Chicago Conference: 2022
Table of Contents
2 Corinthians 4:1-5
Reading
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Perhaps I could mention a few thoughts.
That I had concerning this chapter, and then others will of course be able to expand on them, but.
In the first Epistle to the Corinthians, we know that there were a good many problems in the Corinthian assembly that Paul had to address.
And he goes through them one by one, correcting their wrong thoughts and most of all their wrong attitude.
But then.
At the end of the epistle he uses one more error, the denial of the resurrection, to bring out, I believe, what was really on his heart, and that is the precious results of the work of Christ and the resurrection of Christ.
And he does not merely establish the absolute necessity of.
Christ's resurrection and our resurrection.
But He takes us right on to the eternal state and to all the full results of the work of Christ.
But if I could put it this way and this is the way it comes through to me.
It's wonderful to see all that and to see a glimpse into coming glory. And you get that in the previous chapter to this one, Chapter 3.
Where the last verse reads verse 18 of chapter 3.
And I'm going to leave out the words as in a glass. They're not there in a better translation.
But we all with open or unveiled face.
Beholding the glory of the Lord.
Are changed into the same image from glory to glory.
Even is by the Lord the Spirit.
But it seems that in Second Corinthians.
After we have been taken right up into all of the wonderful results of God's purposes.
We come down to earth, if I could say it this way again with a thump.
Realizing that all the problems and difficulties of life are still here.
And I don't like to talk about myself, but I can remember some time ago after I had had a meeting.
A sister from an assembly from that assembly came up and she said to me, Bill, thank you for being real, she said. You didn't gloss over the problems of life with a lot of high sounding platitudes that didn't give us any help.
Well, I was thankful for that remark, because sometimes a little feedback is good, and if it's negative, sometimes that's good too. But the point is, Paul doesn't gloss over the problems of life in Second Corinthians.
He's real about them.
But he brings all the power of a risen Christ in glory.
And all that he is and all his glory to bear on the problems and difficulties of life down here.
And I've really enjoyed that, especially in the last 2 1/2 years when we've had COVID on top of us.
More recently, disruptions in the world from other causes the war in the Ukraine and economic difficulties, supply chain problems and many other things. And people are now even wondering where it's going to end. Is Russia going to lob a few small nuclear weapons into the Ukraine to turn the tide of the war? Where are things going?
I believe this chapter would give us real encouragement and real help, and not only in major problems in the world, but in things that be set us as individuals and families and perhaps local assemblies too.
I find it helpful to see and go back to Chapter 3.
The Apostle Paul is contrasting.
The Old Administration or Old Covenant?
In verse seven of chapter 3, it says it's the ministration of death.
Verse nine, it says it's the administration of condemnation.
And it was glorious in the measure that when Moses went up the second time into the mount.
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While he came down and his face was shining because he had seen something of the glory of God.
But the ministration that we have now in this present time is called in verse.
Eight Chapter 3. The Administration of the Spirit and at the end of verse 9.
Administration of righteousness. And that's a ministry that exceeds in glory. So this is where the Apostle Paul starts in verse one of chapter 4. Seeing we have this ministry as we have received mercy, we faint not.
And so it helps to get that focus.
Oh, brethren, we have no idea of the glory.
That we're going to step into at any moment.
I just marvel, I I sometimes think rather than when we step across into the presence of the Lord, we're going to look back and we say.
Why was I so occupied with those toys down there?
Why wasn't I more enraptured with this? This is what we were called to.
First, Peter chapter 5 says we are called to eternal glory.
Is there something else that compares with that down here to take our attention? So it's a real challenge, isn't it? As we take up these things in verse two, it speaks of some pretty negative things, but over evidence, remember what we've been called to.
We get the word faint twice in this chapter, once in the first verse.
And once in the 16th verse.
And I am no Greek scholar. Anyone can look this up, but the word has the sense of losing heart.
Becoming discouraged, deciding that the pathway is too rough.
And it is easy to get that way.
We have been used to things being pretty, pretty nice for us here in North America ever since the Second World War. There has been an unprecedented error of peace.
Prosperity and relatively good times. Oh yes, there have been the odd ups and downs, but in the main.
Things have been pretty good.
But God is starting to allow the whole world to feel the effect of His hand on it.
And then to sometimes even in the Christian pathway there are things that can be sent us and as you say, Brother Bob, if we get our eyes on those things and get taken up with them.
It is easy to faint, isn't it? Easy to think of giving up? It's it's it's not worth it.
But all directs our eyes to the glory, as you say, that is ours. And I love the way you put that that what a difference it makes.
One moment we can be dealing with everything that concerns life down here and one moment later.
We could be in the presence of the Lord and.
See that glory, you know, even fuller way than we see it now by faith.
We have this morning's address.
Repeated in this chapter.
Really a lot of left Bruce comment on it, but just to make the comment, this chapter begins with the gospel.
In the context of our present circumstances, but nonetheless, if our gospel behead the majority of the chapters, the practical effect of having to live in the Kingdom of God in its present state.
And the end of the chapter we have some of the eternal purposes and councils of God.
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Not all of them, but we have some of what's ahead of us when more of it's fulfilled to us. And so I make that suggestion as we go through the chapter that we can see another.
Expression of the same.
Line of thought and help that was given to us this morning.
And all that Bruce elaborate if he chooses.
I don't know about the elaboration, but I will make this comment on verse one.
That Paul.
As specially fitted and gifted as he was, and with such a stewardship.
He seems to have never lost track of the fact that he received mercy.
When he writes to Timothy in the first in his first epistle, he says the same thing.
We find that.
Verse 12 I thank Christ Jesus our Lord.
Who hath enabled me?
With that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry, who was before a blasphemy and a persecutor and injurious, but I obtained mercy.
And so on.
So.
That I will say this, that nowadays.
When the subject of election comes up amongst believers.
The Saints seem to get uncomfortable.
That doctrine seems to make people uncomfortable.
She puzzles me because in my personal experience, the brethren took me under their wing a couple weeks after I was saved, one of the first things they taught me.
I know you felt they said that you did it and that you and God looks upon you as having accepted Christ about the knee.
But they taught me that I was chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world.
And my response was.
Why me? And it makes us worshippers when we lay hold of that.
Paul wrote in his perhaps first epistle to the Thessalonians. He said, knowing brethren.
Beloved, your election of God. So he taught it to them in the first couple weeks. It's foundational.
And it's good for us not to lose sight of that, even such a as we would say, a great one is the Apostle Paul. What a servant of the Lord.
I obtained mercy. I was a glass fever, curious, an insolent and overbearing man. But I obtained mercy.
And didn't lose sight of that in his soul's experience, and it motivated him as having been put into the Ministry to not faint.
And as individuals, I'm sure you would agree, Bruce, we need that mercy throughout our Christian lives, don't we?
It's an individual thing and that's why epistles written to individuals.
Generally include mercy and pulse salutation.
Or the you might say Paul includes it in his salutation, But he writes to assemblies. He says grace and peace. Why? Because assembly stand before God in that particular relationship with Christ.
And in that sense, he doesn't mention mercy toward an assembly, but toward individuals. We need mercy throughout our lives, don't we? It's the mercy of the Lord that we're not.
Consumed. It's the mercy of the Lord in our everyday lives with the mercies we received.
I remember a brother in the Toronto Assembly in whose home I was many times.
And he believed in giving thanks for the food in a very brief way.
He never elaborated. And every time it was Father. For these mercies we give thee thanks. Amen.
But he called the Mercies the good food we enjoy, the good things that God gives us in our everyday lives, the way we're dealt with as individuals before Him. What a blessing thing it is, and we need the mercy of God all through our Christian pathway.
I'd like to reread the last verse.
Of the first time we sang this morning.
And it's an Amen to what's just been said.
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Unchangeable, thy gracious love, our earthly path has ceaseless views. Air New our beating heart to move thy tender mercies still pursued.
Here with us, may they abide, and close us in on every side.
Well, there was a danger in Corinth. We don't need to dwell on it. But it was a danger which Paul brings out in verse two of dishonesty and handling the word of God in a wrong way.
Using deceit in order to gain influence and position and authority. And sadly, without going into a lot of detail, it seems that there were those in court who wanted to.
As it were, shoved the Apostle Paul out of the way so that they could take over and have an influence over the Saints there and.
Paul addresses that.
That in more than one place in the Epistles to corn.
But he mentions it here and how that on his part they as it says in the last half of verse 2.
By manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God, and how necessary that is. We do not need to use human energy. We don't need to use. Human means. We don't need to use.
Anything other than the Word of God.
And if I may be permitted, I will say this there are a number of young people here.
I remember what it was like to be in university and face opposition to the truth of God. And we know from Scripture that there is a place according to Proverbs. I think it's Proverbs 26 to answer a fool according to his folly. There is occasionally a place for what is called Christian apologetics and to point out to those who oppose why their objections will not.
Bear scrutiny or stand up even to SOLID logic. But.
While that may exercise someone's mind, and maybe rightly so.
It doesn't save anyone what saves the word of God. And we know that when Paul came to Corinth, he could say, I determined not to know anything among you, but Christ did him crucified. Now some have taken that the wrong way, that Paul never went beyond that. That's not the point. The point is that he preached A rejected Christ without worldly wisdom, without trying to use high-powered words.
In human education.
Or any other means because he knew that it was the word of God used by the power of the Spirit of God that imparted new life.
And that's what your older brethren were teaching you, weren't they, Bruce, when you learned that you had been?
An object of God's choosing before the foundation of the world, and when the time came, it was a work of God in each one of our souls.
The Word applied by the Spirit of God.
To a part of your life now. Then there was our acceptance of Christ.
A subsequent indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the realization that we were truly safe.
But God began the work, and so Paul realized all that, and he didn't seek to meet the Corinthians on the ground of their education, and they were educated people.
On the ground of their wealth, they were a wealthy people. On the ground of their human pride, they were a proud people.
Put all that aside, Yes, if he had to be stacked up against them, he was educated too. If it came to a matter of ability to be a good orator, he could speak several languages. He could probably hold his own.
But you didn't use any of that.
He preached the word of God without any craftiness, without any deceit, without anything else except the power of God. And what happened? God had much people in that city, as you mentioned, Brother Bruce.
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It's commanding ourselves to every man's conscience, isn't it? I think that's a real key when we're speaking the word. Sometimes there's a tendency to want to appeal to the mind and reasoning.
And I don't think reasoning is wrong because Paul reasoned in the synagogues, the scriptures, but it's appeal to the conscience, and I think that's important. Conscience is that which man got when he ate of that forbidden fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and that's what conscience really is.
Take a sale, CON off the conscience and you've got science that's left.
It's with knowledge. And so a person, whether they admit God in their life or don't they have that inside them, The conscience that bears testimony to the truth. Like you say, when the truth is presented then there's something in there that.
They responds to that, and I think that's important to see that we appeal to man's conscience in the sight of God.
Often think of the Lord Jesus when he was brought, that woman that was taken in adultery and they said, Moses said to stone this women woman, what do you say? Well it was pretty evident their hypocrisy.
For adultery, there had to be a man in the picture, and they didn't bring the man. So what was he going to say? Well, he finally stood up and said, he that is without sin among you, cast the first stone at her.
That wasn't an answer to their question. That was an answer to their conscience. And they all got effed one by one, from the the oldest to the youngest. And they walked out.
Their conscience could not stand before the light that was being presented to them. So that's a real lesson, isn't it, to appeal to man's conscience.
Man was brought into a hospital.
His body had been crushed and the physician examined him, said, well, we're going to have to work on you and get some help for you and the man said to him.
I want to know the truth.
And So what is the situation? I know the Lord Jesus Christ is my savior and I'm going to be OK. So the physician said you only have a few hours to live.
The man that said to him.
I have a request. Would you go to the lodging, send somebody to the lodging and he gave the address where I live and ask the landlady to?
Have you bring the book?
And.
Physicians told a nurse, an orderly, OK, go ahead and do it.
So he went on his rounds and he came back a couple of hours later.
And he said to the nurse.
While he could see when he went in the room, the man had died.
And so he asked the nurse if the book.
Had been brought. What book was it? And she said it's under his pillow.
So he reached under the pillow that the dead man was lying on. He pulled out the book. He opened it up, and he knew immediately.
It was the Bible that his mother had given to him when he had gone into medical school.
When he wanted some money for some liquor, he'd sold it and hadn't seen it since. But it's an example that the man's.
Not acknowledged the gospel than what he said to the physician, but more than that the testimony of his own.
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Peace in the face of death was a message to the conscience and then God.
Use that message as the man saw as the Bible. Very quickly the Lord worked in his soul and he was saved.
And became a preacher of the gospel. And so it's extremely important that when we present the message of the gospel to another person, they should see the reality of that message displayed in our own life. And that's what speaks to their conscience.
Just as an interesting note for those that are interested, the Doctor involved was William Mackay, who wrote #34 in Our Little Flock in book.
If you want the full track, that's in the hallway.
Well, we know that Satan is going to oppose all of that, isn't he?
And according to verse four, he's the God of this world.
It's interesting that the spirit of God in Scripture does not call Satan either the God or the Prince of this world until this world rejected Christ. No. Doubtless Satan was very active ever since.
The fall of man, and before the fall too.
He caused the fall of that in that sense, but.
God's word doesn't call him either the God or Prince of this world.
World rejected Christ, and here he's called the God of this world, no doubt religiously. And he's the Prince of this world, if we could say it, perhaps politically.
But he blinds the minds, and maybe I should let Bruce expand on this. But what does he blind them to? Does he blind them? Does it say blind to the minds of them which believe not, lest they should realize that they're lost, guilty sinners?
And need a savior. That's not what it says. He blinds them.
To And it perhaps could read more accurately to the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.
And that's what our brother was bringing before us this morning.
Yes, it is the gospel of the grace of God, unquestionably. And we need that.
But a more blessed truth in one sense, and a higher truth, is that it is the gospel of the glory of Christ.
And that went back into a past eternity when God determined to honor and glorify his beloved Son.
And to give him the highest place.
Apart from Revelation.
The mind of a man becomes the plaything of the devil.
Often being said that way by older brethren, where I come from.
The brighter the mind, the more twisted it can become.
Just look around at some of the things that.
Intelligent people.
Believe as fact in the western world.
And all you can do is shake your head.
So the mind becomes twisted, reducing everything down and down and down of the great.
Testimony of creation, the testimony of conscience, let alone the Word of God.
Reduce it down and down and down to that little mind can take it in, and then it puffs out its chest and walks around in its ignorance.
The story of of our Western world.
But God in verse 6 shines in the heart and bypasses it, so it's wonderful.
Friend of mine I grew up with.
Very prestigious college degree he had from an Ivy League college.
Heard the gospel from Woodsman chicken farmers.
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Man with no teeth.
He wrestled. I went off to work. He wrestled with it and wrestled with it. I got home. I could see on his face something happened. He got insane. I said what happened? He had been trained in a master's degree in biology or something and was all twisted up with evolution and all of this stuff.
Like the Lord spoke to me, he said. John, what you need is faith in me. He got down on his knees in my kitchen and accepted Christ as a savior. He bypassed that brilliantly educated mind and worked in his heart to give the radiancy.
Of the glory of Christ.
In his heart.
So the mind can be blinded, but the conscience never.
I sometimes say the mind could become atheist, but the conscience is never atheist.
Some time ago, there was that.
Debate between a Christian and one of the I forget the name of the famous atheist.
And they asked him what is the full title of Darwin's?
Species What is the called the origin of the species? Origin of the Species?
And he said yes.
Oh my God, I forgot.
You mentioned God in his answer.
Richard talk. OK, that was the guy.
So the conscience never becomes atheist. And so the thing that is important is to let the light shine. And I I think this is what's so interesting in this How do you make a blind person see this is where God comes into the picture in his sovereignty and makes the light penetrate the darkness.
And that's what we have in verse 6, isn't it? It's a quote from Genesis chapter.
One when there was darkness over the face of the deep, God said.
Let there be light and there was light.
Whatever changed in your friend that that all of a sudden he got so uncomfortable. It was not alike from the presence of God that penetrated the darkness. I I seen that happen a number of times rather than Timmy has saw. Amazingly wonderful when you see a person that has struggled against the light.
And all of a sudden.
They can't do it any longer.
It's wonderful to see it. Wonderful the witness.
So the important thing is to let the light shine, isn't it?
To speak the word I said, I say When you're preaching the gospel, it's not your explanation that's gonna make it get through to people. It's the living word of God.
So read it.
Slowly and clearly.
Your explanation might help, or it might not help.
But it's not your explanation. It's the word of God that penetrates. It's living in an operative, penetrating, wonderful, wonderful.
What power we have?
In having that privilege to preach the gospel and know that by the Spirit of God it can Pierce through whatever things put in the way, it can come right through and dramatically.
Transform lives. We have that triplet. What a wonderful privilege it is to be able to do that, whether it's one-on-one or before a group. We know what's going on out there is a work by the Spirit of God piercing through not only to preach it, but to live it.
Somebody has said.
Lights here in this room are not making any noise. They're not saying anything.
But because of their being here, you can see everything clearly.
And that's what the word of God is.
Living in Opera?
In the Word of God.
Seeing and faith go together.
And blindness and unbelief go together.
The reason a person cannot see spiritual things? They may be the brightest intellectual person in the world.
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It's less the light, as it says, blinded the minds of them, which believe not.
Unbelief is what makes a person blind.
In moral and spiritual and matters.
So what gives light that they see?
Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
And so it's the Word of God working by the Spirit of God, that overcomes unbelief. And when there's then faith.
Given through the word of God, the person sees.
And that's not true only of what we call unbelievers.
The principle is equally true in the life of everyone of us here, if there's an area of our life in which we are not believing God.
If there's unbelief in us, there'll be blindness in that matter as well.
Light and darkness and not the opposite of each other. God is light. We have light in this room. If someone would have great darkness into this room, it's not going to affect this room at all. However, if there's a dark room and we bring a little bit of light, the room is going to be illuminated. That's the big contrast, isn't it? I was thinking of Bruce mentioned earlier with the Sorcerer in the book of Acts. He he was the evidence and action of Satan.
Things and it was me blind. He saw darkness. That was really his natural condition because man love darkness, so he would just put back into his condition. There what we have is light, and in fact.
We spoke about light. Light and light goes together too, isn't it? That's what we have light, then it leads to light and we are given eternal life because that light was upon us.
Thinking of Gideon when he went out with his 300 men against the Midianites, he had two things. His men had two things.
One was a.
Picture an earthen vessel with a lighted torch inside. The other one was a trumpet. It's figurative of the two means of testimony.
What is heard and what is seen? And that's what we have in the verse 2. There's things that are not connected with the Christian testimony, things of dishonesty, craftiness, handling the word of God deceitfully. When there's anything of that, it tends to.
Negate the truth of What's your? What's that obscure exactly.
Exactly. Go ahead.
Well that bit in in verse 2, dishonesty, hidden things of dishonouring not walking and craftiness handling the word of God deceitfully. We are plagued by that in amongst Evangelicals in the Word of Faith movement.
The say it claimant movement, the the prosperity gospel movement and all that, That's what they do. They play these games.
They've put on a show. They use techniques that magicians use and so forth and claim to be men of God, and then people who are affected by that. We run into them from time to time. They may be many of them are real believers, and boy do they get messed up by this stuff. They don't have peace. They're troubled by the things that they're told that we have these kind of people that are all over the place.
Several of them recently have told on TV and their congregations that God has told them they need new jets and.
Millions and millions of dollars worth of money.
And this kind of nonsense that they go on, they they put on a great show. One of the ones that's got to be very famous as a man by the name of Benny Hinn. And I was in a Bible study with a group of people in Florida number of years ago and a couple went to this meeting and they described it to me. There are 4 hours of music and show before he came on stage to work them up. What do you need to do that for? Why if if these people are really.
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Men of God who have signed gifts and can do what they claim. Why do you need to play these games?
These and handle the word of God deceitfully, so these guys could make a fortune making pretzels the way they twist the word of God.
It's it's all around us and we we run into people all the time that are damaged and affected by this and thankfully we have something we can do to help them.
Verse 6. The light shines where.
As it says in our hearts.
Lodging place at truth.
Is the heart and the greatest danger for the hearts of I speak to us as believers in this room. Is that the allowance of unbelief?
And what's in the heart of God?
That's our greatest danger.
Unbelief in the goodness that's in the heart of God.
And when we go through this chapter and the circumstances through which people we pass.
That are difficult to go through and accept and so on. There's a natural tendency in us to say, well, I could be happy if you Lord, if you change my circumstances.
And do something that I think would make me happier by doing this or that in my present need.
That's not the truth of God.
Happiness is not the consequence of favorable circumstances, but it's living in the enjoyment of the fellowship that we can have with God our Father and the Lord Jesus in their heart.
They want to bring us into the common daily enjoyment of the fellowship that they enjoy together.
They want us to enjoy that fellowship with them as well, and if we have that without unbelief, then we can go through the difficulties of life in everyday life with peace and calmness that the Lord Jesus, who never doubted his Father's heart, experienced in his life as a man.
Just wanted to comment on verse three. Our gospel be hid. It is hid to them that are lost.
What a tragedy.
Important to let the light shine.
Remember what those leprous men on the outside of Samaria said when they found the camp of the Assyrians abandoned. They said this is a day of good tidings and we hold our peace.
Oh, how important it is to let the light shine. And so it's not only like we were saying what we say, it's the way we live. And so it's so important that there be conformity in our lives to the truth of God that we speak. If that's the case, it will get through.
Still remember our sister?
In the Lord who is quite timid in her personality and.
And she worked in a office.
It was after some time one of the other secretaries in the office approached her and said, what is it you have you have something that I wish I had? Will you just tell me what it is?
And then she was able to open.
Her heart and tell her the gospel and that person got saved. That other secretary got saved. It wasn't what she said that attracted her, was what she was.
That's the light, isn't it? It shows, it manifests.
Does a good verse to be reminded of, especially.
When we're younger, because sometimes you're concerned about what do we preach, how do we preach, what do we say so that people can be convicted. Those are burdening question, isn't it? But yet here I believe it tells us not to worry. So let's go back to verse five. I'm going to read it from the New translation. For we do not preach ourselves. Well, that's rule #1.
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Isn't it? It's not about you and I. We don't preach about ourselves, but Christ Jesus Lord.
That's what the preaching is. So the Word of God can say. Now, another place he says do the work of an evangelist. So you and I may say, I'm not an evangelist. I can't preach because that's due to work. Are you an evangelist? Does it matter? No, you do the work. I mean evangelist. In this case, you preach Christ being.
Lord. And then it echoed and ourselves. What about ourselves? Is that? But?
And ourselves your servant for Christ, For Jesus we are just an instrument for him. All we have to do is preach Christ.
And I love what it says at the end of verse.
Christ Who is.
The image of God.
Incredible to think about what is image?
It's the visible representation of what is invisible.
How can you know God if God is invisible?
The Lord Jesus is the image of the invisible God. You look at the Lord Jesus and the Gospels.
There you can see first hand of who God is in that glorious person and it's kind of repeated in the end of verse 6 to give the light.
Of the knowledge.
Of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Not wonderful that we can know the eternal God.
In the person of the Lord Jesus. That just blows my mind, brother.
That you and IA, God who is eternal, who never began to exist, He always was. That just blows my mind. And I know that God, yes I can, because he became a man.
And as such.
Walked amongst humankind and now we can know God in the most wonderful way possible.
The person of his Son, the Lord Jesus.
Can you go on a little bit, Bob, to explain something to us?
We know from First Timothy chapter 6.
That there is a light in which God dwells, and the Lord Jesus Christ, which no man hath seen nor can see, no man can approach unto. So what? What is this glory that is now seen in the face of Jesus Christ? What can we go any further in saying what glory that is?
I'm asking a question.
Now answer your question.
I'm glad to ask a question. You were enlarging on it.
I have a thought and I'll say it and then maybe others can comment. And I don't mean to spend a lot of time on it, but I'll read that verse in First Timothy 6 just so we know what we're.
Talking about It's particularly talking about the Lord Jesus.
And it reminds us of who he is as God.
And it says there.
Verse 14 The last part of the verse.
The appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Which it should read, which in its times, that is the times of the appearing it shall show Who is the blessed, and only potentate the king of Kings, and Lord of Lords, who only have immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach, unto whom no man hath seen, nor can see, to whom be honor and power ever last.
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And yet here in the face of Jesus Christ.
We see the glory of God.
I don't want to limit it, but to me the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Perhaps is in contrast to the glory that was seen in the Old Testament. Was there a glory seen there? Yes, there was. And you brought it out, Bob, That look. When Moses came down from the mount, his face shone, because there was a glory even in the giving of that love.
A glory of God and all that he was, as a God of holiness, a God of judgment.
But it required of man that which he could never live up to. And man failed, and God knew he would fail.
But now what do you and I see in the face of Jesus Christ?
Again, I don't limit it to this, but what I have enjoyed is we see the glory of God in redemption. We see the whole character of God displayed not merely as light but as love. And we see grace and truth that came by Jesus Christ. All of that, I like to think, is now seen in the glory that shines in the face of Jesus Christ.
Would brethren agree with that, or is there more to it than that?
Yes, I agree with that. I say there is that which we can know.
But I think that verse in First Timothy 6 shows that there are things that are unapproachable that we will never know. Because God is God, and I'm only a creature. I will never be a God. I'm a child of God called into fellowship with God. But I was thinking of that verse in Matthew 11 where the Lord Jesus.
Speaks here Matthew 11 verse 25.
Says at that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and has revealed them unto babes, Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in my sight. Now notice verse 27.
All things are delivered to me of my Father.
And no man knoweth the sun.
But the Father?
Neither knows any man, the Father.
Save the son, and he to whomsoever the son will reveal you.
So the mystery of the Lord Jesus being God and man at the same time as a mystery that just goes beyond our ability to comprehend and I think we need to realize that.
We need to.
Tread with unshot feet carefully.
But there are things that we know wonderful, wonderful wonder.
Things that we do not know, they're unapproachable.
If you know the sun reveals the father.
Perhaps the people illustration.
Thinking of this part there on Wednesday.
Two days from now, our brother Sagar build or well in India will be coming to visit Toronto area and I'll be picking them up.
Staying with us for a few days. I have never met him. I don't know what he looks like. I have not seen pictures of him or maybe I have. Don't remember.
Yet I know it's not David, so in many ways I feel like I already know him. So perhaps it's that's a people way to illustrate that. When you know the sun, you know that I'm anticipating the mannerism, perhaps the similarity and appearance and things.
No man hath seen God at any time. We read in John chapter one the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father He hath declared him. I love that passage in First Timothy 6 that you mentioned, Bill, because it's just so majestic and exalted to point to the inaccessible light that God dwells in this God, and yet he was pleased to come out from that.
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Habitation. That eternal habitation.
Person in the sun and reveal him to you within me.
And the wonder of it too.
As we read Colossians.
In him dwell of all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.
If you wanted to communicate everything in your heart.
And you were a sculptor. You could spend your entire life and you wouldn't be able to communicate just in a human heart.
In one piece of art or a letter to communicate your innermost and complete, you would not be able to.
You might say God has been able to put all the fullness of the Godhead bodily in that man, Christ Jesus, to present him to us. Nothing left out, It's all there.
Little wonder that they could say.
We have the knowledge of this.
I think sometimes we're a little bit shy because of what we know about the first man and about how Satan can play with the mind.
But.
Knowledge is not a bad thing.
Spiritual things. It's it's wonderful. It's the way God communicates across space and time, with, with, with knowledge, with information. It's all packed in your son. And so it is that, as we were saying this morning, our moral condition effects our ability to take in that ongoing and increasing knowledge of itself.
Acknowledge the knowledge of the Sun, its eternal life, this.
Wonderful.
God is inhabits eternity.
Ever existing.
Has no beginning, has no end.
In contrast.
Exists outside of time. Exists outside of space.
By contrast, there's you and.
We are finite.
We can't even think. We can talk about it, but we really can't think outside of time or space.
We can talk about eternity, but our capacity to really?
Understand it is very, very limited in the truth of it.
And.
God is God, and we as finite creatures, what God is is beyond.
US. It's infinite.
And it will never be different than that, because God will always be God.
And we will always be creatures.
And so God in the greatness of his own being and heart.
Has chosen to make himself known to us.
And the person.
Of his son.
And so he has come.
In unity with his deity.
I am as he could say he has become a man and remains a man, and in doing so he has revealed.
God to us.
And in the most wonderful way is this.
