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Awake is wrong.
Start screaming.
A good thing, so pleasant and I don't feel like it was that sound.
Far away.
Umm.
Stranger.
No one's dead. Birds can't hit any.
Tonight, uh, today and this morning is uh, spirit of dog is not coming before us, our wilderness journey.
I have thought of the Hebrews 12.
Uh, uh, reading or two. You don't need to continue the whole time, but I submit my, uh, request to the brethren walling up.
It would be very appropriate.
Maybe we wouldn't have to read the whole chapter today or something.
On the weekend, there's one to umm.
Maybe you should read the whole chapter.
00:05:18
Wherefore, seeing we also are compass developed with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight in the end of us so easily be set up, and let us one patient erase that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the Author and finisher of our faith, for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. You have not yet resisted unto blood thriving against sin, and you have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children. My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him.
Room the Lord loveth He jasoneth, and scourge of every son whom he receiveth, if he endure chastening God bealeth with you as with sons, Or what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not? And if he be without justice meant, where of all our partakers?
And are you ******** and not sons? Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh.
Spirits and lives, for they verily for a few days Jason thus after their own pleasure, but He for our prophet, that we might be partakers of His Holiness. Now no chastening for the present seamless to be joyous or grievous, nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down.
Feeble knees, and make straight paws for your feet. That's that which is lame. Be turned out of the way, but let it rather be healed. Follow peace with all men, and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up, trouble you and thereby.
Many be defiled, lest there be any fornicator or profane person as Esau, and for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. We know how that afterward, and you would have inherited the blessing. He was rejected, for he found no place of repentance.
Though he sought it carefully, with tears, maybe he could stop there.
Well, you've also looked back here to the 11Th chapter, no doubt, and we have all these worthies of faith.
Who, Uh.
Let's walk to that part of the obedience and the faith and it's difficulties and trials.
And uh.
Finish their course.
With joy, as the Apostle Paul did. But there was failure in each one of them.
Not brought out in the 11Th chapter, but uh.
They all, umm.
What the path of space?
But uh, none were perfect.
And the and the apostle rings before us here, one who began the path of faith and finished it perfectly, the Lord Jesus as a man down here.
Amount of dependence and.
Confidence being gone.
Began the path of faith.
And finished it to the glory of God.
00:10:00
Why was the book of Hebrews written and why was it given to us?
Umm.
On 125 a day in the book of fevers we have.
The the doctrines of Christianity developed in death here were the Hebrews that were very much affected by the whole earthly order of things, the temple, the sacrifices, and all that was connected with the Jewish town, ordered of God in its inception, but corrupted by man, and much of tradition brought in and.
On the verge of being destroyed.
The apostle is exhorting the Hebrews.
To separate from that system which came to its end of the cross. Now God is introducing something infinitely better. All those.
Shadows were there in the Old Testament for us, and foreshadowing and figures and symbols. Now we have the substance in price.
Now we have.
A new position before gone. Now we have the Lord as a living man of God's right hand. Now we have no longer sacrifices. We have a perfect work that gives a perfect conscience. Before and gone now we have worship. Nothing through some ritual, some ceremony, which was ordered of God in the beginning. But now we have something that is a spiritual character. Now we have access into the holiest of all.
Not true. So now ceremony or tradition or even what God ordered in the Old Testament, now we have access into the holiest through the blood of Christ. So the whole book is a contrast to Judaism and.
And, uh, it brings before us the wilderness.
Journey of your believer, is that right?
When you measure the being of contrast, I knew a man when he was in college. He took a course at comparative religion comparing.
This is.
Contract not comparing making what the Jews allowed. Christianity is entirely different. Eventually it's it's either not a comparison contract without any mistakes a bit more than this either duty has had. Christianity is not an improvement upon Judaism.
You can't put the new wine into the old bottles. It's a complete contrast. It's something entirely new.
The Hebrew believers were very much attached to their formal religious system, which did have a foundation in the in the order that God has given at that time. But it became corrupted and it came to be an end of the cross. And how God is introducing Christianity is something entirely new. They cannot be mixed together. And that's what we can see all around us, a mixed.
