YP Address—B. Anstey
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#283 Some brother raised the tomb.
Merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, Merry Christmas.
All right.
All day I want to talk about.
More grateful and proud of your grass.
Let's turn first of all the first Chronicles Chapter 29 for a verse.
First Chronicles, Chapter 29.
The latter half of verse 5.
Who then is willing to consecrate his service this day unto the Lord?
This was at the time when the congregation of Israel were gathered together. David was now turning over the reins of the throne and Israel to his son, and it was desiring that there might be dedication and devotion on the part of all that were in Israel at that time. And he threw in a great challenge to the congregation who then this day is willing to consecrate the service under the Lord.
And I'd like to throw that out here this afternoon to each and everyone of us, and particularly the young people for whom this meeting is particularly directed, that we might hear the Lord's call to consecrate our all to him. Now notice what it says here in the verses that follow. Certain of the chief priests of the fathers And so on came forward, and they gave, and we learned that all the way down through the family of God and Israel.
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Once came forward and.
Gave what they could to the cause of the Lord.
And I think that's very nice to see at the very beginning that it was the chief of the fathers that first responded. And we can be thankful for the older brethren who have set an example for us in the path of devotion and sacrifice in their lives. This and we have seen as we have lived and moved and had our being among those gathered to the Lord's name. But as we have seen from time to time, the older ones are passing off the scene, and slowly the Lord has taken them to be with himself.
And now the call of responsibility lies squarely in the lap of each and every one of us that are here this afternoon. The Lord is speaking to us. It is time for us to consecrate our service this day unto the Lord. And I'd like to emphasize those two words this day, he didn't say.
A week Tuesday or sometime later in your life when you get through.
This project or that that you may have in your lap, but the call was this day and.
So I'd like to take up the subject of consecration, the subject of devotion and dedication of our lives to the Lord. I think that is a good place for us to begin when we address young, and I'd like to particularly look at some of the great motives that Scripture presents as to why we should consecrate.
Our lives this day unto the Lord. Someone might ask the question, Isn't getting saved good enough? I've turned my life over to the Lord when I received Him as my savior, and I'm thankful that my sins are gone away. And now you're telling me that the Lord gives another call that He wants me to give, not just.
My sins and all to him and salvation but my life. But this is what the Bible presents as the consecrated life.
That will deal his all as we were singing. And so if that question is in the hearts of any that are here this afternoon, I'd like to try to answer that.
From the word of God, I like to look at some scriptures that would give us the great motives.
For consecrating our lives to the Lord Jesus and His cause, let's look first of all then.
In Second Corinthians chapter 5.
Two Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 14 and 15.
For the love of Christ constraineth us.
Because we have thus judged that if one died for all, then all were dead.
And that he died for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them and rose again.
Here we have a great motive, perhaps the supreme motive, and that is the love of Christ ought to constrain us. Or rather, as the Scripture says here, the love of Christ does constrain us.
And this make me say, is perhaps the greatest of all motives. When we have a great shaft of light dawn upon our souls, and we realize what the Lord Jesus accomplished at the cross of Calvary for us, I believe that it will change us.
And we will never be the same again. When that love and that grace and that sacrifice that he there so freely gave at the cross on our behalf is realizing our soul in any measure at all. There's going to be an effect. We can be sure of it. And this verse is not telling us that the love of Christ, that it's our love for Christ, doesn't say our love for Christ should constrain us to live for Him.
But it is saying the love of Christ. That means that it is his love for us. And that, I believe, is where we need to begin. When we look at this subject, and that is to look and to think and to meditate, consider his love for us. And what better place could we look to see the display of that love, that the cross it was there he poured out his soul unto death. It was there that he suffered. It was there that he gave himself for us.
And this verse here tells us that there are only really two ways in which a Christian can live. As it says there in that 15th verse, we can either live unto ourselves or unto him. And every one of us in the audience here, more or less, are doing just that. We're either living our lives for ourselves or for him. But it tells us here that in the light of the cross and the strength of that love, that what will take place is that we will no longer want to live.
