Address—Dave Spence
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Could we turn to John, Chapter 12?
For a couple of verses. In fact, let's read 3 verses here, John 12 verse 25.
He that loveth his life shall lose it.
And he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.
If any man serve me, let him follow me, And where I am, there shall also my servant be.
If any man serve me him will my father honor?
Let's turn over to the first chapter of John, and then we'll turn back here for a few moments.
And verse 34. And I saw and bear record that this is the Son of God.
Again the next day after John stood and two of his disciples, and looking upon Jesus as he walked.
He said. Behold the Lamb of God.
And the two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus. And then Jesus turned, and saw them following, saith unto them, What seek ye?
They said unto him, Rabbi, which is to say, being interpreted, Master, where dwellest thou?
Saith unto them, Come and see, And they came, and saw where he dwelt.
And abode with them.
With and and abode with him that day, for it was about the 10th hour.
We can turn back to John Chapter 12 for Justice a moment.
Like to just share with you beloved friends.
The question that we've just read.
Concerning following the Lord Jesus Christ, and that is to his dwelling place.
Following Jesus to his dwelling place.
Yesterday we spoke a little bit about taking his yoke upon us and learning of him, and thereby he shall find rest unto your souls.
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light, and we spoke about the importance, the preeminence, of the word of God in our lives.
And taking the cross and having his person before us as not only the one who bore the cross for us.
And bore the penalty of our sins on the cross, and also was made sin for us.
And whether we realize it or not, we are crucified with Him. Have we owned that in a practical way?
Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth within me. And have we yielded to the old nature? And is that what has been being lived out in my life?
Sad to say, much of the time it's true.
Paul said for me to live is Christ, and he said that Christ might be magnified in his body. That is the kind of magnifying glass that we need, that Christ might be magnified.
In our bodies. And if that's true, then we must acknowledge our death with the Lord Jesus Christ reckoning ourselves to be dead in need unto sin, but alive unto God.
Know ye this therefore, that your old man has been crucified, that the body of sin might be removed. It says in Romans chapter six, that ye henceforth shall not serve sin, because he that is dead is justified from sin, or freed, set free from sin, and that is the only channel through which we can be set free from our old nature that enslaves us. And of course the simple picture, and the beautiful one of the beautiful pictures is in the Old Testament.
Where the children of Israel.
Were set free from the tyranny of Pharaoh as they crossed through the Red Sea, a picture of the death of Christ, the waves as a wall on each side, and they pass through on dry land. And they escaped from the Egyptians, Speaking of the world and the lusts of the flesh. And through the death of Christ, so to speak, we make our escape, because the master of sin will not let go, no matter how much we try to apply.
Some kind of discipline. In our lives, we discipline ourselves, and Christian disciplines are probably okay.
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But what we need is the application of his blessed death that censors my own will and my nature and friends. His yoke is easy and his burden is light.
Dear brother Dean was sharing with me just yesterday about a dear Christian who was in Siberia in prison for two years I believe if I remember correctly.
And she said, there is one thing I learned in the Siberian prison, she said his yoke is easy and his burden is light.
And the more we walk in that yoke with him, the more we will find that out, even though it may bring suffering, as this dear sister in Christ experienced.
Paul and Silas were in the Philippian jail with their backs bleeding from the stripes they had experienced and they were singing praises to God at midnight. Now here there is physical suffering involved.
And if they could step forward, they would say his yoke is easy and his burden is light.
We little realize beloved young people, and I say this particularly to my own heart, the power of the Spirit of God.
To take my heart out of this world, to emancipate me, to deliver me from not only the world, but myself, and all that enslaves me in the flesh. But it cannot be other than through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ and saying, Lord.
I have died with thee.
Brother Bob Brimlow was telling me about the necessity of not bothering a cocoon.
And opening up the cocoon so that when we think it's ready for that little butterfly to come out, we can get it out a little bit earlier so we can watch it and and then watch it fly away. Well, we know what happens if that's the case.