I believe the greatest.
Aspect of the glory of God that has been made known to us.
Is his heart.
Glory is the display of excellence.
And the greatest excellence of God is not his infinite power.
As great as that is and it beyond us that is.
But when we see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and we go, as Bill said some while ago, to the matter of redemption.
It's the greatest display of the Excellency of God is at the cross.
Because it is the fullness to the capacity of our hearts to see his heart.
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There's no greater display of the heart of God than what we see He will did through his Son displaying his heart at the cross.
There's all kinds of wonderful blessings for us connected with that.
But the Lord could and did.
Display the glory of God in the magnificent, wonderful way we view it when we see the Lord Jesus, who was willing to pay the price of redemption to satisfy the heart of God.
And the glory of God maintained in it, And as a consequence for us God says now I'm going to give to you to see for all eternity that my son who lowered himself in the sense of becoming an obedient man, I'm giving him as man. He already had the rights as creator and so on.
But as man, as Redeemer, God has invested and shown in him all the displayable glory of God.
In terms of heaven and earth.
And we have the joy of being with him and as man like him.
Again, going back to the heart, God says the greatest glory has to do with my heart. So I'm going to give you the life of my son so that you can share that same heart and enjoy my glory through it.
2 Corinthians 4:6-18
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It's interesting in this earth.
If we bring a light to a dark room, we shine light into the room. God can command light to come out of darkness.
And in observing souls that I've had the privilege to talk with.
One of the things that I've noticed in early as the Lord is working, there's a consciousness of sin that seems to come in. There's like an enlightenment, like God has put light, where they see things they never saw before. I mean, before there's a confession of salvation, there's this consciousness of sin.
It seems to come in.
And I don't know if that has to do with what John says about lighting every man that cometh into the world.
But there's some kind of light that God causes to come in that brings illumination. It's early in the process that he works in a phone.
And that is true. It's very true that the light that Shawn in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ illuminated more than previously.
If he were willing to admit it.
The awful condition of man.
I would just suggest, and we don't need to dwell on it because we did discuss this verse a bit yesterday, but here what we get.
Perhaps goes even beyond that.
Yes, we need to be reminded that we are sinners and it's the light of God's Word and the Lord Jesus Christ here in this world that brought that out, but here it's the glory of God.
In the face of Jesus Christ.
That is a light in one sense that did not shine in the Old Testament.
It's a light, as we had brought before us, that is the glory of God.
Because of his love and because of redemption, the full character of God revealed not merely in life that was revealed in the Old Testament, but God in his love.
That's why I suggested just to read verse 6, because in verse 7.
He speaks of this treasure.
We have this treasure in earthen vessels. What's the treasure?
I think it's that, isn't it? The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Bill Prost, Do you know the Eternal God?
I do. Isn't that incredible? It is.
That's a treasure, but it's in Earth Investments.
When we read this chapter yesterday, 2 phrases.
Struck me.
And I don't recall. Maybe I was too sleepy yesterday.
But the first verse says this ministry.
And verse 7 says this treasure. What is the link between the two?
I think we mentioned it in yesterday in Chapter 3. It contrasts the administration of.
Condemnation and in the law, administration of death and administration of condemnation, in contrast with the administration of the spirit and administration of righteousness. And I think that's what he refers to in verse one.
We have this ministry. So in Christianity you have a.
Display of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ than you ever had under the Law. The law was glorious in that it made Moses face shine that we have something far superior, far superior.
And so when we get to know the Lord Jesus, that's the treasure. I find that just incredible to think about.
Is puny human beings.
To know the eternal God.
And the person of the Lord Jesus wowing incredibly wonderful.
What strikes me about verse 6?
Is that it's not a general out shining of the glory of God like like if the sun comes up.
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In a in a part of the earth, everything gets lit. That's more what we read in John chapter one. The true light lighteth every man. The true light is coming to the world even though men did not comprehend it or apprehended. But here it's as you say, Bob. It's the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.
I'm sorry, previous phrase has shined in our hearts.
So, so this is God working in the heart. So that upon repentance, as Sam was saying, that's really what you're speaking about. Sam's repentance, the Spirit of God works repentance.
When there is faith.
Then we behold, we have the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. That's something that is shown in the heart of the believer.
Not just so. If the world is going to see it, where are they going to see it shining out from, not from heaven.
Where Christ is but from your wife as an earth investment. Agree with your if your all, the fact that these earthen vessels have such have something so glorious, in lack of a word to use, shown into us, that is, that God will see to it that it shines out to others.
Earthen vessels A container made of turf.
Not very fancy, no.
And they're breakable.
The illustrations often been given of Gideon and his 300 Men with the.
They were to break the vessel, and in breaking the vessel the light shone.
So that's what God does in our lives and in what the verses that follow.
Show how the vessel is to be broken.
Sometimes in ways that are not pleasant to ourselves, but and necessary thing.
In our lives the breaking of the vessels so that the light can shine, wowing.
That's the wonderful thing about this is the glorious side. So we see the treasure, we understand the treasure, but it's hidden in something so fragile. And then we find the following Birthday, in a sense, tells us well how How does this vessel get broken so that the light can be a testimony to this world?
That we see all there are problems now we can see the wisdom of God, why tribulations and distressed and so on are allowed into our lives.
Because not to break us in the sense of breaking us down to nothing, but the vessel may be broken, so the light, as you mentioned, as Gideon's Lantern can shine for the show not about us, but the glory of God.
And at the end of verse 7, is that the power Excellency of the power maybe have gotten out of us? Remember that when Gideon blew his trumpet, there followed him 32,000 men.
Of Israel. God says I can't give you the victory too many. You're going to boast that you got it yourself.
Ready to tell all those go home?
There's 20,000 who went home.
That's reducing your army. Pretty good bet. But he still had 12,000, still too many in the Lord says bring them down to the waters to test them. And then there was 300 left, 300 against the hordes of the Midianites.
Rather than this is a lesson we've got to learn. The Excellency of the power is not of us, it's of God.
And God is as insignificant, despicable things.
And his work?
And that's why I.
Excuse me, that's why I mentioned at the beginning of this, when we were taking up this chapter, that.
I have looked at 2nd Corinthians as if it is bringing all the power of a risen Christ in glory to bear on the problems and difficulties in life down here, and as we've been saying, to use those same earthen vessels for God's glory, but with his power. And so these things are real. We are troubled on every side. Verse 8.
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We are perplexed, we are persecuted.
Verse nine, we are cast down.
We do always bear a boat in the bud in the dying of the Lord Jesus, and these problems are very real.
And sometimes what the Lord allows in our lives seem to be very difficult, very hard to bear. Sometimes we as Christians look on what the Lord is doing in the lives of other believers, and sometimes even in our own lives, and we say, I don't understand.
I don't. I don't know why the Lord is allowing this.
But then we read.
If that is the earthen vessel that we've been talking about.
Then there's the treasure. Not distress, that's the treasure.
Not in despair, the treasure not forsaken, not destroyed.
That the light also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.
That treasure is like Gideon's life as we've been bringing out, and sometimes that earthen vessel gets in the way.
It can do a very effective job of keeping the light from shining out, and this was particularly the case in court.
They were a well educated people. They were a proud people. They had a lot of gift in spiritual things and they were taken up with it and they felt that somehow all of this could be used for God's glory.
And Paul has to say to them, no. I was educated too. I had the best education. I had everything going for me.
But it didn't do me anything when I came to know the Lord. Oh, I'm sure, as we said earlier, that Paul's knowing several languages and having his education, he could use it for the Lord. But to rely on it as if somehow it was a necessary thing, and that that made him a better speaker, a better evangelist, a better teacher? No, no, it all had to be by the power of God, and Paul himself knew.
What it was to see the earthen vessel broken.
And we know at the end of this epistle he tells about the thorn it should read for the flesh, not in the flesh, but for the flesh.
And he was so upset with it and so concerned about it The three times he goes to the Lord, the great apostle Paul, he says, Lord, please take this away.
He felt, and we can see why, that he could serve the Lord better, if the Lord would only take that thorn away.
And three times the Lord says all know.
But I'm going to give you the grace that you need. And more than that, what is his eventual reaction?
We glory, he gloried in his infirmities. That's quite a step, isn't it? The glory and something that breaks the earth and vessel. That's not easy.
But he knew that the Lord was allowing it in order that the treasure might be more visible.
It's interesting these chapters.
Two other phrases that stand out.
Build this crew of attention to the one we are.
But there's also.
Verse one we have.
This ministry.
Verse seven we have this treasure just turn up to chapter.
Seven verse, verse, having therefore these promises, dearly beloved.
This world is divided into two classes of people. According to sociologists, they have the haves and the have nots and brother where the haves.
We're eternally the Haves.
Value that we have. We have to understand that then it helps us understand why there are circumstances happen to Christians and to acknowledge that it is from the Lord for our good.
Is to build up our faith, so we had before us praying for ones who are in need, and I believe it's rightly so, to pray for brethren who are in need or or in special circumstances.
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But yet, on the other hand, then we have to also acknowledge that to the Lord His will be done. So we we had in our reading.
Long ago, the book of Acts where Peter was released from prison and someone made a comment. Isn't it nice to see that the prayer was answered and it was they pray that Peter would be released? And then I made a comment. I said, well then what about James who was killed?
Thanks for that. Or do we cast that part and say, oh, the Lord didn't answer that prayer? We can't say that, can't we? That either way we know it is the Lord well and we need to seek what the Lords mind is, whether it be unto death.
All right, I have a question about verse.
The part about the face of Jesus Christ.
For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Do I understand this correctly? Is that just saying that Jesus put a face on God, He's the He's God in the flesh and so we Or what's? What's the idea of saying that?
To give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
I think, Tim, it may be a contrast to the face of Moses in the previous chapter.
Verse 13 Not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, The children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished.
But now we have the glory of God in an unveiled face.
Of Jesus Christ.
Verse 18 Chapter 3.
Yes, following up wonderful verse 18 of chapter 3 as well.
Brothers used to tell us when we were young. If there's a verse that is a key to growing as a Christian, it's Second Corinthians 318, we all, with opener unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord.
Are changed.
That's grown.
To the same image from glory to glory as by the Spirit of the Lord.
So we have an object that is a person glorified in heaven.
That we hold.
The liberty of the Holy Spirit and by faith.
And lo and behold, we're changed. It's.
From glory to glory, it's not.
It happened last Saturday.
It's gradual performance to Christ by being occupied with himself in glory. It's been said that the wonderful grace of God.
Hasn't come to us directly from the cross, but it's come from heaven, from the glorified man. The foundation was on Calvary's cross, but God has raised him up and positioned him in a place where now the full liberty of his love.
It's graceful. It's up to you.
Remember in the Old Testament when Moses was on the Mount?
And God said to Moses, Thou cats not see my face, thou shalt see my back parts, but my face shall not be seen.
But isn't it wonderful that God? And you mentioned that God has become a man in Christ and now by faith we can see in his face all the glory of God reflected the whole true character of God? Yes, it's by faith we don't see his actual face with our eyes. We will when the Lord comes and takes us home. But.
In that face we are able to see without avail all the glory of God.
Revelation One. His face shone as the sun, and I like to think of that face too. Was more marred than any man's just to think of it, Brandon.
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On that cross in those three hours of darkness was the greatest display there has ever been. That God is light and God is love, never a greater display of those two things.
Wonderful.
Like to connect a few scriptures I don't know how to refer to just one seek to bring a thought out with respect to the treasure.
That's in verse 7.
Go back to Romans chapter 8.
Romans chapter 8 and verse 2.
Is bringing out.
The truth.
Summing up, really the truth of the 1St 7 chapters of Romans.
And I could try to summarize the 1St 7 chapters of Romans, but just get the one verse and connect it with our chapter.
The law verse 2. The law of the spirit of life.
In Christ Jesus.
That's that made me free from the law of sin, of death.
Principle of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.
Now our chapter.
Verse.
11.
For we which live.
Who's that as those who, if you will, gone through the 1St 7 chapters of Romans and arrived at the 8th chapter. They're the ones that live.
And so he says here we which live are always delivered unto death.
For Jesus sake, that what?
The life also of Jesus.
Might be manifest in our mortal flesh.
How is the life of Jesus manifest in our mortal flesh?
Because as we have brought out in Romans 8.
The Lord Jesus Christ.
In resurrection life.
The Spirit of God, the Lord Jesus is given to us as our life.
It's an eternal life. It's the life that's given to us and it's sealed in US and it's operative in US.
By the Holy Spirit, it's the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.
And now to connect it with the glory.
In chapter 3.
We see that the glory of God had not has already been said multiple times, was not fully revealed by the law.
It was not revealed even when the Lord Jesus was here as a man, to our understanding and eyes, he was what he was from eternity.
But the glory of God displayed in Jesus Christ is displayed in resurrection.
And how is it made good in us, the light of the knowledge of God?
In the face of Jesus Christ is made good in US, is made a treasure in US.
By the life of Christ himself being in US.
And then we have the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.
Individually, personally made known to our souls.
By the person of Christ who is our life being in US.
And Mr. Darby sums it down to say, the treasures Christ.
That is we.
Are brought into this living relationship. We were born with a body.
A natural physical body and we have a life in that body.
But what do we have now?
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That body has a new life in it. It has the life of Christ.
It's called our life.
The Apostle Paul. The life which I now live. I live by the faith of the Son of God.
His life now lived was the out.
And So what is to be seen in you and I as a vessel in this physical body in which I have that was born?
Under the power of sin, what is God expecting to be seen?
He's expecting the treasure he put there to be seen, which is Christ.
And it's the outshining of himself.
That is enjoyed practically in the heart that becomes the testimony of the believer.
To everyone about him and that testimony is carried on, as it says here in a week physical vessel.
But that only displays the greatness.
Of the work of God.
Because we would never imagine.
The cod would put in us, his son, to be our life beyond our imagination, that God would do that.
But it's a treasure to God.
If you have a treasure, where are you going to put it? Typically in a pretty safe place, right?
But where is God put his treasure?
Put it in you.
And now he says, in spite of all the challenge connected with it. I want the glory, my glory and the full out shining of it that was never seen before is to be seen in you and in your life.
And consequently one more verse, verse 18 of chapter 3.
We all with open face, beholding, as in glass, the glory of the Lord. The Apostle Paul again had one object before his soul, and for me to live as Christ. He said, because Christ was the fullness of the object of his soul, and consequently he could by faith enjoy looking at that glory shining out. This has already been explained in the face of Christ. And then we realized the truth of first John.
Where? He says.
He that hath this hope in him, what is that whole?
That I will be like Christ without the limitations of this body.
And I when I don't have the limitation of the body.
I have the life, the eternal life in it. But when I come to see Christ as He is and what it, how will I see Him as He is? I will see him in his resurrected state and life.
And when I see him as he is, I'll be with him. The limitations of this body will be gone, and then I will be like him fully forever.
That's why in verses 10 and 11 That there's both those verses, there's something that is similar.
In that it mentions the dying of the Lord Jesus.
Before it mentions the life of Jesus verse 10.
And verse 11 Also we which liver always delivered unto death.
For Jesus sake, that the life also Jesus, might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.
Death comes first and then life. That's resurrection light. That's that life we possess by faith in the Lord Jesus.
And so it's manifested in the measure that we bear about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. It says in verse 10 always bearing about this is the norm of Christian life.
Why in my life give place to my own desires and my own likes? Will you see the life of Christ in me? No, you will not.
But it is in the measure that I bear about in my body, the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus will be manifest in our body.
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And it seems that that is presented in verse 10 as the norm always bearing about the body, the dying of the Lord Jesus.
But in verse 11, it's a little different in that it's we which live are always delivered into debt. Now this is something that is outside of our control.
Somebody gets cancer.
And it seems like there's no remedy.
We're delivered to it. We did not seek for this. Why are we delivered to it?
That the life of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. There, it says.
Because it may involve true physical death, not necessarily.
But it's that principle of death.
We've died with Christ, and in the nature that I carry that carry out that principle in my life, then the life of Jesus is manifest. I think that's beautiful to see it.
I think there's additional aspect to it that's seen in the 10th and 11Th verse as well.
If you think about the Lord Jesus.
The Lord Jesus in one sense was born to die.
He became a man.
That he might take our place. And in becoming a man, his whole life was focused on what it was going to be to die.
And consequently he had He was the one perfect.
Mortal flesh, if you will, that there has ever been.
And when we now have his life.
But we still have that.
Mortal flesh in.
There is an aspect in these verses, I believe in addition to what Bob has said, because you can have more than one thought and they can be consistent.
Correct that we are going to follow a path that as to that old life, the only place for it is the place of death, practically speaking, not only doctrinally speaking, but there is no place for it in us who are to live.
A spirit of life in Christ Jesus that is, the new life that we have is the life we're to live.
And the old life is to be recognized not only doctrinally in baptism as dying with him, but it is to be on a daily basis going down the path that is the same path that he went down in his life here until his death and his resurrection.
So for our sake. For the application, for our sake.
Came to die.
Put aside all the natural things that he was a Nazarite from birth.
In our case, we have the privilege for his sake, for Jesus sake, as we have in verse 11 of Going down the Same Time.
And the result of that was in verse 12.
Death worketh in us, but life in you, that is out of all of that.
That the Apostle could speak about concerning himself and concerning those who worked with him. The result of all that was that life of Christ, that treasure exhibited, and blessing in others.
And what a privilege that is.
Perhaps it wouldn't hurt to make an illustration of that, and I read it some time ago.
Probably some here are familiar with a book written by Alexander Solzhenitsyn entitled The Gulag Archipelago, in which he was Russian and he was one who dared to speak out concerning the atrocities and imprisonment of innocent people and ultimate deaths of innocent people that took place in Russia under Lenin and later under Stalin, and perhaps even later still under other administrations.
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And he points out in his book that there were those who were arrested wrongly and those that were treated badly and who resisted it very strongly. They did everything they could to prove their innocent innocence. They reached out to people that they thought could help them. They were even, of course, in many cases told lies, and they signed papers admitting guilt that they had never.
Been guilty of admitted, Admitted to things, hoping that they would somehow get out of prison.
It never worked. All they did was get into bigger and bigger trouble. But he said the people that did the best.
Under those circumstances were those who, when they were arrested, said, well, this is it.
My life down here in this earth is over.
I'll probably never see my family again. They probably confiscated my property.
But I am not going to sacrifice my moral values and my moral principles. And they said, we don't care what you do. You put us in prison, you do anything you want.
But we are not going to sign something admitting.
Wrongdoing that we are not guilty of. We are not going to go back on the things that we said. We are not going to acknowledge the rightfulness of what is wrong, they said. The interrogators were afraid of those people. They didn't know what to do with them because they couldn't. They couldn't break them. Now some of them were true believers, some of them were simply morally upright, and many of them in some cases were simply allowed to go free, they said.
We no use having these guys in prison. They just don't do no good having them at all.
And so the believer in this world.
That always bears a boat and I like the twofold aspect that was brought out.
If we accept that in this world, then we are not going to get all upset.
About what the Lord is allowing in our lives. We're going to say, Lord, this is your will, and this is for your glory. And we are here for your glory, not for mine, not for ours. We are here for your honor and glory and for your interests. And if what happens to us is going to result in death working in us but life and others, and so be it. Now that's quite a step to take, but once it's taken.
It makes everything much easier, doesn't it?
I remember reading about three people called Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego illustrated.
They said to the king, well, more or less than paraphrasing, you're going to do what you're going to do.
The Lord's going to deliver us out of your hand, one way or the other.
But they had to be willing to face death, and then God intervened. And that's resurrection life, isn't it?
It came out on the other side.
The world will never see it.
Unless there's faith.
Men and women who act in hate.
The truth that they have, that's when the world sees it. It's another reality that they only know this 1A lost man, a lost woman. They only know what's the natural world around us. How in the world are they going to see it?
When Private Desmond Doss stood on Hacksaw Ridge.
As a believer.
Being more everyone being ordered to come down and get out.
And all those great battleships off the shore began to lob those shells up there.
He cried out to the Lord. What should I do?
He walks into the Hellfire of it when he hears someone cry for help.
An act of faith?
The reality of that night when he walked in there and saved all of those men up on that mountain, was a kind of bravery.
Men act brave. They're lost. Men who act brave. Their soldiers who act brave but not like this.
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Nobody had ever seen anything like it, and it was a man.
Who trusted in the God that had saved him, acting in faith.
And the world saw another reality.
And were amazed.
How else they gonna see it?
When we realize that we have died.
Then you don't have to fear death anymore, do you know?
And we have risen with him.
That life is a light that death cannot touch.
Absolutely impossible that death can touch.
That's the life that we have. I think it's.
Perhaps that is the force of versus 13 and 14.
That verse 13 of course is quoted from.
From the Psalms but.
I would suggest the force of it here is that.
To speak the way Paul was speaking.
He says we have faith, I have believed, and therefore we are able to speak this way.
And if we really believe.
In the truth of verse 14, as you say, Bob.
Then there is resurrection before US, one way or another.
It may be that the Lord will leave us here, and the precious truth of the power of resurrection will be realized that the Lord's coming when we are changed, but it may be realized when all that are in the graves.
All true believers.
Even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
And that power of resurrection.
Is something the man can't understand.
I remember reading about a missionary who was in a heathen country. This was many years ago, perhaps 150 years ago, and he was preaching the gospel to them. And he talked about resurrection. And they looked at one another in wonder. They said resurrection, really.
Well, all those who have died really be raised, and he was assured they would be.
The chief said. Well, all those who I've killed in battle, will they rise again?
Oh my, what about those that have been killed and in some cases eaten by wild beasts?
He shook his head. He couldn't believe. Will they be brought back again? He was assured that God could do that. Well, I believe some got saved in that particular locality. They believe that the missionary who gave them the truth. How could he speak like that? Because he had faith in that precious truth of resurrection.
So in verse 14 it says knowing. What a beautiful word knowing.
Which raised up the Lord Jesus, That truth Paul had already brought out in great depth in the 15th chapter of First Corinthians.
The precious truth of resurrection, the absolute necessity of the necessity of Christ's resurrection, and the necessity of our resurrection if it's true that he is risen.
And if that truth has a grip on our souls?
What a difference it makes your outlook down here if you were saying.
Sam, the world's horizon is this world, and I have seen those, and you have two who have spent all their time and energy making sure that they had everything under control as they thought in this world. I remember the neighbor across the road from me, his family.
Were heirs to a big chunk of property surrounding his home and so on, and we were chatting once and he said, Bill, we got it all.
All sewed up, legally, everything is the old people pass away and this and that happens. It's all going to belong to us.
No problem at all.
Well, I said to him. What about what about what comes in eternity?
Well, I haven't thought much about that, but he never got that property.
The Lord allowed death to come in and take him, and I have no assurance that he was ever saved. He never, he never saw that property long before it ever came up, As we say, up for grabs. He was gone.
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So it is with this world, but with you and me, everything that is really ours is ours in resurrections.
And it's a resurrection life that we possess right now in the measure that we carry about in the body, the dying of the Lord Jesus. And I think that's the challenge, brother, and it's to apply that principle of death to the flesh.
And to realize we are dead with him, it's not that we have to put the flesh to death.
It's that we are dead with him.
And risen again with him. So the life that I possess is not that natural life.
That we may still have, but it's the life of resurrection in Christ that we possess even now. That life doesn't have to be regulated. It doesn't have to be ordered to obey rules. It needs to be turned loose.
It is the life of Christ. He knows how to best live it. How about we let him live it through us and in US? That idea that he knows best how to live that life and if we get out of the way.
That's one of the problems we have is we keep getting in the way.
Brother Bernie Brack back home.
I've mentioned him here recently.
Dear lady in his town had to go for chemotherapy in the hospital in Cedar Rapids and he found out that no one was going to be there with her. Family wasn't in town and so he decided to go up.
And he met the doctor, her oncologist, while he was there.
And he spoke with him, and he began to witness to him.
And here is a Hindu or has a Hindu background. And he told Bernie after talking with him. While it says you're one of the real ones, I can tell is what do you mean you're you're a real Christian.
And he told how that one of his nurses is a Christian. Has been talking to it since. I've been watching.
Well, how did they going to see it unless something happens where you can do that and this lady, he said. And he told Bernie that customers.
Of his His patients, customers who were believers, were different and how they face death.
And how when he was dealing with them in their cancer treatments, they were not like others.
Well, that's a life that's different and they see it. So we've been praying for this man in our prayer meeting now that he might get saved because he said he's he can tell that there's something real there and he can see the evidence for it. So maybe he's an inch away from being saved.
I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live.
Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.
And the life which I now live, I live by the faith.
The Son of God who loved me.
And gave himself for me all of that truth. Bob, you just talked tied up in that bird.
The yet not I.
I remember as a young man reading that one time and saying what?
There's another I.
The practical realization of these truths that you're talking about and understanding this, that there's an eye who died.
It's not I that do it, but it's in the dwelleth in me.
What?
When brother Don was talking about.
All the summation of Romans one through 7 through 8.
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That's all tied up in that verse, Galatians 220.
Well, in the end of the chapter here. Nice to spend a few minutes on the rest here.
We mentioned it earlier. There are two reasons given in this chapter.
For not fainting. And as we mentioned yesterday, that word faint has the thought of losing heart.
For losing courage.
And we had that word faint, not in verse one, referring to the ministry that we have.
And what has been brought before us in the third chapter, we've already talked about that that perhaps is more a personal thing.
We all.
Unveiled or open face, beholding the glory of the Lord.
Are changed into the same image from glory to glory and for that reason we don't faith. But then in verse 15 it says for all things are for your sakes.
That the abundant grace might, through the Thanksgiving of many, redound to the glory of God.
For which 'cause we faint not.
Paul had on his heart, not only his own, if we could use the term.
Personal well-being as a believer.
But he valued the well-being of his brethren.
And of course, he had done a unique work.
Preaching to people who were in the depths of Paganism and who were saved right out of Paganism.
To acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior, and to acknowledge to all the precious truth of the assembly, all the counsel of God that was brought before us yesterday.
How very important.
And Paul cared about all of that.
And for that reason I don't want to say this the wrong way, but.
Paul couldn't afford to faint. He had.
A great deal of responsibility on his shoulders at the end of 2nd Corinthians 11, he could say.
After detailing some of the sufferings he had been through for Christ, he could say, and that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. There was a constant care, and I am sure that there was much that Paul wrote that we do not have available to us in the inspired word seeking to be an encouragement. There was much that he said that we do not have recorded.
Much that he prayed about.
That, of course, is not recorded. He had all that before him and he says for which.
Comes, we faint. Not all things are. For your sakes, Paul, as it were says. I am not concerned with what happens to me, but I am concerned about you. I'm concerned about which way you are headed. And of course, in court he had some good reasons to be concerned that at the end of this epistle he has to speak pretty firmly to them about some that had not.
Repented of past sins, and that if he came there would have to be some serious dealing with that whole situation.
But he cared about the well-being of the Saints and what a privilege that is.
To be able to be of concern and to be able to be a help to others.
A brother back in the 1800s made this remark. I thought it was an excellent one.
He said Christianity is characterized not by what it finds but by what it brings, and Paul, I believe, felt that right to the core. Sometimes today we can get discouraged because, shall I say it, the condition of things in a local assembly may not be what we would like to see.
And I can remember a sister telling me she wasn't gathered, but she said I'd like to be able to.
Find a nice assembly where there was a good gospel outreach and a nice selection of gift and good ministry and a varied number of people from young to old. I I'd like to find an assembly like that where I could fit in.
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I said, well, it's not always going to be that way. In these last days, we can thank God for all of those things. But I said, how about starting with yourself?
How about starting with yourself? You and your husband are both saved, I said. If you make a start, then maybe God will allow all those things. Not always, but he may.
No, she wanted to have the whole pie presented to her on a platter.
And then she could just join in and enjoy the benefits.
But Christianity is characterized by what it brings, and I believe that's.
What we have in these last few verses should be looked upon in that light, although it is personal as well, of course.
Personal, but in verse 15 I think we have a principle that shows how grace working in one individual spreads itself to others, so then it becomes collective. The Apostle Paul was in very conscious that he was a vessel.
The grace of God.
He could look at his own life naturally.
And recognize.
The sinful character of his own life. And then he appreciated the abundance of the grace of God that had worked in him. But that grace that then worked in him, God was using him to share with others, and they were recipients through the grace made to him and the way God used it for their blessing.