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Unto ourselves but unto him who died for us, and rose again.
And for this, it's going to take faith. Isn't it? Faith to trust him that he can make a blessing in our lives? You know the reason why? That we sometimes hold back in giving the Lord what we know he should? And the reason why some people seem to throw their whole life into the things of the Lord, and many of us hold back? I believe that one of the reasons for it is that there is a lack of faith on our part.
To trust him with our life. We want to control and navigate our own lives through this world, and perhaps there isn't that confidence to turn everything over to him. We may have the idea that we're going to miss some joy or some happiness, and it's a lie of the devil we know, and so the lack of confidence to put our lives in his hands.
Causes us to hold back, but when there is that phase to trust him.
He will prove to us that he is better than we ever thought.
And those that have laid their lives upon the altar of sacrifice for the Lord can testify this day.
That the Lord has been more, and He has proved himself to them.
That he can give them the joy, the happiness, and the fruit bearing that a Christian life should have. But it begins by considering the love of Christ, and that will make commitment, won't it? The love of Christ. Well, if the love of Christ, as this verse tells us, constrains us, we might ask the question, why are we not more constrained to live a life of 100% devotion to the Lord?
While the mass of the Christians that are in this world today not doing.
As we have been speaking, this verse says the love of Christ constrained. This verse tells us that his love will produce that Well, it's no fault in his love, we can be sure of that. But the problem lies of course in our part could never be on His part. And it has been illustrated to me like in the way of a magnet. We take a magnet and we hold it a very powerful magnet. We hold it over some nails. And what happens to the nails when we hold it over mother's movement. But if we held the nails or at least the magnet at some distance from the.
Although the power of the magnet is there, the nails would not move.
You say what is wrong with the nails? What is wrong with the magnet? There is nothing wrong with the magnet.
Because the nails are not close enough to the magnet. If we brought the nails closer to where the magnet was, we would find that they would move and they would jump to the magnet. And so I think that that illustrates just the point I'm trying to make here. And that is that if we let ourselves get close enough to the Lord by taking time to meditate on His love and His grace to think in the shadow of the cross of what has been accomplished for us, there will be plenty of movement and consecration.
To him, because the love of Christ constraineth us and so there needs to be commitment. We all know that we lack this in some area, but that's the kind of that's the way that it's presented in the scripture. And I believe that if the the, the magnitude of what is took place at the cross would really grip us, we would realize that the Christian life as the Bible presents it as the writings of the Apostle Paul.
Or in the life of the Apostle Paul as it is recorded here, would show us that it is all or nothing. The Bible never gives us a halfway Christianity, although many of us know all about living in that halfway land. And I remember hearing a story about Cortez when he landed at Veracruz in the 1500s. Probably heard about this if you know your history. When he landed there. His mission from the king in Spain was to take Mexico.
And he had 200 men.
And they came over and these 11 ships, I believe it was. And what happened was the first thing he did when they got on shore is that he burnt the ships. And the men standing on the shore looked out there at the harbor and saw their only means of retreat going down to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. They knew that there was only One Direction they were going to have to go. And that was forward. And I'd like to just stay here this afternoon. It's time that we began to burn our boats.
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It's time that we began to burn our bridges, so to speak, that we would give ourselves no opportunity to return to the humdrum, halfway type of Christian life. And there's no better time than in a conference like this.
To consider these things in the light of the Scriptures, and especially what has been accomplished at the cross. There is only One Direction for us to go when we think of these things in the light of the Cross. And that is forward. That is forward. That reminds me of the Napoleon.
One time he was in a battle, a fierce battle, and his army was losing terribly. And at the last movement he called to his drummer and he said beat, retreat, and the drummer turned to him and said, Sir, you never taught me that beat.
Apparently, as those armies would move in those days that they would listen to the drummer and that would indicate what they would do in the battlefield.
But the drummer said, You never taught me that, and that stirred Napoleon to such.