We open up that cocoon too soon, and that little butterfly will never fly.
We must go through the processes of God according to the Scripture, that we might know Him, the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death, and those that we spoke of that have suffered, whether it be Paul and Silas, or this dear woman in the Siberian prison, or the martyrs that gave themselves to Christ for the cause of Christ in the early centuries of the Church.
They experience something like what we have in this verse here, the power of his resurrection, and I'm sad to say.
Some of us never learned to fly.
Because we take another route.
Other than through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The scripture says if I'm crucified with him, nevertheless I live.
Yet not I self is gone. It's buried. It's, it's it's planted in His death. And we've been planted together in His resurrection. And that's what baptism pictures simply to us. And when the children of Israel went through the Red Sea, here they were on another seashore, completely alienated or separated from the enemy. And they sang praises unto the Lord. You see, they were in a new position. They had peace.
Delivered from all of their enemies.
And we have been too, by the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. But why doesn't it work?
Why doesn't it work? And I'll tell you something, young folks, that I believe is true, that I heard many years ago.
The problem is, we're not sick of ourselves.
Think about that. The problem is we never get to the point that we become sick of ourselves.
And I believe the process in Peters life brought him to a point of complete self judgment, repentance and surrender. Because all the way the Lord wasn't hard on this man. His yoke is easy, his burden is light.
And Peter learned to rest in his love, enjoy his presence, and no matter how much He failed, and no matter how much all of the disciples failed, they felt free to be very near the Lord. Isn't that wonderful? Some of us were talking about that yesterday, And sometimes we make it a little bit hard for people to come into our presence because maybe they don't measure up to a certain spirituality that we think they should, and we make it make them feel a little bit uncomfortable.
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To be near us.
Not the Lord Jesus.
We are all at different growth levels in our lives, and he knows that. And we are to grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's true, and that's why we're here.
But, you know, we have to go through that process like that little butterfly.
We do. We have to go through the death of Christ, and as He brings this heavily upon our hearts, no matter what we press pass through, He brings us to feel not only our inadequacies and our emptiness and our unworthiness, but we cry out, as we have the language in Roman Romans Chapter 7, All wretched men that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this stitch.
It's true, there are pleasures connected with sin. We all know that. And the enemy is always there to prompt sin in our lives and and to appeal.
Make something appeal to us, attractive to our hearts. And he knows exactly our weaknesses and how to make us fail and fall, because he really doesn't want us to be happy. John, Chapter 15. Jesus spoke these words. These things. Have I spoken unto you that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full, but we have to go through the process of death.
Always say I know he died for my sins and I'm thankful. According to First Corinthians chapter 15 he died for my sins. According to the scriptures he was buried and rose again the 3rd day. But he also died to put me away, to put me away.
That's when the Spirit of God can bring Christ fully to my heart, when I become sick of struggling and striving with the problems within and the attractions. Without that, I come to a point where I say Lord.
What is the answer? What is the answer that Jesus that the Lord Jesus Christ gives us in Romans Chapter 7? When Paul said Who shall deliver me? The answer is almost in the question.
And he says, I thank God through Jesus Christ, my Lord, who? It's Jesus. It's occupation with him having a single eye for Christ, realizing that we're dead in the death of Christ, with him, buried with him, raised again with him in newness of life. And we are a new creation in Christ Jesus. Therefore old things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new. And when we step into his yoke, we take his yoke upon us.
Our will is subjected to his and we say Lord, like he said, nevertheless not my will.
Because our will has only taken us down a pathway of unhappiness. And if you stop and weigh and consider these things and contemplate where your will has taken you and where my will has taken me, I have to own it's nothing but to a place of sorrow and emptiness and disappointment. Isn't that true?
And we have the full potential, just as much as the Apostle Paul did to become.
Not only a servant for the Lord Jesus Christ, and that's very important.
