Address—D. Newby
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Of the.
Waves of God and fix and root.
Assume thy grace.
As those readings by blood.
What's a song?
Of I love.
My angry and then.
Heart.
Will your converse? That's the first comes on.
Are gay.
Or there's so many.
We.
Really.
Count, but we are.
My walls.
The dearest.
Son, just love.
And grave listing.
With.
God, eternal time.
That we may.
Some small dairy.
Return.
My love.
Again.
Let's pray together.
Our Father.
We've read of you as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory.
One who is exalted.
Your beloved son and manhood.
Now ascended.
At your right hand.
And we pray that you would honor his name this afternoon. We think of these meetings that we've had.
The truth that we have considered centers in that man.
Of your counsels, and we ask Father for help as we speak of these things.
This one last time in these days we've had together. We thank you for this time over the word.
And we pray for edification.
And comfort and instruction for each one. And we just give thanks in the precious name.
Of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Sometimes when we go over the scriptures.
The words of a hymn come to mind, and I think that's because I'm sure it's because.
The hymn writers, they have these things before them as well.
Often.
Provoked by much trial and pain.
In their own lives, so that when a soul could write, Oh, tell us often of thy love, of all thy grief and pain.
Who knew? Grief and pain?
As the Lord Jesus Christ did.
We remembered the Lord Jesus yesterday. In his death, we considered.
In the emblems on the table.
The sorrow and the shame, the disgrace.
That he passed through Indiana his holy manhood.
We remember those words, that holy thing.
That shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
He who was without sin.
00:05:02
Who knew? No sin. I just think of our Lord Jesus and how He is the center.
Of all of these things.
I was asked by the brother to address our beloved young people. And what that does is that it certainly puts the mind back at the time when I was among the young people, when I was a new Christian.
My circumstances might have been different than many of yours, but yet there was a newly found faith.
Maybe there had been a long process prior to coming to faith. We touched on some of that in the last meeting.
But nonetheless, there was a moment when the soul came to faith.
What does a soul need? And I know that people come to the Lord Jesus, they come to saving faith at any stage of life.
I happen to be 20 years old.
Those who I see here in this room, it looks to me like for the most part.
Are raised in Christian homes where you hear the gospel, you hear the word of God ministered week in and week out. You've attended conferences like these probably for as long as you remember. That may be true of most of you in the room, maybe some not so much. I can look around the room and I can see adults that I know who were not raised in Christian homes.
But whatever it might be, there was a time when the soul was brought.
By the sovereign God to faith in the Lord Jesus to see that there was life in him and that everywhere else was death.
What is the need for a young person in a condition like that? And I mean young in the faith. But here I'm thinking in terms of the young people among us, many of you where I I can see you out there. I knew.
Maybe of your grandparents before your parents were even born, there are those of you here who are parents.
Who are the age of my children?
Many of the names that have been mentioned, I recognize those names, but you're too young to recognize those names.
And what that tells us, and this is really the burden of my heart.
Is that there is a deposit of truth?
That was given to us. You might say it was finalized.
When the New Testament was finally canonized. When the Canon of the books of Scripture.
Was finally put together.
And that deposit of truth has been entrusted to the Church.
And it's an encouragement to my soul to read writers from many years ago, centuries ago.
1000 years ago, nearly 2000 years ago, who valued the same deposit of faith. And it may. And we've been reading about that in these meetings. We've been talking about Ephesians chapter one and related scriptures that give us something of that deposit of truth.
The content of the faith of Christ that we are called on to believe first and foremost for our own souls, and secondly for those around us and for our collective life as well. The same deposit of truth.
So when I think of young people, I think of the need to be established in the truth. I don't want to read a lot of scripture this afternoon. I know that this is the end of three days of sitting in meetings and everyone is tired, and I'm tired as well. Maybe you can tell.
But for one last few moments, I would like to meditate a little bit.
On some things connected with the deposit of truth, and I want to say first of all, with the Apostle Paul in First Corinthians chapter 8, knowledge puffs up.
