Cuyahoga Falls Conference: 2021
Table of Contents
1 John 4:1-5
Reading
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For everything next week.
While.
There's love.
And God yes, now I'm going to love you.
In keeping with the opening hymn.
And prayer and the exercise of the prayer before God. I would suggest, brethren, that we take up that subject. God is love has brought to us in first John chapter 4.
First John chapter 4 we can read that.
Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of Antichrist. Where have you heard that it should come? And even now already is it in the world.
Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world. They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them. We are of God. He that knoweth God heareth us. He that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the Spirit of truth and the Spirit of error. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God, and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God.
He the loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because the God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him here in His love. Not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No man hath seen God at any time.
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If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in US. Hereby know we that we dwell in Him and He and us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and to testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and He and God and we have known and believed the love that God hath to us.
God is love, and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment.
Because as He is, so are we in this world. There is No Fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment. He that feareth has not made perfect in love. We love him because he first loved us. If a man say, I love God and hateth his brother, he is a liar. For he that loveth not his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he have not seen?
And this is the commandment that have we from him, that he who loveth God, love his brother also.
Very often the questions of doubt that.
Come into our minds when I'll use the way we say things. Bad things happen as we see them that cause us to question why something has been allowed to happen in life. I believe that very often the answer from God is not necessarily to tell us why. Sometimes He does, but is an opportunity for us to lay hold of the truth.
That God is love, as in the end of this chapter.
We have There's No Fear in love, and yet there's often fear when things happen that we don't understand.
I doubt that.
Abraham knew why when God told him, you go Abraham out there and put your son to death.
I suspect there were some questions in his mind as to why he was being told to take his son out and make a sacrifice of him. But he did do as he was told because he trusted the heart of God. And I think this chapter is a help to us to enter in more fully into the heart of God. He created us.
Because He loved us, He created us because He wanted to have an eternal relationship with us in which He could make known to us His heart and in which we could respond and enjoy His heart for eternity. And it was a tremendous pain to God when Adam sinned and had to be put out from the Garden of Eden because it separated God.
From the object of his love and.
So I think as we go through this chapter, there are many points that we will enjoy.
To the end, desire that each one of us may enter more into the enjoyment in our own souls that God is love and that love is not abstract, just a fact, but in the enjoyment in our own heart that God loves me.
Brought the Epistle of first John. We have many ways we might say that we know that we are children of God.
And toward the end of the previous chapter, we have one of them.
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And even keeping His commandments dwelled in Him, and He and Him, and hereby we know that He abides in US by the spirit which He's given us then in the beginning of this chapter.
We have.
Instructions on how to know if other people are believers.
So it says don't believe everybody.
Love it, believe not every spirit, but try the Spirit when they are God. Because many false prophets are gone out into the world. How do you know if somebody who says they're a believer is truly a believer?
You check their spirit and their spirit, it says in verse two. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God, every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is coming to flesh.
Of God. So do I have to have two or three witnesses that somebody's a believer before I will accept him as a believer?
Bible tells me how I know that somebody is a believer. It's by his spirit.
And that he confesses by his Spirit that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.
The times in this chapter we have God is Love verse 8 and verse 16.
That is who God is.
In chapter one we have.
This statement in verse five God is light to me. It's.
Interesting and helpful to understand that.
To love us doesn't mean that God just hides some of our defects.
Rather, he knows absolutely everything.
And he loves us in spite of everything.
And it's a sacrificial love. Sometimes we I find in this culture that we live in, we think of love as an emotion.
And there is a lot of emotion connected with love, but I think it's important to see that agape love is not love of emotion.
It's love of who he is.
We go to the prison and speak to the prisoners there. We say sometimes God loves you.
And you can't change that fact as much as you reject him and decide to go to a lost eternity.
Still loves you even in her eternity. You will never be able to say nobody ever loved me because he loves you.
It's because of who He is. It's not because of who you are. It's because of who He is. That to me is so important if we're going to get ahold of this and enjoy the fact that God loves us.
Is that he knows every single little wit about you, Things that you don't even know about yourself. He knows about it, and he loves you just the same.
If you'd really know me, I don't know if you'd really like me that well.
But God knows me.
And he loves me. Isn't that wonderful?
John, Chapter one.
It's gospel.
We learned that God was manifested in flesh.
God made himself known to us in the person of His Son, become a man of flesh and blood.
That is the mechanism that God has chosen to use to make Himself known to us.
And so in the person of the sun, we learn God is love.
In himself as a man here and in the beginning of this chapter, the trying of the spirits. If someone says as it says in verse 2, every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the fleshes of God. But if I deny that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.
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I'm robbing God.
Of the way in which he has made himself known as love to me.
And so we when we look at the person and the work of the Lord Jesus as a man here on earth, it is God's demonstration to us of his heart, and the fullness of his heart toward us is seen in His Son become man. And so there was false and there always will be because Satan seeks to rob God. And so there would be those who would say no.
And if anyone says such, then that spirit isn't that spirit of what they're saying is not of God. It's a actually robbing God of that which is in his own heart, that we might know him.
So in verse 3.
Speaks of the spirit of Antichrist.
And he says, and this is very in the very beginning, really of the Christian era, after the Lord Jesus had come and done his work and returned to the Father's house on high. He says, you've heard that it should come. And even now it's already in the world. That is that spirit if Satan can't be successful in convincing man.
That price has not come in the flesh and is as such as displayed. God is love and his perfection. Then he will substitute another to take his place. And so there are what are called false Christs and ultimately one called the Antichrist will come and be raised up of Satan to say I'm the Christ.
A false substitute for the God's Son, the Lord Jesus and the Spirit of that replacement of what God has presented to us that we might know Him and we might know His love is already in the world. That Spirit's here and man is constantly being exposed to that which instead of.
God's provision for him in the person of His Son to substitute something else for his life that takes his place.
I will make a comment though, I just read it the last couple of days that I found interesting to remember and that is.
Unbelief.
Is never satisfied.
It's a short, simple statement, but it's worth putting in memory. Unbelief is never satisfied. So we live in a world that separates itself from the love of God and the provisions of God. And what's the consequence? We live in a world that has no satisfaction, constantly striving.
To find something that provides permanent, lasting happiness and satisfaction to the soul.
But God in love, in presenting his Son the Lord Jesus to himself says, if you have me, you're going to have the satisfaction that your heart seeks. And also it will help remove the doubts that come into the mind that want to keep in mind that when we are learning that God is love, it's also that which removes doubt from the soul.
You have the Antichrist mentioned in chapter 2 as well in verse.
18 When he's speaking to little children, it is the last time, and as you have heard, that Antichrist shall come. Even now there are many antichrists against Christ, whereby we know that it is the last time. And notice verse 19. He says, They went out from us, but they were not of us.
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For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. Five times it mentions us. And it's helpful to understand that it's the apostles that is speaking about because our faith is based on the doctrine of the apostles.
Foundation of the Christian faith is the doctrine of the apostles and prophets.
And it's about the Lord Jesus. And if it doesn't square with the doctrine we have about the person of the Lord Jesus in the doctrine of the apostles, then it is the spirit of Antichrist. And I think it's helpful to see that it's connected directly with the apostles. It's again given in this chapter 4 in verse 6 where it says.
We are of God.
He that knoweth God heareth us.
He that is not of God heareth not us hereby know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Again, that us is Speaking of the apostles and their doctrine. That's the basis of our Christian faith and it's important.
The Spirit is going to testify. It's going to be according to the doctrine that we have in in the New Testament here, the doctrine of the apostles.
Says in the beginning of verse four year of God, Mr. Darby leaves out the little.
Year of God, children.
Their children in this room.
And I dare say the children that are in this room know better.
But the probably a person sitting near them loves them and they know of anybody else.
Their children, and God has so made them that they become very young in life, dependent upon mother and father, and learn through mother and father what love is.
When it's displayed to them, and there are those who perhaps most of us are children by birth, there may be some in the room who are children by adoption. And when there's adoption, there's the sense of choice involved in the specific individual that is chosen to become part of a family.
And we're in God's family both ways, and both ways express that God is love.
God has chosen us because He loves us to be His children. He has also brought us into the family, to have the life of the family, the life of Christ that enables us to enjoy His love and to share in what He has pleasure in. You could spend the whole meeting on that very point, but it's part of the truth.
That God is love. He has expressed it in making us his children and making us part of his family, that that's love and both by choice and he has done that which is necessary through his son, that we might not only be adopted into the family in that way, but we also.
Are born into the family by new birds.
It's the apostle John that speaks of being born into the family, whereas it's Paul's ministry that we get that we are chosen in him and brought into sonship. To me, it's very interesting because Paul's ministry is different, but it takes in God's eternal counsels.
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But think that we're born into the family and like you say, brother Don, it's we are have the very nature, we have the very life of God. And if you're truly born into that family, then you're going to see the characteristics of that family. When I look at somebody and their children, I say I can tell that they are in that family because of the characteristics. Yeah.
That's the way it is in the family of God too, so the characteristics of that life are seen in the members of those that are born into God's family. Beautiful to think about.
So he says in verse four, greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.
Consider that.
In the light of life of the perfect Son, the Lord Jesus.
He was here as Son of God.
He constantly and habitually in his conversation, spoke to and of his father.
And enjoyed in his life that relationship.
Could the world overcome it?
Did there come anything between his soul and his father that made him doubt or question?
The relationship or the heart of his father?
He could say I do always those things that please him.
What was the consequence of his life lived in that way? He says in John 17 his prayer.
That he wanted.
Us, the disciples and ourselves to have the same joy that he had.
And that was the joy of the relationship that he lived in, in the enjoyment of his father's love and the enjoyment that he had to do his father's will.
There was number doubt in him when he cried out in agony, an anticipation of the cross. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
In the very place where he says that in Psalm 22.
A couple of verses later he says, But thou art holy, but thou art holy. He recognized even in for himself, going through the agony of the thought of being made sin.
There wasn't any doubt in doing it, but there was agony in anticipation in His holy being of having to be made sin. And in having to be made sin, God would have to forsake him, turn away from him when the judgment was falling upon Him and He felt it. But at the same time he could say, Thou art holy, and when he had finished the work.
He says I have finished the work which thou gave us me to do.
Again.
We can't develop it in the time we have here, but if you go back to.
Genesis 22 in the love side of what took place at the cross, you have something very personal, private and precious. When Abraham says, Abraham, the father says to.
His son.
I and the latter says about himself and his son, I and the lad will go Yonder and worship.
Perhaps the most intense period of true love being ever expressed at any time.
Was the love of God and the love of the sun when they went Yonder to worship, and in doing so established the work that has saved our souls and brought us into the family of God? And as such God is love.
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You'll pardon my taking us back to the end of verse two and beginning of verse three and we have there about spirits confessing that Jesus Christ is coming the flesh being of God or not making that confession. I wonder if we can have some help on something that might lead someone to think that if someone were to state I believe that Jesus born.
That grew up in Nazareth, lived a couple thousand years ago. Was that sufficient?
To say that there was a man that existed named Jesus of Nazareth.
Of course I know the answer to that, but I think that that could lead someone to think that's what it's saying, that it might be good to try to make that a little clearer for some of us.
You and I could not come in. That's what we are.
By creating.
Only the eternal Son of God could come in.
To creation and come in flesh.
And so there's two things there. The fact that he was before he came in flesh.
To come into this room, you had to be outside of it.
And then you could come in.
He was always the Son from eternity. He came in flesh, so it's showing that he always was.
But he came in flesh. It's not the fact either that he came.
It's that he came in flesh.
And has already been brought up spirit, soul, and body, perfectly a man. The Word became flash, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory. The glories of an only begotten with a Father full of grace and truth. No man has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.
And so as come in flesh perfectly a man in that way, as the brother said.
In that way it was in the purpose of God that God would be manifest, and in no other way could he be manifest to us. God, who is love, could not be manifest to us in any other way than Jesus Christ come in flesh.
And so he came in flesh, and in that way he has declared not only God who is loved, but the Father.
The one who we have been brought into closest relationship to. If you deny that Jesus Christ has come in flesh, you destroy the very fundamentals of Christianity and the manifestation of God who is love and the Father.
To whom we've been brought into relationship, Who is the liar? It says in Chapter 2, not a liar. Who is the liar? Turn back to that. I'm not going to be able to quote it.
Verse 22 Who is the liar? But he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ. That's Jewish apostasy, denying that Jesus of Nazareth was true Messiah.
But it goes on. He is Antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son for his common flesh. He's manifested God and God as Father, full of grace and truth, the greatest revelation of grace and truth that man will ever have and has ever had.
Is the Father manifested in the Son come in flesh? And the Antichrist is going to deny that. And there are many antichrists that deny that Jesus Christ is come in flesh. They don't deny His calm necessarily, but they deny in the character and the way in which He came in flesh, spirit, soul and body a man.
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Reminded me recently that Christ isn't Jesus last name Messiah like anointed savior and.
Like you were saying.
Someone might think, well, if I just believe that.
Jesus came, Hey I'm in that Jesus existed but we use Jesus Christ so easily that name and forget that Christ isn't his last name. It's like brother, you were just pointing out he's the Messiah. Here's the anointing chosen.
Jesus Savior.
It's so much more than what someone might look at on the surface.
Isaiah 96 is another good verse to show in that way, and it's a well known verse. We're unto us, a child is born.
Unto us a son is given. He doesn't say a son is born.
No, the Son was given because he was the eternal Son of God.
This is different than any other child that was born. He was born into this world, but he was a son from all eternity, eternal son in the bosom of the Father. So it's a beautiful thing to realize. So like you were bringing out brother.
He was. He was from all eternity, and that's the mystery. That is the amazing truth of his person. That's something in our human mind we cannot grasp. He always was there.
And he came to manifest who God is, and now we have the full revelation of all that God is.
To put that retrieve set in the last last few minutes, very briefly, it's confessing that he so came.
It's not confessing that it's can that it can, it's confessing that he's so king.
So one might ask for how else would you confess him, right?
Well, there are those who say he was just a spiritual appearance.
There are those who say.
There was a body, but there wasn't a human soul or spirit. It was that which was eternally God that indwelt that body. That was the spirit part of that body, denying he had a human soul and spirit.
There are those that say there was someone that looked like him.
And that represented him.
What was just a person born like you and I that did not have an existence from the past eternity? There are all shades of ways that that has been denied overtime.
Everyone of them is an attack on the truth of who He is and what He has revealed and the fundamentals, the foundations of Christianity.
Getting back to the thought and the chapter, it destroys the manifestation of God as of that One who is love and who is the Father and to whom we have been brought into closest relationship. It destroys the truth that this chapter is bringing before us for the comfort and encouragement of our hearts. That's all gone if Jesus Christ did not come in flesh.
We have in verse five further.
Remark made about those who deny His person as Son come in flesh.
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It says they are of the world.
We can, in our minds, go back.
To the cross.
And see the man who hangs there.
Even to repeat the words of scripture, flesh and blood.
You see me have.
Truth of his person.
Being a man, flesh and blood, you see me have and we see.
The spear piercing his side, and forthwith coming forth the blood.
That's the spirit of the world and its treatment.
And its rejection of the love of God manifested in the person of His Son.
In the book of the Acts.
Not that long afterwards, we see Steven presenting that man to the world.
And it's as if the world says to him, God, if you didn't get the message.
We're going to confirm it to you.
We don't want you in the person of your son. We don't want your love. And so Steven is put to death.
Has it changed the world? Changed its mind?
No it hasn't. And if we want to enjoy the love of God?
In in practice.
Then we have to take our place with the Lord Jesus, that man in his rejection.
The world has refused the love of God manifested in the person of the Son. God says he so loved the world He gave his Son. The world says we don't want him.
Cain is an Old Testament example. He went out from the presence of the Lord to live life without him. And so that spirit is, it's important in practice for us to recognize God hasn't left us here to kind of have both.
Well, I'm in the world. I better enjoy as much of it as I can and know that when this life's over, I'll go to heaven and enjoy heaven.
If you try that way, you will find you cannot enjoy in your soul. The love of God will not be in the enjoyment of the soul.
Because the conscience says, no, this isn't the way to go. And when the conscience is at work in us, it's a hindrance. If it has to work in us, it's a hindrance. Practically speaking, God doesn't give the enjoyment of his love when the conscience is working against Him in its will. And so here he says that's the spirit of the world.
And for us, like going back to the desire not to doubt, there won't be doubt if we take sides with God, and in that way we reject the world as well.
Sing 200 and 74274.
Oh Lord, vibrant what I.
Saw.
No.
And breathing is all.
Good.
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Oh.
Behold My Servant
Gospel—Robert Boulard
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Good evening. Welcome everyone.
Like to begin with #16.
Maybe someone can start that please?
And the proclamation?
Also honourable.
It was so everywhere.
So.
Let's ask God's blessing in our meeting and.
Well, we only have a very short time together. It may be the last gospel meeting. We're not promised one tomorrow night. So we'll try to make it clear. And I hope you don't mind this evening. I have a burden on my heart, particularly to the youngest in this room, children, and you young people as well. But you know, we have in this.
I don't want to dumb down the gospel at all. I don't want to dumb down the gospel meeting, but I want to address a lot of my comments to those that are younger.
Going to turn to Gospel of Mark tonight, if you turn to chapter one, and I'm going to tell you why we're going to turn here.
Maybe we'll read one little verse of Scripture first. I'd like to read the Word of God first. Mark chapter one verse one it the beginning of the gospel.
Of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and then if we looked at.
Isaiah chapter 52. Just hold your place there in Mark chapter one.
Isaiah 52 verse 13. Behold my servant.
You know, in the Old Testament, God's heart was constrained. He wanted to tell the children visitor about his servant. He wanted the children of Israel to be his servant, a nation of servants, you might say those that would be intelligent as to what he would desire, they could serve him. But you know, they served a little bit. They served themselves mostly.
And they left him out. They gave him the last place. You know, in Christianity we give the Lord Jesus the first day of the week.
The Lord's day. But in the Old Testament they gave. They used the first six days for themselves. They gave the last day to the Lord.
The Sabbath day, it was a day of rest, didn't work very well. They used the mall for themselves. And I'm afraid that we're in the same boat. None of us.
Can we all have to hang our heads and say we use the Lord's Day the way we ought not to? But you know, God introduces his servant.
The beginning of the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ. And here was God's servant. He wasn't told. They didn't announce in the Old Testament the name of that one. He's in a few instances. He shall be called Emmanuel. That is God with us.
Different things. He was prophesied, but you know in Matthew's gospel, his name shall be Jesus. That's his manhood name, God announced.
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The coming of his son, Jesus Christ.
And he gives us this introductory verse. There are 10 scenes really in this first chapter of Math of Mark. And I want to look at some of those scenes. We don't have time to go through all of them, but this is an introductory verse.
The magnitude of the glory of the person that was sent with good news, the Son of God. But a man just like you and me, except apart, with sin, wholly harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, The head of a new race of men.
So all of us here in this room were born to a sinful race of man.
We didn't ask to come here.
But God arranged that you would have a mother and a father, that you would arrive in this scene.
And he has a purpose of blessing for your life, and he has a purpose of blessing, purpose of love for your life. And so he sent his son.
To announce that good news.
That you could have your sins forgiven. That you could have a new life. That you could have divine life, the very life of his Son.
That you could be indwelled with the Spirit of God, That you could have forgiveness of sins. That means that you would never be anymore guilty before God. You would be.
Guiltless before God forgiven.
But you know, this gospel speaks of the tenderness and the particular way of the heart of the Lord Jesus when I was a young man.
There was brother in the little assembly in Pine Grove.
Brother Art.
And he just lost his wife to cancer.
And he was.
Tender hearted brother, a shepherd, and he'd gone through a lot to lose his wife to cancer.
John Burton had just gone out to the work of the Lord and he.
Asked Brother Art, would you take over the work of the young people, having the young people over to the house every second Saturday night? And so Brother Art did that.
The tenderness of those messages.
Shall never be erased from my heart.
He spoke of the perfect servant.
The servant that God sent, the servant that immediately obeyed, the servant that blessed only brought blessing to his creation. And so he was announced in this world that says the voice of one crying in the wilderness. I'm not going to read the whole chapter, but it will read little portions. So we find that we have here the a wilderness scene that's presented.
The voice of one crying in the wilderness.
Prepare ye the way of the Lord, Make his paths straight. John did baptize in the wilderness and preached. Preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.
Ah, wilderness.
How did this world get to be a wilderness?
I think of how in those opening verses of Genesis.
How God paints the picture of this creation.
The hand of the Son of God Himself. The voice of the Son of God, the Author of life.
Speaking planets and worlds into existence, but with his own hand forming, modeling man with his own fingers in his own image.
His own likeness.
You are formed to represent God in this scene. That's what it means.
You were formed in the image of God. You were formed here to represent God's interest in this scene. But sin came in and became a wilderness. Oh, the Lord saw it was very good.
Very good.
Pristine.
Oh, before sin came in.
With pristine but the Lord Jesus has announced.
Into the creation.
When there was a wilderness that is still a wilderness.
It's still the wilderness. It's still a place where men and women are lost. This place where you can't find nourishment for your soul. That's a place where men and women have no hope.
Without God, without hope in this world, it's a wilderness. You'll never find your nourishment or satisfaction in this world. You know the little word heart or earth? You could spell it earth. How do you spell heart? You take the H and you put it in front of the E.
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Then it spells hurt, but you know God made your heart so big, this world can't fill it. This earth can't fill it. It's impossible and it's a wilderness.
God sent one man.
To announce the coming of His servant Jesus Christ.
You know, I was in when I lived here in Cayuga Falls, Massillon, OH, I was on a business trip coming in.
And to land at the airport in Cleveland and the plane started to circle and it circle and circle and everybody started to get a little antsy. Why is this airplane circling? And the pilot wouldn't say why.
About half an hour in the air went by and then we finally landed and then we were told why.
George W Bush had landed with Air Force One.
And there was no aircraft coming in, no aircraft going out until he left.