And then that resulted in further blessing and Thanksgiving to God. And God is glorified, and so is as it says, through the Thanksgiving of many rebound to the glory of God. And so God is glorified in his excellent way, in which he uses grace to be multiplied first in one soul, and through that soul to others, and from them to others also, And it continues to spread.
Another remark, and I don't want to keep on others have thoughts on this but.
Brother in our written ministry and some will recognize the source of this quotation said.
A humble believer is never discouraged.
When I read that, it sort of took me aback. I read it many years ago. It took me. I was taken aback for a little bit, I thought.
But the more I have thought about it, and the more I go on, the more I see the truth of it. A humble believer is never discouraged.
Because if I am discouraged, I am looking for something and expecting something.
Sometimes from others.
Sadly, sometimes even from the Lord and it doesn't happen.
And when that occurs, I can get discouraged.
But when we read this chapter, we see that whatever God allows.
It is for blessing, even if it is, shall I say it, seeing discouragement in others.
Then there's an opportunity.
There's an opportunity, yes. I can't always go out and turn someone else's life around, but I can seek to be an encouragement, and that is what I believe we are given in this chapter and the last few verses of this chapter. May I suggest bring that out.
Our outward man may perish.
The inward man is renewed. Day by day We may have affliction, Paul says. It's late affliction, It's only temporary.
But it's working for us, not against us.
We're looking not so much of what we see, but with the eye of faith at what we do not see.
And what a what a difference that makes when we see it that way.
Does that fit with your Jim Elliott quote, verse 17?
It does.
I wasn't the one that said that, someone else quoted him.
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Somebody did in here.
Say you, Bob. Yep.
Well then, does that fit verse 17?
I think so. Wonderful thing to experience day by day.
The renewal.
That God works in our hearts.
Physically, I don't think physiologists even understand how it is.
At times, we all know what it's like to be extremely tired or even exhausted.
And sometimes it's like it's almost makes you chuckles like that the body is capable of being so weary. How does it work that you lay down?
And in a few hours.
Be renewed. I don't think physiologists even understand how that works.
It doesn't make physical sense. You just stop something. It doesn't work with a truck or a back or a crane.
And it's renewed and spiritually how much?
What a necessity it is to be renewed day by day.
End of Second Corinthians 3/5 with Christ glorify were changed from glory to glory. Gradual process.
Don't just get up.
Of the spiritual energy. It has to be renewed day by day.
All rights to the Romans.
Exhorts them to be transformed by the renewing of their mind.
It falls upon us to be.
To be, you know, in Psalm 16.
The Psalmist says I have said the Lord always before me.
You say, well, when I'm discouraged, what do I do?
The discouraged person just stops reading and stops praying.
It just showed the the the balloon just just goes out of air.
I notice when I start to feel a little bit that way, when I lack that kind of humility, I think of Psalm 16. I have said the Lord always before me. No matter how I feel, I can do that.
Read and pray and lo and behold, the Spirit of God takes those things and renews me, and I have fresh spiritual energy. It's certainly the Apostle Paul and weariness who who served like him other than the Savior himself.
In this inner man, day by day, the contrast we've read in these in this chapter, outwardly troubled, inwardly not distressed, outwardly persecuted, inwardly not passed down. And he's summarizing it, it seems to me, in verse 16, renewed day by day, And then he takes it to another place in verse 17 and calls it a light and temporary affliction, but for a moment.
When you look at.
The Chapter 11 where you enumerate enumerates.
Trials he's went through that was light affliction.
But brethren, it's because he compared it with the eternal weight of glory, and there is no way to compare that.
So it's beautiful. Verse 16, like you mentioned, the outward man, the inward man.
Still remember visiting the brother Jackson?
Down in.
Tampa, FL years ago when I was young and.
Never forget, he was at the end of his life and he sitting in a easy chair, he couldn't. He needed help to get around it all.
And we went to visit him and he starts talking about the Lord's coming and I mean he got excited and he started waving his arms and he started sitting forward and he's talking and all of a sudden flop, his body goes back and.
In the chair, his spirit was too young for his body. And that's what it means, isn't it? The outward man perishes. The inward man is renewed day by day. Isn't that beautiful?
It's what is eternal. It's a life that doesn't grow old. It's impossible. It's renewed day by day. I think it's it's wonderful, but it's while we look, This is the key to it.
18 Isn't it? Well, we look not at the things which are seen, and it's so much of A tendency, especially in this country, to look at material things rather than their distractions. Yes, we have to attend to the food we eat and the house where we live to a certain extent. But, brethren, I often think of what Brother Clarence Linden used to say. The characteristic of Pilgrim life is simplicity.
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Lord, help us to be simple in our living habits.
Just to digress aside comment, when you mentioned the older one, I I know some of us younger are afraid to visit older ones. Part of the problem is we don't know what we're going to talk to them about. We don't know what to say and sometimes we look at them, they don't even know us anymore. It's discouraging. But what I have learned that I've been encouraged by older ones. That is, you don't need to say much.
Read scriptures.
Or sing hymns with them and I have witnessed that many times that they may look like they're out of it, but when scriptures are being read, our hymns are being sung with them, is interesting to see the reaction that I'd rather mentioned that all those thoughts coming back. So just a word of a courage.
Will be late, so we're not too nasty of a rush if there's one or two last comments to make or.
Perhaps the?
Physical man is hired to.
Make a comment about the perfect example for us.
Was the Lord Jesus ever discouraged?
Was the Lord Jesus ever fearful?
Could the Lord Jesus?
Always experience peace.
I think we all know the answer to those questions.
But God has put a treasure in us, the life of that man.
And now by the power of the same Spirit that animated him, the Holy Spirit.
Is in US to make good in US, those same things.
And it's good for us, that's why we gaze upon him, that we may learn, he says to us, when connection with it come unto me.
We're talking about pride and things like that, or when things are going good, he says. Come unto me, all you that labor are heavy laden.
And I will give you rest. We learn of him.
By occupation with himself and his life.
That we too may more enter in and experience the same.
You wake it up my ear warning by mirror warning to hear is the learn the Lord Jesus is a man had fresh renewal every morning in his life.
And he had fellowship with his father each, I'm going to say with confidence every morning. And there was that renewing.
Out the enjoyment and the lifting up of the spirit for the day that was ahead and when there was no opportunity for that because.
Of.
Circumstances.
He always went off alone.
That he might have that time alone with the Father in prayer. And so it's well for us to see the perfect example. And in that constant is, he says, we believe.
We have in Chapter 11 of Hebrews all these examples of people that live by faith.
But you don't get to the end of it till you get to chapter 12. And then you see the perfect example. Who for the joy that why is it there? Because it's to put the Lord Jesus as the perfect life of faith, to see who for the joy that was set before him, what endured.
It's not atonement there, but it's rather his life of faith. And so it's given again as a model to us to be occupied with himself and learn.
01:10:01
From him to practice those truths that what we say is too hard for me. God would say no. I gave you His life, so you have what's needed all. I don't have the power.
Is my Holy Spirit dwelling in you not sufficient power for it? Yes, it is. And so we're encouraged to live out in practice, not in theory, but to live in practice, that which is the grace of God.
The glory of God that it's been shining into our face.
The end of.
18th verse of chapter 3.
Has looked at more recently.
Sometimes we use a mirror and we talk about.
The law revealing it's like a mirror that we can look at it, see you're dirty, but it won't clean you up.
But quite in contrast with that.
You get Moses in the presence of the Lord and that glory shown in him, and now in the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ.
We get this glory of the Lord, the unveiled face. It's almost like looking at a mirror, but this is a mirror that will transform you while you look at it.
It's a person.
I was thinking 2 of.
Faith is very personal.
And it's a person that has to be personal to us. It's not a group thing.
And yet what Paul's doing here?
We we look at all the difficulties in the assembly at Corinth.
And verse 14 of chapter 4.
We mentioned more on that, but.
The last part says.
The Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you. Wasn't that quite a bit to say?
That was a difficult.
Assembly to work with. He's going to present us with you.
That death working in him might be life in them.
Absolutely marvelous.
At transforming power.
Lord Jesus, whoever dwelt in the bosom of the Father, you always see that.
Glorious evenness of character and the light that's shown in him.
Cost people around him some of them to hate him.
Sometimes when we take up the 5th chapter of Second Corinthians, you hear in summary.
Different reasons why we should and do.
For the Lord.
The beginning of chapter 5 it's. It's the shortness of the time and.
And so on looking forward into that change condition, we read then about the judgment seat of Christ which should exercise, and then we read about the love of Christ constrained us, which is that attractive power that leads us along, but at the end of our chapter.
Our light affliction, which is but for a moment working for us, a far more exceeding and eternal.
It seems to make people uncomfortable when it's mentioned that that which we gain or don't gain spiritually here in this life.
Will have an eternal effect. I think it's very exercising.
Sometimes we look at the afflictions among the Saints.
And we.
I think.
Brother Noah falls.
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Children from Florida, 14 years old.
Four children.
What an affliction.
But we.
Forget that God is forming all the souls about.
Person going through the afflictions.
And he's forming them.
For his glory.
And sometimes it's.
Quite hard to observe.
But the Lord so for all you may see, raise up a soul that observes that.
And has a tenderness to it as it works with other souls, because it observed this soul tribe sometimes we see.
Couple children that are raised with an afflicted parent.
And they grow up to be.
Marvelous Shepherds.
You know, just say God is forming souls to look at all this.
I was thinking 2 of years ago. I was in Eureka, CA and we went to the nursing home.
One little instance. That day we went to a home or a room where there were three women.
The one near the door was tied down in her bed. She was.
She had Alzheimer's and was.
Baffling. Incoherent.
We were able to talk to the other two ladies and.
I walked up to her bed and I just.
Said. I'm going to sing you a song.
And I just began to sing. Cheap went quiet.
I think. I think no one ever cared for me like Jesus anyway.
At the end, I said, Do you know the Lord Jesus?
Then she said I took care of that matter many years ago.
With a smile on her face and just like that, she went back to bed.
The treasure was inside.
A Roaring Lion
Open—Sam Ludvicek
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I have a short thought, maybe it'll lead to something else.
It's come up recently back home, this idea in First Peter Chapter 5.
And we often talk about it and have read it. Verse 8. Be sober. Be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, is a roaring lion walketh about seeking whom he may devour.
Whom resist steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world. It was mentioned that with all that's going on, there's a lot of people being filled with fear, a lot of Christians.
And back in the 60s, when I was pretty young, I still remember the school drills where they had people in school, the children hiding under the desk in case of a nuclear bomb. Well, like that it do anything. But nonetheless people are starting to be afraid like that again because of the threats from Putin and so forth.
We're just finishing up revelation in our local assembly and we were talking here recently about it and saying, look, we know there's no room in scripture.
For a nuclear Holocaust where the world wipes itself out, God won't allow that. But we could see something happen in Ukraine or something limited, and it's a pretty scary time for that. And a brother mentioned that maybe what we're seeing going on around the world, all these different things in a different places, our brother mentioned.
The persecution for Christians and other countries, certainly they go through much more than we do in many parts of this world.
Were confessing Christ can get you killed. Not nobody here is likely to confess Christ and get killed, but just want to make a note of this. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, is a roaring lion walketh about seeking whom he may devour. Now the male lion. When they roar in the jungle, it's not them.
That you need to be immediately afraid of. When they roar and they go around, you can think in your mind, and a native knows this. The safest place is not running straight from them. It's going sideways because the female lions are waiting for you, because he's driving you towards them, and they're going to tear you to pieces.
So when we lookout and we see the devil manifesting as a roaring lion, look in the direction that it's trying to drive people. That's where you don't want to be.
Because the rest of the pride, as they call it, is waiting. The females are waiting in the bushes as you drive them towards you. In Iowa, we've had a resurgence of coyotes.
And near the farmstead, or my brother and I, my wife reside in the evenings Now it's going to start coming in the fall. You'll hear the coyotes, Yip Yip, Yip Yip, Yip, Yip, Yip, Yip Yip Yip Yip. And you can hear them moving down through the Creek bed and so forth. And what they're doing is making noise because some silent ones are waiting up the Creek for the rabbits to come and they're going to kill them.
The noise is to drive you so when Satan roars.
He's trying to drive people in a direction, that direction that you see the sheep going and everybody that's that bows in fear to that running straight away from that's where you don't want to be.
Well, there's a lesson in that for us. And we see sometimes believers being driven in a direction like that and running afraid. We don't have to do that. We can calmly seek wisdom from this book and say, wait a minute.
I'm not going to go with the rest.
I'm going to take the wisdom of this book. I'm going to seek the Lord's mind and I'm going to go to the safe place. And if we are found, we're talking about Acts. How many times Paul ended up. He escaped many times, but there were times where he was.
Taken and he was beaten and he was whipped and he was stoned and so forth, and maybe that's coming for us down the road.
But when he roars, we need to take note of the direction he's seeking to drive people and be wise.
All Things That Pertain to Life and Godliness
Open—Brian Schoen
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Thank you, Sam. Just some brief thoughts from first and second. Peter.
Second Peter chapter one.
The last part of verse 2.
Jesus our Lord, according as his divine power has given unto us all things.
That pertain unto life and godliness through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue. I'm sorry.
Thought it might have been the caterer. Sorry about that. My phone was going off.
So I just wanted to.
Further what Sam was talking about.
Never seen things like they are in society today. The social fabric of this country is being torn in shreds and Christians are being attacked on the right and the left. Now we know our home is not here, our home is in the heaven. But yet we're going to journey here for as long as the Lord has a purpose for us. And then I'm going home where the Lord's going to come first. And so as we continue this journey here and the Word of God continues to become.
Kind of discredited.
Or watered down and these crazy notions about, well, if God really loves.
Then just, you know, they got to, you got to love everyone no matter what they're doing. Well, that's not righteous. God is holy, holy, holy, and he's given a way for everyone to have access to him, free access, by the gift of eternal life through Jesus his Son.
And yet, as we journey on here, some of these things might creep into our minds. You know the the enemy from the very beginning in Genesis, right? Set out to deceive and and make you question.
And I encourage you to please not question, Please remember who you have believed and who we belong to. I am 100% certain beyond the shadow of a doubt. And I will spend time with anybody to tell you I absolutely know that Jesus was here. Jesus is the Son of God. He died at the cross for my sins. And I'm holding in my hands the inspired word of God.
There is nothing too hard for God. So to preserve this book, you know, the Gutenberg printing press was considered by Time magazine the invention of the Millennium.
The invention of the Millennium. What was the first thing they printed on the Gutenberg printing press?
The Bible.
Why? Because no one ever spoke like this man. No one ever did what this man did. That's why these people were willing to lay down their lives and do whatever it took to get the good news out. So as we journey on, don't ever let the nonsense around you cause you to question what is truth and what is right. The Lord's given us all things that pertain unto godliness.
And I've shared with some phrases that this Christian that I work with shares with me. And he says be careful. If you think you should be helped, become open minded because your brain falls out. So do not decide your own ways you get the light and all things that pertain on to life and godliness from this book.
Now very important thing Philippians chapter 4.
Philippians chapter 4.
Verse 13.
I can do all things through Christ, which strengthens me. So the other thing that the enemy sometimes will take us down the path of thinking that we can kind of figure it out ourselves and do our own thing. Well, we know in the day of ruin and we know back in Judges every man did that which was right in his own eyes. And you see that's what's going on today. And it's hard to not be sucked into the world around you. It's hard to not be sucked into the environment.
If I went off into an area, well, OK, my kids were in Hawaii when the when the volcano was going off, there was ash all over. I mean, you can't if, if that's where you are, you sometimes you can't help but be affected by it. But you can then take action and countermeasures to not have it affect you. We have the word of God. We have the power of prayer. We have each other. We have so much light that has been preserved to us since the recovery of the truth.
00:05:04
We are so blessed, but I can't do anything. As I've gotten older. I used to maybe sometimes think I knew some things. As I get older. I know I don't hardly know anything and so but we can do everything through Christ who shrinks in us. So don't lose sight of that. That is our resource and all that's going on. Then a favorite verse in Jeremiah 29.
Now we all probably know Jeremiah 2911. For I know the thoughts that I think towards you saith the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, that I might give you an expected end, and that is a wonderful verse to commit to memory. But the other verse that is really enjoyable and I don't know that we get to enough, is verse 13.
And verse 13 says, You shall seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart, and I will be found of you, saith the Lord.
And so I can absolutely promise you that if you commit your heart to the Lord, the Lord will guide your paths in ways that you never conceived of. Even the even the fact that we're sitting here in this meeting room. I've shared with some my short sightedness. Because I encourage us that we need to look vertically and not horizontally as we do things. But yet I was looking horizontally a few months ago when we were talking about whether we're going to have a conference or not.
And my daughter, who would have been here with her husband and my 2 grandsons, was asking me and said, well, we're going to have a conference because we need to go to Arizona to visit Ben's parents. I said it doesn't look like it's going to happen because the venues are closed and we can't get in and we're a little late in the season. Well, so I was looking horizontally and I was deciding things in my own strength. And then so they booked their trips to Arizona and about two or three days later, then someone said, well, we could have the conference here in this meeting room.
And so I'm just like the disciples saying, well wait a minute, even 200 penny worth of bread won't solve this problem or whatever the case is and and we need to change our view. Remember that He's given us all things that pertain unto life and godliness. He loves you so much.
Nothing ever changes. This is love and today society is sitting there with.
Having no idea what truth is anymore because everyone just keeps making up their own version of whatever they want. But we have an anchor for our soul that tells us in Hebrews.
Today and forever. So in this world that is falling apart, the word told us it's falling apart, you don't need to and it's going to get worse. So there's no surprise here. You know, Sam talked about the way things were back in the 60s. I just have watched things deteriorate over the past 2-3 decades. It is going to get worse. But the word said that.
To almost 2000 years ago when Timothy wrote that. And so in the last days that's where we're living. But I would encourage you.
To take courage in the Lord to remember Proverbs tells us keep your heart more than anything that is guarded for. Out of it are the issues of life. So there's going to be a lot of things to distract us. As a matter of fact, society today can hardly be more distracted that than I and I can't even conceive right because found out 89% of the people in America.
Greater than 10 years old? Have a smartphone.
And and I don't, I'm not aware of a device that's more distracting. Certainly a helpful tool and I had in my pocket think indicators were calling a few minutes ago, right? But nevertheless, you won't believe. But people will spend the equivalent of about 7 1/2 years of their life looking at their smartphone. If that is not a distraction, again, it don't. Don't get me wrong, it's a great tool and I could do my Amazon order sitting at the traffic light or whatever I want to do.
But don't be deceived by the enemy. And so we have a wonderful God. He knew about this, right? God knows the end from the beginning. It tells us in Isaiah, and I think I heard this morning while I was in there. As for God, his way is perfect. And so we we know who we have believed. We can take great confidence in that. He could not love us any more than he does, and he wouldn't love us any less than He does.
So we are loved infinitely. Our heart is being challenged. Like Sam was saying, the enemy is pushing you in a different way all the time. We're being distracted. We're being discouraged. I have another thing, and I won't get into it now, but the deeds of the devil. And so the seat, discouragement, depression, distraction, and you can go on and on and on. And if you think about the things in your life that have left you in those low times, you can find that many of them began with AD.
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And they are the deeds of the devil. But we belong to an amazing Savior, and there is nothing that will ever pluck us out of His hand. We have eternal security. We are sealed with the holy, sealed with the Holy Spirit. So that can't go, sealed that cannot go away. And so take courage as your journey on. The Lord loves us so much. Don't let society with their open mindedness.
And their brains falling out distract you from the path that we're on.
Elisha and Emotions
Open—W.J. Prost
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
Perhaps I could read one verse.
Before we pray.
And be allowed to tell you a story.
Second Kings Chapter 3.
Second Kings Chapter 3.
And verse 14, Second Kings Three and verse 14.
Here we find Elisha.
In the midst of a hostile world.
And in the midst of two kings who were ungodly, and another king who was compromising.
Notice what he says.
Verse 14 and Elisha said.
Verse 15.
But now bring me a minstrel.
And it came to pass when the minstrel played.
That the hand of the Lord came upon.
You and I that live in the dispensation of grace don't look for musical instruments in the local assembly.
But it doesn't mean that we are without emotion.
And hearing about Eric Smith reminds me about his father got saved.
And there are many, or at least some here that know that story. But I'll tell it to you because.
Eric Smith told it to me personally.
His father was not a young man. He was in his 50s.
And Eric Smith's older brother Hugh, who was a godly man and Eric's mentor for many years.
Invited an evangelist to come to preach the Gospel in their area.
And he drove, of course, in those days a horse and buggy, and he had Gospel verses all over his body.
Gospel verses on the two sides and on the back and so on.
And when Eric Smiths father was a wealthy rancher in New Zealand as we know.
Saw that buggy, he said. Get that man out of here. I don't want that stuff. What? How ridiculous. This is a horse and buggy plastered with Bible verses. Get him out of here.
Oh, poor Hugh, who had invited him, had no choice but to escort the evangelist and his buggy out to the gate. But he said to him.
Don't stay away too long. Try again. Come back.
So a few months later, the evangelist came back.
And this time, Eric Smith father grudgingly allowed him to stay. OK, give him a room and let him stay here, but keep him out of my hair.
Of course, in someone's home it's hard to be quotation out of someone's hair every minute of the day.
So as they were sitting in the living room 1 evening.
Anyone who knew Eric Smith knew his family was very musical.
Fact. Eric Smith himself played the violin. He didn't do it very often, but he was a good violinist. And if you listen to tape recordings or cassette recordings or.
CD recordings of his meetings now and then the hymns are included and you will hear him in the background with a live mic break into the tenor or something like that. He had a good voice.
And all of his sisters could play the piano, and they were a musical family. So Mr. Smith senior asked the evangelist in the course of the evening. He said, Do you play anything?
Well, the evangelist was taken a bit off guard and he didn't play any musical instrument, but he said I'll sing you a hymn if you like.
Well, what could Mr. Smith say to that?
So he stepped up to the grand piano in the living room, and one of Eric Smith's sisters stepped up and played the accompaniment and said, What would you like to sing, Sir?
He said. I want to sing The glory Shines before me.
He knew all four verses by heart.
You had a good voice, and he sang to the accompaniment of that piano.
And Eric Smith said by the time the last verse was being sung.
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He saw his father.
With the tears running down his face.
That night, he got saved.
And then Eric's capped it off by saying, in his own, somewhat British in New Zealand, brogue.
And mother had 30 happy years.
You remember that, Bob? You've heard that story.
That's pretty near word for word, the way he told it to me. God is in many ways of preaching the gospel, sometimes in song.
Faith as a Grain of Mustard Seed
YP Sing—Mark Breman
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
So Joseph asked me to speak to young people. I didn't know what age group who all would be here.
So he said I should only speak for 5 minutes. I told him I didn't think I could do that. My wife told me I probably should.
But I'm saying the problem with my brother Pamela's has, I think.
Over planning on what you'd like to share, but I'm trying to keep it basic. I mean, I'd like to hear the rest.
Of his thoughts the Lord gave him, and too bad.
Limits things. I just consumed what, a minute and a half there that I could have been sharing past this.
So I look at a group of young people like this and I I know that.
Most I can.
Guests, everyone of you know the Lord Jesus as your savior. Maybe there's one who doesn't. I don't know that if there's one in this little group that doesn't.
I do want you to pay attention and and gather from this something that might be of a help to you as well, but what I want to talk about has to do with.
Those who do know the Lord Jesus as their savior, I think back when I was.
The same age as you guys.
The things that some of the difficulties I had in my life.
I'm not going to share with you something you don't already know.
I would like to just reinforce a little bit something that you already do know.
Sometimes that really helps just to get a little reinforcement again of something that you already know.
To root it deep into your heart. Those little things help along the way.
So.
Every one of us go through trials and difficulties in our life.
Hard times.
Difficult circumstances you might call mountains. That's what the Lord Jesus called them.
Can says anyone of you had a life where you really never had.
Problems or.
Difficulties. Is it ever had that?
How many of you have ever had a broken heart?
Those things are real.
They're real.
I mean, you've been in a car accident.
Things can happen.
A lot of different things happen.
One thing.
That we can always count on is trusting the Lord in those times, the difficulty, and that's what I want to talk about.
There's one.
Main Angry. I look around here and I said, I can't see anybody here that I don't think doesn't want to please the Lord. If you want to please the Lord in your life, raise your hand.
We all want to please the Lord. What's the one ingredient, The one main ingredient you have to have to please the world? One main ingredient.
It's in Hebrews Chapter 11.
And we'll read it verse 6.
But without faith it is impossible to please him.
One reading.
Faith. Faith. Trusting him.
Trusting the Lord in those times of difficulty, those times of hardship that you run up against. Every one of us have had circumstances, and I would just venture to say that some of you right now are going through circumstances.
That are really tough.
And if you aren't?
And we're left here you will.
I want to please the Lord and seek the Lord's mind in those things. Faith trust in you.
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I was.
Looking comparing some verses back and forth through in the Gospels and I ran across this this last about, well, actually about two weeks ago, Luke's Gospel, chapter 17.
Luke 17 and I'm going to read the first part of verse 6.
And the Lord and the Lord said, if he had faith. This is what struck me. Past tense.
Had three.
If he had faith as a grain of mustard seed.
And why? You've heard this before, I'm sure. Why doesn't it say a grain of sand?
Why does it say a grain of mustard seed?
Exactly, exactly. So I said I'm going to share some things, but you've probably already heard before because it's good to root those things out. There is life in a mustard seed.
And the Lord Jesus was saying to them, if you.
Had past tense. Faith is a grain of mustard seed.
You might have said, it is Sycamine tree. Be thou plucked up by the root and planted in the sea, and it should obey you.
Well, this sick of mine tree, I'm going to liken it to like a trial or a difficulty in your life.
To me, no.
Not in it anymore, but my boys are in the tree business, work with trees a lot. Couple years ago I went to do an estimate for a guy to do some tree work and it was a big Sycamore tree. There's something about a Sycamore tree that's really interesting. If if you take a tree, you know somebody studied in school about trees and stuff and they have the park, the outer bark, the inner bark, the cambium layer and then the sapwood and so on into the tree that can be in layer that goes around that. All the nutrients goes from the leaves to the roof, to the roof and back and forth.
If you cut that out all the way around the tree, just make a circle. But what happens to the tree?
They died. I got a picture on my phone of a Sycamore tree where a guy wanted to kill that tree, so he took a chainsaw and he cut a four inch groove all the way around that tree.
And couldn't kill the tree.
He was just full of leaves and looked as healthy as could be above the cup.
Start drawing moisture, I guess from the satellite or whatever it just kept on going for. He had done it several years before. Maybe there's a trial like that where you just want to get rid of it and you don't want to have anything to do. It's just something that it maybe it plagues you, maybe it's just something you're scared of.
Maybe it's in some situation, you just don't know how to handle it.
Just don't forget how small a grain of mustard seed is, and the Lord said if you had it.
Past tense. Now let's go to Matthew's Gospel, chapter 17.
Matthew 17.
Verse 20.
And Jesus said unto them.
Because of your unbelief.
For verily I say unto you, if you have present tense right now, in the circumstance, right now, if you have faith, is a great mustard seed.
And here it's the mountain.
It's in the way the mountains.
The difficulty.
Same line of thoughts and what I want you notice here is its present tense. Now let's go to Mark 11.
Mark 11 and verse 22.
And Jesus answering saith unto them.
Have faith in God, future tense.
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Past, present, and future.
These trials are going to come. You've had trials, you've had difficulties. You're in them now. If left here, they're in the future.
Past, present, and future.
And this is the verse that that came to mind. Let's go to James.
James Chapter one only No right where I'm going.
Verse 6.
But let him ask in faith. Nothing wavered.
Wavering.
You know there is a time factor involved in wavering, isn't there?
This way back that way. This way back off way.
Past, present and future. The Lord wants us to consistently.
Now Dorothy sat on him, nothing wavering.
You know you can think of circumstances in your life.
That have proved God's faith and he won't let you down.
I don't know. I'll just share.
I know a little.
OK, I'll just. I'd like to tell stories on my cell phone going to.
That's a little boy. My dad was a Barber. He didn't have much finances.
He's a struggle sometimes so.
Meet men.
And.
I was in the living room. My mom was on the phone crying with dad. He was down at the Barber shop and.
Heard half the conversation and mom was saying we have no food in the house.
And Dad was talking about the bills that needed to be paid. And we'll never forget this.