A devotion to his 'cause, that he rallied his forces and they went on to the most signal victory. And he conquered. I'm not even sure what the enemy was at that time, Sir. You never taught me that beat. You know the Lord has never taught us any beat.
To do with retreat, having the scriptures give us One Direction and that's forward. And the Lord wants us to move forward.
According to the leading of the Spirit of God and the 1St place we need to go as young people.
So to speak is to the altar of sacrifice, that place where we can lay down our life for him, and to put him on the throne of our life and give him the control.
Let's look now at another passage, and that's Romans 12.
12Th chapter of Romans.
Perhaps we can read a few verses at the end of the 11Th chapter to take a run at the 12Th.
Verse 33 of Chapter 11.
All the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God.
How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out For who hath known the mind of the Lord? And who hath been his counselor? For who hath first given to him? And it shall be recompensed unto him again. For of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory forever. Amen. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service, and be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
That you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will have gone for I say, through the grace given to me, that to every man is given among you.
That is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly according as God hath dealt to every man a measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and everyone members one of another, having their gifts, differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy let us prophecy according to the proportion of faith.
Or ministry that is weighed on our ministry.
Where he that teacheth on teaching, or he that exhorteth on an exhortation, he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity, that he that rules with diligence, he that show of mercy, with cheerfulness. Here we have in this passage yet another motive for our lives to be laid in the hand of our Lord Jesus. I read the verses in the 11Th chapter because I think that it leads forward to the 12Th chapter as a springboard.
The Apostle has been penning for 11 Chapters, something of the mercies of God and how that he what he has done for us. And then when he comes to the 12Th chapter he turns it around and says now there are things, something that we can do for him. If the 1St 11 Chapters outline what he has done for us, the 12Th chapter onward gives us what we can do for him. It's a nice response, isn't it? I believe that the Lord is counting on a response from those who have read and meditated on the things that are found in those eleven chapters.
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The Mercies of God. And the last four verses or so of the 11Th chapter we have what we call a doxology.
And I suppose that most any of the young know what that word means. But doxology is a short burst of praise that comes spontaneous when a heart is filled with the subject and the matter that we have had in these chapters if we would look through them. Like the apostle puts down his pen for a minute in his writing and just lets out a little burst of praise and wonder to the one who has designed these things and brought them to pass through grace.
And so we find that he names a number of things. Here are riches, wisdom, knowledge, judgments, His ways, the mind of the Lord, his counsels, and so on. Someone said there's about 7 different things that he enumerates here, and he just wonders at the the goodness and the grace of God. And I would like to just attach to these words one word for you to remember, and that is the word appreciation, Appreciation. We need to take time to appreciate what the Lord has done for us.
It's not something that's going to come without taking the time to do that and I can't.
Encourage you anymore than to say that we all need to spend time before the Lord every day. Now, if you haven't established a quiet time in your life each day, you are in need of it desperately. Each and every one of us need to start the day with a quiet time with the Lord, and we need to take time to think of these wonderful things.
Because love will bigot love. It will produce response, and that's what we get here. The first response is a short *********** of praise. Just to think of what the Lord has done will give us a burst of praise to Him. So we find here appreciation.
But appreciation will lead to what we have in the 12Th chapter and that is consecration.
Consecration doesn't happen on its own. It's something that it precedes it and that is appreciation will lead to consecration. And so he goes on in the 12Th chapter and he says, I beseech you therefore, And that therefore connects with those words that we have before it. Whereas we've said back home, whenever you come to a therefore in scripture, find out what it's there for. It's there for a reason. It's connecting the foregoing with what he has in hand now.
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice in the light of what the Lord has done. He would have us to present our bodies, and that would be our energies, our time, our interests, our all.
And notice it's not I command you if I beseech you. And that's because the call to consecration, the call to follow the Lord with a dedicated life, is not a command of the Lord. Exactly.
The scriptures do have commands. We're commanded all men everywhere to repent.
