Address—A.C. Hayhoe
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Beginning at verse eight, Second Peter one verse 8.
For if these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
But he that lacketh these things is blind.
And cannot see afar off. And hath forgotten that he was once purged from his old sins.
Wherefore the rather brethren, give diligence to make your calling and elections sure.
For if he do these things, he shall never fall.
Verse 12 Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things.
Though ye know them, and be established in the present truth.
Verse 15. Moreover, I will endeavor that he may be able after my decease.
Who have these things always in remembrance?
Not my intention to speak on these verses at all. I simply read them, as, shall I say, an apology for that which I feel laid on my heart this afternoon. I trust of the Lord, for I assure you that you will find it nothing new whatever. You will find it to be that which you have heard and read and meditated on before today.
But as I read these scriptures and see how the whole soul of God's servant Peter.
Was involved in this solemn responsibility of putting before the Saints of God those things which were real to Him.
He warned them as to that which they lack, if they are short in these things, of that which will be their blessed portion, if they're in the enjoyment of these things. And he says, As long as I am among you, I want to remind you continually of these same things, though ye know them and be established in the present truth.
You're not going to learn anything this afternoon.
You're going to hear that which you know already, but I take this as an encouragement, Beloved Saints of God, as we open this precious book and read that which we already may know and know quite well, we find it so helpful, so encouraging, so refreshing to our souls to go over those very things which we have known for many years.
Peter even made the expressed desire that after he was gone, these things, not something new, but these same things might continually be ministered to the Saints. I'd like you to turn then, please, first of all, to one verse in Exodus chapter 29.
Exodus chapter 29.
Verse 29.
And the holy garments.
Of Aaron, thou be his sons.
After him the holy garments of Aaron.
Shall be his sons after him.
That which I feel laid on my heart, I approach with embarrassment and with fear.
Because I believe, dear Saints of God, that this precious book that is open before me presents to us.
A wonderful desire in God's heart we have had brought before us in these meetings the love of God's own heart displayed to us so perfectly, so fully in the sending of His own beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, whom I hope you know as your Savior.
But all can we ever fathom the love of God's heart?
Over and over again in the precious Word of God that love is revealed and the purpose of God in law is made known to us. And I believe it, we we find it to be the delight of God to bless in families, to bless in families, and this is very, very often emphasized in the Word of God.
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And when this scripture first came to my attention.
It searched my heart.
Deeply.
For I stand here as a son as well as a father.
And in Speaking of the relationship of son, I think I must say I do so with embarrassment because it will mean.
Reference to the way in which I was brought up and my dear parents are now with the Lord.
In Speaking of the responsibilities that are mine as a father.
I do so with fear and with trembling, but I can speak with the authority of God's Word.
The holy garments of Aaron shall be his son after him. What else did he have to leave? Aaron was a priest. Aaron was a Levite. Aaron had not one possession on the face of the earth. No flocks, no herds, no possession of any kind except.
The holy garments which he wore from day-to-day, and these were.
Were the heritage he left to his son.
May I look solemnly into the faces of the dear fathers who were here today.
And permit a son to speak to you.
A son who was privileged.
To witness these holy garments.
I thank God to be able to say this privilege to witness.
These holy garments, garments are those things that are very close to us, things that are very much in evidence to those around us. And it's an exceedingly searching thing that burdens my heart this afternoon.
For as I look around upon his company, I know that there are burden and sorrowful and weeping heart here today, and my own is touched with fear as I approach this subject.
But I believe it's a solemn and wonderful and precious statement we have here.
The holy garments of Aaron shall be his sons after him.
As our beloved children look upon us, do they see us leave our Christianity at the meeting room and come home to live an entirely different life before them? In the whole, we're going to look at some other scriptures that may bear on this.
But its beloved brethren, is a very precious promise, and a very searching and solemn responsibility that Aaron.
Had the responsibility to privilege the joy of leaving to His Son those priestly garments which He himself had worn? Would you turn, please from this passage to Deuteronomy Chapter 11?
Deuteronomy Chapter 11.
Verse 18.
Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes, And ye shall teach them your children, Speaking of them, when thou sittest in thine house.
And when thou walkest.
By the way, when all lies down, and when thou risest up.
And thou shalt write them upon the doorposts of thine house, and upon my gate, that your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children in the land which the Lord swear unto your Father to give them as the days of heaven upon the earth. Doesn't that have a wonderful ring?