With his whole entourage and security detail on vehicles and everything out on the tarmac, no one was coming in until he was gone. And so the president of the United States has an entourage that comes to the city and makes great preparation for him. The Son of God came into his creation. One man announced his coming.
Boys and girls, young people particularly, God wants to announce in your life he's come, the Son of God to bring you blessing, to bless you and your soul. And if you don't know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, you've never taken Christ as your Savior. It's a simple thing to do is to tell the Lord that you're a Sinner and that you want to have your sins forgiven.
He that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out. So you don't have to be very old.
Had a order come through on the e-mail.
Couple of weeks ago from man in the Ottawa area. His name is Philippe.
Brother in the Lord, and because the way his order came through, I had to ask him some questions, so I had to call him. So I called Brother Philippe.
And I said, I talked with him a little bit, and then we got talking about other things. And I asked him about his family. He said, well, I'm 70 years old, You know, when I got four kids, I said, well, are they all saved? He said, yeah, I think so.
They were raised in a Christian home, you know, I said. I think I know.
He says, you know, but I got one daughter. She's a rebel.
Which married an unbeliever. I have two little boys.
Little 9 year old Daniel. Little 7 year old year old Nathaniel.
He says, you know, but I've been praying for those kids. I've been praying for my daughter.
And I come into the house the other day, he says.
Little Daniel says Grandpa, I believe like you do now, boys. Never been to.
Valley he goes to Sonia School's grandpa takes him to Sunday school. He says I believe like you do. I don't believe like my mom does. I believe like you do now, grandpa.
Can we go upstairs and can you teach me how to pray?
So Grandpa went upstairs with his nine year old son. They kneeled down on the floor by his bed and they prayed. He taught his son, his grandson, how to pray because the mother hadn't done it.
Oh, the Lord Jesus came.
God has announced his son announced that there's He's preached.
Preach that there's blessing.
No, Philippe said.
Few days later I called the house and I said where are the boys? And his daughter said well, I don't know where. I haven't seen him for a bit. I'll go upstairs, see if they're upstairs. She went upstairs.
She says dad, there's two boys on their knees by the bed praying.
God is interested in you.
00:15:01
God is interested in your salvation. He's interested in you as a young person and even if your parents aren't going on in the way that they ought to have gone on, He's interested in you. He knows your name and he wants, even though this is a wilderness, the announcements going forth, but he preached the baptism of repentance. Now we don't preach the baptism of repentance, but.
There is repentance toward God that delights the heart of God.
But he wants you to know that the Lord Jesus went to the cross, and when he went to the cross.
In the three long dark hours that he was on the cross, the Lord Jesus God put my sins upon the Lord Jesus, everyone of them, and he put your sins on the Lord Jesus, if you will receive Him as your Savior.
And my sins are gone.
Because you know the Lord Jesus is holy.
And he was made sin. He was made the sin offering for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. You know, God treated his Son just like sin.
So that you could be set free from the power of sin and the judgment of sin, the rule and the wilderness of sin. Well, we have this little picture of the wilderness and an announcement made John the Baptist. And then we fight in verse nine that we have a river scene.
Came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized of John.
In Jordan, straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened in the Spirit, like a dove descending upon him. There came a voice from heaven saying, Thou art my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. You know, this gospel doesn't give us a lot of details. You can read Luke's gospel. You can read Matthew's gospel. You get some other details.
But in his service for God, the Lord Jesus, the Son of God.
Identified himself with that godly remnant that would go out to the river.
Jordan to be baptized and disassociate themselves from that guilty nation, and take their place as sinners before God.
They could be blessed, God identified with them and the person of His Son, so the Lord Jesus.
Identified himself and was baptized. John's baptism, but you know he had no sin in him is no sin.
He did no sin.
Not like you and I if we say we have no sin, we lie, do not the truth that's I'm not quoting it right. Let's look at I'm not planning to turn to a lot of scriptures, but.
First John, chapter one.
Verse eight If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in.
Oh, the Lord Jesus, that sinless holy man, came into this world.
To bring good news and heaven could open and say, this is my beloved son. Oh, the dignity, the honor, the glory of the person that came and was announced in this world by one man in the wilderness.
In the outside place, cast out, unwanted from birth, but the source of life, the source of your blessing and the one who loves you. You know it says in Second Corinthians chapter 5, it says it's the love of Christ that constrains us. Do you know why you do what you do for the Lord Jesus? Maybe you don't think about it, but it's because you love him if you do something.
For the Lord Jesus, you're doing it because you love him. It's the love of Christ that constrains us.
God has given us a motive. God has a motive of sending His Son, and He sent him in love.
But he's given you a motive to to be able to serve him in love, to delight in him and to be a companion of his. Well, it says there's another scene in wilderness scene in verse 12. It says immediately the spirit drive him into the wilderness.
He was there in the wilderness 40 days, tempted of Satan, was with the wild beasts, and the angels ministered unto him.
00:20:04
Ah, wilderness scene again.
Imagine the Son of God, the Creator.
Sustainer of the Universe.
Comes into this world, it's a wilderness.
Nothing.
Ruined.
No fruit rock.
Baron Fruitless.
You know God gave the best land in all of the world to the children of Israel.
Doesn't look like it right now when you see pictures of it, but let me tell you, it is the best land in all of the earth.
And in the future, very shortly after we're taken out of this world, the Lord Jesus will deal in judgment with this world. He's going to cleanse it with judgment.
He'll cleanse it thoroughly.
He'll deal with the sin and rebellion against him.
And then the desert, the wilderness is going to blossom like a rose.
Then he's going to renew their creation. There's going to be a stream that goes forth from the midst of the temple, goes out towards the Dead Sea, one arm of it, and then another to the Mediterranean Sea. There will be healing waters for the whole of this earth.
Won't be a wilderness anymore.
Be as perfect as the new heavens and the new earth, where there's no never going to be any sin.
But it'll be very good.
Won't be a wilderness then.
But you know.
There were wild beasts.
Wild beasts, you know, there's some inaccurate translations. I sometimes hardly wish to call them a translation. Give them the dignity of that expression.
They say that the Lord created the wild beasts, the wild animals in Genesis chapter one. Genesis chapter 2. That's not true.
The animals weren't wild. Did you know that Adam named the animals and he named the animals that the Lord brought the animals to them? They weren't afraid about them. You know when the animals became afraid of man was after the flood. Let's read it in Genesis Chapter 9.
Verse 2.
The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, upon all the fishes of the sea. Into your hand are they delivered.
Ah, the Lord Jesus came into this world.
And the animals were wild.
They were afraid of man. Oh, they weren't afraid of the Lord Jesus. He could ride on a donkey that had never been ridden before.
Oh, he could take up that fish that Peter caught and take that coin out of the mouth.
No, the creation wasn't afraid of the Lord Jesus.
But he saw the state that had fallen into.
Wild animals and God is going to use wild animals. We're not going to turn to it because of time, but you can look at the 4th seal in Revelation chapter 6 and God is going to use the animals to punish man.
Because they worship the creature rather than the creator, and God is going to do that.
But oh how he loves those that are in his creation.
God showed that he was holy, that he was the Son of God. And then in verse 14 says after John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God and saying the time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand, repent ye and believe the gospel. As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishers.
Jesus said unto them, Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men. Straightway they forsook their Nets and followed him.
Oh, now we have a seaside.
Picture.
You know what the sea speaks of in Scripture? It's a symbol. Symbol. It's symbol symbolic of the Gentiles.
00:25:07
You know, God made no promise to the Gentiles, those that aren't Jews. There's two types of people that were born into this world, those that are of Abraham's seed, those that are of the children of Israel, those that are not the children of Israel, those that are not of the children of Israel called Gentiles or of the nations.
So God made no promise to those that were of the nations God promised Abraham. And you could read in Chapter 11 of our chapter, I'm sorry, chapter 13, I think it is of chapter 12 of Genesis. God made many promises to Abraham, but God didn't make a promise to the Gentiles.
But he sent his son.
And he's promised life for those that would receive the Lord Jesus, those that would confess their sinners and beg for mercy, beg for hope, beg for life, desire a blessing. You know there are some that came to the Lord Jesus.
The Lord Jesus came to them, you know. The Lord Jesus was the Fisher of men. He came one man.
To seek men and then pretty soon there were others that were following. And so it says I will make you become to become fishers of men Straightway they forsook their Nets and followed him. You're all we're all following someone, aren't we? Following a cause following. I'm not a sports guy, but you know, often times that's what happens with your youth. And you've got lots of energy and you're very capable and you can jump.
You can run hard and so on. You're very taken up with sport but it's very, very fleeting.
But these men?
They were fishermen.
And they were poor fishermen, and the Lord Jesus came right to where they were.
And instead of following the fishing fleet, they followed the Lord Jesus.
One man, they followed him. You know, that's what a disciple is of disciple is a learner. He learns about the Lord Jesus. We could read that in Matthews Gospel Chapter 11 verses 2829. He's a learner, he's a follower. You know, you could look in loose Gospel chapter 12, I think it's chapter 12. You travel lightly, you don't have a lot of baggage, you're not carrying all kinds of stuff. You try. A disciple travels lightly, he travels through.
Seed He's only a stranger in a Pilgrim, and he's following the Lord Jesus. Are you following the Lord Jesus?
While these men left.
Their work, they went to Capernaum and we have another scene in the synagogue and there's a man there in verse 23 in their synagogue, a man with an unclean spirit.
Now, how would you like to have an unclean spirit here in the meeting tonight?
I think we all know it if there was someone with an unclean spirit. Because demonic power opposes the power of light, the power of God.
And if you know the Lord Jesus as Savior, greater is he that is in you than he that is in this world.
God's power far exceeds, far exceeds demonic power. You know, the highest ranking Angel that God ever created as Satan, and he's still the highest ranking Angel that God ever created. He's a fallen Angel, but he still has the rank of the highest power that God has created. But he's a fallen Angel and he's got tremendous power of deception. He's got 6000 years of.
Experience. He knows every trick in the book.
The Lord Jesus came into the synagogue where the word of God should have been read.
Where there ought to have been reverence for the person of Jehovah.
Where the scriptures could be read in holy reverence, understood, expounded, and there was a demonic a man.
Possessed with an unclean spirit.
Saying in verse 24, Let us alone what have we to do with thee, Thou Jesus of Nazareth, art thou come to destroy?
House Well, the demons know that they're going to be taken and judged. They're going to be cast into the lake of fire. They know what the end is. They don't know when, perhaps, but they know there's an end. But that's not where God wants you to be.
00:30:08
He's made every provision. Isn't it wonderful for you to be in His heaven? Do you know where you're going to dwell? If you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, do you know where you're going to dwell for all eternity?
In the Father's house.
You will have a right to be there as a son.
You will have a right to be there as a part of the Bride of Christ. You will be wanted to be there. You will be loved in that relationship. You will be there in the Father's house for all eternity. Could there be any better place in the universe for you to be?
Than the Father's house for all eternity.
God gives the very best.
And God wants you to have the best. God has made provision so that every boy and girl, every young person, every older person in this room could live with him in the Father's house for all eternity and bask in his love for all eternity. Well, he taught them the Lord Jesus, he.
He overcame the power of this unclean spirit. He suffered him not to speak. I'm just going to.
We're running out of time here. But you know, he suffered him not to speak. Why didn't why did the Lord Jesus say to the Spirit, silence, I don't want you saying anything to that demon? Why did he say that? He had the power to say it too, and he had the power to impose that judgment.
Because those of us that preach the gospel of the grace of God, those of us that tell others about the Lord Jesus.
Our lost were once lost sinners. We once were lost sinners. But we're qualified now because we know what grace is. We know the grace of God. We know the love of God. We know the forgiveness of God. We know what it is to be reconciled to God. We're no longer enemies.
We're no longer enemies. Did you know that you were born into this world, an enemy to God? You know, Chapter Brown used to have a little expression. He said we were born in this world with our backs towards God.
We were born in this world with our backs towards God, but God has turned us around. You know what it means to be reconciled means that God has found a way on a righteous basis to reconcile you to Himself. And so now you're no longer an enemy of God if you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior.
But he said to these demons, silence.
Don't you tell anyone who I am, but I'm telling you tonight that the Lord Jesus is the Son of God. He's a Savior of sinners. He's the one who loves you. He's the one who died on the cross of Calvary. And if you were the only boy or girl.
That was a Sinner.
The Lord Jesus loves you so much He would have come himself just to save you.
Paul says the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.
All Paul knew the individual love of the Lord Jesus.
Well, it says here that there's another scene that came in in verse 29 forthwith that when they were come out of the synagogue, they're entering into the House of Simon and Andrew.
With James and John, so it seems that.
Simon and Andrew.
Lived in Capernaum. It appears that and maybe they were so poor that they lived in the same house.
And then Simon's mother-in-law was living there too.
I don't think they were very well off.
I dare say most of us.
Are better off than we think.
Some have been to different parts of the world where there's real poverty.
And some of us don't like to eat everything that we have on our plates because we don't think we need to.
But I've been places where there's nothing left on the plate. It doesn't matter what it was.
But the Lord Jesus went to those places where they were poor. He went into this house. Would he be welcome in your house?
He went into this house.
00:35:00
Peter's house and he knew that there was going to be his mother-in-law sick.
He knew, but you know, I believe he had liberty to be in that house. Peter wasn't running around trying to hide things in drawers and, and trying to put a cover over the TV or what all those sorts of things. He wasn't trying to do any of that. He was perfectly comfortable as a fisherman to allow the Son of God to come into his house.
Wasn't ashamed of it at all. And the Savior came, and immediately they told him about her.
Oh, maybe you have a little problem tonight. Maybe you have a little something that's burdening your heart. You can tell him.
You might not be able to tell me, you might not be able to tell mom, dad, if you don't really feel that confidence, whatever it might be, but you can tell him, oh how he loves to hear your voice, to tell him about the troubles, the difficulties, the trials. He knows all about them. He's the one that's allowed those trials, those difficulties. And so you as a young person can talk to the Lord, use a child can talk to the Lord Jesus.
And let me tell you.
If you as a child speak to the Lord Jesus, he's going to listen. He's going to hear your voice.
I don't mean to tell a funny story, but my son Jonathan, when he was a little guy, I fix a pair of broken snow shoes for him and he said dad.
This is great, he says.
I'm going to be praying for 12 feet of snow.
So that we can use these snow shoes, I said, well, son, that's pretty unusual, but.
You pray what you feel that you should pray, and the Lord answers prayer.
Well, the next week it snowed in Washington DC. There were 12 foot snow drifts.
So I said to him the next next weekend, I said, son, you have to be a little more specific as to where you want the snow.
So be specific.
Pray tell the Lord what your problem is. You know, the Lord Jesus healed this woman immediately. You know, there wasn't a recovery period. Some of us have got some COVID shots and everything, and so we kind of feel a little sick for a couple of days or whatever. I don't feel much like doing whatever.
Oh, this woman, she was healed. She was up, and you know what she was doing? She was serving that blessed man. She was serving the Lord Jesus. She was serving his disciples. Is that what you're doing?
Oh, what a privilege to serve the Lord's people, to serve the Lord Jesus. You know the Lord Jesus came into this world, he says. I came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give my life a ransom for many.
All he wants to have you as a companion, He wants to express his love to you and he wants to give you the opportunity to do a little work of service for him. But this woman didn't wait. She did it right away. And so she did. She used her time for the Lord. You know, it says here in verse 33 that all the city was gathered together at the door.
He healed many that were sick of divers disease.
And cast out many devils.
Why was it many?
He healed many, you know, in other places, it says he healed the mall.
But here it says many.
The ones that came got healed.
Many he would have healed all that were in the city. Can you imagine? You couldn't come to a place?
You couldn't go to the hospital in Akron.
Or in Cleveland.
And empty all the beds there's it's not possible.
But the Lord Jesus could go to a place.
And empty the beds of all those that were sick. They could carry the beds to him, and he would empty the beds.
And the people would immediately recovered and would immediately be servicing others. What a blessing. Oh, are you serving the Lord?
You don't have to be old. You could be just a little child and you could be serving the Lord and you can do it right away. You can just serve him for and just do it out of love for Him. Well, it says that he went into a solitary place in verse 35 in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out and departed to a solitary place, a mountaintop. There he prayed.
You know the disciples, they followed them. They found them. All men seek for thee.
00:40:04
Said unto them, Let us go into the next towns, that we may preach there also. For therefore came I forth.
You know, the most important time of the day that the Lord Jesus had.
Was the time alone with his father.
A perfectly dependent servant.
Oh, they were happy times. I am certain they were happy times. When I get up in the morning, I can't wait to get my little bowl of cereal, a cup of coffee, and to spend trying to spend an hour with the Lord. Their happy times. I wonder, could I encourage you if you're not happy, having that happy little time with the Lord Jesus first?
In the morning, could you maybe just ask the Lord for help?
To do that, he'd value that time with you.
He'd value you reading his word alone, you and him.
You asking him some questions about some of those verses of scripture, some of those principles that he's Speaking of. He'd love to hear your voice just speaking to him and reading what he said to you.
And valuing his word.
All those were important times, don't you know? The disciples said. You know, we're so busy, we got some, you got other things to do that's not really very important.
Who is the most important part of the day? And I have found by experience, sad experience. If I think it's too I have too much to do and I don't have time to do it that day, it doesn't go very well.
Well, we have a leper here in verse 40 came to him.
I want to just comment on him.
We have a scene with a leper, this picture of sin covered with sin.
No hope, impossible situation. And the Pharisees and scribes they knew.
And the high priest knew that only God could heal leprosy.
And so the Lord Jesus.
The leper came begging and he said, I don't know about the heart of the Lord Jesus, I don't know what his heart's like, but I could at least ask him. So he asked the Lord Jesus, could I get healed?
You know what kind of a savior we have?
Lord Jesus didn't need to do it, you know, but he reached out and he touched him. He handled him. I think this freely handled him. He didn't need to do that. But you know, the Lord Jesus loves you so much. He's going to do more than you ask. He's going to treat you in such a way that it proves his love to you.
And that's what he wants to do tonight. Will you receive him as your Savior if you've never taken the Lord Jesus as your Savior? Never said, Lord Jesus, save me, just as I am as a Sinner. I just want to have my sins forgiven. I want to know. I want to have that assurance.
The Lord will give you that assurance, and you can take read a verse of Scripture that you feel particularly that is a help to you, even if if it's John's gospel chapter 3, verse 16. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Oh, there are many different verses that could be used. Let's sing number. Maybe just the first verse in the last of #12.
First verse, Last verse of #12.
Just as I.
AM for me.
00:45:54
Ourselves.
1 John 4:6-11
Reading
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Should we ask the Lord's blessing?
And reading in first John chapter 4.
And I suggest we begin this morning with verse 6.
First John chapter 4 and verse 6.
We are of God. He that knoweth God heareth us. He that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby no way. The spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God, and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not, knoweth not God, for God is love. This was manifested the love of God toward us because that God sent his Son or His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him here in His love. Not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation.
For our sins, beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No man has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in US. Hereby know we that we dwell in Him, and He and us, because He hath given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God?
God dwelleth in him, and He and God, and we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love, and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment, because as He is, so are we. In this world. There is No Fear and love, but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath made, because fear hath torment.
Either here it does not made perfect in love. We love him because he first loved us. If the men say I love God and hated his brother, he is a liar. For he that loveth not his brother whom he has seen, How can he love God whom he have not seen? And this commandment have we from him, that he who loveth God love his brother also.
00:05:16
And with the the words in verse.
Six, we are of God.
Everything has a source.
And everything flows from the source.
So with the exception of God himself, who is eternal.
Always has been, always will be. At no beginning, no end.
Yesterday we saw the person of the Lord Jesus as eternal, as Son of God, having no beginning, no end, but in time he became a man of flesh and blood.
But his source, even in becoming a man, begins.
With God himself, God the Son.
But everyone of us had a beginning. Everyone of us, in one sense, had the same beginning.
We are beginning was when we were conceived in the womb of our mother.
And that was our beginning. However, we will not have an end.
There's not a single person in this room whose existence now that you exist, will not continue forever.
In the future, sometime either perfect joy and happiness in the presence of the Lord Jesus or.
Eternal misery as separated from God because of your sins. But in when it says in this verse, we are of God.
It includes the thought that we are of God because we have received eternal life.
And that now defines where we come from.
We are a people who are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, and here he's contrasting those who are of God in this verse with those who are not.
And so a person who does not belong to the family of God doesn't have a place in this verse.
But we are of God, and because of the source of what we are and the life of Christ that we have in us, we judge everything by it. And so he says, we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error because we have the life of Christ in us.
That eternal life which is now ours and He, that life in US, differentiates between what is truth and what is error. If we don't know the Lord Jesus, we're not of God at that point in our life, and we don't have the capacity to differentiate properly between what is truth and what is error, because we only have the sinful life that we were born with to judge things by.
And it doesn't have a right standard and consequently judges wrong about the things that it sees and is exposed to and can't differentiate between truth and error.
As I believe our brother Don just said, we have a contrast in verse 5 is that they are of the world.
Verse six, we are of God, but they have got a particular group of people. But we can generalize that to say that people who are not in Christ are of the world and we are of God. And I had an experience in my life that kind of drives that home.
After getting out of school, got into the workforce and as the years rolled out, I happened to notice the topic of conversation of all people that I worked with and I won't be specific, but the goals that they had for what they spent all their evenings on and what they plan to do with their summer and looking forward towards retirement years. All that I had to do with self and I mentioned this one time to an older brother.
00:10:06
Ultimately my father and said that is kind of depressing seeing how low their.
Thoughts were and he gave a simple remark that stuck with me quite a few years, he said. What else do they have?
And so that's something to think about, because if we belong to the Lord, we do have something more than they do.
If somebody were to follow me around through my days and make a note of the things that I talked about where they find me and reflecting the fact that I belong to the Lord and have a heavenly purpose and calling. If they were to hear me talking about plans for the future, would it reflect again the fact that I belong to Him and and of God?
It's just something sobering to think about for all of us.
Might take notice that as you say in verse one, it says that there because many false prophets are gone out into the world and then it speaks of in verse five they are of the world. So the false prophets are of the world, therefore they speak of the world.