And another place in John's epistle to believe on the Son of God. But when it comes to the yielding of our lives, to him and to his cause, the Lord is not going to command that he's waiting, that there might be a response from our hearts and love to what he has done. And it reminds me of dear Jonathan and David. You know, their lives in the Bible illustrate this very point that we're talking about this afternoon. David, the type of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jonathan is a type of the believer. When David went forth there into that valley of Elah to accomplish that victory for the children of Israel.
When he vanquished their foes as a picture of Christ going forth to the cross and putting down our enemy.
Winning a great victory for us there. What we find, what happened was that Jonathan was so affected by that that he said he loved him in his heart and he and he began to surrender what he had and he put off the many things he gave him his coat and his armor and so on. But we'll find as you look through that story, you'll see that there was something that Jonathan neglected. And they said there's a hint of it right at the very beginning because he neglected to give David his shoes and sandals.
And you'll find through that story that David waits in rejection for Jonathan to make up his mind, to take up that path and fall with him. And they meet together on occasion and have sweet fellowship. But it says Jonathan went back into the house and David went into the wood. Then they come back together again sometime later, and they have a little time of fellowship together. Jonathan goes back to the court of the king and David waits in the field. Why was David waiting in the field? He was waiting for Jonathan to make a decision.
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To follow him in the path of rejection for David was rejected at that time by Saul, and he was haunted by Saul.
And Christ is in rejection today, and He wants you and I to follow him in the path of rejection. But all the while David waited for him. He never asked Jonathan, not even once, to follow him if love for him demonstrated in what he had done for Israel. And vanquishing that full Goliath the giant wasn't enough to affect Jonathan. David was not going to ask him, and you'd find that he waits for him. And you know, dear young people, the Lord is waiting for a response from your heart and mind here this afternoon too.
He's watched your life through from the very beginning.
And he is so interested in your blessing. He wants to see you grow in grace, in the knowledge of him. And he knows that there needs to be commitment, there needs to be that forthright laying down of our lives for him. That's wherein lies the happy, fruitful Christian life. Maybe you say, I hear the brethren talking about those kind of things, but I don't know what they're talking about. It's because what lies between the two did you know?
There's a life of consecration to him.
And so the Lord knows that if we're going to have a happy, fruitful Christian life, it begins here. And so we have the presenting of our bodies. In the Old Testament, they brought their their dead sacrifices to the altar in Israel. But now in the New Testament, the kind of sacrifice they were to bring is a living sacrifice. We're to bring our lives to Him holy. Yes, it needs to be holy. That's the kind of sacrifice it needs to be.
He wants us to be holy in every manner of life and that should be presented to Him, for it is our reasonable service that tells us our reasonable service.
What does it mean reasonable service?
Well, it could be looked at this way.
If he has given his life and his all in death, for me, it's only right then that I should give my life to him and to his cause. That's a reasonable thing. That's something that you can get ahold of and understand. I mean, it's only logical, isn't it?
The word could be translated intelligent too, and that's because the service that we have in Christianity is so much.
Different in contrast really to the service that they had in the Old Testament times. We have an intelligence service in the sense that we have been brought into the knowledge of God's ways and His service, and we can carry out our service for the Lord with intelligence, knowing why He had asked us to do what we are to do.
When we were told to carry the word to the lost, we understand why. Or to bring a word to his people, or to shepherd and help his people, or 10,000 different things that the Lord may call us to do. Each one of them we have an intelligence that goes with it. Now in the Old Testament they didn't have that. When Moses was told told by the Lord to do such and such, and the children are visible to make their sacrifices, they didn't know why.
They knew the Lord wanted them to do it. I suppose in one sense they knew that, but they didn't really understand why the animal had to be cut in such and such a pieces, or why the blood had to be poured out on and why this piece had to be done and all these things. They had an unintelligent service in that sense, but not in Christianity. When we talk about sacrifice for the Lord, He has outlined for us not only what He would have us to do, but we can do it with intelligence in our hearts. Isn't that wonderful a service that we can do for Him?
