that I prepared for him. Then the king said, Cause Haman to make haste, that he may do as Esther has said.
So the King and Haman came to the banquet that Estrate prepared.
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And the king said unto Esther at the banquet of wine, What is thy petition? And it shall be granted thee, And what is thy request? Even to the half of the Kingdom it shall be performed.
Then answered Esther, and said, My petition and my request is, if I have found favor in the sight of the king, and if it pleased the king to grant my petition and to perform my request, let the king and Haman come to the banquet that I shall prepare for them, and I will do tomorrow, as the king has said.
Chapter 6 On that night, could not the king sleep?
And he commanded to bring the Book of Records of the chronicles, and they were read before the king. And it was found written that Mordecai had told a big fan, and cherished two of the King's chamberlains, the keepers of the door, who sought to lay hand on the king hazardous. And the king said, What honor and dignity have been done to Mordecai for this?
Said the King's servants that ministered unto him. There is nothing done for him.
Verse 11.
Then took Haman, the apparel and the horse and arrayed Mordecai.
And brought him on horseback through the street of the city. And proclaimed before him thus shall be done of the man whom the king delighted to honor. Chapter 7.
So the king and Haman came to banquet with Esther.
The queen and the king said unto Esther on the second day of the banquet of wine, What is thy petition, Queen Esther? And it shall be granted thee. And what is thy request? And it shall be performed even to the half of the Kingdom.
Then Esther the queen answered and said, If I found favor in the sight, thy sight, O king, and if it pleased the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request. For we are sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be slain, to perish.
But if we had been sold for bonds men and bond women, I had held my tongue, although the enemy could not countervail the King's damage.
Then the king Hazieris answered, and said unto Esther the queen, Who is he, and where is he that durst presume in his heart to do so? And Esther said, The adversarial enemy is this wicked Haman.
Then Haman was afraid before the King and the Queen, verse 10.
So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then was the King's wrath pacified.
Now, you may think it's strange to take up a passage like this in the Old Testament at a young people's meeting, but I believe it has a very special message, not only for the dear young people here this afternoon, but for each one of us.
You know this is the last of the historical books of the Old Testament.
In fact, it's sort of like a little Paul script at the end.
Sometimes I remember receiving a letter from a brother not long ago, and beside the communication he added a little postscript in which he spoke of his affections from my wife and I, from his wife and himself. And you know, these things are very touching.
Very touching, very precious.
You know God at the end of all the history of God's people down here.
He as much as says I want to add a little post script. What is it?
The people of God were going on badly.
And the ones to whom this was written were not even with Ezra back in the land.
They had been carried away captive, but the time had come for them to return. Ezra was back building the the temple and walls in Nehemiah, but they weren't back. Now. We don't know why Esther wasn't back, except that possibly being born in this land, in captivity, she may not have had the opportunity. We don't know.
But Mordecai perhaps could have gone back.
But he wasn't back.
And there may be some of you dear young people here this afternoon. I'm sure there are.
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Who have never yet risen to your privileges.
You know the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, and he's very precious to you, I'm sure.
And you know too, that you and I are not always doing the things that we should do.
You know too that you and I make mistakes. Now what I want to call your attention to, particularly in this portion, is.
That the love of our God will never change. Never.
I don't want for a minute for you to understand that God will condone, will, will smile at evil, Never. Never.
But the affections of his heart are such that he says, I will never leave you, nor forsake you.
Never. The gifts and callings of God are without repentance.
And that's what I'd like to stress.
We don't have the name of God in this book, nor we do we have the faults of his people.
We just see a condition where everything is as it were at the very bottom, the last communication perhaps almost before Christ comes. And in this passage we find that God is working behind the scenes. And here we have Mordecai in the palace of the king Hajjuaris. In the first chapter we find this king was over 120 provinces from India to Ethiopia.
And yet his Queen absolutely dared to refuse to come in to a bank that he had prepared.
And so he sets his queen aside.
And he chooses another queen who is behind that? If it wasn't God, yes, he chooses another queen.
Now, I'd like to call your attention to the name of Esther. Her name was Adassa, but you know Esther.
I believe means Myrtle. Now, I'm not an expert on plants, but I understand that Myrtle is a tree perhaps 6 to 20 feet tall.
And it has a glossy lace that's at Evergreen.
And in its own season, it bears fragrant blossoms, either white or pink, as the case may be.
Have you ever gone out in the country in the winter time and the snow and you've seen an Evergreen standing out by itself?
And all refreshing to see those glossy leaves.
Ah, dear young people.
I wonder if there are any esters anymore to chaos here this afternoon.
In the days of darkness.
Even though you're not up to the full privileges that God has given you, perhaps you haven't realized them yet.
I wonder if you're going to stand firm for Christ in the measure of the light you have.
Here we see Esther, a little babe, shall we say, a child chosen to be queen over 120 provinces. Perhaps a greater glory in the sense that even Solomon knew. But here she was what caused all this God's love for his people.
We see in the later chapters there was an enemy arising, Haman.
And his purpose was to destroy all of God's people, and that would have meant Jerusalem too.
It had been the complete destruction of the Jews.
But here were their two cousins, Mordecai and his cousin Esther.
In the panelists, God had put them there.
And I'd like to call especially to one verse here that.
Has impressed itself on my heart in the 4th chapter that we've read.
In the 14th verse the last part. And who knoweth whether thou art come to the Kingdom?
For such a time as this now, dear young people, were closing the year 1969.
We don't know what another year will bring forth.
But we know the character of the day.
All such a time as this.
What kind of a time is it? It's a time when the foundations are being destroyed.
Truth is being set aside.
When it calls for individual faithfulness in the part of God's people, Now you have been placed in the place in the.
Under privilege, Most of you here have been brought up in Christian homes. We're living in a world that doesn't know God.
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Did you ever thought why you were where you were?
You know, there's a time when God had to say to Elijah, What doest thou hear, Elijah?
He was in the wrong place.
And where are you this afternoon, dear young people? Are you in the place of privilege?
Do you realize what a privilege it is to stand out like like Esther?
Like a symbol as it were, a blessing for God's people.
Yes, we see here devotedness on the part of Esther and on the part of Mordecai.
We find, however, that when Mordecai finds.
This message of ruin for his people he falls upon his face in sackcloth.
And Ruther or Esther herself with her maidens, they fall on their faces, and they call for all the Jews of the city to fall on their faces.
Now, brethren, this is a principle.
If you and I expect blessing, if we expect to be used of God, we'll have to be on our faces. We will.
We see here how simple all these precious things are. God is working behind the scenes. He's ordering everything. He's setting aside a queen, He's setting aside Haman, the chief Prince of the Kingdom, so he can bring in those that will be for the blessing of these people. But these calls for individual exercise and faith and humbling on the part of his people.
I know how precious it is and we have seen it and do see it.
We're dear young people determine that they're going to follow the Lord.
I heard just recently of two young people that were getting up real early to read their bibles. Oh how good to hear that.
But also to be on our faces before God.
That's the only way of blessing.
Here we see in all our simplicity these two dear ones. The midst of all the ruins is truly weren't in Jerusalem where they belonged.
But still there was purpose and heart to serve the Lord where they were.
And so we find them on their faces before God.
Now it's in this state of soul that Esther goes in before the king.
You know there was a law in that land.
That no one could come into the presence of the King unless he himself appointed it.
And unless he held out the golden scepter to them.
He had the power of life and death in his hands.
Now Esther had reminded Mordecai of this.
Says How can I go into the king?
If I go in to intercede for my people.
I'll be slain possibly. I have no right there unless he calls.
Well, Mordecai said. You're bound up for the rest of them. Don't think you'll escape.
You won't escape. If the decree goes forth to slay all the Jews, you will be one of them.
You know, it's a good thing, dear young people, to discover where we belong.
A member of a young man I heard of a young man who was.
Talking with someone who was an atheist and he himself had not.
Definite convictions as to the truth.
He wasn't saved.
But when the atheist began speaking against Christ, he decided he'd better defend.
And the result was that he was converted.
Converted himself.
Possibly through scriptures he learned as a child. We don't know. And it's a good thing to decide right now where you and I stand. Where do we stand?
Esther had to come to that place. Where do we stand? Do we stand with God's people or do we stand with the enemy?
What a decision for Esther to make. Here she was in the very place of prominence in that Kingdom, the queen.
Was she going to take her place with that man who lay in sackcloth at the King's gate? Mordecai? Make up your mind, dear young people.
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It's a day of rejection.
The day's coming glory blessing. Today is the day of rejection.
Are you going to identify yourself?
With the rejected one? Or are you going to go on and use that which God has given you outwardly?
Just to adorn yourself and to make it easy for yourself down here are you am I estimated choice? She made her choice in the presence of God on her face, and she goes in and stands before the king. And she says, if I perish, I perish. You know in the Song of Solomon it says love is as strong as death. How strong is yours?
I'm sure it refers to the Lord Jesus, but how strong is your love and mind?
It says jealousy is cruel as the grave.
What does the grave do?
It takes old and young. It doesn't spare any.
Oh dear young people, is Christ first in your life and mine?
What a decision for Esther to make. She made it. You know man, when a man's ways please the Lord.
It maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.
And we learn here from this book that the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord as the rivers of water.
She turned as it whithersoever he will.
I may not have quoted that quite right.
Yes, he turneth it Withers so ever he will.
I have loved thee with an everlasting love, he says to his people. Is he from my dear son?
What was Ephraim doing? Going after his idols? Yes.
Is he my dear son?
Is he a pleasant child? Oh, brethren, that breaks our hearts.
Breaks our hearts.
God is always true to what He is, never varies. One moment you and I do. God doesn't change. If he took you up for a blessing, He's going to see you blessed.
