Des Moines Conference: 1982
Table of Contents
Sons of God
Address—W. Gill
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General Meeting at Des Moines, May 1982, addressed by Walter Gill.
46 in the appendix.
Am I an object, Lord, below, which would divide my heart with thee?
Which word the verdicts even flow and answer to thy constancy him #46 in the appendix.
Our heads and close our eyes.
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I'd like to turn to the book of Proverbs, chapter one.
Proverbs chapter one starting at verse 8.
My son.
Here the instruction of thy father.
And forsake not the law of thy mother, for they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head.
And chains about thy neck.
My son of sinners, entice the consent thou not if they say, come with us, let us lay wait for blood. Let us work lurk privily for the innocent without cause. Let us swallow them up alive as the grave, and whole as those that go down into the pit. We shall find all precious substance. We shall fill our houses with spoil, cast in thy lot among us. Let us all have one purse, my son, walk not thou in the way with them.
Refrain my foot from their path, for their feet run to evil, make haste to shed blood.
This would just serve as an introduction to what's before me.
The three times in these verses we have the the address my son as that team that I would like to follow in the book of Proverbs. But before we get into it, I would like to turn to the epistle of John first. John.
Just to establish who we are.
First, John 3.
And verse one.
Behold, what manner of love? Or I believe more simply, behold what love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we, we should be called the sons of God.
Marvelous consideration.
Or we may well say, Who are we, Creatures of the dunks?
But sons had gone now turn to the epistles of the Philippians.
The second chapter.
Philippians 2 and verse 15.
That you may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God without rebuke.
In the midst of a crooked and perverse nation or generation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life, sons of God. In the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. One more verse in Second Corinthians.
2nd Corinthians 6 and verse 18.
2nd Corinthians 618 I will be a father unto you.
And ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
So again, by way of introduction to this subject.
Two or three things I would like to establish.
One of them is that although these remarks are addressed to sons.
I would suggest they equally apply to the daughter, to the sisters, to the young ladies in this room as well as those who are older.
You know, we had three daughters and one son.
I never sent any difference in their thought as to their position, position in our home and our family. We never made a distinction between them. Although we had only the one son, he had no more preferred place than our girls did. And so I would suggest that you sisters have a place equal with the brothers before gone.
But it isn't just a a place.
There it's a responsibility. Not just a privilege, but a responsibility. So I would like to cite 2 little instances in my own life.
Some of you knew my father.
And I remember one time when I called on him in his office, I was just a young fellow, perhaps just a teenager.
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When another man in the office saw me.
And he went to my father and he said, your boy is here.
My father corrected him. I heard him correct him.
He said. That's my son.
Not enough to say that's my boy, that's my son. And I thought and I still think.
50 years later.
At that position position of being a son of my father.
Bespoke. A real privileged place. But now there was another incident.
Which occurred, I think somewhat before that time.
My brothers and I knew.
That there were certain things that we could not just ask my mother.
My mother's permission, we had to go to my father.
And while I have no recollection of what the incident was, I remember going to my father.
And applying him with all the arguments I couldn't or something I wanted to do and I repeatedly was turned down.
That is, this was one conversation.
And finally, and I said, well, so and so is doing that. The other meeting folks are doing it. Finally I said, well, why can't I?
And I got an unforgettable answer, he said. Because you are Frank Gill's son.
That that ended the organ and that spoke of responsibility.
So those two incidents established what's before me that we have a privileged place we occupy as sons of God.
A privileged place, but we have a responsibility to conduct ourselves as.
The Epistle to the Philippians says.
Without rebuke in the midst of this generation.
It is in such disorder. Now those thoughts, Well, I would like to add 1 more.
Again turning to my children.
When my children would go out.
For some school event.
Or even a party among the meeting folks.
I think I invariably told them as they left the home. Remember whose you are?
And you know what interested me? That they never asked me what I meant.
But I never asked them what they thought I meant.
And I might say.
What I meant was they were my children and I expected a conduct.
That was becoming to our home, but equally so, I meant you, children.
The one by one confessed the Lord as your savior and as a conduct that's becoming to that. So let that be before you as you go out on this.
This party, or whatever it is on this occasion. So again, you and I are sons of gong, daughters and sons, if you will, but privileged and responsible before gone.
So now with those thoughts, turn to the second chapter of Proverbs.
And what this goes through in sequence?
Through this book, the several references, the several messages, and I might say that I surely enjoyed The Sunday School yesterday and the thought of this book containing those personal messages. There was a question of salvation. Here, it's a question of responsibility.
So proverbs 2 and verse one.
Says my son, If thou wilt receive my words and hide my commandments with thee, so that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding, Yeah, If thou Christ after knowledge and liftest up thy voice for understanding, if thou seekest her silver and searches for her As for hid treasures, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God.
For the Lord giveth wisdom, Out of his mouth cometh knowledge.
And understanding he layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous. He is a buckler to them that walk uprightly. He keepeth the paths of judgment, and preserveth the way of the Saints. Then shalt thou understand righteousness and judgment and equity. Yeah, every good path.
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So this is the first message that the address to you and me and are responsible position.
Receive my words.
As we go through this series of verses and messages, will find that many of them, most of them, perhaps.
Turn on the fact that we must read God's word, for I believe that's what's given us here in this first verse. If thou art, receive my words and my commandments, and I cannot stress enough.
The urgent need.
That everyone of us read God's Word daily.
Indeed I would that you would read proverbs every day and something beside.
I found it such a joy to read this book of Proverbs for quite a while now.
Every single trip through I find something new, and I'm amazed at the structure of the book, the content of it, the joy that one finds in reading the book of Proverbs. So I would urge upon you to do it. And incidentally, you've heard it many a time, I suppose.
The reminder that there's 31 books, 31 Chapters in the book of Proverbs, and it lends itself very nicely to one chapter a day. And I'm amused sometimes at my own thought when they say it and when I sit down to read my Bible in the morning.
Tomorrow morning for example, I might say oh, today is Proverbs the 1St.
It's easy to remember, then, what chapter to read. But don't just limit yourself to Proverbs. Read. Read other portions of God's Word and feed upon them. We'll talk more about this as we go along.
But here are this basic call to the sun is to receive God's word.
In the second and third verse we get a wonderful coupling, wisdom and understanding and knowledge. This is available to us.
If we're before gone and feeding upon his word, the fifth verse and the ninth verse give us some results. Immediate results, I suppose we might say.
The first verse, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. The ninth verse, then shalt thou understand righteousness, judgment, equity, yeah, every good path.
Even speaking yesterday more particularly, but some today.
About the privilege we have of a banquet place feeding upon the Lord a thing of these added things, not just feeding these privileges. We won't take time to recount them, but.
Think about them, what we just have these two results, multiplied results really and all that would be nice to just go on through that second chapter and see more results that are given us.
Now we go on to the third chapter in the first verse.
My son, forget not my law, but let thine heart keep my commandments. For length of days, and long life and peace shall I add to thee.
In the second chapter, it was if thou receive my word.
3rd chapters we've just read My son. Don't forget it, Receive it. But don't forget it. And there's a result here too. And I believe that it does have an application in our lives in the year 1982.
We often say that earthly blessings were related to Israel, the earthly people, but Timothy, the oppressive Timothy, definitely established.
That godliness is profitable.
It's to our advantage to walk in a godly way and so we have here.
Length of days and long life and peace shall I add to thee Now, I'm not going to say that this guarantees that you're going to live past 70 years. I don't think that's the principle of it. But certainly we can take for ourselves the peace.
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It can be added in our lifetime.
By a dependent spirit and going on in the word gone.
I'll get in the third chapter, the 11Th verse.
My son.
Despise not the chastening of the Lord, neither be weary of his Church.
Whom the Lord loveth and correcteth, even as a father the Son in whom he delighted.
And what an essential part this is of our lives. The chastening of the Lord, the school of God. Wonderful, wonderful place to be.
Sometimes the lessons seem hard, but I suppose invariably.
I suppose I better say almost invariably.
That the results of the school of God are such that they bring rejoice into our hearts I wouldn't want to miss.
A single lesson that I've had in my life in the school of God.
Sometimes it's for correction, sometimes it's just to establish some growth.
And so I would commend the word of God to you all again.
And again, we must not take long to dwell on these points where there's so much ground we can cover again in the third chapter, dropped down to verse 21.
My son let not them depart from mine eyes.
Heap sound wisdom and discretion.
So shall they be life unto thy soul, and grace to thy neck then.
Shalt thou walk in thy way safely.
And thy foot shall not stumble.
You're not amazing to see these positive statements.
Positive assurances are the results of taking in God's word, feeding upon it, and digesting it, and applying it in our lives. So again, just a quick review. The second chapter. If thou would receive my words, the third chapter forget not my law, Let thine heart keep my commandments. And now 321, my son, let them not depart from thine eyes.
Keep sound wisdom and discretion, and immediately the result is stated, then shalt thou walk in thy way safely, and thy foot shall not stumble? And the 24th verse? I really want to touch on it a little later.
In an amplified form, but they don't 24th words.
Says when thou lost down, thou shalt not be afraid, yeah, thou shalt lie down.
My sleep shall be sweet.
Go to bed with the word of God on your heart and mind, and thou liest down. Thou shall not be afraid. Ye thou shalt lie down, and I sleep shall be sweet.
I'll go to the 4th chapter.
Attempts were.
Here, O my son, and receive my sayings, in the years of thy life shall be many.
And again, we've already had this, but here it's repeated Godless with a good reason. We've had it already, the reference to the very advantage in our daily life.
If we hear God's word, receive them for ourselves and act upon to make them a part of ourselves and to go on from that tenth verse.
The 12Th Take the 12Th verse, When thou ghost, thy step shall not be straightened.
And when thou runest, thou shalt not stumble. I remember many years ago.
Sitting in a young people's meeting here in Des Moines and her brother Brown's home.
And the only thing I remember about it is this verse which he gave us.
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In what was said to be the Jewish translation.
As thou, God, step by step, I will open up the way before thee I am. I don't know what translation it came from, except that it was there attributed to the Jewish translation. But again, coupling those verses 10 and 12, Here, Oh my son, and receive my sayings in the years of my life shall be many. When thou ghost, thy steps shall not be straightened, and when thou runest, thou shalt not stumble.
For as thou goest.
Step by step I will open up the way before thee.
The 20th verse of the 4th chapter.
Says my son. Attend my words.
Incline thine ear unto my sayings, Let them not depart from thine eyes. Keep them in the midst of thy heart. They are life unto those that find them in health to all their flesh.
The ears, the eyes, and the heart feed them again. My son attend. Listen to it. Listen to my words. My son attended my words, and climb thine ear unto my sayings. Let them not depart to thine eyes. Keep them in the midst of thine heart for their life under those that find them, and health to all their flesh.
On the 5th chapter.
My son, A10 under my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding, that thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.
Attend unto my wisdom, thou thine ear to my understanding The thalamus regard discretion, and thy lips may keep knowledge.
Just like the calling attention again.
But in those two verses we again get mentioned wisdom, knowledge and understanding.
It's been said that wisdom is God's part.
Wisdom is God's part. Knowledge can be acquired, we can acquire knowledge, and understanding is putting these things into practice. But you find us repeatedly through the book of Proverbs, these three things often connected.
Within one verse or two verses, and many times two of them were coupled together, wisdom and knowledge, or wisdom and understanding and perhaps the same thing, wisdom and discretion.
But again.
It's from God's Word and the study of God's word occupation. Was it attending to it? Letting it operate in my life and your? I just would command God's Word to you and urge it upon you.
Now in this 5th chapter.
The 20th verse is another expression, one almost.
Oh, not hesitate to say it, but.
It's a subject.
It isn't very nice, the 20th verse of Proverbs 5.
And why wilt thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger for the ways of manner before the eyes of the Lord? And he pondereth all his going.
Another two applications to this and some parallel portions that we might look at here.
At the top of my Bible, the top margin.
There's the messages of *****.
And if I made the page, the next page on the 7th chapter speaks of a Harlot's smear.
It impressed me on Saturday.
The address that was given the emphasis.
Only danger.
The awful peril of fornication.
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And since we have a lot of young folks with us, I want to reiterate the principles that were there, stated. And indeed, here in this book of Proverbs we have some of the most solemn expressions.
New young folks.
It seems almost impossible that it should be so, but you young folks are even in junior high.
And in high school, and I suppose the same thing prevails in college and at work.
And I wouldn't limit it to young folks. Anyone of us are imperiled by these things.
But especially to you young folks that are in high school, junior high and Senior High.
As I understand it, you're being told your body is your own.
Have a good time, do what you want, go as far as you want, no restraints anymore.
Now what we have here in the book of Proverbs says it will not work. You cannot get away with.
Not to enlarge upon it, I would just like to call attention of all of us.
To four expressions here in the book of Proverbs. We must go back to the second chapter for the first one.
If speaking.
Of a strange woman.
Only greeted the second chapter, Proverbs in the 16th verse.
To deliver thee from the strange woman, even from the stranger which flattereth with her words, the 18th verse, her house inclineth unto death.
Now the 5th chapter.
In the fifth verse.
Again, it's a strange woman.
The fifth verse says her feet go down to death.
Steps take hold on hell.
I'll go to the 7th chapter.
And the last burn?
Her house is the way to hell going down to the chambers of death.
That's not all. Go to the 9th chapter.
In the last verse.
He know not that the dead are there and that her guests.
God's word forbidden. And here we see something of God's appraisal of it. Now, I by no means to mean to say what we have here, that our guests are in the depths of hell. I don't mean to say that one who's failed in this way has lost his salvation. Certainly from the earthly viewpoint, you can ruin your life.
By ignoring God's warnings.
And again, you young folks, when you're told these things in school.
Do not hear those things. Remember, God's standards have not changed.
Remember what God's word says.
Now, to go on, we'll come back to this subject in a little bit and let's go on to the 6th chapter.
In the first verse.
Hi, son.
I'll be surety for thy friend. If thou hast stricken thy hand with a stranger, thou art snared with the words of thy mouth.
Are taken with the words of thy mouth.
This should automatically remind us of the unequal yoke.
And I might say in passing that in this series of verses.
Goes on into the 7th chapter. I picture it as.
As no one is at home in his father's house and these are basic instructions getting me ready to go out into this world.
And here's the warning on the unequal yield.
If thou be surety for thy friend, or if thou stricken thy hand with a stranger, I believe that's an expression that relates to the these the Mid Eastern countries, where, in contrast to our shaking hands to establish a contract or an agreement, they would plot their hands together, and that established the relationship. So if thou stricken my hand with the stranger, thou art smeared with the words of thy mouth.
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Are taken with the words of thy mouth. And so the warning is, as a Christian, you have no business making such an arrangement. What are you going to do about it? We'll go on at the third verse. Do this now, my son, Deliver thyself. When thou come into the hand of thy friend, go humble thyself, and make sure thy friend give not sleep to thine eyes, nor slumber to thine islands. Deliver thyself as a roll from the hand of the hunter, and as a bird from the hand of the follower.
That is, you acknowledge that you made that agreement, but because you belong to the Lord Jesus, you must break the agreement and do it as quick as you can.
Notice we think of as business arrangements.
But you may have a girlfriend or a boyfriend.
Who doesn't belong to the Lord Jesus?
You better break off that relationship.
Better than breaking off?
Because here's a message from heaven itself.
My son, if thou be surety for thy friend, if thou stricken thy hand with a stranger, thou art sneered with the words of thy mouth. Thou art taken with the words of thy mouth, and break that relationship as soon as you can.
How the 6th chapter again 20th verse?
My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother. Bind them continually upon thine heart.
And tie them about thy neck.
No one would die, just diverge for the moment. I was thinking of these messages as from heaven itself, from God our Father speaking to us as Son. It seems to speak more of home here, your Father and your mother, in the home from which you come.
Keep thy father's commandment and forsake, not the law of thy mother. And it's an expression that's used several times in Proverbs. We had it in the first chapter.
And I'm not sure just the real distinction to me between these two, but it would seem all. I would just suggest that we got two or three things coupled in proverbs. One of them is knowledge and discretion.
And someone has applied that in this very verse that we have thy Father's commandment.
And the law of thy mother father's commandment may be rather rigid. This is it, he said. This is the commandment, and the mother more tender and soft.
Says this is the way to apply that now.
And truth and mercy is another couple that we might apply. The Father again says this is the truth.