But to say, as He as He did for me to live is Christ. And if we had something of the fullness of His love in our hearts and the importance of His work, His cross applied to our lives. We take up our cross and follow Him, having Him before us and letting His word judge us.
It's only judging us because it spoils our happiness, that's why. And we need guidance through this world, and we're given the various things in the Epistles, even, that tell us how to live. It's not that we if we obey all of those things, we'll be happy.
It simply tells us how to keep our lives in check so that when we do tell a lie, or we show anger or lust or whatever it might be, those things break communion with the Lord Jesus Christ and the only way back.
Is repentance confession owning the failure? And that brings us back in the blessed communion of his love? It's not as we were saying the other morning.
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That if we keep His commandments then we will gain His love. We will arrive at fellowship with him. No, it's confession of the problem that joins us to the Lord in fellowship.
And that's only maintained by continuing by keeping His word. Continuing in His love is only maintained by obedience to Him.
Is there anyone here that?
And I asked this question to you because we've been talking about the the yoke of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Is there anyone here contemplating?
In unequal yoke.
We've heard over the years our brethren bring before us the unequal yoke of business.
In ecclesiastical way, joining ourselves to an organization, a religious organization.
And those that do good in our community called a philanthropic organization something like that. But is there anyone here?
Considering.
A friendship, or possibly even even marriage.
With one who is not saved.
The scripture is very clear in Two Corinthians chapter 6, and I know you've heard it. Read it many times as I have. Be not therefore unequally yoked together with unbelievers. It's very clear.
Stop dear young people, and consider living a lifetime in an unequal yoke with someone who cannot enter into the precious things of the Lord Jesus Christ. And you could go a step further, as our brother suggested the other day, one who doesn't appreciate the fullness of the truth.
Of Christ and the Church, and the Assembly.
Do you want that kind of life?
You say, well, I can make it with a believer as long as he or she is a believer. And that may be true, but you're going to miss out on an awful lot.
Nothing like being joined together as husband and wife and enjoying the same thing spiritually, the same truths, the same precious things and the treasures of the word of God that we had before us this morning of Christ and the Church. The unsearchable riches of Christ. They they, they are unsearchable. And to have that joy of sharing those things together is unspeakably precious.
And Satan is out to ruin that in marriages today, even among Christians.
But there is another thing that I think we should consider, and that is it says in First Corinthians 6, we're living in a world where the enemy is desensitizing you by heart and mind to the sin that is out there in the community.
And in your place of education?
And everybody talks about the immoral things that go on just as though marriage doesn't mean anything anymore.
But remember what the scripture has said. First Corinthians chapter six. He that hath joined himself unto in harlot is 1 flesh.
Knowing not that you are joined to the Lord, it says First Corinthians 6 minutes verse.
Flee fornication.
You see, the enemy reduces the level of importance of abandoning those things in your lives. By having all of these things and materials that you can read and look at and what you hear every day, it just sort of reduces the importance of keeping yourself from all of those things.
And it will spoil your testimony. And I've seen it turn young people into the world. Never recovered. Never recovered. Going on in a pursuit of that for many years without being delivered from it. Sad.
The scripture says knowing not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost.
And that you are not your own, and you're bought with a price. Imagine the Holy Ghost living within my body and your body. And whatever we do with our bodies, we connect the precious.
Person of Christ in the form of the Holy Ghost to that.
In John chapter 12, we've read the verse that if any man serve me, let him follow me. Notice it doesn't say if any man follow me, let him serve me. There are many who are following the Lord Jesus Christ and trying to serve him, but they're really not serving him.
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And serving the Lord Jesus is not necessarily doing a great deal.
Is following him.
You have seen bedridden Christians, and I could share some cases with you, souls that have been on a sick bed for many years. And you say, what can they do for for Christ. Surely they're not in a position of following him. Oh yes they are. And that's why this verse said, if any man serve me, let him follow me. The Lord has introduced that kind of an affliction in a life to create, you might say, a greater capacity.
For his love and also a testimony for it in that life.