Come what night?
Oh, we're not speaking this afternoon of his government. It's bitter sometimes, you know, but that's not the subject.
Because you know, dear brother, and as we were singing that little hymn, if you and I could only get a glimpse of that love of our God for us.
How different it would be in our ways.
No, brethren, the answer is not the whip, it's the heart. It's affections drawn to Christ.
The heart's affections drawn to Christ.
To know that love of God for you and for me.
That never varies one moment.
What wilt thou, Queen Esther? What is thy petition?
That's the answer.
Why? Because the King's heart is in the hand of the Lord, can't be otherwise.
You know, there's nothing like faith that pleases God. Without faith, that's impossible to please him. Do you want to please Him? Well, that's the way.
And if there was ever a day when there was that simple childlike faith needed that's just simply trusted and clung to God, it's today, A day like this.
Well, Esther says I want you to come to a banquet tomorrow. Why didn't she give her petition? No. Well, I think there's a lovely type here, and I'm not going to say much about it, but just a little.
More decay has to be exalted first.
And who is he? He's a type of Christ.
He is the man that God delights to honor. And there is only one it is Jesus.
Oh, how precious, Esther hesitates. She will not make her petition yet. There's never going to be any blessing for Israel till Christ is exalted.
Now let's apply it.
There never be any blessing in your life spiritually until Christ is exalted.
Never Christ must have, shall I say the first place?
Someone corrected me and they said he has to have it all.
He has to have it all.
Oh how good this is.
That we might get broken down, dear young people, to where we belong. Discover our position. Discover that state of soul that brings us into God's presence, where we have that confidence that Esther received here.
00:25:06
You know he that believeth shall not make haste.
I love to remember what our dear brother Jackson has said. If in doubt, don't. Don't just wait upon God.
We have that in the 27th Psalm. I wait, I say on the Lord, wait.
How many times we made mistakes to be in a hurry, especially in serious matters like this. And so Esther waits.
Oh, how good it is. She waits. How beautiful the picture here.
And the king can't sleep that night.
Something is bothering him. What is it?
Why away back Mordechai who sat in the gate?
Discovered that there were two who were seeking the life of the king.
And they were found out and they were hanging.
And the king had it inscribed in the Chronicles of the Kings of Media and Persia.
And this night he couldn't sleep. There was something wrong. Something bothered him. God was working in his secret ways in the heart of that king.
And he calls for the chronicles, the records to be brought out. And he discovers.
Mordecai had saved his life.
He says, has any dignity and honor been done to this man for this? He said, no. He said, all right, You take the chief Prince that's in the land and cause him to to take Mordecai through the streets on the King's old horse with his own apparel, and say, this is the man whom the king delights to honor. Oh, what a lovely picture of Jesus.
Of the one that God delights to honor and will honor.
Publicly in the coming day and there will be no blessing for man.
On earth, in the Kingdom of Israel, until the Lord Jesus Himself is publicly honored.
Yes.
This is the man whom the King delights to honor.
And now we find the banquet is called the 2nd banquet that Esther requested.
Although solemn occasion this was.
There was a little girl, shall we say?
Just a little girl. She's queen.
And she's going to stand face to face with the enemy of God's people.
Oh how this speaks of days of weakness and it touches my heart, dear young people.
That in days of weakness God picks up and uses what he pleases. A left-handed man if you please, as we have in the book of Judges.
Don't be discouraged if you don't have the abilities that you see others might have.
Don't be discouraged, it's a day of weakness. And here's Dear Esther without anything except what God would supply.
Faith, Faith that rests upon God. And there she stands face to face and accuses that wicked.
Mordecai wouldn't bow to him because he was an malachite.
God had told the Jews that they were to have war with family from generation to generation. Mordecai wouldn't bow to him. He didn't have to.
God had already provided that he was in the King's favor. God had provided this.
Oh, how thankful we should be for God's order in our ways.
Hope we should appreciate this.
He does, He orders it every step for us. If we only knew it. We do well to wait upon Him.
And now Aunt Esther turns, says this wicked Haman to his face.
Isn't about the boldness of faith.
She accuses the chief Prince in the Kingdom to the king.
Got a pretty serious matter?
These are the ways of God's deliverance for His people.
Now I know this is an outstanding account.
But it gives us the principles of the workings of God in the last days, when everything is in ruins.
And when you and I, dear young people, may not be exactly in the right position that we should be.
We may be unintelligent as to all of God's ways, but there is one thing sure.
We have a precious savior.
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Our God loves us, and He has power over all of our circumstances.
And if you and I just trust him?
And we do, like Esther and Mordecai, get on our faces before him.
We'll discover what they discovered that you'll never forsake you nor leave you.
And you know.
There's no temptation beset you but what is common to man.
And God has provided.
A way of escape that you might be able to bear it.
You never put you in a position.
But what you'll be able to meet it. Isn't that precious? Isn't that a comfort, dear young people in the last days?
Don't go away and get discouraged. Don't say well everything is in ruins.
No it isn't.
God is working. He has his hand underneath it all. Alterably. It's in ruins, but you know God's time clock is right on time.
And he is hurting his ways for the glory of the Lord Jesus and for the blessings.
Of God's people.
See how he is working for the deliverance of all of these his people that he loves.
He's going to move kingdoms, but he's going to use an Esther.
And a Mordecai. I take them to be both young people. They were cousins.
One perhaps older than the other, but perhaps young people. Esther surely was.
God was using them.
Yes, it's a day when God uses young people today. Are you one of them?
Are you going to say, well I'm going to wait till I get older and I know a lot, then maybe God can use me?
To be too late.
Be too late.
So in this.
7th chapter then.
Third verse Then as to the queen answered, and said, If I found favor in thy sight.
O King, and that please the King, let my life be given me in my petition and my people at my request.
For we are sold. Notice that we we.
Are sold I and my people.
I and my people, oh how good this is.
How Esther could have been different. How she could have said, well, I'm going to shy away from this. I'm going to take my place from the palace and let come what may. I'm safe.
Oh no, she wasn't. I and my people.
To be destroyed, and to be slain, and to perish.
But if we had been sold for Bond men and Bond women, I had held my tongue, although the enemy could not countervail.
The King's damage.
Then the king as you whereas answered, said, And Esther the queen, who is he? Where is he that does presume in his heart to do so? And Esther said, The adversarial enemy is this wicked Haman.
In the 10th verse, he's hanged.
Now what happened following this?
In the following chapters we see the full deliverance of God's people by the decree of the King.
And we see at the very last chapter Mordecai.
The one who lay in sackcloth at the King's gate.
The one who in his devotedness to the interests of God's people and to God.
Would defy that wicked Haman.
And would direct Esther as to what she should do on behalf of God's people in the last chapter. Notice it in the last chapter. These there are 10 chapters in this book.
And the king the Hazueras laid a tribute upon the land, and upon the Isles of the sea, and all the acts of his power and of his might, and the declaration of the greatness of Mordecai, where under the king advanced him, are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Media and Persia? For Mordecai the Jew was next under the king of Haju heiress.
And great among the Jews, and accepted of the multitude of his brethren.
Seeking the wealth of his people and speaking peace to all His seed.
Is there any of you, dear young people this afternoon that do not know the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior?
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Remember that you cannot start with God without having your sins forgiven.
You must at the start know the Lord Jesus as your own personal Savior.
But then once you have, remember God loves you.
And you're going to begin discovering what's in your own heart a little bit, as the people of God did.
And you're going to discover two as you do so, the marvelous love of God that will meet you.
And where there is this state of Mordecai and Esther to be on our faces before God? Oh, what a blessing. And then to think that God would take up any of us, and He will.
To use us in blessing to others. It might be in the gospel, it might be in blessing for his people, might be for the deliverance of his people. But I say the pattern we have here.
To be on our faces before God, to recognize His secret ways in days like this, and to wait upon Him. To not be in haste, but to wait upon Him for His blessing, and then to stand out in simple faith, in boldness, having the consciousness of having been in His presence to act for Him in a day.
And such a time as this.
Daniel The Man of God
Address—R. Rule
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We turn together to the book of Daniel. First chapter of Daniel. Just read at this time a few verses in the first chapter, but had before me speaking in a somewhat general way of those things that characterized Daniel as a man of God.
Chapter One. In the third year of the reign of Jehovah, and king of Judah came Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon under Jerusalem, and besieged it. And the Lord gave unto Jehoiakim king of Judah. Pardon me. The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah, into his hand with part of the vessels of the House of God, which he carried into the land of Shinar, to the House of his God, and he bought the vessels.
Into the treasure House of his God.
The king spake under ash Pines the master of his eunuchs, that he should bring certain of the children of Israel and of the king seed, and of the Princess children, whom was no blemish, but well favored and skillful in all wisdom and cunning and knowledge and understanding science, such as had ability in them to stand in the King's palace.
And whom they might teach the learning and the tongue of the Chaldeans. And the king appointed them a daily provision of the King's meat, and of the wine which she drank, so nourishing them three years. At the end thereof they might stand before the king. Now among these were of the children of Judah, Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, And whom the Prince of the eunuchs gave names, forgave unto Daniel the name of Belteshazzar, and to Hananiah of Shadrach, and a Michel of Meshech. And.
Of Abednego. But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with a portion of the King's meat, nor with the wine which he drank. Therefore her requested of the Prince of the eunuchs, he might not defile himself. Now God had brought Daniel into favor and tender love with the Prince of the eunuchs. The Prince of the eunuch said unto Daniel, I hear, my Lord the king, who has appointed your meat and your drink. For why should he see your faces worse liking than the children, which.
Of your sort then she make me endanger my head to the king.