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We read about knowledge, intelligence in Ephesians chapter one and that is of vital importance to us. Jose said my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. He said I have given unto them the great things of my law and they are accounted. A strange thing we don't want.
To take the great things that God has given to us in His Word and that they would ever be accounted a strange thing to us. We want these things to be familiar to us. We want to feed on these things. We want them to be our daily occupation. And this is the encouragement that I want to give to our young people.
There was a comment that was made earlier.
About a young man and an older brother. Took him and sat him down at a table and went over some things with him.
I will remember that for myself. I could name you a number of older men, and there are some of them that are in the room here this afternoon who very faithfully sat down with me and went over the Scriptures.
Everyone of us, everyone of you young people needs to be taught.
There is going to be an aspect of being taught by others. Who are you taught by, first of all, and I'm humanly speaking, within the company that you find yourself, you're taught by your parents. You might be taught by your grandparents.
As you get older and you get down the road a little bit and you develop a network of friends, maybe your brothers and sisters in the Lord, in the assembly where you are.
You want your brothers and sisters in Christ to be able to edify you with your Word, with His Word. You want to think about your companions. Who are your companions?
Some of our brethren have brought out how two very critical things in our lives.
Our companions and our habits.
And I will tell you that the two of those always go hand in hand.
If you spend your time with people who carry on with certain types of habits, most likely you will carry on with those habits as well. And just to put it positively, if you spend your time with people who know and love the Lord Jesus and want to speak of His Word and want to be together with the Lord's people.
That will be.
An encouragement to your soul as you grow.
What your part is?
Is to want to be that kind of an encouragement to the people that you spend time with?
There have been plenty of times in my life where I thought, you know, I could have said or done something differently that might have led someone to a little higher plane. And I had to go to the Lord and say Lord. I didn't use wisdom in that conversation. Maybe I talked about something or I talked in a way that wasn't really edifying. We have to be brought back to the Lord.
We always want our words to be with grace, seasoned with salt, that we might know how we can edify and encourage one another. You know the times when we have to be hard.
God willing, we desire that those times would be few and far between.
And I think of the example of our Lord Jesus.
And the way that he dealt with his disciples, the way that he dealt with those.
Who sovereignly came across his path?
I just read the 21St of John yesterday, probably one of the most classic examples.
Peter in the garden prior to the garden saying.
Even if all of the rest of these deny you, Lord, I won't deny you. I'm going to be faithful to the end.
And we see him cutting off the servants here in the garden.
But then by the sea in the 21St to John we see the Lord Jesus and it almost brings me to tears sometimes because I can see myself in that too.
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How tenderly the Lord Jesus, after having already said to Peter.
Satan has desired to have you. That's the plural.
Satan wants all of you that he may sift you as wheat.
But I've prayed for thee, Peter. The Lord singled out Peter.
Because in following verses we see that there was a needs be within Peter and everyone of us knows in our heart of hearts that there is a needs be with each of us.
To be brought back every moment to realize the value.
Of communion with the Lord Jesus.
We can get together.
And we can spend time with the people of God. We can have our regular meetings. We can have our conferences.
But if the Lord Jesus is not primary in my soul.
Not only will there be a lack within myself, but there will be a lack in being able to encourage in a fitting way. My brethren, we live in a difficult time. We know this is a fearful time. A comment was made about.
Our families, young families now.
I can look across the room and I can see older people and I know.
You as well as I, we fear for our grandchildren.
We don't know what is going to come.
In this.
Society that we live in, we don't know. We know, I think that we can say with the trends and the principles at work, we have a good idea of what's going to come. But all of the hows and the winds and so forth remains to be seen. But we do know that the juggernaut's moving, the avalanche is going down the hill and it's starting to pick up the trash. And the thing that we need to see is that this has been happening for a.
Long time, the apostle John said. Children, it is the last hour.
And I would maintain the world is no more evil today than it was 1000 years ago.
Or 2000 years ago if you can discern the principles.