My dad and mom started praying together on the phone. He was in town, we were out in the country and they started praying together asking the Lord for what to do. And while they were praying there was a bang on the front window when it pheasant had flown into the window and broken its neck. My mom said if there was a crash on the window with that one and she came back to the phone and said it was a pheasant.
In the window.
Thank the Lord.
Many of you had a circumstance in your life that it's kind of like strange like that, that you knew the Lord was reaching out to you.
You think of things that happen. Probably you're driving down the road one time and exhaust stack fell off of a semi and then another truck hit it. It was coming up, spinning right for our windshield and it was just coming down. And I called on the name of Jesus.
And Honey and I watch that exhaust pipe go over the air. We drove right underneath that and we hit the road behind us.
Sparks were flying.
Different things like that.
I know a guy that.
That financial difficulty trying to meet some bills and things.
And he went outside on his way to work one day and he put his hands up in the air. And he says we don't need $400.
I'm going to get it, but I need $400.
And on Monday there was two guys that came over to his house and said, the Lord told us to come over here and give this to you, and they gave this God.
Faith trusted in the war.
The almost stories like that.
Nothing, Waverly.
Maybe you want to do that? Something you want to share. Anything happening in your life that you want to share?
Lord help you with.
I'm sure you've been thinking of something.
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It's kind of hard. I'm putting you on the spot.
OK. You weren't prepared to share anything. That's all right. I don't know that you can think of things.
Where the Lord showed himself faithful to you.
And don't forget those things. Hang on to those things. Don't let go of them.
Because when times come.
That your faith is tested. Remember nothing wavering.
Past, present, and future. The Lord wants that same faith to be anchored in His supply. Doesn't mean a lot of faith.
Grain of mustard seed. And we've often heard before, it's not the faith.
Intuitive.
And so we trust him because of who he is.
Not on the basis of our faith.
But on the basis that our God is so much greater than the things that we come up against, He's known all about it before it ever happened.
And he wants to hold our hand right through it to prove his love and care to us.
I wrote a verse.
According to this king to me that Philippians 4.
Philippians 4 and verse 4. Rejoice in the Lord always and again. I say, rejoice. Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand. What does that mean? The Lord is at hand.
He's right there. Don't take it. I mean, it's nice to think of it, you know, the Lord is coming, is coming, is near. That's not what it means.
He's right there for you.
He's right there.
But those, whatever those circumstances, are that Sycamore tree, those mountains.
The Lord is right there. The Lord is at hand right there.
Be careful for nothing but everything.
By prayer and supplication for Thanksgiving. What your request be made Melinda Gall these are right there.
Talk to him about it.
Sometimes it helps to thank him for the things we don't like.
You want us to?
Prayer is general supplication specific. Don't forget the Thanksgiving part, it's very important the Lord is right there.
Nothing waiting.
Prasma, trust the Lord. Junior trials trust the Lord for his direction and all those circumstances where life would come your way. You'll have them. You've had them. You have them now.
Just lean on him.
Gospel
Gospel—R. Thonney
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.
Well, I'd like to read first of all a verse, well known verse in First Timothy chapter one.
And verse 15.
This is about the Lord's first coming.
Incredible story of the coming of the Son of God into this world in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ.
First Timothy 115 tells us the purpose of his first coming.
This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief, Paul says.
So this is his first coming. His first coming was with the purpose of saving sinners. Now that's quite a task.
Because Scripture tells us clearly that all have sinned and come short of God's glory, we cannot meet God's standards on our own. And besides that, Scripture also tells us very clearly the wages of sin is death.
Have you ever known anybody that has escaped death in this world? Sometimes there's people who die when they're old, sometimes the people who die when they're very young.
Never forget going to a funeral at a Funeral Home. I think it was here in the Chicago area.
And as we visited the family of the deceased brother or sister, they said go look in that other room over there and there was a room where there were three caskets.
A bigger one in the middle and two small ones on either side.
It was a mother who had had a head on collision and killed her and her two children. And there they were, the three of them. So death does not.
Respect any age, any age group may.
Call be called out at any time?
Oh, what a serious thing. Death is a reality in our world, and it's the wages of sin.
And so it applies to all who are sinners and we are all sinners.
But not only that, Scripture also tells us another detail that is very serious.
In Hebrews Chapter 9, it says after death is the judgment, and so death does not end at all. There is to appear before God and settle the accounts. There's no way anybody will ever be able to avoid that. Now you can see the importance of settling this issue, not only settling it according to the demands of some particular religion.
But according to God's way of thinking, and that's why God sent his Son into the world.
To address this issue, He came and the Lord Jesus, as we've often mentioned, was not born of a human father. He was miraculously born of a virgin, the Virgin Mary, and as such He did not have a sin nature, and so He had come with a specific purpose of dying in our place. And I'd like to go to the.
Gospel of Luke Where our brother last night.
Had in mind to take us and to read a bit there about.
What the Lord Jesus did when he was crucified and especially.
Another malefactor that was nailed to another cross beside him.
There were three that were led out of the city of Jerusalem that day and nailed to crosses.
It appeared there were three malefactors to be executed that day.
And the method of execution of the Roman Empire was crucifixion.
Don't mess with Rome. If you do, this is how you're going to end your days.
So there were three. In the middle was God's beloved Son, the Lord Jesus, the one who had never committed any sin in his whole life. And yet people rejected him. Especially the religious community rejected him.
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And they finally got Pilate to condemn him to the death of crucifixion. And they took him outside the city of Jerusalem. They pulled out his hands, and they put spikes through his hands and his feet. And there he was hung between heaven and earth for six hours. He lasted in life there from 9:00 in the morning, according to the way we calculate time.
To 3:00 in the afternoon.
And then here they bring 2 malefactors and they will hang one-on-one side and another on another side. I'm going to just read the story here so that you can see.
What God has given us to understand here, let's go to Luke chapter 23 and we'll begin reading at verse 32.
And there were also two other malefactors. That means people who had done bad stuff.
LED with him to be put to death and when they were come to the place which is called Calvary.
There they crucified him and the malefactors, one on the right hand and the other on the left. Then said Jesus.
Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do, even in this awful suffering, the Lord Jesus.
Pled for forgiveness for his tormentors, and they parted his gaunt raiment and cast lots. And the people stood beholding and the rulers also with him derided him, saying he saved others.
Let him save himself if he be Christ.
The chosen of God.
You know what? If he would have saved himself, there would be no salvation for lost sinners like you and me.
But he stayed there on that cross verse 36, And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him and offering him vinegar, and saying, If thou be the king of the Jews, save thyself.
And a superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek and Latin and Hebrew. This is the king of the Jews, And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying.
If thou be Christ, save thyself, and us but the other.
Answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation he was coming to his senses. Here I'm going to die, and I'm going to have to step across the line and face God to give an account of my life.
We're in the same condemnation in this we indeed just leave verse 41, for we receive the due reward of our deeds. But this man.
Referring to the Lord Jesus.
Has done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus.
Lord, Remember Me.
When thou comest into thy Kingdom, he recognized that Jesus was Lord, and somehow he recognized that Jesus had a coming Kingdom. He must have believed in the resurrection.
Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee.
To day shalt thou be with me in paradise.
What is this?
Does God let thieves into Paradise?
How could this?
Possibly be that he could say to this thief today, shalt thou be with me in paradise.
Somebody's going to have to pay the price of all the sins that this thief has committed.
And so notice what follows immediately, Verse.
44 and it was about the 6th hour. That's 12 noon the way we calculate time.
And there was a darkness over all the earth until the 9th hour.
And the sun was darkened.
The veil of the temple was rent in the midst.
You know, Scripture doesn't talk. Tell us too much more about these three hours of darkness when the sun is right overhead until 3:00 in the afternoon. It was dark. Nobody could see what was taking place.
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But God, who is holy, has to be satisfied about the question of sin. If he's going to forgive you, somebody has to pay the price.
Of redemption.
And it was in those three hours that God took our sins and laid them on Jesus, and then God took his punishment rod, and for three solid hours.
Punished the Lord Jesus on that cross.
Incalculable sufferings that he suffered to be able to redeem.
Guilty sinners like you and me.
No wonder he could say to that thief to day shalt thou be with me in paradise, because in those three hours he paid the price of redemption. He paid for those sins that that thief had committed. You know God is holy, and his character must be vindicated if he's going to forgive you your sins. God cannot just say, OK, we're going to sweep those off into the corner and forget about him.
No way can that happen. Every single.
Sin must receive its full punishment from the hand of a righteous God, and that's what happened in those three hours of darkness.
In the Gospel of John, we're not going to read it now, but it says at the end of those hours, he said. It is finished.
The full payment for sin was paid in full by the Lord Jesus on that cross.
And after he had given up his life, it tells us there in John's Gospel that a soldier came and pierced his side with a spear and outflowed blood and water.
The price of our redemption was paid in full by the blood of God's eternal Son.
Oh, what a story. I can't believe it. Hardly. It's so amazingly wonderful.
But God was satisfied with the payment that Jesus made on that cross. So satisfied was he.
That he raised in the third day from the dead, and God has not quit raising Jesus.
Until He ascended upon high in the glory. There is a man, the man Christ Jesus, sitting at God's right hand in glory. Now God was satisfied with the payment that He made for our sins. This was his purpose. When he rose from the dead three days later. He was amongst his disciples at different occasions, and in one occasion.
He was with 500 brethren at once, it tells us in the Scripture. So there were many witnesses to the fact that Jesus was raised from the dead.
You know, even if you ignore the testimony of Scripture as to his resurrection, I understand that even in human history, one of the best established facts of human history is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. He not only died and was buried, but he rose from the dead. God raised him from the dead because he was fully satisfied with the payment that Jesus made.
For our sins.
And before he was taken up into glory, because he was here for 40 days in this world, appearing to one, sometimes two, sometimes a whole group together. But they saw him and he interacted with him until 40 days later.
He was taken up into heaven, and Jesus is in heaven today, waiting.
And now I want to get around to the second part of the message. It's Jesus is coming again. Let's go to John's Gospel chapter 14 for.
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The promise that he gave before he left this world.
Jesus is coming again. Listen to what he says.
John Chapter 14 verse one. We're going to read 6 verses here.
Let not your heart be troubled, ye believe in God.
Believe also in me. You know, there's a lot of troubled people in this world today.
Are you troubled? Let me tell you.
The remedy is believed in God and believe in the Lord Jesus. Then he says in verse two, In my father's house are many mansions.
Ye, if it were not so, I would have told you, I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, notice this, I will come again.
To be any clearer, Jesus promised before he left. He is going to come again, and that promise has not been fulfilled yet. He's coming again.
And he says, I will come again, and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there ye may be also.
Whither I go, Ye know, and the way ye know.
Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest? And how can we know the way?
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
No man cometh unto the Father, but by me It is a wonderful portion of Scripture.
Where the Lord Jesus speaks about his father's house.
You're not really only speaks of one house in heaven, it's the Father's house. And that word, many mansions really should be many abodes. In that father's house, there's a place for everyone of God's redeemed children.
That wonderful.
You know, I like to talk to people in some of the countries where I travel.
Meet up with people who have quite a few children.
I like to ask them sometimes.
Which is your favorite child?
One brother down in the Dominican Republic.
That I got to know who had 33 children.
I don't know how he could keep track of that many, to tell you the truth.
But our God has many children, and if you are his child, he has a specific place prepared for just you. You're not going to be lost in the crowd up there. No, there's a place specifically prepared for you. I think that's so wonderful to realize because sometimes, you know, you're in a crowd of people and you just feel kind of lost in the crowd.
Remember being in a crowd of people of several thousand people down in Bolivia one time? And it was some candidate that was speaking way up front. I could see him, barely see him.
I felt lost in the crowd.
But you know, when we get to heaven, you won't have to feel lost in the crowd. The Lord Jesus has a place. If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus, he has a place specifically prepared for you. I have four children in my family. Let me tell you, each one of them is special. In my heart, I can't say one is more special than another. They're all special.
In different ways, of course. And so I think that is what it means. I go to prepare a place for you, for David. There is a place prepared for you, brother. And to me, there's a place prepared for me. I'm sorry you can't fill that place. To have your place in that Wonderful. I find that so encouraging.
But notice what he says here.
I will come again if I go and prepare a place for you. I will come again. So Jesus is coming again and I want to, briefly.
Take up the question of his coming again.
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What he's speaking about here is coming to get his own people, his redeemed ones, those that have faith in him. I trust, my friend, that you are here and your faith is in him. If it is, he's coming for you.
He's promised to come and he's never failed on one of his promises yet, and to me, I find this so amazingly wonderful. This is what we would call the Rapture.
At any moment it could take place the Lord Jesus when he speaks of it in other places.
Does give us to understand that there is no earthly sign that indicates exactly when it will be. It may take place while we're sitting here in this room. I trust that this room will be completely empty. If that should take place. I hope that nobody will be left sitting in their seat, so do make sure.
That your faith and confidence is in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because notice what he says.
When Thomas asks, in the way, Thomas seemed to wonder what? How can we make sure Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. It's not a matter of a of a religion. Some people say I'm Roman Catholic, others say I'm Presbyterian, I'm Pentecostal. It's not a matter of belonging to some religious organization, it's a matter of a person.
The person of God's beloved Son. He's the one that paid the price of redemption. He's the one that our confidence must be in, and if it is in him, then we can know for sure that he's coming to get us. He is his own glorious person, the way, the truth, the life. And no man comes to the Father but by him.
But I want to go to another.
Portion of scripture is found in Matthew's Gospel that speaks of his coming as well, and this is his the second part of his second coming.
His first coming took place 2000 years ago.
But his second coming that has not taken place yet.
Has two specific parts. The 1St is to come to get his own redeemed people and take them to the father's house. That's what we wait for at any moment.
But then he's coming again, and the specific purpose is to judge this world. Those that will not have him, those that refuse him, he's going to judge them. And so we're going to read quite a bit of this chapter to show you the serious times that are just before us. I think it's important that we should be aware of where we are and what's ahead.
Notice in chapter 24 we'll start with verse 3.
As he That's the Lord Jesus sat upon the Mount of Olives.
Remember, the Mount of Olives was outside the city of Jerusalem, across the Kidron Valley, and over to the east was the Mount of Olives. There he is sitting. The disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?
Or the end of the age.
Because we're living in an age that is called the times of the Gentiles.
The Old Testament There was a king of Babylon, and he came and defeated.
The royal lineage of the House of David and when he took that king captive to to Babylon, then began a day that's called the Times of the Gentiles and that's the day we live in.
And that time continues today, and it will continue until the end of a time of judgment and when the Lord Jesus comes back from heaven in person with his people.
To take the Kingdom, he is going to take it away from the Gentiles, and the Gentiles of the Gentiles will be over.
And that's what it's talking about when it says the end of the world. It's the end of the age, the end of the times of the Gentiles. Now notice Jesus is talking about this. That will take place, we believe, after the Lord takes His people home to the Father's house in the Rapture. This is the time called the Great Tribulation.
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Verse four says Jesus answered and said unto them, Take he that no man deceive you.
For many shall come in my name, saying I am Christ, and shall deceive many.
Incredible to read some of these things because as you travel around you hear these stories. And when I we were residents still in Bolivia, there was a man, I think he was born in Chile and came through Argentina to Bolivia and he professed to be the Messiah.
And I was amazed how people fell for him.
He said I am Christ.
Remember we used to have a little book room on the main class of Montero to the north of Santa Cruz, Bolivia and.
One day into that book room came a man who was a follower of this man.
And so I talked with him a little bit. I said, man, you'd better be careful. It says in Scripture very clearly when Jesus comes back to set his feet down on this world, every eye shall see him. I haven't laid hands on this guy you're telling me about.
And he listened to me for a while. And you know what He said.
You talk bad about him, but the more you talk bad about him, the more I worship him. And he turned and walked out. I was astounded at the blindness of that poor man, that worship that man. I hear he's disappeared since. So I don't know where that man is in connection with that, but it's something that's happening in today's world.
Some of you remember a man down in Texas called David Koresh.
In Waco, TX. I think it should have been Waco TX.
But he said he was Christ as well.
Still, remember what a radio commentator said down there. Somebody asked him about it and he said, you know, what surprises us is not so much that David Koresh says he's Christ. It's how many people call up the radio station and say he couldn't be Christ because I'm Christ. All over the United States they call him up and say that, well, it's what God, what the Lord has said is going to happen. Take he that no man deceive you for many shall come in my name saying.
I am Christ, and shall deceive any.
Ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars.
Does that resonate?
Wow. See that ye be not troubled, for these things must come to pass, But the end is not yet.
For nation shall rise against nation, and Kingdom against Kingdom, and there shall be famines and pestilences and earthquakes in diverse places.
All these are the beginning of sorrows.
Boom. These things are going to take place after the Lord has called his people home. The beginning of sorrows. Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you. And you shall be hated of all nations for my namesake. And then shall many be offended, and they shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. Many false prophets shall arise, and shall deceive many, because iniquity shall abound the love of many.
Shall wax cold.
He that shall endure unto the end in the same shall be saved. Now he's not talking to believers like we at this time, because we're going to be raptured into the Lord's presence and taken to the Father's house before this takes place. But he's talking to these Jewish believers and during the time of tribulation that follows, many are going to believe, and he says they're going to have to endure to the end.
And they're going to be saved in the sense that they will go into the millennial day.
Into the earth during.
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Under the Lord's righteous reign.
This gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come.
We don't preach the gospel of the Kingdom now. We preach the gospel of the grace of God. If you accept the Lord Jesus as your savior, you have the forgiveness of sins, you have eternal life, and you have a home in heaven. That's the gospel we preach. But the gospel of the Kingdom is if you repent and believe the gospel of the Kingdom, you will go into the Kingdom on earth under the reign of Christ.
But there's one added detail that needs to be addressed. If you have heard the offer of God's salvation and have not accepted it in that time of tribulation that comes, you will be deceived because there's going to be awful deception during this time of tribulation.
Now gonna keep on reading verse 15 of something that takes place that is extremely serious and is spoken of by Daniel the Prophet, when he therefore shall see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the Prophet stand in the holy place. Whoso readeth let him understand.
Then let them which be in Judea flee into the mountains. Let him which is on the housetop, not come down.
To take anything out of his house, neither let him which is in the field returned back to take his clothes, and woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days. But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath day, For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world. To this time no, nor ever shall be.
That's what's ahead for this world. Great tribulation. People don't have a clue as to the awfulness of the judgment that's getting ready to fall upon this world. That's why we urge you, if you have not accepted the Lord Jesus, don't put it off any longer.
Open your heart to the Lord Jesus. Accept him, Believe in Him to those that receive him To them gave he power to become the sons of God, to them that believe on his name.
So then it says, verse 22 And accept those days should be shortened. There should be no flesh be saved, but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ or there, believe it not.
There shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders in so much that if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect. Behold, I have told you before.
Wherefore, if they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert, Go not forth. Behold, he is in the secret chamber. Believe it not. For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the West, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be For wheresoever the carcass is, there will the Eagles be gathered together when those believing Jews get out of Jerusalem, because that's.
Where the abomination of desolation is going to be in the temple that's going to be rebuilt.
When they all leave, what's going to be left? Is a mass of lifeless Judaistic?
People. And that's the carcass. And there's where the Eagles are going to be gathered together. It's figurative of the nations that are going to come to meet their end with with the Lord Jesus there.
Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light. There's going to be a complete change of earthly authority. And the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven shall be shaken, And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven. And then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet. This is not the rapture, because when the rapture takes place, the Lord himself descends from heaven with a shout.
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With the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first. But here it's a different time. It's he sends his angels. These are the elect of the children of Israel, the great sound of the trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Now learn a parable of the fig tree when his branch is yet tender, and put a fourth leaves. You know that summer is nigh. So likewise ye when ye shall see all these things.
Know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I said to you, This generation shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall no not pass away. Now notice verse 36 but of that day and that hour.
Knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. For as the days of Noah were, so shall also the days the coming of the Son of Man be as in as in the days were before the flood, they were eating and drinking.
Marrying and given in marriage until the day that Noah entered into the ark and knew not.
Until the flood came and took the mall away, so shall also the coming of the Son of Mandy.
Then shall two be in the field, and one shall be taken in the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill, one shall be taken, and the other left.
Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come, but know this, that if the good man of the house had known in what watch the thief would come.
He would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore be ye also ready. You listen to me.
Be ready.
For in such an hour as you think, not the Son of Man cometh. This, of course, is talking to the Jewish believers that were listening to him. Now I'd like to go over to the 25th chapter and down to verse.
31 Where we have the judgment that takes place at the end of the Great Tribulation period, the throne of his glory, he's going to sit on the throne of his glory. He's going to judge those that remain alive at the end of the great tribulation.
Notice how it tells us about them.
Verse 31 of chapter 25 When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered all nations, and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, and the goat's on the left.
Then shall the king say unto them on his right hand.
Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Here's those that have recognized His authority, and they will enter into the Kingdom on earth under the rain of the Lord Jesus.
For I was in hunger, and you gave me meat. I was thirsty, and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and he took me in.
Naked. And he clothed me. I was sick, and he visited me. I was in prison. He came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when Saudi were in hunger, and fed thee or thirsty, and gave thee drink, when saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? Or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee, sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the king shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you.
Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of my brethren, my brethren, these my brethren, you have done it unto me.
Verse 41 The goats. Here's the goats that are on his left hand, figurative of those nations that have rejected the testimony.
Then shall he say unto them Down his left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed into everlasting fire. Notice this prepared for the devil and his angels. Let me say this. God has never prepared everlasting fire for any human being. He prepared it for the devil and his angels. But for the person who will not accept his lordship, who will not?
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Believe in him.
They will have for their company for all eternity the devil and his angels in everlasting fire. That's why we are urgent in pressing this matter of decision for the person of the Lord Jesus.
Verse 42 For I was in hungered, and he gave me no meat, I was thirsty, and he gave me no drink. I was a stranger, and he took me not in naked, and ye clothed me not sick in prison, and ye visited me not. Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when sorry thee and hunger.
Or a thirst or stranger, naked and sick and in prison and did not minister into the.
Then shall he say unto them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as he did it not to one of the least of these, you did it not to me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal.
O my friend, how important it is that we get these things straight.
The Lord Jesus is coming back again. First of all to take all His people to the Father's house.
But then he's coming back to set this world in order, and it depends on your response to Jesus. What will you do with Jesus? What is the response of your heart?
To remember many years ago.
That has a boy. I opened my heart and accepted Jesus as my Savior. It was a simple matter. It was not a complicated matter. It's a matter of confidence, not head belief, but heart belief. If thou shalt confess with my mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Scripture speaks so clearly about it, and you can be sure of your eternal salvation.
If you will simply accept God's Word, believe it, and be saved.
Christ came once to save. Christ is coming again, and oh how important it is that you be ready. We are living in serious times. I really believe that our country is on the downward trend. We pray for those in authority that God would.
Put a resistance to the evil that is being propagated. But it's evident that things have gone so far that I don't know if God's going to give a reprieve or not. We just don't know that.
But I say, the way you can be sure of your soul's salvation.
Is by settling the issue clearly in your soul? Where is your confidence in a religious denomination? Or is it in the person of God's beloved Son, the one who went to that cross, the one who paid the price of redemption in full, the one who rose again, and the one who is at God's right hand? If your confidence is in Him, then you can be assured of full and free salvation.
There's any question that anyone would like to have answered?
We're certainly open to talk with you.
Judas, Pilate, Thief
Gospel—Michael Hapanowicz
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Well, good evening and welcome to the Gospel Meeting. You know, if I could pull back the curtain a little bit, I just want to share with you that a couple minutes ago there were a couple of us here met in a room and just a little bit Yonder and we held what was called Prayer for the Gospel Meeting.
And it's remarkable to see. You know, the room was filled with grown men, and yet here they were, burying their heart before the Lord. And as I go into this and I I hear the chorus of amends that ascends at the end of each prayer, it always does my heart good.
And I've sometimes thought, you know, if we would just hold the prayer for the gospel here in this room with everyone present, I think there are souls that would be saved even before the message was delivered.
So I want you to know tonight, if you are sitting here in your chair and you have never accepted Christ as your Savior, you are cared for.
You are loved and you have been prayed for.
And that's how much those who have hosted this wonderful conference and this meeting here tonight care about you. So I pray that that's not lost on your soul. And there are so many people in the world here today who think no one cares about me. But that's not true for you here tonight. So let's open with, from our hymn sheets here, the echoes of grace.
Hymn #30.
Someone could start that for us. Please hymn #30.
You must save me, though my face were breathing.
Like an hour away my fears.
Could not watch the sins of years weeping. Will not save me.
Jesus.
Flat and die for me.
It's a suffer upon the tree.
Jesus waits to make me free.
Be alone and say.
Working when I'm saying.
That I can do only as I'd send feelings to can I for my soul on you working will not save me.
Jesus.
Jesus suffered on the tree.
Jesus waits to make me free.
Can't say me.
Waking will not save me. God bless. Guilty. Lost by life.
In my ear is first is crying. If I wait, I can but I.
Waiting will not save me.
Jesus.
Plead and die for me.
Jesus suffered on the tree.
Jesus waits to make me free.
He alone can save me.
They think Christ will save me.
Trust in him, thou Raisin won't trust the work that he has done.
To his arms I now make one.
Faith in Christ will save me.
Gives us flare and die for me.
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Privilege of travelling to another country. Actually a couple, but Malawi is the one I'm thinking of specifically, and in that country they wrote a tract.
Was seven things that will not save you.
And we've had a couple of those things mentioned here in this song tonight, but thankfully there is that fourth verse of the song that tells us what will save you.
Faith in Christ will save you. And now before we pray, I want to read 2 verses for you.
First one is in the book of Ecclesiastes.
It's in the 11Th chapter.
Ecclesiastes Chapter 11, verse three. And this is what it says. If the clouds be full of rain, they empty themselves upon the earth.
And if the tree fall toward the South or toward the north?
In the place where the tree falleth.
There it shall be.
The other reference is in the book of Luke.
The 14th chapter.
Luke, chapter 24 and verse. Sorry Luke chapter 14 and verse 26.
If any man come to me.
And hate not his father and mother and wife and children, and brethren and sister Yay, and his own life also.
He cannot be my disciple.
Those are kind of unusual verses to read at a gospel meeting, don't you think?
I don't know if I have ever heard Ecclesiastes, 11, read at a gospel meeting.
I want to share with you two stories, and I don't intend to share the names of the individuals in this story. I want you to know that both of these are true stories. They happen to real men, one of which I know personally, the other of which I only know of. But the stories are something like this. The first one took place in the life of a man who was around 18 years of age.
And he had just graduated high school, and he was a basketball player.
And he had applied to a number of universities, but he was offered a scholarship to play at a Christian university for their basketball team.
And this man had.
I suppose he might have said he was a Christian in the extent that that's just kind of the thing that you do or say here in America, at least at the time when he was young. But he had no personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, and so when he was offered this scholarship at this Christian university, he decided that it was the best offer he had received.
And so that was the school that he was going to go to. Not because it was a Christian university, but we might say, despite the fact that it was a Christian university.
But as he played there basketball, it was the habit of the team.
Before the game to meet together in a huddle and one or two of the basketball players there would share some thought or some scripture and they would pray together.
And one evening before a basketball game.
The team captain read that verse from Ecclesiastes, Chapter 11, verse 3. There's a different translation, but the thought is more or less the same. If a tree falls in the forest, whether it falls north or South, wherever it falls, that's where it stays.
And that night, this young man could not fall asleep.
And as he lay there on his bed, he could not get out of his mind the image of himself.
As a tree dead.
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Within eternity, that was fixed.
And unmovable.
And that night he got off of his bed. He got onto his knees, and he cried out. Lord, save me.
And he was saved.
And he went on to be used very powerfully of the Lord.
The second story that I want to share with you is also the man who is around 18 years of age and he was raised in a religiously observant household.
He would, I suppose, have considered himself to been religiously observant as well. He too had never come to a saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
But the school that he was attending put on a play. The name of the play was Godspell. It's a play about the Gospel of Luke. And so he attended that play.
Shortly after there was a movie version of it came out, also called Godspell on the Gospel of Luke. And he went and he watched the movie Godspell and he thought to himself, you know, I've seen a play on the gospel of Luke, and I've seen a movie on the Gospel of Luke.
Maybe I should read the Gospel of Luke.
So he went home, found a Bible, and he began to read.
And he couldn't put it down. He couldn't put it down until he got to the 14th chapter.
And he came to that 26th verse that we read. If a man doesn't hate his father and mother, he cannot be my disciple. And he thought to himself, can this possibly mean what it's saying?