Their prophecy has to is brought down to the level of the world and the world here at them. So they're popular in the world. The world has its own profits, and the world will come up and take things up in a religious wave and name the name of Christ. But really?
They are of the world. And so in verse six we are of God. I believe the apostle here is bringing in the fact that the world is against Christ, against the doctrine of Christ, and it's also against the the apostles and the doctrine of the apostles. And so he says we, the apostles are of God. He that knoweth God heareth us, hears the apostle's. And so it's necessary for us to read the epistles.
So that we know what the apostles taught. And so he that is not of God heareth not us. And you'll notice that there's a little bit of a test, you might say, as to the reality of someone's faith is do they want to read the epistles of Paul? Do they want to read the epistles of John and be clear as to the character of the person of Christ, his work, his deity, his eternal sonship? Are they willing to read?
The apostles, do they agree with what the apostles taught? And so hereby we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error. You and I are indwelled with the Spirit of God. And it says in chapter two, I think it is, yes, chapter 2, verse 20, ye have an unction from the Holy One and you know all things. So you and I have painted with the Spirit. That's what the unction is. You're anointed with the Spirit, you're indwelled with the Spirit of God, and you have the power of discernment.
The Spirit of God gives you the power of discernment between that which is true doctrine and that which is false. And so when it says and you know all things, it doesn't mean that once you're saved, you know everything there is to know. And you don't need to read any ministry and you don't even need to come to meetings like this because you know everything. That's not what it means. It means you have the power of discernment. And if you walk in communion with the Lord, in fellowship with what the apostles taught.
You will have the power of spiritual discernment to detect error that is being presented. And so this is so necessary for us to recognize the authority that God gave to the apostles. We, he says, are of God. John puts himself in that company of apostles. He that knoweth God heareth us. It's evidence of divine life. Someone wants to hear.
And agrees with what the apostles taught.
And someone give us a good definition of the world as used in this verse.
Well, we know that the world is spoken of in several different ways in Scripture three that I can think of One is God so loved the world. That's really the people in the world. He's not talking about the globe, but God so loved the world of people that he formed And then it speaks of, you know, the world speaks of the system of things that man has raised up and God the.
Prince of this world, Satan has raised up a system of things, religiously, politically.
00:15:03
And.
Economically, a system of things to keep man in a state of contentment while he's alienated from God. So man lives in this world, he's alienated from God, pays no attention to the rights that God has in his life, doesn't even get thanks for his food, doesn't recognize the food comes from God. And so there's a world system that's opposed. And so I believe that this is really what he's Speaking of.
Here this world system that is opposed to Christ.
There's another aspect of the world. I've forgotten what it was. Maybe someone else knows.
It's created world.
The created world, yeah.
It's the same. This one in chapter 4 is the same one as in chapter 2 verse.
15 that says love not the world. It's that same system of things that has been built up so man can be.
Self-sufficient without God.
But I think that's important. But you bring out Robert, it's in verse six. It's the apostles doctrine that is so important to keep. There is a norm, there is a standard. What is it? What the apostles have said and we read it yesterday, but there is quite a few that weren't there. Go back to chapter 2 and I think you have the same thought in verse.
18 and 19 it talks about Antichrist.
Little children, it is the last hour and a I'm reading other Dartmouth translator feed out of King James.
Little children, it is the last time. And as you have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now there are many Antichrist, whereby we know that it is the last time. Now notice in verse 19, as we read it, us is mentioned five times.
And it's helpful to know that it is the apostles that is referred to. They went out from us, but they were not of us. It's not talking about somebody leaving the meeting, it's talking about somebody leaving the apostles doctrine. For if they had been of us, they would have no doubt have continued with us. But they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
So that's that's helpful to see that because our fellowship, if you go back to chapter one, a verse that we often quote is verse three. And notice what is our fellowship based on that which we have seen and heard, Declare we unto you what they saw, what they heard, they declared it. The apostle John is one of the witnesses, but he was not the only one. There were others.
That ye also may have fellowship with us, So the apostles.
Fellowship is based on the apostles doctrine. Those two things go together intimately and I think that is really important to see in the day in which we live, there is a standard. What is it, the apostles doctrine?
It's helpful to see that in chapter one, the very first verse, brother Bob, it says that which was from the beginning which we have heard. And So what had taken place was that in the time of the apostles and John is the last apostle that writes.
He's the last writer of the New Testament, and there had been a decline. There had been those that taught something else, something that they presented as a further light new truth.
They were Gnostics, and they sought to override and set aside what the apostles had taught. But isn't it wonderful? The Lord preserved John right to the last, you might say?
And there he is. He's saying this is what Christ said at the beginning, and I'm telling you right from the beginning, this is the doctrine that he spoke of. This is the doctrine he taught. And so it's absolutely vital for a believer to know what the apostle John taught. It's vital for him to know what the apostle Peter taught. It's vital, absolutely vital for him to know what Paul taught. And the only way that you're going to know those things.
00:20:23
Is to read those epistles and to read the teachings or to come to the meetings like this where there are those that have walked in the truth and are disseminating the truth that they have walked in the same things. Let's look at it in, I think it's in Second Timothy. Just I know we're stressing this point, but not everyone that names the name of Christ is speaking the truth.
So Second Timothy chapter 2 and verse 2.
Let's read verse one, Second Timothy 2 verse one. Thou therefore, my Son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
That and the things that thou has heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to teach others also. And so you have generation after generation after generation, and they're teaching the same things. And so we live in a day.
Sad to say that there are new things, new departures, new truth, and what others might say is essential truth, that we should go on and and so on, brethren, is all essential. And if the apostles brought it forth, the apostles taught it, particularly in connection with the person of Christ. We ought to pay attention to it and enjoy it in our souls. Now why is it?
That John speaks so much of the person of Christ because what you think about the person of Christ, the work of the cross and his holy person will govern how you live. It will govern how you think and the fruit for God in your life. That's why the Spirit of God has given us John's ministry, because it will affect your whole life. What you think of Christ will affect your whole life.
Like to go back for a moment to the beginning of the world.
And it's given to us in Genesis chapter 4.
And it's perhaps the simplest and easiest way to understand what the world is.
Genesis chapter 4.
And a verse.
15 This is after Cain slew his brother.
And the Lord spake unto him. Therefore whatsoever whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him. And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod on the east of Eden. And Cain knew his wife. And then we have the history of Cain's family. This is the beginning of the world.
As referred to not the natural world, but the world we talk about, we live in a world of people.
Cain disobeyed God because his sacrifice was not accepted and he slew his brother.
And as a consequence, God's hand was on him. And So what did he do? The world is what he did. He went out from the presence of the Lord. And that's what the world is. It is a place where man has gone out from the presence of the Lord.
And establish something for himself, leaving God out. And what follows we see the development of industry and commerce and so on in in Cain's family.
But connecting it with first John 4.
Is we can be connected in this way?
When Adam disobeyed God, he went out was put out of the garden himself, where God had fellowship with him.
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Adam did not know God in his fullness.
He did not have a full understanding of who God was. He knew him, but he knew him with certain limited limitations to his knowledge of God.
God set apart a people for himself that became the Israelites and gave a further revelation of Himself to them, but not a full one.
They had absolute fear of being in God's presence.
They did not know God as we know Him and having this chapter, God is love. They experienced the love of God. They experienced the care of God, but it couldn't be said of them that they truly enjoyed, as we do this morning, that God is love.
Because God had not yet made himself known in that way.
It was a test to see whether man was capable of being righteous with God, as God had revealed himself to him under the law and we know the answer. He was not capable, he could not, and consequently God in love.
Began again in a different way, to make himself known to us mankind.
His son came.
And his Son came to make God fully known to us.
But there was a hindrance to him, full liberty of God, God Himself having liberty to make Himself fully known to us, and that was because we were separated with from Him by sin.
And so God himself was not at liberty to make himself known as he is in his very character. God is light and God is love.
And he gave his son in coming into this world, a job, a work to do.
And when the Lord Jesus finished the work, he said, I have finished the work which thou gave us me to do.
Is almost last words on the cross where it is finished, because the work that was His to do was to establish what was necessary, that we could know God as love and God is light in fullness.
So what? How does that take place when the Lord Jesus rose from the dead?
There was now a risen man.
In a glorified body.
Who could impart to us that same character of life which we now call eternal life?
It's life in resurrection power. It is life also in which part of what God did.
And they had to wait. They didn't get it on resurrection morning. They waited till the day of Pentecost.
When the head in heaven then sent the Spirit of God to indwell each one who was to be part of the family.
And so that then changed two important things. One is we know God is love and we know God is light because we have the very.
Life of Christ, who is love and light in His person.
And 2nd, we have the Spirit of God dwelling in us to make that good and realized in practical way in our lives and in our souls and in our eternity. And that's particularly what's before John here in this chapter. The difference, the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
How can I differentiate? Because I can see things as God sees them.
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I can see things as God sees them, and it's a good question to ask sometimes. To ask the one soul when the matter comes up and you wonder what's the truth of it, is to ask yourself the question, well, how does God see it? How does God see this? And if it's entered into properly in communion with God, it will be seen in the character of how it affects light and how it affects love.
And that's why it's the spirit of truth here, and spirit of error, the actual revelation of the details.
We're committed to the Apostle Paul and what's been referred to this morning as the apostle doctrine that flows from it. But if you don't have the beginning point of God in his character, then you'll misrepresent or get wrong the apostles doctrine, even if you read it every day of your life.
You have to begin at the right point, and that's with God. And then in the reading of it, the Spirit of God, through the life that's in US, will be able to understand the doctrine that was given, that we might walk in it in its detail.
I was thinking of some examples in the Old Testament.
That and thinking of what our brothers have emphasized on, which is.
The doctrine of the of the Apostles.
Point to Christ, point to God.
And I was thinking of one example in in terms of profits in Deuteronomy chapter 13.
Because they also had a standard, a brother mentioned Adam.
Mentioned the Saints in the Old Testament and the greater revelation that we have received through the apostles doctrine.
And there is some similarity in the sense that the Lord gave some light to each one of them. He gave some light to Adam. He gave further light to the Saints. So they're Israelites. He has given us the fullness of things through the apostles, the fullness of the truth.
And but going to Deuteronomy chapter 13.
And thinking of the false prophets there at that time.
He says in verse one, Is there a rise among you, a prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and give her the sign or a wonderful, and the sign or the wonder come to pass where obvious speak unto thee the sign or the wonder come to pass.
So why he said came to pass? Is that our standard? It was that their standard. Were they supposed to look at the sign and say, well, this is a true prophet because the sign came to pass?
That's not what he says here.
It says and when and the sign comes to pass, and he says saying let us go after other gods, which thou has not known, and let us serve them. So what he's saying comes to pass, but he's what what he's also saying is let us go serve other gods.
Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for the Lord or God proveth you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Nowadays there are prophets that way too. Are we to look at them and see the signs that we go after emotions only? Or are we to go after what the Scripture says, what the apostles have said?
So from verse seven of our chapter we get some of the very basics of the apostles doctrine.
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God. Everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not, knoweth not God.
Or God is love.
A statement that is repeated twice in this chapter.
I find that very interesting. I.
Suppose that to define love.
I don't know that I've heard a very good definition.
00:35:04
Maybe some comments could be made as to that. I remember a number of years ago.
Hearing some brethren discuss this.
And they said love and light are not attributes of God, they are what God is in his very person.
God is love to me. It is tremendous to understand that because so much that is spoken of like we mentioned yesterday.
Of love in this present day.
Is reference to emotion. There is emotion.
In connection with love, I don't deny that, but love here is not in itself an emotion. It is, I suppose, and I'd like to have other brother and input on this. It is the.
Uh, disposition of favor towards those that are loved.
And that's God's disposition towards us. God is love.
And as he loves this world, that verse was mentioned. God so loved the world. The world was at enmity with God. How could he love God? I mean, in this world, if you'd be nice to me, I can love you. Yeah. But if you do me and I'm going to try to do you in, too.
And so that's not love that we're talking about.
It's a unchanging disposition on God's part toward this world. I mentioned it yesterday, and I repeat it sometimes in the prison we tell them in.
God loves you.
And nothing you do can ever change that fact.
You may reject Islam, you may decide to go to a lost eternity, but you will never be able to say nobody ever loved me because God loved you so much that he gave his only begotten Son. So it's a love that is sacrificial. So often love is spoken of with an interest that I'm going to get something out of this.
That's not what we're talking about.
And so I would like to hear more comments on what love is. How do you define love?
We might say that the God, the nature of God is love, the nature of God is light, and so his very nature.
Is love. And why does the apostle John say in his ministry here that you can love the way God loves? He says he that loveth not, knoweth not. God doesn't have his nature. And so you and I are indwelled with the Spirit of God. But we have the very life of Christ and we can think the way he thinks, as you've already mentioned, and we can love the way he loved. We have that capacity because we have a new nature, a new life.
In communion with God, and so God's nature is love in him is no sin.
It's impossible for God to sin. He can't think like you think. And I think if we could put it that way, his nature is love. His nature is light.
There's another word that is used in the New Testament for love. It's filial.
This in this chapter, it's agape love, but phileo love is brotherly love, and it's often connected. It's the mutual appreciation of each other, and that's proper too. It says in Hebrews 13, Let brotherly love continue.
I learned to know you and I appreciate you and perhaps you appreciate me. There's brotherly love. The interchange. There should be that, but it's a different word. I just like to point out a couple places where it's the two words are used together. First is in First Thessalonians chapter 4. Notice in verse 9.
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Says But as touching brotherly love, there's the phileo love.
You need not that I write unto you.
For ye yourselves are taught of God to love. There's the agape love one another so they go together, but they're not exactly the same. Another place is second Peter chapter one just to point out a couple because they are often connected in scripture.
Here Peter is telling them what to add to their faith.
And in verse seven he says, and to godliness add brotherly kindness, there's the phileo love and to brotherly kindness, charity, that's the agape love. So they go together. But it's there's a difference. And I find it helpful to understand that both.
Are recognized in the New Testament. Maybe there's others that can help on that.
Might be helpful to turn to Second Chronicles chapter 18. You have a little example there of a wicked king, King Ahab and.
We've spoken a little bit of the spirit of truth, the spirit of error, but you also have the fact that this king did not have love for the people of God and for the prophet of God.
Second Chronicles chapter 18 and it's a long story, but let's just look at.
Verse 18.
Second Chronicles 18, verse 18 Again he said, Therefore hear the word of the Lord. I saw the Lord sitting upon his throne, and all the hosts of heaven standing on his right hand, and on his left. The Lord said, Who shall entice Ahab, king of Israel, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth Gilead? And one spoke spake, and saying, After this man, or another saying after that manner, then came there out of spirit, and stood before the Lord.
And said, I will entice him. The Lord said unto him, Wherewith he said, I will go out and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. The Lord said, Thou shalt entice him, thou shalt also prevail. Go out and do Even so. Now therefore, behold, the Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of these thy prophets, and the Lord has spoken evil against thee. Then Zedekiah the son of Canaan came near, and smoked Makaya upon the cheek, and said, Which way went the spirit of the Lord from me to speak unto thee?
And then just verse 26 and say, thus saith the king, put this fellow in the prison, feed him with bread of affliction, with water of affliction, until I return in peace. Then just back a little bit.
It says.
In verse 7, the king of Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, There is yet one man by whom we may inquire of the Lord, but I hate him, for he never prophesied good unto me.
So you have the hatred of Ahab for a prophet of the Lord.
Evidence that he had not divine life. Ahab was a wicked man and even in the Old Testament you see that divine life. The Saints, the Old Testament Saints, they had divine life. They didn't have eternal life. They didn't have that relationship with the Lord Jesus. They weren't indwelled with the Spirit of God. They didn't know God is the Father.
But they had divine life.
And so an expression of divine life is the expression of love for one another and love for the world, for those that are in the world that need salvation. We don't love the world system, but we love those that are in the world. And so in first John chapter 4 here we have beloved, let us love one another for love is of God verse seven. And everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. So it's evidence of divine life if you love your brother.
You love them.
And you prove it. You prove it by how you treat them. You prove it by obeying the word of God, as in Fellowship chapter one. And it's a test of divine love.
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We began with the words in verse six. We are of God.
That's true of us now. None of us were born that way.
We were born dead, spiritually speaking.
But.
God worked with us as dead people and through faith given of God in the Lord Jesus, He gave us life.
And so verse 7.
Says Beloved, let us love one another. I'm going to put it this way.
Brethren, be what you are. Be what you are. What are you? You're a child of God with the life of Christ, and that life loves. Period.
It loves because it is the life of the character of God, of light and love. It loves and it loves in a holy way. And so he's saying.
To his brethren, as it were, be what you are. Everyone that loveth is born of God. In other words, if you have that life as born of God, then you love.
There may be things that hinder it. It's working in US, and He wants to bring them out so that we live the life that we've been given. But it's not here a character of exhorting us to have something we don't have, but rather to live the character of the life that we do have, which is given to us of God. If the flesh in US works, it hinders.
But if the flesh is not at work in us, we love our brothers. We I love you because that's the life I have. You love me, You can't help but love me because that's the character of the life that has been given to you. But there are things that can come in, and if they do, it's an evidence that we're not living the life that has been given to us, but we are acting in the flesh of the old man, as scripture calls it.
The former life that was ours before we came to know the Lord Jesus as our Savior. So we live not independent of our Savior, we live through Him. And when the Spirit of God is free to work in us because we're not hindering the Spirit by disobedience, then that Spirit working in US automatically works in us to see and care about others.
The Lord Jesus did not live a self-centered life. He lived a life that was perfectly occupied with obedience to God the Father and interest in God the Father's love for souls. And that's the life he lived and that's the life we will live.
If we do not walk in sin.
One other comment that to me is a wonderful thing about this subject, and that is.
God from eternity had perfect enjoyment in love and light with His Son.
They enjoyed each other, we'll say, day by day, even though eternity doesn't have time connected with it, but they enjoyed each other day by day in perfect harmony and perfect love.
And I believe that God created us because he said, I want to share my son with others. I want others to enjoy with me that which is the delight of my heart. And He created us. But having created us, He had to do a work that we could truly enter into His purpose of enjoying His son as He does. We had to have the same life.
I saw this morning down the by the lake.
Some Canada geese.
They're not really interested in me and so I couldn't go down and talk to him.
But even if I had gone down with them, there is no possible way that I could have communicated my heart to them. They don't have a nature, a life that's capable of understanding me. So they can understand each other to their limited extent. They don't know God exists, so they don't have any relationship that way with God. But God wanted us to enjoy what He enjoys in the way He enjoys it, and so He has given us.
00:50:28
A life.
The life of Christ that we can enter in and will enter in without hindrance and glory to an eternity of fellowship with God and common enjoyment one another in the exact same things that God is cares about, we care about.
Few minutes ago, our brother Bob expressed the difficulty of defining love.
And problem, when we try to give a definition of something, we're putting limits on it in an extent, to an extent.
Find something you're saying, well, it's this and it's not that and.
God's love can't be defined in that sense. It's infinite.
The world sees love.
And I'm hoping I get the attention of the young people here.
The world sees love as a feeling, and it comes and goes.
And that's not the love we're talking about.
Love is to start with an attitude. An attitude is a deliberate choice.
You say regardless of what that person does to me, I'm going to love it. That's the love of God, a coffee love. But it's more than an attitude. It's more than just a setting of the heart. It's dynamic, It's active.
God's love is dynamic, and I think it's helpful to see that in John first. John chapter 3.
Verse 16.
Hereby perceive we.
The love of God.
This is how we recognize the love of God. This is how we perceive it, comprehend it. We can't define it, but we can comprehend it to a certain extent. Hereby perceive with the love of God, because he.
Laid down his life for us. That was an action.
It was a deliberate action. It was an action that.
Is overwhelming.
He laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives.
For the rather love is God's love is dynamic.
And in our chapter we have the two following verses give.
Ways that it is manifested in this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him.
Did God know what they were going to do to His Son?
Absolutely. They knew he knew exactly what was going to happen.
Did He withhold giving them? No, He went through with it. And then verse 10 as well here in His love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. It wasn't a matter of a response on our part to love God, no.
He loved us in spite of our attitude of enmity toward him.
It really accentuates in a greater measure, God's luck. Amazingly wonderful.
Brother and I just.
And exercise that.
In John's Gospel and John's Epistles.
We have seven times.
Definite command to love one another.
Let's see the first one in John's Gospel, chapter 13.
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It doesn't say love each other if you can, if it's humanly possible. He doesn't say that.
Look at how he puts it.
Chapter 13.
And verse 34.
A new commandment are given to you.
That is love one another.
As I have loved you.
That ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if you have love one to another.
Not interesting. It's a command.
It's something that it is for us to do.
You know somebody that doesn't exactly strike you very well.
You know somebody that's done you in.
That's where we are to manifest this lot.
And it's a command. Notice though the reference point in verse 34.
Because in the Old Testament there was the command to love your neighbor as yourself.
How do I love myself? Well, you can see I dress fairly well and take care of myself.
That's the way I'm to love my neighbor.
But the reference point has changed here and I think that's why it says it's a new command.
That you love one another as I have loved you.
Oh, tremendous.
How can we ever come to that measure of love? It's by looking at the Lord Jesus.
When he stands.
There in Pilot's judgment hall, when those chief priests come up and spit at him right in the face.
When they slap him. When they crown him with thorns.
Does he still love?
This is the point, brother.
I have to confess.
I'm still lacking quite a bit there.
But this is the measure, this is the reference plan.
This ninth verse tells us that it was manifested the love of God toward us. Our brother Dawn mentioned that in the Old Testament they really didn't know God fully. They didn't have a full revelation of who God is, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. They didn't know the character of God. They knew that God loved them, but how much he loved them they didn't really know. This is one of the reasons that the Lord Jesus came into the world.
To manifest the love of God toward us. And so it's the explanation is to be given in the by our older brethren. Oftentimes to be manifest would be something that taken the cover off. Suppose we had a table here and they had two dishes and that sort of thing under a tablecloth and you think you might see some a cup, the outline of a cup. You might see the outline of a plate. You think it's a plate.