And let us remember, each one of us have a servant for God for our lives.
He says be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
That ye may prove that good and acceptable perfect will of God. Here we find that the world stands as an obstacle in the way of a Christian really discerning the will and mind of God. For him We have a yielded body in the first verse. The second verse we have a separated life. Be not conformed to this world. Yes, the world has a way of hindering from us. 1000 blessings.
And we need to be careful. We need to be careful that we have made sure to distance ourselves from the world. And this particularly is a great attraction to the young people. And when we speak of the world, we're not talking about this globe, as the Bible sometimes uses the world as the universe. When he talks about the world, at least in this verse, he's talking about that system of things that man has built up in his alienation from God, an attempt to make himself happy. He has all kinds of things built into this system.
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An entertainment system, an art system. Music plays politics. It's even got its own religion. Everything that a heart, a man and his alienation from God may long for. Man has tried to develop a system of things that is now almost 6000 years old. That was what fill the void and to keep him happy at a distance from God. It doesn't exactly work. And that's why that so many of this world that have as much as the world can offer, usually end their lives with sadness.
Some with.
With suicide.
But nevertheless, this world is what stands in the way of a believer. And I think we need to be very careful. You know, I once heard a story of a bunch of young people that in the north of Scotland, they were going to go on a little tour in some of the mines that they had. They had a coal mine up there and there was this old coal miner that was hired to to be the guide to take them down into the coal mine. And so these young people showed up there and one young girl was wearing a white frock dress and she said to the guide because she was kind of wondering.
What it would be like in there, she said. Excuse me, Sir, do you think there be anything from hindering me from wearing this dress into the mine? And the old farmer, said Lassie, there'd be nothing from hindering you from wearing that dress into the mind, but there would be considerable from you for you wearing that dress out of the mind.
It would be awfully filthy dirty because of the cold, and so in one sense, in every sense.
The world can make us dirty, and so how careful we have to be.
And so, if we have appreciation, it needs to consecration.
And consecration will lead to separation, and separation will go on to transformation, as the verse goes on and says that you may be transformed by the renewing of your mind. And every one of us this afternoon are either being conformed to this world or being transformed.
We are transformed by the word of God. I believe by saturating our lives with the word of God in a daily way, we begin to think like the Lord. So we have transformation by the renewing of our mind. Our minds see things as God sees them. We weigh things as He weighs them. What is?
Sin in the eyes of God will be sin in our eyes. What grieves the heart of God will grieve us. The mind is transformed when we saturate ourselves with the word of God. And again, I can make this plea. Let us saturate.
Our lives with the continual reading of the word of God.
You know it was mentioned in the in the reading by a brother about the.
Taking in the word of God like a civil our minds may be like the sieve. You've heard the story and he put it in the water and you bring it out and well, he doesn't retain a whole lot, but it gets a lot cleaner. Did you know what they told that story to Jan Darby? Did you know what he said? He said, oh, if you want to keep the basket full of water, just keep it in the fountain.
I like that you want to keep it full of water. Just keep it in the fountain. Don't bring it out. It's full. And so it is. If we want to keep flow, the word of God, stay in the word of God.
Yes, and it will form our thinking. And you know, this world wants to do our thinking for us. To quote another brother. This world wants to do our thinking for us. It wants to squeeze us into its mold and gives us its smile of approval if we go to March to the beat of its drum. Or it will give us its sneer and scorn if we choose another path. But that shouldn't affect a Christian who has been affected by the greatness of the work of Christ and the cross.
You may be considered fanatical, but who cares? We're marching to the beat of a different drummer now, and everything demands our sacrifice for him. Well, transformation leads to realization of the will of God to realize and understand the will of God for us. And God has a purpose and plan for every one of us. What He may have for you to do may be different than me, but one thing for sure, that the Lord has a plan for every one of us.
A place to fill in his body as the verses go on here and so even for the youngest believer here.