And the Mother adds mercy. This is the way it's to be applied knowledge or a wisdom on the part of the father discretion in applying that wisdom. I would just suggest that they're kind of a distinction might be made between this.
Thy father's commandment and the law of thy mother. Certainly we can be thankful for godly fathers, godly mothers, who have marked out the way.
And shown us the path that they had determined.
Undergone in large school and they passed it on to their children and maybe we can pass it on to our children.
My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother. Now I'd like to go on, though it says, buying them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck. So now Gauss, yet shall keep lead thee.
When thou sleepest, it shall keep thee, and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee.
Where the commandment is a lamp.
And the law is light and reproof of instruction or the way of life, as a lot said in those verses. Again, let's apply it to the word of God.
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The 22nd verse, when now ghost, it shall lead thee.
What about our path, your path and mine day-to-day path?
While the Lord leaves us here, we can get lots and lots of instructions from the word of God. When thou goest, the Word of God will somehow instruct you as to the passage of the phone with regard to your work, your companionship, your home, and of course, as to heaven itself, when thou ghost, it shall leave thee. When my sleep is, it shall keep thee wonderful thing to read the word of God.
Before we go to bed, I remember our brother. Doctor Rule emphasized that to me, and I generally tried to follow it, although I have to confess to a real failure. But he said, the last thing you ought to put in your head at night is the word of God. I'll have to say, though, that I tend to fall asleep in my chair, and sometimes I don't do justice to the word of God, and I'm ashamed of myself for that. But when thou sleepest.
At Choctri. And then when thou awakest, they shall talk with thee.
You wake up in the night 1:00 two o'clock 3:00.
You wonder what? Why are you away? It's nice to just lift your heart, to go on and say.
Is there something that you would say to me?
And maybe the Lord doesn't answer. Maybe there isn't anything you want to reach your conscience and heart about. But it's nice just to meditate on God's Word, what you had put in your mind when you went to bed.
To think about it, and I pretty well promise that sleep will come back pretty quickly after that, somebody has said. Or Satan wakes up in the night and you think about God's word, he'll get you back to sleep quick.
I don't know that we should count on that. But I say, when you awaken in the night, it's nice to have God's word before him. So we have. When thou gross that shall lead thee, when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee. And when thou awakest it's autocracy. I want to add one thing to him.
I speak from experience.
When you go to the hospital, it'll be a wonderful comfort.
Being a wonderful comfort when you're in trouble.
When you're in the hospital yourself or with a loved one, the word of God that you stored up.
The Holy Spirit can bring it and make it good in your heart and conscience when you're there in the hospital.
And again just to briefly touch on at the 23rd verse says the commandment is a lamp and the law is light would take us to the 119th Psalm about the word of God being a lamp unto my feet and a light to my path. So the word of God contracts itself.
Now we must go on though, and in the 7th chapter.
First verse.
My son, keep my words and lay up my commandments. With thee I have virtually a duplication of what we've already had. Maybe it's the third time it's expressed the urgent appeal from our God and Father to you and me as sons and daughters to read His word, to let it act in your heart and mind. My son, keep my words and lay up My commandments with thee keep my commandments and live.
And my law is the apple of thine eye. Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart, Say in the wisdom of thou art my sister, and call understanding like kinswoman, that they may keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words.
How I'd like you to keep that place and turn back to the book of Job.
Job 23.
I've been reading Job lately and I have to say what a remarkable, what a wonderful man he was going to be. Great to meet him in the glory.
To talk to him about his book and his experiences, But now the 23rd chapter of Job. Just one little expression in the middle of verse 12.
Jerome says I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.
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I'd like to paraphrase it.
I have esteemed the words of his mouth more necessary than my breakfast.
I mean that.
You could time yourself some time reading a chapter.
It won't take 5 minutes even if you go over it slowly, but I don't want you to stop with one chapter. I think you should read somewhat something besides the one chapter in Proverbs, but it wouldn't take long. You could sacrifice a little at breakfast time. You could get up a little earlier.
Job says I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.
For now, let's look at what Jeremiah says about it.
Jeremiah 15.
Jeremiah Jeremiah 15 verse 16.
Says thy words were found and I did eat them.
My word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine harm, for I am called by Thy name, O Lord Godfold.
Thy words were found right here in the book, and I beneath them. Thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart.
So back to the 7th chapter. Keep my my son, Keep my words and lay out my commandments with thee. Keep my commandments and live and my laws, the apple as I know, buying them upon my fingers. Write them upon the table of thine heart, Say into wisdom thou art my sister, and call understanding thy kinswoman. Now the next verse says that they may keep thee from the strange woman.
From the stranger which flattereth with her words, we already talked about that strange woman.
In connection with promiscuity.
The alcohol breakdown of morality in the world and so close to us and being urged upon young folks at school. I want to take a little different aspect though, and that is to consider that this strange woman and the stranger.
Something in the world itself, the world system making its claims upon us.
There are no need to specify what those claims might be. There could be greatness, fame.
Pleasure, whatever it might be, nothing to do with morality.
But the world wants to make claims upon us all.
They they would attract young folks in many ways. Now the word of God will keep us from that. We have no business dealing with that rural system that's characterized as the strange woman or the stranger which may be distinguished from the strange woman. I'm not just sure how.
But we get different aspects in the world, and God's Word will protect us, deliver us from those claims that are made upon us. But it stems from the Word of God being operative in our hearts. And So what we have here it it's solemn to read especially the 5th chapter and the 7th chapter and then the latter part of the 9th chapter.
It's regard to the claims that this strange woman.
Makes upon us, and she does it so quietly. You may walk into it innocently, and nevertheless there are claims that are made upon you, but God's word will preserve you. Do not forget or Jeremiah said, I'm called by thy name, And again what we have in the God in the epistle of John, that we should be called the sons of God. Oh, don't you ever forget, And as I said to my children.
Remember whose you are. You and I belong to the Lord of glory, to the living God. And we're sons and daughters of here. So the 7th chapter now.
Really concludes this series, except we go on into the latter part of Proverbs. And as I said, it seemed to me it appeals to me that these early admonitions are getting started for life's path, now, if you will.
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There are about 15 chapters that we skip over. There's no mention of this anymore when we come to the 23rd chapter.
And it seemed to me that there's a measure of maturity in the ones that are being addressed, the one who's addressed.
And the 23rd chapter in the 15th verse.
Says my son. If thine heart be wise, my heart shall rejoice, even mine, yeah, my reigns shall rejoice when thy lips speak right things.
We're on the way now.
Sort of on our own.
Not so dependent. Not getting that basic instruction, but has it taken effect?
My son, if thine heart be wise, my heart shall rejoice.
I dare say that we can without any doubt say that God, the living God looks down upon his children here and it gives joy to his heart when he sees one or another and many another walking with him, regardless of the cost. Seemingly unknown, unheralded. The world might say you're getting nowhere, but that heart is in tune with heaven.
My son, thine heart be wise, My heart shall rejoice, Even mine Yeah, my reign shall rejoice when thy lips speak right things. The 19th verse. Hear thou my son, and be wise and guide thine heart in the way.
Now, coupled with these things in this chapter are some solemn warnings.
In the 17th verse it says let not thine heart envy Sinner.
Honestly, the danger is to keep up with the Joneses, as the world says.
Ah, don't be envious. We're strangers here. We're on the way home.
Then the 20th verse says be not among wine giver. Be careful in this connection.
The 30th verse, they that carry long at the wine are warned to avoid that. But then there's one more thing.
And that's the 23rd verse by the truth and sell it not.
Also wisdom and instruction and understanding. Our time is running out. We can't dwell on these things, but.
It seems to me that.
These are such important things, reminders as we're going on the way now.
Wallace on our own, not tied till home. We're out on our own, but still we appeal. The message comes from heaven.
As to the means, the dangers, the perils that were up against now, the 26th verse of chapter 23 says, my son, give me thine heart.
I want an appeal, that is.
I say one pictures best person, but it's actually you and me.
One pictures us out on our own.
But being observed from heaven itself.
And the heaven that called from heaven, says my son, give me thine heart. What's so important about it? Well, if we turn back to Chapter 4.
Keep that place, if you will, in chapter 4.
Verse 23 says Keep thy heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life.
Keep thy heart with all diluted.
Out of it are the issues of life.
You know, it's a simple thing for me to say that my heart belongs to my wife.
I love her very much and I like her too and we like to do things together.
So it's in that.
In that light that I believe, our Heavenly Father says, give me thine heart.
Not make me the object of your life. I don't mean in Contra distinction to my wife. We know how this is.
Were companions together, but as a son of God.
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Lord says, give me thine heart. Now if we could quickly look at this, the other verses in that 4th chapter, 24th verse, Put away from the forward mouth and frivolous lips put far from the left. Thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before the corner. The path of thy feet and let all thy ways be established. Turn not to the right hand nor to the left. Remove thy foot from evil.
Now, Lot said, in those verses, there's a reference not only to the heart, but the mouth and lips. What are you saying? What's your conversation? Is it in keeping with the high calling that we have the 25th verse, the eyes and the eyelids? What are you looking at? What's your object? Did you go along this path? What's attracting you? Is it all the billboards, all the things that are on the side of the road that the world seeks to use for?
The 26th verse pondered the path of thy feet. Where are you going?
And last, in the 27th verse removes thy foot from evil. Where do you stand right now?
The time doesn't have lost and expand upon it, but it seems to me that.
For some song things they are forced to remember.
Now the 24th chapter.
13th verse says my son.
Eat thou, honey, because it is good, and the honeycomb which is sweet to thy taste.
Now if with this we read in the 25th chapter.
I'm sure there are better taught brothers and I, but the 27th verse says it is not good to eat much honey. So for men to search their own glory is not glory.
If I can take the liberty to suggest that the eating of honey here.
Speaks of a sort of a self satisfaction.
In something that you and I may have accomplished, that you may have accomplished.
I look back over my business life in particular. There's something that I like to think about. I made some marks.
But as I told some of the folks that I worked with, you'll never see a name plate that says Walter Gill did this. But when I look at it, I can say I did that. I played a part in that.
I I played a part in a Telegraph system.
That grew and is an important part of American business.
I helped in the building of a pulp mill that our brethren up.
At Eureka, CA called Uncle Walt's Mill. I was only a small part of it. But I think what we have here, my son. Eat thou, honey, because it is good. Said Don't get occupied with that now. Don't think how good you are. Sure, be confident of yourself. That's good. But don't be occupied with it. Good to have some ambition. Some ambition. It's good to think well of yourself.
But don't get occupied with it, my son. Eat thou, honey, because it is good in the honeycomb, which is sweet as I take. But don't overdo em.
Now in the 24th chapter, the 21St verse says my son.
Fear thou the Lord and the King, and meddle not with them that are given to change.
Share thou, the Lord, Here is our attitude, our relationship above.
And honor the king her earthly relationship. There are other verses that speak about our relationship with the king.
How is the proper attitude with the proper?
Voice that is, words that are spoken. We may indeed stand before great men. We may stand before kings. So here again on the path as we're going along, two reminders.
You stand before God and you're a witness before men, so don't forget those relationships, my son.
The Lord.
And the king honored the king.
Now the 27th chapter.
Gives us the last one.
2711.
My son.
Be wise and make my heart glad.
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That I may answer him, that reproaches me.
A wonderful one. It reminds me of Dear Job.
Sound. I've been reading about job recently.
That man is the most admirable man.
But there was a day, as you surely all remember, when Satan appeared at one of the meetings, if we can say that up there in the courts of glory, when the sons of God came before God and Satan appeared.
And it tells us that God said, Satan, what have you been doing? Well, he said. I've been going up and down the earth.
Looking over the scene, and I dare say that that includes Des Moines in Oakland, CA and many another place, and that that same kind of thing may be going on right now.
But here our Father and the glory.
Says be wise to make my heart glad that I may answer him that reproaches me.
Is it possible?
But Satan, the accuser of the brethren?
Would stand before God and say.
Sure, so and so says he trusts you, he believes in you. But what kind of conduct is that?
When? When he accused? When God called his attention to Job.
God gave Joan the highest commendation. Satan could not bring an accusation against it. But could Satan to day bring an accusation against you or me? Oh, I trust nothing. We do know that if there's been failure, there's a means of correction, and that's a wonderful thing. But here is the closing statement, the closing message from heaven, for you and for me, my son.
My daughter be wise, and make my heart glad that I may answer him that reproaches me.
At the privilege and a responsibility. Now in closing, let's go back to the 4th chapter.
Here it's not my son.
Perhaps a warmer expression. Chapter 4 and verse one. Hear ye, children, the instruction of a father, and attend to no understanding, For I give you good doctrine forsaking not my law. The fourth verse.
The second clause, let thine heart retain my words, keep my commandments, and live, get wisdom, get understanding, forget it, not near the decline from the words of my mouth.
Forsake her not, she shall preserve thee. Love her, and she shall keep thee. Wisdom is the principal thing. Therefore get wisdom, and with all thy getting get understanding. Exalt her, and she shall promote thee. She shall bring thee to honor. When noticed, embrace her. She shall give to thine head an ornament of grace, a crown of glory shall she delivered to thee.
In the 8th chapter.
The fourth verse.
Unto you, O man, I call, and my voice is to the sons of men, O ye simple, understand wisdom, and ye fools me of an understanding heart. Here for I will speak of excellent things in the opening of my lips shall be right things, for my mouth shall speak truth, and wickedness is an abomination to my life. All the words of my mouth are in righteousness. There's nothing.
Forward to perverse in them. They're all plain to him that understands and write to them that find knowledge.
Receive my instruction and not sober knowledge rather than choice. Gold for wisdom is better than rubies, and all the things that may be desire are not to be compared to.
In The Way
Address—P. Johnson
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General Meeting at Des Moines, May 1982, addressed by.
Paul Johnson.
Mr. Glory bringing God set forth his heavenly name.
On we March in Korra singing Worthy the Ascended Lamb, hymn #16.
Many songs to glory.
Bring.
Oh my God, you feel it's a long time.
Ago.
I'm going to read first a passage in the book of Joshua chapter 2.
Joshua Chapter 2.
And we'll begin reading in the first verse.
And Joshua the son of Nun sent out of Shitham 2 men to spy, secretly saying go view the land even Jericho. And they went and came into an harlots house named Rehab in lodge there. And he was told the king of Jericho saying, Behold, there came men in hit her tonight of the children of Israel to search out the country. And the king of Jericho sent unto Rahab saying.
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Bring forth the men that are come to thee, which are entered into thine house, for they become to search out all the country. Verse 6 But she had brought them up to the roof of the house, and hid them with the stalks of flax, which he had laid an ardour upon the roof. And the men pursued after them the way to Jordan under the Fords, And as soon as they which pursued after them were gone out, they shut the gate.
And before they were laid down, she came up unto them upon the roof. And she said unto the men.
I know that the Lord hath given you the land, and that your terror has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when ye came out of Egypt.
And what you did under the two kings of the Amorites that were on the other side, Jordan, Sion, and Ogg, whom ye utterly destroyed. And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt. Neither did there remain any more courage in any man because of you, For the Lord your God He is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath. Now therefore I pray you, swear unto me by the Lord, since I have showed you kindness.
That you will also show kindness unto my Father's house and give me a true token.
And that you will save a life, my father and my mother and my brethren and my sisters and all that they have, and deliver our lives from death. And the men answered her. Our life were yours if you utter, not this our business.
And it shall be, when the Lord hath given us the land, that we will deal kindly and truly with thee.
Then she let them down by a cord through the window, for her house was upon the town wall. And she dwelt upon the wall. And she said unto them, Get you to the mountain, lest the pursuers meet you, and hide yourselves there three days until the pursuers be returned, and afterward may you go your way. And the men said unto her, We will be blameless of this thine oath which thou hast made us swear. Behold, when we come into the land, thou shalt bind this line of scarlet thread.
And the window which thou didst LED us down by and thou shalt bring thy father and thy mother.
Thy brethren, and all thy father's household home unto thee, and it shall be that whosoever shall go out of the doors of thy house into the street, his blood shall be upon his head. And we will be guiltless. And whosoever shall be with thee in the house, his blood shall be on our head, if any hand be upon him. And if thou utter this our business, then we will be quit of thine oath, which thou hast made us to swear. And she said, according unto your word, so be it.
And she sent them away, and they departed, and she bound the scarlet line in the window.