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Just let me read it over again as the days of Heaven.
Upon the Earth isn't that grand? I think it's worth underlining.
The days of heaven upon the earth. I have been in and out of many homes, and I have witnessed this in some of the homes that I have visited. The very days of heaven upon the earth. I know, and it's most evident to all of us, that this is an earthly promise.
To an earthly people, promising them long life and the blessing of the Lord.
Down here, but with that very happy description, the days of heaven upon the earth, I want to emphasize that because the Lord. I believe as we go over these verses slowly, we need to be reminded that the purpose of God in the instruction given is.
Our happiness. Oh dear Saints of God, He wants you to be happy.
When you take John's gospel and you turn page after page and read of his loving desire that our joy might be full.
Over and over the Lord Jesus presents that happy expression that your joy might be full. And we find ourselves, do we not, sitting down and thinking, well, if this circumstance and that were changed a bit, then my joy would rise much higher than it is now.
Forgive plea the quotation that you'll immediately recognize, but I heard it more often than you did.
Happiness is a state of soul, not a question of circumstances. Have you ever heard that before? I suppose there's a generation here that haven't heard these things that I heard since my boyhood days, but I know that's a true statement. And in going in and out among the homes of the Lord's beloved people, how I have seen it.
All the radiant joy and happiness that I have seen.
In the countenance and the home, and the life of some of those whose circumstances you and I would not envy for one moment.
And yet they have the joy of the Lord in their souls, and it shows.
To all around. Let us remember then I say again as we go over these verses slowly, that the purpose of God in bringing it before us is because he wants you to have personal happiness, that He wants you to have a happy home and family. Now let's go back, shall we, to verse 18. Therefore shall He lay up.
These.
My words.
Beloved, forgive me again, I said. This would be embarrassing.
But this book was beloved, much beloved in the home in which I grew up, greatly beloved, continually referred to. It seemed to be woven into the topics of conversation day by day. And when I read this word lay up, it's not something that happens suddenly. You don't wake up all of a sudden one morning.
With a good knowledge of God's precious word, laid up with in your memory or your heart.
And I'm going to look at everyone here who is able to read and recommend to you that you read God's precious Word regularly, daily, and in an orderly fashion.
I won't ask this for one moment, but if I did, I wonder what I would see.
How many could raise their Bible and say I have read God's word from the first word of Genesis to the last word of Revelation without missing anything? I wonder what I would see if I asked for this to take place.
You and I cannot lay claim to laying up the word of God in our heart and soul.
Unless we read it, read it with diligence, read it with prayer, and I can say you'll find yourself reading it with delight. To lay up these my words in your heart. Isn't that grand? The heart seems to me in God's word to speak of the affection and know how lovely it is to see someone who reads this precious, precious book because.
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The affection of their heart yearns for more and more of a preciousness.
And the loveliness of Christ and to discover in this book.
Not the boundaries beyond which I will be transgressing, but rather those things which will plead the one who loved me with a love that is stronger than death. When young believers come to me and say, is there any scripture against this? Is there anything to condemn that I am reminded of what our dear brother HF Clawson told us in Montreal.
Quite a number of years ago.
He had a large piece of construction paper and on one side he had.
A square drawn, and inside that square number of scattered dots. And he likened this to the people of God in the Old Testament, who were kept in by definite boundaries, laws beyond which they dare not go. And if they went off in this direction, they soon found a law which forbid them going any further. And he pictured this to us in some detail.
Then he turned the card over and on the other side.
He had won.
Prominent Flagstaff in the middle, no boundaries to be seen, and clustered right near that black dot. Quite a few smaller dots, some farther, some farther, till some were dangerously near the edge of that piece of paper.
And he reminded us that now it is our happy joy and privilege to remember that we have one who loved us and who gave himself for us, who has put into our hands his most precious book, which doesn't bind us in with the laws of the restrictions of the Old Testament. That presents to us one who loved us with a love that took him to the cross of Calvary to redeem us. And the.
Planted in your heart and mind by His grace to live to please Him. You do want to please the Lord Jesus, or you're not born again.
You do want to please the Lord Jesus, or you have no new life within you all. My beloved friend, I believe it's a solemn, solemn thing to realize that there are altogether too many who have this precious and this wonderful book and have had it since the days of their childhood.
And they can perhaps quote a good many of its passages, but is there really any affection in their heart for the person of the Lord Jesus Christ? As we listen to the conversations that take place between meetings, do we find an indication?