Then said Daniel to Melzar, whom the Prince of eunuchs had said over Daniel, Hananiah, Michelle and Azariah, prove thy servant, I beseech thee 10 days, and let them give us pulse to eat and water to drink. Then let our countenances be looked upon, and the countenances of the children, that either the portion of the kings meat, and as thus deal with thy servant, so he consented to them in this matter, and proved them 10 days.
And at the end of 10 days, their countenances appeared fair and fatter and fleshed in all the children which did eat the portion of the King's meat. Plus Melzar took away the portion of their meat and the wine that they should drink and gave them pulse. Well, that's as far as a read at the minute.
I've always found Danielle a very interesting.
Book and Daniel's personal activity something.
Of real interest, because of the many qualities that he manifested as a man of God, I would like to bring out this afternoon, with the Lord's help, some of those qualities.
To seek to encourage us that.
They might, in a fuller measure, be that which characterizes those of us who belong to the Lord.
As most here know, Daniel lived in a difficult day. I don't need to tell you that we're living in difficult days. A scripture says in the last days, perilous times shall come. I think a more accurate rending is rendering is in the last days, difficult times shall come. Well, those times have come, dear young friends, they have come. We are living in difficult times, difficult days, but God in his word.
Given us guidance and instruction for the very day in which we live. And Daniel himself lived in difficult days.
He was a Jew.
He was one of God's earthly people. They had been given Jerusalem and Palestine as their home.
But because they had sinned against God finally.
God came in and his people were taken into captivity, and we find in Daniel many had been carried into Babylon and there they were subject to a Gentile monarch where they had been brought into *******.
Daniel was one of that number.
It was a difficult day in which he was found, but we find that Daniel was one who sought to stand firm. Verse Revelation 2 Says, Hold that fast which thou hast, and Daniel was one who sought to hold fast the principles that he had learned from God's Word well.
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We find here one of the first things that.
Early in our chapter we find that the king had Aspen as the master of eunuchs. He had to bring some of the outstanding Jews before him. Those that were well favored, those who were skillful in all wisdom, it says Cunningham. Knowledge and understanding science.
Those that had a special ability, Satan is perfectly willing, the world is perfectly willing to make use of the abilities of Christians if he can get them to compromise as far as the principles of truth are concerned. But we find in Daniel one who wasn't prepared to compromise.
Your exercise as a Christian, dear young friend. Is it your desire to hold fast what you have? Is it your desire to stand firm, as we see with Daniel's desire? It says here that the king appointed them this verse 5.
Appointed them a daily provision of the King's meat, and of the wine which he drank, and so nourishing them three years, that they might stand at the end thereof. Might stand before the king.
I have been at business seminars, not three-year seminars. Most of them have been three day seminars.
And I think once a weekly seminar, but here is.
Three years seminar, as it were. They were to have three years of special training that they might.
Perhaps be used to the furtherance of the cause of the King.
And during this period they were given the King's meat for daily provision of the King's meat and of the wine which he drank.
But in the case of Daniel.
It says in verse eight he would not defile himself with a portion of the King's meat, nor with the wine he drank. Why was that? Well, if we were to turn back to the book of Leviticus, we would find in the 7th chapter that they weren't to eat fat of certain meats that they were permitted to eat, nor drink blood.
Nor were they two in the 20. In the 11Th chapter there were.
Many kinds of meat that they weren't to eat at all or to touch.
And undoubtedly the King's meat included some of those things that they that would have defiled them according to the law of Daniels God.
And so it says, he requested of the Prince of the eunuchs. He might not defile himself.
Well, what brought this about in Daniel? He was facing quite a decision. You know, we have decisions to face in life here. He was faced with this three-year special training course program that would fit him to have a special place in the Kingdom, a place of more prominence. Why is it that Daniel wouldn't touch the King's meat?
Because he was going to stand true to the word of his God.
There he was a man of purpose, it says in the eighth verse. Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself. Well, that's the first quality I'd like to bring out and emphasize connection with Daniel. He was a man of purpose.
You know in the 11Th chapter of Acts when?
Barnabas went to Antioch.
Tells us the exhorted them with purpose of heart. To cleave under the Lord. To my cleave unto the Lord with purpose of heart. Oh dear young friend, this afternoon we would exhort you. We would encourage you to cleave to the Lord with purpose of heart. You'll never be the loser if you do.
Daniel Maddafort will now if I don't.
Eat the King's meat, the provision that he's given, and drink of his wine.
I'll be not be in favor with him and it might cost me something.
Well, dear friend, it might cost you a little something in this world if with purpose of heart you seem to you seek to cleave under the Lord, but you'll be the eternal gainer.
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We find in writing to Timothy the apostle Paul could say.
Thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, and so forth. The third thing mentioned. There was purpose. Just before that comes manner of life. He knew the conduct that was proper to the doctrine that He taught. He knew the conduct that was proper to it. But there was also purpose of heart, that that proper conduct might be manifest in His life.
Oh, may the Lord give you and me to have purpose of heart.
That's the first quality I'd bring before you. Verse 8. Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself. How many things there are in this world that it might seek to be, It might seem to be to our advantage to go along with. We might gain something by going along with it.
But you know, if we do, we'll only be defiled if it's something of this world we've had reminded in our reading meetings in John 17, it says the Lord says they are not of this world, even as I am not of this world. And all of the things of this world can do is to defile you and I. We're heavenly citizens. Our citizenship is in heaven.
Our hope is there, wrongly. Pilgrims and strangers here, let's remember.
And were put to the test. Let's remember. Let's seek to act like Daniel did.
He knew what was written in the book of Leviticus, and he would not eat of that meat. He would not defile himself by having a portion of the King's meat and a drink or with the wine that he drank. No, well, you know, it says in the ninth verse, God had brought Daniel into favor and tender love with the Prince of the eunuchs, if we seek to please the Lord.
The Lord here and there in his own way.
Well, I caused that others in the measure act on our behalf here, that Daniel was brought into favor and tender love with the Prince of the eunuchs. And this Prince said to him, Daniel, I fear of the Lord. My Lord, the king was appointed your meat and your drink, for why should they see your faces?
The margin says Sadder than the children, which are of your sort. Then shall you make me endanger my head to the king?
Oh, Daniel just said verse 10, Prove thy servants just put us to the test.
Let us have a pulse to eat and water to drink. We are not sure what that word pulse means. Some have suggested might refer to lentils. Our brother reminded us this morning of Shama how when all his companions fled from the Philistines, Shama stood firm and he defended the field of lentils. Food for God's people. Well, in any event, all he wanted was that which.
He could have God's approval and eating pulse.
Water to drink and then he said then look at our countenances. And so verse 14 says that.
He consented to them in this matter, and He proved them 10 days, and it says at the end of the 10 days their countenances appeared fairer and fatter and fleshed, and all the children which did each portion of the King's meat well. The Lord has his own way of undertaking for his own, if will only be faithful to him well.
Before I go on, I'd like to suggest that that eighth verse brings Daniel before us as a man who would be separate, a separated man. The Lord would have you and me to be separated, separated to himself and apart from this poor world and not getting involved in it.
He would also have us to have purpose of heart. I remember I haven't sung it very often recently, but when I was younger it seemed to come up more often. That little chorus that goes like this. Dare to be a Daniel. Dare to stand alone. Dare to have a purpose. True. Dare to make it known.
Why won't you dare to be a Daniel? Don't you dare to have a purpose? True. Make Christ your purpose in life.
The Apostle Paul said we mentioned thou known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose. What was his purpose in life all was Christ. I think in the third of Philippians he says this one thing I do forgetting those things which are behind, I press toward the mark or the goal.
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For the prize of the calling of God on high in Christ Jesus, is that your goal, Christ and glory? Are you pressing toward the mark? May God give you and me to seek to be found pressing toward that goal, the man in the glory, Christ Jesus. Well, Daniel was a separated man, and he went on in purpose of heart. That's the first thing.
Now on the verses that follow in this chapter, we find that He was in.
Enlightened man, if we seek to walk according to the Word of God, God will give light for the pathway. Notice verse 17. As for these four children, God gave them knowledge and skill in all learning and wisdom. And Daniel had understand and envisions and dreams at the end of the days that the king had said he should bring them in. Then the Prince of the eunuchs brought them in before.
Nebuchadnezzar.
Here is their examination day, and you know, you and I were all going to have an examination day, as it were. And now how do we find the king communed with them, found among them and apart and, and, and among them all was found none like Daniel, Hannanaya, and Azariah. Therefore stood they before the king, and in all matters of wisdom and understanding that the king inquired of them.
He found them 10 times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm. Oh, you know God undertakes for the one that's true to him, faithful to him. Here they were found 10 times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in his realm.
As I read that verse, Speaking of wisdom and understanding, I'm reminded of the verse in Colossians in connection with the prayer of the apostle for the Colossians. He prayed for them.
That he says that he might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. Well, you know, if we put the Lord first.
If we read the word of God and we seek to have it as our guide, the scripture says thy word is a lamp under my feet and a light under my path.
And as that verse tells us in the 119th Psalm, God's Word will be a light, for the pathway here will give guidance.
And we do need guidance. Are you seeking guidance primarily from the textbooks in schools or from this precious book here? I'm not saying that one shouldn't read or study the textbooks in school. That isn't my point. But the real guidance for your overall path and mine is to be found right here in this book. Well.
Daniel gave God his proper place, and we find that as the 21St says, that in all matters of wisdom and understanding.
The king found them 10 times better than all the magicians and astrologers in this realm. Oh, we'll never lose by letting God be our guide, letting His Word be our guide, and seeking to go on in separation like Daniel did. We mentioned you as a separated man, and if there is that and purpose of heart and reading the word, God will give light for the pathway.