Judaism and Christianity.
Systems that we have around us, we have, uh, imported into their system things that are definitely from Judaism, uh.
Choirs and ministers and roads and cathedrals and incense and what have you, One man ministry. It all has its origin in Judaism for it. And the apostle is saying now this has come to an end.
Now you have.
You have something infinitely better superior, their brother said. It's not comparing it, It's a contrast. It's what we have now, Revelation of Christ and uh.
The truth of God that was ministered by the apostles.
Under contrast Brother John and the introduction to the book in chapter one, verses one and two.
00:15:04
And it says God, who at different times.
Many times in different manners take on in time pass on the father by the prophets raised up prophets to speak to it, and children in the Old Testament. But this is a verse two has in these last days open on July his son.
He has appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the world's.
On trasters were between those that God raised up to speak to his the children of old and his son that he gave that was with him from past eternity as who we have today that's speaking to us.
The writer of this epistle.
Certainly.
Want to?
Focus our attention.
I believe I know one other than Lord Jesus Christ the Son called the Son. And we see how the epistle begins with God who had sent me times. Well, if you look at the other epistles.
Most of the other epistles begin with the rider of the epistle, whether it be Paul or James or Jude or Peter. They put their name first. But here is God, and God is speaking now through his Son, and how important it is that we listen.
You know, leave them. The Lord Jesus was baptized.
It tells us that there was this.
Voice from heaven, it was the Father speaking, he said. This is my beloved Son, in whom I'm well pleased. Hear ye him. And so today we might well question, who is it that we're listening to?
How important to realize that.
Christ as the last word, and I believe in this epistle the writer would seek to elevate a force to this one who is now seated at the right hand of the majesty on high. This is Jesus Christ.
You don't have any apostles name mentioned. It's.
Generally assumed that it was all. I couldn't think of anyone that could expound myself a wonderful umm.
Declaration of Christianity outside the apostle Paul. However, then his name is not given. But there is an apostle mentioned that's not Paul is Lord Jesus, look back at him third chapter.
Moreover, brethren.
I think there's a heavenly calling there we have in the apostle. They need before us are heavenly called contrast to Israel and an earthquake called. Consider the apostle.
And high priest of our profession, our confession, Christ be good. So in the apostle he came down from heaven.
To reveal God in manhood. He came from heaven.
With a message from the Father, Revelation of the Father, he's gone back to heaven now as I priest. He wasn't a high priest while he was down here on earth, but now he has assumed that character in manhood of High priest at the right hand of God.
And uh, that person is the Lord Jesus Christ, absolutely apostle.
Magnifies in this, uh, crystal.
It's been sent.
You know what sets apart Christianity from any other religion?
Is the fact that.
The leader lives, and that's resurrection.
Instead that.
This is what distinguishes Christianity.
That Christ lives and extinguishes every other religion.
And so I believe we see here in our portion how that we are to be looking unto Jesus, We're to be looking up, we're looking at a living glorified Savior. You don't find that in any other religion.
00:20:10
And how blessed we are, you know, to have our eyes open to see who she needs to do.
And the writer, he was writing to the Hebrews. But of course.
We, uh, find this epistle very precious to our hearts.
I was wondering over in Second Peter chapter 3 and verse 15 if Peter was referring to this epistle when he says in.
His 15th verse. This is second Peter 3/15.
Accountants are long-suffering of our Lord is salvation, even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, hath written unto you well, Peter was rising to converted Jews.
But now he's speaking about how Paul had written unto them. I wonder if that might refer to this book. I think, uh, Wally, you could go on with the next verse too, because it says as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things in which are some things hard to understand which they are, they that are unlearned and unstable rest as they do also the other scriptures.
The word scriptures there is used in connection with what Paul wrote to the Hebrews. So I don't think there could be any other book but the book of Hebrews. So I think it's interesting that he says there the other scriptures.
I just mentioned that in passing.
I think there's something very practical in this first verse, isn't there? It says let us lay aside every weight and sin which cut so easily beset us.
I remember Paul Wilson speaking on this verse many years ago and he said, you know, if you were running a race.