And you know, the interesting thing is.
His mind didn't go as he thought about. Who can I ask?
Who knows the Bible? His mind didn't go to the priest.
It went to an old man in the neighborhood who had taught a Bible study for young men.
He thought to himself, I'm going to ask that man.
What does this verse mean?
So he made his way up the street. He knocked on the door.
Asked if he could come in.
And he had a conversation with that old man about Luke's Gospel 14, verse 26.
And after the man explained the verse, the old man explained the verse. He asked the young man, do you want to be saved?
And the young man said no.
And the old man asked again.
Do you want to be saved?
And the second time?
That young man said yes.
And that night, he was saved.
You know, if we were to go back in time and you were to ask me.
I want you to go share the gospel with these two young men.
And I want you to think of justice, the right verse.
That will get hold of their soul.
I would never in a million years have picked Ecclesiastes 11/3, and I never in a million years would have picked loose Gospel chapter 14 verse 26.
But those are the 2 verses that God used to get ahold of their souls.
And so my plea with you here tonight is this.
Listen. Listen to the word of God. Listen to the word of God like your life depends on it.
Because it does.
I want to speak to you tonight.
About the final 24 hours.
Of the Lord's life.
And in the final 24 hours of the Lord's life, there are a number of different individuals that he interacts with.
We are not going to look at all of them.
But we are going to look at three of them.
They are.
Judas.
Pilot and the thief on the Cross. And even though these three men have lived and died a long time ago.
I think in some ways everyone here is either.
Judas Pilate.
Were the thief.
And you might be surprised which one of the three.
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You should want to be.
Now it is my hope that as we go through the interactions of the Lord Jesus with these three individuals.
That even as we examine, we might call it the profile of these three men. We would not lose sight of keeping the main thing the main thing.
And that is that the Lord Jesus would be the focus of everything that is said here tonight. It is not possible for me to emphasize strongly enough that he.
Is what your soul needs.
So I do pray that he would be our main focus. Let's turn to Matthew's Gospel, chapter 26.
And before we read verse 20 through 25, I just want to give a little bit of the context for this setting.
And where does one even begin to provide the context for this? Well, let me go back all the way to the birth of the Lord Jesus.
That miracle that we call the Incarnation is the reality that God has stepped into this world as a man.
And even as he became truly a man, he stayed.
Truly, God.
And he walked on this world for 30 years, and in those thirty years he lived his life before the eyes of only one.
Of God as Father.
There was really very few else who noticed or cared that the God of this universe had stepped into his world.
And in those thirty years which we know very little about.
He lived a life that was totally pleasing to God his father.
So that before anything had really been done, before the eyes of men, God could look at his son and say this.
Is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.
But at 30 years of age, he began what we call his public ministry.
And in those three years of his public ministry, he performed for those who had faith to see all of the proof and evidence that was needed to show that he was and is the Son of God.
You know, in those three years of his public ministry, he called 12 men to be with him. They were going to be 12 Companions, 12 friends, 12 disciples. These men would spend their life, their time with the Lord Jesus, and he was very close to them.
And now we have come to the end of the three years of that public ministry, and the Lord knows exactly what is going to happen to him within the next 24 hours, and he has chosen to spend that last meal of his life with these 12 men.
But one of the 12 is Judas.
And even though no one else could tell the difference.
Judas in his heart was not right towards God. There was a lust for money, and he was willing to sell the Lord Jesus to the chief priests who hated the Lord because of reasons for envy. He was willing to sell the Lord Jesus to them.
For 30 pieces of silver.
And the knowledge.
That this close companion is going to do that.
Weighed on the Lord's soul. So let's read from the 20th verse.
Now when the even was come, he sat down with the 12 and as they did eat, he said, Verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me.
And they were exceeding sorrowful.
And everyone of them.
Say unto him, the Lord, is it I? And he answered, and said, He that dippeth his hand with me in the dish, The same shall betray me. The son of man goeth as it is written of him. But woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed. It had been good for that man, if he had not been born.
00:20:04
Then Judas, which betrayed him, answered and said, Master, is it I?
He said unto him.
Thou hast said.
You know, it's a remarkable thing to me here in this interaction between the Lord and Judas.
That when Jesus says one of you will betray me.
There wasn't a single disciple in that room who pointed the finger at Judas and said, ah, it must be him.
That's the one that's going to betray Judas. Not one of them suspected that Judas was the one Each one of them asked the Lord. Is it I?
And I think that shows us two remarkable things. It shows US1 The ability of Judas to continue on in an outward way, like he was real. But it also shows that the Lord in those three years.
Had never given any indication.
That Judas was different than the rest.
He had never treated Judas differently. He had never given Judas the cold shoulder.
He hadn't dropped insinuations all over the place again and again. Judas, I know what you're going to do, because none of the disciples suspected that Judas was the one, and so the Lord was patient.
With Judas, he gave him opportunity again.
And again and again to repent and change his course.
And you know, I'm speaking here to an audience, and as I look across this room, I think I might recognize, if not everyone here, most everyone here.
And I can say to you tonight as well.
That if you are sitting here in your chair and you have never accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, God has been patient with you.
He has given you opportunity again and again and again.
To repent.
To turn to him.
To set aside the hypocrisy of pretending to be something or someone that you are not.
And to come before him.
And confess and embrace him for the reality of who he is. That is the patience of the Lord, and that is the patience with which he dwelt with Judas. It's the patience with which he dealt with you is dealing with you. And so I pray, as we look at some of the other incidents here in the life of of Judas, that would be a word of warning to you. You are still under the sound of the word of God.
You still have opportunity to change course, and I pray that you would not spurn the patience of the Lord.
And I just want to say this to you as well. You know, in the Gospels we get the record of what happens, but in the Psalms we get the record of the inner emotions and thoughts of the Lord. And he could say of Judas, mine own familiar friend.
Has lifted up his heels against me. He felt the sting of what it was to have so close a companion.
Willing to betray him, you know. As we turn to the next section, we're running behind schedule. So just to read from verse 47.
And you know what? I want to present the context for this as well. The Lord Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane, and Judas has gone out to do the deadly deed. He's bringing with him the soldiers that will arrest the Lord Jesus. And as we're getting closer and closer and closer to the cross.
It is increasingly weighing on the soul of the Lord the knowledge of what he is about to go through.
Certainly yes, the human suffering that he was going to experience. But I'm sure it is the thought of what would happen on the cross in the three dark hours as he was punished by God.
Holy and righteous, he was going to become the sin bearer.
And that was horrifying to him.
And as he thought about it, he prayed again and again.
To God his Father let this cup pass from me.
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And if his prayer had ended there?
How sad it would be for you and me.
But that wasn't the end of his prayer. He ended it with this nevertheless. Not my will.
But thine be done.
It was so distressing.
That he sweat, as it were, great drops of blood.
Falling down to the ground.
And I don't know if the Lord Jesus ever got an opportunity.
In the final 24 hours of his life to get any rest or any sleep.
But when he turned to look at the companions, those few men that he had brought with him to be there in prayer, as he turned to them, perhaps to get some comfort, what did he find?
He found that they were asleep.
And so in the Garden of Gethsemane there was number solace for his soul.
And that is the context.
That these verses take in.
Verse 47 And while he yet spake, lo Judas, one of the 12 came, and with him a great multitude, with swords and staves from the chief priests and elders of the people.
Now he that betrayed them gave them a sign, saying, whomsoever I shall kiss, the same as he hold him fast.
And forthwith he came to Jesus and said, Hail master.
And kissed him.
And Jesus said unto him, Friend.
Wherefore.
Art thou come?
Then came they.
And laid hands on Jesus.
And took him.
Hail Master.
I know the Gospel Meeting is not really the place.
For Greek word studies.
But I want to read for you.
A few times from the book of Matthew.
Where this same Greek word hail.
Is used.
Because I want you to know the force.
With which that word?
Must have struck.
The heart of the Lord Jesus.
Matthew Chapter 2.
In verse 10.
When they saw the star, they rejoiced.
With exceeding great joy.
Matthew Chapter 5, verse 12.
Rejoice.
And be exceeding glad.
For great is your reward in heaven.
For so persecuted they the prophets.
Which were before you?
Matthew Chapter 18, verse 13.
And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, He rejoiceth more of that sheep.
And of the 90 and 9 which went not astray.
What word did those 3 verses have in common?
Did anyone notice it?
Rejoice.
That is the word.
That Judas used to greet the sorrowful heart of the Lord.
Rejoice, Master.
How cruel.
Can you be?
And it doesn't even end there.
We can't tell in the English.
But Judas told the soldiers.
The one that I kiss.
He's the 1:00. Grab him.
But when he comes to the Lord Jesus, he doesn't kiss him, not with the Greek word that he used to describe it to the soldiers. He kisses him in the same way that the Father smothers the prodigal son with kisses.
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He kisses him again and again and again.
Why? Just so the soldiers could be sure it wasn't someone else.
How it must have touched?
The heart of the Lord Jesus.
You know, I want to read for you in Psalms chapter 55.
Psalms 55.
Verse 12 Port was not an enemy that approached me.
Then I could have borne it.
Neither was it he that hated me, That didn't magnify himself against me. Then I would have hid myself from him.
But it was thou.
A man might equal my guide and mine acquaintance. We took sweet counsel together.
And walks under the House of God in company.
The Lord.
Felt the sting.
Of that betrayal.
You know, I think I forgot to mention it, but earlier as we go through these three interactions of the Lord with these different individuals.
In his interaction with Judas, we find revealed to us the Lord as a man.
In his interaction with Pilot, we find the Lord revealed as God.
And then his interaction with the thief on the cross, we have the Lord revealed as savior.
And so I say to you again.
The Lord felt.
Sting of the betrayal.
Of his close companion.
And it hurt him.
I'm sure it hurt him more than the nails hurt him.
It hurt him more than the whip hurt him.
Hurt him more than the thorns hurt him.
This one who had walked with him to the House of God.
Had lifted up his heels against him.
How does the Lord address Judas?
You say betrayer, get away from me.
Was the verse that we read.
Friend.
Wherefore art thou come?
He asked him a question.
Why did you come here?
Just like God asks Adam a question in the garden. Where are you, Adam?
Did God not know the answer to the question?
He knew.
So why did he ask it?
He asked it because he was trying to draw out the heart of Adam. He was dealing with Adam. He was appealing to Adam.
Isn't it the same way in our chapter here in Matthew?
That the Lord Jesus.
Question of Judas. Not because he doesn't know the answer, but because he's trying to draw out from Judas's heart a response.
He's dealing with him. He's appealing to him.
The Lord Jesus.
Never stopped.
Reaching out to Judas.
Even.
As he was in the act of betraying him.
Matthew Chapter 27.
Matthew Chapter 27.
Verse one when the morning was come all the chief priests and elders of the people to counsel against Jesus to put him to death.
And when they bound him, they led him away and delivered him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. Then Judas, which had betrayed him when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, I have sinned.
And that I have betrayed the innocent blood.
And they said.
What is that to us? See thou to it.
And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.
00:35:03
The chief priests took the pieces, the pieces, and said it is not lawful for to put them into the treasury because it is the price of blood.
And they took counsel and bought with them the Potters field to bury strangers in.
Wherefore the field was called field of blood unto this day.
And was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the Prophet saying, And they took the 30 pieces of silver, the price of him that was valued, whom they have the children of Israel, did value, and gave them for the Potter's field, as the Lord appointed me.
And Judas.
Went out.
And he hanged himself.
It is a sad end.
To a sad life.
It's one of the most vivid illustrations I can think of.
Of the verse, the way of the transgressor.
Is hard.
Judas had seen the Lord in the past.
Walk right through.
Crowd that wanted to kill him.
And I think he must have.
The Lord Jesus is going to do the same thing again.
So why don't I just get 30 pieces of silver?
And you know what? It didn't workout.
That way.
I'm going to read a verse though in Second Corinthians.
2nd Corinthians.
Chapter 7.
2nd Corinthians Chapter 7 reading from verse 9.
Now I rejoice.
Not that you were made sorry.
But that he sorrowed to repentance.
For ye were made sorry after a godly manner, that ye might receive damage by us, and nothing.
For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation, not to be repented of, but the sorrow of the world worketh death.
You know, it's one of the reasons why I picked the hymn that we started with. It has the opening verse. Weeping will not save me.
Though my face.
Were bathed in tears.
Judas was sorry.
For what he did.
He was sorry.
After a worldly manner.
And that kind of sorrow.
Leads to death.
I pray that you would have the sorrow of your sin that's spoken of in the preceding verse that leads to repentance because you still have the opportunity to be saved.
Satan was behind what Judas did.
And death is what he wanted for him.
The Lord Jesus wants life for you.
So repent.
And be saved.
The Lord did not rejoice in the death of Judas.
It says in Ezekiel he does not take. And you know what, Let's read it and Ezekiel chapter 33.
Ezekiel 33 and verse 11.
Say unto them as I live, saith the Lord God.
I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked.
But that the wicked turned from his way and live.
Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways. For why will you die, O House of Israel?
The Lord didn't want Judas to go out and hang himself.
There was not one iota of a vengeful spirit in the Lord.
There wasn't a single thought or a single desire. That's what he had coming to him.
That's not what the Lord wanted for Judas.
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He wanted him.
To repent he wanted him, as this verse says, to turn from his way.
It's too late for Judas.
But it's not too late for you. And so this verse, this, this plea is applicable to you tonight. Turn.
Turn knee.
And live.
That's what the Lord wants for you.
You know I can't look into your heart.
I don't know who here is real and who here isn't.
But it seems to me.
That if it's possible.
For the very companion.
Of the Lord Jesus.
To be with him for three years.
And keep up that charade the whole time.
And it's possible for someone here tonight.
To be putting up a charade and we wouldn't even know it.
I don't want to assume.
Everyone here is saved.
I don't know roughly how many people there are in this room.
But what if the ratio wasn't any better?
Than what was present.
On that night, as the Lord gathered his 12 disciples to eat a meal with him.
That would be one in 13.
1/2.
3/4.
567.
891013 persons getting really nervous right now.
That's not not exactly the point, but I pray that you will turn and live. I'm kind of in a difficult position at this point.
Because I obviously haven't left enough time to go through the other two men.
And I shouldn't have even told you I was going to and you wouldn't have known the difference.
So.
Maybe we'll just end with that.
And let's close with one prayer or one hymn.
The 20th.
Behold, the Savior at the door. He gently knocks, has knocked before, has waited long, is waiting. Still, you use no other friend, so I'll open the door. He'll enter in and Sup with you, and you with him.
Did someone start that?
I'm sorry.
It stands when all can follow.
And download scriptures.
All right, let's.
Find this.
Open my door.
Kill What happened to him?
I am so when you.
Thank you.
The Enterprise ain't so kind of guest no portal.
Always can tell.
Where it will be gone?
Listen to the.
All by the internal Lord, your hands.
And some great view and you.
Will kill you.
You know, I do want to share this verse with you before we end because.
You know we didn't get into the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus.
We did, I suppose, already refer to the three dark hours we're there on the cross. The Lord Jesus paid for the punishment of sin, as he was there a sin bearer we didn't speak of. After the Lord had dismissed his spirit, how a soldier came and pierced his side and forthwith came there out blood and water. We didn't speak of how he was placed into a grave where there he laid for three days.
But afterwards he rose again from the dead.
And that is an amazing and incredible thing. And without that, we would never have a gospel message to share with you.
Because it is a risen Savior who is on high on the glory, and we stand here in Christ stead, pleading with you be reconciled.
To God.
I want to read for you from Matthew, chapter 28.
And.
Why don't we just read from the beginning of the verse? Why not? We've got time in the end of the Sabbath as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and Mary the Mother, and Sorry the other Mary to see the Sepulchre. And behold, there was a great earthquake for the angels.
Descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door and sat upon it.
His countenance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow. And for fear of him the keepers did shake, and became his dead men. And the Angel answered and said unto the woman, Fear not.
Ye for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified.
He is not here, for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay, and go quickly and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead. Behold, he goeth before you into Galilee. There ye shall ye see him. Lo, I have told you.
And they departed quickly from the sepulchre with fear and great joy.
And they'd run to bring his disciples word. And as they went to tell his disciples, behold, Jesus met them saying, all hail, And they came and held him by the feet, and worshiped him.
This is a lot of fun.
That I get to share this with you.
Do you remember back in the Garden of Gethsemane?
Where Judas came and he greeted the Lord and he said, Hail master.
00:50:02
Rejoice.
Master.
The Lord Bore.
The sting of that alone.
What is his message to the women who are leaving the empty tomb?
All hail.
And they come and worship him. It is the same Greek word.
All rejoice.
Was there a reason for the Lord to rejoice in the Garden of Gethsemane?
No, there wasn't.
Is there a reason for these two women to rejoice as the Lord greets them?
Yes, there is. And he didn't want the rejoicing to be just limited to those women, he says. All hail.
He wants you to share in his rejoicing the sorrow he will bear by himself.
The rejoicing he shares and he wants to share with you.
You know there will be joy in the presence of the angels of God if one Sinner here tonight repents.
And there would be joy on our parts too. So if you do repent.
And we are calling you to do that.
Share it with us.
Jude
Address—W.J. Prost
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I'd like to turn this afternoon to what would normally be thought of as a rather negative book in the Word of God, The Epistle of Jude. The Epistle of Jude, right at the end of the Bible.
And yet at the same time.
With all the negative comments that Jude is compelled to make, we do find tremendous encouragement.
And I would like to share with you what brought this epistle before me.
Between two and three weeks ago.
There was a rather interesting and what I felt was a perceptive article that appeared in a leading newspaper in Canada called the National Post.
I suppose Canada probably has.
To what would be called national newspapers. One is the National Post, the other is the Globe and Mail. And in Canada they hold about the same status as we'll say the New York Times or the Washington Post would here in the United States.
Both of them come out of Toronto ON, but they are national newspapers and are distributed across the country.
The National Post tends to be conservative in its outlook and, in spite of the day in which we live, tends to uphold, at least in a large measure, good moral values and uprightness and good principles.
I don't have a subscription to the newspaper, but now and then I stumble across an article that has come out of that newspaper.
And on September the 21St, there was one that caught my eye and it was on the Internet.
And what was interesting was that the author of that article, a man by the name of Edward Crowley.
To start off, his article actually quoted from the word of God.
We won't turn to the passage. You'll recognize it from First Corinthians 13.
He quoted this verse.
When I was a child.
I spake as a child.
I thought as a child, I understood as a child, but when I became a man I put away childish things.
And then he likened Canada, and ultimately much of the Western world.
To a child with a mentality.
That went ahead and did things without stopping to think perhaps of the long term consequences of their actions.
I won't say a lot about the article.
But one thing that he said.
Was rather interesting and it rung true with me.
He said since the Second World War.
We have enjoyed an unprecedented era.
Of peace and prosperity.
Probably founded on what might be called the world order that was generated after the last war.
Probably LED mostly by the United States, with other countries joining in.
Which imposed a world order that generally led to peace and prosperity in the world.
And he said, unfortunately we have in our childishness assumed that this is the way the world is and no matter what we do.
It's going to continue.
And then he went on to say that we have.
Insouciantly thought we could nibble away at the moral principles and uprightness that undergirded this peace and prosperity, thinking that we could do that doing away with the constraints that were upon us, and that the peace and prosperity and everything that we had would just continue.
The adjective insouciant or the adverb insouciantly is not one we use commonly, is it?
But the word simply means to do something.
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Usually something wrong.
With a casual indifference.
As to what the consequences will be.
And you and I.
That that is what has happened and what is happening in the Western world today.
At first it was only in thinking and perhaps in actions by individuals.
Now those same wrong things are being enshrined into law.
So that anyone who speaks against it is.
In many cases considered to be breaking the law and can be prosecuted for it.
And you and I are seeing things in the world today, especially the Western world.
That people, at least in my generation, never thought.
Where possible.
I spoke a little bit about my late father-in-law, Albert Hayhoe.
It was not that particular address to which I referred when he gave out the hymn that we just sung.
But it was at another address to young people.
Back in the 1970s.
And he said to the young people at that time, he said, young people take a good, long, hard look at yourselves.
Because you have to realize that you have already lived more than half of your life. The Lord's coming is that close.
Well, he was wrong, wasn't he?
Those young people, for the most part, are now grandparents, and they're still around many of them, and the Lord has not come.
God is long-suffering, not willing that any should perish.
And you and I are living in a world.
That we never thought we would live to see.
Some here will remember our late brother, Norman Berry Of Montreal.
He made this comment to us once, he said.
Back in the 1960s and 1970s, he said. Morally, I thought the Western world was in the cellar.
And we could not get much worse.
But in the 1990s, he said. It seems to me this was as a much older man, of course, when he was in his 80s, he said. In the 1990s, it seems to me as if the seller has given way, the floor has given way to reveal a yawning pit, the bottom of which we have not seen yet.
I don't know what he would have said today because Norman Berry has been with the Lord for more than 20 years.
Well, so much for all of that.
Did the Lord know all that long ago? Indeed he did.
And here in the epistle of Jude, we find Jude.
And what does he say? We aren't going to read through the whole epistle, but just to mention a few things he says in verse 3.
Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation.
It was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend.
For the faith once delivered unto the Saints.
Who was this Jude, anyway?
I believe this was actually a natural half, brother, if we could put it that way, of the Lord Jesus.
It says brother of James. I believe that refers to the James who wrote the book of James.
And he was, I believe, the Lord's brother. It was in the apostle James who was beheaded by Herod.
With the sword, it wasn't James, the son of Alphaeus.
It was James the Lord's brother and Judas or Jude was another brother of the Lord.
And what is remarkable about those two men was that all through their growing up years.
They together with at least two other brothers.
Of the Lord Jesus.
Did not believe on him.
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And it shows us that the brightest light that God can give to man.
Has no effect unless God works in the heart to implant new life.
And it doesn't seem that any of those brothers really had faith until after the Lord Jesus was crucified, was buried, and rose again.
We know that James was one of the pillars in the early church. Evidently Jude was a prominent man too. We don't hear much about the other two brothers. I'd like to think that they too were the Lords, and I base that we don't need to turn to it. But it's in the first chapter of Acts where it tells us that Mary, the mother of the Lord Jesus, continued with the disciples there in Jerusalem.
And with his brethren, I'd like to think that it includes all four of those brothers.
I can't prove it, but I'd like to think that.
So here was Jude, who as a young man.
Did not believe on the Lord Jesus and probably came to know the Lord Jesus.
After he rose from the dead.
Sometimes the Lord doesn't begin with our lives early on, even if we are raised.
In Christian homes, sometimes those who are raised in Christian homes don't get saved when they're very young. It's wonderful if they do, but it doesn't always happen that way.
And so here is a young man.
Who came to know the Lord Jesus?
As a.
But he didn't really come to know him until he was in adulthood.
And he wants to right now to the believers about the common salvation.
But he's writing a little later than most of the apostles, later than Paul, later than Peter, and so on He writes a little later on.
And he wants to write about something positive. And that's good, isn't it?
We should always dwell on that which is positive if we can.
And I have said this before, but it bears repeating.
Never let what we witness against.
Assume such proportions that it eclipses what we witness for.
Yes, warnings are needed and we get them in the word of God many times.
But warnings do not feed our souls.
Warnings by themselves do not.
Save souls. They may bring a soul to the point where he wants to be saved.
They may make a soul realize the peril of his position if he is not, or she is not saved.
But what saves is the Word of God applied by the Spirit of God.
And what encourages your heart and mind is that which is positive.
But then he goes on here with some very solemn warnings and we are not going to dwell on them.
Except to point out.
That if we look back in human history, we find that all down through the ages.
God has given warnings.
Right from the get go.
The flood of Noah, for example.
What a voice to mankind.
And in many civilizations of this world.
Maybe those who don't acknowledge the Lord, but in many cases there are legends that go back all the way to the flood of Noah.
And man may attempt to deny it.
But the fact remains that it happened.
And there is no real denying of it.
So what do we read here? Verse four. For there are certain men crept in unawares who were before of old ordained to this condemnation.
Ungodly men turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness. Lasciviousness is just another word for.
Uncontrolled lust. Uncontrolled lust.
That's what we see in the world today, don't we?
I don't want to be crude, but I saw a bumper sticker the other day.
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How can it be so bad when it feels so good?
Referring to wrong things that men want to do and women too.
Unbridled, uncontrolled lust.
And it says, turning the grace of God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Jude is directed at those who have heard the word of God, who know the gospel, who know the truth of Christianity, and who have given it up.
How serious an outward show but no inward reality.
And that's what we are seeing around us today. And that is the worst state of things for a man to be in. It's easier to preach the gospel to a heathen world than it is to try and get through the souls who are self satisfied.
In the way they are.
Some of you are well aware. Well, some of you. That's a ridiculous statement. All of you are well aware.
That Her Majesty the late Queen Elizabeth the 2nd.
Passed away.
Last month.
Little less than a month ago.
I personally think she was the Lord's.
But then someone.
Thought they could paint a picture.
And depict what it was like for her to meet up.
With her.
Ex daughter-in-law, Princess Diana in heaven.
I don't want to call anyone as to their eternal destiny, but I very much doubt of Princess Diana knew the Lord, no evidence of it at all in her life.
And yet.
At her funeral. Princess Diana's funeral.
She was blatantly and publicly referred to in the funeral service as our Sister in Christ.
Our sister in Christ. Of course. That funeral was a good many years ago now, more than 20 years ago.
The point is, the Christian world relies on outward profession without inward reality.
It refers back here to the Israelites who came out of Egypt in verse 5.
And it says.
The Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.
Then it goes back even further.
Than the flood of Noah.
Verse 6 To the angels which kept not their first estate, they took upon themselves the bodies of men.
And came down into this world and corrupted themselves. You can read about it in Genesis chapter 6.
They are reserved in everlasting chains, it says.
Sodom and Gomorrah, another witness of God's warning to this world.
And so on.
We don't need to go on in all of this because we want to dwell on what is positive.
But I want to make one comment which is important here.
Verse 9.
Yet Michael the Archangel.
When contending with the devil, he disputed about the body of Moses.
Durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, the Lord rebuke thee. Here is an important principle for us, because there is a movement extent in Christendom today that you and I have the right and the power to rebuke the devil.
And we find here a warning in Jude's ministry.
Concerning even Michael, the Archangel and angels are greater in power than might, greater than we are. And I suppose Michael the Archangel might have considered that in as much as he was an Angel, and one of the chiefest of them. And Satan was an Angel too, admittedly a fallen one, that they were.
Roughly equal in status before God. And so that Michael might have we say it with all reverence. Figured that he had the right.
00:20:05
To rebuke the devil.
Evidently there was some dispute about the body of Moses, because you will remember that when God told Moses.
That it was time for him to die. Moses climbed up there, up Mount Nebo.
It's quite a climb too, 2300 feet high above sea level.
120 years of age. It would have been a good climb, but we recognize as Moses himself.
It says in Deuteronomy at 120, as I was not dim nor his natural force abated, so he climbed it probably as he would have 80 years before when the young man.
Anyway, up the top of the mountain he went, and we know that the Lord buried him, very likely so that his.
Burial and his tomb would not become a shrine that Israel would get taken up with.
But evidently, somehow the devil got into the mix and there was an argument.
But Michael, the Archangel, says, the Lord rebuked thee, and you and I.
Can have power through the name of the Lord Jesus to cast out demons.
Very definitely.
But we do not.
Have power against Satan in ourselves, and so let's not assume we have power to rebuke the devil.
Michael the Archangel wouldn't do it. Neither should we.
One other thing here before we go on to something positive.
Notice verse 14.
I love this.
And Enoch also the 7th from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with 10 thousands of his Saints.
To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them, of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
Enoch was a remarkable man. He was the 7th from Adam.
And by the standards of the day, even though he lived.
What was it, 365 years of age? And it tells us that he walked with God for 300 years.
And yet, as far as his contemporaries were concerned, he was taken away as a relatively young man.
But I love that because it's a picture of the church being caught up when the Lord comes, and I believe that many will be caught up as young people and as children. Isn't that wonderful?
I don't know whether that'll be my situation or not. Some of us are getting on in years.
And in some cases.
I have to say that it's going to be very difficult and we'll get into that in a few minutes.
For those that are here, but how wonderful it will be to be taken away without having to go through death, and Enoch enjoyed that special privilege.
But he didn't know what you and I know.