Now the manifestation of it, that might be a different thing I do. I have appreciated my local brethren, have heard it many times. I apologize.
Commentator 19th century AB Bruce.
Said moral laws require large spaces of time for adequate exemplification. We have an example of that in Scripture. Many the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full. So there we see that God has many purposes. God had a purpose for the people of Israel, for the sons of Jacob to go down into Egypt.
One of the things he says is the iniquity of the Amorites.
Is not yet full, but there was another purpose that we read of. The Lord said to Pharaoh, I have raised thee up, that I might show in thee my power. He wasn't an Amorite, he was an Egyptian. So there's a second purpose.
He also used that 400 years.
To build the nation of Israel who were going to come into the promised land. Well, we could go on and on. God's purposes are many, and His purposes in your life are many as well. I am very thankful that here in this year, 2024, we're still here able to open the Word of God and to talk about it.
Freely.
It's not that way in many places in the world, and there have even been troubles in our very land from time to time, things that have happened in different churches and so forth.
The trouble is there.
Why is the trouble there?
Why is Christianity so despised? Particularly, you might say, in its most recent homeland in the Western nations? Why is Christianity so despised?
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It's quite a question to ask.
I'll answer it this way.
Because Christianity provides a rival doctrine of salvation.
A rival doctrine of salvation.
Arrival to what? Everything that stands against it? What is the truth?
That we have in this book that is so fought against.
Or maybe what is its effect? The effects of it? What does this book do #1 It crosses your will.
And #2 it troubles your conscience, and the natural man doesn't like anything that crosses his will.
Or troubles his conscience? What do you mean to tell me that there's only one way that Jesus is the only way to heaven?
That just crossed my will. I don't like that.
Well, you think that you're better than I am. Oh, it troubles my conscience, and I don't like that. Now, the things that we face today.
In our world have been going for a long, long time, and I'll put it like this.
Gnosticism is relatively about as old as Christianity. At the time of the New Testament, it wasn't fully developed.
And unfortunately, it waited till some who were within the confines of the Christian profession to help continue to give it impetus. And I would hold, and this is not original with me, I would hold that those systems of teaching.
That are prominent in the world today, that are gaining much impetus in the Western world.
Are in one way or another gnostic systems and elitist type of a doctrine that at its root not to go into it in detail, is salvation by works.
Salvation by works has been referred to as a criminal doctrine and the reason why is because.
In the final analysis.
A Sinner is a criminal. Everyone of us that's saved, especially if we've been down the road.
For a while we know that there's a criminal in here and at some point in the past.
The precious word of God crossed the will of that criminal.
And troubled his conscience.
And we've been reading in the book of Ephesians about how by God in his grace.
He steps in and he works with that crossed will and that troubled conscience, and he gives us to see something that we have never seen before, and that is the glory of that blessed Redeemer. And part of Christianity, a big part of the starting of Christianity, we can say, is that I, each one of us.
With this will that would have stood against God. Sin is lawlessness.
One John 3/4.
It's that principle within me that says I am going to do my own will and I will not be constrained by anything outside of myself. That's lawlessness. For a man to do what he knows to be wrong is lawlessness. And brethren, lawlessness is something that every one of us has to face within our own hearts, because that's the tendency.
Of the natural man.
Lawlessness, a lawless spirit. God by his grace.
Dear young people, I want to say He is reaching into your heart. He is presenting his word that you might be instructed in righteousness.
I would like to turn to.
Second Timothy.
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And I want to talk about something in each of the four chapters in Second Timothy.
I've said before that.
I'd make the comment that I know I've spoken on this before.
And then?
My wife would say to me, I think that was about 30 years ago, dear.
Which underscores the fact that we have a different generation in the room here.
Before we go into Second Timothy.
And talk about.
The departure that we see, that characterizes the day in which we live, not just the day in which we live here today, but that characterizes the last hour.
Where we see an undermining of truth. Before we do this, I want to make a comment.
About the Book of Genesis.