You wouldn't wear an overcoat. If you wore an overcoat, you'd be sure to lose the race. Not that there's anything really, uh, wrong about wearing the overcoat, but it would certainly hinder you in winning the race. And so there are things in our lives, aren't there, that, uh, Christians, I suppose, could argue that there's nothing wrong with them, but their weights and they hinder us from running the race. And so I think it's very important here is that.
Lay aside every week and I think it should read and send, which does so easily be set or entangled.
I have enjoyed thinking of this way in connection with the this epistle, and I think we see it frankly in almost every epistle on whether it be in Paul's epistle, Peter's epistles, and so on, that God was using these men to take and encourage the Saints to go on.
You know, if you go back to the to the second chapter, in the first verse of the chapter, it says, Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard less than any time we should let them slip.
You know Satan cannot take away salvation from the believer. It's a precious thing. You receive the gift of God and you have it forever.
But one thing he will try to do in your life and mine, is to discourage us from going on.
And so you see the Apostle Paul in his ministry and again with Peter, you read Peter's ministry and you feel like these men, they were used of God to encourage the Saints. And that's why we need chapter or a, a meetings like this to encourage one another to go on in the path of faith because there's a danger of giving up. It's all around us. And when you see it more and more and one thing leads to another.
How much have we seen being given up of the word of God by so-called fundamental, umm uh.
00:25:03
The the Lord's people in the last 5-10 years, it's it's incredible to see it coming, it coming in but anyway, in this chapter, sometimes it's hard to know how to deal when you're faced with questions about.
Umm things as to how to give answers and it gets down to a logical argument of one person against the other and whoever mind is stronger is the one who wins the argument. But that's not the answer. It's really the Lord and the word of God. But I'm thinking of in connection with the with the the these verses here. See, we also are compassed about. Think of those people in the previous chapter.
What happened to them? Some of them were slain were martyrs for Christ.
Somewhere is a great victory.
Umm, and we look back and we're encouraged by seeing the faith that God gave those ones. And so He encourages us to go on and in connection with this, lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us. I've enjoyed thinking of it two different ways. First of all, there's two things that are mentioned here, actually, three things.
There is weights, there is sins and there is a cross that are brought before us. Every word of God is pure and why does he choose these 3 words? To signify or to teach us three different things?
Well, we know what sin is. You know what your besetting sin is. I know what my be setting sin is.
And then it speaks of weights. And like our brother Stan was saying, you don't believe an overcoat on when you're going to take and run a race. You put it to the side. And there are things that that entangle us in this world. And God would have us to seek to, to, umm, to be released from the things that would hinder us in our Christian life. There's so many things today.
You know, you get up in the morning, you got one of these little phones, you have messages on it.
You know how, how it is, it's easy to, there's a little, little traps that are there to take us, our thoughts away from the beginning of the day. Uh, they come awaits. They can hinder us and faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And that's how the Lord got his, his guidance when he was here in this world.
And so you have before us the in this verse, the weights.
Which is different from sins. Weights can be perhaps to say, well I, I need this, I need that and so on. Yes, but do we keep it in its right place in our lives?
Waits and sin, and then it says, speak so in the next verse about the cross, and the cross brings before us reproach for the name of Christ.
And the Lord may have given you a particular cross to bear in connection with something that is a, that is a very difficult thing in your life. And the Lord had it, didn't he? He had a cross that he bore right to the very end. You know, it, it struck me just recently, I'm thinking about it, that the Lord, you know, the hardest day of his life was the last day of his life.
When he gave himself for us and he endured it.
He went on and saw the Lord, it seems to me through the apostle, we believe, uh, I think the same connection with my brother. And there was probably the Apostle Paul that wrote it, that, uh, uh, they want to encourage the Saints of God, the Hebrews to go on and he wants us to be encouraged to go on.
We may wonder why should I exert myself to live the life of faith when there's no promise of an easy life? We see all the people in the Chapter 11, so many people of faith, but they never, many of them didn't experience the results of their faith that they went all the way to the end of their life, but they had the faith. And then there was those towards the end of Chapter 11.
00:30:19
As you mentioned, some were stone sawn asunder. They were slain with the sword. They were killed. They were martyred for their faith.