Did he know how all this would pan out? How this judgment would come about, when it would come about how everything would take place? I don't believe he did.
All he knew was that there was the Lord giving him that prophecy.
That all the evil that he must have been very conversant with, as he saw it all around him.
Was not going to be left unjudged.
Now the flood of Noah, which came after Enoch, was, of course a solemn reminder to this world that God would judge it.
But it is not the fulfillment of Enochs prophecy.
No, God did not come with His Saints in the time of Noah that waits a future day. When you and I come with the Lord in judgment on this world, and you and I now have the full revelation of how it is all going to happen.
Well, so much for what is negative.
What is the encouragement that the Lord gives us? Let's go down to verse.
20.
And we want to dwell on these things for a few minutes.
00:25:02
But ye beloved.
Formerly, in the earlier part of the epistle, he is largely speaking about those.
Who have an outward profession without inward reality.
It's rather common today.
Our next door neighbor recently moved away.
A very good neighbor man with whom I got along very well.
Bit younger than I, maybe 10 years younger than I.
Successful good business.
Excellent neighbor, morally upright. Good church goer in every way.
I'd like to think he's the Lord's. I'm not sure.
But when we were over in his home once, my wife and myself, they invited us over for dessert and coffee.
And we had a chance to share the gospel with them.
And afterward, he said well.
That sounds very good.
But we don't ever hear anything like that in our church.
Hmm, very sad. But he listened.
And you know.
About a year ago, his wife suddenly took.
Very, very sick and when they went to the doctor and had some tests done.
They shook their heads and they said to her, You have?
Cats are all through your body.
And there is no point in our trying to play around with it.
Chemotherapy isn't going to do much good. It'll only make you sick.
We'll make you as comfortable as possible.
But you don't have long to live.
And she passed away about three months ago.
I don't know whether she knew the Lord or not. We had a good opportunity to bring Christ before her again.
As I say, I'd like to think that her husband truly knows the Lord in a limited way. He doesn't know a lot, but he responds well when I speak of Christ.
But what a world we live in, when here are those who faithfully go to a Christian place of worship. And yet when you present the gospel to them, they say I never hear anything like that.
But, ye beloved, oh, what a beautiful word that is.
But what does it say, building yourselves up on your most holy faith?
Now these things are positive, but may I say.
That each one.
To some extent involves spiritual effort and spiritual energy.
God doesn't if I can use a common phrase.
Expect you and me as Christians to be what are commonly known as couch potatoes.
You know what that term means, don't you? Or is that a Canadian term? Never heard it before? Sure, you know what it means. Or you can guess. Couch potatoes.
Sitting and relaxing and justice.
Well, I know I'm saved. I know the Lord is my savior and I'm going to heaven at the end. That's good.
It is good, and I'm very thankful for that, but God leaves you and me here.
To be living witnesses for Christ to further his interests in this world.
And it says here your most holy faith.
You know, in the beginning in verse three we read about contending or contending We Sometimes that perhaps is not the best word, because contention sometimes tends to embody the thought of fighting with someone about something, and that is not the thought. But earnestly contending means that that precious truth.
Because the faith I.
In this context, is not referring to personal belief, but rather to the whole body of revealed truth, the faith.
Contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints, and it's the same thought in verse 20.
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It is so precious to us that we can't bear to let any of it go. We can't bear to lose any part of it.
I can contend for the truth in one of two ways.
You know, I can contend for it with the spirit that I'm right and you're wrong, and I'm going to prove you wrong if it's the last thing I ever do.
That spirit is not good.
No, we get the best spirit in Second Timothy Four. We don't need to turn to it in meekness, instructing those that oppose themselves.
If per adventure, your able presentation of the truth will give them repentance and so on.
Did I quote that right? No, I did not, did I?
If peradventure, God will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.
You and I.
By the grace of God.
Are called in humility.
To present.
The precious things of Christ, not merely the truth of salvation.
But all that has been given to us in the preciousness.
That is connected with.
True Christianity, the precious truth of the one body, all the things that God gave the Apostle Paul from a risen Christ in glory.
All those precious things.
That, Paul says, completed the word of God.
But then it says your most holy faith, and I don't know of any expression like that elsewhere in the word of God.
Why does he say your most holy faith?
Because the tendency is and I say it.
Very carefully.
Because when I say the word Christendom, it's not as if you and I are not part of Christendom. We are. We're part of the great House and we cannot get out of it unless of course, we renounce things and become Muslims or Hindus or something like that. But if you and I are believers in the Lord Jesus and hold the name of Christ, we're in the Great House.
But our most holy faith? That implies just what our brother Bruce was bringing before us. And our brother Bob too, yesterday.
There is a Christian character and a Christian walk.
Which is in keeping with the truth that we know. And that's why the Apostle Paul preached earnestly the Kingdom of God.
Not merely the gospel of the grace of God, but the things concerning the Kingdom of God.
Notice he didn't say the Kingdom of heaven and we don't have time to go into the difference this afternoon. The Kingdom of heaven has a limited meaning, It will not mean much in eternity, but the Kingdom of God will mean everything in a coming eternity.
Building yourselves up. But building takes energy. Building takes effort.
It means effort to read the word of God. It means effort to read the good written ministry that God has given us.
And it takes spiritual energy and effort to live it out in this world.
Building very necessary.
You will remember a king in the Old Testament by the name of ASA.
He was a godly king, and when he became king, God gave him, you'll remember, 10 years of peace.
But ASA knew that that peace would not last. He knew that there would be a time when the enemy would come against him.
And so he spent those years not just in relaxing and enjoying himself. No, He fortified Israel. He fortified Judah. He built fortifications and got himself ready, had his army ready, so that when the enemy came, he was ready for them.
Did he rely on his army, though?
He couldn't really. If I remember the figures rightly, ASA had a pretty good army for that day and age.
580,000 men.
Pretty good army.
But who came against him? The Ethiopians. How many did they have?
A million men.
A million men.
Can you imagine?
In those days, an army on foot of a million men.
00:35:05
And yet he relied on the Lord.
And the Lord gave him the victory.
And as far as I can tell, it is the greatest slaughter.
Of the enemy ever recorded in the Old Testament.
It's not as clear in our King James translation, but if you read it in the Derby translation, it appears that not one of those, a million men, survived the battle.
Unbelievable.
I can't imagine.
And yet the Lord gave ace of the victory. Why?
Because he relied on the Lord, indeed, but also because he used his time profitably before the enemy got him.
He was ready.
Let's go on.
Praying in the Holy Ghost. Oh how necessary.
Some here that are a little older will remember our late brother Clifford Brown, originally from Des Moines, IA and later lived in Burbank, CA for the last perhaps.
13 years of his life, something like that. I knew him fairly well.
But.
He used to tell us a prayerless life is a powerless life.
And it is Why?
Because prayer expresses our dependence upon the Lord.
And it's needed.
And the Lord Jesus himself, as the perfect dependent man prayed.
And I have often thought how that when the Lord Jesus wanted time to pray, it was hard to get.
Because all day long he was interacting with people besieged by crowds from all sides.
Everyone's different in this world.
I've never been afraid of crowds, but I don't like them.
And to be in the middle of a crowd and be jostled around this way and that way and have somebody.
Talking to you or trying to get your attention every moment of the day.
Is not something that appeals to me.
Now there are.
Other people, and I hope it's not out of the way, but I have relatives of mine who.
They don't mind a crowd, and the more the merrier they they work a crowd. They'll go from this person to that person. They love it.
Be that as it may, the Lord Jesus, when he wanted to pray, he scarcely had time.
What did he have to do?
At night, go to the Mount of Olives. Can you imagine?
To pray, and I have no doubt that more than once he spent the night out there out under the stars, if we could use that term.
It's been very seldom in my life that I have slept under the stars.
I've done wilderness camping a few times with some people that are here in this room. Very enjoyable, but we always had a tent over our heads.
The Lord Jesus no doubt was out in the Mount of Olives. Why he needed that time with his Father.
And you get that in the 21St of Luke.
The last verse of the chapter, we might turn to it. 21St of Luke, I think it is.
Yes, verse 37.
Luke 2137 and in the daytime he was teaching in the Temple.
And at night he went out and abode that in the mount that is called the Mount of Olives.
I say to each one here we need that, but it says praying in the Holy Ghost.
Oh, shouldn't we always pray in the Holy Ghost? Indeed we should.
But all of us know that what we get in Romans 8.
Is the case sometimes in our lives where we know not what we should pray for as we are.
And we can be thankful that he would search at the hearts N what is the mind of the Spirit? Because he that is the Spirit of God, maketh intercession according to the will of God.
Our prayers, if they're not right, go up not according to our poor apprehension or understanding of what we need.
But according to God's perfect understanding through the Spirit, that's wonderful.
00:40:08
But you know, it's a blessed thing to be walking with the Lord so that we can have a sense in our souls.
That what we are praying is according to the mind of God.
And that we can expect to have the answer. Brother Sam referred to that a little bit when he was speaking to us and now that we can have confidence in prayer.
If we pray in the Holy Ghost.
Reminds me of a story.
A man whose faith was exemplary. George Mueller.
Who was on a sailing ship to Canada back in his day in the 1800s.
And they were in what is called the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, where the Saint Lawrence River flows out into the Atlantic Ocean.
And that is an area where the Gulf Stream comes up from the South on the Eastern Shore of the United States.
And Arctic currents come down from the north from northern Canada, and they meet one another.
And the result is frequent, heavy what we call in Canada pea, soup, fog.
Very dense fog and in the days of sailing vessels you did not dare try and go anywhere with that fog.
Well, George Mueller.
Was on that sailing vessel and for two full days they were in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, not daring to move.
And finally he went up to the captain whom he knew was a Christian and said captain, I have an engagement in Quebec City.
In less than 24 hours.
I need to get there.
Well, the captain, understandably, was a little bit as we would say, ticked off at this.
Landlubber trying to tell him what to do and he he said. And Mr. Mueller, we also happen to have some fog around us that we can't sail in.
Well, Mr. Mueller said. Do you think let's let's kneel down and pray about it?
Well, what could you say to that? So they knelt down in the captain's cabin and Mr. Mueller prayed earnestly that the Lord would lift the fog.
And then he said, Now captain, you pray, but before the captain would open his mouth, he said on second thought, don't bother.
He said. Because I can tell that you don't think it's going to work.
You said as far as I'm concerned, it's already working. Let's get up there and get going.
You know, the captain said. It changed his life.
Because he went up on the.
And he said it was just as if someone had taken the crank and was raising the curtain on the stage and the fog was just.
Lifting like that.
George Mueller kept his appointment in Quebec City.
Well, I don't like to tell that kind of a story because I've never had that experience. But I just, well, I don't. That's not fair. I have, but I won't tell stories on myself. But I did have that experience a few times. But anyway, never mind that The point is praying in the Holy Ghost.
The Holy Ghost is still here.
Verse 21 Keep yourselves in the love of God.
We don't need to say too much about that.
Her brother read to us.
That verse in John 15.
As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you.
Continue ye in my love.
My wife's late grandfather, Harry Hayhoe, whom some will remember here. You have to be pretty old to remember him because he went to be with the Lord 60 years ago this year.
But he used to tell us, and I can't say that I've done it, but he used to tell us. Memorize that verse and say it over to yourself every day of your life.
Why? Because it is important to remember that no matter what your circumstances and mine are.
God's love never changes.
And he will not suffer us according to what Paul told the Corinthians in chapter one Corinthians 10. He will not suffer us to be tempted or tested above that which we are able.
00:45:03
And that is true.
And if God in his love has allowed very hard circumstances in your life and mine.
Let us remember that in His love he is going to bring blessing out of it that will last for all eternity.
Keep yourselves in the love of God. Now what does that mean? Does the Lord's love ever stop? No, it doesn't.
But we all know what it's like.
To be in a place where.
And sometimes we're glad of it on a hot day to be in the shade, but on other days when it gets cool, as it is now.
It's a wonderful thing to enjoy the sunshine.
Most of you know that I live up in Canada and we get some pretty cold winters up my way.
And 25 below 0 would not be an unusual temperature on a winter day.
And some of us don't mind the crunch of the snow under our feet and the freshness of the air under those circumstances.
Other people say you can have it more and more more power to you, and I understand that too.
But the point is.
Keep yourselves in the love of God means that I do not allow anything in my life to come between myself and the Lord, because the moment I allow something.
The moment I allow something in my life that feeds the old nature.
And it's easy to do.
And don't think it gets any easier as we get older. If you want to know that, ask any of us that are in my generation here. If it gets easier, I know they'll all say the same thing. If anything it gets harder because the more you want to live for the Lord, the harder the old nature fights to get up there and get the ascendancy, and the more the devil attacks.
You want to build yourself up on your most holy faith.
Every aspect of, or every new truth.
That God seeks to bring before you by His Spirit will find its corresponding antagonist in some aspect of your old sinful self and mine.
Keep yourselves in the love of God. A brother that's sitting here today made a remark at a Bible conference a long time ago. But I enjoyed it.
He said.
One minute is 60 seconds too long to feed a dead man.
Yeah, who's a dead man? Or should be the dead man. What we are as children of Adam. Don't feed that dead man, even for 60 seconds. Keep yourselves in the love of God.
And finally.
Looking for the And this is an unusual expression to the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.
That refers to the Lord's coming.
And Jude foreknew by the Spirit of God that things would get so difficult in this world.
And he saw the beginning of it in his day.
That it would be a real mercy when the Lord came and called us home now. It would always be a real mercy at any time in the Church's history.
But particularly.
As the days get darker.
A sister in my own home assembly.
She's a lot younger than I, young enough to be my daughter, she said to me the other day. She said, Bill, the glad you live and the generation you live in.
I think she was referring to the fact that if the Lord doesn't come.
I'm going to be.
Out of this world.
And I won't live to see, perhaps, some of the moral darkness that may come upon us.
I hope the Lord doesn't allow things to get a lot worse.
But he may.
Why? Because he is long-suffering and not willing that any should perish.
But the point is.
That if you and I lose sight of the Lord's coming.
Then we are going to cave in. We're going to give up.
I learned an unusual expression the other day.
00:50:03
And it's a French proverb.
But I wouldn't have known about it except, and I don't think he'd mind my referring to it. Our brother Sager from India and his wife Sophie are visiting in Canada right now, and he had an address in Montreal, Canada.
A week ago today.
And he referred to what he saw in the Montreal airport when he landed in Canada because they flew direct from New Delhi, India to Montreal and that was their portal of entry to Canada.
He referred to a proverb he saw up on the wall of the airport.
And translated from the French, it read Never let go of the potato.
And I'd never quite heard that put that way before. But underneath in English, it said never give up.
Never give up.
Well, the world says that. Never give up, never give up.
But the trouble is, humanly speaking, we can give up.
If things look hopeless. If things get too difficult.
Looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. And here the expression eternal life refers to the full realization of it.
Transferred into a scene where that eternal life will be right at home, having a glorified body suited to that eternal life which we now possess.
That's what it means here.
One more comment.
On the last part of the chapter, we've had four things that are important to us.
But in the last part of the chapter there's an exhortation and I'd like to speak for one moment on it and it'll just be a moment given the time we have left.
Because it's a little unclear in our King James translation.
In fact, it was even unclear to some of our well taught brethren of past generations.
An even excellent Greek scholars like JN Darby and William Kelly.
Did not totally agree.
On the meaning of the Greek construction of what we have here.
If I may, let me give you what I feel to be a simplified version of it.
If you really want to delve into it, you can read what William Kelly says about it and what Darby says about it.
It's not the same, but anyway, that's fine.
There are, I believe, at least two groups of people here. William Kelly thinks there are three, but we'll talk just in terms of two.
Of some have compassion, making a difference.
The thought there is not so much of compassion.
But of conviction?
And some convict.
Those who oppose convict.
There is a place to speak.
In a solemn warning with conviction to those who oppose the Word of God.
God is glorified in the preaching of the gospel, even if men and women are not saved.
There is a place to point out very clearly to the mockers and scoffers about which Jude is referring or to whom he is referring. Here there is a place.
To bring before them the truth of God's Word, the warnings of coming judgment.
And what the word of God has to say?
There's even in the word we said yesterday, a place sometimes for Christian apologetics to make men see the foolishness of some of the things that they are trying to bring out.
It's very interesting to me.
That the man that wrote that original article in the National Post to which I referred.
And this will appeal to some of the young people here who have studied science and physics. He even referred to the second law of thermodynamics.
Now the two laws of thermodynamics in simple terms, are the first law of thermodynamics says you can't win, the second law says you can't even break even. Is that is that fair? Bruce does that. Does that encapsulate it?
00:55:10
And he referred to the second law of thermodynamics to say that the general.
Average course of things in this world is from order to disorder.
Not from disorder, up to order.
He said any effort at order or any attempt at order requires effort and energy to do so, because the trend of things in this world according to the second law of thermodynamics is always the other way around, from order to disorder.
To me, that one law of thermodynamics smashes the theory of evolution right at the roots. It will never work. I don't care how many billions of years you say it will take disorder.
Without any other thing applied to, it never progresses up to order.
Anyway.
You can bring that before people sometimes and occasionally someone. Oh, that's right. Yeah, that sets me thinking.
But then what does it say in verse 23 And others save?
And it could read pulling them out of a fire with fear.
Hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.
That's the way it's going to be with people that get saved just kind of pulled out of the fire as if the house is about to fall down. It's on fire and they're just saved at the last minute before everything caves in.
But it's a wonderful thing to be able to save someone like that.
And then I'll just read this 24th verse, because our time is gone.
Know unto him that is able to keep you.
And that word falling is a good word. But Darby, I think, uses the word stumbling.
Can we be kept from stumbling? Yes, we can.
And to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.
He's not here now, but our brother Michael brought before us the meaning of that word. Hail, meaning rejoice. Same word here.
Exceeding joy.
Joy.
The Lord will have that exceeding joy in a coming day when he presents you and me faultless before him.
But he's beginning that work down here.
And he can complete it.
Materialism
Open—R. Thonney
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Go along with what our brethren have been saying, I'd like to read.
A verse in Second Timothy chapter one.
That I think goes along with it.
And verse.
7.
Or God has not given us the spirit of fear.
But of power?
And of love.
And of a sound mind.
It's true. There's a lot of fear in today's world.
And if you do not have your faith in the Lord Jesus, you have reason to be afraid.
You really do.
But.
God has not given us that kind of a spirit. I find this so challenging and wonderful to think about.
You know, David.
Was one who could.
Stand before Goliath and I am amazed.
At the confidence.
You know, in Proverbs it says. I think it's chapter 14 and verse 26.
In the fear of the Lord is strong confidence.
And his children shall have a place of refuge.
Think of Goliath.
About 10 feet tall.
Huge giant of a man, all covered with armor.
And even had an armor bearer out front of him.
To protect.
Him.
And David said to Saul, fear not, I will go against this giant. And Saul says you can't, you're just a youth.
But he says, I was with my father's sheep in the wilderness, and there came a lion and a bear and took the flock and I went after it. It's interesting.
He says.
When he was attacking those animals, the lion, he says. I caught him by the beard. As far as I know, there's only one lion that has a beard. It's the African lion. Can you imagine a youth? And he did that when nobody else was watching.
What gave him such confidence? Again, that verse in the fear of the Lord is strong confidence, brethren.
Let's learn to fear the Lord.
To not displease him in any way. And that will be the secret of not letting fear dominate our lives. So David goes out.
Our Saul puts his armor on him.
David says I can't use this. I haven't proved it.
And he leaves Saul's armor in a heap there. And what does he take? He take what he took, what he knew he could count on.
The armor that he had proved.
His sling and stones, and the shepherd's staff.
And he goes out.
And I think the Goliath was probably kind of insulted. They're sending this shepherd boy against me, he says. In my dog. You send me this.
And David says to him, I love this, because Goliath had said, come, I'll give your body to the birds of the field, and the fowls, the beast, the field and the fowls of the air.
David says You come to me with a sword and a spear. I come to you in the name of the Lord, the God of the armies of Israel which you have defied.
And it's interesting to read the account. I just never get tired of reading. It says. When Goliath started coming towards him, David ran towards the giant. You know, I think if it was me, I would have stopped, step back a little bit and took my shots from back there aways. Not David. There was such confidence. He ran toward the giant, put his hand into the bag, took out a stone, put it in the sling.
00:05:04
You know, they use slings like that down in Bolivia where we used to live. And I'm amazed the the ones that go around and around like this and and they get expert marksmanship with those stones. It's it's amazing. And David must have had that, but he got Goliath right in the head and he won To David, it wasn't a matter of David versus Goliath. It was a matter of God versus Goliath. And so he knew how it was going to end before it even started.
Brethren, that's the secret. It's not a matter of you against the difficulty.
It's a matter of God.
How big is your God, anyhow? Is he bigger than the difficulties or is he smaller than the difficulties? When you find a God that is smaller than the difficulties, you're going to get fearful. That's true.
But when you realize how great our God is.
Then that disarms all the fear that there is.
I did have on my heart brethren here in Timothy, going back to the 6th chapter, First Timothy.
A subject that I wanted to present.
It's an expression that I find you find here in First Timothy. I don't know that you find it in any other place, but let me read the two verses. The first one is applied to Timothy.
And.
It's in.
Verse 12 I'll read from verse 11.
But thou, O man of God, flee these things and follow.
After righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness.
Fight the good fight of faith.
Lay hold on eternal life.
Whereunto thou art also called, and has professed a good profession before many Witnesses.
That expression lay hold on eternal life.
What does that mean? Didn't Timothy have eternal life?
What does that mean? Lay hold on eternal life?
Notice a little bit further on verse 17.
Charge them that are rich in this world that they be.
Not high minded nor trust in uncertain riches.
But in the living God who giveth us richly all things to enjoy.
That they do good.
That they be rich in good works.
Ready to distribute?
Willing to communicate.
Laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come.
That they may hold, lay hold on eternal life. There it is again.
Here it's not in connection with.
Timothy, it's those that are rich in this world. Who is he talking about? You know, when we talk about the rich in this world, we always look at somebody else that's a lot more wealthy than us, and we said it must apply to them.
With this chapter, evidently we're going through it in a reading meeting somewhere.
And that question came up Who are the rich in this world?
And the answer I found quite interesting.
Whoever answered it gave the.
Answer here in the earlier verses it says.
But godliness verse 6 and with contentment.
Is great gain.
Verse 8.
Having food and raiment.
Let us be therewith content.
The answer was given if we have more than food and raiment, that word raiment really is covering. Mr. Mr. Kelly and his exposition says that could include a roof too.
But he says having more than that makes us the rich in this world.
00:10:01
I think we pretty well all fit into that category, brethren.
And to me, it's a challenge then to take it to heart ourselves.
We are the rich in this world.
What does it mean to lay hold on eternal life? Don't we have eternal life?
Yes, we do have it.
But what it means to lay hold of it?
Is not exactly the same. It means live it.
And I do believe, brethren, I have been challenged in my own soul.
We see our dear brethren in other parts of the world.
We've been hearing about the persecution in India.
In northern Nigeria, there's.
Quite a warfare going on there.
And Muslim radicals are going into villages and burning them and killing the Christians.
They're not gathered to the Lord's name that I'm aware of.
But they're believers. They are members of the body of Christ.
Is that something that I can do something about?
Brethren, I believe that there is something we need to be exercised about.
Perhaps more than we are.
To do what we can.
Maybe you say. I don't. I can't really do that much. But are you doing what you can?
And to me this is what it means to lay hold on eternal life. We tend to be occupied with material things.
Material things.
Are passing.
And as we were talking earlier in the Reading meeting.
One of these moments, brethren, We're going to hear the shout. Or can they hear the sound of that trumpet?
And we're going to be caught up to meet the Lord in the air.
Everything we have occupied ourselves so much with is going to stay here and we're going to go into that eternal glory.
Have we lived in view of that day?
I must say I have been challenged in my own soul by.
Those that have lived for the Lord in their measure. I don't like to make people too much the focus, but I must say there are those who have lived in view of that day.
Some of you remember.
The Missionary.
One of the five missionaries that were killed in Ecuador.
A number of years ago.
Jim Elliot. Yeah. Thank you.
My memory for names is not very good anymore.
But I remember one time when I worked at Bible Truth Publishers in Oak Park, Jim Elliott's father came into the Bible Truth Publishers because Bonnie was Degraff used to work there, and he had known her in earlier years.
So he came in and I got to know Jim Elliot's father.
But Jim Elliot made this statement that it was always a challenge to me.
Here it is. Listen to it carefully.
He is no fool.
Who lived? Who gives that which he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose?
That is really something to think about. He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.
You know, Paul spoke of his deposit and there is a deposit we are depositing in that for that day.
And I must say it's a challenge to me to live for that day. Yes, we need to provide for our families. I don't say we don't.
But, brethren, our focus is not here. Our focus is on that eternal glory.
And the Apostle Paul.
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Could say in two Timothy. I am not ashamed. He had lost everything. He was waiting in the prison for them to take him out and cut his head off.
And he says to Timothy, don't be ashamed.
I am not ashamed, but I am persuaded that he is able to keep my deposit for that day.
Brethren, our religion living for that day.
Or reliving for the brief.
Material.
Things of this life. Yes, we have to occupy ourselves with material things to a certain extent, but they are only a means to the end of living for that day. And that's what it means to lay hold on eternal life. You've got it, but lay hold of it, live it.
Let's say another.
Person that was a great.
Blessing to my Own Soul to as dear brother Eric Smith.
How many here knew Eric Smith? You want to raise your hand?
Yeah, not half of the amount anymore. And know of him.
But you know, when I came to work at Bible Truth Publishers, I took the place of of.
Francis, who was his third wife.
His first two wives he buried in Bolivia.
And Francis was his third wife. And he.
After he married her in 1962, why he went to Bolivia.
And I came later on that year to take her place.
And after about a year and a half, he came back because she had gotten cancer of the intestines and had to have several operations. And so Eric Smith was stuck here, and of course he was talking about Bolivia. And so you know why?
We ended up going to Bolivia.
But he told me the story of his life and I must say it was impressive. He came from a wealthy family in New Zealand.
And his father was not a believer at the first of his Christian life. Some of his brothers, I think, were influential in leading Eric to the Lord.
And so, in the course of time, Eric Smith decided he was going to go to Bolivia to preach the gospel.
And he told his father, who was still an unbeliever. Later on, he did become a believer.
But he is still an unbeliever, and Eric Smith's father said son. He wanted all his sons to get good jobs, to make good money, to be accommodated down here in this world.
And so he said to Eric. He says, son, if that is your decision, get out of my house. You have no longer any place here. Get out.
And so he had to get out and make his own way. He went to two years of medical school.
And that's why in Bolivia they call him Doctor Smith.
Anyhow, he went to Bolivia.
And quite a few years after he went.
It was my privilege to go with him, with Eric Smith, Eric Smith and Ramon Alarcon of Mexico and Clem Buchanan and Doug Buchanan. The five of us went to Peru and then to Bolivia.
And we.
I one day taking a truck because they.
There's not a lot of buses at that time down there. We took a truck in Eric Smith and Ramon Alicon, rode up in the cab with the driver in the truck, and Clem Buchanan and Doug Buchanan and I stood in the back with the rest of the brethren.
Jostling over those rough roads down the riverbed to where Eric Smith started his work amongst the Indians a number of years earlier.
And at the end of the day, here comes this group of brethren standing in the form of an ark around the road and singing hymns as we came to a stop right in front of them and they were singing. And I looked through a little cubby hole in the front of the chassis of the truck. You can see into the cab and there is Eric Smith.
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His head down, tears streaming down his face. The joy.
That he had in seeing those people one for the Lord because of his sacrifice.
And I still remember the challenge came to my own soul at that time.
And I said to the Lord, please, Lord, please.
Help me not to be deceived by the material things of life.
Please help me to use all my efforts to that which will last forever and that eternal glory.
And it was my privilege before Egg Smith went to be with the Lord. He lived.
To almost. He died two days short of being 103 years old.
Up in Montreal, Canada and I went to visit him a few days before and he could no longer speak.
He is sitting in his wheelchair and I greeted him in the Quechua language.
Himanayaka Shankar Manum and.
All he did was nod his head a little bit. I knew that he understood me.
And it was several days after he went into the Lord's priest.
Do you think he was sorry for the sacrifice he made?
He had relatively not much at all at the end of his life, materially speaking.
But he had what will last for all eternity.
The Lord help us, brethren, and I think this is what it means to lay hold on eternal life.