I know a woman who was.
Spoken to me by a brother, Eric Smith many years ago who was in a on a sick bed for years and she had sent out the most beautiful poetry throughout the area there in Melbourne, born Australia.
And souls were blessed by it.
And one day he thought, well, I'll look up this dear soul and I just would like to, to encourage her and have a little visit with her. So he knocked on the door and he heard this voice say, come in and he walked in the door. That's when they didn't used to lock doors in those days. He stepped in and here was this dear woman.
Flat on her back.
In a bed of affliction had been that way for many, many years.
And he couldn't believe his eyes.
All of the production of this lovely poetry that had been a blessing to the Saints.
Emanated from a heart that.
Was so full of Christ and yet suffering in body.
For many years.
We often gauge the ability to serve the Lord by maybe our physical well-being and very comfortable circumstances that we are in. Not so.
The Lord has chosen for you to follow him through a certain pathway to do something for him that no one else can do.
And you'll have to find out what that is. But remember, the scripture says he's given a gift to every man. I Peter 410.
Just give him a gift to every man and every woman.
And I wish we had time to go into the importance of living.
In a responsible way concerning the gift that he has given you to exercise.
Matthew chapter 25 talks about it a little bit.
About the Kingdom of of heaven, one who.
Was umm.
Had charge of servants, and he's likened unto a man who.
Delivered to his servants various things like.
10 talents and five talents and one talent according to their several ability.
The Apostle Paul had a natural ability that surpassed many in his particular day.
He doesn't expect others to have that same capacity because he didn't suit them with it.
But it's according to their several ability. In other words, he had a capacity to be able to deliver the truth in an orderly and a wonderful way. As we read the Epistles, we can see that.
And to preach the word of God in a wonderful way. It must have been a great experience to hear him deliver the word and to get it down to a level where the Saints could understand it and enjoy it.
But he also received a gift from the Lord when he was born into the family of God, and the Spirit of God controls that gift.
It's not through the natural ability. Yes, there is a natural ability, but the spirit of God controls it, you see, and works through that vessel that has been given a certain capacity to exercise.
And so with you, dear young people, you have been given something that I haven't.
And others haven't. That's important to the Lord. And when this one came back to review his servants.
As to what they had done with the 10 talents and five talents and so forth.
He said, Well done, thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. And he said that with the 10 and with the five, because they've taken the 10, and they got other 10, and the five, and they they made other five talents. They used what the Lord gave them, and they were responsible to use it.
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And the honored and glorified the Lord. In doing that the other one took it.
And dug a hole and put it in the earth.
He forgot about it, Didn't didn't want to be concerned about it. It was too interested in making a living, perhaps, and doing other things.
There are two ways in a coming day that we will perhaps be reviewed before the judgment seat of Christ, and one is did you use the gift that I gave you to use?
While you were in the world.
#2 is were you faithful to me? And that's the pounds. I think that's Luke 19. I'm not sure, but that's the pounds that were delivered. And so forth. General faithfulness to the word of God. And again, we cannot be faithful to him without walking, taking the yoke of the Lord Jesus Christ in obedience to his precious word. And notice here there is a lovely expression.
That's it here in verse 26.
If any man serve me, let him follow me, And where I am, there shall also my servant be.
And that leads us to the thought of his dwelling place.
We have discussed the subject of worship and service, perhaps many times What is more important and we put one maybe above the other.
And we try to understand which that which should occupy us in this world. But notice that following the Lord Jesus Christ as being where He is. And it's not only where he takes you in this world if it's to a mission field as our brother Dean is over there and.
A country so far away from us, or someone else right here in a local area, that he has a place of service marked out for us.
It's being where the Lord is, but I believe that this goes beyond that.
For direction to his dwelling place where I am, there also shall my servant be. Do you really want to serve the Lord?
Then follow him to his dwelling place.
Some of us were speaking last evening that something to this effect, the greatest privilege is perhaps that we have and share.