And so it's not an easy life to live a life of faith because there is there are things that are going to to be hard and difficult in the life because this world hates the Savior. And if you're going to follow the Savior, this world is going to hate you too. And so when the life of faith is going to be very difficult. And so he's encouraging us here. He's not trying to hide the Lord's not hiding from us the fact that there's going to be difficulties in the life of faith.
But he says in verse two, look unto Jesus.
He's the author of Faith.
He's a finisher of faith. And so we look unto Jesus and he is the one who gives us the strength to go on. The Lord Jesus, he in his life, in his pathway here in this earth, it led him to the cross, but there was joy in it. There was joy in it for him and for us. There's joy in the path of faith. Maybe not right now, maybe we don't. We can still have joy now. But.
The Lord Jesus looked forward to the joy of doing the will of His Father, and we can have joy in doing the will of of God our Father even now.
Sometimes we argue for these weights and deaths. Their brother mentioned that there may be nothing more wrong with that.
Uh, and we know it will.
We're on it, but uh, they are hindering us in our pathways, but we loathe to give them up.
Because we like to do those things. But if we really have Christ before us, we have boys and girls here. I sometimes like to tell a story for the children. They all have no dogs. I'm sure you would probably have a dog. You take a dog who has a bone.
You can. I had a dog when I was young, Very nice dog. We loved him. He didn't get a hold of a bone. You couldn't get that bone out of his mouth. You could fall and yank and you could hit him and you could do anything. He wouldn't give up that ball.
Remember I used to grab the balls of the children on the street and they'd come weeping to my mother because Stubby wouldn't give up the ball. But.
If you take, how are you going to get that bone out of this number?
Just take that nice juicy piece of meat and put it in front of his nose. Immediately he'll drop that ball because you've got something much better.
You'll grab them as well. It's a just a.
Another, another station of how many often the things of this world hold us.
Because we don't have a view of crisis before, we don't have Him filling our vision. I think in the second verse, although I don't object to having the thought of the looking to the Lord and the glory, I think the primary thought is rewarding His pathway down here.
Looking unto Jesus, the beginner and the completer of the path of faith, and it was not easy to think of the difficulties, persecutions, the privations the Lord endured in His pathway. As a man, He never used His Godhead power to shield himself from any of the circumstances of the pathway of faith. He didn't use it. He never used a miracle for himself.
He was hungry, he was thirsty, he was tired of the Well of Sychar, and he never used his divine power to shield himself from those dead.
Demands of the earthly pathways, and he walked with God. He is put before us as the as our example.
00:35:06
I think it's encouraging in the in connection with that, that this chapter starts with a wherefore and wherefore pointing to something pointing to Chapter 11 and all these examples we have that as you mentioned listed of the walk of faith, and it's encouraging that.
Looking at our first verse, almost all of them had a weight or a sin that beset them and it's not recorded and it's recorded elsewhere in picture. It's not recorded in in that chapter, but them running their race with patience is recorded in that chapter and it's encouraging.
That's what the Lord would record, the Spirit would record, and we have.
Need people to look to as examples of faith and we have people in our lives to look to as examples of faith. But as it was mentioned, the the real example is is in verse two, looking unto Jesus primarily as our as is mentioned our example of how to walk in this world.
You're running running at a race that somebody mentioned putting a coat on. What does that do? It slows it down. What else does Awake do?
When if you're trying to run a race, it's a discouragement, isn't it?
You're trying to run a race and you have a weight in your back and you're not getting rid of it. It's discouraging. And we find out in the Old Testament, the children of Israel were traveling through the wilderness instead of getting rid of the weights. They murmured and complained, and it was a burden to them. And umm, oftentimes it could be just in the assembly. We're unhappy with things.
Unhappy perhaps with the our brethren and some way or another.
And it brings discouragement.
And so they can all be weights. And how many divisions are there around us because of discouragement where somebody has an idea and because others didn't want to go along with it. There's been division costs and all sorts of things because?
Just because of weights and but if the Lord tells us how to get rid of the weights, we have it in Philippians is to take it to the Lord.