And so the second characteristic of Daniel, whom this chapter that we would say he was, he had light, he was enlightened man.
Now let us turn to the third, second chapter and we'll find.
We'll find another thing that characterized Daniel.
In this chapter, in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar had a dream.
And.
It and his spirit was troubled by it, and he called in as astrologers. Miss soothsayers.
And he asked them to interpret the dream for him, but they couldn't do it. They didn't even know what the dream was. King couldn't even remember the dream. But he told them that if they didn't tell him what the dream was in the interpretation of it, he told them that he was going to take their life. And.
Daniel heard about this.
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That the wise men were going to be slain. And Daniel says in verse 16 of the second chapter. Then Daniel went in and desired of the king that he would give him time. What did he want time for? He wanted time to pray.
You make it a point each day to have time. Time to pray.
He went into the King and desired he would give him time. All dear young friend, and all those of us who are older too, let us take time to pray.
He says time that he would show the king interpretation. Verse 17. Then Daniel went to his house, and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mitchell, and Azariah and his companions, verse 18, that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret, all they were going to get before God about it, and ask of him.
Mercies concerning this secret, that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men in Babylon.
Well, here's the third characteristic or quality of connection with Daniel.
A powerful man. A man of prayer. Oh, I exhort. I encourage you, dear young friend. May we all take more time for prayer. How important is reading the word and prayer in your life and mine? Well, he asked the king to give him time. Time to pray. Well, that's the third quality. A prayerful man.
And the 4th one, I think we might say is he was a man of praise because you know, if there's sufficient prayer in our lives, or there'll be many things to praise God for, because he's one who answers prayer for there's true dependence upon Himself. And now notice in the verses that follow, verse 20.
Daniel answered and said blessed be the God for end of verse 19 says then was the then was the secret revealed under Daniel the night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. Daniel Anson said blessed be the name of God forever and ever for wisdom and might are his. He changes times and seasons. He removeth kings and setteth up kings. He giveth wisdom unto the wise and now it's them that no understanding.
Reveal deep and secret things you know if what's in the darkness and the light dwells with him.
Oh, he learned he knew what a God he had. God may change times and seasons, and times and seasons have been changing in recent years.
It says he removeth kings and setteth up kings. The powers that be. We've seen changes, but God is behind the scenes moving all the things that He is behind. He knows the end from the beginning. Things may be getting darker around us, but God knows all that's ahead and before things.
The terrible state that we see approaching reaches its climax. We know that everyone that belongs to Christ is going to be called home to glory.
Everyone that is has that hope. We can rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Dear friend, do you have that hope? The Lord is coming soon. Is there a boy or girl here? A young man, a young woman that doesn't know Christ as their Savior yet? But won't you take him now? He may come at any moment. I am waiting for Him to call me home.
I would just be delighted if it happened before I leave this platform.
Well, where would you be? Would you be left sitting in your seat or words you open your heart to receive Christ as your Savior. Because if you were left behind, and he might come, while I might hear standing before this audience, he might come. If you're left behind, it would be to be cast into that place of honor, darkness where there's nothing but weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth for all eternity.
Well.
Daniel was a man of praise. In verse 23 he says, I thank thee and praise thee, thou God of my Father, who hath given me wisdom and might. And this made known unto me now what we desired of thee, for thou hast now made known unto us the King's matter. I like that little word we in there.
Daniel is the one that seemed to be the leader, the one that God used in a special way.
All but he had three companions here in this chapter. That little poem that we quoted said there to be Daniel dare to stand alone. He wasn't alone in these first two chapters, but we find him alone in the lions den in the 6th chapter. But he wasn't alone. God was with him.
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But here he had his companions, He says made known unto me now what we desired of thee. He wouldn't forget his companions who were associated with him in this separated place. Well.
We must go on the fourth thing, then that we 4th characteristic as he was a man of praise. Now if we turn to the.
End of that chapter we find something else in connection with Daniel.
We don't have the time to go into the.
Interpretation of the dream. There's a lot involved in it, but he did interpret the dream and in verse 48 it says.
Then the king made Daniel a great man and gave him many great gifts.
And made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon.
Then Daniel requested of the king, and he said Sadrak, Meshach and Abednego over the affairs of the province of Babylon, but that Daniel sat in the gate of the king.
Well, here we have what I might refer to as the 5th characteristic brought out there. Fifth thing brought out connection with Daniel. He prospered.
Now, God doesn't measure our prosperity today in the same way that it was measured when He had an earthly people. Daniel was part of God's earthly people, and he was given a place here.
Very high place made ruler over the whole province of Babylon.
He sat in the gate that would speak of being a judge, but today?
The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich not in this way, but God has his own way of bringing in blessing and prosperity for the one that trusts in him. The blessing of the Lord, it won't be measured in the same way of Daniels, but if we're faithful like Daniel was, the fair separation.
And dependence why God will prosper one in his own way. And so we find that this characteristic of Daniel. He prospered. Now turning on a little further to the to the fifth chapter.
Here we find quite a few years have gone by, and at the present time Belshazzar, a very important man, was king. We find in this 5th chapter how he took the vessels that had been taken from God's holy temple in Jerusalem. He brought them down to Babylon, and we find that he had a great feast with 1000 of his Lords.
The first verse tells us and.
And they dress says in verse, and they use these vessels from the temple for for for their feasting. It says in verse three that they brought the golden vessels that were taken out of the temple of the House of God, which was Jerusalem. And the king and his Princess wives, concubines drank in them. They drank wine and noticed what they praised the gods of gold and of silver, brass, of iron, of wood and stone.
Oh, you know, I enjoyed reading recently a little article that referred to Queen Victoria of England.
How she was used to the salvation of God. Used her as an instrument to bring the gospel to the grandson of one of her servants.
And from what we've read, we feel quite sure that she was a true Christian.
But all we find those in authority today, so many of them are turning their backs on God. I'm not Speaking of anyone person in authority now I'm Speaking of what generally is going on in this poor scene in which we're living more and more God is being left out here. We find they got to where they they praise the gods of gold and silver and brass verse 4 and that's the trend that we find about us today and by many.
Authority and in the place of of judges and so forth. God is being left out. But thank God Daniel was one that had courage to stand firm. I think we might say one thing that characterized him in in these two chapters, the 5th and the 6th, is that he was faithful.
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You have much thought out about Daniel in these chapters, but the fifth quality, or 6th rather, he was a faithful man.
Now in the 17th verse.
Well, before reading that I mentioned this, while he was having this impious feast, the king saw part of a handwriting on the wall and he couldn't interpret it. And his astrologers and soothsayers couldn't interpret it. And the queen told him about Daniel and said, well, he can interpret it. And Daniel was called in. And then verse 17 that says.
The king had told him in the 16th verse of what he'd given. If he made no interpretation. He told him to be quelled with Scarlett have a chain of gold about his neck.
Be made the third rule in the Kingdom. But Daniel said, verse 17, let thy gift be to thyself and give thy rewards to another. I think that would show us that he wanted to be independent of man. He was depending on God. Independent of man, but dependent on God.
And the Lord would encourage you and me to be independent of our of man, but our dependence to be on God Himself.
In the end of that chapter we find that he did make known what this handwriting on the wall was. Verse 26 says this is the interpretation of the thing. Many goddess numbered thy Kingdom and finished it. Kick a large weight in the balances, and found wanting perish. Thy Kingdom is divided and given to the Pers, Medes and Persians.
Oh, how sad. He had nothing but judgment to pronounce. That's what that handwriting was on the wall.
God was being mocked by that that feast, for his vessels from the temple were being used for their drinking of wine, and yet the gods of silver and gold were those that were praised. And now Daniel pronounces judgment. But the king, true to his word, closed Daniel with scarlet.
And it says at the end of the 29 first is made the third ruler of the Kingdom. And in that night was Belshazzar the king of Chaldean, slain.
Verse six we find another characteristic of Daniel, as I said in both the chapter 6 rabbits, both these chapters we find him faithful, but another quality, another aspect is brought out in the sixth chapter. It says in verse.
One is pleased to us to set over the Kingdom 120 Princess, which should be over the whole Kingdom, and over these 3 presidents, of whom Daniel was first, that the Princess might give account unto them.
And that the king should have no damage. Then this Daniel is preferred above the presidents and Princess because of an excellent an excellent spirit was found in him. The king sought to set him over the whole realm. Then the presidents and Princess sought to find occasion against Daniel concerning the Kingdom, but they could find none occasion.
Nor fall, for as much as he was faithful, neither was there any error, fault found in him.
Oh, it's lovely what we've read in those verses.
One thing that said in verse 3 is that an excellent spirit was found in him. An excellent spirit.
Oh, could that be said of you? An excellent spirit. It's something we should covet. What kind of a spirit would others say that you and I have?
Well, that's something we should see. An excellent spirit was found in him, and so the king fed him over the whole realm. Oh, but the next quality, the next thing that I would bring out in connection, Daniel comes out in the next verse because of this.
Yeah, he was hated, it says in verse 7. The presidents and the Princess sought to find occasion against Daniel concerning the Kingdom, but they could find none occasion for fault in him.
Well, they hated him. Their pride was hurt when Daniel was given this place, and so their hatred comes out. And the reason?
That they could, they themselves had to admit that they could find that occasion for fall, for as much as he was faithful. Can your companions of school say that about you? I can't find any occasion to fall. And your companions at work say that about you? About me? Isn't that a blessed, lovely testimony? He was a man of integrity.
It says neither was there any error or fault found in him.