That's how they looked at things in the Old Testament. They didn't have a clear perspective. But in Christianity, the covers taken off. We can absolutely see the heart of God.
Exposed completely, and it was the character of God's love that was shown in the face of the Lord Jesus. And so when they looked upon the Lord Jesus on this, in this scene, they saw the character, the very nature of love itself, divine love.
Now might just say that I think there's four different features of that love that are told to us, and some of it is it really found in the Old Testament, the features of divine love. We might look at Jeremiah chapter 31 and just look at one passage there and it tells us.
In Jeremiah chapter 31.
And let's just read verse three. The Lord of hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yeah, I have loved thee with an everlasting love.
01:00:09
Therefore, with loving kindness have I drawn thee. So one of the features, characteristic features, of Divine Love is that it is everlasting. It will never cease.
It will never cease. That love for God that God has for you will never cease His love for those that come into this world, reject His love and sin against that love, and go into a lost eternity. That love will cease for those individuals. They'll be cast into the lake of fire and they'll be under judgment in separation from God for all eternity. But God's love for you will never cease.
And then in chapter one of Malachi it says.
There that.
Verse two, chapter one of Malachi, another feature of divine love. I have loved you, saith the Lord. And then we might just tie it in with chapter 3 and verse six, for I am the Lord.
I change not his love is unchangeable. It's impossible for him to change in his love. And so you and I that are married, we our love ebbs and flows and we're we're just so changeable.
So.
So changeable. But isn't it nice, the love that Christ had upon the cross before the judgment for my sins, That love didn't change. That judgment didn't change His love. Many waters could not quench love, and so it's unchangeable.
And then we find in Romans chapter 8 another feature of divine love, and that is the power of it.
Just for the sake of time, maybe we'll just read verse 39, Romans 8, verse 39. Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. The power of God's love is such that nothing, not a demon, not Satan himself, can ever pluck you out of his hand. I and my father are one, and he could say that.
He's got you and I in his hand.
And the power of God's love is that He can never release us. He died for us, loves us, And so this Love Is All powerful. And then Ephesians, we have another. And I believe this is what we're Speaking of here. Ephesians chapter 5, verse 25.
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the Church and gave himself for it. Divine love is a sacrificial love.
It gives and it gives and it gives and it gives and it gives and it never stops giving.
Just think of it, brethren, Luke chapter 12. It says that he shall gird himself.
Sit down shall come forth to serve.
It's going to serve you and I with joy, with love, with everything that is possible to service in that heavenly scene, that divine love. And so it's everlasting, it's unchangeable. It's a power that will never let you go. And it's a sacrificial love. And you and I have the capacity.
Indwelled with the Spirit of God, with a new nature, you have a nature that is capable of loving in those ways.
Not that we have we're not sharing deity at all, but we have the capability to express divine love.
Sing #142.
Glory to God.
He's wonderful and the Lord.
Sink through.
Long time.
It's sort of never mind, can't stop. It's not. It's all it's going to happen. It's voice.
Idolatry
Open—Steve Stewart
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218.
As soon as.
There are.
#275 versus 2 and three.
Every step.
Where are we asking Lord self like to read a verse from Nehemiah chapter 8. Nehemiah chapter 8 verse two. Nazareth the priest brought the law before the congregation both of men and women and all that could hear with understanding of our state. So they read in the book of the law of God distinctly.
And gave the sense.
'Cause them to understand reading, says the Lord self.
Psalm 115 verse two. Wherefore should the heathen say, where is now their God?
But our God is in the heavens. He hath done whatsoever he hath pleased.
Their gods are silver and gold, the work of men's hands.
They have mouths, but they speak not. Eyes have they, but they see not. They have ears, but they hear not. Noses have they, but they smell not.
00:05:11
They have hands, but they handle not feet have they? But they walk not. Neither speak they.
Through their throat. But they that make them are like unto them. So is everyone that trusteth in them.
And then a verse in 50th Psalm Psalm 50.
Verse 21.
These things hast thou done, and I kept silence. Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself. But I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes.
I'd like to speak a little this afternoon about the subject of idolatry the psalmist graphically lays out.
The idols of the heathen, they have all the semblance of being able to do something, of having intelligence.
Of being able to communicate something. But they are dead, dead idols. They can't do anything.
And those that make them are like unto them, the Scripture says. And then we read in the 50th Psalm, The Lord says, Thou thoughtest I was altogether such a one as thyself, when man makes an idol.
And if you have had any little bit of history or world history and culture, you know of the different gods that have been worshipped by the nations, their names are still around and usually they have some attribute that is.
Similar or the same as what men have. A God of War, a God of love, and all the gods of the heathen.
They argued and fought among themselves and were envious of one another, and they had all the traits of fallen sinful man.
And so when man makes an idol, he makes something that's like himself that answers to what he is inside.
And the Lord says, you thought I was like you.
But I'm not like you. I'll reprove you. And so when man makes an idol that he calls God, he makes it like himself. And then he says that's what's God's like. He's like me. He's like this God I've made.
That's an idol, it's not God.
And God says I will reprove thee. I want to tie those thoughts in with what we've some of what we've had in our readings.
But first I'd like to go back and look at an Old Testament account of a man who made an idol her idols. And we want to look at judges. The book of Judges is the history of Israel from the death of Joshua up until the end of the times of the judges, just before Samuel, who was the last great judge of Israel.
There's a series of judges.
That are raised up by God as deliverers. The people fall into sin.
Get away from the Lord. He raises up a judge, they deliver them and they repeat the cycle again and they cried to the Lord and he has mercy and raises the judge. And but as you go through the book of judges, it's really a, it's a slope down. It gets worse and worse. Things get worse. And in fact, the very last judge is Samson.
And Samson, instead of being a deliverer of the people, he needs to get delivered.
Himself. And then we come to Chapter 17 of Judges.
In chapter 17, through the end of the book are an appendix. You know, an appendix is right. You read a book, you read a story and you come to an appendix and an appendix will tell you something and give you details that weren't given when you read the story. It takes you back and says, I want to, you know, the author wants to show you a little something more about what he wrote about the story, and he takes the appendix and he unfolds it. That's what.
This is in the book of judges, starting with chapter 17. It's an appendix that opens up something from the time of the judges to help us understand better what took place. It was a downward slope. Why was it a downward slope? Well, chapter 17 to the end unfold to us more. Why? Two big events take place in these chapters. The first one is connected.
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Idolatry. The second one is connected with immorality.
They both take place way back at the beginning of the Book of Judges, but it's not till the end that the account is given.
The first one in chapter 17 we're going to read just a little bit, starting with verse one. There was a man of Mount Ephraim, whose name was Micah, and he said unto his mother, the 1100 shekels of silver that were taken from thee, about which thou cursed and spake also in mine ears, Behold, the silver is with me, I took it.
And his mother said, Blessed be thou of the Lord, my son.
And when he had restored the 1100 shekels of silver to his mother, his mother said, I had wholly dedicated the silver unto the Lord from my hand, for my son to make a graven image and a molten image. Now therefore I will restore it unto thee. And he restored the money unto his mother, And his mother took 200 shekels of silver and gave them to the founder, who made thereof a graven image and a molten image. And they were in the house.
Of Micah and the man Micah had a House of gods, and made an ephod and a tariff him, and consecrated one of his sons, who became his priest. In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
And there was a young man out of Bethlehem, Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he sojourned there. And the man departed out of the city from Bethlehem, Judah, to sojourn where he could find a place, and he came to Mount Ephraim.
To the House of Micah as he journeyed. And Micah said unto him, Once cometh thou. And he said unto him, I am a Levite of Bethlehem, Judah, and I go to sojourn, where I may find a place. And Micah said unto him, Dwell with me, and be unto me a father and a priest, and I will give thee 10 shekels of silver by the year in a suit of apparel, and thy Vidal. So the Levite went in, and the Levite was content to dwell with a man, and the young man was unto him.
Sons and Micah consecrated the Levite and the young man became his priest and was in the House of Micah and said Micah now know I that the Lord will do me good, saying I have a Levite to my priest.
And so Micah's mother had this silver, and her son stole it from her.
The boys ever steal from their moms.
Yeah, they do.
You know a lot of dollar bills in that wallet. Quite a few. Mom's not going to miss a couple 2-3 she did.
She say anything? No, she prayed. But this mother didn't. She cursed.
She cursed.
You ever thank the Lord for your mom? Ever out there shopping Walmart somewhere else and you hear what somebody else's mom is saying and the words that come out of their mouths, how they treat their children.
You ever thank the Lord for your mom?
What a blessing that mother is that the Lord gave you and gave you to her. We thank the Lord for her. Micah's mother cursed.
And then she turned around and blessed and James says, how can Bitter and Sweetwater come out of the same fountain, blessing and cursing all. But out of this mother's mouth came both. Well, I think she cursed so badly that it scared Micah. And he was a grown man. And he quickly fished that money he stole out and said, here it is, take it back. Take it back, you know?
I don't want that curse coming on me.
All And she blessed him, and she says I dedicated it all to the Lord.
And did she?
Well, then, she takes only a little part of it.
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Because she really didn't want to dedicate it all to the Lord.
But she takes that, and she has an idol made out of it. And Micah takes that idol and puts it in his house, and he thinks that he is worshipping the Lord. Doesn't say that he thought he was worshipping Bail or Ashtaroth or one of the heathen gods, but that he was worshipping the Lord.
With this idol that he had made out of silver.
And pretty soon he adds a Levite as his priest, and now he's got a priest to take care of all the religious stuff.
To do all the religious things, all the religious ceremonies. And you know, that's nice. Got all that in this place and now I know God's going to bless me because I got all of this arranged nicely. I don't have to worry anything about religious stuff. I got somebody to take care of it for me. I've got this idol.
That I worship all set.
You see a picture of the development of what took place in Christianity as Christianity slipped into idolatry and developed a priesthood to come between the people and God to take care of all their religious business. And I can just go to church on Sunday and somebody else does it all for me, Whether it's a Catholic Church and it's the priest and he does it all in his little things, or whether I go to someplace else and there's another man up there that takes care of the sermon and makes.
Feel good and I can go home talking with my boss. He says it's McDonald's church. He's not a believer, but he perceives it. He says I go through like the drive through at McDonald's. I get the sermon and I pay and I leave. And he feels very satisfied because he goes to church every Sunday. It's all taken care of for him as long as he puts the money in the box.
Just like Micah.
You know, it says and Peter were not redeemed by corruptible things such as silver and gold, but with a precious blood of Christ. Silver and gold were used in the Old Testament as prices for redemption, especially silver.
And those precious metals that were used in various things in the Tabernacle in the Old Testament, and the service of the Lord as the shekel of the sanctuary price of redemption, are all pictures to us. Those precious metals are pictures to us of different attributes of the Lord.
Silver speaks of redemption. What he's done for us is we haven't been redeemed with Silver, but it's a picture to us.
Of redemption, gold that covered the ark and the altar of incense, and so on, is a picture of the righteousness of God.
All of these things, precious metals and jewels, they're different pictures to us of different attributes of God.
And man likes to take one attribute of God, or maybe 2.
And he likes to take it, and he likes to make an idol, and he sets that idol in front of him, and he says that's Jesus.
Maybe he takes Grace.
The grace of God.
And he makes an idol that he calls Jesus.
And he says, My Jesus would never judge anyone.
Judge not lest ye be judged. My Jesus would never judge anyone.
And he makes an idol.
That's according to his own heart.
That conforms to his own way of thinking, and God says you thought.
I was like your idol, that I was like you, but I'm not. He takes one attribute of God and he makes an idol.
And that's what he calls his gone, and that's what he worships.
And you know.
In 2nd Corinthians 3, let's just turn there.
2nd Corinthians 3 excuse 2nd Corinthians 3. That's the scripture I want.
Verse 17.
Now the Lord is that spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there's liberty. But we all with open face beholding as in a glass you can just leave out, we all with open face beholding the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.
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It is.
A fact.
That we.
Are changed.
By what we worship, what we are.
Occupied with what consumes us, what is has all of our attention.
You like Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Nothing wrong with a Harley.
You know Harley's. I'm sorry, I'm picking on Harley's if anybody has a Harley.
You really like them. That's what you're all about. You get all the magazines, you find the other guys that got one, you get together.
Talk about it, work on them. Pretty soon you buy the jacket that goes with the gang. Have a good time out there, right? And you're all about Harley's and riding the Harley's. And you know what? You look just like it because you're being changed.
Into just what your idol is. You like glamour?
Pretty soon you look like the girls in the glamour mags. You've changed into the same image we occupied with Christ.
Is he the one before your soul?
You changed into the same image.
From glory to glory. They that make them, we read, are like unto them, because what occupies our hearts is what we become like. You can't change. It's like a law of physics. It's a spiritual law. You will look like and be like what you're occupied with and what absorbs you in your life. Do you like money?
Do you want money? You'll look like money.
You'll be like it. You want power. You'll look like it. You'll be like it. You wrapped up in the politics of this world and the pursuits of this world. That's all you'll talk about. That's what you'll be like. That's what you'll be involved with. You'll look like it.
You'll look like your idol.
All for the believer. We have one before us that changes us into his own image more like him. Day by day, day by day. You know, in that moral appendix and judges Tribe of Dan comes along. We're not going to take time to read it. Time of tribe of Dan comes along seeking.
Their place, their portion in the land, and they send spies out to look for a spot.
For them and those spies come by the House of Micah, and they turn in and they say, what do you got here? As they see that idol and the Levite that he made into a priest, who a Levite wouldn't have never been a priest. They were another priestly family.
And when he tells them, and they say, we'll inquire of the Lord for us, and he says, oh, and he bestows a blessing on them, Go, go, go ahead. The Lord's gonna bless you, you know. And those that occupy those places, they only dispense blessings. They never give you a word of plain truth.
And then they find the place where they're going to tell the tribe this is the ideal spot. There's some people here we can conquer and take their land. The whole tribe comes back and they say, wait, there's Micah's house. You know what's in there? What's in there? First time I read it, I thought they're going to go in and destroy Mike and his house and destroy that idol, and that's going to be the end of it.
Instead they take the Levite made into a priest and the idols and they make off with them and a whole tribe goes into idolatry. A whole tribe of Israel goes into idolatry, and no one in Israel says a thing.
Not one thing.
The next incident that takes place, a woman is horribly abused.
Horrible immorality that takes place. The tale is told to all Israel. They gather as one man to destroy the perpetrators of that sin.
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They're incensed.
That that could take place.
And you will find, sad to say.
In professing Christianity, there is far more righteous indignation against sin, against another person, against immorality, than there is against the open idolatry that has come into Christianity.
That which is an offense against the person of God himself is disregarded. Nothing is said. Oh, that's just a matter of opinion. Your opinion, you're welcome to it. I have my opinion. But when it comes to some immoral thing, oh, up in arms and protesting, get out the placards and March down the street and we got to stop this. This moral appendix is the root cause of the decline of things in Israel. They didn't really care about the.
Of the Lord. But where they were personally offended, they got up in arms about it. So we read in the Epistle of John. John is writing in a day when the doctrine of the person of the Lord Jesus Christ and who he is, is thoroughly attacked.
It was under attack and he writes in defense.
Of the Person of the Son of God, and we read one of the.
Tasks that is given first, John, let's turn there.
We read in the 4th chapter.
How every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in flesh is of God, and every spirit that doesn't confess that Jesus Christ has come in flesh is not of God. And we spoke how that really takes up that he came, Eternal Son of God came into this world and he took manhood into union with himself. God prepared a body.
He was born in this world and he was a man spirit, soul and body. And he could say that he we could read of him and John that he groaned in spirit and he in Chapter 11 and we could read in chapter 12. He said now is my soul trouble? He had a human spirit, a human soul and a human body.
And other than that, He could never have given himself for you and I on Calvary's cross. Because if there was going to be one to be a sacrifice acceptable to God for our sin, it had to be one like us, but without sin himself personally, He had to be a man, just as you and I are.
Outside of that, we do not have a savior.
A little further down in our chapter, we didn't get to it verse.
14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he.
In God, another test confession that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
Not that He became the Son of God when he was born in this world, but that He was always from eternity the Son of God. Early in the chapter we read that God sent his only begotten Son into the world. You cannot and He could not send the Son unless he were a Son to send.
What does that mean? It means when the Father sent the Son, the person he was sending was the Son, not someone who would become the Son after he was born. Otherwise he couldn't have sent the Son. He would have been sending whatever person in the Godhead it was that wasn't the Son.
And that he would have become the Son on birth. No, he sent the Son because he was the Son from all eternity.
Who shall, whoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God?
Chapter 5. Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.
He is the true Messiah, God's anointed. And we saw that Antichrist denies that Jesus is the Christ denies Messiah, and Antichrist is going to head up Jewish apostasy. What are the Jews not believe? They don't believe that Jesus of Nazareth is the true Messiah.
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And the Antichrist is going to reinforce that. He's going to head that apostasy up. But what's the wonderful revelation given to Christians?
The revelation of God the Father, he that has seen me, the Lord said has seen the Father, the revelation of God the Father in the Son. And he's going to deny the Father and the Son. He's going to deny that revelation of the Father and the Son, and he's going to head up Christian apostasy too, both in that one person. And so these are touchstones given to us.
And John's epistle.
Of the true Person of the Son of God. Now, perhaps you have never run into someone who denied any of those things.
You may, you may, but I want to take something up that perhaps.
You may run into or may have run into.
We had a little earlier in the chapter that verse six that the apostles could say, John could say we are of God. He that knoweth God heareth us. He that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
It is Sunday school picnic some years back.
And a big SUV pulled up. We've just been giving thanks for the meal. Big SUV pulled up, man got out of it.
Came over, he said. Wonderful to see all these Christians praying. Wonderful, he said. And.
Began to talk and as the conversation went on, well, I'll get to the point he he wanted to come to our meeting room and preach to us.
And we told him, well, we would not allow that. We really don't know who you are or what doctrine you hold. You're welcome to come and observe if you'd like, but no, we wouldn't invite you to preach. And he really began to press the point that he was a capable preacher. And not only that, he did miracles, and he had proof of the miracles that he did.
And so on.
And he began to very vehemently press his desire. And I think we took up with them that, you know, we really don't let those participate in ministry of the Word unless they're in fellowship at the Lord's table because they are evidencing by that desire that they want to go on in the truth of God. And so there's confidence in them that that there's a desire to go on in the truth. They've embraced the truth of God.
And we can let them minister in the Assembly meetings if they have that gift.
And he began to argue that point and that how could we take a place of being separate in that sense from other believers? I'm just giving the very gist of the conversation. And I said to him, well, Paul the apostle writes to us in First Corinthians that we're not responsible to judge those that are without, but we're responsible to judge those that are within and to make sure.
That things are kept clean at the Lord's table and there's a rejection of all that would dishonor the Lord.
And he said to me.
Whose greater Paul or Jesus?
That's a rhetorical question. What's the answer? You know the answer. What did I answer? The same thing you would answer.
I said Jesus then he said, And Jesus said, Judge not, lest ye be judged also.
What was he doing? You know, I didn't know what to say.
Conversation ended not long after that. He climbed into his big SUV and off he went.
Who's greater? That question just rang in my mind.
Who's greater?
Paul or Jesus?
The answer was always the same, Jesus.
But what was he doing with that question? And you may get asked a similar question. You may run into a similar situation. He was setting the words of the Lord Jesus Christ against what the apostles had written. And that was unsettling to me, but I didn't know how to answer it.
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You know, if you get a question like that.
You don't and are not obligated to the one who poses the question to give them an answer that satisfies them.
You can leave it embarrassing, might be feeling like you didn't win the conversation.
Yep, that's not important. Take it to the Lord. It may take some time, but He'll give you an answer. I want to show you the answer the Lord gave me.
John, First Corinthians, Chapter 11, verse 23.
For I.
Have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you.
Chapter 14 Verse 37. If any man think himself to be a prophet.
Or spiritual. Let him acknowledge that the things I write unto you are the commandments.
Of the Lord. But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant.
First Thessalonians, chapter four. First Thessalonians chapter 4, verse 15. For this we say unto you, by the word of the Lord. And now I want to turn to a scripture in Hebrews chapter 12. Hebrews 12.
Verse 25.
See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escape to refuse him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven?
What the apostle Paul received and communicated, he received from an ascended Christ, and that man was putting the words of the Lord Jesus Christ here on the earth against the words of Christ, ascended and glorified, that he had given to Paul as if they were opposed to each other. The question is not who is greater, Paul or Jesus? The answer to that is obvious.
The point is, is that what the apostle Paul has given us, what the apostles have given us, is from Christ.
It's his words, it's his authority.
They're not opposed to each other.
That man was making an idol. He was making an idol. He called Jesus. It had one attribute.
You might call that attribute judge, not.
My colleague Grace it had one attribute and it denied all the other attributes of Christ.
And it was used to deny the very words of an ascended Christ. See that you refuse, not him that speaketh from heaven. And you are going to run into those who have made idols for themselves that they call Jesus.
But they're not the Jesus of the Bible. They're not the Jesus of this book. They're not the God that this book presents to us. They're a God after their own making, and they're like them. They suit their own hearts because every band in the days of Micah did that which was right in his own eyes. They're gods that allow them to do whatever they feel like and want to do.
And that's their idol. But we have the true Jesus, if he had not come, the Son of God.
Come in flesh, gone on to that cross and dine. We'd never have known the love of God.
We'd have no object to form us into that same image like himself. How does Paul close this epistle Chapter 5, verse 20. The precipitate is one is said of all of John's ministry. John chapter 5, verse 20 and we know Christian knowledge. We know that the Son of God has come and have given us an understanding that we may.
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That is true, we are in Him, that is true even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life and nothing else beside that. Everything else is an idol of man's making that suits himself and will never conform you into the image of the Son of God.
Little children, says the aged apostle.
In his closing words.
And tender affection to you and I little children, keep yourselves from idols.
