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#5 in the back of the book. Hymn #5 in the appendix.
Interposed is precious one.
All the great.
Great honor.
Strangers.
Let the praise Lord.
Like a pleasure.
By my laundry.
Hard to be.
Yes, the Lord and inclusive.
With life experience from my heart.
How far did we get in our chapter, Bob? What do you think? I think we can start with verse 5, right?
Good.
Hebrews chapter 12 and I'll start with verse 5.
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. For whom the Lord loveth, He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons. For what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof?
All our partakers then are yeast ******** and not sons. Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us.
And we gave them reverence. Shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?
But they verily for a few days chasing us after their own pleasure, but He for our prophet, that we might be partakers of His Holiness. Now no chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous nevertheless. Afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees, and make straight paths for your feet.
Lift that which is lame be turned out of the way.
But let her 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. Must there be any fornication or profane person, as he saw, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright? For you know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected.
00:05:18
We found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.
Fear not, come unto the mount that might be, that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness and darkness, and Tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words which voice they had heard entreated that the word should not be spoken to them anymore, for they could not endure that which was commanded. And if so much as a beast touched the mountain, it shall be stoned, thrust through with the dart.
And so terrible was the sight that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake. But ye are come unto Mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the General Assembly and Church of the first born, which are written in heaven, And to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the New Covenant.
And to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that available. See that you refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth much more Shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven? Whose voice then shook the earth? But now he hath promised, saying yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.
In this word yet once more signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore we receiving a Kingdom which cannot be moved.
Let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire.
In the first part of the chapter that we have considered up until now, we've seen the Lord Jesus as our example, as the one who is and was the beginner and finisher of the life of faith.
But now we come to that which is needed for us, but of course was not needed for him.
The Lord Jesus was always the perfect example, and he was the only one who could say, I delight to do thy will, O God, with no qualifications or exceptions.
But in your life and mine, there is always the need, isn't there? For God's hand in government, God's hand in chastisement. And so we get that brought in in the next few verses. And as it is brought out here, if there were no chest men in our lives, we might wonder whether we were really, really sons of God because as it says here in verse seven, what son is he whom the Father chasing us not?
And so in all of our lives, there is the hand of God correcting us.
Sometimes preventative, sometimes after the fact to bring us back to Himself. But in every case there is that which God does in our lives in order to correct those things which are not of Himself.
This is a quote from Proverbs of course, Proverbs chapter three that is mentioned here in verse five. My son, despise not thou the chasing of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
Those are two of the fleshly reactions to chastening that are very common in our lives. First is despising it.
Have something go wrong in their life? Oh well, that happens to anybody. I just have to grin and bear it and go on.
Not recognizing the Lord's hand in it. That's despising the chasing of the Lord. But the other fleshly reaction is to faint.
00:10:09
And that is when things come that are negative of my I don't think I'm going to be able to handle this anymore. I just can't take it any longer. Neither of those reactions gets the desired result that God has in mind. And what is proper for us is what we have in verse 11. It says no chasing for the present seemeth to be joyous but grievous.
Nevertheless, afterward, remember, brethren, when you're going through chastening, you don't understand it at the moment there's an afterword. Nevertheless, afterward it yield us the peaceable fruit of righteousness. And notice this part unto them which are exercised thereby. In other words, when things happen in our lives that are negatives.
To recognize the Lord's hand in it.
And to the exercise, Lord, your sense something to me. I don't know that I understand it, but I want to learn from this. To be exercised is the important attitude when things happen. The Lord help us to do that, because this is something that touches every one of us. Sometimes I say.
To.
Our brethren in the South.
In the family of God, we are all under discipline.
And what we're talking about here?
Who of us has gotten to the state that we don't need correction, rather than the more I go on, the more I realize how much I need.
At least in some measure.
Perhaps I don't realize how much I need, but we learn to mistrust ourselves, and we trust the Lord. It leads to mistrust of ourselves.