His accounts were kept accurate. There was uprightness, there was integrity. He had what I believe answers to the in the in Ephesians 6, we have the armor of God and one of one part defensive part of the armor is the breastplate of righteousness. That was righteousness practically in his life.
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All let's be exercised that that might characterize you and me, whether in school or in business or in relations with our brethren, that there might be uprightness.
There was no error nor fault found in him. What a testimony, what a testimony. Well, you know they hated him for that. If we seek to walk in a way that's pleasing to the Lord, it might bring bring out the hatred of this of this world. I'm thinking now of of a verse, for example, in in Luke's gospel, it says blessed are ye when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate from you, you from their company and reproach you and cast out your.
Evil for the Son of man's sake. Rejoice in that day and leave for joy, For behold, your reward is great in heaven. Oh, that's the real accounting day. Rejoice and leave the joy, for your reward is great in heaven.
Yes, we don't need to be concerned when men reproach us or separate us from their company if we're faithful to the Lord or cast out our name. It says, rejoice in that day, and leap for joy. Behold, your reward is great in heaven. In the 5th of Acts we find that the apostles were beaten and told not to speak any more of these things concerning the Lord.
And it says that they rejoiced.
That they were found worthy to suffer for his namesake.
All they realized there was a blessing connected being identified with a rejected Christ. Yes, dear friends, Christ is a rejected Christ today, but take a stand for Him, you'll never regret it.
In fact, if you're if you suffer a little reproach, why just rejoice? Because great is your reward in heaven.
Well, the seventh thing then that we get in connection with Daniel, He was the man who was hated.
But as we said in this chapter, we find that he was a man of faith, and we find his faith was tested.
In the 10th verse, because they hated him, they had the king pass the decree that whoever, whoever made any petition during the next 30 days other than to the king, would be cast into the den of lions. Well, Doral signed the decree and it says Now when Daniel knew that their writing was signed, he went into his house.
And his windows being opened in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees.
Three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before.
His God, as he did a four time, he made it a practice of praying three times a day. If we were turned to the 55th Psalm, we would find reference to the psalmist Speaking of praying in the morning and and at noon time and in the afternoon, and he did it three times a day. That was his practice and in first Kings.
The 8th chapter we find that if God had said beforehand, used his prophet to tell him beforehand, when carried into captivity, that they were to pray toward Jerusalem, Daniel hadn't forgotten God's word in connection with that. And even though playing to anyone but the king was said, he'd be thrown into a lion's den, Daniel prayed anyway. He wasn't afraid of what men might do. His trust was in God.
Dear young friend, when you come to the test, don't worry about what man has said.
If you have instructions from God, stand firm.
The result of Daniel standing firm was he was cast into the lion's den, but God preserved him. The king didn't sleep that night, but Daniel had a better night. I doubt not than the king. He was in the lion's den, but I doubt not he had a better night than the king. The king was troubled when he saw what had happened as a result of this decree. There isn't time to go into the details, but the eighth quality connection with Daniel comes out. He was a man.
Preserved. God delivered him. And if you and I, if we trust in God, we can carry on His deliverance, His preserving care.
And so that would give us the eighth quality or characteristic.
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Of Daniel, I don't have time to go into detail as to the other two. The 9th one that I was going to mention was in a later chapter we find him interceding for the people of God.
And in human and joining in humiliation, encouraging prayer, acknowledging their failure.
And how they have sinned against God, and that which should cause God bringing them into captivity. And so there we find him. One who was identified with the people of God in their failure, and one who is truly an intercessor for God's people. And then later on in another chapter we find him spoken of.
Has spoken to his old man of God, greatly beloved. He had this morning that word beloved, brought before us. Well, we find twice in connection with Daniel spoken of as a man of God. Greatly beloved. The apostle Paul called Timothy a man of God. Are you seeking to walk in a way that one might properly refer to you as a man of God? As it were all. May the Lord encourage us to walk in that path of His.
Forth, may we seek to go on in separation from the things of this poor world, counting on God, trusting in him. Daniels trust was in God and he was never disappointed. And you'll never be disappointed if you let the Lord have sway in your life and mine.
Book of Remembrance
Address—A.C. Hayhoe
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Like you to turn with me, please, first of all tonight to the book of Malachi, the last book in the Old Testament.
Book of the Prophet Malachi.
The third chapter of Malachi.
And the 16th verse.
Then they that feared the Lord.
Spake often one to another.
And the Lord hearkened and heard it, and the Book of Remembrance was written before him.
For them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name, and they shall be mine, said the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewel, and I will spare them as a man spare his own son that serveth him, then shall he return and discern between.
The righteous and the wicked.
Between him that serveth God and him that serveth Him not. I'm sure the 16th verse is very, very well known to everyone here. We've often read it before and enjoyed it together, but I believe it becomes more and more significant and needful as the hour draws nearer and nearer, when you and I are going to hear the voice of our Lord Jesus Christ.
And be called home into his presence.
The little verse begins with the word then, then, and I believe that is very, very significant because it seems to suggest that there was an occasion which surrounded the attitude described in this verse. That makes it all the more important and all the more remarkable. I wonder if we could go back in our thoughts a little bit in order that we may picture.
Just exactly the condition that is described here and in which we find these few who were characterized by the fear of the Lord.
And who enjoyed the sweetness of his name and fellowship together in the bonds of that name? You remember that the children of Israel were carried away into captivity, and that magnificent temple which Solomon had built was utterly and totally destroyed.
And after 70 years of their captivity, a number of them were invited and privileged to return.
Through their own land in the days of Ezra and of Nehemiah, in order that the temple might be rebuilt, in order that Jerusalem might again be inhabited, well as the foundations of the House of the Lord were laid in the days of Ezra.
There were those who gathered around and observed the laying of this foundation, and their hearts were filled with joy. They had returned from the land of captivity and ******* and well might their hearts rejoice as they set foot again in their own land and as they looked at the laying of the foundation of the House of the Lord. Oh, what a privilege would now be theirs not only to stand in a place where the.
Set his name but to see the foundations of the Lord's house laid before their very eyes. But there were some who were present on that occasion, who, when they saw the foundation of that house, they began to weep, and they wept so vigorously that you could hardly tell who was weeping and who was rejoicing. The sound was heard far off, and if you listened carefully, you would hear something filled with joy, and you would hear some weeping with disappointment. Why?
Disappointed. Why did they weep so loudly? All because they were old, old men, and they could remember the magnificence and the glory and the magnitude of Solomon's wonderful temple. And as their minds went back to the days of Solomon's glorious temples, then they opened their eyes and they looked at the foundation of this House of the Lord. It was so small and insignificant, so lacking in glory.
Majesty as compared to Solomon's temple that they wept aloud with disappointment.
Does the Lord care of you? And I are disappointed?
You know, I feel the devil has two weapons that he uses very successfully. One is the weapon of pride and the other is the weapon of discouragement, and he doesn't care which one he uses. I believe one is just about as successful as the other.
When things are going well, dear Saints of God, do you and I not feel a danger?
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That the enemy brings forth that weapon of pride and begins to cause sorrow among the Lords people, even in a time when it seemed that all was going well. And then when things are very, very weak and the condition is very, very low, they can get their weapon of discouragement. And he tells us it's time to be cast down with despair, perhaps even to stay home from meeting. Because things are.
Small, and the attendance is so few. Oh, dear Saints of God, these are the weapons of the enemy. God looked down upon that company. He heard the noise of that weeping, and it touched his heart. He doesn't like to see disappointment, discouragement. Such things are certainly not from His hand. Oh, you say, but ought we not to feel these things?
Indeed we should. We were just reading today from Mark's gospel of how the Lord Jesus, that perfect servant, went forth in his Father's bidding and crossed the sea and presented himself to the people who were waiting there.
They saw him, they arrogantly asked of him a sign from heaven. What did he do? He sighed deeply in his spirit and said there shall no sign be given unto this generation. And he got on the ship again to the other side. It wasn't a matter of indifference to him. He cared. Beloved Saints of God, he.
Sighed deeply in his spirit. But I ask you, was he discouraged? Was he disappointed? Immediately you shrink from the use of such words.
In the life of the Lord Jesus, Oh dear Saints of God, as we look one another in the face this evening.
Is it not true with everyone of us that the enemy has been pretty successful with us in using these two weapons? My dear father used to say quite often. You know, son, the most dangerous time in the experience of any assembly is when things are going well. I'd rather a shocking statement to make it if not when things are going well, when all seems so smooth and everyone seems to be getting along so happily together.
And perhaps numbers are increasing. Why the danger? You know why.
Because although we hate to admit it, we begin to pat ourselves on the back a little bit and think that we're a pretty fine company. Others may have their troubles, others may have their disagreements, but not here. We get along so well. That's where the danger lies. Dear Saints of God, when there's trouble, you know as well as I do that we're on our faces before the Lord, crying to the Lord in our great need, that He may come in and grant restoring mercy.
Oh, why do we not do this also in times when things are going well?
Well, as I say, in the days of Ezra, there was this mingled weeping and rejoicing, and God sent a very special messenger with a very special message to that people. If you just turn back to Haggai, just two books back, Malachi, then Zechariah, then Haggai going in reverse, two books back in the Old Testament, chapter 2.
And verse 3.
Now this is the message that the Lord gave through his servant Haggai to these very people who were weeping as they saw the foundation of the House of the Lord laid before their eyes. Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory, and how do you see it now?
Is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?
Yet now be strong, O the rubble, saith the Lord, And be strong, O Joshua son of Desk the high Priest, and be strong, all ye people of the land, said the Lord. And work, for I am with you, said the Lord of hosts.
According to the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you.
Hear ye not, Oh dear Saints of God, I think we need this word of encouragement.
It is a day of small things.