That there is a real love for the Lord Jesus Christ. All God grants. That it may be more so. That this precious word may be laid up in our heart, and that the reading of God's precious word may stir and quicken the affection of our heart. The next thing is the soul. I believe it's generally considered that the soul is the seed of the appetite.
The desires Are you willing, and am I willing, that this also shall be under the authority and the control of God's precious words? Do I read it with that in mind, that it may actually have its powerful and constraining influence upon my very heart and soul? I say it's a very, very searching passage to read, and yet it brings with it such.
Blessings and it was given to us because he loved us so much. And again, I would encourage each and everyone to make it your daily habit to read this precious word of God and allow it to reach into your very heart and soul. Those are your affections are governed by.
This precious book that is all things he.
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Might have the preeminence in all things.
You know, I don't say this to make anyone smile, but I believe perhaps it's a practical consideration.
I was talking to a young man far from here who told me that he was never going to get married because he didn't feel it was at all right to take a measure of the love that belonged to the Lord Jesus and bestow it.
On his wife and thereby have that much less who bestow on the Lord's visa. He was very, very sincere about this.
And I asked him what would become of a man who, having married a wife and perhaps finding four or five children to grace that home, now had to take the affection that belonged to his wife and divide it thinner and thinner still among the children who came to bless that family.
All he said, it doesn't work that way, does it? And I said, no, indeed it doesn't. Nor does it mean that your affection for the Lord Jesus is in any degree lesson, nor that he has any less the preeminent place, because he has given you by the grace of God, a partner who also loves the same precious Savior and wants to please him. I just passed this on to you, dearly beloved young.
Because I believe that these bonds that God in wondrous grace has put before us in this precious book, all the affections proffered to them.
Cause us, I believe, to look up with increasing gratitude to the one whoever put these affection within our hearts. They're not natural to us. Naturally we were hateful and hating one another.
For how beautiful to see the heart and the soul governed and controlled by the Word of God.
You'll notice it seems to become more practical. Bind them for a sign upon your hands.
First of all, that which cannot be seen, that which is within.
Is controlled by God's word, the heart and the soul, and then we find it very word bound upon our hands that that which we do is controlled by the direction and the wisdom of the word of God. Is the Bible really that up to date surely you can't take a book written this long ago and use it to help you in making decisions concerning what your.
Two in 1969, yes, thank God. There is nothing that ever needs to be added to this precious book. And it has impressed me very, very much in visiting in other lands where their language and culture and custom is so totally different from that which we are accustomed to.
To find that this same book contains all the light and wisdom needed.
In order to live to please the Lord Jesus, according to the pattern of this book, in any nation under heaven, all let us just look at those hands of ours and realize that they have been, as we've just been told, redeemed.
You're lost your own. You're bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body.
I'm going to repeat what I may have mentioned before.
The occasion when a young man traveling over in England entered one of their trains. The trains over there are different a bit to our own here. They're not made-up of 1 long continuous coach, but rather in each coach there are compartments in which there are usually about 6 passengers. Well, when this young man entered the compartment, there were already three young men in that compartment.
And no sooner did he sit down and the train begin to move than one of the three young men reached in his pocket and pulled out.
Of cards, and he shuffled them and handed some to one and handed some more to the second and offered some to the newcomers. And the newcomer sat there with a happy smile with his hands folded, and he said no thank you, I don't have any hands.
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Well, of course. The one who was offering the card looked at him in bewilderment. He could see what appeared to be a perfectly normal pair of hands.
Well, he said, maybe I ought to explain these hands don't belong to me. That didn't help the matter at all. It still sounded just as bewildering as before. So he went on to explain further. He said I am redeemed with the precious blood of Christ. I am not my own. I am but with a price. And I just don't believe it would please the one who redeemed me if I took these hands and used them for such a purpose.
He didn't hunt all the way through the Bible to find a verse that condemned the use of those things.
He knew that redeemed with the freshest blood of Christ, and in a desire to live to please that One who redeemed him at such infinite cost that he could well fold his hands, not with a frown of disappointment, with a smile of real gratitude, that he was redeemed with a precious blood of Christ. Not only the hands, but the eyes.
The affection, the very appetite, that which we do, and our eyes perhaps would look outward to that which is even beyond the things that we can grasp.
And in what direction are your eyes and mind turn, beloved friends?