There's a lot of things that can be done. There's parts of the world where brethren believers are pleading for Bibles. There's not enough to meet the demand.
I understand in China that.
There are people that borrow a Bible and they pass it around from one to another and copy out.
Parts of the Bible so that they can have it in their own possession.
And here we have. I would not want to tell you how many Bibles I have in my own house.
And they don't have enough to go around.
Is there something we can do about that? I do believe, brethren, we need to be exercised about how we are using our means so often. We.
We use our means for our own pleasure and our own good and that is what is tearing down the Christian testimony. I often felt that what is the greatest detriment to the Christian testimony is the spirit of self pleasing. That is not the Spirit of Christ, it's the Spirit of Christ. Was self sacrifice. When the Lord Jesus was here in this world, what did he have materially speaking?
You know, it convicts me.
All the things that I think of that he could have had, but.
He only had the clothes on his back.
He never had a lack when it came to meeting somebody else's need, but when it was for his own pleasure, his own necessity, he never acted for that brethren.
May the Lord help us, Lord brethren, to live in view of that eternal day we.
We are so involved. I have to confess, brethren, I don't want you to think I'm an example here, but I have to confess how much I do for my own pleasure. It's just built into our culture. It's a strong stream that runs through American life.
And were affected by it. And I find for myself, I have to say the best thing I can do is to recognize the problem and confess it to the Lord and ask him to help me to deal with it properly.
The Lord help us to know what it means to lay hold on eternal life. He tells that to Timothy first of all, and then he tells it to the rich in the world.
This is a challenge that I find.
Very strong in Scripture, and so you find even the Apostle Paul.
The end of his life? He had lost everything. Was he ashamed?
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That he ended up his life that way, Not for one minute.
And brethren.
Our desire should be so that that moment comes when we go into His presence. We go as those that have laid hold on eternal life.
Search the Scriptures
Sing—David So
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Well, I keep hearing isn't over yet.
So I trust that I won't take too long. I take that as a hint that it's almost over.
There are many story we could tell by a man, so just I know parents sometimes get embarrassed over that. I would say don't be. It is nice to see children in here.
I just have.
I wrestle with this when I was asked. That is for all. Sometimes it's difficult to address all age groups.
It's not like a Sunday school. We address the children. Actually even that is difficult because we're children. Do you address the four and five or do you address the 10:00 and 12:00? So I find that difficult. So I trust that the portion.
Before us that the Lord can use it, perhaps for encouragement, for each turn with me to the Old Testament, the book of numbers. We don't often go to the Old Testament.
And I believe there are many lessons and applications in there for us and we know too that many principles that we follow, we can find them in the Old Testament. So there are much to talk about in this passage. So I'm only picking on perhaps two or three topics. Tim told me I can't have more than 45 minutes. That wasn't it. So I will have to keep that free. And I trust that with this portion, it was more to exercise your heart.
To search the scripture more, so I'm just going to read a few verses.
To get us going, Numbers, chapter 13 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, oh, by the way, it's interesting to see phrases where it says, And the Lord spake unto Moses, So this is the Lord's word, not just Moses decided to tell us something, the Lord's faith and the voice is saying, send thou man, that they may.
Search.
The land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel, of every tribe of their fathers, shall you send a man, everyone ruler among them. And the following verses tells us who the rulers and so on. And for property we'll leave it there. And verse 16.
And these are the names of the man which Moses sent to spy out on the land.
Now.
The first thing I had in my heart was about search.
They are told to search.
They were told before that they will be going into a land flowing with milk and honey. But now why does the Lord tell them to go search? And I find sometimes with ourselves young people, older ones too, they say I have to search things out.
Have you ever heard that I got a search, Not what's on my heart. Where the word search is this here, They are very specific. We won't have time to go into it. They're the search according to the word of God. Now Can you imagine? We have young people here. Perhaps somebody got lost in the woods. And we go, we're going to start a search party.
That's pretty specific. We're looking for a little Johnny who's 10 years old, lost in the woods.
Now what I find sometimes we use the phrase search is we'll go. You know, I went out searching, I found that puppy dogs. So I brought it back.
What about Johnny?
Oh.
That's not really searching in the sand, is it? So to search, there's a purpose for that search. What are we searching for?
So I just want to draw that as an application for us. Search the scripture. We're told that on way. There are many blessings. Are you searching for more blessings?
No return to the book of Ephesians. All this have any blessings have been given to us. It's not like tomorrow he's going to give us a few more blessings. No, we have it. But it's good to search and be reminded of that. So the first job they had was the search. As if OK, go check it out just to make sure that the word of the Lord is true. OK, so.
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Verse 18 and see the land what it is, and the people that dwelleth therein, whether they be strong or weak, few or many. Why is that important?
What the Lord told them. Don't worry about it. You can go check it out. It's yours.
But they need to search it now, verse 20 and what the land is, whether it be fat or lean, and so on.
Verse.
22 And they ascended by the South and came to Hebron, and I won't read the rest. Did she notice how specific they follow the instructions? They didn't just hope to find something and bring it back.
And verse 23 And they came unto the brook of Oscar, and cut down from advance a branch with one cluster of grades, and they bare it between two upon a staff. And they brought up the pomegranates and of the figs. The place was called the broker, because of the cluster of grapes, with the children of Israel cut down from thence. And they returned from.
Searching of the land after 40 days wow they searched, they found and they brought back evidence of that search. But Brian please don't take this as a as a complaint. I didn't see any cluster of grapes that you have set out where it required two person to carry it.
I would picture the graves are probably the size of an orange.
I don't know, but it was proof, isn't it? Isn't it nice in today's world? We said, well, show me the evidence.
So search, search the scriptures. What did God promise you? We had before us, and I had thought of my heart for the last little while to God gave us the whole council of God.
Oh, I shall not declare unto you the whole counsel of God. You got the master plan.
You know, it may be sounds kind of bad for young people. It's like, would you like to go to a football game? No, I said it wrong.
Like to see a recording of a football game where you already know they won yesterday?
Would that be interesting?
Stop the saying, is it? But here God has told us this is what's going to happen. Oh, let me show you at the end.
We know the beginning to the end. We don't need to know what's in between in a sense, right? It's like they say you read a book, and I'm not a book reader. I understand the easiest is read the beginning and read the end. You got the gist of what the book is about.
He told us all that searching out for yourself and then we see here.
After you search it out, I'm I'm trusting this for perhaps for my brethren, my older brother and I still consider myself a younger one here.
So it sets here.
Verse 26 And they went, and came to Moses and Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, and to the wilderness of Paran and Kadash, and brought back word unto them, and unto the congregation, and show them the fruit of the land.
And they told him, and said, We came unto the land, whither thou sent us us? And surely it floweth with milk and honey, and this is the fruit of it.
Brethren, we are, don't we, to be a testifier of his word, the goodness that we see from the word of God. And actually, I believe the last two days we saw evidence from.
Mandy To give us testimony from the word of God.
So we.
Or you. Or someone who has been enjoying the word of God.
Testifier for others who are perhaps still new in the faith. Now if you notice I didn't read on there. There will always be opposition. There is evidence they brought back and we find that many didn't believe.
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They doubted they were afraid. Why are they afraid that there are giants over there, That and so on. It's because unbelief sets it that they did not believe the word of God and what God has said. And you know, often when unbelief comes in, difficulties comes in.
It begins with unbelief. We have the Book of Jude this afternoon. You look at some of these declension, It start with unbelief. I believe the three stages. I won't go into that.
And unbelief and then you see apostasy as a result of that. So be careful. But now one more thing that I think I will stop Caleb. Verse 30 is interesting evidence were brought back.
Unbelief sets in. They were complaining that they want to go home because they don't want to face the Giants.
Verse 30.
And Caleb?
There's so much we can talk about, Caleb, Can we? And Caleb in this case here.
Still that the people before Moses.
And said, let us go up at once and possess it, for we are well able to overcome it.
What are characteristics of Caleb being mentioned here, as there are many in this chapter and the next chapter to show Caleb's faithfulness. But here I thought it's so nice to see that yes, there are evidence, yes, there are problems now.
Big problem.
How nice to see a brother like Caleb.
Not adding to the problem, not taking sides. We didn't see Caleb stood up and told how wrong they are. Did we see that?
What did he do? I don't really understand it, I'll be honest. But he stilled the people before Moses. Isn't that precious?
That still he's still the people before Moses, and we'll find that the word surge is used numerous times afterwards. Caleb, he's one of the one that went out in search for the land afford to to so he can bring back and be a testifier. So just to sum it up.
Is quick to search the scripture.
Ones we enjoy and learn what the word of God have for us Believe is very nice to be a testifier to the word of God.
And perhaps the Lord may use that testifier. And I notice I used to what may, because the Lord used all of us very differently. Just because Steve is sent out to do something doesn't mean that he will send me out to do something.
And just because you want to serve the Lord a certain way doesn't mean that's how the Lord will want you to go. I often say jokingly, as I hope the Lord sent me to Hawaii.
Well, what if the call comes in, say no, you go to Haiti.
Or Haiti, is it? Well, do we argue with the Lord and our Lord? Hawaii is better.
We have to learn to accept it, and when difficulties come, can we be one to be a help to our brethren, and that we to the Lord's help be able to steal the people of God? And we know of His faithfulness and many things afterwards. And I'll I'll leave that with you to enjoy when you get home.
Three Aspects of Paul's Ministry
Address—B. Conrad
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Well, let's turn to the book of Acts.
In chapter 20.
I don't want to read the whole chapter.
My thought really today.
Bears upon 3 aspects of the ministry of the Apostle Paul.
And they believe he touches on those in verses 24.
And 25.
Through 27, so I'll read those and perhaps we'll drop back.
And look at the events that led to the apostles.
Statements to these Ephesians.
In this passage.
Acts 20 and verse 24. But none of these things move me.
Neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course.
Leave out with joy.
And the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel of the grace of God.
And now, behold, I know that you all, among whom I have gone preaching the Kingdom of God, shall see my face no more.
Wherefore I take you to record this day that I am pure from the blood of all men.
For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the council of God.
The Apostle Paul at this point in his life.
At a very heavy heart.
He has.
He has been on his first journey from Antioch.
With Barnabas.
Departing from Antioch in the southeastern part of what we call today Turkey.
By modern standards, it was not a long trip.
They went down to the coast by sea. They went across to the Isle of.
Island escapes my.
Somebody call it out.
Cyprus. Sorry.
Went across to the Isle of Cyprus.
Barnabas.
Paul Barnabas name given first in the early days and John Mark.
And there is a man that resists the truth.
And Paul led by the Spirit.
Declares to him that he's going to be blind temporarily.
And he went away blind.
Whether this is what so staggered young John Mark or not, we don't know.
But they ministered there on the Isle of Cyprus, and then took ship again back to the mainland of Turkey, went up to a different Antioch.
And then to Iconium, Lystra, Derby and so on.
It was in Lystra where Paul having healed.
A man.
Let's just turn to it briefly. I don't want to spend too much time in the history.
But in Lystra, chapter 14 of Acts.
Paul perceives that an impotent man had faith to be healed.
And he heals him. He leaps and walks on his feet.
And the local people decide that they are gods and they are about to do sacrifice to them, And Paul and Barnabas run in and stop them from this.
They move on to Iconium verse 19.
And the Jews that were at such resistance to Paul in Antioch and Iconium follow them there.
And stirring up the people, they stone Paul, and they dragged him out of the city for dead.
And yet in verse 20, as it says, as the disciples stood round about him, he rose up and came into the city. And the next day he departed with Barnabas to Derby.
He retraced his steps. Just amazing.
Just amazing.
They complete their journey and they go back to Antioch, from whence they had been sent forth by the Holy Ghost.
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And there's an interlude in chapter 15 where a certain matter concerning the Gentiles has to be addressed, and they addressed it there. And at the end of chapter 15 they go out again.
In verse 36, some days after Paul said unto Barnabas, let us go again and visit our brethren in every city.
There's a difference of opinion between Paul and Barnabas, and Barnabas takes John, Mark and goes one way and Paul and Silas head out. It would appear with the with the Fellowship of the Brethren, they go their separate ways and service for the Lord.
They go this time by land and not by sea, and they go, as it says in the beginning of Chapter 16, to Derby and Lystra. Timothy joins their ranks. Later on, Luke, who is the writer of this book, joins their ranks. And you'll see in a certain place it goes from they to we, in and out.
And they head W further into Turkey on this second trip.
And they seem to be a little bit unsure of the direction of the Lord they head to. There's a closed door here and a closed door in Asia, which is southwest Turkey, where all those seven churches are located that we read about in Revelation 2 and three.
And finally, they go all the way West to the coast to Troas.
And Paul sees a vision in the night, a man from Macedonia saying, come over and help us. And so he says, aha, how much grander and bigger God's thoughts are, as so, so often than ours. And off the gospel goes from Asia into Europe. What a tremendous passage of that, of that body of water. World history is filled with tremendous passages of water.
From from what we call Asia into Europe. To me this was the most.
Important of all when a few men with the gospel of the grace of God head across the water, do they see a man in Macedonia to help know?
And they show up by the side of the river there where prayer was won't to be made of Jews and you know, the history. Who do they meet first? Lydia, a seller of purple of the city of Thyatira. They go into Europe, but the first contact that they really have is a lady from Asia, where the Lord had closed the door. And so, you know the story. There's blessing in Lydia's household. Paul and Silas are thrown into prison.
In Philippi, the Philippian jailer gets saved, and so on and on they go. They work their way down what we would call today the northeast coast of Greece in those days called Macedonia, Philippi, various cities, Thessalonica, beautiful conversion of souls in Thessalonica, and then again in Berea down to Athens and to Corinth and so on.
It's at this point.
That Paul determines I need to go back to Jerusalem.
What we call our.
Our 2020 hindsight we saw Paul. It would have been so good if you had just kept going and gone all the way to Rome. He had it in his heart to go to Rome.
And he says so I can't recall the exact place.
But after being in Athens, as you know, and he preached there, and some souls were saved, he goes to Corinth, his eyes wide open by this horrendously ungodly prosperous city, and the Lord has to speak to him as if Paul says I'm not staying long here in his heart, but the Lord appears to him in, I think it's in chapter 18.
Yes, 18 And verse 9. The Lord spake to Paul in the night by a vision. Be not afraid, but speak, and hold not thy peace, For I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee, for I have much people in this city. And he continued there a year and six months.
After a certain period of time as as we would follow there.
He's first going to take by sea and head back across the Mediterranean back to Jerusalem.
Jerusalem had such a hold, I should say, really.
His His brethren, according to the flesh, as he writes to the Romans.
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I could almost wish myself a curse for my brethren, according to the flesh.
They had such a hold on his heart.
And far be it from me to judge him for that.
How patient the Lord is.
We read of him, the Lord Jesus himself coming.
Looking over Jerusalem as he walked towards it and how he wept. Jerusalem, Jerusalem.
How he would have He was capable, and he was desirous of bringing them into blessing, and they would not.
And that heart had been duplicated.
Reproduced, if I could put it that way, the life of Christ in this.
Servant of the Lord and the apostle Paul, and it governed his actions.
Perhaps we might say.
In a way that was not altogether wise.
But again, we have to stand back. Who am I to judge another man's servant?
And back he heads, And so rather than go across by sea, because there was word that he would be, he would be.
Accosted either getting onto or on the ship and lose his life, he heads up again, the coast up through.
Macedonia. And that's where we pick up in the beginning of Chapter 20.
Well, I'm sorry I missed some places here.
In chapter 19, Paul is in Ephesus.
Any leads into the full liberty of the Christian position, some who knew only the baptism of John?
And there in Ephesus, he spends two whole years in a certain school outside of the synagogue, and probably over three years with these believers in Ephesus, and there was much blessing.
An Ephesus, being a central city, as I gather for that part of the world, that through that ministry of the apostle Paul the word of God spread throughout all that part of the world and beyond, and there was tremendous blessing. Verse 20 of Acts 19 So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed.
And this is the verse I was thinking verse 21 after these things were entered, Acts 19 and 21.
Paul purpose in the spirit when he had passed through Macedonia, to go to Jerusalem. After I have been there, I must also see Rome.
There is an uproar in Ephesus.
And when it quiets down, Paul heads back east.
I'm sorry, back West.
Verse beginning of Acts chapter 20. After the uproar was seized, Paul called unto the disciples and embraced them and departed for to go into Macedonia.
And when he had gone over those parts and given them much exhortation, he came into Greece and thereabout 3 months. And this is the time, as I was speaking about, he was about to sail into Syria. He purposed to return through Macedonia, and now he has companions he has.
From Asia sopater of Berea, I'm sorry, Into Asia sopater of Berea and of the Thessalonians, Aristarchus and Secundus. Gaius of Derby and Timotheus.
Titicus Trophimus, and we assume Luke as well.
And they sail away from Philip I, verse 6 after the days of unleavened bread, and come unto throw us in five days, where they abode 7 days.
I will skip over the incident that is well known with the young man Utica's who's sitting in the window. While all is long, long discoursing to them, they probably met in the evening.
It's not as if Paul spoke all day and into the night. The way I take it, the the Lord's day would have been like a work day to them. Like a Monday would be to us, perhaps.
And they discharge their work and their responsibilities, and met together afterwards, and it would have been there in that upper room with many lights.
Paul being about to leave and he himself having the sense that he might not be back again ever.
That he spoke in discourse to them late into the evening, and as you know, the Utica's in the fall falls down and is taken up dead. Paul goes down and falls upon him like Elijah with the with the with the young lad, or Elisha later on with another.
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And his life is in him and he comes back up, and the brethren are much encouraged. The point I review all this for is because as we read in Acts 20 and get down to verse.
13.
And we went before to ship.
And sailed into Asos there, intending to take in Paul, for so had he appointed himself to go afoot.
And when he met with us at ASOS, we took him in and came to my Delini.
The Apostle Paul as I perceive it.
The weight of his heading back to Jerusalem, the testimony that was rising up around him as to how that would go when he went there.
He seems to feel that it may be the end of his life.
At the very least, he seems to feel it's the end of his ministry.
His whole life was in his ministry.
And and so he decides, rather than enjoy. You can imagine what a happy thing it is.
For these brethren, when Paul would go to a city, maybe with Silas or Timotheus or Lucas, and go to the next one, he would leave some of these brothers behind to help the new converts and help them get established and for their encouragement. And so as you read through the book of Acts and some of the Epistles, you start to get this picture of these brethren moving and some staying behind and catching up later and being sent back and all of this kind of thing.
And to a large measure, I think these brethren were individually or in smaller groups of maybe 2.
Staying behind and encouraging these new gatherings of souls as they were established.
And So what a happy thing it would have been for them all to come together and to be on that, on that ship together, and to rehearse what had happened into bounce things off each other, as we say.
But then as they start to head down the West Coast of Turkey all the way back towards towards towards Israel.
Paul says. You guys just go, I'm going to walk.
And when we went through this some time ago, we we had the young brothers run it to ground, check it out for us. And this little jut of land that Paul walked across maybe 20 kilometers or maybe maybe 12 to 15 miles, I'm not, I can't exactly recall, but I remember knowing how long it takes me to walk a mile or two or more. I just kind of did the math and it was an all day hike that the apostle wanted to take and he took by himself.
But I think this is just one of those indications of his need to be alone with the Lord and how when he gets finally when the ship comes down the coast and he calls for the Ephesian elders who he knew so well from having been with them for the space of three years, and they come down to meet him there and he unburdens his heart. And that's the passage that we read.
It weighed on the Apostle Paul. Surely it did. And he realized what a, what a, what a responsibility, what a stewardship had been given to him like no other, like no other.
Except for the precious savior himself.
And so in the verses we read, as you could see, he characterized the parts of his ministry that he had, he had carried out amongst.
The Gentile World.
And amongst the Saints as the gospel of the grace of God, the Kingdom of God.
And the whole council of God and I would like to spend a little time on on each of them in the time that we have here this morning.
But first, we're going to find that these three.
Aspects of the truth of God are not distinct from each other.
They're interrelated.
And there are some verses that when you when you have this in mind that you read other passages of scripture, you see that let me just take one or two First Thessalonians 1.
And in our minds we can see.
By this point, when Paul is with the Ephesian elders.
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There on the South Coast of Turkey.
He has already written the first epistle to the Thessalonians and probably most likely the 2nd.
He has already written the Epistle to the Corinthians and the 2nd.
He wrote to the Galatians, perhaps when he was in Asia at the start of that third journey.
He got to Ephesus and he had been in Galatia, and he writes back to them as I take it.
He wrote to the Romans, perhaps when he was in Corinth.
And so we have the Book of Romans, the Epistle to the Romans, First and 2nd Corinthians, Galatians.
And not yet the prison epistles, of course. Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians send the epistle to Philemon.
How much Paul's understanding of the truth developed.
We know that he had what he had by revelation, not by figuring it out.
And he could say of the cardinal truths of our Christian faith, of the faith once committed to the Saints, that he got them by revelation.
We'll see in Ephesians 3 if we turn there. Let's turn there now hold your finger in first Thessalonians 1.
In Ephesians the chapter 3.
Verse 2 If you have heard of the dispensation or stewardship of the grace of God, which has given me to you, word, how that by revelation he may known unto me the mystery. Verse 5, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.
The existence of the Church of God.
As being.
United together to Christ in glory.
By the Holy Spirit, out of Jew and Gentile, making up one body was a mystery hid in God. It cannot be found in the Old Testament.
You say, well, I see a picture of it here or I see a picture there, Yes. But I teachers back east to my youth used to say a picture is a picture of nothing until you get the substance of the thing revealed. And once The thing is revealed, you say, that's that picture of Joseph with a gentile bride. That's that picture of Moses with a gentile bride. That's that picture here or that picture here. And really it's more the bride than the body, but still.
I always remember those words ring in my ears. A picture is a picture of nothing.
Until you get the revelation of the thing, and the apostle Paul received a revelation.
A communication from God, not from the Lord Jesus, as he was here on earth in flesh and blood, but after he had been raised and ascended into heavenly glory.
And everything he had came from the risen, from the glorified Christ, the mere existence of the Church in its character.
That's one body united to him was a mystery hidden God until he revealed it through his to his holy apostles and prophets.
And so this explains why, when Paul says, infer to the unruly Corinthians, for I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread, and break it, and said, this, take eat, this is my body. And Peter could have said, Paul, where do you get off saying that you weren't even there? We were there.
It was because of this heavenly character of things which Paul calls in the word of God, the mystery.
That this added element of the remembrance of the Lord is the expression of one body.
Is given to Paul.
Don't have it in Luke 22, Don't have it in Matthew 27 in that character.
Another subject though.
And so the revelation of the existence of the Church, a mystery hidden God in that way, the characteristic expression at the Lord's table, her destiny to be raised out from among all the rest of the dead.
And finally, the Lord taking us into heavenly glory to be eternally with himself. All of these revelations Paul received back to first Thessalonians chapter one to show.
The how the Gospel of the grace of God.
The Kingdom of.
And the counsel of God are woven together frequently in Paul's ministry, in his expressions, in the space of one verse or two, and so in first Thessalonians one and verse.
00:25:12
Uh.
Verse 8 from you sounded out the word of the Lord not only in Macedonia and Akaya, but also in every place your faith to God word is spread abroad.
That's the gospel of the grace of God they had received so that we need not to speak anything, for they themselves show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you how you turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God.
This is the character of the Kingdom of God I believe Paul was referring to in Acts chapter 20, and we'll get to that in a moment, Lord willing.
And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.
Sandwiched in between the gospel of the grace of God and the whole council of God.
Is what Paul called the Kingdom of God.
I was helped many years ago when our brother Heinz Brinkman, was still with us.
He came to Palmyra where we were and had a series of meetings on the Kingdom and a comment that he made I found very helpful, which is that and I know.
This question comes up all the time. I know it does. What's the difference between the Kingdom of heaven and the Kingdom of God? And to sort out all these references to the Kingdom, but just briefly, I would say this that there are times in scripture when the expression Kingdom of God is just the broadest aspect of God's headship and rule over all things.
Forever and ever.
And it's, you might say, the master category.
Of the Kingdom of heaven.
The Kingdom coming Kingdom of the Son of Man. The Kingdom of my Father, my father's Kingdom.
And and other these other aspects that are discreet times and administrations, if I could put it that way.
They're all the Kingdom of God in that sense. And sometimes in the word of God, the expression Kingdom of God is used that way.
And we ought to be familiar with the fact that there are a number of words in Scripture. The.
A number of concepts expressed in words where the word takes on a different meaning according to the context, like the word salvation, for example, or the word sanctification.
These words take on a different context, take on a different meaning according to the context, but the aspect of the Kingdom of God. I think for myself that the Apostle Paul is referring to in Acts 20 is the moral response in our lives as a result of having received the gospel of the grace of God.
When these Thessalonian people, these people that lived in that city, received Christ as Savior, when they received the message imparted to them by Paul, they obeyed the gospel.
And it changed them.
And so it was here that they turned to God from idols. To do what? To serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven.
For the sake of time, let's just do one more, for example in Colossians chapter three, well known passage.
Colossians 3. If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.
Set your affection or your mind on things above, not on things on the earth if you are dead.
And your life is hid with Christ and God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth.
The expression Kingdom of God in many places in Paul's ministry has to do with the practical character of the life of a believer living out that which is now in him.
I wish I could say it more simpler than that, but.
Verses come to mind like in Romans chapter 14. The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. These are the practical character of things.
In Galatians. Paul points it out to the Galatians in chapter 5. These are the works of the flesh.
This is what it is. And those they that practice such things will have no inheritance in the Kingdom of God. The same language and I think Ephesians 5 and some other places. And so the Kingdom of God in this sense really is the lived out character in the lives of his own, in this world that we might display Christ. Christ is on high in heavenly glory. You and I are still here.
00:30:14
And once we have been brought out of darkness into the Kingdom of the Son of his love.
We are now in the Kingdom of God, in morally responsible, and it is our desire and delight to walk here in accordance with that wonderful grace that has been shown to us, going back to Acts Chapter 20.
The Gospel of the grace of God.
Isn't it striking?
That there are times where Paul speaks.
The Gospel, Our Gospel.
The gospel that he preached.
That was identical and in substance no different than what Peter and John and the others preached from the time of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and onward in Acts chapter 2 and Acts chapter 3 and all of that.
But Paul could also refer to what he called my gospel.
And you would say, wow, this guy is really something he calls the gospel his.
My gospel, he says in Romans. I think it's chapter 2 and then at the end maybe chapter 16. My gospel. What does Paul mean by my gospel? I believe what he means is the character of things that he received by Revelation, not from the Lord Jesus in Jerusalem or not connected with the 12, but from Christ himself when he was heading way away from Jerusalem.
And immediately he preaches Christ, that he Jesus, that he is the Son of God. And we don't know exactly when these revelations came to Paul, but we know that they did. And when he refers to my gospel, he refers, He's referring to a line of things that was, you might say, in addition to added to what had already been presented by others.
For example in.
First Timothy, chapter one. He speaks of the gospel of the glory.
Of God, of the Blessed God.
And it's a wonderful thing, and Paul stressed it that God has been glorified. The good news, the gospel at its center, is not your salvation or mine.
It's God's delight in his beloved Son.
And all that flows out of that.
Which includes your blessing in mind and that for all eternity.
So when we started these very meetings, it was refreshing to my soul with Christ, our theme begins.
The Gospel of God is just in the King James. It's a little different. First Timothy 1.
A list of unsavory things.
In verse 10 and then.
If there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine, first Timothy one and 10 according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust.
I believe you read it in a better translation, the Darby Translation, For example, it is the gospel of the glory of the Blessed God. God has been blessed.
By the great work of Christ in this world, he could say on his way to Calvary's cross. In anticipation of the accomplishment of that work, I have glorified thee on the earth. I have finished the work thou has given me to do. He brought great glory to God and made God, if I could put it that way reverently. He's a blessed God. He's a happy God. He has had his delight in his Son for all eternity.
All eternity he was his delight, and yet the Lord Jesus could say, For this cause doth my Father love me.
For I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
As one brother put it many years ago, it's as if he found a fresh cause to love the sun.
And God having been glorified by his Son, and never more fully than on Calvary's cross.
It's as if, he says. How do I respond to this?
What's my response? He saw it all. The three hours of darkness.
00:35:04
It's All in all.
The heavens were turned to darkness.
The heavens were like brass above him at Holy One, and he saw it all. He lays down his life, and He's taken down.
How do you take a man down?
Of a cross.
I don't know how you would have done that.