And in that day of small things, the servant of the Lord was sent to encourage his weeping people. With this testimony. I am with you, saith the Lord, according to the word that I spake unto you when you came out of the land of Egypt. So my spirit remaineth among you. Fear ye not. I believe there are three resources here which were to the encouragement of God's weeping people.
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And those three resources are the presence of the Lord and of His Word.
And of his Spirit. And I believe you and I, by the wonderful grace of God, are privileged to rest in and to rejoice in the wonder of these same three resources this very evening. The Lord Jesus Christ himself in the midst of his gathered people, His precious words filled by God's matchless grace available to us. And I trust we can say.
Our guide and our delight, and the Spirit of God to open its pages and its message.
Through our hearts. And so he says, be strong. Not only be strong, but be strong and work. Oh dear fellow believer in the Lord Jesus, We are very, very near the end of the journey. We are just about at the threshold of that glorious moment when we're going to hear the voice of the Lord Jesus. And you know as well as I do that the enemy realizes the nearness of that glorious moment and is redoubling his efforts.
To bring in among the dear Saints of God that which would soon scatter us, whether the weapon be pride, whether it be discouragement. He is busy. And yet you and I can by the grace of God, rejoice in this wondrous provision that is ours. Now I would like you to turn over again to the prophet Malachi, and we will begin at verse one of chapter one.
Because I would just like to build up to the meaning of that little word. Then in the beginning of the 16th verse.
I would like you to see the picture that makes that verse so specially beautiful. You have seen a few of the children of Israel gathered back into their land. You have seen the House of the Lord rebuilt. You have seen an element of discouragement, and the Lord sending His servant to tell him not to be discouraged, but to be strong, and to work where He presents to them those resources.
But beloved paints of God, not many days and years roll by.
Before we see in the book of Malachi that which is so sad to read about.
And I stand here this night and say, by the grace of God, and with all certainty in my soul, that I am gathered to the precious name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I have no shadow of doubt about this in my soul.
A good many years ago, by His matchless grace, He not only opened my eyes to see my lost and guilty conditions and to receive the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior, but to see also the wondrous and happy privilege presented here in His precious Word.
Together with his own invitation that I draw near and share in that privilege.
And I want to stand here tonight and say but a matchless grace of God and with a thankful heart that I am gathered together with my beloved brethren in the precious name of the Lord Jesus on the ground that is marked out in His precious word. And I thank Him for it with all my heart. You know, I just mentioned this because I know that there are those who look around and Christendom.
And they see such very, very fine Christian people. They see such open doors for Christian fellowship here and there. And I have seen them too. And I have met dear and devoted believers in the Lord Jesus, whose affection and devotedness have humbled me greatly.
But I still thank God for the glorious privilege that is mine.
Of being gathered to his precious name.
I would just like to mention one such instance that humbled me very, very much on our way out from visiting in El Cacao in Oaxaca a year ago.
We came a long, long way on foot.
Until at nightfall we were found in one of the villages where there was very, very evident danger. Brother Doug Buchanan and I laid down to sleep, and as usual a company of about 15 Indians slept all around us for our protection.
Early the next morning, long before Daybreak, we started out and we were able to get a truck to take us part of the rest of the way. And this truck came into a village called Chaucer way back, still in the jungle area and still long before sunrise. And I heard someone stop the truck driver and ask permission to put.
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Four or five sick people on board this truck in order that they might be taken to a hospital.
The truck driver said no I'm sorry, I have been chartered for this trip and I can't take any more passengers. Well I leaned over the side of the truck and told him by all means I would like him to take these sick folk and whoever was responsible for them.
So the sick folk were put on board, and a young lady, a young American girl from Pennsylvania.
Got on board along with them.
She had been speaking in Spanish to the driver, and then she turned and began to speak in Miss Tack to some of the Indians who were on board.
Douglas and I just chatted one with the other and presently she said, excuse me Sir, but what church do you belong to?
And I said, well, if you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, you and I belong to the same church, for I know the Lord Jesus, and I'm gathered to his precious name.
Oh, praise the Lord, she said. I was afraid perhaps you were one of these terrible cults that are beginning to infiltrate into such areas as these. And we began to talk together, and I found a very dear child of God waiting for the coming of the Lord Jesus. And I said, may I ask, what are you doing in this remote village of Chaucer? She said, well, I'm trying to translate the word of God into the native dialect of these Indians. They don't have the Scripture.
Own tongue and I said, how long have you been here? 2 1/2 years.
I said about how long do you think it will take you to complete your task? He said. I think I can finish it in 15 years.
Now I left that place feeling exceedingly humbled and exceedingly small, and I think I had every reason to feel that way. Here was a very charming young lady in her 20s from Pennsylvania, isolated away back there in that village, trying to turn God's precious word into the native language of those dear Indians. And here I was on my way back home to my wife and loved one.
I say this, dear Saints of God, because I don't want you to think for one moment.
That because I exalt and value, by the grace of God, the wondrous privilege of being gathered to the precious name of the Lord Jesus.
That I looked with scorn upon those who know not this privilege. I rejoice in it, and I thank God for it with all my heart. But I look around and I see those who whose devotedness humbles me deeply. And I think of that as I read that which I'm about to read. Here is a company of people that is in the very place of the Lord's appointment. Here is the very company of people that return from the captivity.
They're gathered back in the land, they have rebuilt the House of the Lord, and they're exactly where the Lord told them to be. But what is their state of soul?
Let us read just a few verses here and there through the book of Malachi, The Burden of the Word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi.
I have loved you, saith the Lord.
Oh, I just have to stop here to tell you a little secret.
Some time ago I was searching this precious word love through the pages of this glorious book, and I noticed, as I know most of you have also noticed, that the first mention of love in all the Bible is the love of dear old Abraham toward his only son, Isaac. Take now thy son, thine only son.
Whom thou loveth. The preeminence of love in all the Bible is the love of that Father toward His only Son, whom he is about to lay upon the altar of sacrifice. Oh, don't tell me this book is not inspired. The Spirit of God reserved the use of that precious Word to be found on its first occasion in connection with the Father's love toward His Son, and then the next mention of love, as you know.
Is the mention of that same son.
Having been received back again in Figure from the Dead, he takes to himself a bride and the scripture says and he became his wife and he loved her. And I just couldn't wait. I said. I wonder when the last mention of love is going to be found in this history.
And I thought, it's going to take a lot of reading to find the answer to that one. I know it won't be found in Malachi, but I'm going to start at Malachi and read backward and see when I come to the mention of the word love. But I know it won't be in any of the last few books because Israel by that time has been so wayward and so disobedient that I just know I won't find it there. So I turned to the book of Malachi.
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The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. I have loved you, says the Lord. Isn't that beautiful, dear Saints of God?
There is a very disobedient and wayward servant standing up here tonight. That the Lord loves me still.
And he loves you, He loves all his people. And here in the days of their disobedience and their waywardness, he sent the very last of his prophets to them, and said, Tell them that I love them so. What did they do where their hearts melted with the news? Notice yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us? Brethren, isn't this sad? Wherein hast thou loved us? What a response, what indifference.
Look now at the sixth verse. His son honor of his father, and a servant his master. If then I be a father, where is mine honor? And if I be a master, where is my fears? Said a Lord of hosts unto you, O priests that despise my name, Angie, say, wherein have we despised thy name?
He offered polluted bread upon mine altar, and ye say, wherein have we polluted thee? Would you turn now, please to the second chapter?
And the 17th verse.
Ye have wearied the Lord with your word, yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied thee?
The third chapter and the seventh verse. The middle of the verse, return unto me.
And I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. But she said Wherein?
Shall we return? Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me.
But he say, Wherein have we robbed thee? The 13th verse.
Your words have been stout against me, says the Lord. Yet he says, What have we spoken so much against thee?
I think you realize why I'm reading these verses.
Beloved Saints of God, can it be that this is the company of God's people in the place of His appointment? Sad to say, it is. This is the company that returned from the captivity, the company that rebuilt the House of the Lord. The years have rolled by and here they stand in a place of God's appointment, and their hearts have become so indifferent and so cold and so forgetful. And the Lord knows all about it.
So he sent his servant Malachi, Tell them, I love them. And their answer is swearing. Hast thou loved us? And beloved, we see throughout this book that every pleading of His love, every word of faithful reminder that He has seen that which is the true condition of their heart, meets with the same callous and indifferent and cold response. Wherein have we despised Thy name? Wherein have we polluted thine altars?
Wherein have we spoken so much against thee? Wherein have we wearied thee? Wherein have we robbed thee? Wherein shall we return?
Every pleading of his outstretched hand of faithful love is met with the same arrogant response.
Then they that feared the Lord, Oh, does that not put an emphasis on that word. Then there were those who lived surrounded by that very attitude of carelessness, who were characterized by that which is a was a delight to the heart of the Lord.
And as we read this verse once again together, beloved Saints of God, let it search my heart. Let it search your heart.
God is looking not at the place you occupy, but at the condition of your heart. Now you know when I say that, that I don't belittle the place of His appointment. God granted, it may be very real and very precious to every one of us, but it's quite possible to be in the place of His appointment and be very indifferent in heart toward the claims of His love.
Then.
Surrounded by an attitude like that.
Then they that feared the Lord.
They that feared the Lord, What does that mean?
Fear of the Lord. You've often heard about that, and you've read the term in scripture a good many times.
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What does the fear of the Lord mean?
With apologies to a sister whose presence tonight, I'm going to use an illustration.
I was driving along the streets of Washington, DC, 1 day with our dear brother Frank Jackson, and he and I were talking together about our school days and about his father and my father. And I could see that he loved his dad very much, even as I loved mine. And we were becoming pretty frank with one another in our conversation. And he said, you know, Albert, when I was in high school.