And again, the things that I say here, these are things that were brought out to me when I was a young believer and I want to pass those things on. I remember a statement.
I didn't personally hear it myself, but I was told that Brother Chapter Brown made the statement, and I think it bears repeating. We can really echo this sentiment. I want to pass on the truth.
To my younger brothers and sisters in Christ in as pure a form as I received it myself.
And we'll see something of that in Second Timothy, because in Second Timothy we see things.
That are passed on, but they aren't passed on in a pure form.
And the comment was made earlier.
Christ.
Plus nothing.
That's the teaching of Galatians, right? Christ plus nothing.
I'm saved by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And if I have Christ.
Even if I don't fully understand it.
I have everything that is his because that's part of the inheritance. He is bringing us in to everything that the Father has given him. We want our young people to enjoy those things. We want you to lay hold of those things in your own soul. You know what I want? I want to tell you what I want to do, and I address my younger brethren in this one.
If the Lord would leave us here, and we have.
Generations and have had generations who have gone home to be with the Lord and they would have said the same thing, though they would have also said I'm expecting the Lord Jesus to come and call us home.
But they would have said the same thing that I'm going to say if the Lord chooses.
To leave us here.
For a protracted period of time.
You know what I want to do? Some of you young brothers? I want to sit down here and listen to you. Stand up here and talk.
Because I won't always be able to.
I can remember when some of our older brethren.
Had to sit in these chairs because they weren't able to do it anymore.
Many of us enjoyed sitting at a table or maybe a living room conversation with some of those men. I can still remember when Clarence Lundeen told me I can't write letters to you anymore.
I want to be able to sit here and know that somebody who came after me wanted to lay hold of the truth. And this is the thought of of, as we'll have, we'll see in the second Timothy chapter two, of the truth being passed from one generation to another.
Second Timothy. Chapter One.
In each of the chapters of Second Timothy, there is some departure from the truth that is noted, and then something that is an antidote to that departure.
Second Timothy one and verse 13. I'm reading from the new translation.
Have an outline of sound words, which words thou hast heard of me.
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In faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.
Keep by the Holy Spirit, which dwells in us, the good deposit entrusted.
And that shows you that that deposit of truth is to be kept within us by the Holy Spirit. We've been talking about that in the previous four readings, very important foundation truth. Now verse 15, thou knowest this, that all who are in Asia of whom is by jealous and homogeneous have turned away from me.
This has been spoken of as a general defection.
From the teaching that Paul was used to give. From the teaching of the mystery.
If any of you have studied early church history and some of the principles that were introduced into the Christian profession and some of the different types of systems that evolved where sacramentalism came in and and the system of of the bishoprics and and.
Authority over the people where the pure simplicity.
Of the Christians gathering only as believers and with the exercise of gifts as it is, there is a lot that we don't know about the early church.
A lot of it is shrouded in mystery and I would also say that for quite a long period of time.
The early church was very Pagan in its.
Beliefs and it took a long time for clarity to come, and I believe that it was especially connected with the final canonization of the New Testament. Thank God there were men who were raised up. Many of them were Pagan philosophers.
Who were converted to the Christian faith?
Is everything clear and distinct in their writings? Not necessarily.
But God was watching over the deposit of truth, and I'm very thankful to say that overtime.
The entire Word of God was put together. All of the Gospels and epistles were gathered together.
And one of the councils in the three hundreds, the Canon of Scripture was determined after all the argumentation over which books of the Bible really belong there. Second, Peter had a tough time getting in but and there were questions about some of the others. But God ordered providentially that the entire New Testament Canon would be gathered together. And there are.
I know that in some areas there are over.
What 5400 manuscripts of portions of the New Testament that have given us textual critics a good idea of exactly how the New Testament reads? What a mercy of God in his Providence that he ordered it that way. But the point here? There were those who turned away.
Young people, I would encourage you.
To think about and outline of sound words.
There are many scriptures that help us to have an outline of sound words.