I don't think I could have done it.
How do you do?
We're going to thank Joseph of Arimathea Nicodemus.
For the love that they showed.
The respect to that one.
Put it into a new tomb where never man had been laid.
And what is God going to do in response to that?
The only righteous response to that was to raise him up from among all the rest of the dead.
And he gave him, moreover, the highest place in heaven.
Think of it. And that's where he is this very moment, seated as a man. There's one man there. Only one man.
In.
It's a glorified man.
He took a seat there because of who he was. Yes, he took his seat there because of what he has done. And God has rewarded him with the highest place in heaven, Wonderful, the gospel of the grace of God.
I was happy that our brother read Ephesians one today. I've been thinking about Ephesians 1A lot lately.
And I won't read it myself either, except to say this in passing, because our time is going.
When I moved into.
Change companies 25 or some years ago.
In my in the construction business, my work had been out in rural places where there's usually plenty of room.
When you want to build a big structure, whatever it is, a pier, a bridge, power plant, whatever, as everybody knows, you go down to build the foundation. And we always had the luxury to to just blow it open, you know, just to dig it out. And big banks, wide open space to get down, to start the work in the bottom in the foundation. Can't do that in a big city. When you're building a tunnel or building something because everything's built all around you, you can't.
Open up anything. And so some, some guys in the company, I think they invented this. We call it top down construction.
And so they build the top first.
So they go into a city, densely populated skyscrapers on different sides, and they kind of scrape out the lot.
And they build the roof.
And then they leave it with a hole and they go down and they excavate a first level and they brace that, and then they build the next to the top floor and down they go. It's it's about the only way you can do it without tremendous cost to support all of this, all of this.
Ground that has tremendous pressure.
And it's from the top down. When I refuse read Ephesians one, I think of top down construction because that's what it is. It's the gospel of the grace of God from God's point of view.
Because we read in the counsel of God that there was an eternal purpose.
An eternal purpose. That's in Ephesians 3.
In verse I read at the end of verse 10.
That he might might be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus the Lord, and then in Ephesians chapter One.
In verse 11.
In whom?
Also, we have obtained an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose.
Of him who worketh all things after the Council of his own will.
There was an eternal purpose.
We all love that hymn. I think it's 142 in deep, eternal counsel.
That expression, eternal counsel, is not in Scripture, but.
I I think it's OK because as we read there in verse Ephesians 1.
According to the purpose of him that worketh all things after the Council of his own will.
God had one purpose. He had it from all eternity, and it was to display the glory of his Son as man with a bride, that was one with him in whom he and the Father himself could take delight in, and through whom the fullness of God could be displayed.
00:40:22
At the end of Ephesians one, as our brother, read it to us his body, the fullness of him.
That filleth All in all.
And to say it reverently, and you almost hesitate to say it, there is that of the glories of God.
Which could not be displayed if it weren't for his bride. There are certain glories of Christ, of God's glory in his Son that would not be displayed if it weren't for the bride.
We read in Acts 20 again the gospel of the grace of God.
Paul could say it's my gospel. It doesn't just.
Say justice kind of disrespectful. It's not only the forgiveness of sins that we have as a present possession.
It's not only as Paul.
Taught in his gospel message that we're justified in him, which is beyond being forgiven.
You could be forgiven of all your debts and be dead broke.
There you are, wonderful to be forgiven of all that debt, but your debt broke.
Justification is more than that.
It's the fact that in Christ we now have a life and are looked upon as possessing a life to which sin has never been attached, nor could be the wonderful thing. Isn't it to be justified in Christ?
And we could be justified with that more exalted blessing. And yet still God could say, yes, they sinned against me. I forgave them.
I even justified them.
But that doesn't mean he wants our company. But beyond that, as we get into Romans, Middle of Romans, chapter 5.
We are reconciled to God through the death of his Son.
And by that, by being reconciled to God, we learn.
That he wants our company, and he has accomplished such a work through his son, that he can take the poor fallen sons of men.
And through the value of the work on Calvary's cross and the work in your soul.
He can bring you back so that there might be joy in you and joy in him, and that there would be reconciliation. A wonderful truth, wonderful truth that we don't speak about that much.
And so the gospel of the grace of God, as Paul presented it and could call it my gospel, would include these wonderful aspects, this wonderful fruit from the great work of Christ on Calvary's cross.
The gospel, the Kingdom of God, is the outflowing in your life and mind of the grace that we've received. And so we read in Titus that the grace of God, which brings with it salvation to all men, hath appeared, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live righteously and soberly and godly in this present world. And that's the desire of the new nature, and everyone in this room is to walk in that way. But we just need to be.
To remember.
As we see this truth of the Kingdom of God and its moral character, that that is not the sum and and and All in all of the Christian life.
I I am really not in touch with with our brethren.
In all of the Evangelical.
Circles of our country. But I rely on a brother that's in a nearby gathering who I won't mention, who keeps track of all these things and and he he lets me know.
But much of much of the ministry in the Christian of evangelical Christian profession, as I understand it.
Is occupied with the gospel of the grace of God as it pertains to you having the forgiveness of sins.
And then to the Kingdom of God and its moral aspect.
But I would my one of my main points that I hope to get across in this. I've indulged your time now for 50 minutes.
Is that we need more than this in order to be here for His glory. We need to take in have an appreciation and understanding of the whole council of God. It is necessary.
00:45:09
Because there's only so much we can talk to one another about righteousness and peace and even joy in the Holy Ghost.
My salvation is not enough to keep my heart, nor is it enough to keep yours.
God has not only provided A Savior to take our guilty place, but He has raised them to be the object of our hearts, affections that we might be drawn after Him.
I've lived in cold places most of my life in New England.
Snow is a part of life, as is the mud that follows it in mud season.
And we always, you know, we all had rear wheel drive and if you use chains or you got stuck, you you you address the the rear and you you know to push your car along. And if you skidded or lost control, everybody knew how to kind of handle that with rear wheel drive. But guess what? Then they invented front wheel drive, a whole different thing.
And you know, the Christian life is meant to be meant to be driven with front wheel drive. It's meant to be attractive. It's meant to me as.
The As it said in the I think in the psalmist Psalm, draw me we will run after thee and attractive power. And so it is that we can't just be preoccupied with ourselves and carrying a mirror around. How am I doing? Am I Righteousness is not our testimony.
Practical righteousness. Without it we have no testimony, but it in itself is not our testimony. Grace is Grace is the topmost stone, as as as the hymn writer put it. And grace draws us along, not only saved our soul, but draws us along.
And Grace has now provided an object for us at the very end of the book of Acts, Acts 28. When I first read it as a new believer, I thought my that kind of ended on a just a drab way. It's like.
There's no kind of big concluding statement or or wonderful off into the into the sunset or it just ends if you look at it that way, you look at it.
Pulled dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, received all that came in unto him, preaching the Kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him.
But it's years and years later, and maybe I got this from Nick Simon. I don't remember. He spent a lot of time together lately.
Is that well, the book of Acts is the Acts of the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is still here.
And he's still working and it's very understandable that it should just kind of, you know, the account trails off because on we go into this very present hour and I I enjoy looking at it that way.
But as to the counsel of God?
The whole Council of God we learn we.
Need to learn?
About God's eternal purpose that is centered in his Son.
And God has a council that sits to my mind under that purpose as to how that purpose is going to be carried out as we sing in that hymn in deep eternal counsel.
And then the Council is carried out and we see that there are there are actions and ways.
And we experience them and we see them, and we seek to understand them. But how do we understand them?
Without an understanding.
Of God's counsel.
What God's purpose is as Paul?
Was burdened to to summarize his ministry with them because he knew that attacks were already coming to them.
They were, as we say in English slang, sitting ducks.
They were just from from within and without it was it was going to come upon them as it had come upon him with interferes, without fighting, she said.
And it was going to come upon the testimony there, And he knew it, and he felt it. And he could say, I commend you to God and the word of his grace.
And he reminded them of what he put before them, the gospel of the grace of God, the Kingdom of God and its moral aspect, and the whole council of God.
In Ephesians chapter one. Sorry Ephesians chapter 3 in closing.
00:50:11
We read this expression.
The fullness of.
Again.
Bob read to us the prayer at the end of Ephesians 1.
And that prayer is centered that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory.
May give unto you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of him the eyes of the understanding opened, and so on.
In Ephesians 3, it's more the practical side of embracing it, understanding it, enjoying it. And so at the end of Ephesians 3, just in summary.
There are a series of that's there.
Starting in verse 14 is the prayer I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Verse 16 That he would grant you according to the riches of his glory.
To be strengthened with might by his spirit in the inner man. Why that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.
That ye being rooted and grounded in love, that's the foundation, practically.
May be able to comprehend with All Saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge that he might be filled with all the fullness of God.
You say? Well, I thought we already were chapter End of chapter one.
That's our position. That's the glorious position that the Church of God has been given in God's counsel to occupy.
But he wants it to practically to be enjoyed now.
And that was his prayer.
We pray about a lot of things in our prayer meetings, a whole lot of things. And well, we should.
I believe we should add to our prayers these kinds of prayers that we read in the end of Ephesians One, the end of Ephesians 3.
In the prayer of one whom Paul could single out as saying that he prays for you, that you might stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.
It is vital.
To being here for His glory, that we understand where we are in the scheme of God's counsel.
That we understand that our Christian life, that our spiritual life was initiated by him before the world's were even made.
That presently we are part of an entity that is heavenly. Our citizenship is in heaven. We are a heavenly people.
And our destiny is heavenly as well.
Everything about the essence of your life and mind is heavenly and it is eternal.
There's an expression that that I read years ago.
I think I wrote it in my Bible.
It is in the intimacy.
Of the Councils and the Grace of God.
That.
Fortifies himself.
For a battle which he cannot escape.
I didn't quote that exactly, right.
It is in the intimacy of the councils and the grace of God that man fortifies himself.
For the battle that he cannot escape, you're in a battle.
And so am I. He can't take the enemy of your soul, can't take your salvation, but he can take your joy of it away, and your appreciation of it away.
It's God's desire that the radiancy of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ be appreciated by you and me and displayed in our lives as we walk through this world on our way home.
To heavenly glory with Christ.
I'm going to read in closing one verse.
That, I think, illustrates this importance of understanding.
At the end of Luke's Gospel.
It just came to me.
A little bit earlier in the meeting today.
It's when the Lord is walking with the disciples.
These two on the way to Emmaus, the going in discouragement away from Jerusalem, and they were confused.
00:55:00
And the Lord draws them out. He says, well, what, what? What are you sorrowful about? And he kind of pokes and prods a little bit to get it, to get it to come out. And then in verse 21, they say, I'm going to read it in the new translation. But we had hoped.
That he was the one.
Who was about to redeem Israel? We had hope, I think, in the King James it says we trusted.
We had hoped.
That he was the one he is the one their hope was was not properly situated in their understanding.
And if you and I are confused in the way they are, we're going to get all tangled up.
With present.
Issues that surround us in the culture of the Western world as it becomes darker and darker and darker. And we ought not to be surprised. We were warned. The Lord Jesus warned us, Paul warned us, Jude warns us, Peter warns us, John warns us it's going this way, but the true light already shines.
And it's the light that you and I walk in. We need to be armed. We need to be fortified. And the councils of God, that ability to have a sense of what God is purposing in this present age and in your life and mine, will enable us not only to be morally suitable.
But also to be a light in a very Dark World.
What Does God Think About Sin?
Children—Titus Buchanan
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.
OK, who wants to pick us up? All right, let's start here. We're trying to Which one? Number 40. All right, perfect. That's great. So good place to start. This Backpage is full of really good ones to start. Just flip it over and you've got some nice highlights. OK, let's sing #40. Everybody find it on the very back. Easy to find. I liked it in our Sunday school. In our little Sunday school back at home, we have. We usually use the other books.
It's hard to find, so I'd like to help all the kids find songs so they don't want to try to find it. Lower singing right Then you're ready to sing. These are pretty easy. They're all most of the ones are going to pick her on the back. OK, let's sing #40.
Jesus loves me. This I know.
For God tells me so.
Being as strong.
As Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
He has. Jesus loves me.
The right world tells me so.
Jesus loves me. He Good night.
And escape to open.
He will watch the way my sin.
Child, come in.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus was made.
Not by all Tamil speak, so.
Jesus loves me no my bad and give ways to make me mad. Wait till for me and his heart it's missing from everyone.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Jesus loves me, loves mischief.
Wherever I bury wink and then from this shining.
He will watch me where I am.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
All my whole house me so.
It's also loves me. He will stay close beside me.
All the way.
If I trust him, should I die, he will Take Me Home on my. OK, Just a second here, OK? We're going to sing a lot. We're going to sing it one more time. Yes. Jesus loves me.
You know, sometimes.
Sometimes, every now and then we like to say, well, kind of sing without words. Have to do that. How do you sing without words? Maybe it's not called singing, maybe, but it's.
Like coming that's that's a pretty good way that's better answer than what I had for you. OK. So what I what we sometimes do is we do some motions to it, OK. And sometimes if somebody can't hear you.
Maybe. You ever heard of sign language? You ever heard of sign language? Yeah, kind of like talking without words, right?
So there's somebody might actually have to help because I'm kind of might forget how you do it, but there's something like.
Yes.
Jesus.
Like this loves.
Me. Is that right?
And then it goes again, yes.
Jesus loves.
Me and we're going to sing it like that, but we're going to just do the motions.
00:05:01
Singing it out loud. Well, maybe we better sing it out less. Sing it out loud. Bible is this Bible. Yeah, you know why it is.
Jesus, that's right. What does it mean? What does it mean?
Do you know?
What happened to the Lord Jesus? What did?
He died on the cross. Why would we do this?
Right, absolutely. He died on the cross.
For my sins and for yours accepted. But there's a thing like this when we do that, that's actually number one. Well, it didn't, actually.
You know what they did to his hands?
Or what they did. What did he do?
Nails.
Throw nails into his hands.
OK, and that's why we do this, OK, that's isn't that interesting that that's a that's a universal sign for the Lord Jesus.
Yes. All right. Let's, let's sing it and we'll do the motions along with it, OK.
Just the last chorus, yes.
Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves me.
Yes, Jesus loves. Jesus loves me.
The right world tells me so.
So it's like this or like.
This because when a judge makes a lot, he breaks his pen so that it's so. Oh, wow. All right, Lord, something new. All right, let's sing another song. Who else wants to pick one? OK, Lincoln, what do you want to sing?
You know how it doesn't have to be in in the book?
Let's sing it.
You want to pick a different one.
Which one? What do you think?
You want to do the two little. Be careful, little eyes. That's one thing you like down right. We'll sing. Oh, be careful, little eyes. How about that? All right. Oh, be careful.
What you say? Oh, be careful that your eyes what you see.
There's a father up above, looking down and tender love. Oh, be careful when Hawaii's what you see.
Oh, be careful. Let me come here as much, you hear? Oh, be careful.
There's the father of the father looking down in tender love. Oh, be careful.
What you hear?
Oh, be careful in what you say.
Oh, be careful, little tongue. What you say?
Let's the father of the father working down the gender of Be careful what you say.
Oh, be careful in the hands what you do.
Or be careful with your hands what you do.
There's a father of the public looking down the tender love. Oh, be careful, little hands, what you do.
Oh, be careful. They'll be where you go. Oh, be careful where you go.
There's a father of the father working.
Of Be careful.
Where you go?
Right, very good.
OK, let's sing maybe a couple more there. Any other kids out there?
Go ahead. Which one would you like? Can you pick one of Garden Heading? All right, that's a great one. Is that on here?
#4141 Thank you.
OK, Around the Road of God in Heaven will manage Children's Day children.
Who sins are all forgiven? Will help the and come spraying singing glory.
Glory. Glory.
00:10:04
To God.
It's shining roads are spotless, like each one will be alright.
Lasting life and Joyce and everything glory.
Glory.
No children there singing glory.
Glory.
Glory to God.
God.
Must say their shadows want to wash away their sin.
Now watching that must Precious blood be all the white and clean singing glory.
All right. That was an excellent, you know what?
You think there will be very many little kids, little children up in heaven?
Yeah.
Probably more children than anything else.
You think probably something.
Little children, you know what? Isn't it nice?
That we can have a Sunday school like this.
For the children, you know what? Sometimes you want to sit back and those roads back there, you might think, you know what? There's a lot of stuff that I don't understand. You know what?
Our Jesus loves us. You know what? That's where it all starts understanding that. And that's not too hard to understand, isn't it?
The Lord Jesus he loves us, and in fact he loves us so much.
But he hung up on that cross.
And he loved this so much that he bored sins of those who will say yes. Lord Jesus, I believe that you died for me, for those things that I get, those bad things, OK? And I want to be saved. We're going to talk about that a little bit later, OK? But I think it's beautiful that there is going to be thousands and thousands and thousands of little children up in heaven.
OK, around the Lord Jesus.
Let's sing and not who else? OK, Evan, what do you want to sing?
47, All right. Right. On the back page, OK. You just stay right on that page.
Let's see.
When he comes, when he comes to make all this jewels, all this jewels, precious jewels.
Like the stars of the morning.
It's right.
And for his crown.
In a gathering for his Kingdom.
Of the same ones, All the bright ones.
Here's what that is, all right. The stars of the morning.
Righteous for his crown.
Little girl.
Won't there be humor?
Attitude, The most precious jewel.
Here's love and it's all like the stars.
Morning.
00:15:00
It is right.
They shall shine.
Disgusting bright hands for his crown.
All right. Well, we just talked about there's going to be a lot of children in heaven, you know? And in here, what did it say? It says something about stars.
How many stars did you look up at night? And it's a really dark night.
And you start counting.
How how long would it take you to count all the stars?
What's that?
I don't think you'd ever get done right. OK, But the point is, what did it say here? It said like the stars.
There's a lot of warning. OK, so there's lots and lots of stars.
You know what? And that's the point. There's going to be lots and lots and lots of children up there in heaven. But you know, they're not just going to be there, They're going to be singing. They're going to be gathered around the Lord Jesus.
Singing and praising him. But for how long do you think it'll be? Just for maybe an hour, like you have? Or 45 minutes like we have Sunday School? No.
Longer than that.
Because you know what? We talked about how the Lord Jesus, he loved us so much he died on that cross.
Not only the little children, but everyone who loved the Lord Jesus. We're going to be up there forever. We can't understand that we've been talking about that. We can't understand. Our minds think, you know, OK, forever. That's a long, long time, but not just a long, long time. But it's not time, right? We can't understand that it's forever, right? And we're going to be praising and worshipping and giving him thanks.
For forever, there's no other way we can explain that.
Because what he did for me and for you, OK?
All right, Who else? Somebody else Pick a song out, right. We'll sing a couple more maybe.
All right, Logan, what do you want to say?
If it's not in here, you can just say it. OK some. Maybe there's one that you know which one you want to send. You can just think.
Number one.
Somebody remember what number one is in the in the other books?
All right. Perfect. Certain man. OK.
Certain man, we have something more than gold.
Oh yes. So yes, there's something more, something more than gold.
Till all your sins are of forgiveness, something more than go.
Have them down. A certain day this little man was stolen.
That Jesus stood my past death way with something more than gold.
Oh yes. So yes, there's something more, something more than gold.
Below your sensor of forgiveness, something more than gold.
Find the tree upon the crowds of that they might be cold.
Let less than one great power to give them something more than gold.
Yes, yes, there's something more, something more than gold.
To know your sins are of forgiveness, something more than gold.
Along the way and started in the tree.
When calling to him, Jesus said like my survive with me.
Oh yes, Oh yes. There's something more, something more than gold to know. Your sins are all forgiven. You something more than gold.
So in your bed and 70 from the night that not been told.
00:20:02
The blessing Jesus brought to him was better more than gold.
Oh, yes, Oh yes. There's something more, something more than gold.
To know your sins are all forgiveness, something more than gold.
All right. That's excellent. Right, Very good. Now we'll just sing one more. Somebody can pick it out, but somebody think of one that we can maybe maybe has a few motions with it, All right. So we can wake up a little bit and then we're going to, when we're done with that one, we're going to ask the clerk for his help.
We already did that. Somebody think of one that maybe. What do you think, Allie?
The wise man. All right, that's great. OK. All right, so can you guys all help me?
I need some help. Right. You know how to Do everybody know the wise man? All right. Sometimes I messed up before went like this. And you're supposed to do this. All right? So we'll try to keep it straight, all right?
So wise man.
Upon the run the lights and build his house upon the rock the lights and built in his house upon the rock, And the race came down, the wind down.
The rains came down and the floods came up. The rain came down as the floods came up. The rain came down as the floods came up and the house on the front stood firm.
The foolish hand built his house upon the sand. The foolish man built his house upon the sand, and foolish and built his house upon the sand. And the rains came down the wing down.
Rain stand down and the ones came up, the rain came down as the floods came up, the rains came down and the floods came up and the house on the sand.
If you build on Christ, who is the rock? So if you build on Christ with the rock, so if you build on Christ against the rock, you'll be safe when the church comes.
You will be safe when the judgment comes.
It will be safe when the judgment comes.
It will be safe when the judgment comes if you build on Christ of Rock.
What is that song talking? No, we sing a lot of these songs, but sometimes I always. I think it's really important to understand what it's talking about. OK? I remember as a little kid growing up singing songs, and sometimes I didn't even know what the words meant when I was singing. And we were just singing because we sang him every week, Right. But what does it mean when it says does this judgment? No. What's judgment? What is judgment?
Right. That's right. What is it talking about here? There's going to be judgment.
In a very in a coming day.
What is that judgment talking about?
Hey, there's, there's Eva. There's, well, there's maybe different ways to understand this, but if we don't believe in the Lord Jesus, what's going to happen? Yeah, what's going to happen?
That is right. Very good. And that is very, very solemn. That is very, very important. Understand that if we don't accept the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior.
Hell.
A lot of people don't like to talk about that, but it's very important to understand. And we don't have to go there. We don't have to go to hell because the Lord Jesus died. We heard a beautiful gospel last night. I hope you were listening, guys. It was very nice, OK? The Lord Jesus, he died on the cross.
This side was pierced. The blood flowed out for me and for you too.
All right. Well, you better say the verse. We're going to run out of time here, right? So let's ask the Lord for his help, and then we'll say the verse about that. OK, let's close our books in our eyes, and we'll talk to the origins. Lord Jesus, we thank you so much for this time here this morning.
We just pray very specially for each of these children in a very special way that they would, if they haven't already, that they would come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as their savior, very own personal savior. We just pray Lord Jesus, that I helped this morning as we they say the verse and we just talked about it just a bit too. We asked by blessing Lord Jesus and thy precious and worthy name, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
00:25:18
OK, I don't know how you guys do it. I gotta don't actually bring this into the paper up here, but the verse is found in Romans and.
It is Romans chapter 5.
Verse eight. Wow.
All right. That's great. So it says.
God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners.
Christ died for us, right? Very good. Now somebody.
If if you don't want to say, you don't have to, OK, I know it's kind of, there's a lot of people here, but don't worry, OK?
You want to say you can. You don't, right? So who wants to say the words? Raise your hand. If you want to say, wow, that's great, OK, let's just start over here. And if anybody wants to go around, you can say. If you don't, that's OK. So what do you want to go ahead and say it?
Very, very good. OK.
All right, great. You want to say, Landon?
Logan, you want to say it?
God commended.
All right. Great. You want to say it, Jacqueline?
God.
Commendeth his love.
Toward.
And now, while we were yet sinners.
Christ.
Died for us.
Romans 5/8.
Great. OK. Lincoln, you want to see it?
Go on.
Commendeth his love.
Toward us.
In that while we were yet sinners.
Christ died for us.
Romans 5/8.
Very good. All right. Do you want to say it? OK, go ahead.
Excellent. Excellent. Great. Anybody over here want to say You want to say it? No. OK. Would you like to say it? All right. God. God.
Amended his love. God bless his love.
For us.
And that while we were yet sinners.
Christ died for us.
Romans 5/8.
Very, very good. All right, your buddy over here, when I say it. Ellie, you want to say it?
Very good. OK. Would you like to say?
This is my.
Excellent. Excellent. Did I miss anybody else?
All right. That is very, very good. OK, so there's a let's see here, Let me find it here. It says there's a little phrase in there that says while we were yet sinners, OK, We kind of talked about this maybe a little bit this morning already. But and I've talked about this before back in our home assembly a little bit. But, you know, there's AI like to think of this.
Here yet Sinner, what do you think God thinks?
We used to be.
Well, you know what? We still sin. But God paid for those sins, right? The Lord Jesus paid for those sins. God gave his son. We talked. We're going to talk more about that, OK? And.
You know, here I think I like to think of a little piece in the Bible that that kind of shows what God thinks of sin. What do you think God thinks of sin?
00:30:03
What do you think he thinks of Sid?
Let's, let's read a little bit real quick, OK. We don't have very much time, but let's go back to Genesis in the very beginning. OK, in the very beginning, because I think that's a good place to look at what God thinks about sin. All right. When there was no sin yet. OK. And then what happened when sin, the first sin came in? OK. I think that's important to understand and I think it helps us. OK. So we're going to bring back to Genesis and you don't have to turn there. There is a verse that.
You all know.
Remember, you remember who we're talking about, right? Remember Adam and Eve. Raise your hand if you remember Adam and Eve.
Great. You guys all remember Adam and Cake, so.
Does anybody remember what? What happened? What happened?
They ate her. The fruit, right? Yeah. God had told him not to. Very good. All right, now we're going to read that first says I won't read much because we don't have time here, But says in Genesis chapter 2.
In verse 17, well, let's first back at 16. And the Lord God commanded the man saying of it, of every tree of the garden. Always freely you can, he said, You can eat whatever fruit you want to hear.
Except.
Except yeah, it says but.
Verse 17 Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it.
He told them. He said you can eat whatever you want in this garden. A beautiful garden. OK, is it? You can eat any of this fruit except, I said. But that is, this is the one thing.
One thing they couldn't do OK, they couldn't eat, says But.
Thou shalt not eat of it. The one, the tree, the knowledge of good and evil. We're in the day that thou eatest thereof.
Thou shalt Surely What?
Die, OK?
Thou shalt surely die.
So they knew this.
OK, And then we could read some of the verses. We won't read them because we don't have a whole lot of time here. But in the next part of the next chapter, the very beginning, it talks about the serpent. What's the serpent?
Snake OK the snake and Satan. Satan came in the form of snake OK and he told them.
You won't surely die.
And so, kind of paraphrasing a little bit, what did they end up doing? Eve said.
OK, well.
What happened?
Yeah, what happened?
They did.
What did God said? He said. Thou shalt surely die. That's right. What if? Well, she did. She took a bite of it. She gave some fruit to her husband. She gave some fruit to Adam. And what did he do? He knew it as well, right?
He ate all of it. He ate it as well, he said.
Now put that back there, OK?
They disobeyed and I told you the answer, but what is it when you disobey?
What is it when you don't do what you're told and you do the opposite? Yeah, that's right. I didn't ask that very, very good way. When you disobey, it's a sin, right?
They disobey God, and what did God think of it? He said. You are going to die if you eat of that fruit, and they did.
That's what God thinks of sin, you know. I need to help reading this real quick.
Thanks to Mr. Kaiser, he printed this off for me before Sunday school.
Who can read that for me? OK, what does it say?
God hates.
In fact, so much that he said. If you read of that group.
That's how much he hates.
Let's turn to another verse real quick, OK?
00:35:01
There's a person you don't have to turn there now, Adam, Eve, sin and so.
Who else is sin? Anybody here? Sin? Raise your hand if you've ever sinned. OK, Raise your hand. Wow. I'm glad to see that. I mean, everybody's hand up. OK, All right.
OK, we've all said, and in fact that's the verse I was going to read. OK, you don't have to turn to it. I'll read it here. It says I can find it here. The 23rd verse of Romans chapter 3 says 4/3 little letters.
ALL spells? What is that spell?
What is ALL spell?
All very good. All And what does it all mean?
Everybody right? So we all sin and the next part says.
And come short of the glory of God.
How many sins do you think are going to be up in heaven?
Zero, thank you. That's a very good answer. Zero, I like that answer.
Absolutely none.
I said earlier, maybe I didn't say it, but I'm going to heaven.
OK, I'm going to heaven. I have no doubt in my mind. I'm going to heaven. OK, And there's going to be 0 sins in heaven and we've all sinned.
Let's take a look here.
In Romans chapter 6 and verse 23 says the wages of sin is death, we talked about that.