As being gathered to the precious name of the Lord Jesus Christ is that heritage, if we want to put it that way, that we've been given these truths have been just dropped right into our laps.
Have you ever heard of other Christians speaking about Christ in his church as one?
The one body, and the importance of that and owning Christ is our head in heaven. Do other believers occupy with those kinds of conversations? And it's not to be critical. No, beloved, because there are very few who are in the enjoyment of those precious things that have been given to us.
Very few.
We're responsible. They've been given to us. His body. We read this together. This was it yesterday or the day before his body, which is the fullness of him that filleth All in all his church. The body is the full complement of the glory of Christ. Isn't that marvelous when you think of it?
In other words, the full display of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ will emanate from and through his body.
When he comes to be glorified in His Saints, and to be admired in all them that believe.
His glory is so great it can only be told out through the millions. That will be one with Christ when that full complement is with Him. And that's the moment that he waits for.
Isn't it only fitting that while we're in this world, we should find and be urgent and anxious to find out where He is, so that we might share something of that oneness now? And He prayed for it in John chapter 17. He prayed that they whom thou hast given me might be 1.
Even as we are one that they might be one in us, that the world might know that thou hast sent me, he prays for that oneness to be lived out in our lives, beloved. It's not just kind of a a secondary truth. In the Bible, Jesus prayed first of all that there might be one in communion. John chapter 17 you can read at verse 11.
And further down he talks about oneness or Unity in testimony.
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Where is that today? Where is the oneness and testimony today? You and I, by His matchless grace, have stepped into that oneness, we might say through the truth that's been given to us. We may not realize it. We may be simply in a position of it outwardly, but not in the enjoyment of it inwardly. But it's He that is joined to the Lord is 1 Spirit. We are one with Jesus right now, whether we know it or not.
We are one with him one.
And then later on in John 17, he talks about the oneness or the unity that he's going to enjoy in the glory when he has his bright home.
And this little story. Here we read about John the Baptist beholding Jesus as he walked his.
Just glorious.
It's wonderful to read as a story and justice kind of leave it in that form.
But the truths that are brought before us here are immense and perhaps are beyond our ability to even enjoy or explain.
John chapter one. It says after the next day after John stood and two of his disciples.
And looking upon Jesus as he walked, he saith, Behold.
The Lamb of God.
Has there been a next day in your life?
Beloved brother or sister the next day.
The first day was when he said, Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world.
And that brings in redemption, because Christ was going to the cross. And he saw this blessed 1 The Messiah of Israel. And as to the work that he was going to do. And he declares publicly, declares, preaching, you might say, behold, the land saw Jesus coming unto him. And he said, behold, the Lamb of God taketh away the sin of the world the next time here, the next day after, He's just standing there.
In blessed contemplation of the glory of the Lamb of God in his heart is near the breaking point.
As he beholds the glory of the Lord, he wasn't preaching. He wasn't teaching anything to his disciples. We might say John was simply retiring from service.
And he's about to go to prison, as we well know, and be beheaded. There would be no rival when Jesus came on the scene. John, the greatest of all prophets.
And there he is that the next day just enjoying Christ.
Has there been that next day in your life?
I believe for you and me to have.
Any desire to follow him to his dwelling place, there must be that enjoyment. You may be there without that enjoyment because you've been born into it. And we've read and heard many stories of those who have paid an awful price for the truth, and one of them is back there in the form of a tape by our brother Dan Anderson. And I would recommend to the young people that they, they get a copy of that tape. It will make you appreciate.
How the spirit of God works in a man's life clear over in Africa, much like those in Malawi that our brother Dave Whittaker has put a tape out on, which was very encouraging for some of us to hear it as we wrote up in the van which shows how the Spirit of God works and Drew, Brother Anderson, Brother Whittaker.
Out from the systems of men, and to step into another independent group, and finally to find out that was wrong too, because they didn't own the discipline in one gathering to apply to another, and through a variety and a maze of circumstances they prayed and the Lord brought them to that place called His dwelling place.