There were quite a few things that were quite attractive and interesting to me, but I never did get involved in them. And do you know why? Because I love my dear dad so much and I knew how my dad would feel if I got involved in this or that. So rather than grieve my dad.
I stayed away from those things that I knew would displease him. I said, Frank, there's a perfect example of the fear of the Lord, and I believe it is. I believe perhaps there's many a young person here that can say somewhat the same thing. There was a man who loved his father and whose father loved him with a very real affection. And that young man in the days of his school experience, surrounded by those things that were quite attractive.
Thought from time to time, would this bring sorrow to my father?
Who loves me so much then I will not do it. I will not get involved in it. Oh dear fellow believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. Then they that feared the Lord. What a wholesome thing this is. You and I are living in a world whose moral standards are going downhill so rapidly that I think all of us are shocked and astonished. Perhaps we can say frightened.
What will preserve us? What will keep us, beloved Saints of God, dear young people.
The fear of the Lord. Not a certain code of conduct that your parents or your brethren might draw up for your behavior.
The fear of the Lord. You know if you came to our home, you would not find 10 commandments written on one wall by me.
In order to govern my wife's conduct and 10 commandments over here which he wrote to direct my conduct.
There are no such commandments or restrictions posted anywhere in our home. We've lived together for 27 years. And I'll tell you a secret. I know what pleases my dear wife and I know what grieves her. And do you know why I want to please her and avoid that which grieves her?
Because I love her very much, and I know that she loves me. And my dearly beloved brother and sister in Christ, there is looking down at you this very moment, and there is looking down at me, One who loved us with a love that was stronger than death. He loved you enough to take your place and die upon the cross of Calvary, to redeem you, to claim you as his own, that he might have the joy right now.
Of looking down at you, and calling you one of his own. And you know a sense of this enjoyed in the soul will produce that good and wholesome fear of the Lord. That everything that is presented to us will be looked at in view of the fact that the eye of the Lord is looking down upon us. And he longs to have us blessed and happy, but He cannot bless us if we walk in paths of disobedience.
Then they did feared the Lord spake often one to another. Oh, I like this also.
It's a precious and a happy thing when the people of the Lord meet together and speak together of the things of the Lord.
There was a dear old brother in the Ottawa Assembly who was as Irish as could be. His name was Brother Watson.
And now this story is no credit at all to myself. I should make that part quite plain. But I was walking on Bank Street in Ottawa one day and I happened to pass by a church bulletin board on which there was a text of the Word of God. And I glanced at it and rather enjoyed it as I saw it. And a couple of blocks later, whom should I encounter but Brother Watson, he said. Good morning, Albert, what's the good word this morning?
Well, you know the rest of the story. I quoted the verse that I had just read as I had passed by the church.
And you know, his face lighted up with joy and he gave me credit for something that I wasn't entitled to, he said.
Albert, When I was a boy in Ireland, my mother used to line us up every so often, make us all stick our tongue out as far as we could, and he could tell by the condition of our tongue if there was anything wrong with our health. I don't know what a physician would think of that procedure, but this is what brother Watson told me anyway. And he said, Albert, I can tell by a brother's tongue.
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The condition of his spiritual health, you know, I think there's something to that.
As I meet my brethren and as I meet my sisters, I just know when I meet certain ones among them, I know what they're going to talk about. They're going to talk about the Lord.
You know I shouldn't have done this but one day when my father was coming to our home in his later years to visit us.
I said to my wife, I'm going to see how long I can keep him away.
From the things of the Lord in conversation, it wasn't very kind to me, was it? Well. He pulled up outside the door with the old Plymouth car they used to drive.
And he walked in and I knew if I didn't start the conversation how it would start off. So I said, Father, your car is getting pretty well worn out isn't it? Well yes son, it is. But you know. And I knew what would come next so I had to quickly say something else. But after about 3 sentences I gave up because I just knew that there was one thing that he would enjoy and that was the precious savior that had loved him and died for him and cared for him and to whose presence he was soon going.
Now dear Saints of God, I just want to pass this on to you, for I lack in it so very very much.
They that feared the Lord spake often one to another, and the Lord hearkened and heard it. Isn't that lovely? He hears your conversation. He heard every word of it today. What does that word hearkened mean?
What difference would it make if this scripture had just said the Lord heard it and a book of remembrance was written?
That would be true. Why then does it say the Lord hearkened and heard it?
You know, it seems to me to suggest that He was listening for it. If there were a loud noise outside right now, I would hear it, but I couldn't truly say that I was listening for it. But do you know, dear fellow believer, the Lord is listening for something. He's listening for that in your conversation or mine, which He can have the joy of recording as that which will bring His own approval in that day. Yes, even your conversation.
They speak often one to another, and the Lord hearkened and heard it, and a book of Remembrance was written before him. Oh, how important every word is. In the glorious days of Solomon's temple, when all was in order, there was no mention of this book of Remembrance. But now, when things are weak.
When the attitude around is so careless, God values so highly that thought upon himself, that conversation concerning himself, that fear of the Lord, that he can seek in the light that he Harkins, he hears, and he writes it down in a book of remembrance before him, the book of remembrance before him.
You know, there are names that are so greatly honored in this world today.
And their names are on every lip men that have made great contributions to world affairs or science or adventure in one way or another. Everybody knows their name. But if you know that there was a book written up there in the glory in which the names are written down of those who walk in the fear of the Lord, who speak one to another of these precious things. And then it goes on to say.
For them that feared the Lord. Second mention of it in the same verse, I believe, showing a very vital importance of this in a day of very great weakness and that thoughts upon his name. Or how can we pass this by that thought upon his name. Is that not precious? Perhaps there's no one around to whom you can speak, but you can think about His name. I tell you, it would make me pretty happy right now if I could just look at.
Right now and say write this very minute, my wife is thinking about me way over in New Brunswick. I don't expect she is because it's four hours later than this over there. However, I just know how much it would mean to me if I just could communicate and know that she is thinking about me in love. Dear Saints of God, I say once again, the words of your lips and the thoughts of your heart were observed by Him all day this day.
With the joy of being able to write down all that which was for His glory. Now I'd like to slip down to the 18th verse. Then shall he return and discern between the righteous and the wicked? That's rather an astonishing statement, isn't it? Discern between the righteous and the wicked? Can anyone make that kind of observation?
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Surely, surely anybody can tell the righteous from the wicked. There are two extremes. You know wickedness when you see it and hear it. You know that which is righteous when you see it and hear it. Or do you? You know, the Word of God warns us that the day described here is so callous and so indifferent that only the man who walks in the fear of the Lord can discern between those two extremes, the righteous and the.
Kids and I feel the need of this solemn warning to my own soul. And beloved Saints of God, we all needed. We are living in a day when that which was wicked a generation ago is considered normal and accepted topics of conversation today. Can you discern between the righteous and the wicked? Not unless you walk in the fear of the Lord. Not unless I walk in the fear of the Lord.
Oh dear Saints of God, this is a day when we need these warnings from God's precious word.
He has given us every resource that we need. He has put within your heart by matchless grace, that love for himself, that value toward His precious name. But perhaps these things have become dim. Perhaps you have noticed. Perhaps you have.
At that which troubles your conscience a few years ago doesn't seem nearly so bad now. Am I alone in making this observation? I don't think so. Why has this happened? Because, brethren, we have been influenced by public opinion. We have forgotten what the fear of the Lord means, and we are going to lose our discernment.
Either personally or on behalf of our children, or even in our assemblies, we're going to lose discernment between that which is righteous and that which is wicked unless we walk.
In the fear of the Lord is that a long face, narrow and difficult path? I can tell you this, beloved Saints of God, and I dare not say it stole from public opinion, from personal experience, but I say it from the observation of those whom I believe walked in the fear of the Lord till the end of their days, that it is a.
Halfway filled with the richest blessings of the Lord and the joy of the Lord. Oh, May God grant that our lives and our homes and our assemblies may be characterized by the fear of the Lord. Now I'd like to turn over, please, to the epistle of Jude.
For I feel that the last words of counsel and warning, both in the Old and in the New Testament.
Are very, very appropriate for us today. The epistle of Jude.
And the 20th verse.
But ye beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. I'm going to slip over to the 24th verse.
Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling.
And to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy.
That the only wise God, our Savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.
You know, in the days of the Apostle Paul, when he was sailing in the midst of that terrible storm, there came a time when it seemed evident that there was going to be shipwreck. The storm had continued on unabated for a long time. And at last, when they realized at the end of the journey was very, very near and the danger seemed so imminent, the Scripture says they cast.
4 anchors out of the stern and wished for the day.
I think there's something nice about that. They cast 4 anchors out of the stern and wished for the day. Well, as others have remarked, here are 4 anchors just at the very, very end of our journey. And as we read these four anchors of God's own providing, I trust we may see to it that we make application of them in our own lives and that we wish for the day.
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Let's go over them again, verse 20. But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your holy face. Did I read that correctly?
I made a mistake there. Building up yourselves on your most holy faith. Why is that emphasized? Well, if we were to take time to read the rest of the epistle, I think you'd soon see why when you read that awful description, God own description of a heart and conduct of man in these last days.
You see, beloved Saints of God, why you and I are exhorted to build ourselves up not only on our faith or on our holy faith.
But on our most holy faith, is it not necessary that this viewpoint be emphasized strongly in view of the ungodliness and the unholiness that is all around us? That which is ours by matchless grace, dear Saints, as God is indeed a most holy faith, we're told in the beginning of this epistle.
Earnestly contend for the faith.