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He would love to hear you say to him, Lord Jesus, I want to give my life to Thee, my all, and be whatever it is. You may not think that you have any ability to be a help to the Lord's people or to His cause at all in this world, but he doesn't see it that way. And more than that, if you put your life at His disposal and there is a consecration, there is that separation and the transformation that will lead to the realization of his will for you. But it goes here and it says not just the knowing of His will.
The proving of his will that goes beyond just knowing.
Most, if not all, young people seem to want to know God's will for them, but He gives the knowledge of his will for those.
Who are willing to do it? See it says there, and I think it's the 7th of John. If any man will do his will, he shall know.
If any man is predisposed to the doing of his will, is when there is going to be the revelation of it to us in the past.
And we are going to prove just how good and acceptable and perfect it is.
He wants us to prove it, and we prove it by walking in it. Well, that leads to something else. Verse three. You might think it would lead to the performance of his will. Not yet. That would be verse 4 on know there's something in between. The third verse brings us to yet another thing, and that is humiliation.
If transformation will lead to realization of the will of God, there will be a familiar humility in our lives that as we discern what we believe to be His will for us, there will be that quiet confidence in our lives. We won't be boasting in saying the Lord has sent me, I am. The Lord has told me to do this and to do that. If you hear a Christian saying the Lord told me to do this, the Lord sent me to do that, the Lord told me to do this. He is much as telling you that he lives so close to the Lord that He couldn't possibly miss the Lord's mind. And the Lord just speaks almost like audibly to him while the rest of us have to wait in His presence.
But you know, as a boast that I think is very dangerous, very dangerous. And I believe that if we have discovered in any measure what we believe to be his willed forest in the pathway, it will take all the pride out of it. And what will happen is that there will be, as this verse says, not a thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought to think. Yes, he'll be that quiet confidence that we trust we have His will for us, and that so is so very important.
Because there's a danger, you see, of trying to stretch ourselves beyond what we really have been called to do for the Lord.
And try to rethink ourselves more highly than we ought, and we can create difficulties and problems among our brethren. But just the thought there of humility. And then shall we say the last one in verses 4 through 8, which we read. It's the waiting on our service. The waiting on our service for the Lord.
And I would have taken that might be administration.
Yes, ministry. Everyone of us are in the ministry and Christendom today. Usually when you speak about being in the ministry, they mean that you wear the badge of being a minister. But the Bible presents the subject of ministry as simply the exercise of our service for the Lord be whatever it is. In that sense, we're all in the ministry. I asked the sister one time a few years ago. Do you believe that a sister could be a minister? She said. Oh no, I said, Well, look at Romans 16, he says. I commend unto you, Phoebe.
A minister.
The church said right there in the Bible. She was a minister of that church there in Centuria.
Well, she didn't know what to say about that.
Then my wife and I explained to her, of course, that the word ministry means a whole lot different than the conventional meaning out there. And yes, dear sister, dear brother, dear young person, you are in the ministry and the administration of our service for the Lord is simply the exercise of it, the performance of it and humility. How important that we take that place of humility and waiting on the Lord, We are going to have something to do that will come into our hand and soul. Verses 5 through 8 there tell us whether it be this gift or that.
Let us wait on it and notice it says if it be prophecy, let us do it according to the proportion of faith or ministry. Let us wait on ministry teaching, on teaching. It doesn't say let teaching, we wait on preaching.
We are to perform that which we feel the Lord would send us to do.
Not another person's work.
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And the Lord has something for each of us to do.
There's never been a day when the challenge has been greater, to live for Christ, to serve Christ.
When I was younger, I thought all the bases are covered, the Lord really doesn't need me. I remember saying that to somebody too. I mean, you know, they've got plenty of teachers in the meeting and they've got lots of preachers and I can't think of anything for me to be doing, but I'll just carry on. But as we get older and we see the gaps become bigger until finally we see that there is a field white.