If I could just add to that 2 Bob. And it's something that needs to be guarded against. There is in some dear believers A twist on that despising of the chastening of the Lord. Maybe others have heard it too. But I I say it very kindly, having heard it from some dear believers that just about every time.
Any adverse circumstance comes into their lives, their attitude is this is an attack of Satan to destroy my ministry, my service for the Lord, and everything is written off as if we have to resist this with all our might because Satan is trying to interfere with my life and with what I'm doing for the Lord.
That can be the case.
But before I make that conclusion, I suggest that we need, as Bob has just said, to go through verse 11 and be very seriously exercised about it. And if I do arrive at that conclusion, don't boast about it. Don't go around telling everybody else because.
Next time it may not be that. It may be the Lord speaking to me.
About something that I need to deal with, and to write it all off as if Satan is interfering with what I'm seeking to do for the Lord is really only another form of despising that I suggest.
There's three talks about painting. There's five talks about painting.
In verse three, it's fainting because of what centers may do against us. In verse five, it's when the Lord's hand is upon us that day we are exhorted not to faint.
Uh, it's to me we have to be careful and appreciate that if the Lord's hand is upon us or if a sinner's hand is upon us, that there is a purpose of God for our good and the motivation, if we don't recognize it, we don't have to understand it, but it's incredibly important for us to realize the first part of verse 6.
00:15:27
For whom the Lord loveth?
Every time the Lord puts His hand on our lives or allows someone else to put their hand on our lives, He has a purpose of love in what He is allowed.
And if we could simply rest in that, we would be more benefici benefi benefiting from that hand upon our lives and his his love causes him to do it, and verse 10 gives his purpose in it. He says in verse 10 that we.
Uh, it well, the latter well, we'll read the whole verse where they barely for a few days chastised us after their own pleasure. Never God doing it that way. What is his way? The Lord's way, but he for our prophet.
That we might be partakers of His Holiness.
God's ultimate purpose is that when he looks at you, he's looking at a reflection of the same character as his son.
You're a son of God and he's very satisfied with his own Son, and he wants you to be like him. And so the experiences of this life and love from God in his work of correction and government are intended to work out the result that will make you holy like his Son is holy. And then it's for.
Eternal prophet, It's not just to it's, if I could put it this way, God's government is not to punish. It's not an act of judgment. The wrath of God against sin is an act of judgment with an eternal consequence. But His hand upon our lives is a necessary hand of love for our good, and whether we understand it at the time or not.
We will profit by it if we submit to it and seek to know the why and whatever he wants. Change, change.
See chapter 3 this same word for chastisement in our chapter.
Is translated, uh instruction.
So, so it is, uh, verse 16, all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine or teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction and righteousness. So as you were saying, we can't just sit around in our homes or, or, or somewhere nice and protected and read the word of God, as valuable as that is, and grow.
Umm, and God wisely and graciously orders our circumstances as we've been speaking, uh, instructing us through tribulation, which were patients, patients experience so that we can lay hold practically of the truth that we might learn privately in our, in our study or in our home. We need both. And we can put the word of God before us, but he's the one who puts the, the real training practically before us in our lives. And it's a, it's a great privilege.
And so I appreciate the comment yesterday about Old Testament Saints that are listed in Hebrews 11 not really having an object so much like we do with the glorified man Christ Jesus.
And so we were noticing back home in our reading meeting in 2nd Corinthians 318 well known verse, we all with open or unveiled face beholding is in a glass. The glory of the Lord are changed the same image from glory to glory. And we are wondering in the reading meaning, what does that mean? Glory to glory? And we, we're just just, umm, not getting that at all. And then then as we, uh, getting dinner ready and visiting a while, we said, you know, I think it must mean that it's gradual.
And I think that is the thought we have. It's important to have the Word of God to put our circumstances into context. So when I experience something, I can process it properly as a spiritual man. I don't have to understand it. As Bob was saying, I need to be exercised by it. And the Word of God teaches me that, puts it into the right frame so I can receive it properly, hopefully in humility. In contrast to that, I think it's at the end of Jeremiah.