Once delivered to the Saints and the Epistle ends building up yourselves on your most.
Holy faith, may I just ask this searching remark? Do you, dearly beloved young brothers and sisters, do you read this precious book and meditate upon it and the sound ministry to that God in wondrous grace has put at our disposal? Are you building yourself up on your most holy faith? Are you able, as this book would exhort us earnestly, to contend for the faith?
Delivered to the same Oh, you say? I don't think that's necessary. There are plenty of well instructed brethren around who can do this on our behalf.
This is for everyone of us, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, and I would urge you and encourage you, dear young brothers and dear young sisters alike, to read this precious word of God.
Read it as a bulwark to your soul. Read it as light and wisdom for your daily pathway and as food for your soul.
Read it, beloved, so that your soul and mind may be built up on our most holy faith, for I believe in days like this there is nothing more needful than that our very heart and soul should be saturated with the precious living Word of God. I hope you will forgive these references to home, but I know that from time to time, as we would bring our questions and our problems and our.
For a little more liberty to our Father at home, he would answer us by the language of God's Word.
If he had answered us according to the wisdom of the Father, whom we considered a bit strict and old fashioned.
It would have been a little hard to bow to, although I have a feeling we would have bowed to it anyway.
But we felt that we were bowing to the Word of God, and that which was presented to us in the fear of the Lord.
For instance, I well remember asking his permission to go to a certain occasion at school in which part of the evening was spent in that which was worthwhile, and then the latter part of the evening was to be spent in that which was not at all becoming to a child of God. And I said, Father, is it all right if I go? And when it comes time for them to start these other affairs, I'll come right home, Dad, I really will.
Son, the word of God says he that trusted his own heart is a fool.
That was a good answer. I was trusting my own heart to expose myself.
To that which I knew would be a very real temptation to me. I was trusting that I would have the courage at a certain point to turn around and walk out. The Lord knows whether I would have walked out or not. But my father said he that trusted his own heart is a fool. Oh dear Saints of God, building ourselves up on our most holy faith, I believe, would indicate that in these last days surrounded by indifference and darkness of evil.
This precious book, the Holy faith.
And trusted to God's beloved people. And oh, what a holy faith it is, lifting us completely out of this world, and imparting to us that which is heavenly in its origin and heavenly in its destiny. Most holy faith. You know, I was much impressed recently in reading of Peter on the housetop when he was hesitant to remember to go down and be of help to these Gentiles. Unclean they were.
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And what did he see? You remember it well, a certain sheet knit at the four corners. And where did it come from?
It came down out of heaven, and he looked in, and he saw all manner of four footed beasts, and wild beasts, and fowls of the air, and creeping things on. A very pretty picture was it? And that sheet was taken up again into heaven three times, and you and I know what that picture represented.
I believe that picture represented you and I, poor unworthy creatures of the Gentiles.
From the four corners of the earth. Where did that sheet come from? It came from heaven, and it went back to heaven.
Thy stand here possessed of a citizenship and of alike that is heavenly in its origin and heavenly in its destiny. The faith that is mine, beloved strength of God, by the grace of God, is a most holy faith, and I needn't think that I can simply sit in meeting and hear it handed to me by someone else.
And trust to my memory to uphold this most holy faith. You and I are going to be tested as to it in the exhortation here is that we might be built up in this most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost.
Oh, do we not lack in this praying in the Holy Ghost?
How busy the enemy is to rob everyone of us of the time that ought to be spent in prayer. It's not wasted time, dear Saints of God. You can find and I can find time at least three times a day to sit down to the meal table and our bodies might be sustained. And yet, you know and I confess, how sadly most of us lack in that which is now before us.
Praying in the Holy Ghost.
Ever pray for the state of the assembly where you come from? I visited one assembly.
Quite unexpectedly, nobody knew I was coming and I turned up to the Bible reading and there were sixteen of us present at the Bible reading that evening and there are well over 100 breaking bread in that assembly and there were 16 including my wife and myself at the Bible reading.
You know, when that meeting was over, a brother came up to me and he said, brother, you caught us unawares tonight. And then he hung his head and he said, what shall we do? He said the ministry at the Bible readings is not such as seems to be helpful and encouraging to the young people and there are just so few that attend. He said, what can we do now? This brother had not opened his mouth during the course of the Bible reading at all.
And I said, brother, may I ask you a question? Did you get down on your knees before you came tonight?
And ask the Lord that there might be helpful, profitable, encouraging ministry from His Word.
No brother, I didn't. I said, have you ever done that in your life? He said, no brother, I never have. And there was another one standing right beside him and I said, Brother, have you ever done that? Have you ever gotten down on your knees before you came to the Bible reading and asked the Lord that there might be profitable and helpful ministry of His word? No brother, he said, I never have in my life. Well, I said, this just might be a good beginning if you two brothers and your wives would kneel down together before you come to the assembly.
That there might be that ministry which would be helpful and encouraging and food for the soul. They hung her head. While I'm very, very, very thankful to say that the picture now by the grace of God is quite different in that assembly. But I also want to add this as a word of caution, dear fellow believer, that it's no excuse for me to stay home.
Because I feel that the ministry is not that which I might like it to be.
Why do I go to meetings? Why? Because the Lord Jesus is there. Because the Lord Jesus is there. There was a dear brother at the Wheaton Conference whom I know very well and have known for a good many years, and I know that in the days of his youth, every Lord's Day, he walked 50 miles to be at the remembrance of the Lord.
He walked 25 miles to get there.
And 25 miles to get home and never miss the Lords day. Why do you think he went there? Because there were some wonderfully gifted brethren that he wanted to hear? No, but because the Lord was there. 50 miles. Every Lord there had a lot of coaxing to do to get it out of him. But I knew where he lived.
And I knew where the nearest meeting was. When I asked him where he attended, they told me and I looked him straight in the eyes. I said, brother, how did you get there?
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Well, I walked, he said. And I said, what time did you have to start in the morning? Well, he said, I usually start at about 3:00 and he stayed for Sunday school and he stayed for the gospel and went to bed and got up again at 3:00 Monday morning to walk 25 miles home. Again. I say this lest anyone think you have a right to stay home because you think the ministry is not quite as.
As attractive as you might wish it to be, our time has slipped by.
But we've got two anchors, and we have two more. Keep yourselves in the love of God. Is this not a needful expression? Dear Saints of God, that love of God shines down with a never changing fervor. But there is an enemy that knows what it means to your soul to be robbed of the enjoyment of His love. And He would busy you with this and that, so that you might fail to enjoy and to be kept in.
Sunshine of that love. You know, when Smith Falls where I live in the winter time, I used to walk to work there. The sun would be shining, of course, from the east, and the Main Street of that town ran straight North and South. And I always walked to work on the West side of the street, going to work in order that I might get the benefit of that early morning sun, particularly if it was 20 or 30 below 0. And coming home after a day of work, I would walk down the east side of the street in order that.
Western sun might warm me just a little bit. I kept myself in that sunshine as much as ever I could in those wintry days. And dear Saints of God, there's a shady side and a sunny side to the pathway to the glory. And in order to enjoy the warmth of that sun, you have to enjoy the light of it as well.
Does this not betray to us perhaps the reason why some of the Saints of God enjoy the warmth of that love more than others? Is there anyone here who would like to say the Lord loves that brother more than He loves me?
You know very well it's not true. You know he loves you just as much as he loves anyone else. But would it not be right to say that Brother seems to enjoy the Lorde love more than I do? And you and I know that we have seen this so often, and we ask ourselves, why is it so? Why is it so? Oh, I believe that brother has, by the grace of God, kept out of those shadows which would hinder him from the enjoyment of that love.
Now the one thing more is looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. What do we have to look forward to? Your Saints of God?
Oh, what a glorious prospect. May we be characterized as those who are not only waiting. This refers, I have no doubt, to his coming to take us away. And it's spoken of as a mercy. And indeed, there are many right now who think of that coming as a mercy. I have been in many homes recently where fathers and mothers are looking at their dear children, and they're seeing the calendar approach the time when their children are going to go back to school.
Or off the college and they are just crying to the Lord Jesus at a mercy.
That He might soon come and take us out of this corrupt and defiled world. Oh dear Saints of God, the circumstances in which you and I are found are pleasant indeed compared to those right now who are behind prison bars and suffering much for the name of the Lord Jesus.
And to them the prospect of the coming of the Lord is indeed a great mercy. And we visit with those who are in pain and suffering and weakness on a sick bed.
And we find them eagerly Speaking of the near return of the Lord Jesus, and we go into a home where all is comfort and pleasant.
What do we find? By the grace of God, I believe I can say I am finding from time to time, and I'm glad to see it and glad to hear it. A cry going up from many a heart, Even so calm. Lord Jesus, first of all, the desire of the heart is to be with Him, to see Him, to enjoy His love without hindrance. And then the very circumstances through which we passed.
Are making us more and more realize what a mercy it would be.
Jesus were to come and take us from this world from which the fear of the Lord is rapidly fading away. So, dear brethren, as we look at the last words of warning and comfort in the Old Testament, as we look at the last words of warning and appeal and comfort in the New Testament, may it just search our hearts and encourage our hearts to for I don't want anyone to leave this meeting room all distressed with the.
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And the indifference that's all around us, you and I have one to whom we can turn that will fill our hearts with joy.
You and I have a resource that can give us all the strength that we need to go on in the fear of the Lord, and you and I have a prospect before us that can send us out the door of this meeting room, rejoicing every one of us. May it be true then, with us that these four anchors may be the real experience of our heart, of our home, and of the assembly tool in which the Lord has placed us. And may there be granted to us by His wondrous grace that.
For the day that characterized those who cast out those four anchors.