I was just there that uh says be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God. And so I don't know when we have a weight, we know it's a weight.
We can't rely on our own strength and our own ability to get rid of that weight. We may we need help. And so in scripture we have, we have the help, uh, given to us as.
The access of prayer, same as the sin here, we, there's sin that perhaps comes into our lives and uh, we can't get rid of that sin, but I can go to the one that is able to get rid of it for me. I can go to the Lord and confess it and it's forgiven. And then I go on, but can't rely on my own strength and my own wisdom to get rid of anything.
But we can and him.
And so it's in the Lord. We have weights. We all get discouraged sometimes. I've gotten discouraged. And there's things that we just can't change. We know we can't change them on our own, but we know what that can. And we know one that is working for our benefit all the way through the pathway. And he's the one that we need to go to. There's some nice persons just in connection with the Lord's care for us and.
Chapter 13.
We enjoyed it like this. It is a Good Shepherd that gave his life for the sheep, for Jesus that saved us, dying on the cross, forgiving us our sins is.
Says here.
In the 21St of chapter 13, now the God of peace that brought a game from the dead, our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, to the blood of the everlasting covenant, the promise, a wonderful, the great shepherd here that that lives for us now. He died for us on the cross, and now he lives for us.
It is the purpose.
That he has for us is to make you perfect or full grown in every good work to do as well working in you that which is well pleasing in the sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever, Amen. And then he says, I beseech you, brother, and suffer the word of exhortation, for I have written a letter unto you a few words, and to mention that we need the word of God, and we're to allow that expectation to reach our ears. It's good for us.
00:40:26
And uh, the Lord's purpose for us is that we might be full grown and he is interceding for us, our Great Shepherd, the one that died for us, Ross Malice living for us.
Just a quick little thought, uh, person is one of them. We have two examples, you might say those of chapter 311, and it truly is amazing to see what they endured.
My faith, uh, however, it's, uh, it's been mentioned that they were not perfect and we find from Old Testament scriptures and so on that they failed here and there. And so if you go over to chapter 13 and uh, look at verse 7.
It's a little different here, but uh, I'll apply it by May, uh, to those of Chapter 11, uh, towards the end of that verse, it says whose faith follow. So we are to look at the face that they had and, uh, and be encouraged and that, that is an example to it. Now, if you go over to first Peter chapter 2.
And the second example I might mention is in verse two of our chapter, The Lord Himself.
I just want to draw attention to verse 21.
Because in the middle of the university game, Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow his steps.
Well, it just seems to me that every step that the Lord took for was in true faith and without weight and without sin, obviously. And so we can follow every step that we go.
When it came to the human examples, we are to follow their faith, and when it comes to the Lord Jesus, we can follow these steps.
Orders steadfast and the purpose wasn't it says in John six that he can't do the will of his father and in verse 2 where it says Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith, umm Darby uses the word umm.
The leader and finisher of our faith, the leader and completers and when I think of the Lord on the on the earth, the first word that's Lord that are recorded as the word spoke, the Lord spoke we're in Luke chapter 2 when he was his parents had gone down to Jerusalem for the sacrifice and they started traveling home and realized he wasn't with them. They went back to find him. They found him sitting with those in the temple and asking them questions and they said in verse 48, son, why have so dealt with us?
That's with us. Behold thy father and I have sought thee were sorrowing and he said unto them, How is it that you sought me? Wished he not that it must be about my father's business. So he came here at that very focused to complete his father's will. And what were his last words during John 19 on the cross? He said it is finished and gave us the ghost. So we came here with that steadfast purpose, never wavering. His first words indicated that he's here to do his thought as well. And he finished on the cross forest with those words that he finished kind of a very neat connection to see.
That's nice. That was the purpose, wasn't it?
He came to do the Father's will. That was a joy that he had in in completing that will become his Father. Even though it meant going to the cross. It was a joy for him to do that will. I'd like to do thy will, God.
And we have been given the same nature.
And so it says, for the joy that was set before him. And when you and I received Christ as our Savior, we received the very life of Christ, and we treat the Spirit of God, and there is joy in doing the Father's will.
May the Lord give us to.