And a passage in the 10th chapter of Mark.
Mark 10.
And verse 46.
And they came to Jericho. And as he went out of Jericho with his disciples, and a great number of people blind, Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, set by the highway side, begging. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me, and many charge them, that he should hold his peace.
But he cried, the more a great deal thou, son of David, have mercy on me.
And Jesus stood still, and commanded him to be called. And they called the blind man, saying unto him, Be of good comfort, Rise, He calleth thee. And he, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus. And Jesus answered and said unto him, What wilt thou that I should do unto thee? The blind man said unto him, Lord, that I might receive my sight. And Jesus said unto him, Go thy way, thy faith hath made thee whole.
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And immediately he received his sight.
And follow Jesus in the way and one other passage in Luke.
Chapter 19.
Luke 19 and verse one. And Jesus entered and passed through Jericho.
And behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was rich. And he sought to see Jesus, who he was and could not for the press, because he was little of stature. And he ran before, and climbed up into a Sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down.
For today I must abide at thy house. And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it, they all murmured, saying that he was gone to be a guest with a man that is a Sinner. And Zacchaeus stood and said unto the Lord, Behold, Lord, of the half of my goods I give to the poor. And if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore him for food. And Jesus said unto him.
This day is salvation come to this house far, so much as he also is a son of Abraham.
It wasn't my thought to go into these passages in detail, but to link them together.
As they all linked together by events that take place.
At Jericho you perhaps noticed in each one of these passages we read, we have the city of Jericho brought before us, and I suppose most of us are aware of the fact that when we we have in the Old Testament the various types.
And we were to look beyond the physical cities and towns.
That are brought before us and see in them types of spiritual or moral things. For instance, we know that Egypt is a type of this world as being that where the you might say souls are enslaved and in the House of *******.
Well, Jericho also I believe is a type of this world, but it's a type of this world as being opposed.
To God being opposed to the people of God and their blessing because Jericho stood right in the way.
Of the advance of the people of God, who had been delivered out of Egypt and brought through the wilderness, and were about to come into the promised land of Canaan and Jericho, stood in the way, and that city had to be brought down. It speaks of the world in opposition to God and to the people of God, and the world as lying under judgment. We had in the scriptures that were read this morning in John's Gospel.
Chapter 12 when the Lord Jesus says now is the judgment of this world.
Well, we know of course, that as to actual execution of that judgment, that day has not yet arrived. We know that that day has not arrived because of the long-suffering mercy of God, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But nonetheless, we know that the judgment is already passed upon this world. It lies under judgment, and God is going to judge the world.
In righteousness.
By the Lord Jesus, and he's given assurance in that he has raised him from the dead, as the apostle Paul speaks in Acts 17.
So Jericho brings before us this world as lying under the.
Sentence of judgment from God. It is already a judged thing.
And it's just a matter of time when God is going to execute that judgment upon this world.
But when I wanted to bring before us this afternoon.
Is the fact that God, you might say, rescues or secures for himself and for his people something?
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For himself and for his people in this world at the present time.
That is, he has something for himself and he has something for his people. Even while, as it were, we are in Jericho now, we are not a part of the world that is passing away, but we're still in it. We're still in this world that lies under judgment and this world that is in opposition to God and to God's people. But the wonderful thing is that God comes in.
And God brings blessing to his people and he secures something for himself. When we think of this world, even we find people who do not know the Lord feel that the world is in in a terrible condition.
And those of us who know the Lord have we even feel it more keenly, the state of things that exists in this world. But there is something for God in this world, and that's his people.
There is something for God and there is something for his people.
And in these three passages I would like to bring out what God has secured for his people and for himself.
The first one we read Have you turned back to Joshua? Chapter 2 brings before us what God has secured for His people.
That is, we have in this history of the setting forth of the faith of Rehab, we have brought out something that God has for his people and secures for us.
And I might say at the end see it what it is, and then I trust we will be able to see it for ourselves. From the scriptures. What is prominent in connection with Rehab here in the second chapter of Joshua is the window of her house. You will notice that that was through the window that she.
Let these spies out of the house. It was in the window that she put that scarlet thread.
It was the window that became the prominent feature.
Of her house. Now she had a door to her house because we read in verse.
19 about the doors of the house. She had doors.
But she also had a window. Now, apparently, this woman's house.
As we read in the 15th verse, was built upon the wall.
Of that city, the city of Jericho had a wall about it, and her house was on that outside wall.
So that the door, you know, I'd say would face out to the City side. If you went out of her door, you would be going out into the city of Jericho. But her window opened up to the outside, so that outside her window, when you go outside her window, you were outside the city. The window opened up to what was outside the city. The door opened up to what was inside.
And I believe that we can see in these two things the door in the window.
But you might say that God has secured for us His people. That is, we have a window. We have a connection now with that which is outside this world. We are those who are no longer identified and associated with this world under judgment. Everything that we hope for, everything we look for, all of our connections are outside.
This world, so that Rahab we see, turned her back on the door. She didn't. She wasn't occupied with the door of her house. She was occupied with the window.
Now we read in the Epistle to James about Rahab being justified by works when she received the messengers with peace and sent them out another way.
I might contrast that with Hebrews 11 In Hebrews 11, where her faith is mentioned, says by faith the Holy Rehab perished not because she received the messengers, or rather the spies, It says in Hebrews 11 with peace.
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In other words, she received them as spies who were harbingers of the coming judgment. She recognized that they're coming to spy out the land meant that the city where she was living was doomed to destruction.
But as receiving the messengers, she received them who came with a message from God. For we find those two characters right in this second chapter. The men came to spy out the land because that city was doomed for judgment. But they also came with a message. They gave a message of hope. They gave a message of peace. A message of deliverance was brought to rehab. And so we might say that in a sense, the gospel comes to us in these two characters.
God brings the gospel to you and me.
In these two characters, as you might see, the spy character, the gospel, declares to us that the world is under judgment.
And all of that is, everything outside of Christ is going to be judged, just like.
The world that was condemned all perished outside of the Ark in Noah's day.
As spies, you might say, it's as harbingers of coming judgment. And it's good for us to realize that judgment does lie down the road, not only for this world as such, but for every individual who rejects the Lord Jesus Christ. But also the gospel comes bringing us a wonderful message of deliverance and peace, telling us of the work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
How did he die for our sins according to the scriptures?
And that he bore in his own body our sins. On the tree he suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.
And he is the one who delivers us from the wrath to come.
And believing on him for that sent him, we are we shall never come into judgment as we have in John 5/24.
These many wonderful things that come to us as messengers or as a message from God. But now, as I say in James.
It says that she sent them out another way.
But I'd like to make an application of the door here that we would want to apply to everyone in the room.
And any who might be in the room this afternoon who is not one of the Lords. Because if you are not the Lord, you don't, You do not have a window of hope. If you're not the Lord, you're a part of this city, Jericho, as it were, which is headed for judgment.
Well, the spies and these messengers, they came into rehabs house through the door.
She sent them out another way through the window, but they came in through the door.
And so it is that each one of us has to open the door to receive the message that God has for you and me. We have to open the door, as is often used in the gospel, and I believe it's a legitimate application. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. Have you, have you opened the heart's door to the Lord Jesus? And have you received the message into your heart of the gospel and believed on the Lord Jesus?
If so, then you want to shut that door. You want to shut the door that goes out into the city.
And become occupied with the window because it's the window that connects you with everything that is of God.
You see, the city of Jericho was a doomed city. There was nothing there for God.
Not a thing, Not a bit of that city. There was number, delight and pleasure in the heart of God, of anything in that city.
It was all to be judged and removed, so the door is not to be used. You'll notice that in verse 19. And it shall be that whosoever shall go out of the doors, you don't want to go out of the doors.
You want to shut the door toward this world?
And take one's posture, as it were, at the window.
I have no doubt that what after these messengers left to the House of Rehab and she bound that scarlet line in her window, I have no doubt that Rahab stood by that window looking for the armies of Israel to come, because she was told that when they came she would be delivered and would go with them into that promised land. She was no longer concerned with the City side.
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She kept that door closed and she was looking out that window because all of her prospects were outside of that doom city.
Well, we see here also that she put a scarlet line in that window.
And that Scarlet Line identified her house as not being a part of that doom city, so that when the armies of Israel came and encompassed that city, as we know they did seven days.
And when they compassed that city, they would see that scarlet line there in the window.
Of the House of Rehab. And they would say that house does not belong to the city of Jericho. That house is associated and identified with the people of God who are going on into the promised land and and are delivered from destruction. It was the scarlet line that identified her with the people of God. She put that scarlet line out there to show that she was not a part of this world. She was not a part of that city of Jericho.
That was headed for destruction. Well, I would like to just ask a little word. Especially. I'm thinking of the young persons here this afternoon. Have you put the scarlet line in the window? First of all, we want to have a window. Do you have a window? Can you say that all of my connections are heavenly?
I'm not saying that. I'm not indicating that you have entered into perhaps a lot of the truth.
But can you say that, as Paul says, our citizenship is in heaven?
Can you do you have a connection with the world above where the Lord Jesus is the center and the Lord of that glory?
Are you a part of this world that is headed for destruction? The Apostle Paul says, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which I am crucified under the world and the world unto me.
It was the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ that separated him from.
This present evil world, and he is now. He was associated with that word above. Do you have a window if you are a believer on the Lord Jesus Christ? You do. You are connected with that which is outside this world. You belong to another world.
You belong to the world above. You're part of that new creation. If any man be in Christ, it's a new creation.
All things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new as a believer in Christ.
And in Christ you are part of that new creation. You belong to the world above.
And so everything that you have that is lasting and genuine.
Is connected with what is outside this world. But now then, do you, have you put the scarlet line in that window? That is, have you made it a public thing that you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ and that you're not a part of this world? I believe when Rehab put that scarlet line there, it indicated that she was not a part of Jericho.
And everyone who saw that Scarlet line would understand that they would say that woman doesn't belong to Jericho.
And that's how they knew it. It was the scarlet line that made it evident. Have we made it evident that we're not a part of this world? As we go about our various pursuits and our work in our school or wherever we are, and when we make contact with people in this world, do we leave the impression with them that we are a part of the world like they are, That we're just as interested in the things of this world as they are?
Our conversation is along the lines of the world and when they leave our presence.
They may think we're a nice person, but they have no idea that we were not a part of this present evil world. Well, we want to put that scarlet line in the window, as it were, and to show that our connections are outside this world. While we're here still in this world, we're not a part of it. And our connections is with that which is outside. We want to put that scarlet line. I have no doubt that it speaks to of the death of Christ.
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Of Christ. As I just quoted from Galatians, it's the cross of Christ that has separated us from this world. And when one puts out, you might say unfurls his colors.
That Scarlet would be.
A color that would show up.
From some distance of brilliant color like Scarlet, she unfurled her colors.
Have we unfurled our colors in this world so that we give evidence?
In our manner of life, that we are not a part of this world that is under judgment. So God has secured for you and me, His people a window.
It's a window of hope.
And we want to close the door, as I say to the City side all that belongs to this world and and see that everything that is for our good and blessing is connected with the window outside when I turn over to Mark.
Gospel of Mark, chapter 10.
Where we have another.
Incident at Jericho.
And here again we have something that God has secured for his people.
And I would like to say here that we have God has secured A pathway for His people through this world, a pathway. A pathway in connection with the testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ. In this 10th chapter we have He received His sight and followed Jesus in the way. Well, the thought of being in the way is a pathway.
There the Lord was in the way.
There was a pathway here and this pathway was associated with the testimony.
The testimony of the Lord Jesus. I believe we see that in the 11Th chapter we see where the pathway was leading to, and it was it's leading to what we have in verse seven of Chapter 11. And they brought the code to Jesus and cast their garments on him, and he sat upon him.
And many spread their garments in the way, and others cut down branches off the trees and strawed them in the way. And they that went before and they that followed cried, saying, Hosanna, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Blessed be the Kingdom of our Father David that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. What a wonderful testimony is born here to the Lord Jesus. Of course. It's the testimony in connection with Israel, I know.
It's not the testimony of the gospel that we have today. It's not the testimony of the assembly, which is God's testimony in this present age. But the point I'm making is that there is there was a testimony rendered to the Lord Jesus and the pathway that he was in.
And the pathway that Bartimaeus entered upon was that pathway of testimony to the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the pathway that God has secured for you and me as his people in this world, that we might be in this pathway associated with the testimony of the Lord. The Apostle Paul says unto Timothy that he should not be ashamed of the testimony of the Lord. Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony.
Of the Lord. The pathway that we've been called to is a pathway in connection with the testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ. He has a testimony here in this world. We know He established a testimony in Jacob, that is Israel, and now he's to establish the testimony in the assembly.
And we see here that this pathway being in the way and in this pathway is not exactly an easy pathway.
You remember, we might just turn back. I'm not going to read it, but when we read in verse 17 that he went forth into the way, there came one and spoke to him, and he was well to do, but he was one who could not take the rigors of the pathway. When the Lord told him to come take up the cross and follow me, he turned away. The pathway was too difficult.
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It's a pathway of self denial. The pathway of testimony to the Lord Jesus is not necessarily an easy one. It's a pathway of self denial, self judgment. And this man could not take up the cross and follow the Lord in that pathway. And we see later on in verse 32 as they were in the way.
James and John wanted to have a special place.
In other words, we see here that the pathway is 1/2 of humiliation, because the Lord speaks of being taking that low place.
There to be in a low place. It's a pathway of humiliation, but it is a pathway of joy. It is a pathway of blessing, as the Lord indicates in verse 29. There is no man that have left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children or lands, for my sake and the Gospels. But he should receive 100 full now in this time, at this time.
So while it is a pathway of self denial and of humiliation, there is great blessing in being in this pathway. Well now I'd like to just speak a moment about Bartimaeus being brought into this pathway because we read in the last verse of our chapter that he followed Jesus in the way.
He followed Jesus in the way as remarkable the Lord had said to him, Go thy way. Verse 52 Jesus said unto him, Go thy way. But he didn't go his way. He followed Jesus in the way that brings before us the five that in this pathway that God has secured for his people.
There is no place for self will.
We can't go on our own way.
We go in the way that the Lord has set out in His precious word. We cannot go our own way. Oh, how the testimony.
Of the Lord Jesus committed to his people because the assembly is the pillar in support of the truth, and the Apostle Paul speaks of having declared the whole council of God what a testimony has been deposited.
In the assembly and it has been rendered greatly ineffective because of the self will of man each going his own way.
We know this is characteristic of man in the flesh to go his own way. But Bartimaeus did not go his own way, you might say. In a sense he was at liberty. The Lord said, go thy way, but he followed Jesus in the way, the way that God has marked out in his word for his beloved people, the pathway that He has for us, that's the way in which he went.
But now you'll notice when he is brought into this way, the first thing we see about Bartimaeus is that he understood the testimony. Notice in verse 47. Apparently he had inquired as to who this was and why the commotion? Because he was blind and couldn't see. And when he heard that, it was Jesus of Nazareth.
While I take it from this that when he inquired, he was told that the person coming that way was Jesus of Nazareth.
But when he speaks, he doesn't say Jesus of Nazareth. He says, Jesus thou son of David.
He doesn't say Jesus of Nazareth because as Jesus of Nazareth it speaks of his rejection. It's it's not associated with the the testimony that God had for his people. But as the Son of David it is. We read in the beginning of Matthews Gospel the book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the Son of David.
As the Son of David, he is associated with the testimony that God had for his people.
That's what he's declared and when the testimony is rendered to him in Chapter 11 That we read a few moments ago.
He is declared to be the son of David. Martimius understood the testimony.
Well, now you know we can't really be in the way.
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That God has for his people if we do not understand.
What the testimony of the Lord is today, the testimony of the Lord is not an earthly program.
The testimony of the Lord today is not that he is about to set up a Kingdom.
The testimony of the Lord today is connected with the gospel, and the gospel brings the light to the truth of the assembly.
The testimony of the Lord is connected with what we James speaks of, that God is visiting the Gentiles to take out of them a people for His name.
And that God is procuring a bride for his beloved Son, the Lord Jesus.
It's the gospel and that which is really connected with the gospel, the truth of the assembly.
You know the Apostle Paul in the 6th chapter of Ephesians, when he desires that the Ephesians pray for him that he might open his mouth and speak boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel.
The mystery of the Gospel.