Turning to God from Idols
Open—Robert Boulard
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Perhaps, brethren, we could just turn to 1St Thessalonians, chapter one.
Just read a couple of verses there.
Verse 8.
First Thessalonians chapter one, verse 8. For from you sounded out the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia and IKEA, but also in every place. Your faith to Godward is spread abroad, so that we need not speak anything.
They themselves show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.
And then in the book of the Acts, chapter 17.
Verse 22 I'm not.
Blessed with the privilege of having a parallel edition up here, so maybe some have the new translation. Mr. Darby's more much more accurate in this passage, But from verse 22, we'll just read a few verses.
You could read it in the new translation and it's very, very striking.
Paul stood in the midst of Mars Hill and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious, or in the new translation given up to demon worship. For as I pass by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, or a shrine with this inscription to the unknown God.
Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship Him, declare I unto you God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is the Lord of heaven and earth dwelleth not in temples made with hands, neither is worshipped with men's hands. As though He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all life and breath, and all things, and hath made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and have determined.
The times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation, that they should seek the Lord, if happily they might feel after Him and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us. For in Him we live and move, and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said. For we are also His offspring, for as much then as we are the offspring of God.
We ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold or silver or stone.
Graven by art and man's device, and the times of this ignorance.
God winked at or had patience with, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent, because he hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness, by that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, others said, We will hear thee again of this matter. So Paul departed from among them.
Howbeit certain men clave unto him, and believed, among the which was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
Well, my purpose in taking up these couple of passages of scriptures just to show the darkness and the ignorance that was characteristic of the Gentile world, because, you know, the Gentiles lived without God, without hope in this world that says in Ephesians chapter 2. And they were strangers from the covenants and promises given unto Israel. And so they had fallen into all kinds of darkness and wickedness.
But you and I have been blessed with the privilege of having been brought up in a Christian environment. We might say, I don't know if all here have been brought up in a Christian home, but what a blessing, what a privilege it is to have been brought up under the sound of the word of God and have had the word of God read in the home. I want to encourage you this afternoon if you.
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Are a young parent.
Have the Word of God open daily before your family, and you don't think perhaps the antenna is up and that they're listening and that they're really too engaged. But they are engaged and they are hearing what is being said. And let the Word of God have its effect upon the soul and upon the conscience of the young, as they listen and teach them the truth.
Because it's the light of Scripture, and the opposite is the darkness that we have in this world, and it's a darkness.
That God characterizes here in the Gentile world that was characterized by idolatry.
That is, men are worshipping the things that they have manufactured themselves.
And instead, on our Lord's Day morning, going to be in the presence of the Lord.
They're polishing their new cars. They're doing all kinds of things. You see it yourselves. Every one of us need to be engaged with the Lord and recognize that we've been brought into the light of Christianity. While these dear brethren in Thessalonica, they turn from idols.
They were steeped in idolatry and all the wicked practice of those immoral temples that they had in the Western world, in the Roman world at that time. They turned, they believe the word of God. And you know, I was thinking of Acts chapter 2 and how we need to be found under the sound of the word. And let the word judge us. Let the word search us.
Let the Word of God have its effect upon us. Let's read in Acts chapter 2.
And let's read from verse 36. We don't have a lot of time here, but it says, therefore let all the House of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified both Lord and Christ. Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart and said unto Peter into the rest of the apostles.
Men and brethren, what shall we do then? Peter said unto them. Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Well, there was a call to repentance. There was a word of God that was spoken, and the apostles of their brothers mentioned had a word from God, and they presented the word of God, the Old Testament Scriptures, as well as the revelation that they had from the Lord in connection with the Lord Jesus as being the Christ, the Messiah, And they allowed the word of God to judge them.
They didn't take the word of God and judge the word, but it was the word of God.
That was read, that was spoken to them, and they allowed the word of God to judge them.
It's a false principle for us to take the word of God.
And say I personally agree with this or I personally disagree with this. It's a false principle and it will lead to idolatry as has been presented to us.
And so we need to submit to the wisdom and of the Word of God and the light that God gives us in His Word. And these Thessalonians, they did that. They turned from there to God.
You're going to have to have an object. Everyone of us has to have an object as we walk through this world. And it's either going to be Christ at the center of life, Christ the object of life.
Christ who is the source of divine life, Christ the source of my blessing. And in the relationship that we have with the Father, every good gift and every perfect gift cometh down from above, from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. So we're going to receive what we receive from the Father in relationship with him, or we'll reach out and we'll become self-centered and will think that.
Christianity is about me. What is in Christianity for me? What? It's all about me. No, it's not. It's all about Christ. Life and having a fruitful life is having Christ before us. And so they turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God. Oh how the Lord delights to have us turn from those things.
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That would replace.
The affections that we have had for him perhaps in the past.
And that have robbed us in some small way, very subtly, the enemy just uses other things to come in and to displace Christ in our lives and how He longs for us to turn to Him. Now they turn to Him for salvation. But we can turn to Him in repentance for what we have gone on with, what we've allowed in our lives, perhaps what we've allowed into our homes. And we can.
Turn to God.
From idols to serve the living and true God. And how will it show that we've turned? Oh, I think it's precious, you know, as you and I are believers in these very last days, just before the Lord comes, it will show whether or not we are waiting for His Son from heaven.
Or whether we are not.
I was in a home not too long ago, not of one gathered to the Lord's name, one of my nieces.
And her husband. And there were signs of divine life all over in the home. There was gospel text. There were Bibles on the tables. I was so thankful to you to see it. So thankful after the meal, the brother.
Push the plates aside, open up his Bible before things would get too busy and he read a passage of scripture. Not very well educated, he had a difficult time reading that chapter, the 10th chapter of Ecclesiastes. He didn't even barely make any comments on it, but how it warmed my soul to hear him stumble through reading of that chapter.
With his family and with the guests at his table. Not a man of gift, but he had a priority that they would have the word of God.
Before them, I made a comment to his wife a little bit later about the coming of the Lord. She said, oh, that might be a long time away for now.
I'm not. I'm not concerning myself too much with that.
I was sorry to hear it.
It will characterize your life. It will color the flavor of your life. It will color what you how you prioritize your day. It will color how you prioritize your week, your career. You might, whatever it might be if you are found watching and waiting for the Lord to come. Not just waiting, but watching.
And waiting for him to come. And so this is what characterized these brethren. I would just want to encourage.
Each one of us again to read the scriptures daily, to search whether these things are so as they have in Acts chapter 17, and to be sure to allow the Word of God to search us out.
Not for us to render an opinion about the word of God or to judge the word of God. Say I agree with this or I don't know, that's not of God. Let the word of God judge me and search out the truth of God and bow to it. Because what was delivered to the apostles has been delivered to the church from Christ, and he used the apostles to deliver it to the church.
May we submit to the truth that He has given us in the light that He has given us, and walk in fellowship with the apostles that continued steadfastly, and the apostles doctrine and fellowship, breaking of bread and prayers. They did that at the beginning of the church period. May we be found doing it now at the end of the church period.
318.
Oh Lamb of God, still keep us.
This weekend.
Was.
A song.
By the.
I'm.
Josiah, Cyrus, Jesus
Address—Paul Hadley
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.
Let's start with #159.
159.
All things that God or man could wish.
In Jesus Christ.
Praise to believe.
Our eyes is my soul, dear Lord.
So sweet. OK, He has been himself jealous.
Spray.
Our God and Father.
I.
That the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart might be pleasing in thy sight.
No, God, we pray that these words and these meditations might be blessings.
To those who hear them. Thus we ask the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen.
I have considered off and on for the past few months.
Two men.
Whose names were given them?
Long, long before they were born.
One was a king named Josiah, the other was a king named Cyrus.
Let's turn to 1St Kings.
And I've wondered.
Considered, what would it be?
What would it be that God would have a name?
Of a person identified before he was born, long before his parents were born.
What would move God to do such a thing?
Let's first look in First Corinthians Chapter 11.
I don't want to read verse 38. It says that it shall be. Oh, I guess I should tell you this is the prophet Abijah speaking to Jeroboam.
And this is in the days of the fourth king of Israel, Rehoboam.
And the Kingdom has just was just to be divided.
Into the Northern 10 tribes. In the southern 2 tribes.
And advisor is giving instructions to Jeroboam who is going to be in charge of the 10 tribes.
About his future.
And it's this verse 30 it shall be. 38 and it shall be, if thou wilt hearken unto all that I command thee, and will walk in my ways, and do that is right in my sight, to keep my statutes and my commandments as David my servant did, that I will be with thee and build the assure house as I built for David.
And will give Israel unto thee.
This is an amazing point.
Jeroboam.
Could have been the and his children. Could have been the only king that there ever was in the northern tribes. Northern 10 tribes.
As it turns out.
00:05:00
Only he and his son two generations reigned and then Vayasa.
Reign for two generations, and then there was the House of Omri, which reigned for four generations, and there was the House of Jehu which reigned for four generations, and then between all those.
Various rains, we might say, or.
Whatever you want to call them, there were various upstarts and traders and rebels that raped, but it could have been.
That that we would read through this book of First kings and every king.
That was named from the northern tribes would have been one of the sons of Jeroboam. All he had to do is this one thing and it doesn't even say that.
If your son fails.
Then it's going to stop.
David's children failed and his reign continued on and on for 22, well, 21 generations.
It could have been the same thing in the Northern Kingdom.
But Jeremy almost took some counsel and we find in the next chapter in verse 27 it says, if this Jeroboam says to himself, if this people go up to do sacrifice in the House of the Lord at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this people turn again unto their Lord, even under Ray of Om, King of Judah.
So he still thinks Ray of Om, David's son, is the king. He doesn't realize it's been given to him. It's his.
It's his only to lose.
Then shall the people turn to their akin to their Lord, even under rail home, king of Judah, and they shall kill me, and go again to Ray of Om, king of Judah. Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.
Yes, it was quite a bit too much.
Can you imagine?
The Lord Jesus, when he was here on earth, he lived in Capernaum near the Sea of Galilee and.
See if God will see if Gala is.
696 feet below sea level.
We think Death Valley is low. Death Valley is not even 300 feet below sea level.
Steve Galley, 696 feet below sea level.
And every every year, three times in a year.
They'd have to pack up their bags or get on their donkey or walk my foot. Every male.
And walk 100 miles north-south to Jerusalem. Jerusalem.
Is 2800 feet above sea level.
That's a steady climb for 100 miles, and they had to do that three times a year.
Most of them on foot.
Yeah, it was too much for them, and Jeroboam had a good excuse to tell them don't bother to do that.
It's too hard. It's too hard to go to that place. And besides, if you do, I'm worried that you might kill me and go back and become part of the Kingdom of David again.
That was such a significant event.
Such a significant event in the history of Israel.
That this king Josiah was named.
And so we read on in chapter 13.
And it says, And behold, there came a man of God out of Judah, by the word of the Lord, unto Bethel. And Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense.
And he cried against the altar, and the word of the Lord, and said, Oh, altar alter. Thus saith the Lord, Behold.
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A child shall be born unto the House of David Josiah by name.
And upon thee shall he offer thee.
Priests, so the high places that burn incense upon thee, and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee.
And he gave a sign the same day, saying, This is the sign which the Lord hath spoken. Behold, the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out.
What was wrong with that altar? Besides it, there was a golden calf there.
Well, you know what an altar is a place where.
People offer sacrifices.
It's a place where.
They approach God.
It's a place where they worship.
But that's a place that from the time that there has been a people of God, from the very time that there has been a people of God.
There has been only one altar in that place.
And Jeroboam was spoiling.
Spoiling that divine principle that there's only one altar. Imagine having to walk 100 miles uphill to go and offer a sacrifice. Why did God have to do that and make his people?
Walk so far because he wanted to have a picture that.
It can only be done in one place, only one place.
And it's the place that represented the people of God, the unity of the people of God. And so it was in Deuteronomy 12. Moses gave the instructions. You couldn't go off for sacrifices in any old place. You have to go in the place where the Lord appointed and so.
It was also.
When in the days of Joshua, when the 2 1/2 tribes across Jordan built an altar not to offer sacrifices?
That there was a big deal about that.
And there almost came a war over it.
It's so important that there should be only one place, only one altar.
That the people of God could gather and won't make their sacrifices.
So he gave this sign that there was coming a day when a man by the name of Josiah, one of the children of David.
Was going to.
To.
Solve, we might say, this problem, and he was going to defile that altar.
There, if you search through the Bible, you'll find no other man by the name of Josiah.
I find a whole lot of Shimmy Ayers and you know, lots of other names you keep coming across.
No other. No other Josiah.
And so.
He also gave a sign and that altar that Jeroboam was standing by. 4 1/2 rent.
And ashes poured out.
Jeroboam was upset about them and stuck out his hand and said.
What did he say?
Verse 4.
Saying lay hands, lay hold of him.
In other words, arrest. That man in his hand wouldn't come back. He was stuck and he had to beg for the prophet, the old, the prophet to to.
To pray for him and have his hand restored.
And that altar did fall apart, and the ashes poured out on the ground.
So the altar.
Being broken, the ashes poured out. I wondered why. Why does it point out that the ashes poured out?
00:15:06
Well, the altar was in the wrong place.
And it could not represent the unity of the people of God.
It was destroyed. What about the sacrifice on it?
The sin offerings it tells us in Leviticus 4 that they are to be.
The sin offering is to be burnt outside the camp.
The innards of that.
Sin off rain.
They were to be burnt on the altar.
And the ashes were to be taken outside the camp also.
Strange. You know, if I was to take a, let's say, a chicken and put it on the rotisserie and.
And the sweet saver comes up.
I take the innards and throw them in the garbage.
And enjoy the smell of the cooking chicken. It's the exact opposite.
Inside the camp, at the burnt, at the brazen offer altar, was the innards.
The liver, the kidneys and so on.
Burnt on the on the altar.
And the body.
And the skin.
It's taken outside the camp.
And it was burnt outside the camp.
That's because that which was inside.
It's a picture of the Lord Jesus.
Offering himself there as our sacrifice, the only sin. Offering that ever, you might say, counted.
All that was inside him offered to God.
A sweet saver.
His innards, everything that made him tick, we might say.
The outward, the skin, his body, all that.
Burnt outside the camp. That which man saw was the cross.
Just across a man dying there in the cross, that's what man saw.
But God saw what was inside, and so that was.
That was offered on the.
Brazen altar. The rest was burned outside the camp. And so it points out here in this passage that.
The ashes spilled out in the ground. The sacrifice was not a picture of Christ at all.
Let's.
Turn to read about Josiah in the Book of Chronicles.
Second Chronicles chapter, chapter 34.
So 14 generations pass.
About 325 years later.
And.
An ungodly king.
By the name of Ammon.
And his wife, they have a little boy.
They named him Josiah.
Means whom Jehovah heals.
I have no idea if they had any knowledge of this.
Prophecy that was made long ago, but they fulfilled it.
And we see here in Second Chronicles 34.
Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign.
Chapter verse one.
Now 8 year old boys like to be kings.
You know, I don't know if there's any 8 year old boys here, but if we took one and stood them up here, hard to imagine this guy having a crown on us yet.
Little girls always, they seem to want to be princesses, but little boys seem to like to be kings. Here's a man, a boy that could do anything he wanted to because he was king. He could say off with your head and that person would be executed.
00:20:09
He was king, he could do anything he wanted to.
What would you do if you're an 8 year old kid and you were made king?
Ah boy, you might start thinking of all the things you could do.
He must have done the mall or whatever he wanted to anyway.
It says that he reigned 3031 years, and then it says in verse three and in the eighth year of his reign. So now he's 16 years old while he's yet young.
He began to seek after the God of David, his father.
You know, that is about the time where a lot of young men and women decide which way they're going.
When I was seven years old, I asked the Lord to be my Savior.
I was like Josiah, just a kid.
Came to be about 15 years old. I remember there was a time I decided, do I want to grow up to be a a thug or a gangster? A bad talking person?
Is that what I want?
There came a time in my life when I was that age about the same as Josiah did it.
Besides, I've got it. I've got to search that. I've got to seek after the Lord.
There's something more to life than being.
Popular.
Are feared.
Or being the class comic.
There's something more to life than that. There is indeed.
And Josiah came to realize that.
And he started to seek after the Lord. Then it says we're still in verse 4.
In the 12Th year, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high, from the high places and the Groves in the car of images and the molten images.
You know, after a while.
You're not 16 years old anymore. You realize I've got to do something about this. It's not just me. It's not just me that is changing my way of life. I have a responsibility. I've got to do something about the things that come before me. I may not be king, but I do have certain responsibilities, maybe in the class.
Maybe.
You know, maybe in your workplace.
But there's a responsibility, and Josiah saw it.
And he started to do things about it. He started to clean up his Kingdom, we might say. And you?
Have a Kingdom.
It may not be a big one, but each one of you have a Kingdom.
It may be just yourself, but it's probably more, probably more than just yourself. Josiah began to clean up his Kingdom.
And it says.
Then.
This.
See. So he's 16 years old.
And then it says in verse 3.
Well, let's see, I'm losing my place. I'm going to read it.
There's three we read about. He began to purge.
The high places and so on. And verse four and they breakdown the altars of Balaam in his presence, and the images that were on high above them, and cut down the Groves and carved images and the molten images, broken pieces and so on.
And then?
In verse five, he actually fulfills the prophecy that was.
Made all those years before. And he comes to the altar and he breaks, and he breaks it down. He sacrifices, he defiles it, he burns, burns the bones of priests upon the altars, and so on.
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And.
Then we find in verse 8.
The 18th year of his reign.
So now he's 26 years old.
I might make one remark before he got to be 26 years old.
In Jeremiah chapter one and verse two it says that Jeremiah began to prophecy in the 13th year of.
Of his reign.
You know what if you are like Josiah?
And you come to make a decision for the Lord, and then you start to clean up your domain.
Begin to seek after God.
You'll find that there's someone else.
That's going to be an encouragement to you and you will be an encouragement to them.
So.
In the.
13th year of his reign, so he's now 21 years old.
After he had already begun to fulfill the prophecy and so on.
God provides a prophet, Jeremiah.
That.
Works, we might say, in harmony with this king.
You'll find.
You'll find others of like spirit with you if you make this commitment to do as Jeremiah has done.
Right so then in verse eight, we come to the part where he's he's now 26 years old and and in the 18th year of his reign, he he'd done all this purging and so on. I.
And we find in verse 15 that he.
He's putting together, he's repairing the House of the Lord, and they find.
A book.
Yokiah answered and said to Schaffen describe I found the book of the Law in the House of the Lord, and Al Qaeda delivered the book to Shaphan.
You know, it's remarkable what Josiah did before he even had the book.
He had a sense of what God would have him to do.
Then he got the book.
And.
He had the word of God to guide him.
So now he's, what, 26 years old?
No, you young men, 26 years old and older, be better if you started already. But it's time to get out the book. It's time to get out that book and.
And.
The guide of your life.
Well, one of the things that he found out is that you're meant to keep the Passover.
And we read in in Chapter 35 how he did that now.
I'm going to skip over talking about that, but.
I think that was perhaps the high point of Josiah's life.
Interesting enough I can't explain it, but I don't.
I don't know, it doesn't seem like there ever was another Passover.
After that.
Same thing I wonder about Hezekiah. Wonderful he got to the close to the Lord and.
Had a Passover, maybe did everything wrong but got honored.
And.
Yet you never read of another Passover.
And it seems like Josiah might have done the same. I don't I don't know.
But it was a wonderful Passover.
You know, after Josiah.
Had this high point of his life.
Next thing we find out about him is that he got mixed up into things of the world.
00:30:04
He was told not to.
He got mixed up in the battles of the world.
Got in between somebody elses fight.
And many a Christian has gone down this road.
Getting involved in all kinds of things.
And.
Unfortunately, this godly man.
Died at 39 years old in battle.
Or as a result of wounds in battle, we might say.
Very godly king.
The most godly of all the kings.
Says there is no king like him for turning to the Lord with all his heart and soul and might.
Like David, What about Hezekiah?
Whoa.
Josiah there says there's no king like him. That's what the Bible says about him. Turn to the Lord of the whole, his heart and his soul and his might.
Yes, and.
Then he got mixed up in the world and died young.
Well, 22 years later.
4 kings later.
There was number more king to be had.
In Judah.
For 70 * 7 years there was a king in Judah.
From the time of Saul.
To the Last King of Zedekiah, the House of There was a king in Judah.
All that Saul be in the House of David.
Zedekiah was deported in like 599 BC.
About that same time.
There was a king in Persia named Canvasses.
His wife had a little baby.
There was a boy. What do we name him?
Let's name him Cyrus.
Cyrus means like the sun.
He's going to be like the sun shining over the whole world.
Interesting.
I don't know if this ever happened, probably didn't, but I can imagine one of campuses.
Servants coming into him and saying, you know.
I told one of the Hebrews that is serving us that you've named your son Cyrus, and he says that there was a prophet in Israel that prophesied that there would be a king named Cyrus.
Someday.
That's interesting.
Well, I don't. I'm not any worshiper of the God of Israel, Canvas, it says. But that is very interesting.
And so.
We have.
The prophecies.
Of Isaiah.
And there were.
3 prophets that prophesied at that same time. If you were to turn to the first verse of Isaiah, you would find that Isaiah prophesied.
In a time of a of a Isaiah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah.
Then if you turn the first verse of Hosea, find the exact same exact same thing.
As I.
Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah.
Then he turned to the Book of Micah.
And you find that Micah prophesied in the time of not Josiah, but Jotham. He has, and Hezekiah. Imagine that three prophets at the same time.
00:35:02
They all had different prophecies.
Isaiah was a prophet to.
Judah.
Hosea was a prophet mainly to the northern tribes, the 10 tribes of Israel up north.
Hosea says.
Hosea says.
Though am I.
You're not my people.
Makes it clear that.
If you read that in chapter one of Hosea that he's Speaking of the northern tribes.
And then?
Well, let's just divert to Hosea for a moment.
In chapter one and verse.
6-7 it speaks six and seven. He speaks of low am I and so on and.