This is truth, beloved, that is precious to the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And two of his disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus.
It was the enjoyment of John the Baptist's beholding Christ that caused the others to follow Jesus. And if you want to win souls to Christ, you can do it in a very wonderful way, and that is by living Christ. Not only preaching, but living. Here is a man who is living Christ.
Beholding the Lamb of God, there was an enjoyment in his heart and life that could be seen and felt, and two of John's disciples just checked out with John and followed the Lord Jesus Christ.
He was the focus of John's ministry, Brother read to us. And the other morning in the prayer meeting, he must increase, but I must decrease.
You see, that was the tone and the character of his ministry. He stepped back in the shadows, and brought Christ before the heart. And these two just simply followed Jesus, because of his his enjoyment of him. Jesus turned, and saw him following, and saith unto them, What seek ye? And they said unto him, Rabbi, which is a saving interpreted master, where dwellest thou?
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He didn't say whom seek ye.
Lord was waiting. He knew where they were. He knew that they were following him. He wanted them to follow him. But he didn't want to put words in their mouth whom seek he, he said. What are you seeking?
What?
And they said, where dwellest thou? We're interested, Lord, in where you dwell.
And he saith unto them, Come and see.
And they came and saw.
Where he dwelt, there is no address given here. I know we've heard some of these things before. He could have said now just go down the street, make a left turn two blocks, make another right turn. Is the 1St house on the next corner on the left.
And the reason that is so beloved, I believe, is very simple because.
It is not connected with this world at all. It is no sanctuary in this world that we are directed to as we have in Hebrews. It speaks about an earthly sanctuary and there are many beautiful sanctuaries in this world, but it's without place or without name.
It's like the upper room that we have in Luke Chapter 22, and the man bearing the pitcher of water, the Holy Spirit.
Guiding by the word of God to the upper room, a place that is out of this world. Because the Lord Jesus was a stranger here, he didn't have a place in this world. The foxes of the have their holes, and the birds of the air have their nests, but the Son of Man have not. Where to lay his head. He was a stranger here. He had been rejected, and this was not for the world.
This was for those who were interested in finding where he abode.
Where he dwelt are you?
How much do these precious things mean to you? And I know they perhaps have been discolored by some of the problems in your life or in your assembly, and you have sort of been a little bit turned aside by problems and some of us by.
The division some years ago.
Isn't that true? Don't these things hurt?
When we realize the the joys that were ours as a company going on for many years as families enjoying precious things together.
Fellowship.
Keeping the unity of the spirit.
Spirit of God indwells each of us and brings us together as the body of Christ. But many of our brethren are in different places.
But we have the responsibility to maintain the unity of the Spirit, and that is owning Christ as our head.
And Paul spoke to the Corinthians, and he said, I beseech you, brethren, that when you come together in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that there be no divisions among you. Is Christ divided. Some say I'm a Paul, I'm Apollos. Others said I'm of Cephas, I'm of Christ.
He prayed for oneness. He prayed for unity, that we might keep that unity, so to speak. The unity of the Spirit. Has it been kept.
Even by brethren who are privileged with such treasures of truth and having a greater responsibility to maintain this unity.
Now we failed, we have failed, we have contributed to this unhappiness, this unhappy condition of things.
And I believe that there may be some here with hearts that are broken and don't understand why the Lord allows this. And maybe you have relatives or friends on the other side, or another group that you miss and long for their you miss their company and long for their fellowship.
I do.
Remember what we read earlier when it said if a man hate not his father, mother, wife and children, sisters or brethren or his own life also.
He cannot be my disciple.
When you follow him to the place of his dwelling, there is connected with the precious person.
Responsibilities that are according to the word of God that can direct us in a path.
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That will keep us from division.
And when action has to be taken, it is not happy many times.
In Matthew 18 says, where two or three are gathered together under my name, there am I in the midst of them.