Desire to do it, and we will have joy in doing it. Connection with that reference to the Lord. You know how old He was in that second chapter of Luke 1212. Any boys and girls here 12.
00:45:01
Raise your hands if you're 12, anybody 12.
Close, close. I always, I have grandchildren and when they get their birthday card on 12 years of age, I always give reference to that, to that incident in the Lord's life when he was 12 years of age, and what it is said with ye not that I must be about my father's business when a child reaches about that age.
They are growing from being a child into puberty into manhood. And there is a, a, a, a that, that's a time of life that is very special. May not be exactly 12 years of age, maybe a little before, a little bit afterwards, but I think that the child becomes more directly under the, under the, umm, umm, the, uh, connection.
In a practical way with the with the God of the universe.
It says there in loop 2 at the end of the chapter, Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God.
And then you see that he was living a very well balanced life as a young person.
Tells us here that he grew in wristband mentally.
There was growth and then there was stature physically.
And it says in favor with God and man spiritual growth.
But could we also say the social?
Doesn't it also say he was subject to them?
Who his parents are. It does it.
Could I ask you a question?
Brothers mentioned here that the Lord must be about his Father's business. What's our business? Once we're saved, we're ready for home, aren't we? We are fitted for Him. Why are we left here? What is our business?
You feel it, brother.
I think our undeniable privilege.
Is to show Christ to the world around us then, and that's in the first verse of our chapter, seeing we also are compassed to those who are so great a cloud of witnesses. The world around us is that cloud of witnesses.
They won't read their Bible, they won't go to church, but they'll watch out. What are we showing? Are we showing them Christ? That is our privilege in this world.
Not so much of A job as a as a privilege.
There's the other side of the tube we have in the.
In John's Gospel chapter 13.
And.
Verse 10 Jesus said to him, Simon Peter he that is why he is not to save.
Not save to wash his feet, but it's clean every wet. You're clean, but not all.
Know what? Peter was born again. He was clean in the eyes of God through regeneration. But, uh.
Says, For you know who should betray him. Therefore he said here not all clean. So after he had washed their feet and had taken his garments, sat down again, he said unto them, Knowing what I have done unto you.
You call me Master and Lord, and you say, well, for so I am.
By then your Lord and master have wash your feet. You also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that you should do as I have done on you. Barely, barely. I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his Lord either. He that is said greater than he that said him. If he know these things, happy are ye if he do them.
We just had an enjoy of the Lord. Jesus was adult. They liked to do the Father's will. That's where he came. Uh, God had given to him, uh, a Commission, you might say, to come into this world to save sinners. And the Lord delighted to do it for the Father's glory, even on the death, the death of the cross. But here we find with his disciples that they were clean and you are too.
00:50:15
If you have been reborn, you're clean every wet but.
We have in the pathway things that come up that defile us and today we're sitting here together at this meeting and we have the opportunity of washing on the others feet, removing those defilements that come in along the pathway and.
The Lord has given to us the privilege of coming together in this way where we can, uh, practice this and do this and, uh, said, if you know these things, happier ye if you do them. And so we should be happy to be able to be together and to be able to, uh, go over the word of God and, uh, learn the things that he will have for us.
What a privilege that is.
But there is the most of the other side too. There is a is a going out to the lost world with the light that we have to shine out, perhaps draw souls in. And so there's the two aspects of it.
You have the the apostle mentioning here sin.
Which does so easily Second time? Well, I think we all can understand that because we have an old nature.
That love sin.
And, uh, we will never be ridden of that, uh.
That terrible route there that we have in our beings until the Lord comes. God doesn't himself try to improve the old nature.
It can't be improved.
And it manifests itself in different ways. So we have to be on our guard because we all have a different, different weakness. I know my weakness. You know yours. But if we're not dependent on the Lord, that is going to assert itself in our life to the dishonor of Christ, exactly what Satan wants.
You know, I sometimes say he has good material to work on.
Because he knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows our weakness. He knows what will appeal to you. He knows what will appeal to me.
You work in the assembly, you work in the family, works in the world. That's his fear. The world belongs to him. The Prince of this world is the God of it, and in any way he can lead us away from the word of God, from the path of obedience.