And so the message of Hosea is that there is judgment coming for those northern tribes. He also speaks of the.
Southern Kingdom and judgment coming to them also. But mainly he's a prophet to the northern tribes.
He says in chapter 3.
The Children of Israel Verse four The children of Israel shall abide many days without a king.
Exactly what happened? There are many days when they didn't have a king.
And without a Prince, that means no royal family. Exactly what happened without a sacrifice.
They weren't sacrificing. They had sacrificed to other gods. Without a sacrifice, without an image, What happened to those golden calves? No more public images without a tariff. And those are the household images, like what Rachel stole from her father. They're the household images no more. None of those.
Afterward, the children of Israel says in verse five, return and seek the Lord their God.
And David, their king.
Now that's very interesting, because he's saying that you 10 tribes afterwards are going to seek the king of the South, not the king of the north. Afterwards they're going to seek David their king, and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in their latter days.
Chapter 6.
He says in verse 2.
He has a message of hope. There's coming a time when things are going to be restored.
So it says, verse one, Come, and let us return unto the Lord, for he hath torn, and he will heal us. He has smitten, He'll bind us up, and after two days will he revive us. In the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.
There's coming a time when Israel gets restored.
But there's going to be two days. Hosea lived in the time. The Lord speaks of it as the time of.
The Law and the Prophets, Luke 1616.
Jose lived in that time, but there's going to be two more times.
That come and then the third time.
They're going to be restored. What are those two times?
That's certainly not the church area.
Church time. The church never was the subject of prophecy. It makes that very clear in the New Testament.
But there were two days. One day lasted 3 1/2 years, the day of the Messiah.
The Day of the Messiah lasted 3 1/2 years.
And then there's a second day. We call it the day of Jacob's Trouble.
In between is so far about 2000 years between those two days. But they have nothing to do with prophecy.
00:40:02
So there's a damn Messiah and the day of Jacob's trouble, and then the third day they're raised up. So Hosea, his message is that there's judgment coming.
But there's.
There's going to be hope.
Micah has a similar prophecy.
Isaiah has a similar prophecy.
Concerning Isaiah.
Concerning Isaiah.
It never says you're not my people. In fact, I read just last week in Psalms 94, Psalm 94.
Says the Lord will not forsake his people.
From chapter one to the end of Isaiah he refers to.
The people as his people.
And so we have.
Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people.
And so we have.
In chapter 53.
For the transgression of my people.
Are they stricken?
And.
More significantly, we might say in chapter 49 of Isaiah says.
Verse 13 Sing, O heavens, and be joyful, O earth, and break forth into singing all mountains. For the Lord hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted. But Zion said, the Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me. Can a woman forget her suckling child, that she should not have compassion on the center of her womb?
They may forget, yet I will not forget thee now, the Lord, as it says in some 94.
Will not forsake his people, and Isaiah was the prophet to his people.
To the people of Judah.
So then.
And Micah, we have that Micah is a prophet to both Samaria.
And Jerusalem says that in the first.
First verse.
And then we find that in chapter 4 it says.
The first three chapters speak of all the judgment that's coming on both of those on Samaria and Jerusalem. But in the last days it says in chapter 4, verse one, it shall come to pass that the mountain of the House of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and people shall flow into it.
So it was coming a day that.
There was going to be a restoration.
And then it says in verse 8, And thou tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion.
Not to the stronghold of the daughter of Samaria, to the stronghold of the daughter of Zion, unto thee shall come.
Even the first dominion, the Kingdom, shall come to the daughter of Jerusalem.
Yes, there's going to be a restoration of the Kingdom.
And then in Chapter 5, you find out how it's going to come about.
Verse 2 But thou, O Bethlehem Ephrata, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall come forth unto me. Let us be the ruler in Israel, who's going forth have been from old, from everlasting.
Ah, yes.
There's coming a time when.
There would be somebody born in Bethlehem of Judea.
I didn't read Isaiah chapter 5045 where it speaks of Cyrus.
You can read it yourself if you want to.
But now I want to get on to something else.
You know there was.
00:45:02
600 years between the last.
King.
In Israel.
And the time of the Lord Jesus.
And so.
The Last King of Israel was.
Zedekiah.
And he started raining in 600 BC or so.
About 200 years go by.
And the last prophet dies.
Joel.
No more. No more prophets raised up for 400 years.
Another couple 100 years go by and people start saying you know.
This has been 400 years since David's.
David's family reigned over us.
And I don't think, we don't think anymore that there are angels.
We don't think there are.
There's there's resurrection from the dead.
I mean, it's nice to be an Israelite. Nice, nice to be from Judah. But those things that we're taught long ago, they're outdated.
And so in the year 204 BC, a group of people called the Sadducees.
Were formed.
Years go by.
Months. Years.
Time rolls by so slowly.
Another few years after, shortly after, the Sadducees are formed.
If only that we had somebody to reign over us.
And a guy named Judas Maccabeus is a great warrior.
They say we want him to rule over us, him and his children from now on.
No wonder the Maccabees aren't part of the scriptures.
They gave up the Christ.
And they anointed in their own minds a replacement for him.
Months go by.
Years go by.
And there's the.
A decree for everybody to go get taxed. Everybody has to sign up for the taxation.
And two people.
Who happened to be?
Long ago, we might say, long descendants of the House of David.
Head off to Bethlehem. She is heavy with child.
And while they're at the end, she gives birth.
They called his name.
They called his name Jesus.
Jesus.
Now you might wonder after what we've talked about.
Why was the name of Jesus not prophesied? There was a very important event.
The false altar and the false sacrifice.
That provoked the name of.
Josiah to be announced.
There was another very important event, that is that God had planned that his people should be put away in Jerusalem. He didn't want them to give up hope.
And he wanted them to know that there was a king coming that was going to send them back home.
And so his name was identified Cyrus.
Why was not the name of Jesus given?
Well, first of all, every Jewish mother would have named their child Jesus from then on.
That was the hope of every godly Jewish woman to give birth to Messiah.
That's not the reason.
That's not the reason.
The reason is this.
It was the name of his humiliation.
His names of glory are given. You can read about them in Isaiah chapters 9 verse six. His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. His names of glory are given.
00:50:18
But his name of humiliation is not.
But the name of his humiliation is the name that every knee shall bow to at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. We would have done it the other way around, wouldn't we? We would have said, we're going to, we're going to have them bow at the name of wonderful and bow at the name of.
Mighty God, no at the name of Jesus.
Every knee shall bow.
There is something that we need to know a name represents.
Of power, we might say.
In Revelation 5, we read that he has seven horns.
The king of the Medes and Persians.
Two horns meets Persians, Alexander the Great One horn.
The Eagle.
The future.
Beast of Israel, two horns, political and religious.
That lamb in Revelation 57 horns, what are they?
Well, I could say prophet priest. That's religious.
King, That's political.
There's more. We don't know what they are. Well, we could name a lot of other things.
You know.
In Revelation 19.
It says this.
Verse 12. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns.
And it had a name written that no man knew but himself. The name represents something you know we know.
His lots of his names.
Mrs. Helen Willis.
Went through the Bible and I think she gave about 400 different names.
He has many names.
But there's one name.
Tells us in Revelation 19 that we don't know.
I don't think they ever will know it. There's something about them that we don't know.
No, when I when I named my child Victor, let's say I have in mind that he might be victorious in things.
The name represents what the person.
Is.
Or is wanted to be, we might say.
You know there's in the gospel of.
John.
There's a few passages, one of them John 118.
Want to refer to.
No man hath seen God at anytime. The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.
It doesn't say the only begotten Son which came from the bosom of the Father. He has declared him. It doesn't seem to say that He the only begotten Son that's going to the bosom of the Father. He has to says the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father.
He has declared him.
He's there now. He was there then.
While he's, while he's walking on this earth.
He was also in the bosom of the Father.
John, chapter 3, verse 13.
And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man, which.
Is in heaven.
Shouldn't it say he's here on earth and going to heaven or came from heaven? No, should not say that because while he was on earth.
It was in heaven.
Then John chapter 14.
00:55:04
Verse.
Three.
Whether I go, I go, I go and prepare a place for you. I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there you may be also.
There I am.
He was there.
And.
While he walked on Earth, he was.
In heaven also.
In John in Matthew Chapter 11.
There's a verse that's and the other gospels, some of the other gospels also, but it's.
It's in verse 27 it says.
All things are delivered unto me of my Father, and no man knoweth his son but the Father.
I'd rather read the rest of it, but no man knows his son. But do you think you know Jesus?
You don't know.
You know a lot about them. We've learned and love. Know him and love him.
You don't know Jesus like the Father does. You don't know all about him. There's so much that we don't know yet.
And there's some things that we never will know.
That secret name?
There's so much more.
But we're out of time.
And I want to.
Have us sing one verse of #152.
And it's verse 3.
Because it brings before us his humiliation.
152 verse 3.
Thy name we love.
Life.
Spray.
The Death of Christ
Gospel—Bob 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.
Good evening everybody.
Let's sing #10 on our hymn sheet.
There is a savior.
On High in the Glory.
There is a savior.
I say nowhere else will bring to the sand now I'm alive.
I.
'LL bring it.
All.
To the greasy.
00:05:38
Let's pray.
Last night the gospel was preached.
The first verse that was read.
Was the beginning.
Of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
I'm going to read another first verse of one of the gospels that has the word the beginning in it too.
John's Gospel chapter one and verse one.
In the beginning.
Was the word.
And the word was with God.
And the word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by him and without him was not anything made that was made. So here we have the beginning again. You know, it's a lot better to go back to the beginning.
Because when you hear the message from the beginning, you can understand it. Sometimes people come in when you're telling the story about halfway through. You're telling the story, and then they don't understand very well where we're going back to the beginning and what was in the beginning.
The Word This is an interesting title of the Lord Jesus Christ and we want to focus on His person first of all.
Here is called the word not an interesting title.
Sometimes people wonder why that title?
You know what would happen if I stand up here tonight and instead of opening my mouth and saying words, I just looked at you?
You would just sit there and say, what in the world is he thinking?
You wouldn't know what I'm thinking.
Until I open my mouth and with words.
I express what I'm thinking about.
You know God is such an infinitely an eternal being that there is no way that you and I, creatures of this world, could ever understand who God was.
Until the word of God came.
Now we have it in the person of the Lord Jesus.
A man that was born into this world.
We have the word of God. He was the full expression of all that God is amazing to think that he walked through this world.
Pretty much completely unrecognized.
When he was born into this world.
His poor mother.
After making that long trip from Nazareth.
Nine months pregnant.
To Bethlehem.
Gets to the hotel or you'd say the inn in that time. Sorry, no room here.
Poor Joseph was looking for a place where he could make his wife semi comfortable.
Out there where the animals are once you go out there.
And that's where the God of the universe was born.
I'm amazed.
The angels came down. You know, I don't think the angels had ever seen their Creator before.
And for the first time, there he is.
00:10:01
His mother wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a Manger.
And the angels came down.
And they suffer the first time their creator.
In the person of that little newborn baby.
And they must have thought, where are these people, these religious people that have the Bible in their hands, that know all the answers? Where are they? Don't they realize what's happened?
Religious people were not around.
It went out to the shepherds in the countryside to tell them.
This good news that today in the city of David is born to you as Savior, which is Christ the Lord. Oh what a person, this person, this one who is called the Word. But notice in this first verse, in the beginning was the Word. That's his eternity. He is an eternal person. He never had a beginning. Don't ask me to explain that please, because I cannot.
That he always was. There was a time when he came into this world as a man, but before that he always was. He's eternal, second phrase says, And the word was with God. In other words, he was a distinct person within the Trinity, God, his Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The word was not the Father, the Word was not the Holy Spirit.
The word was the son.
And then it says, And the Word was God, because he is in every sense of the Word, God manifest in the flesh. What a story.
The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. In other words, He is not a creature, He is the Creator. He made everything that is made. You and I are creatures. He made us.
And not another incredible thing to think about when I think of the universe where we are located in the Milky Way Galaxy.
I love to look at the stars, especially when I'm on the high alteplano of Bolivia where you're about 12,000 feet.
And you miss a lot of the pollution that you get around big cities like we do here in the United States. No city lights there and.
It is so vivid, the view of the stars that you can actually see other galaxies with the naked eye besides the Milky Way Galaxy.
He made it all by the word of his power. He spoke and it was done. And here he is, laying in a Manger, a little newborn baby.
What a story, what a story, but I really want to go on to the.
Story of his crucifixion tonight because that is the crux of the whole gospel message. Before we go to that, I want to go down to verse 29 where we have another title of the Lord Jesus. Here it is John the Baptist that is speaking.
And he recognizes the Lord Jesus.
You know in the flesh John the Baptist was a cousin of the Lord Jesus, and I suppose he had known him as a person in growing up years. But here it says, the next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and Seth, behold the Lamb of God.
Which taketh away the sin of the world.
God had shown him.
Here it is, Person is the Lamb of God.
What does that mean?
You know, in the Old Testament because of sin.
God demanded sacrifice when Adam sinned. Adam and Eve sinned. The Lord clothed them with skins of animals, garments of skins of animals. Some victim had to die so that Adam could be clothed.
00:15:12
And so, through the Old Testament, you have sacrifice.
Tremendously.
Major sacrifices. You read about the dedication of the temple in the time of Solomon. Do you remember how many animals died at that event?
120,000 sheep.
22,000 oxen man, I just never have seen that many animals together in my whole life.
I've seen big flocks of sheep sometimes on the altar plant of Bolivia, maybe 1000 that.
120,000.
With those animals, the shedding of their blood satisfied God's righteous demands about the sin question.
No.
Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world, John the Baptist said. I'd like to go over now to John chapter 18 and 19 to speak.
Of the Lord's.
Trial his crucifixion.
His death and his resurrection.
Start in chapter 18 and we'll begin to read in verse.
33.
Then Pilate, that was the Roman governor that time, entered into the judgment hall again, and called Jesus, and said unto him, Art thou the King of the Jews?
Jesus answered him, says thou this thing of thyself? Or did others tell it up thee thee of me?
Pilate answered, Am IA Jew thine own nation, and the chief priests have delivered thee unto me.
What hast thou done?
Jesus answered. My Kingdom is not of this world.
If my Kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews? But now is my Kingdom not from hence? Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king? Then Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I'm a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world.
That I should bear witness unto.
The truth, everyone that is of the truth.
Here with my voice.
Pilate saith unto him, What is truth?
And when he had said this, he went out.
Question of truth.
There is a standard.
Dear young lady, dear young man.
And God has established that standard. It's called truth.
And you know, in this world, people like to think your idea is just as good as mine, or my idea is as good as yours. Who are you to tell me that I'm wrong? And if it's a question of just you and me talking together, you're exactly right.
But I want to tell you that that's not the standard that God gives.
The Lord Jesus said in John chapter 14, I am the way, the truth and the life there it is in its absolute sense. Truth is absolute, in other words. Beyond that there is no appeal, there is no argument. It's the final word.
And so here's Pilate.
When the Lord Jesus speaks and says, everyone that is of the truth hears my voice.
What is truth?
And then he turns and walks out.
It doesn't even wait for an answer. I don't think he was really interested in the answer.
He was in charge there in Palestine to do the Roman Empires business and so it wasn't a matter of truth, it was a matter of what he thought was right and notice what happens.
00:20:19
When he goes out again unto the Jews, Verse 38.
And says unto them, I find in him no fault.
At all.
Isn't that amazing?
That was his conclusion and I'm sure he had judged a lot of cases.
But ye have a custom that I should release unto you one at the Passover. Will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews?
Then cried they all again, saying, not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber, and we know that he wasn't only a robber from other gospels. We knew that he was a murderer.
And a rebellious man.
That's who they wanted, the Christ of God, not this man. Brabus, give us Barabbas.
That's what they have in the world today, Barabbas.
Not Jesus.
Now notice verse 19, chapter 19, verse one. Then Pilate therefore took Jesus and scourged him.
Come on, Pilot, I thought you said you didn't find any fault in him. What are you doing? Scourging him. Is this right?
No, it's not right. But when you establish your own norms, anything goes.
How dangerous that is, how important to recognize the absolute standard of truth that God.
Has given us in the person of the Lord Jesus and in His precious word.
I don't know if any of you have ever read any historical accounts of Roman scourging.
Some time ago I read the account of it.
Romans were known for their cruelty.
They were purposely cruel so people wouldn't mess with them.
So that they would obey when they talked and when they give it command.
They took the person to be scourged. They tied them.
And then?
A couple soldiers would stand behind with these whips with in the points of the whips were embedded pieces of metal and as they passed over the back of the victim it would rip open the muscles at the back.
It was called the Living Death because many criminals did not survive Scourge. They died while they're being scourged because of the shock to the human body of scourging.
Therefore, then Pilate therefore took Jesus and scourged him.
Verse two. And the soldiers flattered the crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe and said, Hail King of the Jews.
The crown of thorns.
In Bolivia, where we lived for a number of years, they have thorns. I don't know if they're the same as they have in the land of Israel, but they have thorns 2 to 3 inches long.
And they are as tough as nails.
Fact. One time I remember going into an area where a brother lived.
And.
Evidently they recognize that I was an evangelical, and what I didn't realize that on my way back out they had spread thorns on the road.
To get me and I drove by.
00:25:00
And drove home. The next morning my 4 tires were flat on the ground.
Those name, those thorns had gone right in and punctured.
Everyone of those tires ruined my 4 tires.
Can you imagine?
Those put on the head of the Lord Jesus, and those soldiers who took a stick and whacked him over the head.
As I said.
They were not known.
For sympathy, they were known for cruelty.
Into verse three, they smote him with their hands. The old English that we're used to, but it means, I think a slap. You imagine here's God's eternal Son, the creator of the universe, and they come up and slap him. Matthew's Gospel, it says the chief priests came up to him and spit square in his face.
I've had people spit at me, but I've never had anybody spit in my face. I can't think of a thing that is more demeaning. What was the reaction from the Lord Jesus?
Stood there calmly.
As that spittle ran down.
His blessed face.
Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him forth to you.
That ye may know. I find no fault in him. Here's the second time he's saying it. I find no fault in him. Well, let him go then, Pilate.
When the chief priests.
Therefore an officer saw him. They cried out, saying crucify Him, crucify him.
Pilot saith unto them, Take ye him, and crucify him, for I find no fault in him. There it is the third time he states no fault in him, not one fault.
Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.
He did not make himself the Son of God. He was the Son of God.
And it would have been.
Blasphemy.
If he had made himself the Son of God, the truth was he was the Son of God.
When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid, and went again into the judgment hall, and Seth unto Jesus.
Whence art thou? Jesus gave him no answer. Then said Pilate unto him, Speakest thou not unto me? Norest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee? Jesus answered, Thou couldst have no power at all against me, except that were given thee from above. Therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.
In front thenceforth, Pilate sought to release him.
But the Jews cried out, saying, If thou let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend, with whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar. They certainly knew how to handle Pilot by appealing to Caesar. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth and sat down in the judgment seat. It was another step in the direction of crucifixion.
In a place that is called the pavement, and in the Hebrew gabatha, and that was the preparation of the Passover and about the 6th hour.
That would be approximately 6:00 AM in our thoughts. And he said unto the Jews, Behold your king, they cried out Away with him, away with him, crucify him. Pilate said to them, Shall I crucify your king? She priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.
Oh, the awful treason of these Jewish leaders.
Then delivered He therefore unto them to be crucified, And they took Jesus, and led him away. And He bearing his cross, went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha.
00:30:12
We have the story and the others gospels as well.
And evidently.
They got another man to bear the cross after Jesus. After being scourged, I'm sure they realized that his body physically was in a weakened condition.
Never says the Lord Jesus fell.
Catholic tradition says he fell, but Scripture never tells us that there was another who bore it after Jesus.
But notice verse 18 now.
They get to Golgotha.
Where they crucified him.
If you look through the.
The story of history and the different.
Ways that capital punishment was carried out in different parts of the world. The most awful case is crucifixion that was used by the Romans.
There they took him.
They stretched out those wonderful hands, steaded, healed so many that had multiplied the loaves that had fed the poor, that had raised the dead, and they nailed them to the cross. Can you imagine having nails through your hands and feet? I understand it probably put through at the rest because in my palm of the hand it would have ripped out. So they did it at the wrist. You imagine that's where all the.
Nerves go into the hand and the pain that that would involve. I think sometimes we try to shy away from the awfulness, the gruesomeness of crucifixion. But there they pounded nails through his hands and his feet.
And then?
They lifted up that cross and left the foot of the cross drop into a hole that was dug there.
Imagine the jolt when it came to the bottom of the hole.
In the Psalms, he says all my bones were out of joint.
Ever had a bone out of joint? He experienced pain in every possible way.
Very hung. He was numbered with the transgressors.
And for three hours, from 9:00 in the morning to 12 noon, he suffered from the hands of man. We have some of his expressions of sufferings in the Psalms.
Psalm 69 He says reproach has broken my heart.
You know, sometimes people can sustain physical suffering, but a broken heart is another thing that is terrible to have to sustain.
They said he said he's the Son of God. If he's the Son of God, let God deliver him. And did God deliver him?
No answer from God.
Reproach broke his heart.
I have two sons, my family.
It would be terrible for me to give them up.
To be mistreated.
And executing.
God had one son.
Why didn't he come to deliver him? Because there was number other way for you and I to be saved.
But.
We need to go on from 12 noon to 3:00 in the afternoon, Scripture tells and other gospels.
That there was darkness.
Over the face of the land.
Nobody could see what was taking place there.
Isaiah 53 tells us what was happening.
00:35:01
He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him. And with His stripes we are healed. Oh, we, like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. So in those three hours of darkness, God laid on His own beloved Son.
The iniquity of us all and in God.
Raised the rod of his judgment, and the fury of God's judgment fell for three hours the waves and billows of God's judgment.
Rolled over the Lord Jesus in those three hours.
It's way too awful for us to even imagine.
And that's why it's clothed in darkness for three hours.
No sound from that center cross.
Here in John's Gospel.