The gospel itself, that is the declaration of the work of Christ.
Is not a mystery. That's not what he's talking about when he says the mystery of the gospel. He's not talking about preaching the gospel to lost sinners. But the mystery of the gospel is the mystery that is associated or connected with the gospel because God sends out the gospel.
Not only to save souls from.
An eternal tournament, but that he might have a people for himself. That the assembly might be formed. The mystery of the gospel. The purpose of the gospel being preached is to secure members of the assembly. That's the way. That's the way the church is formed.
The Lord added daily to the church, such as we're being saved.
That's the way it's formed, the mystery of the gospel, so the testimony of the Lord.
Is, of course the gospel the good news of the work of Christ. But we don't stop there. It goes on to take in the mystery of the gospel the truth of the assembly. Our brother. Yesterday afternoon, those of us who were here heard something of that in connection with the truth of the body of Christ.
The mystery of the gospel. Do we understand that that is God's testimony today?
There are those who take up the testimony of the gospel and stop there. They don't go on to the truth of the mystery of the gospel and to understand why God is sending out the gospel.
That he has in view of the assembly.
He hasn't viewed the assembly, which is going to be presented to Christ, a glorious church without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. Then I'd like to go a little stage further.
The days in which we live are turned by the Apostle Paul when he writes to Timothy in his second letter, The Last Days. Now there is a testimony, I believe, in connection with the last days, and that testimony is set out in the.
Second chapter of Second Timothy.
That is, it is a testimony in separation from evil. That is, that evil has come in to the Church in its profession here in this world, the House of God set up in the place of universal testimony.
Has fallen into a condition, so that it's like a great House of this world and a great mixture. And there is iniquity there. And everyone who names the name of Lord is to depart from iniquity, And their vessels under dishonor are there and recalled upon to purge ourselves from vessels under dishonor, and then to flee youthful lusts, and follow righteousness, faith, love, peace.
With them they call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
So the testimony of the Lord is not only the gospel, not only the truth of the assembly is the body of Christ, but it's also that separation from evil is God's principle of unity, and that if there's going to be a faithful testimony maintained for the Lord in this way, it's going to be maintained in separation from evil.
00:45:13
It's not enough to stop in the truth of the one body. We find that sometimes there are those who take up the first part of the testimony, the gospel, and stop. And there are others that go a little farther and take up the truth of the one body and stop. We want to go on to the full thought of the testimony as to separation from evil in the last days, that wasn't a necessary part of the testimony in the early chapters of Acts.
Now all that believed were together.
And we read when Paul writes to the Corinthians, it's with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours. But in the last days the testimony is is identified or connected with the principle of separation from evil. It's with those that call on the Lord. Out of a pure heart do we understand the testimony.
Well, I think Bartimaeus represents one who understands the testimony.
He didn't just take up what was being said by people round about Jesus of Nazareth.
No, he took up the thought of God in connection with the testimony. Well, we see here that.
He comes to the Lord and his eyes are opened.
Well, if we understand the testimony, I believe we're going to have our eyes opened and we'll see a lot of things that we wouldn't otherwise see.
And you know, it's only the Lord that can open the eyes of his people.
Who may still be in association with evil.
We've often used the expression that it's the Lord that gathers, and I believe it's true.
We can't go out with the truth of gathering. We cannot go out with the truth.
Of the testimony in these last days in separation from evil in a sort of a broadcast way, like in the gospel.
Now where the Lord opens up and exercise, and where the Lord is working.
We might be of some help, but we can't go out in a broadcast way with with that truth. It's the Lord who must open the eyes.
And when one is, the Lord is working, and he opens the eyes.
Of his people than they see the place, they see things perhaps that they're in association with, that they never thought of before. There are those in the room this afternoon, If we wanted to have testimonies, could get up and testify that when their eyes were opened as to the testimony, they saw things that they were associated, that they were associated with. It was not of the Lord that they never saw before.
And they saw the place, and it was so plain they had never seen before. Well, this man Bartimaeus had his eyes open, and not only that, but we read in verse 50, casting away his garment.
While the garment in scripture of course has a reference to our habits and ways, if we're going to be in the way of the testimony, we we cannot take up or have the habits in ways of the world and man in the flesh. And sometimes I've wondered if if sometimes some hesitate to follow the Lord Jesus in the way, the pathway of separation.
In these last days.
Because they feel that they must castaway their garments, that is, they're going on with certain things.
They're associated with certain things. They have certain habits and ways that would not be in keeping with such a pathway, and so perhaps they're not willing to cast away their garments. But this man, when he had his eyes open, he was so happy that he wanted to rid himself of those garments that would not be in keeping with the way, because he's going to follow Jesus in the way he could have perhaps maintained or kept his garments.
If he was going to go on in his own way but to follow Jesus in the way he had to cast his garments.
Aside. Well, as we said, the way perhaps may not be the easiest, but it's a way of blessing. God will give blessing a hundredfold now, and not only that, but a blessing in the in the day to come. Well, here we have a pathway secured for His people, a window and a pathway now turn to the 19th of Luke.
00:50:04
And I believe we have here.
What is secured not only for.
God's people, but for God himself.
Not going through this story of Zacchaeus, well known to most of us, but verse 9 is what it wanted to emphasize.
Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house.
Now he didn't just say that Zacchaeus was, or that salvation came to Zacchaeus. And this also of course, takes place in Jericho.
We find again that this is an incident that's connected with Jericho.
Salvation has come to this House.
I might say in passing that this man Zacchaeus.
Was not the kind of man that the some of the people thought. They spoke of him as being just a Sinner, but the Lord speaks of him as a son of Abraham.
And he was an upright man, as he says in verse eight, he told of what his.
Manner of life and conduct had been he was the son of Abraham. He was not what they had derided him as being a Sinner.
But in verse nine he says salvation today is salvation come to this house.
And I would like to just speak a little bit and direct it especially to those who have.
We might say young families, of course, they reply to all of us who have a house.
But I want to apply it especially to those who have families they're raising. In this world, salvation is come to a house. God's thought is not only that individuals should be saved, but that there should be saved households.
You remember in Acts 1631 when that jailer asked what must I do to be saved?
The answer was Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
Wonderful news to that man. He was in fear and trembling of his life. He was in fear and trembling that he was going out of this world a lost man, a lost soul, went wonderful words. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. But then they add, thou and thy house. Salvation could be brought to his house.
Well, of course we want. We want to. First of all, we want to we have that exercise and desire that our children are saved individually, that is that they each one come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior. Because after all, that's what it's all about. All of the training and everything that one would be exercised about in his household would have in view of the children coming to know the Lord Jesus and following Jesus.
In the way that they might have a window too, that having received the messengers with peace through the door, and shut the door to the world, and have a window that connects them with the outside, and to follow Jesus in the way to come to know the Lord Jesus, of course, is the first thing, But I believe when they say, thou shalt be saved thou in my house.
Was bringing before that jailer that he could have.
Saved household that he could have his household for the Lord.
So that everything in his household would be dedicated to the Lord Jesus.
And what I had in mind is just to touch upon this subject a little this afternoon as to our households, our houses, there's quite a bit in scripture about the houses. You remember in Matthew 10 when the Lord sends out his disciples as as with a message, he tells them that when they go into a city and there if they find a house that is worthy, they enter into it and salute. It speaks of the house being worthy.
And they were dissoluted and abide there. What does it mean? A worthy house.
I believe it means that there were conditions there that were in accord with the testimony.
They received the word of God. They received the testimony. There was something there for God.
00:55:05
There was something in the house we're not talking about now. The furniture.
We're not talking about the physical things that might be in the house, we're talking about what is in the house for the Lord.
And I thought we might just trace or just speak of a few households or a few houses that are brought before us in Scripture without turning to them. I'll just recount them. I'm thinking in the 10th chapter of Luke, when the Lord Jesus went into a certain city, we know it was Bethany, and he says Martha received him into her house.
Well, I would say to those who have houses, have you received the Lord Jesus into your house?
Now, I'm not talking about receiving the Lord Jesus as your savior.
But have you received him into your house so that everything in your house is connected with the Lord Jesus? I mean by that the whatever you take up in your house, everything.
Has in view of the Lord Jesus, you've received him into your house. You know, sometimes there are those who believe on the Lord Jesus and they receive him as savior.
If they do not have an exercise about their households, there is not an exercise to receive Jesus in the house.
And you know, if you receive Jesus into your house, he's going to adjust everything according to his mind and thought for when he came into the House of Martha.
He had to correct Martha. He had to adjust her thinking. And if we receive the Lord Jesus into our houses, it means that everything in the house is going to be under his charge and direction. We're going to take up everything in reference to him and his mind and his will.
Well, I know there's a great exercise on the part of most parents for their children.
Desiring for them to know the Lord and to follow the Lord. And there is an exercise to teach them the word of God. And they want to bring them to the children's meeting and have them at the meetings. This is all good. But if we don't receive Jesus into our house, it's going to be ineffective. That is we. We have the Lord Jesus, his will and his mind and his thoughts and everything at the table. What we wear, what we have in the house where we go, everything we receive. Jesus.
In the house, and I'm thinking of one in the 16th chapter of Acts.
Lydia and her heart was open to attend to the words spoken by Paul.
And then she was baptized in her household. She committed her household to the Lord.
And she was baptized in her household. And then she says that if she was deemed to be worthy, well, she wanted to Paul to come into her house. She invited him into her house. Well, I believe that would bring before us that we should have in our houses the teachings of the word of God. We should have the doctrines of the apostle Paul. If we have had our hearts open to receive the truth ourselves, we want to bring that truth to our children.
Teach them in the home. We can't leave everything to the children's meeting. Teach them in the home. The word of God. Receive Paul into your house.
And then we have another expression. Paul writes to file women, and he says he speaks of the church that is in my house or assembly in my house. Well, of course, literally there was a gathering of the Saints there in the House of Philemon. But I believe it would suggest also that we should have the principles of the assembly in our house and our house so associated with the assembly.
That it's understood that when it's time for a meeting and the meetings of the assembly, while the household knows the thing to do is to get ready and go.
We have the assembly, as it were, in our houses. It's so identified and associated with the assembly that our children grow up with the understanding that it isn't just going to a meeting once in a while. You know, and Christendom people go to church and they when they leave that they go back and they live in their houses according to their own thoughts. They don't, as it were, take what they had their back with them.
01:00:04
But I think the thought of the assembly in the house is that our houses are identified with the assembly and the children grow up with the thought that they're a part of it. And when the time for meeting comes, that's where we go.
Then again we have in Romans 16 a Priscilla and acrylic and it's spoken of there, Paul says the assembly that is in their house. Now to Philemon it was the assembly and by house as the father, as the husband, he was the head of the house, it was his house. But I think it's nice to see that it's in Romans 16 it says their house, Priscilla and Aquila that would bring before us that the wife was with, was of one mind with her husband.
Oh, what an important place the mother and the wife has in the house.
To see that the assembly is there too. Not only the husband taking the lead the assembly in my house, but it's the assembly in their house. The wife is of one mind with her husband and not pulling against him, but going along with him in these exercises to have the assembly in thy house. Well, I believe that these features that we've touched on would bring before us something that might fit in with Matthew 10 when he speaks there of a house worthy.
That is their conditions that are congenial to the testimony. And if we receive Jesus into our houses, if we take Paul in and we have the assembly in our house, we'll find that there are conditions that are congenial to the testimony, and it will help and further the testimony in the way. Well, God has secured for his people a window so that we're connected with a glorious world.
Outside of this world entirely.
God is secured for us a pathway through this world, a pathway of following Jesus in the way, in the way of testimony. And God would secure for Himself our houses to be for Himself, and for His glory, and for His testimony shall we pray.
Messages
Children—D. Rule
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General meetings, Des Moines.
May 1982.
Children's meeting Don Rule.
OK, this is time for you children, so I'll start out by thanking you all for coming, especially those of you that have come right up close. And for any of you that are a little more shy, you're most welcome to come up and join us, particularly while we're singing so.
We're glad to see one more come up with OK, which child has a song you'd like to sing? I don't know your name.
But I'll try and identify. All right, You 2 girls, 1 of you have a song you'd like to sing.
You'd like to sing a song anyway. OK, Becky, do you have a song you want to sing?
Number one, well, I think that we're not using the same song book you're used to.
51 Oh well, still not the right.
Turn to the back, turn to the Backpage. These are songs that are particularly for you. And we'll start off. I'll give her first one, okay? And then maybe you'll see some of the rest. Let's start off with the first one on the Backpage #40.
Jesus loves me as I love for your heart. Lord, how's it going?
Yeah.
And.
Singing the last verse. Sometimes boys and girls, we know these songs so well that we can sing them and our mind can be way off somewhere else. We're thinking about something entirely different from the song that we're singing. So I want to try and help us, and I want you to try and help yourself to pay good attention to the words that you're singing, especially if you're old enough to be able to read or even think about what you're singing.
00:05:03
So listen, when we sing the last verse in the chorus this time, every time we sing the word me.
I want you to point to yourself. That way you can pay better attention to the song that you're singing. OK? So every time you sing the word me as we sing this last verse, you just point right to yourself because that's what the song is for and that's what the song is about.
Jesus loves me, He won't stay close to me.
If I cross him, joy.
Will Take Me Home.
Yes, I'm on the spaghetti.
Yeah.
Recognize when we sing it that way.
Can't you how often it's talking just to you?
Just write to you when it says me. OK? Who has another song you'd like to sing, Joseph?
What number?
Number one. All right, we'll sing #1.
That's the song we finished up with last night, isn't it #1?
Almost.
100 years.
That seems like almost a sad song to me, because when it says almost, when it says almost, that means not quite enough. That means not quite, almost, but not quite. And how sad it would be if there was some boy or girl or older one here that was here last night that heard God speak to you by his word and you listened and you thought about what was said.
And you were almost ready to accept it, but not quite. Wouldn't that be terribly sad if someday you had to stand before God, and the record of your life was opened up? And there in the record of your life it said this boy and it gave your name, or this girl and it gave your name. Came to hear my invitation.
And you almost.
Accept it. But you said no in your heart. All boys and girls were here for a very special time, that God might speak to you by His word. So.
00:10:17
Accept what God wants to say to you this morning is that we sang in that song, it says come. And I'd like to emphasize to you that word calm and come now.
To the Lord Jesus. OK, another song. Let's pick one from the Backpage.
41.
Around the throne of God.
Children.
For one more.
OK #14 OK, let's put it #14.
That's fine.
Have you been to Jesus for like Wednesday?
In the world.
00:15:29
Are you?
A.
OK, children, let's.
Let's stop now and speak to God in prayer.
Go, boys and girls, and thinking about the responsibility of speaking to you. This morning, as I was thinking about it, I realized and thought about the fact that my job is just to deliver a message from someone else to you. I'm just to be a messenger to you or someone else. And when I started to think about that, I thought about lots of different messages that people get.
I've gotten hundreds and thousands of messages in my life, and I'm sure you may have gotten many more messages than you've ever realized how many messages that people give to you?
You know a message that I used to get very often when I was a boy. I would be out playing and it would be supper time and my mom or dad would send my sister, one of my brothers, out with a message for me. What do you think they would say suffered?
They'd come out and they would say.
Mom says or dad says I'm to come to suffer.
That was a message, wasn't it? They had come out to where I was playing to tell me that it was time to come to supper. Now, do you think it was important for me to?
Do what was said right away.
Yes, it was important. It was important right away to stop what I was doing and answer them and then do it was time to come for supper. Now I know sometimes I got messages I didn't want to hear and sometimes I enjoyed usually the message come to supper. If I was hungry I was glad to come. And then sometimes when I got home I got another message.
I was told as you have to go wash your hands and your face before you come to supper. I had to get ready in order to sit down at the dinner table. And sometimes I didn't like that message so much. I'd look at my hands and I'd say, well, they're not too bad.
I think I ought to be able to go. Do I have to? But always I have to. I had to be ready, and so I had to go.
And wash my hands and my face. And then I could sit down at the dinner table and I was ready. And so if I received the message and you know what happened, maybe I didn't get that message that day, but I knew it was a message. And so when I got to the dinner table.
What do you think? I was asked once in a while.
00:20:03
I imagine we could get Did you wash your hands?
I have to say no. And so I could, I wasn't ready, was I? And so I had to turn around and go back to the.