What needs and service. Yes, you may not see just a whole lot what the Lord may have you to do, but the first thing is to put our feet in the path. And I, being in the way of the Lord, led me. That's a verse from Genesis 24. When we're in the path of His leading, he will guide us. It's like the rudder of a ship. We're not going to get guidance in the pathway. But just like the ship's rudder doesn't guide the ship when it's sitting at port, the helmsman could get back there and turn it this way and that. The ship doesn't move at all, does it?
That's because the ship isn't moving. See what the wheels in my car.
As long as it sits in the parking lot, I can move the steering wheel around, but the car doesn't move. But when it's moving and we apply the steering, the car moves in the direction that we move it, that we steer it. And so as we move in the pathway, walking day by day with him, the Lord will open the path for us as to what he'd have us to do. Well, let's go on now and look at yet one more. And I know we've come to the close here of our meeting and I want to just look.
At.
First Peter.
First Peter Chapter One, verse 15.
But as he which hath called you is holy, so be holy in all manner of conversation, because it is written, be holy. For I am holy. And if ye call on the Father, who out of respect of persons, judges according to every man's work past the time of your soul, journey here in fear, here we have the third motive, and that is the disciplinary hand of a loving Father. Yes, there is such a thing as a motive of the Father's hand and discipline.
And when our ways do not please him, if we are careless in our lives, he has undertaken as our father to perfect holiness in our lives.
And he knows just what to do to produce that in us. He may allow suffering or some trial and difficulty. Not all the trials and difficulties that we get in our lives are because he is seeking to correct and to perfect holiness. But very often they can be. He wants to perfect holiness in our lives. It's like that verse in Psalm 139. Thou winnowest my path. So he's taking a lesson there from a farmer who winnows his.
Wheat that he takes the chaff from the wheat, and there may be some chaff in our lives, those things that don't belong there.
Have no business being there. The Lord knows how to win of that and take it apart, take it aside. It may cause suffering, may cause trial, but it will produce exercise. And so if our ways are such that they do not please the Lord in some direction, some way, a hand of the Father in love will seek to work that out. And so we need to have a healthy respect unto our God our Father, and we need to pass the time of our soul journey in fear, as this verse tells us.
You know, I heard a story about Alexander the Great. One of the soldiers was acting up in his army. He brought him before him, had him in, and he said, what's your name? And the soldier, said Alexander hesitantly.
Alexander said.
Either you change your ways or change your name. There is a soldier in the army of the Emperor and he was carrying on in such a way he's bearing his name, he said. Change your name if you're going to carry on like that, or better yet, change your ways. We carry a name, don't we?
And we have a father that will change our ways.
Why is he allowing those things? Because he loves us too much to let us go on our way. And there is such a thing as the motive of the hand of a father disciplinary ways, A man that I know, at least I heard of. He has had sculptured a lion, an enormous statue of a lion. And in the at the day of the unveiling of this thing, people are all around and people are asking him how did you ever do it?
And he said, well, I just chipped away everything that didn't look like a lion.
You know something? That's exactly what the Lord is doing in our lives. He's chipping away everything that does not look like his own son, though, his attitudes, those ways, those things. He knows exactly what to do.
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And so we need to have that healthy respect to our Father that loves us. He wants us to be holy, and if there is no holiness in our lives, he will produce holiness. If he has to even bring chastening in, our time is through. We've gone over 3 motives for living for Christ, and I just like to close with this one verse in Exodus 32.
Hardly without comment, Exodus 32 and verse 29. And Moses said, Consecrate yourselves to day to the Lord, even every man upon his son and his own brother, that he may bestow upon you a blessing this day.
Twice in this verse we find this day, he says. Consecrate yourselves this day and you'll get a blessing this day. Isn't that nice? And so I believe that's the word of excitation for us to.
It begins at the foot of the cross.
The love of Christ, the mercies of God, and the hand of a Father.
And discipline are the great motives for living our lives for him. Let's pray.
Our God and our Father, We look up to thee now and thank you for this time we've had together with Thy Word, open.