And I take it it's toward the end of those three hours?
There's a cry. I thirst.
In other gospels, we have the cry.
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Why did the Lord Jesus say my God?
Wasn't God his father? He had always addressed God as his father, but why doesn't he hear?
Oh, it's because God was settling the account of sin once and for all for the satisfaction of his holy character. It was necessary so that God could extend forgiveness to you and me, guilty sinners that we are.
Verse 28 after this Jesus knowing that all things.
Were now accomplished.
That the Scripture might be fulfilled, saith I thirst. Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar, and they filled a sponge with vinegar, put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth. When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said.
It is finished. And he bowed his head.
Give up the ghost.
It is finished.
Spanish it says consumables.
Consumed. All that judgment that was against us as guilty sinners is consumed. It's gone. God is satisfied with the payment that Jesus made. God's holy character has been vindicated in full. Now God can come out in the holiness of his character and extend forgiveness of sins to you and me.
Guilty sinners.
Have you not yet accepted that offer of full forgiveness from the hand of the Lord Jesus?
Right where you are sitting tonight. If you haven't settled the issue, I plead with you to accept that salvation right where you're sitting.
By believing in him who settled the account.
Who could say it is finished?
But let's go on here. Verse 31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation that the body should not repain upon the cross on the Sabbath day, for that Sabbath was in high day, besought Pilate, that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. And came the soldiers break the legs of the 1St, and of the other, which was crucified with him.
But when they came to Jesus.
Saw that he was dead already, they break not his legs, but one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. And he that sight bear record, and his record is true, and he knoweth that he sat through that you might believe, for these things were written.
00:40:04
That the Scripture should be fulfilled, The bone of him shall not be broken. And again another scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.
So that soldier came, and with his spear pierced his side, and out flowed blood and water.
You know, we've spoken of the different ones that the Lord Jesus suffered in his body. The Scripture never speaks of the blood that came from any of those wounds. It only speaks of the blood that came from the wound in His side. Why is that? Because when the wound, when that blood flowed out of his side, it showed that there was no life in that battered body.
He paid the price in full.
My redemption was paid not with silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ.
I can't forget that, dear young people, don't forget it. The the amount that was paid to redeem you to God. Is there any response from your heart to Him for having paid that awful, awful cost?
Our time is going way too fast but they in this chapter they take them down.
Verse 40 it took.
Then took they the body of Jesus, and wounded in linen clothes with the spices, as it is the manner of the Jews to bury. Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden. In the garden a snooze sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid.
There lay they Jesus. Therefore, because of the Jews, preparation day for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.
Now the next chapter, 3 days later.
Was from sobriety to Sunday.
The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene, and she sees the stone taken away from the mouth of the sepulchre as she runs to tell Peter.
And.
John. And they come running, and they go in, and they see the linen clothes line. The body of the Lord Jesus had vacated those brave clothes, and they just settled down.
And it says about Peter in verse 8 when?
They went, and then went they in that they, that other disciple, that's John, which came first to the sepulchre, and he saw.
And believed the disciples went away to their own home.
And Mary stands there, and she sees in verse 12 two angels.
Sitting and they asked her, why weepest thou? She turns her back on the angels, turns around and there's Jesus standing and she doesn't recognize that it's Jesus.
And that interesting, I think that shows that the body and resurrection is not recognizable the way we know each other down here.
But when the Lord Jesus said Mary, immediately she knew who it was.
The Lord Jesus is calling each one of you tonight. Have you accepted the Lord Jesus as your Savior?
Our stocking to a young sister this afternoon and telling I was seven years old. That's what you said you were too when you were saved. I was seven years old when I accepted the Lord Jesus as my Savior.
That's seventy years ago for me.
I'm not sorry I did it early. I want to encourage you to do it as well.
You know we're going to close in prayer now.
But I said sitting over there with my wife and if anybody has a question or a doubt, I want you to feel free to come over there and I'll try to help you in any doubts or questions you might have after the meeting. Let's pray.
Your Future
Children—John Kaiser
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'm not technologically oriented, sorry.
When I was a boy, there was a particular song that I used to listen to every Sunday morning, every Lord's Day morning, almost every Lord's Day morning for a number of years, and I associate it with the Lord's Day.
That's a nice way to start. So I'm going to start singing it and then you can.
Join in heavenly sunshine.
Jesus is my blessed Lord.
Blessed Lord Jesus.
Thy face I'll see, you know, my memories getting a little rusty and I'm not sure I did it right all the way through.
So maybe somebody later on can refresh my memory, but this you know this morning.
Every one of us.
Is under the sunshine of God's love. The Bible tells us that God is love and He loves every person. He loves every person in this room, whether you feel it or not.
Now let me ask you a question. I want a child to answer this.
Do your parents love you while you're sleeping?
I see a head knot here, of course. Do you feel it then? Are you aware of their love when you're asleep?
Oh, that's remarkable.
I think most of us are not pretty well unaware when we're asleep, but the the love of God is a constant.
And that's why we're here this morning, because God loves us.
If God didn't love us, we wouldn't be here.
This is a provision. The Sunday school this morning is a provision of God's love. All right, now let's sing some songs from the hymn sheet. And most of the children's songs are on the Backpage, but I'll tell you if someone wants to raise their hand and make a suggestion, we'll consider anything. All right, what number?
Now #10 the.
That's #41 in this hymn sheet. OK, thank you.
Well, let's see if it. Let's see if #41 sounds like #10 to you #41.
Is.
Oh Jesus, around the throne of God in heaven, Yes, that's.
Good.
Around the throne.
Glory, glory, glory, glory.
To God.
How about another choice?
#46.
All right.
Glad.
And.
Give us all.
Day. Now in the first line of this hymn, there's a big word.
TIDINGS. What does that word spell?
Tidings. I heard someone say that what does tidings mean?
Good news. OK, I'm, you know, I don't mind people calling out because I don't see very well. And if you raised your hand, I know that if the boys and girls in the front row raise their hand, I can probably see it most times. But so I don't mind you calling out in this particular case. I really appreciate it. Good news.
Good news, and it's always good news, good tidings I bring Good news. I bring that Jesus has come to save me.
You know I have known the Lord Jesus as my Savior for about 70 years.
And I'm so glad I came to him when I was a small child.
And we hope that every child here this morning will trust the Lord Jesus.
That Jesus has come to save me and he calls, and he calls all the girls, all the girls, and he wants all the boys.
Too.
I've heard some people say well.
I don't want to invite this person to my party or I don't want this person to come to my house or I don't want to play with this person.
Do you know God loves?
Everybody never doubt that.
Never doubt it, everything depends on the character of God.
Everything depends on what God is. We tend to look at things in life according to how we are, how we act, how we feel, but everything depends ultimately on God.
The Bible begins with these words in the beginning.
God, that's where everything starts. Everything depends.
On him and then upon how we respond to him.
So he wants all the boys to to trust in Him and have all their sins now washed away. All right, got time for another one or two songs.
00:10:06
OK, OK. What number?
#5.
Garden. Excuse me?
Oh, happy day. All right, That's when we often sing in the Sunday school.
Oh, happy day.
And continues as far as my sins away.
Transactions done. I am blind.
It drives me out and I followed. All life should come back.
My sins away. You know, whenever we sing this song in a Sunday school, I like to talk about this chorus here because I told you that I received the Lord Jesus as my Savior when I was very young.
About 70 years ago.
But I remember sitting in Sunday school and seeing this chorus, and I was a little bit older, maybe eight or nine, and it says he taught me how to watch and pray and live rejoicing every day.
Are you always happy? You know, there's no nobody here that's I don't think there's anybody here that is actually happy all the time.
Though we can live rejoicing every day. But you notice it says here he taught me how to watch and pray and live rejoicing every day.
The Lord Jesus, when he saves us, we are saved immediately. But then there's things we have to learn, and teaching takes time.
00:15:09
And so some of you are in school and you're looking forward to spending 12 years in school, maybe more. That seemed like a long time.
Because it takes time to learn things. Now suppose you went to school and didn't listen to the teacher.
How would that work?
If you go to school and don't listen to the teacher.
Who can tell me?
Would you learn well? No. I see somebody shaking her head. No, he wouldn't learn well.
So you need to spend time listening to the Lord Jesus. He taught me how to watch and pray. If you want to be taught by the Lord Jesus, spend time in His word. Spend time with Him. It takes time to learn.
All right, we have time for one more short one.
I haven't heard from a boy. Oh yeah, recently. So other boy there, yes.
Is there a boy that has a choice?
Yes, Sir.
What number?
26.
26.
All right.
All right, we'll sing the first verse and the chorus of #26.
There is life.
Life.
Until they're given and it's saying on to the bill to watch them.
This moment for thee. Just think about that.
You're sitting in your seat.
If you wanted a cookie right now, you think you'd get it right now.
Not likely.
But if you want salvation right now, you can have it right now.
There is life in a look at the crucified one. There is life at this moment for thee. Now let me ask you, are you saved this morning? Are you sure you're saved? Are you sure you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you sure you're going to heaven?
You need to be sure. God wants you to be sure. Now let's pray.
Father, we thank you for this time here this morning. We acknowledge our need of your help.
As we consider your word, consider a message from yourself to our hearts.
Father, we ask, and we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ who came to die for us.
And who lives for us now? We ask your blessing in Jesus name, Amen.
All right.
Next item on the agenda.
How many of you seen this before?
In this there was a memory verse. This is the paper that was probably handed out in your Sunday school, some of you anyway, last week, and there was a memory verse in it. How many memorized the memory verse?
Good. Would you like to start by saying it?
Very good.
Once you go down the row here, anybody next one you want to say it?
To give.
OK, very good.
00:20:09
OK, very good.
Very good. By the way, if you're wondering why I'm standing so close so that you can the mic can pick up your voice.
I know the past that I think George and say it says no.
Very good.
OK.
Good.
Go ahead.
Thoughts of peace.
Very good.
You want to try? No. OK. OK. Anybody else? How about this side here?
No, I don't want to miss anybody. I remember when I was young and learned a verse and didn't get a chance to say it. I was disappointed because learning a verse takes some work. So if I'm if I'm missing somebody, somebody let me know.
I don't want to miss anybody.
All right, now this is a wonderful verse. It's a long verse. I commend you who learned it. This is a longer verse than usual, and I don't recall ever in my life seeing this in the Sunday school paper before this particular verse, but it's a wonderful verse. It says this is God saying, I know the thoughts that I think toward you. Now if we want to know God's thoughts.
How do we know God's thoughts?
You know, God is great and he's in heaven and we have these, we think we have thoughts.
How do we get God's thoughts in our minds?
How do we know God's thoughts?
How can we know God's thoughts?
Somebody can answer that?
I'll give you a hint.
Yes.
By reading the Bible and some of you maybe can't read very well, you can listen these this very verse is what some of God's thoughts God says, I know the thoughts that I think toward you. Do you know why God said that Because we like to think our own thoughts and we often think wrong thoughts about God because we think based on how we feel.
And our experience, and maybe God isn't in a lot of our experience.
Maybe we haven't recognized God in our experience and so we tend to think.
Wrong.
We tend to think wrong. I remember many times I have been going down a road and I realized.
I was wrong, I thought I was right and things just didn't look right as I went and I started to stop and get directions and look at a map and get my thoughts changed. God says I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord. Thoughts of peace. You know, peace is a wonderful thing.
We like to have peaceful homes and peaceful lives. Do you ever think about having peace with God?
Let me ask you a question.
Would you like to go to meet God this morning?
Would you like to go? If you have peace with God, why not?
What did you want to say?
Oh good.
I'll tell you something very often I tell the Lord, Lord, if you want to Take Me Home today, I'm ready. I want to go. I have peace with God. I know that. You know, if there's no peace with God, there's no, there's no place in heaven. You can't go to heaven if there's no peace with God. But I have peace with God. The Bible says we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
00:25:27
So it says here, God says, I know the thoughts, I think toward you, saith the Lord. Thoughts of peace and not of evil to give you.
An expected end.
Now I want to talk about ends this morning.
That's what I really want to talk about.
An expected end, something that we expect is something we anticipate. We look forward to.
And you know, I remember one time I was riding my bicycle.
This was on a Sunday afternoon and I was still on my Sunday go to meet and close. I went out after lunch and got on my bicycle and took a bicycle ride and.
While I was riding I hit a bump and my front wheel fell off and that was the end of my bike ride. Was that an expected end?
No, I wasn't expecting that at all. And I went right over the handlebars and probably did a somersault on the road and messed up my pants. And of course I had to carry the two pieces of bicycle home.
A few blocks. That was not an expected end. That was the end of that bike ride. That was not an expected end, but I want to talk about.
An expected end, and this involves something that's in this book here, so.
We're going to talk about.
Who can tell me what this says?
OK, we got one person here. It's not bashful, all right?
Your future. You know, all of us have a future.
We all have a future, you know, every time we take a breath, we're stepping into the future. We all have a future. Everyone of us has a future now. It may not be as long as we expect it to be. It may not be what we expect it to be. Like I said, I took that bike ride and I thought I had a future of a nice.
Ride I wasn't expecting my front wheel to come off my bicycle, but we all have a future. We all have time in front of us. So I'm talking about our future now.
Your future. There's things in your future we don't know, and we don't know everything in your future, but we're going to talk about some of the things that may be in your future.
So let's turn the page here.
What's that say?
Yes, let's have fun.
People say what is that got to do with Sunday school? Have fun. Well I want to read you a verse in Zechariah chapter 8.
Zechariah chapter 8.
That's Zechariah is right near the end of the Old Testament.
And it's very interesting here it says.
And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof. Now, is playing fun? Yeah. Well, I when I made, when I made these pages in this book, I didn't. I could have written down playing, but I wanted something everybody could read. So I stayed with short words. But you know, God is interested in children playing. It's in the Bible.
God has plans for that.
Now, I'm not saying that he has plans for us to play all the time. The Bible tells us, the apostle Paul wrote, when I became a man, I put away childish things. But playing, having fun as a child is legitimate. And we, I know some of you been I've been seeing you running around here and you've been having fun and that's with God's blessing.
Some people think God but doesn't want people to have fun.
00:30:01
No, he wants children to have fun. He wants us to enjoy the things he's provided. That is something that may be in your future yet what's the next thing?
Oh yes, right now we're out of school, but how many here are looking forward to going back to school? I don't say you want to, but you expect to, right? And you go to school to learn and everybody is expected to get an education. So learning well should be part would would be a natural part.
Of your future.
Oh, and why do we go to school to learn how to do things to live well? What do you suppose this means to? Who can tell me what this means to live well? Yes.
What's that?
Earn well. I'm sorry. Earn well. I'm skipping ahead. Earn well. How do you earn something?
Yeah, you do do a job, right? Yeah, we earn by doing a job. We learn and then we earn.
And people like like to have good jobs. How many here, if the Lord leaves you here, would like to have a good job someday?
Yeah.
A lot of people look forward to having a good job. All right, so you earn well. What's the next thing?
Very well now there's probably most of you children aren't thinking about that quite yet. And yet you're here because your parents married.
Marriage is a normal part of life, and a lot of young people here are thinking about that. Mary. Well, you marry somebody and of course, first, you know, the old saying, first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes.
A baby carriage? Sure.
That's how children get here, you know? Now the next thing is live well. I skipped ahead. We want to have a happy life. People talk about about getting a good education, having fun, getting a good education, getting a good job, getting a good life mate, and then having a good life. Live well. This is normal expectation in this world.
All right.
And people talk about living well and, you know, having a comfortable life. And then they talk about retirement. What does this say?
Rest Well, yeah. And people talk about retiring at their end of their life. This is what people think about when they think about the future.
And then what's next?
The end.
Everyone of us, our normal life here will have an end.
And you know, there's a verse in the Bible in Deuteronomy chapter 32 or 33, it says, oh, that man would consider their latter end. You know, we think about our immediate ends. We want to finish school and finish this and finish that and.
We forget that there's a latter end.
There's an end to life. We all, we deal with ends all the time. You know what this is? That's the end of my nose. I have an end to my finger. I have an end to my height. I'm only 5 feet. I all used to be 5 feet 8 anyway that that's the measure of that end. So we deal with ends in this life limits.
God wants us to consider the end because He.
Has plans. Now let me ask you a question.
We talk about the future and we talk about your future life. If you live a normal life, how many years? This may be a question for somebody a little bit older. If you live a normal life, how many years would you expect to live?
Wow, you're optimistic. 80 or 100? I, I, you know, I appreciate the idea.
I'm 73 and I I I expect I may live a few more years, but normally they 70 is kind of been the benchmark for living a lot of people, a lot of countries where they aren't so healthy, the lifespan is a lot shorter, maybe 50 years on the average.
00:35:17
But we'll say 70 years. So they say 70 years or 80 years give you the benefit of the doubt there. 80 years is your future. Is that the end?
No, there's a future. Beyond that, which future is bigger?
This life or the life? The next life? Which is bigger?
Very good. The next life is bigger. How much bigger?
Forever the next life is forever. It's so much bigger and so that now let me ask you another question, which one is more important than.
If the next life is bigger, shouldn't it be more important to us than this life we have on this earth? You know, as a matter of fact, this Earth is going to end someday.
This building, nice building, it's only a few years old. It's going to end someday. Everything in this life has an end, but that's not the ultimate end or the latter end that God talks about. And so we have a life that we live now.
And then we need to prepare for the life to come, the, the life that lasts forever. You know, I want to talk talk about that a little bit. So let's go back through here and reanalyze things a bit.
Your future.
What's who remembers what the next page might say?
What's that? Have fun. Let's see.
What my, my, my point is, some people don't live to have fun. A lot of boys and girls don't live very long. They don't have time to have fun. Some of them have very sad lives. And of course, the things that we talked about after that, learning well and earning well and marrying well and living well, they never experienced that. A lot of people don't have that kind of a future.
So we need to consider the fact that we don't know about all these things that might happen, but we do know about things that will happen.
Think about how short your life could be.
It could end today. Who knows how our lives down here might end today? There's two ways our lives down here might end today. Who can tell me?
You could die. And how's it? What's the other? How do we get there?
The Lord coming. Yeah. Two ways our lives could end today. Something cataclysmic might happen. I don't know. Can't imagine what. Maybe a terrible earthquake or something. I've not not heard that this place is this area is prone to earthquakes, but who knows?
I could die today, or the Lord Jesus might come. And you know, if the Lord Jesus came today, I wonder if he'd leave anybody behind in this room.
Are you ready to meet the Lord Jesus? Are you ready for the Lord Jesus to come? The end could come.
Today.
But we want to think about this verse, God says.
I know the thoughts that I think toward you, thoughts of peace and.
And.
So let's talk about God's plans.
All right, God says, I know the thoughts that I think toward you, Seth the Lord. Now we know what God says, because we have God's word.
And we are thankful that we have God's Word.
So what does God say?
Maybe I should ask somebody else to turn the pages. You've answered a lot of questions this morning. Going to turn the next page.
00:40:05
Now what does it say?
Ah, thoughts of peace and not of evil. You know we don't always think good thoughts. God always thinks good thoughts, thoughts of peace and not of evil. He wants to bless us. I want you. I want us all to understand that because God is love, He wants.
Good for us, and matter of fact, not only does he merely want it got, our good and God's glory are tied together.
Our good, our well-being, and God's glory are linked together. God has thoughts of peace toward us. Thoughts of peace.
Not of evil. God doesn't want evil. Not evil does exist, and the Bible tells us that judgment is God's strange work. Let me ask you a question. Do you think your parents like to discipline or punish you?
They don't. I had seven children. I can testify. No, I didn't want, didn't, didn't enjoy spanking my children. But I did it because they needed it.
I've got one here that's thanked me for it.
And other others likewise. OK thoughts of not of evil.
To give God is a giving God.
God is a giving God who can tell me something that God gave?
Very good, his son. I'm glad people in the back are listening to OK. God gave his son the greatest gift of all. Who can quote the verse that tells us?
I hate to pick on the same people, although yes please.
Very good John 316. Wonderful verse to learn. God so loved the world.
That he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. And so God gives.
An expected end. It gives us something to look forward to. He guarantees it.
But you know, not only do save people have an expected end, but unsaved people, people who are lost in their sins, have an expected end to not that they're necessarily expecting it, but God has predicted it. But let's talk about what God has for believers. Let's look at the next page here.
What do you think that is to remind us of?
Yes, here's the gold page, the expected end for believers. Now the question is, is that an expected end for you? You know, there's a song that we sing. Oh, my time is up already. I'm sorry. There's a song we sing sometimes. I am so glad that Jesus loves me. And there was a man who was visiting a little girl one time.
And she was dying. And she said to him, thank you for teaching me that song.
Because today the doctor says I'm going to see Jesus.
Now.
We're almost done here.
The expected end for believers is wonderful. Who will read this for me? You're a good reader, go ahead.
Yeah, things are so wonderful, we can't imagine them.
But each of us is faced with the same choice. Are we going to be where God can fully express His love?
You notice there's another page here. This is the expected end for unbelievers.
And what do you think this is a picture of?
All right, we don't know what that's like either, but it's is this someplace you'd like to go?
00:45:05
Oh, no. OK.
All right, you know I had a lot more to talk about. I should explain to you how this little book works so you won't feel I did something nasty here. But this book has has two sides and.
Turn it over and there's the pages we looked at originally.
All right, our time is up. Let's thank the Lord for this time here.
Our God and Father, we thank you so much for the Lord Jesus Christ. We think of the end that's before us so much better than what we know now.
And we pray that each one here might expect.
What you desire them to expect, what you desire to give. And we ask your blessing for the remainder of the day in Jesus name, Amen.
Learning Our Own Hearts
Open—Don Rule
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.
Lord stands we've seen, I said to the hospital. Grand slaves.
No, God shall prepare me.
Wrong place.
Praise, oh man, God, See, it's more holy and scary you're having.
More life to help me save the sins.
I am more of a kind of being.
We've had before us this weekend.
Several hours.
Of time together.
With the opportunity to learn better the heart of God.
As we've had it in First Corinthians or First John chapter 4.