We've heard about the seven feasts of Jehovah, the seven parables of the Kingdom, the seven churches of Revelation two and three. But even if we think doctrinally, I'll go back to what was emphasized to me when I was a young believer study Romans. Romans places the soul before God justified Romans the the very things that Mark mentioned and that we were talking about.
In the last reading regarding being saved, what does it mean to be saved? What does it mean to be justified? And how is this seen within the entire scheme of God's ways with us, the scheme of salvation from start to finish? How do we see it that way? Study the book of Romans.
In Romans you get the doctrine, you get the dispensational approach.
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In chapters 9:00 to 11:00, how what God did with Israel is seen in the light of what he's doing now, today, and we get practical application study Romans.
Everyone of these books of the Bible, and I'm thinking of the epistles because.
In the epistles you might say we get divine commentary on the Gospels as well as the Old Testament. Now come back to my comment on made a comment on Genesis.
Genesis.
The first book of the Bible is very important. I was encouraged when I was young.
To study the book of Genesis. Genesis is the beginning. Now think about the readings that we've had.
We've we heard about the Creator, the creation, we talked about the new creation, what we see in Ephesians there.
Even though it might not have been named, I don't remember.
What do you have in Genesis? Just think about Genesis a little bit. Just kind of picture the book of Genesis in your mind. Get a little chart in your mind there.
What do we have in the book of Genesis? We start with the creation.
What's one of the first things that we read of in the book of Genesis that goes all the way through the Bible?
Marriage.
What is under attack in our Western culture today?
Marriage. Marriage is at the basis.
Of society, of human community Marriage.
And children.
Let me say this. Have you ever heard of the expression the sacred? What is the sacred?
I really love this definition given by a writer that I have enjoyed, he said. The sacred is that which cannot be otherwise.
It is the sine qua non of human life, sine qua non, that without which not you cannot have human life, human civilization as God intended it to be, without the sacred, without things that cannot be otherwise, and the pleasure, the satisfaction that we get out of life.
Will be enjoyed in as much as we value the sacred as God has given it to us.
There is a defection from Pauls teaching where to have an outline of sound words. There are many things that you can do to gain an outline of sound words. Chapter 2. The next step, the introduction of fundamentally evil doctrine. We talked about the resurrection in these meetings.
Chapter 2.
Verse 14 of these things put in remembrance, testifying earnestly before the Lord, not to have disputes of words profitable for nothing to the subversion of the hearers. Strive diligently to present thyself approved to God, a Workman that has not to be ashamed, cutting in a straight line the word of truth.
But profane vain babbling's shun.
For they will advance to greater impiety, and their word will spread as a gangrene. And then he gives an example of these individuals who taught that the resurrection was passed already. Seems to be some kind of a teaching of perfectionism.
What's the antidote everyone of you study to show yourself approved unto God? You can do it.
Now I know that there are many homes where there are sets of books.
Every once in a while, maybe your mom pulls them off and vacuums the dust off the top of them there. I know that some have done that.
You can read those books, I guarantee you. I guarantee you that you can read those books.
I was having a conversation with a sister.
Probably 25 years ago, 2025 years ago, if not more.
And she made a comment about those books. They were always there on the shelf.
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And one day she looked at those books and she said I can read those.
She pulled one off the shelf, and she did.
The rest is history.
Not completely done yet, but the rest is history.
You can do it three times, if you'll pardon me for saying. And Plato's writings, he says fine things are hard.
Do you want to have a good marriage? You won't have it without working at it.
Marriage is a fine thing, but you have to work at it fine. Things are hard.
You want to learn how to cook a really good meal? Fine things are hard, takes practice. You blow it a few times, but you know you keep working at it.
You can pull that book off the shelf and you can read it.
Fine things are hard, but you know there's great reward, the book of Proverbs tells us there's great reward in seeking these things.
Strive diligently.
To present thyself approved not to your brethren.
But to God.
I have been very thankful.
From time to time.
Some time back I was with a younger brother.
And I asked him what he'd been reading.
And he made some comments about some things that he had been reading.