Are your eyes and mind.
Governed and controlled by this precious book, the Word of God. May I just remind you again that that which we have here in verse 18 is the preparation.
In a home or bringing up a family, isn't this pretty searching?
The heart, the soul, the hand, the eyes. And you can't hide these things from your family.
They'll know. It will show. They can tell, beloved, whether these things are real to you or not. And I believe as this fourfold charge was laid upon the fathers in Israel.
That it ought to be felt very, very, very solemnly by everyone of us.
Now the next verse says, And ye shall teach them.
Your children, isn't this a happy privilege? And isn't it a very continual responsibility to that which has brought joy and happiness to us for the grace of God? Oh, do we not desire the same thing for our dear children?
But what can we expect if our heart is not controlled by the Word of God?
What can I expect if the appetites and the desires that are natural to me are not controlled by God's precious Word, nor my hands engaged in those things which redeemed hands are free to use to the glory of God?
And if my eyes turn away to those things which would only distract me from the loveliness which is in Christ Jesus.
And then to turn and teach them to our children, all beloved. It's embarrassing and it's.
A serious matter, but here it is in God's Word, and I dare not shrink from what it says.
He shall teach them your children, Speaking of them, when thou sittest in thine house. Are we so busy now, is our timetable so taken up, that we don't have time to sit down in our house with our children and with the precious word of God?
And when we do so to the children, have the feeling that Dad's just trying to get this over with because he's got something else on his mind anyway, and get this reading over with because there are other responsibilities much more important than this quick little reading in the morning or in the evening. Oh, dear fellow believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, this precious book that he has given us.
With all its unfolding of His loving heart, with all its wisdom, and with the glorious hope that it puts before our souls.
Surely should be worth more to us than anything else that might intrude upon our timetable.
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Speaking of them, when thou fittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way.
Precious memories come back to me as I read this.
Speaking of them.
Forgive another quotation. We ought to read the Word of God until we become so saturated with it that our very thoughts are formed in the wisdom of Scripture.
May I please just say this, that there were many many times?
When this rebellious sun right here wanted his own way very, very much.
And I would present what I wanted very, very much to my father.
And he would answer me in the language of scripture.
You can argue with your dad, but you can't seem to argue against the word of God.
At least I didn't have the heart to. And when the answer was interwoven with the wisdom of God's Word, it seemed to be just what this stubborn heart needed. All I can remember. Yet on one particular occasion, there was something so educational and attractive to be coupled with something that we naturally felt was out of place for the believers.
And so the easy conclusion was, well, we'll attend until that commences, which we wouldn't approve of. And then of course.
We'll come right home.
The answer was he that trusteth his own heart is a fool.
That's a pretty straightforward answer. He to trust us, his own heart is a fool. Would I not be trusting my own heart to have the courage to pack up and leave when these things began, which would be quite a novelty to a boy brought up the way I was brought up?
I wouldn't want to just stay around for a little while and see what this was all about. And then perhaps just a little while longer too, trusting my own heart, I would find out what a fool I was.
Oh, let me remind my own heart, for these responsibilities still weigh heavily upon my own shoulders. And I say it with fear and inward tears.
But I mention what I speak up today I can mention my memory.
But that which lies ahead the Lord alone knows. But here is the wisdom, here is the promise from His own loving heart, who so earnestly desires your happiness and blessing. May I turn a moment from perhaps addressing parents to addressing children who are being brought up as.
By the grace of God, I was brought up.
May I remind you that someday I believe you will thank God for it. You will thank God for the many times you saw your father and your mother on their knees.
You knew they were praying for you, you heard your very name come from their lips in prayer. And when you so much flaunted your own way, when you were the only one of a group that wasn't permitted to take part in this or that, you felt your parents just didn't understand you. They had forgotten all about their own youth. And all such thoughts went through.
Your mind, as they did through my own.
Beloved young people, I stand here and thank God.
That I was preserved by His grace and through the firm hand of a praying father and mother.
From those things which would only have brought sorrow and disappointment to me.
Speaking of them, when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, you know the Bible is the most wonderful book as we walk by the way and see the handiwork of golf, the wisdom and the skills, and shall I say, the thoughtfulness with which his hand has wrought it makes.
A never ending topic of conversation.
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You know, when we were down in Oaxaca, every time we left one village to go to another.