It's a wonderful thing.
It's a work of God in us to know His own heart.
For our blessing and for His joy and satisfaction.
I would like to take up with you.
What I want to call the other side.
00:05:02
Of this subject for a little bit.
And that is the necessity to learn our own hearts so.
So there's one side of it to learn. The heart of God is love.
But there's another side that is part of life, and it's an important part of life in its place, and that's the learning of our own hearts. Turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter 6 for a few verses.
Deuteronomy chapter 6.
And verse.
Five or verse four hear O Israel.
Lord our God is 1 Lord.
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.
And these words which I command thee this day shall be in thine heart.
Thou shalt diligently teach them unto thy children, and talk of them when thou sittest.
In line house and when they'll walk us by the way, and when thou liest out.
And when thou risest up, and thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thy hand, and they shall be as frontlets before thine eyes, and thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates.
There was blessing for these earthly people in verse 11. The time would come when their houses would be full of good things that they hadn't done themselves, but God had provided for them.
They got a warning that we also had in the last couple of days.
In verse 14, thou shalt not go after other gods.
Of the gods of the people which are around you. For the Lord thy God is a jealous God among you. Thus the anger of the Lord thy God be kindled against thee, and destroy thee from off the face of the earth.
Also.
In numbers, the statement was made to these people.
About the 40 years they spent in the wilderness. Why? That was their life. That was the path of life through which God was passing them. And here's what he said about it.
To humble thee.
To prove thee.
To know what is in thine heart.
There is in the path of life the wonderful and important and joyful side of learning the heart of God, and we often learn it by experience.
In the ways of God with us.
But life has the other side as well, and it's a part of what is necessary for us to appreciate the blessing and love of God.
And to it will make eternity for us a more rich and blessed.
The time or timeless time?
To humble thee.
To prove thee to know what is in thine heart.
You're going through that experience.
Perhaps not consciously all the time, but you are going through the experience that God is teaching you.
What's in your own heart?
It says he that trusteth in his own heart is a fool.
I won't do it, but rhetorically, I'll say it. If I said to you, everybody who hasn't been a fool in their own heart, please stand up.
And I think if you had any sense of your heart, you wouldn't stand up because you know that at times your heart you have acted fully.
00:10:03
Because you trusted in it. He that trusts in his own heart. That's one of the things that we all naturally as children, start out in life with confidence.
And very often in the process of life, God strips us.
Through the experiences of life in that self-confidence that is part of not knowing our own heart.
It's one thing to be sincere, and in many spiritual things we start out with sincerity.
But sincerity doesn't mean we understand our heart. Sincerity you can be sincere and sincerely wrong.
You can believe and be with sincerity and believe wrong, and part of the process of life is that process that God uses for blessing, painful as it is, that is to teach us.
1St to humble us.
We don't have a right appreciation of God when we're proud.
In fact, if we're proud, it's evidence that we don't really know God.
Because you can't fully be in the presence of God with pride. You're stripped of it, but it's a hindrance because it's natural. It's as natural to be proud as it is to breathe. It's the way we are because we have sinned by birth in US, and man has that independent spirit of God.
Cain, who went out from the presence of the Lord.
He went out with confidence, he went out to live life without God and that fosters pride, self-reliance to humble thee.
To prove thee.
You know, sometimes we do all right. We go along fine.
Until a problem comes up that's too big for us, and then we say, oh God, please help me.
And sometimes at the moment we may seem disappointed because he doesn't seem to step in and take care of it.
At the same time, if we would reflect a little bit, we would recognize that what we were doing and how we were doing it and how we planned it was our own.
And God in his ways with us sometimes says, you want it, you want it this way. OK, go ahead.
Have it your way.
But you will learn the consequences of going your way.
And when you do, I'm not necessarily going to immediately bail you out.
Because it's part of learning. You don't always teach somebody something that's beneficial to them if they've gone their own way. And instantly when it doesn't work there, you're just there to take care of the mess that they've created by their own choices and so.
To humble thee, to prove thee, to know what is in thine heart. And it's a process that's unavoidable.
You can't say I don't want to go that way. It's going to happen.
Because it's for your blessing and mine. It's a process that goes on.
And it went on.
I'll make a comment to moms and dads here.
Made the comment. It's been helpful to me in life, it says.
Verse 7. Thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children.
That's why.
In part, there's not a single parent in this room that wasn't first a child.
Adam and Eve are the only exceptions in the history of man. Why?
Because to teach your children properly, you have to have experienced what they're going through. And when you've experienced that, then you are able, by your own experience and what you learn through it, to understand and to teach.
00:15:21
Your children. And so here were some people that had spent 40 years.
In the school of God learning for themselves. And now we're being told, now you're ready, if you will, to teach your children what you've been learning in the process of life for yourself. And part of that process, they were learning the heart of God.
They were learning their own heart.
There's something else mentioned here that isn't directly on what we're talking about exactly, but I'm going to comment on it. I think it's helpful. Verse five says thou shalt love the Lord thy God.
That was a command.
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God.
It was a command that was conditional, That is, if you obey.
And it's repeated in the Gospels, in Matthew 22 I think, or 21 when they were saying to the Lord, well, what's the law say? The law says you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart.
How many people?
Have kept that command.
Not one.
Not one accepting, of course, the Lord Jesus.
Why? Because man in himself is not capable.
Of loving the Lord.
Is God with all his heart?
That's law.
That's the principle of law.
That and love your neighbor as yourself. If you did those two things perfectly, love God as you should, and love your neighbor yourself, you would have fulfilled every requirement of the law.
But the point I want to make out of it is.
Is man couldn't do it.
And we spent two days in the reading meetings.
And you didn't hear once.
Connected with us that command.
Not once.
You and I, as trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ, are not given that command.
We heard over and over again the importance of loving your brother.
As evidence that you have the life.
Why does it put it that way?
Why doesn't it say instead of saying you shall love your brother, you shall love God?
As a an injunction, an exhortation.
To us, I'm going to suggest a thought to you.
God is love.
And all things flow from the God who is love.
We love, it says in First John Four. We didn't get that far in the chapter, but we love because he first loved us.
And we love because God has chosen to give us the life of Christ.
In which that love is and can be manifested.
But this comes to the point.
That God is eminently worthy of our love. We say God's love is unconditional. He loves because he is love, and this is true. And so he loves us without regard to what we are.
00:20:01
But the other side is this.
God has manifested himself in a way that he has absolutely worthy.
Of all our love.
The Lord Jesus in the manifestation of the love of God, has presents Himself to us in perfect perfection and love in activity, and we have every reason.
There was fear of God to tell them to love Him with all their heart.
Under law, even though they couldn't and didn't do it.
But God has turned it around.
He's put what we didn't have in US, and rather than exhort us to love him because he's perfectly worthy of all love.
He constrains us by it. It's a response in US rather than a command. And so God is working in your life and mind to pull us to Himself in responsive Ness.
To what he is, the love of Christ constraineth us.
For God so loved the world that he gave is a constraining statement to those of us who have accepted that love.
And that work that that love did.
And so in that way.
He then though says I'm to love you as I love myself, and you're to love me.
As you love yourself.
We need that exhortation because I'm not worthy of your love. I can't constrain you by the amount of love that's in my heart for you. You may see some of it, but it's not perfect. It's incomplete. And so God says He loves us unconditionally. I have a life that says I'm to love you unconditionally.
Even though I may not always see you worthy.
As God is worthy of receiving that love.
I'd like to go over and connect these thoughts with Hebrews chapter.
13.
Hebrews, chapter 13.
Verse 5.
Let your conversation be without covetousness and be content with such things as you have.
For he has said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
So that we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper.
I will not fear what man will do unto me.
I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
If you go back under law, if you go back to the learning experience that God was teaching man, most of the Old Testament really in that way is God teaching man what's in his own heart to recognize that he could never be right under law. It was a long lesson.
You know, a couple thousand years of a lesson, pretty serious lesson, that God would take that long to work it out.
But God said this to those people. He said, If you forsake me.
I will forsake you.
In the prophets, I forget which one, he says. If you forsake me, I will forsake you.
That's what having an agreement with God is like, being under the basis of I should love God with all my heart, but if I forsake him and in fact the forsaking that God was warning them about and said I'll forsake you, goes back to something that was brought out.
When idols were brought before us.
00:25:01
In particular, emphasis is given in that Forsaken is if you forsake me for idols, I'll forsake you.
And the 10 tribes rather rapidly forsook God for idols, and God in that governmental way, forsook them, and they've never had the relationship yet again with him. And when they do, it won't be on the basis of law. He has to go back before law, as we see in earlier chapters of Hebrews, and he will restore the relationship on the basis of his promises, which were unconditional.
Not conditional with the Law, but unconditional with Abraham and the promises made to Abraham.
Are the basis on which the children of Israel will be restored and brought into their millennial place a blessing, but under law and under the rules of law, God forsook them.
The Lord Jesus who is brought before us in these verses says to us.
I will never leave thee.
Nor forsake thee.
He knew.
He experienced.
In a way more intense than you and I ever will. What it was.
To be forsaken.
Forsaken of God, yes, but also forsaken of man.
He experienced it.
And he in having experienced it in his own life, Here's a man on earth, as it were, as saying.
You're not going to experience what I experienced.
Whether or not we're conscious of it, he doesn't. We may not be aware of it.
But he doesn't leave us.
And he doesn't forsake us.
He could say I am alone.
As a Pelican or as a Sparrow upon the house call.
As a Pelican in the wilderness, he recognized to be in a place alone.
That no others entered into where he was and what he was feeling.
He was intensely alone.
In his life, in many aspects of it, even those that loved him and that he loved could only go so far with him.
And then, as it were, like it was in the garden, there were all 12 of them at first.
And then he goes a little farther, and then there are three, and then he goes farther, and he's alone.
With God.
He understood it and the difficulty of it, and he makes this promise.
I will never.
Leave you.
I will never forsake you.
If he had not become a man.
And had not experienced what we recognized as recorded for us in the Word of God.
We might be tempted to say, Lord, you don't really understand what I'm going through.
And sometimes we can't help another person in a situation because we've not experienced it.
A little amusing, but I think it makes the point. Best way I know to make the point.
There's no father in this room.
That is ever said to his wife when she was.
Delivering a baby Honey, I know just how you feel.
And there's not a father to be in this room that's going to say it either.
Because the father has never experienced.
What the wife is going through and consequently other sisters OR others who've had children can say that and may say that and be a help and be a comfort in the pain and the.
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What is going through in the person?
But one of the things that we want to appreciate about the Lord Jesus becoming a man.
Is that he went through the experiences of life.
That he might be able to say to us in time of need. I know just how you feel.
I know just how you feel and I will not leave you.
I will not forsake you.
You know, there's something very comforting in that because in the Old Testament sense of it.
It wouldn't have been said that way.
Because sometimes when the people failed.
God didn't.
Take care of it. He allowed it to happen and the consequences of it without giving them the comfort of his presence.
They're going to experience some of that and learn the other side during the tribulation. Some of the two tribes during the tribulation, we'll we'll go through experiences that they'll be totally bewildered and not know what's going on and why it's going on and why Jehovah is not coming in.
But the Lord, in our relationship with him, it's pure sovereign grace of God that God is free to work with us differently now. He's been liberated in his freedom of grace through the work of His Son, so that he can work with us in the purity of grace that will stay with us even when we have failed.
And this promise is unconditional.
That doesn't say I'll be with you unless you mess up and sin and get away from me. We won't enjoy his presence if we're out of fellowship with him, but the promise that He's there with us is good.
I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
Particularly would like to leave that sentence.
If I could burn it on your heart and mine, I would just remember it. It's a simple sentence, but it says a lot about knowing the heart of the Lord Jesus for you in a personal way.
The second statement and and that is simply a simple statement to.
That statement is.
The Lord.
Is my helper.
Next time something doesn't go right.
Pause and say thank you Lord.
That you're here with me to be my helper.
That's grace. That's a promise.
The Lord is not maybe not if.
Not conditional.
But it's a statement of fact. The Lord is my helper.
May the Lord help each one of us to enter into it individually.
I can say to you, the Lord is your helper, but that's not the benefit to your own heart this afternoon unless you make it. Enjoy it personally.
My helper.
We the first hymn of this these days of meeting and the first prayer had to do with doubt.
The question of doubt.
And why?
It's a good thing when there's doubt and why that produces fear very often to notice what's said right here. The Lord is my helper.
I shall not fear.
Make a little personal application of it because it's been a lasting joy.
To my own soul in these things.
Many of us and very shortly are going to get on the road.
And.
Some tomorrow be on the road.
I want to recount a personal experience that helped me.
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To get the words the Lord is my helper, more practically into my own soul.
Some years ago, a brother, Seth Palmer, who lives out in the state of Washington now and I determined to go, felt the Lord's mind to take a BTP display to an Aberdeen conference. And it was.
2567 hours of travel and we were going to.
Made the arrangement that I'd do a tank of gas and then he would and we wouldn't stop. We would just go both ways that way.
A little younger and a little easier. So we did.
We had a nice, happy conference in Aberdeen and we started home.
On the Lord's afternoon, like this afternoon, and we got several hours out of Aberdeen.
It's been out that way. It can be pretty hilly. We were going on an uphill slope in the middle of nowhere. It was probably 5 miles from the bottom into the top. We're halfway up the slope.
The BTP van sprinter van just quit.
We pulled off to the glided off to the side of the shoulder of the drop off.
There we were, middle of nowhere.
I don't know, 50 miles from on large, the afternoon from.
I don't even know how many miles we were from any quote. Help?
I can assure you the first words out of my thoughts were not the Lord is my helper. They were. What do we do now?
What do we do now?
We did thankfully turn to the Lord immediately and say Lord, we're in, we've got a problem and we have no idea what to do about it. Neither Seth nor I, we knew where the engine was and that was about it. We also, that was their extent of our knowledge.
We sat and we.
Set.
The Lord knew.
Maybe 30 minutes later, a vehicle pulled off behind us.
And up to the window came Arthur Buchanan and Wally Classo.
There probably wasn't a person at the conference at Aberdeen that new vehicles better than Wally Clausen.
That was his work and this was a diesel.
And so on. So we told them.
And.
Off comes the engine hood and in relatively no tools.
We didn't have any tools, they didn't have any really tools and so on, but with minimal amounts of anything.
Wally in a very short order said here's your problem, I've disconnected this and that and you drive back without it and when you get back get it fixed and then they'll re hook it up and you'll be good and that's what happened.
A practical but real.
Reinforcement. I hope to you to be able to say for yourself, the Lord is my helper.
Our Fellowship Is With the Father and His Son
Open—Bob Thonney
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Let's go back to the beginning again.
First John, chapter one.
That which was from the beginning.
Which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon in our hands of handled.
Of the word of life.
For the life was manifested, and we have seen it.
And he bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us.
That which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us. And truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things right we unto you, that your joy.
May be full.
Just like to make some brief comments.
It's interesting this expression at the beginning of verse one.
From the beginning? What beginning is it talking about here?
And so in verse two and three, it's evident it's the beginning.
Of the manifestation of eternal life in the Person.
Of our Lord Jesus.
Never before was eternal life visible in a person as it was at that time.
Go back to John's Gospel, chapter 8.
Just for one verse.
Verse 25.
Then they said unto him, This is the Pharisee said unto the Lord Jesus.
Who art thou?
And Jesus said unto them.
Even the same that I said unto you from the beginning. There is that expression again from the beginning, and it's interesting. If you read through John's epistle, first Epistle, you'll have that expression again and again. Notice in chapter 2 and verse 7.
Verse Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had.
From the beginning, there it is.
The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning.
Notice verse.
13 I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him, that is, from the beginning.
Verse 14 I have written unto you, fathers, because you have known him. That is from the beginning. It's the beginning of the manifestation of eternal life in the person of the Lord Jesus.
And as it's been brought out in this conference, this is the life that you have right now if you are a believer in the Lord Jesus.
And what I would like to encourage in these few brief moments is to cultivate.
Fellowship with the Lord Jesus. You know God is.
A personal God.
He's so personal.
That he came to be a man in this world, so that man to man, we can communicate, we can talk things over.
I think it is amazingly wonderful to think about.
And so you have in verse one, which we have heard. That's one of our senses. Have you heard him?
Here's the Word of God.
Has it really penetrated as it is in truth the Word of God?
At which you have seen with your eyes.
Well, there is the eyes of faith.
And in Hebrews chapter 2, it says we see Jesus crowned with glory and honor. That's the.
00:05:05
Vision of faith. We read it in the Scriptures. It becomes surreal to it. It is as if we are seeing it. Can you see him there, brethren? There he is sitting, a real man of flesh and bones in the glory of God. Wonderful to think about.
But then another statement which we have looked upon. What's the difference between seeing and looking upon?
Looking upon gets more detail. I may see something at a glance. Yeah, I saw that person today.
But when I look at somebody, I look at them in detail.
I sometimes say to people, if you look at thee brother, and you're going to see.
Some failure, so don't take too much time at that.
The more you look at him, the more perfection you're going to see in every detail.
You know, it's interesting because we deal a lot with literature and I have noticed that people that use printing presses have a magnifying glass off times and what they do after they have a press or a page that's been printed, they look at it under a magnifying glass and that way they can see where the defects are.
Put the magnifying glass to any of us, brethren.
And you're going to see defects. But put the magnifying glass to the Lord Jesus. Oh, magnify the Lord with me. All you're going to see is complete perfection to me. It is amazing to do that. And then it comes so close. The apostle John says our hands have handled the Lord Jesus laid on his bosom at the Last Supper. He says I.
Talking about, I'm not talking about.
Fables. I'm talking about reality.
This is what happened.
His hands have handled, and they say here in verse three, that which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us. Now this us is the apostles.
The Apostles fellowship. We often quote that verse in Acts 242. They continued steadfastly in the apostles.
Doctrine and fellowship. Here we have those two things. What they saw and heard, they declared to us. That's the apostles doctrine, that you also may have fellowship with us.
So that's the standard.
But notice it doesn't stop there. Truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.
You know, it talks about fellowship.
In verse 7 as well, we walk in the light as He is in the light. We have fellowship one with another. It sure is great to be back together in meetings like this, to be able to rub shoulders, shake hands, give an embrace, and to see each other find out how you're doing. God has made us for that.
This is part of what Christianity is. But I want to point out this pact that fellowship won with another is not first.
What's first fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ? Oh, are you cultivating that fellowship?
And this is my desire in these few brief moments.
Is to cultivate that fellowship with the Father, with his Son, Jesus Christ. Again, I say God is a personal God and he's interested in walking together with us. We have two people in the Old Testament that walked with God.
To me, it's interesting. What does it mean to walk with God?
It says about Enoch, he walked with God 300 years. Wowie, that's pretty impressive.
300 years. How did you do it, Enoch? How did you walk with God? 300 years.
You know what he was said.
One step at a time, take it, each step with the Lord. We've heard that promise this afternoon. I will never leave you nor forsake you. Do your steps in the consciousness that He's right there. Talk to him. Listen to Him.
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And so I say to cultivate this fellowship.
I say there are two things that are so important.
Reading the Word of God.
That's listening to him.
And then prayer.
That's talking to him. Both those things are so important in walking with God.
And I'd like to encourage young people to read the scriptures.
And I get some interesting reactions when I challenge young people sometimes to do that.
What does it mean?
To read the scriptures.
And I think I might have mentioned it, but at our conference in Oaxaca.
Mexico. Sometimes their conferences get quite large too. There was a conference in a place called La Cumbre in Oaxaca. I don't know if it is two or three years ago.
Probably close to 1000 people there.
And so I got talking to a group of young men between the meetings.
You read the scriptures.
Yeah.
Said how often? Oh, maybe two or three times a week. Oh well, I'm glad you hear you're reading at least that much.
And I say, let me ask you another question.
How often do you eat any food?
Oh, every day, brother.
Just once a day, I guess. Really. No. Three times a day Without fail. Yes, without fail. I say, OK, well, I'm going to make another conclusion then, that your, your body is a lot more important than your soul, isn't it? Don't say that. That's not right.
Well, let's be practical, brother.
Do we give sincerely time for the Lord to speak to us? And when you give time for the Lord to speak to you, you don't do it in the midst of doing a bunch of other things. You pay attention.
You listen.
So I want to encourage you to take time to listen to the Lord.
As you read the scriptures, I don't like to make myself.
An example that I must say, rather than that the Lord laid on my heart.
In early years.
When I was working at Bible Truth Publishers.
In Oak Park at that time.
There was a time that we had to leave for work.
I decided as a young person I was going to get up one hour earlier and take 1/2 hour to read the scriptures and maybe some ministry on it.
And another half hour to pray.
I will never regret having done that. The fellowship, the enjoyment of the scriptures, the understanding of the Word of God that I got not only from reading but from ministry of some of those good.
Ministry books that we have in English and now in Spanish as well.
But it was a tremendous blessing. And you know what?
I found that when you cultivate fellowship with the father and with his son.
Jesus Christ. Then, when you meet up with your fellow brethren, there's something that clicks immediately. There's fellowship on that ground, too. Why? Because you are cultivating the fellowship with the Father and the Son, and I am too.
Oh how important it is. Remember I really enjoy seeing you all together enjoying fellowship with one another. Remember fellowship one with another is not #1.
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His fellowship with the father and with his son.
Jesus Christ.
Lord help us brethren, one more detail here in verse four. These things right we unto you that your joy.
May be full, not half full, overweight full.
Joy.
Enjoyment comes.
From walking in fellowship with the father and with his son.
I must say I've met up with people that radiate their enjoyment, they're so evident.
And it's because they're walking in the fellowship with the father and with his son.
My presence, so my Congress beginning.
By itself Horrible heart.
Our presence.
Save your life, Lord, give Lord, sin can come.
All I ever wanted to hear, our bride to hear instead.
Of our strange material, our snake of all.
Conference Singing
The Life of Timothy Part 1
Great Salvation
Hymnsing 1
The Life of Timothy Part 2
Peter Learned Part 1
Hymnsing 2
Peter Learned Part 2