Into something that dishonours the Lord. It's mentioned here definitely as sinful and we have to be on our guard.
And the thing with them so easily be set up, I'm going to go back into the world.
On Monday, Tuesday hasn't changed. There's lots out there to appeal to the old nature.
Lots of things we know we have to be on our guard, dead with Christ.
Risen with him that old nature has been put away in the sight of God. We are to keep it in the place of death. Is that right there?
Keep the old nature where God has put it in the place of death.
I was just reading something recently at Darby had said. I really enjoyed it Umm he said that we should see umm Christ in our.
Are flushing ourselves and uh.
Realize that umm, we're dead and reasonable price and so.
Is our brother sister from the world and I want to just digress for a moment on the.
Well, this verse was sent to me by a brother so many times and I didn't understand it, you know, until I read it myself and, and uh, but since John sent me, I'll just read it quickly and it just says umm.
00:55:08
Umm, verse 18. I thought it sent me into the world. Even so, I also have sent them into the world.
Sent here.
I was thinking too Bill not the 33rd verse. Previous chapter John 16 verse 33.
The last part of this verse, that's what orchestra says, the silence in the world. You shall have tribulation, but be a good cheer. I have overcome the world, which I believe he was saying to his disciples that.
We run the race successfully. He overcame and so can you.
And so can we, because we belong to Christ.
You have support and said I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
The Lord Jesus said all power is given unto me in heaven and earth.
And we can draw upon that power now we know the Spirit of God within us is the power of living to walk to please the Lord. And the Spirit of God would like to occupy us with Christ.
As that perfect object as far as heart, but you know, if we're allowing sin in our life.
Spirit of God is going to do something different. I don't think he's going to occupy us with Christ. He's going to occupy us with her. Let's see.
You know, that was my judgment that we might identify this.
And we don't lose our salvation, but if we allow sin.
Become weak as far as our testimony for the Lord and our our our joy. It wins like Enos were saying.
Salvation, I believe, comes from faith in Christ, but happiness comes through obedience to Christ.
You know, I have this book here, and every boy and girl knows that if I let that blood drop, the law of gravity is going to take it down. It's universal, always acts in that way.
Wherever you go in the world, wherever I am, however, if I take a balloon, a big helium balloon here, and I attached it to that book, by spring, what's going to happen? You know, it's going to rise right up into the ceiling, right up to the ceiling. Now, the law of gravity was there, very strong.
Trying to bring this book down to the floor but now I have.
Attached to it's something that is stronger than the law of graphics. I've attached to it a big balloon and it lifts that book up against the law of gravity. What do you say as the law of gravity been cancelled? No, no, it's still there, just as strong as ever. But I've introduced them to that book, A stronger law, and it rises against.
That natural law of gravity.
Because I have something stronger than.
That overcomes that law. Now you turn to Romans 6. We're on this line of things.
This is exactly what Ron has done.
He's brought in a new power that I never had before. What is that? Well, look in Romans 8 and verse 2 for the law. Now, that's not referring to the 10 commandments. There it is the principle, the principle. The new principle has been introduced now into the believer's life. Just like I put that balloon on that book. That's something that wasn't there before.
Now God has given us the spirit of life, a new principle, the Holy Spirit in Christ Jesus have made me free from the law of sin and death. That's just like the law of gravity trying to pull that book down.
You take away the balloon that's going to fall down again, but now I've got something that is longer.
A new law, a new principle is acting on that book.
And when do you accept Christ as your Savior?
01:00:04
God gives you a new life and a new nature. That is true, but he doesn't take away the old nature. As we have said, it's still there, but now he says, I'm giving you a new power. You don't have to obey the those evil desires that rise up in your heart and that you may have lived in before you were saved. Those things no longer should characterize your life, you say, But I have a strong temptation.
To do those things still, yes, that's quite possible. But now God says I've given you a new power, the Spirit of God. So it says here the law of the Spirit of life is Christ Jesus has made me free from the lost sin and death. That's the free from the law of gravity now because there's a new power acting on it. So it is in the life of the belief. You've got the Holy Spirit of God. And as our brother Walling said, if he is operating.