They would all gather together, and they would sing so lovingly and so heartily. I will lift up mine eyes under the hills, from whence cometh my health, my help cometh from the Lord that made heaven and earth. They would sing that song through, if their tears would permit them to do so.
And oh, it made the hills of Oaxaca very precious to me, for I'd look around and see those hills, and I would think, from whence cometh my health from these hills all my help cometh from the one that made heaven and earth. Why, the sight of those hills that existed so long before you and I were born just turned our thoughts to the one who made them.
The little flowers that bloom.
All the feuding, the majesty, the thoughtfulness that is behind it all.
I hope I'm not digressing too much in these practical things, but I can still hear the comment that would so often be made at the table of an exceptionally nice meal was set down in front of us. You know, children, we ought to be so thankful there's no nourishment either in the color or in the flavor of this food that you're eating.
If it all looked the same, it all tasted the same, it could nourish her body just as well.
But here are these nice mashed potatoes, here's this lovely roast beef, here are these peas and these carrots. And they look so attractive and they each have their own taste and generally considered to be very pleasant. Why did God give us such variety and the ability to recognize these colors and flavors and to enjoy them? Why?
Just to sit down there and eat the way an animal would eat.
Oh, I tell you, somehow or other conversations such as this caused our hearts to look up in gratitude to the one who had been so kind and so thoughtful in everything that we saw all around us. When thou walkest, by the way.
To see the beauty of God's handiwork in creation and to be able, as we walk along, to realize that the loving eye of Him.
Who put all this beauty around us is looking down upon us as we walk along the way.
Oh, that's been a precious thing to me. And some hours that would otherwise be pretty lonely, to think that the eye of him who created all things is looking down at me, wherever I may be, and looking down at you. Oh, beloved, I tell you, it's a grand thing to be a Christian, and that doesn't mean simply to have your sins forgiven.
And now that there's a corner of heaven where you're going to find yourself at home, it means that there's a failure who loves you enough to die for you. It means that there's a Savior living in the glory at this very moment who wants your joy to be.
Whoa. Once you are home to be a happy home, once your family to be a rejoicing family sheltered by the freshest blood of Christ, and once every one of us to look up day by day with the eager anticipation of soon hearing His voice when our citizen man host. When thou walkest by the way, when thou last down, and when thou rightest up. It just doesn't seem.
Anytime out at all does it. It just seems as though the word of God belongs in.
All the experiences of the believer. And so it ought to be.
Thank God, beloved brethren, if you and I are found at the Bible reading, and at the prayer meeting, and at the remembrance of the Lord and at the gospel meeting. But what about the rest of the time?
I was in the office of a professional man a long, long way from here. Not one single person in this company knows who this is at all, so please don't try to even get. But he didn't know I was in the reception room.
He was in his consultation room, and he was really telling somebody off in pretty vigorous language, and his voice was rising in greater and greater heat of anger. I didn't know whether I ought to walk out to save embarrassment or not, but presently the door opened and out he came with the other gentleman who'd been with him, and he saw me sitting there.
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And when he got this third party out the door, he turned to me. He said Christianity's one thing in business is another.
I was very sorry to hear him say that.
Christianity is one thing.
Home life is another. Is that true? Christianity is one thing.
School is another. Is that true?
Oh, I believe that there's precious book with all its precept and wisdom can be taken by you into every area of your life. And if you perchance are in some occupation or situation that you cannot feel at home with this precious book, you're in the wrong place. I say again, you're in the wrong place simply because I've traveled a bit. I get asked quite often to speak when I get back home and.
Places that I personally just don't feel free to speak in.
And when they will ask me now, would you come and give us a talk on such and such a trip you've taken?
I usually say, well, I'd be glad to uncondition that I could bring along my Bible and hold it in my hand while I speak.
Well, I have to consult someone else about this too, so I'll let you know tomorrow.
I've never heard back from any of them. They just don't seem to want someone standing up there with a Bible in his hands. And I do recommend this to you, dearly beloved brethren and sisters in Christ and dearly beloved young people, as we see in this little passage in Deuteronomy, the place that God's Word up to have in our life and our heart and our home.
Don't ever let yourself be found where you would not wish to bring this precious, precious living book.
And we don't live to ourselves. We don't die to ourselves. The attitude that we take in these matters has a profound effect upon others. I remember one time they came to our particular town in Canada. They found a new branch of one of these well known.
Societies.