Bathroom and wash my hands and then I could come back and sit down at the dinner table and I could eat. And so boys and girls. And thinking about that, I thought too, that there are other kinds of messages that we get. There are lots of other kinds of messages that we get. You know, in fact, I carry around messages all the time since I've come to this conference.
I've gotten a number of messages that I have to take care of when I get back home where I live. And in fact, sometimes I had a message to give to somebody else when I got here and they're not here. So I really am not going to be able to deliver them the message. What is this that I have in my hand?
That's right, it's a letter. That's a kind of message. A letter is one type of message.
And so I got this letter and it's addressed to me. It says Donald Rule. And when I opened up the letter, it's a message that I have. It says in here a letter, I'm not going to read the whole letter because it wouldn't be of interest to everybody here. But it says, dear brother in Christ, it's talking to me. I know because it has my name on the front. And then it's a letter to me that a man would like some information about some things he would like me to send him.
With some information or perhaps have somebody visit him where he lives. And so he tells me in this letter, the message that he has for me. Do you think he would appreciate it very much if I just took this letter and said, oh, I don't know, I'm kind of busy. I think I'm going to take this letter and I really can't do anything about it. So I'll just put it in the waste basketball. So that'd be very nice.
No, that wouldn't be very good, would it? At all. He's taking the time to sit down and write out what he wants. And I can tell from what he says that he's very sincere and he's he's very interested in the the answer to his message that I need to give him or have someone else take to him. And if I just said, oh, it's not important, I think I'll just show the letter away. Well, boys and girls, I want you to know this morning.
That God in heaven.
Also has for you today a message.
God Himself in heaven, He has a message for you today, and He wants you to listen and He wants you to respond to. He wants you to answer the message He has for you all. He's given many messages to people at many times.
And he wants us to respond or answer the message or the letter.
When He speaks to us, and so as you sit in your seat, I want you to pay careful attention so that you may listen. And when God speaks to you and your heart by His word, the Bible, you may respond to that message.
Now I want to tell you about a message, just to make sure you understand what we're talking about. I was thinking about a person in the Bible.
And you raise your hand. I don't think it'll take you anytime at all to guess who I'm talking about.
Well, if you got your hand up now, you're a little quick. But wait. Wait until you're sure you know the name. I want you to wait until you're sure you know the name of the person that had a message to give.
And we'll see what happens. All right, there was this person, and I won't tell you to begin with, whether it was a man or a woman. And they were given by God himself. God said to them, I have a message, a very important message that I want you to take for me and give to some other people. Now you be sure that you deliver this message. He knew.
This person knew.
That it was a message from God. They knew who was giving them the message, and they knew who they were to deliver the message to.
00:25:08
But they didn't like the message. They didn't like that message. And so they decided, this person decided I don't like that message. I don't want to give that message. And so I'm not going to. I'm not going to.
So they started out, I'm sure it must have been walking. They started out walking, and instead of walking in, let's say, this direction where the message was to be given, because the people they were to give the message to lived in this direction. Which direction do you think they win it? That's right. They went right straight in the opposite direction. They turned right around from the direction they were supposed to go, and they started out in the opposite direction.
And it tells us that it was down, it was down, They had to go down. You know, when you go away from God.
We see that picture. It's always going down. And so they went down, down, down, until finally they couldn't go any farther because they came to a lake for a great big body of water. They couldn't go any farther. And so they were stopped there, right at the edge of the water. But, you know, I think Satan was at work because, boys and girls, he wants to help you go in the wrong direction.
And so when they got there, everything seemed to be fine because when they got to this great big body of water, they wanted to keep right on going. And what do you think was waiting on them?
Well, yes, but what it was, what else do you think was waiting there for them?
Well, yes, he was there too. I'll tell you a boat. There was a boat right there. And so they got in the boat and off the boat sailed away from the direction that this man was supposed to go. And that boat sailed along for a time. And I guess this man, he thought everything was all right and taken care of. So he went down inside the boat, and there must have been places to lie down, and he lay down on.
On a bed or something.
And he went to sleep, but up top the man that was the captain of that ship was having trouble here. This man was down sleeping, and he was up.
The captain was having trouble because the ship was starting to rock. The waves were starting to come up on the ship and it was real stormy.
Oh, I see somebody whispering. Who is it?
Now you're turning the other way.
But who was the mayor? Yes, dude, Gianna, haven't you heard of Jonah? He was given a message to deliver, and yet he was told to go to a city called Nineveh. But instead of going to Nineveh, he turned around and went in the very opposite direction. He went down to the seaside place called Joppa, I think, and he got on a ship and he started out. But was God? Did God intend for Jonah to deliver his message?
Yes, he did. Yes, he did. Boys and girls, he had a message for Jonah and he intended Jonah to give that message. And I don't want to spend our time telling the whole story of Jonah.
Because we have something more important to talk about even. That's God's message to us. But what happened so that God can give Jonah a message? It got so bad, didn't it, boys and girls, that they finally took Jonah and they threw him over the side of the ship. And God provided a different transportation for Jonah, didn't he? He provided a great big fish that swallowed Jonah and took Jonah down to the bottom of the sea.
You think he was thinking pretty hard about his message.
I'm sure he was. I'm sure he was, he was thinking very, very carefully by that time about the message and he was sorry that he he didn't want to deliver it.
And he was afraid for his own life, I'm sure. And finally he said these words. He said salvation is of the Lord. He finally recognized that the Lord was the one that could deliver him. And the Lord was the one too that could deliver the people from the city he had to go deliver this sad message to. And so God used that fish to take him. And it doesn't say that I know of, but it wouldn't surprise me if he took him. That fish took him right back from the direction he came from.
00:30:26
If he wasn't willing to go that way, why God could produce a fish that would turn him right around and send him back in the direction he was supposed to go. And the fish put him up on the on the land, and then he started out on his journey and he went all the way to where he was supposed to go.
And he gave his message.
It was a sad message, boys and girls, he had to tell those people.
That God was going to overthrow their city. That is, God was going to punish them.
That was the message that he had to give, and he didn't want to give that message because he knew God loved those people and that if they said they were sorry in their hearts, if they accepted the fact that they deserved to be punished and told God so that he might change his mind, he thought and be merciful to them. And God wanted to be merciful to them all the time. He didn't want to have to overthrow those people. So boys and girls, we have a solemn message from God too today to tell.
You boys know. You girls know that.
You're a Sinner, don't you?
You boys, girls and girls know that you're sinners. I know sometimes the Bible, we have good news to tell, but it's good news because there's, you might say, bad news too. Important news for us to remember first. You know this letter where I put it in my pocket? Not this one. But you know, I've received letters before. And when the letter came, as soon as it came in the mail.
And I looked at that letter, there was right around the edge of it. It was all black.
All black all around the edge of the letter, if you know what that meant. It meant it told me before I ever opened up the letter to see what was inside. The fact that it had a black border all the way around it was a notice to me that there was going to be sad news.
In that letter. But there was going to be sad news in that letter and there was. It was to tell me about someone who had died. And boys and girls, we want to tell you that God in his word says, for there is no difference. There is no difference between you and your mommy and daddy, between you and the oldest person in this room. For there is no difference for all.
Who can finish this for me?
You know, OK, you finished.
That's right, for there is no difference, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Now I want to tell you what I trust is God's message for you today.
Boys and girls, a long time ago God was thinking about you. He was thinking about you and he was thinking in his own heart and saying I love you and I want you to come and live with me. I want you to come to heaven and live with me. I want you to be here with me and the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's what God thought and that's what God purposed for you boys and girls. That was His desire for you to come to heaven to live with Him.
But he couldn't write that letter to you. He couldn't give you an invitation. Just like that. God wanted you to come to heaven, but he couldn't say come. Isn't that sad?
Well, God was determined. He wanted you to come, but he couldn't just sit down as it were, and write out in His word, the Bible, a letter to you that said come because there was a problem. There was a problem when God looks down at you and me today.
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He sees a problem if we haven't put our trust in the Lord Jesus, and that problem is that there is a separation between ourselves and God, what is it that comes between us?
And God.
What is it that can keep us? What is it that God saw when he looked down from heaven and said, I want you to come to heaven to be with me?
But there's a person.
It's called sin.
Called sin. Boys and girls, if you have ever done one thing wrong in your life, one thing that displeased God, God says you're a Sinner and he can't have you with your sins in heaven. He can't have you with your sins in heaven.
But he wanted you to come anywhere. He wanted you to come anyways. You know, all of us are here today because the people that live here.
In Des Moines and surrounding areas have given us an invitation to be here. They have written us a letter just like the letter I have in my pocket. And the letter said come, we invite you to come. We want you to come.
But in order to write that letter, they had to sit down very carefully and think about it, and they had to ask God what He wanted them to do, and then they had to start making preparations. This microphone in my hand here didn't just walk up here and put itself here, did it?
Someone had to put it here. And so all the preparations in this room and getting arrangements for the food and even getting this room for us to have and lots and lots of work, sending out the invitations and so on to invite us to come and making arrangements for motels for us and to stay at our homes. All those preparations had to come into it. And now boys and girls, God has made preparation and he said I want you to come.
To be with me.
But because of your sins, you can't come. You can't come with your sins. But boys and girls, there was one person in heaven with God.
Who was there, you might say, speaking with God about his desire to have you in heaven?
It was God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
And he said.
I will go and make things ready for you to come. The Lord Jesus said. I'll go and make things ready so that all may come to heaven. And boys and girls, the Lord Jesus came down to make things ready. How did he do it? He told his disciples, those that followed him.
He said I go to prepare a place for you. He said I'm going and I'm going to make a place in heaven for you.
And it would cost him a lot. It cost him a lot to make a place for us in heaven.
It required the Lord to use us to go to the cross, and there they lifted him up on the cross, and there the Lord Jesus died, didn't he? And when the Lord Jesus died, and while he was on that cross, boys and girls, God took my sins and put them on the Lord Jesus, and the Lord Jesus suffered there for my sins.
And he shed his precious blood, and that precious blood God says, cleanse from all sin. And so now God can look down from heaven and he can invite. And he did. He invited me. He said to me, come.
Come, in fact, it tells us, and I'll just turn to it. In Luke's gospel, I think it's the 14th chapter, it says come for all things are now ready. That's Luke 14, verse 70.
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Come, for all things are now ready, boys and girls, the Lord Jesus has prepared for you at the cross.
A place in heaven. And he now says to you, Come.
For all things are now ready.
Have you come?
You ask yourself that question right now.
Everyone of you, ask yourself that question. Have I come to the Lord Jesus?
Now that doesn't mean walking up to heaven. No, it doesn't mean that. But have you ever said in your heart, Lord Jesus?
I come.
Have you ever told the Lord Jesus that you come to Him? He invites you to come. He says come unto me and he wants you to come.
And he says, when mommy? Well, I'll say it this way.
Sometimes I say at our house.
Come to suffer.
Sometimes I get this response.
Just a second.
I don't suppose that happens to take care of that.
To come to supper and the response sometimes is just a second.
And sometimes I feel in my heart I have to say something to feel like saying, well, OK, but it's too late because the invitation is to come now. Come now, boys and girls, God's invitation for you to come is right now.
Right now he doesn't say come this afternoon, come tonight, come tomorrow. But God's invitation for you to come is right now. And God wants you to say in your heart, I come. I'm a Sinner. I know I'm a Sinner.
But I come right now.
You know there was a man in the Bible.
It said some wonderful words, wonderful words, he said. Lord.
Have mercy on me, Lord, have mercy on me. But you know, boys and girls, those were wonderful words, but he said them.
Too late. It was too late when he said that. He said Lord have mercy on me, but he said it too late. You know why it was too late? Because those words were said by a man after he died.
After he died, you can't come to the Lord Jesus.
After you die, you can't say when you may die. So God says right now I want you to come. Come now, come on to me. Will you not answer God's invitation to you this morning? God from heaven, He's looking down right now, boys and girls, upon us in this room, and he wants you to come.
And He wants you to come right now in your heart. And I'm going to stop now and pray. And as we pray.
Won't you come to the Lord Jesus? Won't you say Lord Jesus, I come, I cross Lord Jesus as my savior. Let's pray.
One Body
Address—D. Andersen
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.
General Meetings, Des Moines, Des Moines, May 1982, Addressed by Dan Anderson.
Shall we sing #210?
One Spirit.
Lord.
O blessed wondrous words.
What heavenly life, what power divine thought that sweet word afford?
You notice it's in quotation marks. One spirit with the Lord.
This is scripture. It's a scripture that this hymn is based on 210.
One Spirit.
With.
All.
All plants, that was.
Let us turn to that verse.
That's quoted in the hymn we just sang.
First Corinthians.
Chapter 6.
One Corinthians chapter 6 and verse 17.
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But he that is joined unto the Lord.
Is 1 spirit.
Now we ask the question, why did the apostle Paul put that in that position?
Because you see what the context is.
There's something very serious and solemn.
Brought before us in those verses.
Notice what it says in the verse just previous.
What nor ye not?
That he which is joined to an harlot as one body.
For two says he shall be 1 flesh.
That's a solemn statement.
And why does the apostle speak of this when writing to the Corinthians?
Because they had that very thing in their midst.
And the Apostle Paul is bringing out this truth.
Of the believers oneness with the Lord Jesus Christ here.
By the Spirit.
One spirit with the Lord.
To help them to judge that thing.
Because there was that professed believer.
Assembly.
And he committed fornication.
And Paul says know ye not that he which is joined to and harlot is 1 body.
He had joined himself.
In an unholy, wicked relationship.
For two saith, he shall be 1 flesh.
So he says, But he that is joined unto the Lord as one spirit.
Spirit was the Lord.
Having been joined to the Lord Jesus Christ.
He brings before us this thing in the power of the Spirit of God.
To warn us seriously, solemnly about this kind of thing.
And it's manifesting itself more and more.
In Christendom.
And sad to say, amongst those gathered or professing to be gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And what a solemn thing for one who has professed to believe.
And profess to be joined to the Lord Jesus Christ to enter into such an unholy, immoral relationship.
The Word of God is living and powerful, sharper than any two edged sword.
And we need to come under.
The powers of the Word of God brought to us in the power of the Spirit of God.
And everyone of us has this book and he can read these things.
And he can be brought under the power of the truth that's brought out and the warnings given, and look to the Lord for grace to be kept.
There is no excuse for any one.
Falling into something like this.
Perhaps it's a manifestation of our low state.
And we need to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God.
But all God is gracious. We were speaking about that this morning.
Gracious God is, and we see a man like that in Corinth committing that awful sin put away and then later restored.
And what restored him the grace of God?
And Paul writes to them, and says, Confirm your love unto him.
But why would she discipline that he might feel it, That he might feel how awful it was?
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And humble himself before God. And then after a while he was mourning and weeping.
How wonderful. God knows what he is doing. God knows what he did.
When he instructed the apostle Paul to write to those Corinthians, put away from among yourselves that wicked person.
Don't eat with him. He's outside. He was put outside in the world under the government of God.
But he brings in this blessed truth of being joined to the Lord in connection with this.
Emphasizing the positive.
And if we lay hold upon the positive, If we're occupied with Christ and the wonderful relationship that we've been brought in.
In one spirit with the Lord.
We will get so full of that that we won't want to have anything to do with the other. We'll flee from it.
And that's what characterizes those as we heard this morning.
In two Timothy chapter 2 follow with them.
Calling the Lord out of a pure heart, flee all of these things, the lust of the flesh.
And show up.
But you can't flee it in your own strength. I can't flee it in my own strength.
It says the Lord ministers to us himself and His truth and things like this that when we have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ were sealed by the Spirit of God and were joined to the Lord Jesus Christ in the glory. It's a real thing.
And it's brought to us in the Scripture that we might feel the reality of it, have a sense of the reality of it, back when we have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ and washed from our sins.
Spirit comes to dwell in our hearts, We are joined to the Lord Jesus Christ, and we are joined to every other one who has been joined to the Lord Jesus Christ and where one body with the Lord and one body with one another.
Flee fornication, he says. Flee, Flee, Run away from it. Look to the Lord for grace and remain faithful to the Lord Jesus.
You know, fornication here is set in the light of being unfaithful to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Being unfaithful to him.
Let's go to 1St Corinthians chapter 12.
And she there how the apostle Paul develops.
There's truce about the body being joined to him.
And joined to one another.
One Corinthians chapter 12.
Verse 12.
For as the body is 1.