And I got to stand there and listen to him give me a little discourse on some things that he had gained from the Scriptures, and I was very impressed. What he laid out before me he didn't get from just reading the book. He had taken it and he had assimilated it for himself, and it was very clear that he had.
Thought about it and considered it, and that's what we need to do. You know, you need to take some degree, some percentage of your leisure time.
And devote it to the Word of God. A prayerful consideration of the Word of God.
It's very rewarding, especially when you begin to cross lines. You cross a line and now you see a connection, and then that brings a bit more of scripture into focus for you. You keep studying and you cross another line. Now you see some more connections and it's like it. It's like it just keeps going.
And you begin to see.
More clearly as time goes on, the connections that God has for us.
In all of these different parts of Scripture, well these ones, they said that the resurrection was taking place already.
Many of these systems that I mentioned a few moments ago that are in antagonism to the Word of God, they have a doctrine of perfectionism.
But I want to put it this way to you. Let's just put it this way. I'll look so you can look left to right.
Is that right? Yeah.
Soul is saved.
And here is our final perfection when we're with the Lord Jesus. But in between there are steps, and you cannot sidestep them. You have to go through them all.
Look at it societally, there is something wrong.
Something fundamentally wrong with human society. I envision a perfect society.
I have my little pet utopia in my mind and I want to jump over all the ways to get there. God says no, it's not going to happen. Every time man tries to make heaven on earth, he makes it more of a hell than it's ever been before. And those very same principles are at work today.
In systems that are antagonistic to Christianity because Christianity offers a rival doctrine of salvation.
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And the rival doctrine again says there's something wrong with me inside. I need to first and foremost be saved by faith in the Lord Jesus.
You can take any of these systems that are going to make a heaven on earth.
Marxism, communism and socialism in all of their different forms.
Psychoanalysis.
Freudian and Jungian psychology.
If anybody studied Karl Gustav Jung, he talks about the process of individuation.
Sorry, that's not salvation. You can't skip over what God says you're going to have to go through. If you're going to reach this, that final state that God has for mankind. You have to go God's way. You can't have a counterfeit. Which brings us to chapter 3.
Chapter 3.
Verse 8 Now in the first 7 verses he's talking about this self filled.
Society that was getting underway even in the apostles days. Now he says in verse 8. Now in the same manner in which Jenny's and Jamborees withstood Moses. This is the only place where the Egyptian magicians are named. I believe in the same way that they withstood Moses. Thus these also withstand the truth. Men corrupted in mind, found worthless as regards the faith. What do we have here?
Chapter We've had the abandonment of Paul's teaching.
And we have had the introduction of fundamentally evil doctrine.
Denial of the resurrection.
Now we have.
Undermining the truth by imitation.
You know BB Warfield wrote a book called Counterfeit Miracles. We live in a society where we have to be on our guard for counterfeits.
And this is just an area where I again come back and the antidote in this chapter, at the end of the chapter is Scripture coming back to the Word of God.
Studying to show ourselves approved unto God. Learning.
Rational and objective principles of biblical interpretation. It was something about Bible interpretation that was brought up so that we don't go way off the mark in what we think about scripture, what we think that Scripture teaches. You know, there's a lot of weird stuff out there and a lot of times it's.
Fueled and driven by what I want, by some experience that I want to have. There's one movement after another and it's like a JG, Billet said when he referred to some fond thought.
Which is nurtured rather than regulated.
Young people, I have a mental crutch that I've used for a long time. I call it kill your idea if I think I see something from scripture.
I want to amass every argument against it that I can.
And if I can't?
Maybe it's true. On the other hand, there have been way too many you can think.
Of some of the people who have been leaders in all kinds of different movements, especially I'd say over the last couple of 100 years, they had some fond thought.
Something that they thought that they had, and after a while that's all they see from Genesis to Revelation. Whether it's speaking in tongues or handling snakes or whatever it might be, that's all they see in the entire Word of God.
We need to approach scripture from the standpoint of versa.