Service clubs, as they call them, and they came to me and asked me if I would be interested. They said their particular activity was concerning young men and they knew that that was somewhat of an interest of mine.
Well, I didn't like to cut them off too promptly, so I asked for a little further information, all the while wondering what I might say.
And finally, I asked them the same thing. I said, what do you what day do you have your regular scheduled dinner meeting? Well, every Wednesday at noon. Well, every Wednesday at noon.
One question, would I be free to bring my Bible with me to this?
Dinner on Wednesdays at noon. And you know, they made it quite plain to me that that Bible of mine would be.
Totally out of place and unwanted. They didn't even wait till tomorrow to tell me that it just wasn't wanted.
So they went out again and you know, I didn't know the sequel to that story until we were having a Bible reading in the assembly at home a couple of weeks later. And one of the brothers in town who is a businessman said, oh, by the way, they're starting a new branch of such and such a service club in the town and they.
Have approached me to see if I would be interested in being an active member.
He said. I didn't know exactly what to say to get out of it, so I asked them who they already had among their members.
So they read off quite a list of names came to the end and said, and we think we're going to get Hejo the optometrist to sign two. He said, that's fine, I'll sign my name right under his.
But that's the way he lasted with it. You know, I just mentioned that, beloved brethren, to show you that we do not live to ourselves, that if the precious living Word of God is effectual, beloved Saints, in this heart of mine, as it ought to be.
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As we had together with the dear young people.
Draw me.
We will run after thee. There is no heart that is ever drawn after the Lord Jesus, but what it has its happy effect on others.
And we read the sad contrast where Peter says I go a fishing.
And immediately the answer is, we also go with thee.
All, beloved friend, which is it, as we read this portion of God's word and see the claim of that word over us for our good, and for our happiness, and for our blessing, and for the welfare of our families.
What shall we do? Shall we dare to suggest that these claims are too much? That this is going to restrict us in some way or another? Restrict us? I shudder when I hear that word, and yet I've heard it from the lips of those who are truly the Lord.
There is something about the claims of Christ that they find restricting, and they shatter at the word separation as though it had a ring of legality about it.
We were at a very beautiful wedding the other day at which I heard the same words repeated that have so often been repeated before as the young lady stood.
Waiting to slip her arm through that of her expected bridegroom, she was asked a very talented question. Do you promise that forsaking all other, you will plead to him only so long as he both shall live? Have you ever heard that question before?
I heard it addressed to a young lady 27 years ago and she said yes, she said I do.
And you know, I don't believe that in any of these cases that I have witnessed.
Has there been any hesitation or thought of the legality involved in that?
The privileges and whatnot that are going to be abandoned forever, forsaking all other cleave to Him only so long as he boasts shall live. I like the sound of that. May I put those words to you this afternoon here? God has opened up his heart and said, I love you very much. I want you to have fullness of joy.
And I want it to be in your families, too.
And here is what I am going to put before you, the word of God.
With all its light and wisdom and blessed story of love revealed.
Hidden in the heart and the soul, seen in the activity of the hands and in that which we seek after. Talked over with our dear children. Not just once or twice, not just in order that they might know a verse for Sunday school. A fine thing to do, but just a topic woven into the conversation of.
Every day. What a memory. Well, now it says here in verse 20. And thou shalt write them upon the doorposts of thine house. I like this.
It seems that the house itself is recognized and stands out from others as a home where the word of God.
Is love and reverence. Would you like that to be the testimony of your home?
Dearly beloved parents, is it not true? And I speak with my own hand accusingly on my heart, is it not true?
That we have ambitions for our home and our children. That we need to judge before God.
I heard my father say to us.
Quite a good many times.
Sons, I would sooner see you sweeping the streets of the city of Ottawa for a living and pleading the Lord and making the biggest income in the province.
I would sooner see you sweeping the streets of the city and living to please the Lord and making the biggest income in the province. And you know, as God gave us a family and the memory of those words came back to me.
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They challenged me till I didn't know which way to turn.
I felt I couldn't honestly say such a thing. I felt that God knew the desires, the wretched, wrong desires that were in my heart. We like our children to be popular. We like them to be pointed out. We like them to excel in this or that. Am I the only parent that has to make such a confession?
Is your desire, is my desire that they might live for the glory of God?
That this precious book might mean more to them than it's ever meant to us.