Now that he's Speaking of there's a human body. The Apostle Paul is using the human body as an illustration of the body of Christ, the Church, the assembly.
And Paul gets down very simple in this and I trust that we might be able to get down simple this afternoon too.
And see some of these things that Paul brings before us by the Spirit of God.
For as the body is 1 and has many members and all the members of that one body being many are one body.
All that down to there, speaking about the human body. So also is something else. There's another body.
So also is Christ or the Christ.
Well, what does the human body have? It has a head.
And it has members.
Members of the body.
So is the church the body of Christ? It has a head and we are the members. Christ is the head. We read a scripture in Ephesians.
About the place the Lord Jesus Christ has.
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In chapter one.
It tells what God has done for and with the Lord Jesus Christ.
In verse 22 of Ephesians chapter one.
And have put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over all things to the church.
He gave a head to the church, and Christ is that head.
He's not head over the church. He's head over all things. But he's head to the church, just like God in mercy. When he created mine, he gave this body a head.
And what do we have a head for? To direct all the functions of the body?
And what's our head in glory for? To direct all the functions.
Of the assembly.
He did not give that place to any man.
Or any Superman, if you want to speak of them that way. No, he gave it to the Lord Jesus Christ.
To rule the body. To control the body, To direct the body.
To guide us directly.
And if the Lord Jesus Christ is the head of the assembly, and when I speak of the assembly, I'm Speaking of all those who are saved in the whole world.
Because we read in Ephesians 4 there is one body.
There is not one body of gentiles and one body of Jews, or one body of black people, and one body of red people, and one body of white people, and one body of yellow people. No one body.
And the whole world, just one body. And when God looks down here, He sees one body.
And that's why it's such a tragedy.
See what man has done that? Outwardly, of course. Inwardly, really.
Man could not divide the body, but outwardly it's all divided up into sections and parties and denominations and cults and whatnot.
Oh, how solemn. How sad to see that.
But it's all one body.
All one body.
But we say, where are they? We ought to all be together. Yes, that's right. In the beginning they were all together. All those who were members of the one body were all together. And we read here in First Corinthians chapter 12 and verse 13. For by 1 Spirit are we all baptized into one body.
When did that start? When did that take place? It took place on the day of Pentecost. The Lord had said, as we read in Matthew chapter 16, I will build my church. When did He begin to build it? On the day of Pentecost, There were 120 believers together in the upper room, waiting, as the Lord had told them to do, waiting for the coming of the Spirit of God. And they were there.
120 of them.
And ten days after the Lord had gone to heaven.
50 days.
After his resurrection, that's why it's called Pentecost. Pentecost speaks of 50.
The Holy Spirit came down while they were in that upper room.
And indwelt every one of them.
And they began to speak for the Lord's glory and to preach the gospel. And everyone heard the gospel in his own language, in his own dialect.
On a day that was, but the part that we are speaking about.
It is pretty nearly forgotten in Christendom.
They get occupied with the one part of the speaking in tongues, but the other seems to be hidden.
Now we read about this wonderful truth of the church, that it was hidden, hidden in God.
Hidden in God before the foundation of the world. Hidden in God in eternity past.
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But there came a time then, when God revealed it, revealed it to the apostle Paul. And Paul speaks of that.
In the third chapter of Ephesians and he tells what happened.
That God made a joint body.
From Jew and Gentile.
He was no respecter of persons now.
And any Jew and any Gentile that believed were sealed by the Spirit of God.
And made part of that one body, but there were 120 to begin with in the upper room.
So there were 120 in the assembly.
There to begin with.
120.
They were all baptized into one body, and they were all one body.
There was something different from what they had been before.
They had been 120 separate individuals, believers, of course.
They had, they had life. They had the forgiveness of their sins.
But they didn't have the Holy Spirit until that day when He came down to indwell them. In the Old Testament times, there were those.
That did things in the power of the Spirit, but if we read that, the Spirit came on them.
To do that particular work, whether prophesying or like Bezalel, doing the craftsmanship in the Tabernacle and others. They were endued with power from on high to do that, but they never received the Holy Spirit as a person to dwell in their hearts.
But here, on this day, the Holy Spirit came to dwell in their hearts.
And from that day to this, everyone who has believed in the Lord Jesus Christ and been truly washed in the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, he receives the Holy Spirit and has been joined to that body that was formed there on the day of Pentecost.
That is why in Ephesians chapter 4 it can be said there is one body that is put in the present continuous tent, then tense. There never has been a day from that day on to now where there has been two bodies, or three bodies or four bodies.
And no break. There's been a body ever since then, until now. There is one body.
We need that truth.
Really burned into our souls.
Because sometimes we get the idea that there are many bodies. Well, what else can people say when they look around in Christendom?
And they see all these different bodies. And you meet a Christian, you say, well, what body do you belong to?
Or what faith do you belong to? Or what church do you belong to? As though there were many or several?
A good question is to ask them, well, what church should I belong to? Well, they don't really know what to answer.
I said if I want to know what to belong to, I have to go to the word of God.
There was a time.
When I was still in my 20s.
My wife and I were missionaries in the Congo, but I didn't know any better than that.
I thought there were many bodies.
But when I began to really read the word of God, meditate upon it, studied to translate it into the native language, I learned something that I had never seen before or been taught in school.
But I found it in the word of God.
Or didn't see it all to begin with.
But the Lord began to show me something. I wanted to see more.
And I was exercised about seed.
About knowing this truth.
And I'm thankful for what the Lord showed me.
Well, we had been writing letters back to different ones that the Lord had been using to support us.
Because we didn't receive any salary from the mission, we seemed to know better than that when we went out. We wanted to go out on real faith.
We did belong to an interdenominational, so-called Faith Mission, but most of them were receiving a salary. But we didn't feel happy about that. We wanted to be on the ground of faith, really.
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While the Lord began to show us things.
And we were writing about it in our letters to these different ones.
That were interested in the work.
And lo and behold, one of these that was getting our letters sent.
Me Two booklets.
I didn't know at the time where he had picked them up. I found out that found that out later from the assembling in Walla Walla where this man had been going for the reading meetings. And he had found the Assembly of God by Macintosh and the all sufficiency of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ by Macintosh. And I guess he discerned or detected something and he thought it would be a good thing to send them to me. Well, I'm thankful he did because it made me realize there was somebody, somewhere.
That knew these truths and had been gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And of course that made me want to find them.
But there it was in those two booklets, the things that the Lord had been showing us.
Some of you here may be the young people. You wonder whether this truth is really in their books. It's there.
The Lord showed it to me. He can show it to you too. All you say. Well, it's just for old people. While I was young when they showed it to me.
You don't have to get old before the Lord shows you these things.
When you get saved? When you're young. When can you know these truths? When you're young. When when can you be gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ? When you're young.
Don't have to wait until you're old.
This is for everyone, old and young alike.
It's precious to know Christ as our Savior.
But oh but joy, and what peace it is.
To know the Lord Jesus Christ as a center of God, the head of the body to church.
And to be able to look to him for guidance and direction in everything.
And I believe, dear brethren, every assembly.
Gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Gathered to gather to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ today.
Needs to learn this. Better to look to the Lord Jesus Christ for direction and guidance in everything.
Because.
There are things that come into the assembly.
That are real problems and difficulties and there is no way that we can.
Steam things out or reason things out. We have to look to the Lord. Be guided by His Spirit as He opens the word to us, and he'll be faithful. He will be faithful if we just trust in Him.
For by 1 Spirit, are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free.
And have an all been made to drink into one spirit.
God makes no difference.
God makes no difference now in this age of grace or the church age.
God saves souls and they are joined to that one body.
And there is still one body.
All the original ones were gone and they keep on passing away.
And the Lord saves others and their exercise, and they take their place at large table to express the fact that they are not only saved, washed in the precious blood of Christ, but they're members of one body.
When we sit at the Lord's table to eat the Lord's Supper, what is it we eat first? The loaf?
And that is a symbol of the one body as well as the body of Christ when it's broken.
So that's the first thing you meet in eating of the supper. It's like that loaf is asking you.
Are you eating this supper as a member of the Body of Christ, or are you eating this supper as a member of something else?
There's only one way to eat the Lord's Supper, and that's to eat it as a member of the Body of Christ.
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Ferries up, nor the ground in scripture, nor the ground.
Now there may be those that feel that they are remembering the Lord. I used to think that I was remembering the Lord.
Even though what was on the plate was a cracker all broken up, which was really symbolic of the thing that I belonged to.
Yet as far as my own heart was concerned, I was remembering the Lord, but I found out it was way down here on a lower ground than the ground of Scripture.
Only apostle goes on here.
To say something about the body now.
For the body is not one member, but many.
Who want us to drift in that direction.
We would like to have somebody take the whole responsibility and make it look like that the body is 1 member.
And the rest of us could just sit by and do nothing.
I remember when we were home on furlough from Africa.
That was in 1935. We've been over there a little over four years.
And we'd already begun to see some of these things.
And I came back.
And I was asked to take the pastor.
I'm a little church.
And I did.
For a few months.
While the one who was the pastor went off to something else, I guess he was a.
He had some service in the army.
Don't remember what it was. Anyway, we were there in one large day, mourning.
Of course, at that time we just said Sunday morning.
But you know, it's a wonderful thing to call it large state Lord's day because it's his special day.
On Lord's Day.
You sit at the Lord's table.
To partake of the Lord's supper, to remember the Lord, it's his day. Do we devote that day to him as though it is and own that he is Lord?
Well, I was standing behind the pulpit this Sunday morning.
And we were going through the order of service.
That I had already outlined and I was doing everything.
Giving out the songs, starting the songs, doing the praying and reading the scripture and giving the message and supervising the the communion so-called communion service, but in the middle of that time.
Just seemed like there was an audible voice that spoke to me, he said. Who are you to think that you should take this old meeting?
I never forgot it. It was the Lord speaking to me by what I had already seen a little bit of in the Scripture.
I never forgot that and I went back to Africa.
And I saw more of the truth and finally the mission society said.
You have to resign. We can't have you doing the things you're doing because I was beginning to practice these things and show these things to the natives and they wouldn't have it. They wanted us to establish a big school and all at the mission station.
But I wanted to go out to the villages to show them this True souls were saved there when I preached the gospel. And then I just read the scriptures to them that I translated until there were those that said, oh, we want to be baptized, we want to remember the Lord.
And they did. But the mission society said you can't do that.
We resign.
We not only left the mission, but we left the denominational association we were with.
And justice wanted grace to look to the Lord alone for guidance and direction.
And I don't regret any of it.
I don't regret the day when I believed in the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior. I don't regret the day when I was separated to the Lord Jesus Christ, but God himself and took my place at the Lord's table. I don't regret it.
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The body is not one member, but many.
Come to that point where you see yourself simply as a member of the body of Christ with all the rest of those who are members of the body of Christ.
With all of those who have received like precious faith.
Just one with them.
Well, again we read if the foot shall say, because I'm not the hand, I'm not of the body. Is it therefore not of the body? Now why would why would the foot say that?
Above the hand.
Is there jealousy there? Is the Apostle Paul saying this because there's a root of jealousy in the assembly car?
And it's here for all that in every place call on the name of the Lord.
This is not just for the church at Corinth. It's for everybody. All those who've confessed the name of the Lord, all those who profess and belong to the church. The body of Christ is for everybody.
Jealousy. Jealousy.
Why would the foot envy the hand? All the hand is up here and doing all kinds of things, but the foot is down here carrying burdens.
And we don't like burdens.
Not we don't want burdens and we wish the Lord wouldn't give us burdens, perhaps.
And we'd like to be up here.
In a place that looks more public.
More place of display and all of that.
But the Scripture says bear ye one another's burdens. That would say that we all should be burden bearers.
All of us.
And seek grace not to shirk burdens.
If the ear shall say because I'm not the eye, I'm not of a body, is it therefore not of the body?
Now the ear.
Is jealous and envious, says Because I'm not the, I am not of the body.
I'm just not taking account of it all. I'm not of the body.
Well, it's true that we may learn more through the eye than we do through the ear.
But that shouldn't make the one jealous of the other.
And there may be variations in US.
As to what the Lord might have for us to do, maybe he wants us to be an ear to hear what the Lord has to say. Maybe He wants us to be an eye to have discernment as to what is going on.
And we we need these gifts.
Verse 17 If the whole body were an eye, where were they hearing?
You can't have a body being a whole eye. That would be a monstrosity, wouldn't it?
All discernment, all seeing, all you got to have hearing as well.
If the whole were here and where were the smelling?
We need them all. We need all these parts and all these members of the body.
I think we become conscious of that sometimes when we have to lose one of our members.
Brother Brown down in Saint Vincent. He lost his leg. He felt it very much.
And it hindered him a great deal from coming to meet him and of course when he got sick on his bed.
He couldn't get out. He couldn't bounce himself. He tried but he couldn't because he didn't have that one member. He was missing it.
And when we get to a point.
We act as though we are not part of the body.
Who misses us the most? The Lord Jesus.
Are we really taking our place as members of the Body of Christ?
Or are we shirking the part that he's given us to do in the function of the whole body?
Now there is one thing about the body. The power function is within it.
This body doesn't need a machine set up alongside of it.
00:40:01
To keep it going.
There's function within it, and so in the assembly. There's power function within the assembly.
And if everyone of us, every individual, every part of the body of Christ, every member of it, is looking to the Lord for guidance and direction?
He will take care of it.
He will give us guides, he will give us direction, He will give us grace, He will give us strength, everything that we need. The power of function is within the assembly. It doesn't need an organization set up alongside of it to keep it going.
We need to look to the Lord our head and he'll give direction and help.
But now hath God set the members everyone of them?
In the body as it hath pleased him.
He has set the members, everyone of them, in the body.
As it hath pleased him.
Are you satisfied with the place that the Lord has put you in his body?
In the body of Christ.
Perhaps we haven't been aware of that, that we're part of the body of Christ.
This mystical unity, the Church, the assembly.
But it's true. Everyone who is a true believer is part of the body of Christ, and you have a place there. And we should cover that place. And we should be careful that we act according to the place we've been put in.
If these fingers could speak.
I believe they would say.
We're thankful for the place.
That God has given us in the body of that man.
And we don't want to be separated one from another.
What would you do if when you went to the wash station?
To wash your hands or your hand? If you had just one hand, how would you wash it?
What if this hand was over here some other place or had been lost?
And you had only one.
You would be keenly aware of the need of that other hand.
How many times have you done that washing your hands?
These hands need each other.
You know their dear Saints of God in Christendom.
But they are not here on the ground of the one body gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We wish they were because we need them.
Yes, there are gifts out there.
Their gifts that the Lord could use to really minister the word of God to us.
We need them.
They are there because God has put them there, but God wants the mall together on the ground of the one body.
That's where he wants to.
You say, well, what are we to do?
If we can't get everybody together.
Well, if we can't set everybody right, we can do one thing. We can set ourselves right.
And I think that's what two Timothy 22 is about. Let him. That name is the name of the Lord. Depart from iniquity and follow with them that call in the Lord. Out of a pure heart we can set ourselves right. What? To begin with, I tried to set some of these places right within. You can't do it. No. It's an individual thing. Let him That name is a name of Christ. Depart from iniquity.
So it's our responsibility, if we see the truth, to set ourselves right and take our place as members of the body of Christ gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ on the ground of the one body.
And I may be speaking to somebody here this afternoon.
That is not gathered, that has not taken his place at the Lord's table.
And you're beginning to realize I'd like to be gathered unto the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Gathered together, that means on the ground of the one body, under the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the name recognizing His of power and His authority. Because then we're promised the presence of the Lord in the midst. There am I where that verse starts out. Where? There Where two or three?
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Are gathered together in my name. There am I in the midst of them.
That's what you have to look for.
Are they on the ground of the one body?
Are they acknowledging the authority of that name and the authority of the Lord in the assembly? And whatsoever is done in the name of the Lord is binding?
Do they recognize that?
Or are they loose and careless about it? Or even as they do in some places, say every assembly is independent one of the other, and what they do over there doesn't concern us. But when a thing is done in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, it concerns all of us.
And what decision is made in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ holds? It must be. It's bound in heaven, even as it's bound on the earth.
So he goes on to say. And if they were all one member, where were the body?
All lots of importance is given to the body. Well, Christ is the Savior of the body.
He cares for the church, his body.