And I'm agreeing, He's going to give us that power to overcome those evil desires that we find rising up in our hearts too often. But we don't need to obey the dictates of that old nature. Now we we have the Spirit of God to occupy us, deliver us and occupy us with Christ.
Let's go back in time.
I just noticed here that he says let us.
Run with patience the race that is set before us.
The The Christian life is an individual life.
But yet we've been put into the body of Christ and we are running. In a certain sense, we are running together. But us?
Run with patience the race that is set before us. And so, as members in the body of Christ, we go on together.
You think that maybe the apostles coming down to their level and right alongside them.
It's a good way to be, isn't it?
I have the same thought in the beginning of that verse one it says wherefore seeing we and.
I believe that individually we can ask the Lord for helping these things as our brother is mentioned, but we need each other and we need to be together, as our brother mentioned, to have a meeting like this or to come together so that we can watch each other's feet. But we also need that in our home assembly as well. And I believe that I've encouraged much to get into the local meetings and to be there for the prayer meetings and the reading meetings and, you know, put those things aside that are that are weighing us down, you know, our phones, as our brother mentioned, or computers or our.
Sport events or whatever it might be that we would get out and we would, uh, spend time and fellowship one with another. And you know, our faith can only grow if we're reading the Word of God and being together in fellowship.
I don't think that if we're trying to.
In case fast it's some read the scriptures on the phone.
Be very useful in that way to read the word of God.
Diabetic can certainly consume the first time unprofitable.
This word patience that we have here in the first verse really is the thought of endurance, isn't it? And I was just thinking that the second verse continues the thought of the race because, uh, it says looking unto Jesus, he's the object that we should have before us, isn't it? It's very easy to sort of get discouraged with the difficulties and trials of the pathway, but he's encouraging us here to.
Uh, endure keeping our eye on the Lord. And then he gives the Lord as the example because he says, umm, he's the author or the leader and finisher of our faith. Uh, who for the joy that was set before him. He had an object before him. What was that doing? The Father's will and the joy too, of having us with him in the glory. And So what happens? He endured just like he encourages us to endure in the first verse.
01:05:19
The Lord Jesus, he endured and what did he endure? He endured the cross. He, uh, despised the shame. And what was the result? He got to the end of the race and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. So he's encouraging us to follow the example the Lord has given. He has run that race and he endured to the end and now he's encouraging us to endure on to the end.
And it wasn't an easy passport. Yeah, No, the contradiction of sinners, that in itself.
Despising the shame.
Great, I don't do that. I make a great deal of the pain. The same thing I might endure for the Lord. The Lord despise the shame and his pathway at the right hand is oh God, that would be the end of our pathway too. But I agree with what Stan said.
The joy of having his people before Him. No doubt that was prominent in the Lord's desire, but also the joy of entering the glory.
Having finished that work that the father had given him to do.
Only in his pathway down here, which was not an opponent, of course, or through that awful suffering of the cross.
And he completed it. The hours of darkness.
The rejection of man is such a terrible way. You know, crucifixion was the most cruel way of putting a person to death, and also it was a very shameful thing. The Lord said the will of God was prominent and turned into the glory of manhood.
Umm, the joy that he had finished the work that the Father had given him to do. Of course we come into that blessing. But.
You know the Father was glorified and.
He was so pleased with the obedience of his son there through his death.
I was in the, uh, United States one time many years ago in a place where a lot of people were there for various reasons, and this one great big guy came in. Jewish fella wore a sweatshirt on the front of his sweatshirt was for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
And he was sitting at a table with a whole bunch of other Jewish people.
So afterwards I went over to him and I said, Jonathan, I admire you for taking and wearing a shirt like that. Tell me your story.
And he did, and he was way off and he got Christ through. Christ got him, whatever way you want to put it. And the result was that he wanted to tell everybody else, and he didn't care about having that bearing some shame for the name of Christ.
Could we sing number three 12312?
Please unknown, my Lord.
Lay the burden.
Of my life.
That word.
Of joy when it was living. We would be doing anything in life.
01:10:43
OK.