Verse 14. Chapter 3. Verse 14. But thou abiding those things which thou hast learned, that's good advice.
Abide in those things which thou learn and of which thou has been fully persuaded, knowing of whom thou hast learned them. He learned them from the Lord Jesus, through the apostle Paul, and that from a child I was known the sacred letters. That was the Old Testament, but perhaps even some of the New Testament books had been written by then. But it's all of Scripture which are able to make the wise unto salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus, you know.
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Even the Old Testament can make you wise unto salvation, but only through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. I have heard some interesting stories that some brethren have told from time to time about how the Lord used a passage in the Old Testament to convict them of their need of the gospel. How does that happen? It's God's Word, it's not the word of man, it's God's Word, and you want that word to have effect in your heart.
Every scripture.
Is divinely inspired.
And it's profitable.
For four things. First of all, for teaching.
I need to be taught.
For conviction when the word of God comes and teaches me.
It convicts me.
For correction, I'm a convicted soul, so I see that I need to make correction. I need to be corrected.
For instruction and righteousness, and the purpose is that the man of God may be complete.
Complete, fully fitted to every good work. Now when we come to conviction and correction and so forth, I want to say something about this book which is it makes it very different from other books. This book is a self condemning book. You don't find that in the so-called holy books of other religions.
Think of it this way. Here's a graphic example.
You know, we know from the scriptures.
The attitude.
That the Pharisees and the Sadducees in the Lord's Day had toward marriage.
And yet they were the very ones who preserved meticulously the Book of Malachi, which condemns them for their attitudes towards marriage.
This book was written by, and I'm talking about the Old Testament in particular now, which stands at the foundation which leads us up to when Christ was born of a woman born under the law, leads us up to the incarnation of the Lord Jesus. The Old Testament was written and preserved by the men that it condemned.
That is a remarkable fact of history.
Many times can you think of it if you had something that just condemned, you said well I'm going to put that in the wood stove. I don't want anybody to ever find that out. They didn't do that. Even these ones that during the days of the Gospel, the Lord Jesus said you are of your father the devil and the lust of your father. You will do. They held this book in reference, the Old Testament. It is a self condemning book and this brings out a principle that's very good for us to see.
Again, that we've touched on it. I come into peace with God.
I live in the sunshine of His eternal love.
Only after the realization what he has taken me out of and the fact that he has made me new, I could not have been there as a natural man.
There would have been no home for me in His presence as a natural man.
How we should value the Scriptures chapter 4? Here's the 4th step.
Verse 3 For the time shall be when they will not bear sound teaching.
In the first three chapters, we've had this entrusted deposit.
Have an outline of sound words. Study to show yourself approved to God.
The sacred letters, every scripture that's divinely inspired, that's what we've had in the first three chapters, but now they won't bear that teaching.
But according to their own lusts.
So this is not primarily an intellectual thing. William Kelly said that a lack of apprehension of the truth.
Is not so much a matter of intellect as it is of the will, and people are led by their lusts.
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And.
They're generally LED in the direction of something that doesn't.
Cross their will or trouble their conscience, and that's what they want. And there are lots of teachers out there.
Who are peddling fables to meet the needs of those people?
How about some of these perfectionist fables that we've got going in these days?
That somehow extraterrestrial life is going to bring us something that we didn't have before. Or how about transhumanism?
Poor pathetic man, he will go to any ludicrous fable instead of coming to the feet of the to the foot of the cross and bowing to what God has said. Dear young people, these things that we have here that Paul, we believe in the last epistle that he wrote.
Lays out so clearly that emphasizes the importance of being in the word now.
I am not naive enough to believe that you can infuse into someone something that they don't have, that they don't bring to the table if you will. That's going to have to come from within you. Your brethren cannot convince you to take up the Word of God and to make it good to yourself. These four antidotes that we read here, be sober.
Be sober minded.
Not subject to all of these deluding influences, nobody can do it for you. And what our desire would be is that you would so see the value of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
That you would want these things for yourself.
May the Lord add His blessing to the Word.