And he loves the church. He gave himself part. And we should take note of that, that the body is something special to the law. And he wants every one of the members of his body to act the way he wants them to act, to do what he wants them to do. Not every man doing that which is right in his own eyes. They did that in the days of the judges. And what was the result? Confusion. Utter confusion. Read the book of Judges.
And you will see what a sad history that is of the children of Israel. Every man doing what was right in his own eyes there. They didn't seem to know even where God center was and it was utter confusion.
And if we do not look to the Lord and own him as our center, our head and look to him for everything, and we bow to the decision made in his neighbor, we don't do that. It's going to be utter confusion because he said there's no king in Israel.
Every man did what was right in his own eyes. What does that mean? No king in Israel meant no recognized authority.
No recognized authority.
And all doing as they pleased.
If that comes into.
The assemblies.
There's going to be confusion. May the Lord keep us all. How we need to cry to the Lord to keep us.
We're so weak, so helpless. But he.
Everything. And Paul said I can do all things through Christ, which strengthened me.
But now there are many members yet, but one body, and the eye cannot say to the hand.
I have no need of thee. Now we're talking about the eye in the hand again. Why does Paul do that?
Always bring before us how every member needs Every other member The I cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee. We all sat down to a nice meal. It's noon.
And the first was that her eyes looked at it.
And if we hadn't had hands, what would we have done? Just sit and look at it?
The eye could not say to the hand I don't need thee. That was emphasized right there at the me. See, I needed the hand.
To take the food and bring them to the mouth, And no doubt it could be said the mouth needs the hand in other parts of the body needs to hand and other parts of the body need other parts of the body.
And again, the head to the feet. I have no need of you. The head cannot say to the feet, I don't need you.
Now who's the head?
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The Lord Jesus is the head.
And he says to the lowest member.
I can't do without you.
I can't do without you.
He doesn't say I don't need you, which means he does need us. The Lord does need us. He needs you. He needs me. He needs every member of his body.
Oh, it's not. It's not a loving way for the for the Spirit of God.
To put it before us through the Apostle Paul, it comes right from the Lord himself.
He's telling you and me, I need you. I need you.
I touched my heart when I first saw it.
The Lord says I need you.
Hear what happens.
We get away from the Lord, we stray away from the Lord and.
We forget to have fellowship and communion with him.
Forget to pray, forget to read his word, forget to spend time in his presence, forget to come to the meetings.
Where he is in the midst, he says, I need you. I need you.
Perhaps you say I don't need to go to meeting today. I don't really feel like it. The Lord says I need you. I feel like I want you there. Are we going by our own feelings? Are we going by His? How he feels about it?
Just think of him how gracious he is, how loving he is.
We were Speaking of His grace this morning. If so be you've tasted that the Lord is gracious. All I need to taste it more, that He's gracious, so gracious, so loving, and he's so approachable.
And it's just like Joseph. And I believe he's pictured in Joseph when he said to his brethren, Come near unto me, come near unto me, I need you. Wasn't that gracious of Joseph to say that?
What his brethren had mistreated him, sold him as a slave into Egypt.
Yet he says, Come near unto me, telling his brethren, I need you, I want you.
Well, we've all had that experience. Have.
We've already been in the place where we've come to see that we've sinned against the law.
Poor wretches that we were, and it broke us down when we found out that the Lord Jesus Christ loved us, the Church, so much that He died for it. God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish. It broke us down. The goodness of God LED us to repentance.
And I trust that in this matter of taking our place as members of the body of Christ.
And acting as members of the body of Christ and seeking grace from Him to do what he wants us to do as members of his body.
That will just cry to him, cry to him for that grace that we need.
Without him, we can do nothing. What a loving savior he is, The.
He has done everything to win us to himself. What more can he do?
What more do we want him to do to witness to himself?
I'm so thankful that we're here, all of us, in these meetings, because we have an opportunity for the Lord to just show us a little bit of himself.
So that our hearts might be drawn after him.
We will run after thee. Is that our feeling today?
Well, if we have felt a little of that drawing of his love today.
This morning. Oh, that's what it's for. To draw us to himself, to a closer walk with him if we feel anything this afternoon. Drawing us to himself to act more like members of the one body and honor him who is the head, and on him as Lord every day and every moment of our lives.
Have we felt it? I trust we do feel something of it.
His word speaks to my heart.
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Those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary Or you say I'm so weak?
The Lord needs you.
And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable upon these we bestow more abundant honor.
And an uncommon fox. Have more abundant comeliness. Oh, the Lord needs everyone. Don't look at yourself. That's really saying. Don't look at yourself. The Lord needs you. The Lord needs you. No matter what you are, what condition you're in, whether you're ignorant or whether you're wise, whether you're uneducated or educated, whether you're sickly or whatever it might be the Lord needs.
That's what he says. The Lord needs us.
For our commonly parts of no need but God has tempered the body together, having given more abundant honor to that part which lacked, oh, how the Lord has arranged all the members of the body of Christ.
And they're all set in their place according to his pleasure.
So don't get put out with anyone.
5th brothers in his place, Sisters in her place.
Let's look at one another as members of the body of Christ, and look at one another through the eyes of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And what is the Lord seeing?
And what is he saying? I need everyone of you. I need everyone of you. Get your eyes on Christ. Let him draw you to himself, that there should be no schism in the body. You see, the Lord doesn't want any division in his body. And what? That's why all of this is being written.
That there should be that the members should have the same care one for another.
Impartiality or sometimes like at corns we set up clicks parties, we get sectarian and spirit, but that's not according to the Lords mind. And when I read that as I was translating this official into the native language, I saw how they formed parties, some like Apollo, some like Peter, some like Paul. I thought that's that sectarianism is being condemned.
And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it, or one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it. Oh.
This is one thing that really rejoiced my heart when I was gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I saw that there was at least a measure of care one for another. I know there's failure and weakness in these things, but still, it was so different from what I'd seen before.
And if one suffered?
They all suffered and why were we praying for those this morning that were mentioned that were suffering, that had trials?
Because of this.
We hear one member suffering. We suffer with them. It's a burden on our heart. We pray for them.
And one member be honored. All the members rejoice with us. Don't get jealous of him.
No, they rejoiced with it.
Oh, what?
What a description this is of the body of Christ.
As it is should be when it's in tune and in touch with the Lord Jesus Christ, the head in the glory. That's our only help, our only solution, the only grace for us to look to Him for all that we need and will be what the Lord wants us to be.
A Man, A Woman, A Well
Address—Dn. Spence
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General Meetings, Des Moines, May 1982. Gospel by Dan Spence.
Let's begin this meeting tonight by singing #19.
Oh Christ and thee, my soul hath found and found in thee alone the peace, the joy I sought so long, the bliss till now unknown. I tried the broken cisterns, Lord, but the waters failed. Even as I as I stooped to drink, they fled and mocked me as I wailed.
Now none but Christ can satisfy none other name. For me there's love and life and lasting joy Lord Jesus found in thee #19.
Oh Christ standing.
I saw.
Joy, I thought.
Lovely tilde of unknown.
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Bow our heads in prayer.
The Blessed God and our.
Like you to turn together with me to a well known book and a well known chapter.
Gospel of John.
Chapter 4.
The Gospel of John, chapter 4 and verse one.
When therefore the Lord knew how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John?
Though Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples, he left Judea and departed again and into Galilee. And he must needs go through Samaria. Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Saikar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well.
And it was about the 6th hour. There cometh the woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink, for his disciples were gone away into this unto the city, to buy me. Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, ask us drink of me which am a woman of Samaria? For the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.
Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, give me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living Water. The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. From whence then hast thou that living water? Art thou greater than our Father Jacob, which gave us the well?
And drank thereof himself.
And his children, and his cattle, Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water, shall thirst again.
But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up, and do everlasting life.
The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither Come, hit her to draw, Jesus saith unto her, Go call thy husband, and come hit her. The woman answered, and said unto him, I have no husband. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband, for thou hast had five husbands. And he whom thou now hast is not thy husband in that.
Says thou truly the woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive this hour to profit. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain. And ye say, in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when he shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father he worship he know not what we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.
But the hour cometh, and now is when the true worshippers shall worship the Father.
In spirit and in truth, For the Father seeketh such to worship him.
God is a spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
The woman saith unto him, I know that Messiah's cometh, which is called Christ, when he has come, he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her eye, that speak unto thee.
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Am He and upon this time His disciple, His disciples.
Came his disciples, and marvelled that he talked with the woman. He had no man said, What seekest thou, or why talkest thou with her? The woman then left her waterpot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men, Come see a man which told me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Christ? Then they went out of the city, and came unto him.
Well, here's a chapter that we're all of us perhaps familiar with. Perhaps there's some here tonight that have never read this chapter before.
But what the burden that I have on my heart tonight is those of you in the audience who are yet without the Lord Jesus Christ.
And who are seeking after something in this world to fill and satisfy your soul?
Now we're not going to cover this whole chapter. We couldn't in the.
Hour or less that we have. We're just going to talk about a few of the verses in this chapter, but I wanted to read it so that you would get the continuity of the whole story.
Now notice that first of all we have a man. This man is the Lord in Jesus Christ. Secondly, we have a woman. Her name is not given. This woman has a need. This woman is a Sinner. This woman has a heart that is unsatisfied and unfulfilled. And last of all, we have a will, a well of water that has been drawn from many times.
And yet could never permanently satisfy the thirst of those who've come to it.
Jesus, the Son of God, a woman who is a Sinner and a well of water. And at the end of the meeting, perhaps we'll turn to talk just about this man, the Lord Jesus Christ and you and a well. But first of all, let's notice that Jesus is God's Son. Now that is of utmost importance as we begin this meeting.
Jesus, the Son of God. This book of the Gospel of John just starts out like as if God were to say, I want you to know who my son is. And so it starts out in this manner. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
In other words, God says I'm introducing my son as the word.
As if to say I want to fully express myself in my beloved Son, He goes on to say that all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made. He identifies him as the Creator, not only as his Son, but as the Creator, and as we read through this book of the Gospel of John.
One thing that is impressed upon everyone who reads it.
And that is who Jesus was. He was God's Son, the one who existed back into eternity as far as you can see. The one who lives in the glory today, the one who, as we will find out in the end of this book, dies upon Calvary's cross. Jesus the Son of God the Creator, standing there by a well of water.
Tired and thirsty.
Our beloved friends. This tells us a message all in itself, that Jesus was really a man.
Jesus, the Son of God, became a man. He came down in the form of human flesh, apart from sin, with no evil nature. But he was God, manifest in the flesh, and here he stands by this well of water, weary and thirsty. I wonder for a moment if you could picture for me this little scene. Here's the Lord Jesus Christ.
Sitting down by that well alone, the disciples have gone.
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Into the town to buy some food.
There Jesus sits, wishing for someone to come and draw him a drink from that well. And then, as the sun begins to set, a woman alone comes up the pathway from the city.
Alone to draw water by that well the shame of her sin impressed upon her.
Wishing to be alone, not wanting company, there she meets Jesus at that well of water.
All my friends, you know the Lord Jesus speaks in such wonderful and simple ways to the.
Unbeliever. And we'll try to do the same tonight. Sometimes, you know, Jesus just draws a picture. Sometimes you'll find him using a field of grain. Sometimes you'll find him using a little child. Sometimes you will find him using a rich farmer. And all of these things Jesus just uses to draw a simple picture that we're going to seek to do tonight.
Notice first of all several things. In verse seven there cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. In other words, he begins right down on her level. He establishes a contact with her, and that's the purpose of our meeting tonight. Not that you and I may come into contact, but that you and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Might come into contact notice then in verse 10.
Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, give me to drink, thou wouldst ask of him, and he would have given thee living water. In other words, he arouses her interest by introducing her to a very wonderful, wonderful gift.
Then notice in verse 14.
In verse 13 Jesus answered and said unto her.
Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again, but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst. But the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.
In other words, he speaks of the need of her heart, but he doesn't condemn. And then, last of all, we go down to verse 17 The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband, for thou hast had five husbands. And he whom thou now hast is not thy husband. In that thou saidst truly.
In other words, he brings out her sin. He brings out her sin.
And then he goes on to introduce her to himself in the remaining verses of this story. Now, I want to speak a little bit to each of you tonight, and I think that perhaps we'll be speaking to those of you who are in the teenage area of life and on up. Perhaps there'll be some children here tonight too, who have never accepted the Lord Jesus as their savior.
I like to speak to a little bit tonight.
On the wells of this world, here was this woman who was coming continually to this well every day. She had this painful journey out there to the well alone. No one wanted to be with her every day. She carried this pot of water back to her home. Every day she drank of the water from that pot that was taken from that well.
And every day her thirst continually came back to her.
Well, you know, Jesus is using that well to picture a thirsty soul. And if I were going to entitle this little message tonight, I would call it something like this.
Soul Thirst for not only is there a thirst of the body.
But there is a thirst of the soul, A thirst of the soul that would love to be quenched. Now this woman had tried to quench her thirsty soul by finding a man, as we noticed.
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She was perhaps a teenager when she fell in love for the very first time. She thought that this man would be so wonderful that he would meet every need of her heart. But as time went on, she found herself disappointed in this man, and for one reason or another she left him or he passed away or something, and she went on and married someone else.
And thinking that perhaps he could better need meet the needs of her soul. And she found in him the same disappointing thing that that man, no matter how different he was, could never meet the needs of her soul. And so she went on to #3 and #4 and #5 and found with each the same disappointment and the same emptiness.
She could not find satisfaction in marriage, and so she then turns to what the world is turning to today for satisfaction outside of marriage. She's living with a man who's not her husband, and for this she brings down upon her head the shame of that city. Well, she's looking for something that satisfy her soul, and the Lord Jesus is able to look right down into that heart and know.
The depths of sorrow, the depths of dissatisfaction, and the depths of thirst that man can never fill. All my friends, I wonder if you to night perhaps, are looking for satisfaction in a boy friend or in a girlfriend in a young man or a young woman.
I wonder if there's any in this room tonight who, like this woman, are looking for satisfaction outside of the marriage time. We're living in such an immoral, degenerate world. I was traveling on the bus over the Rocky Mountains just a week ago and we were leaving a little city called Glenwood Springs, and there was a young lady who got on the bus at Glenwood Springs and sat down.
Beside me and I.
Said hello to her and we went on our way and I was noticing the beautiful scenery outside the window. But she was reading a magazine, She was reading a magazine for young people. And so as time went on, I began to get a little nosy and glance at what she was reading. And she was reading this magazine for young people that was recommending that young people not getting married, but that they live together.
And try things out before marriage. So.
Sat there for a while, not knowing what to do or what to say, if anything, And after a while I looked over to her and I said, I said, do you agree with this article that you're reading? And she said, well I guess I would have to say yes. She said did you see that boy back at the at the bus station? And I said I did. She said that's my boyfriend and I'm living with him.
I said tell me one thing, how is it working out?
She paused for a moment and she said terrible, terrible, I said to her, I said I could have told you that. She said it started all right in the beginning, but she said it ended up terrible.
My friends, he could not find happiness in that kind of a thing. And yet the whole world tonight is going after it, you know, I began to open up the scriptures to her and speak a little bit and she said something like this, she said.
Well, I was raised in a very religious home, but she said, you know, I don't want to be put in a box. I don't want people telling me what to do. And I said to her, I want to show you something. And I took out from my pocket my wallet and I said here's a couple of pictures of my family back in California. I said there's my two boys and my daughter. And I said, you know, I have a very wonderful wife and.
I said I'm heading for a Bible conference in Des Moines, IA. I said, Now tell me, do you think I would have anything to gain by being unfaithful to my family and to my wife? And she said absolutely nothing. I said, would you recommend it to me? She said absolutely not. I said, would you say that I'm in a box if I'm faithful to this family?
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And to God. And she said. I couldn't say it.
All my friends, salvation through Christ does not put you in a box, but it sets you free from the dungeon of your sins to be free for the first time in your life. All my friends, Christ alone can set you free. You know, I had a knock at my door one night and a young man came and he said.
I want to talk with you for a little while. He sat down in my living room and he talked and finally he got to the point of his message. He said I'm tired of everybody trying to run my life. He said, you know, I'm just, I see the world out there with all that it has to offer. And he said I don't want the brethren telling me what to do.
And I said to him well.
Let's just get the brethren out of the way.