We gather to that precious name, but connected with that precious name, the worthiness of that precious name that not only saves, but it's the gathering center.
There is the truth of the one body to own him as the head.
We must receive everything in the assembly from the head, and so therefore we don't have one man standing up and taking charge, one man whom all the gifts are found in, and he can exercise that to the to the audience sitting by.
Those at Colossians had lost the good of that. They didn't hold the head, they were disconnected from the head.
The other thing is something that's very difficult to bear, and that is discipline, separation from evil. Let him that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.
I know of a young man in a church nearby my home that got involved with a young lady.
They got married.
They weren't even disciplined. A church that no doubt preaches some fundamental truths.
A little leaven. The scripture says leaveneth the whole lump. These are the qualifying factors for where the Lord Jesus is.
Do we value?
Some of the other factors such as music and and a gifted man to stand up and give us a word and there are many gifts out there more than the truth that Christ set before us has to maintaining the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
According to his word.
The assembly is the ground and the support or pillar of the truth. The truth has to his person and I am thankful, beloved, and I I shared with this with some of you last year. Perhaps I am thankful to be in a place where his precious person is held in the esteem.
Of the Word of God according to the Word of God.
He did no sin. He knew no sin in him was no sin. And there are many out there that say I don't know if Christ could sin or not. I'm not clear on that fundamental, so-called fundamental preachers.
And there are many things we could talk about. The person, the work of Christ. One moral mention. Then we'll quit.
And that is the sovereignty of the Spirit of God.
Isn't it a marvelous thing as we sat together here Lords Day morning?
The joys of that hour still go with the sentiments go with my heart and I'm sure with many here.
And some of us said after the meeting that it was such a precious hour.
That none of us dare say anything or do anything out of the leading of the Holy Spirit. It is true that the assembly is the habitation of God through the Spirit, and the Spirit of God dwells in the the the body of believers throughout this world.
But he is not allowed to have his place, and that's the difference. Lord's Day Morning, thankfully.
We tried by his grace to give him his place.
A brother gives out a precious him. A younger brother gave out of him. A younger brother prayed. Another brother broke the bread. Sisters were worshipping, rejoicing in Christ. Could we think of fabricating something according to our own imagination?
And natural understanding or intelligence that could be better than that, That's what it's going to be beloved like for all eternity, and we just have the privilege of having a foretaste of it now.
I can't think of anything better and I don't know.
If I'm going to be gathered next week, and I tell you that very frankly, because I can't trust my own heart.
There are some brothers here who witnessed a brother, very faithful in these precious things.
Spoke of Matthew 1821, Lords Day and the preciousness of that verse and the truth of it. To the Saints in Buena Park and the next Lords Day he was out of fellowship.
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We can't trust our own hearts. We cannot.
Keep the truth. Paul told Timothy, to keep that good thing which hath been committed unto thee. How by the Holy Ghost. But he spoke to him personally. He said. Timothy, he said, I know you've shed many tears, and some of you have shed many tears about the the division and the problems. And there were many that were turning away from Paul, and and Timothy was associated with this reproach. All they in Asia have turned against me.
And Paul said. I know of your tears, Timothy, but keep that good thing.
Keep it. It's been committed to you, and that is the treasure of the truth.
Keep it only you can only keep it by the Holy Spirit walking in communion with the Lord Jesus Christ, with the Spirit ungrieved in your life.
Can you and I go back home? Honestly, even if we have to go back to a problem or two or more in the assembly and we don't really understand these things, can't we go there with the desire in our hearts to say this is his dwelling place?
This is where I come to meet him as we did Lords day morning.
And to enter into the holiest, and behold the glory of the Lord, gazing on him in glory.
Beloved, there is no greater privilege, as some of us said the other day, no greater privilege on the face of this earth and dear Brother Gene and shared that with me many times. Dave, there is no more wonderful place and privilege.
Then, coming to where he dwells and remembering him, shall we pray.