And that the precious claims of the Lord Jesus might lay hold of their hearts in a deeper way than had ever touched our own. Oh, if those ambitions of yours and mine are to see them advance in this world, will live to regret it. Will live to regret it. I've seen it happen again and again. Ambitions raise those children higher and higher in the esteem of their.
Fellow classmates at school until.
The charm of it all takes them completely away from the joy that has promised us here in these passages.
Thou shalt write them upon the doorposts of fine house. I was standing on the front porch of a home some time ago.
With a dear old man and a couple of little girls walked past.
And I saw them looking up at the dear old man, and he smiled and waved to them and they went past and he hung his head, he said.
Maybe I shouldn't tell you this, but you know what I heard one of those girls say to the other when she passed this home a while ago?
She plucked her little Playmates coat sleeve and pointed to this house and said that's the home where they loved Jesus and talk about him.
Isn't that a nice testimony for a home? The word of God found upon the doorpost of such a home. Is that your home?
If the Lord leaves us here, will that be the memory or children will take forth from the doors of your home, a home where the Lord Jesus was loved, where his praises were sung continually?
Where His word was read with glad submission. I say again, beloved, will this be the memory that your children will take with them when they walk out one day from the front door of that home to set up a home of their own?
Bound upon the doorpost of the house and upon my gates. I suppose that's a little farther out, perhaps a little more public testimony. But this comes last. It begins in the heart. It works its way through the soul, the hand, the eye. It's given to the children in such a precious and continual and natural way.
And then the whole house is characterized by it. And finally the gates, public testimony, and then the wondrous promise of the Lord, the days of heaven upon the earth. Oh, beloved, I told you at the beginning, and it was an embarrassing and a very frightening thing that I had before me today.
It's the responsibility of parents and homes today. It's a big responsibility.
And I I don't think we realize what a difficult world our dear children and young people are facing, but if they're hedged about with the word of God.
They're well protected.
You know the very last verse of the Old Testament. I will turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite thee first with a curse. It just seems to me that last picture.
When things are so dark and so indifferent and so evil, as though those fathers were just putting their arms around their children, that there might be found for them a bulwark against the evil that was, in that day so dark.
Let me go back again, please, to that verse in Exodus 29. The holy garments of Aaron shall be his son after him.
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Now, mind you, there's no father.
Here or on the face of the earth?
That would ever think for one moment.
Of pointing to his children.
As though God had rewarded his faithfulness every Father.
And every mother would have to own in all honesty.
With their heads bowed lowered, with the tears running down their cheeks. That thou blessing of the Lord upon our children.
Is sovereign, matchless, undeserved grace, and I own it before you.
Sovereign. Matchless.
Undeserved grace. But do we have a promise or do we not? Yes, beloved, we have the promise of God. From the day that little one was given to us, we have the promise of God. May God grant that we shall lay hold upon these promises and display before them in our own life and testimony, the fear of the Lord.
And the joy of the Lord.
May I repeat that please? The fear of the Lord and the joy of the Lord, for I believe they go together. I guess a lot of folks considered my dad to be a very legal man.
I don't think he was.
I'm prejudice, of course, but I don't think he was. I think I have observed this in going in and out among the Lord's people.
There is quite a distinction between the fear of God and legality.
A legal man is not a happy man. Do I not speak the truth? A legal man is not a happy man. But a man who walks in the fear of the Lord is a happy man. He may have a conscience about the same thing that the other man abhors, but his conscience is governed by the joyful control of the fear of the Lord in his life.
And I truly believe, dear Saints of God, that that which our children will remember if we walk with God in this.
The fear of the Lord and the joy of the Lord was the character of the home in which they grew up. And this we earnestly seek, with God's help, may be true of the homes and families represented here. Oh dear boys and girls and beloved young people, you and I only realize what a treasure we have in this book and how needful it is for you and for me to read this precious book.
Prayerfully, earnestly, and.
I hardly know whether to say this or not, but I sometimes recommend reading it on your knees.
I was traveling with a young man some time ago, and each evening before we retired, this young man got his Bible, opened it with such loving reverence, and knelt down and read for a good long time on his knees. He didn't do it just to show off in front of me either. I knew him well enough for that. He had formed the habit of reading God's Word on his knees, and it shows in his life.
The young man that walks in the fear of God and bears a testimony of real joy among those who know him well. Oh, May God grant that it shall be true, and that the holy garments of Aaron may, by the grace of God, be handed down.
From father to son.