Let's just get the brethren out of the way. If you want to do it, you can leave your little meeting from where you've come. You can walk out the door, say goodbye. You don't have to deal with the brethren. But one thing I want to ask you, and I'm going to miss, apply this verse. Does not thou fear God?
And friends, I'd like to ask you that tonight as the well of immorality.
That is everywhere prevalent in the world tonight presents itself to your soul as something that can satisfy.
Dost not thou fear God? Aren't you afraid of a lost eternity? Aren't you afraid of the Judgment seat, the Great White Throne standing before a thrice holy God? All my friends, that young man said, yes, I do, Yes, I do. Well, this woman was involved in the Well of immorality and found it.
Founded a well that could not satisfy her poor longing heart.
There's other wells in this world. There's the well of education, and I certainly am not against education. I highly recommend it. But no one can find satisfaction in this well of intellectual attainment. You may become the valedictorian of your class. You may have a straight 4 point average. You may have won all kinds of.
Academic awards. But my friends, education will never, never satisfy your soul. It cannot satisfy the longing soul. There have been many who have tried it. You know, I was looking at a plot of the knowledge of this world and.
It goes something like this. If you were to look at time going along, starting with Adam and Eve, it stays pretty level occasionally. Like it will go up a little bit as we look at the Egyptian dynasties and the Roman Empire. It takes a dive into the Middle Ages. But all of a sudden in the late 1800s and the 1900s, that curve of knowledge begins to bend upward. It goes up and up and up.
Until today, it's almost going straight vertically.
Because the knowledge of this world is doubling every ten years or more.
Printed material is doubling every 15 years, so if you come out of college today with a degree that has specialized you in some field, you'll find that in 10 years your knowledge will be obsolete.
Yes, the knowledge of the world is a deep will, but it can never satisfy. I remember when I was going to school at Iowa State University, there was a young man who went all the way. He went all the way. He got his bachelors degree, he got his masters degree, he got his doctor's degree, and then he went into his room. He took his gun out of the desk and he put it to his head.
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And finished his life. And you know that among college and high school students today.
Suicide is one of the leading causes of death. Why? Because education can never never satisfy your heart. Never. You may go all the way into it, but it can't satisfy the thirst of your soul.
And what about entertainment? We're living in a world that is very entertaining.
A world that is full of entertainment that will entertain you from the moment you get up in the morning to the moment you get in go to bed at night. You know, they say that the average high school student who graduates from high school today has watched 15,000 hours of television and observed 18,000 murders. And at the heart of this television industry is.
A place out in California called Hollywood. You know, there was a young lady, perhaps tending toward middle age, whose name was Natalie Wood, and this young lady had gone to the top.
She had been in the entertainment industry for many, many years. She had married several times, and she had married the man that she felt would be the person that could satisfy her. They had, for a while, a very happy marriage. They bought in Beverly Hills, a beautiful grand estate. They had a yacht that was very large. They traveled around the world they were in.
All kinds of movies.
And, you know, they found that they, their hearts were empty. You know, I read a statement from this young lady, Natalie Wood, just before she ended her life by accident out on Catalina Island. And she said something like this. Her marriage was on the rocks and she said, I don't know why I've married the most wonderful man. I've got the most wonderful home.
My children are happy, but, she said. There's an emptiness and a longing in my heart that nothing has ever filled.
And then she found herself in those very trying moments, those last moments.
Before her death, things that were so evil that I could not even mention them, she found herself there, over on Catalina Island, about 20 miles off the coast of California, with her husband and with another man.
Under the influence of alcohol, going out in the middle of the night, slipping, slipping as she got into her little boat to go out there into the middle of the ocean and think it over about that soul that thirsted and had never been filled. She fell into the waters and never was able to get out.
Sad story, the well of entertainment can never.
Never satisfy your heart. And there's other wills. There's the well of attainment. You know, you may you may have life before you. You may think of all of the things that you're going to do in life. But all my friends, none of those can ever satisfy your heart. You may think about that home. You may think about that car, that swimming pool, that real estate, those new dresses and all. You may think about the stock market and all of those kind of things.
But my friends, attainment in this life will be an empty well that will never satisfy your heart. Never.
One night some time ago, my family and I went to a travelogue by.
A man who had sailed down the Congo River called it the Congo from stem to stern, and he had a little presentation that night.
Of all the things that he had done in life, you know, when he was 15 years old, he set out for himself 125 or so goals in life, things he wanted to accomplish, Things like climbing the highest mountains.
Going to the bottom of the deepest seas, traveling on the world's fastest planes, Hang Gliding, parachuting and all of those things, He set out 125 goals, and he said that he had accomplished about 115 of those goals, and as he was talking about all of his goals and the attainment of them, a little boy.
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Sat at my side and said dad, he said, do you think he said that that man's happy. And I said, I don't know. He said, you know, I think that man has missed the greatest thrill of all. And I said what is that? He said the thrill of knowing the Lord Jesus Christ as his savior.
Oh my friends, that's what we want to present to you tonight.
Just to cover for a few moments some of the wells that this world has to present, wells that are empty, wells that are never satisfying, and to ask you at this moment of the meeting to turn from that well of pleasure that you have looked into.
And turn and directly face a man, the Son of God the Lord Jesus Christ.
All my friends, I want to present to you in the remaining moments of the meeting that well of everlasting life in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. This world has poisoned springs, poison springs that will result in eventual death.
That will result in eternal judgment for you.
And I want to encourage you now in this meeting to turn from the wells and from the polluted springs of this world.
To face a man, to face the Lord Jesus Christ who loves you and who gave himself for you on Calvary Cross, I want you to just lay aside the cloak of religion. You know, as the Lord Jesus brought out to this woman her sin. He did it in a very quiet way, not in a condemning way. Did this woman have to stand up in front of the disciples and say, I have sinned?
Ah, no. Where does she say it? She doesn't say it publicly. She just eventually concludes that here is a man that knows all about her. She quietly admits in her soul that she sinned. And all my friends, as we come to this very important point of the meeting, as you turn from that well that can never satisfy. Think of your sins for a moment.
We're not going to ask you to stand up here and admit them to anyone, but just quietly, as this woman did, sit in your seat and confess that I have sinned against the thrice holy God. Well, when you come to that point, now you can turn to Christ, and you can find in him one who can eternally satisfy your heart.
You can find in one in Him who can eternally give you the everlasting delight of your soul, You can find in one in Him who not only will satisfy you right now at this very moment, but will take you on into the unending ages of eternity and satisfy your soul forever and forever. Now you may have met met some disappointed Christians, or some Christians who are under trial in some way.
Christians who have had difficulties or troubles of one kind or another. But my friends, one thing that you have never met is a Christian who's said that Christ has never satisfied my soul. All my friends, He is the source of every blessing, He is the source of every joy. He is the source of every satisfaction. And he stands tonight at the at this point in the meeting.
Before your never dying soul knocking at your door, presenting himself as the one that would love to come in and give you a drink of that ever lasting water.
Well, notice this woman.
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In verse 14 again.
But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. Jesus is offering to this woman something that is free. He's offering to this woman something that will cost her absolutely nothing, something that she does not need to work for. It's a gift, and it's something that is living.
It's going to spring up within her into everlasting life. How is it, my friends, that Jesus can offer water like this? How is it? Can he offer this water to you tonight? Oh yes, but how is it that Jesus can offer this water?
All I'd like to look for a few moments toward the end of this book, The Gospel of John, Chapter 19.
John chapter 19 and verse 16.
Then delivered he him 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, where they crucified him, and two other with him on either side, one and Jesus in the midst.
And now let's look at 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 and 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, and gave up the ghost, the Jews, therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath day, for the Sabbath was in high day besought Pilate, that their legs might be broken.
And that they might be taken away. Then came the soldiers, and break the legs of the 1St and of the other which was crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus and 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.
Now my friends, here we have.
A very, very strange picture. The Son of God.
The one who is that source of everlasting water, We see him condemned. Condemned for something he did not do. We see him led away to a place called Calvary, a throng that is mad.
With envy and hatred, A throng that wants to cast him out, crucify him, get rid of him. We see there the Lord Jesus Christ crucified, his hands and feet nailed to the cross, in the midst of two thieves, those thieves suffering for things that they did, and he suffering for being the sinless, perfect one.
And then we see, as time goes on, in the midst of all of this suffering, and after the three hours of darkness, he says, I thirst.
Now I want to think about that, and I want you to think about it for a few moments.
You know back in the book of Genesis, Chapter 7, Chapter 7 and verse 11.
It talks about that arc where Noah and his family was all safe within it, and it says that the fountains of the great deep were opened up. The windows of heaven were opened up, as if to say there's a drenching rain that comes down from heaven upon this arc of safety, as if to say there's a gushing water that comes out of the deep of the earth and comes upon this ark.
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And all my friends in a little, just a little way.
This is a picture of what happened during those hours of darkness when Jesus suffered for my sins, when he bore them in his own body on the tree and suffered that infinite pain that no human soul can ever imagine.
This is what Jesus suffered. All that judgment that came down from above, and all of that judgment that came up from underneath, that came in upon his soul, there in those hours of darkness that caused him to cry out, my God.
My God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Oh, you know, sometimes I read that verse.
In the book of Lamentations, but it seems to be a pleading word to the Sinner.
It says, Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger. And then it says, For from above he has sent fire into my bones, as if to say, God cannot in human language ever describe the suffering that the Lord Jesus Christ went through on Calvary's cross.
He uses the drenching rains, the floods from underneath. He uses the fire coming down from above, as if to say, I can't express it any, any better than that in human language. But let's imagine for a moment that fire of judgment, my friends, that perhaps you deserved coming down upon that sinless soul of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, And then think of these words.
I thirst.
I thirst. I am sure that he was describing his physical thirst, for the thirst of the cross was extremely great. But I want you to know, my friends, that Jesus thirsted upon Calvary's cross. He thirsted upon Calvary's cross, that you might take a drink of that everlasting well of water, of eternal life.
And one drink of that water will cause you never never to thirst again. All my friends, Jesus loves you. He loves you. He loved you when He died on the cross. He loves you from the glory. Tonight, He loves you as He stands outside your soul and asks if you would be willing to take a drink of that water. Would you? Would you, as this meeting comes to a close, be willing to drink of that water?
My friends, that alone will satisfy your heart. Notice as we read down through these verses that there as Jesus dead body hung upon Calvary's cross, a soldier came along and pierced his side, and out of it came, could we say, a spring of water and blood that will cleanse and wash away every spot?
Every stain, every record of sin. And you know when you read in the Old Testament of your sins.
Being buried in the depths of the ocean, in the depths of the sea. Just think of it as being buried in the depths of the sufferings of Christ. You know, this world is a polluted place. And I've noticed as they get more polluted and with the nuclear generators and so on, they begin to look for places to get rid of these poisonous waste. And so they've taken some of them and they've put them in containers.
They take them way out into the ocean and they drop them in to the ocean, hoping that they will never get broken loose.
Well, you know, it's possible that they might, and that worries a lot of people. But you know, when your sins are buried in the depths of the suffering of Calvary Cross all my friends, they are safe forever. Never will they be brought up in judgment against you. Never. They'll never be brought up at the judgment seat. You'll never stand before God and see one sin.
Ever brought to condemn you to an eternal hell? Never.
All my friends, Jesus suffered on the cross, he said. I thirst that's you tonight might have your thirst eternally satisfied in partaking of him as your own personal savior.
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I'd like to turn just to look at a man in the book of Luke, A Couple of Men, chapter 16.
One man who was thirsty eternally, and the other man who is.
Not Thirsty Luke, Chapter 16 and verse 22.
I'll start right in the middle of this story, and it came to pass that the beggar died.
And was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom. The rich men also died.
And was buried, and in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried, and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou and thy lifetime receiveth thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things.
But now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. Notice here was a man who drank at the rivers of the pleasures of this world. He's in eternity. He's suffering from thirst, A thirst that occurred over 2000 years ago and is going on tonight. He wished that.
That Abraham would send Lazarus down with one drop of water, as if to say, I know he has plenty to drink, I know he's satisfied up there, but if he could come down and relieve this burning pain that I have, oh, I would be so happy. Just a drop of water. But that prayer was never answered. So these two men, both of them go on in there. This, this one man.
Goes on in his suffering and Lazarus goes on enjoying drinking at that well of everlasting life.
All my friends, I want to impress upon you. I want to impress upon you the realities of hell. The realities of hell. I want you boys and girls tonight to think of it a place of eternal suffering.
Where no one can ever hear your prayers. Hell, a place where your tongue will be parched, where your where your mouth will be scorched, where you will suffer on and on. I want you to think of heaven for a moment as that place, as the Book of Revelation describes it. A place that has a river of water flowing through it with a tree of life.
A place where you are eternally satisfied. I want you to think of those two places and then think of Jesus as He suffered on Calvary cross and said I thirst, that you might never thirst.
Oh, let's turn back for just one more look in the Gospel of John Chapter 4.
Notice the simplicity of verse 10.
Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, give me to drink, Thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.
Notice the simplicity if you knew.
If you knew the gift of God, heaven, everlasting life, and if you knew who it was that spoke to you, the Son of God, then all that you had to do was ask and he would have given you living water. My friends, it's just as easy as taking a drink from this glass. It's just as easy as taking a drink from this glass is free.
And God is offering it to you tonight. Just partake for a few moments of the Lord Jesus Christ. Invite Him into your soul to wash your sins away in His precious blood. Invite him into your soul that is never been satisfied by the things of this world. All my friends, I highly recommend him. I was saved many years ago, almost 40 years ago. Saved.
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Saved by the grace of God and by the power of His precious Blood. And I've never been unsatisfied yet, and I never will. I want to recommend to you right now to night.
As this meeting comes to a close, to just surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ, let him into your life. Invite him into your heart. Ask him to wash those stains of sin away and he'll do it. At this moment I was thinking tonight of those over in the Falkland Islands, that little group of Argentinians that is surrounded by the British, perhaps, if they're still there, surrounded and things look so grim for them.
Oh, if they just surrender, I thought if they just surrender, if they just surrendered two or three weeks ago, they could have saved all of this bloodshed. And I was reminded of a little story that happened in the Second World War. There was a German general on the continent there in the country of Germany, and the Allied forces had his little village surrounded. And, you know, this German general was extremely stubborn.
And so he would not give up. The odds were very great against him. And so they flew into this little village, all kinds of little leaflets, pamphlets like gospel tracts. And they said, please surrender, come out with your hands up. We'll let you live. We won't. We won't put you in *******. We'll let you live. We'll set you free. They said, you know, if you don't surrender. The planes are now on the runways. Their engines are started, Their engines are warm. Their their bays are filled with bombs.
Please listen to this message and surrender. And you know that stubborn German general would not give up. And they moved in on that little village with all that they had and they totally destroyed every house, every every building, every person. Those men went down because they wouldn't surrender against very great odds. And all my friends, tonight I ask you at the close of this meeting.
To consider the odds of your sins, to consider this well that you've been seeking satisfaction from and justice. Realize that Christ alone can satisfy the need of your heart, that he loves you and wants to do so. Tonight, just before I left the little girl, about 16 years old, I had noticed her across the room and had not met her. I'd been gone for a while.
And her name was Laurie. But I could tell by that smile on her face that something was different. And I went over and I said, Laurie, why is this big smile on your face? And she said, I got saved. I said, that's wonderful. When did you get saved? And she told me about it. You know, just before I left, we had all of the young people over at our house for a little thing. And Laurie said, could I talk to you for a few moments? And so.
Someone else joined me. We went to a room and we talked for a few moments, and Laurie said, I'd like to tell you something. I'd like to remember the Lord Jesus in death as soon as possible. And I hope, my friends, as we close this meeting tonight, that you have that desire to. It's a normal desire once you've come to him. And we didn't have time to talk about those wonderful verses that talk about worshipping God in the Spirit, but Lori knows what that means, and she wants to do that.
And now, as we close, let's just sing #12. Just as I am without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me and that thou bidst me come to thee, O Lamb of God, I come. And if there's anyone in the room who's not saved, just let this be the prayer of your heart as you're as you sing. Perhaps you don't know the words to use while they're written down in this little hymn.
Just for you.
Just as I.
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Wore me.
I love you. I have all day.
Hebrews 11:1-4
Hebrews 11:13-20
Hebrews 11:21-
2 Peter 1:6-12
2 Peter 1:13-16
2 Peter 1:17
2 Peter 1:1-5
Open Mtg.