00:20:28
Uh, where you have the children of Moab?
It's kind of interesting that that was the land that Elimelech took his family to. In the Book of Ruth, I think the name Moab means no father.
A land that was typical of being independent of God as opposed to the good land they had been in. But in Saint Jeremiah 48, umm.
I can find it here.
We have heard verse 29 of the pride, the pride of Moab, loftiness, arrogance, and so on. There's another verse in the chapter earlier on verse 11, Jeremiah 48 and 11. Moab hath been at ease from his youth. No chastisement here. He has been. He has settled on his leaves that's not been emptied from vessel to vessel and so on and so.
Is that, as our chapter says, if we don't have the privilege of chastisement, we're not even his children at all. Moab does not have the privilege or opportunity of being bored.
From vessel to vessel, but like we do as as much as we may grown or or or resisted as we're experiencing it.
Uh, it's a it's a wonderful privilege of being in God's family.
Six, uh says whom the Lord loveth thee chasteneth, And then it uses another word and scurget.
Every son who may receive it.
That's pretty strong word, isn't it?
Scourging.
Anybody here like scourging?
I don't think so.
But it says everyone receive it scourging.
I still remember brother Eric Smith talking about this, and when he first went to Bolivia, he said he got a royal dose of mountain sickness. It's pretty heavy when you first get there and he was pretty violently sick in his bed and.
One of the older brothers, older Indian brothers, sat by his bed, quiet for a long time.
And then he said.
Brother Smith, the Lord must love you a lot.
Why do you say that, brother? Smith said.
Because whom the Lord loves, he chastens and scourges.
Oh, brethren.
Let's recognize His hand. We need it, all of us. Every Son whom he receives needs that scourging. And then it goes on in the verses that follow as to earthly chastisement.
The endure chastening God dealeth with us sons, for what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not?
And verse 9 Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh, which corrected us. We gave them reverence. Shall we not rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live?
Therefore, a few days chastened us after their own pleasure. Sometimes that happens. We're chasing our children according to our own pleasure. Sometimes we make mistakes and chasing.
But we have a father in the family of God who never makes a mistake, and I have found brethren in my own life when I've had the recognition of His hand and bow in His presence.
The Lord gives me a peace that even though the trial may continue on for some time, still there's peace in the soul recognizing that it's His hand. And oh, that's so amazingly wonderful to experience in a time of trial. Lord help us to bow, to recognize His hand in it.
00:25:27
We like to blame circumstances and people for. That's the way I'm having this problem. You'll never get peace when you do that, brother. You get peace when you accept it from his hand.
Yesterday, Brother Don, you were speaking about job when you spoke.
And it's interesting, the expression in verse 9, the father of spirits.
Could you help us with that?
Express.
I'm going to help by saying you tell me.
Mm-hmm. Just breathe. Problem all through and through, didn't he? Nobody else did. He was the father's spirits.
Yeah, so often not a matter of what we're doing as the spirit we're doing it in. That is the problem.
And he's dealing with that.
I think you made the comment though, brother Don about Joe that.
Job was a good man, but he wanted to take credit for the good he had done.
How did you put it?
God made Job what He was and what He was compared to fellow man. He was greater in his righteousness and in his character, uh, than those about him. But his difficulty was he took the credit for it.
And God said no, Joe, I made you what you are. And so.
Uh, at at the beginning when God put his hand on him, he said of God, you, you put me in destinations.
When he learned his lesson, he said, I abhor myself in dust and ashes. In other words, once he got into the presence of God and learned the lesson that God wanted to teach him out of love for Job and his blessing, he put himself in the very position in which he had charged God with putting him. And so he had learned. And as mentioned on the Father's spirits, it's important to realize that.
We do best, perhaps naturally speaking, of being able to discern things concerning the body, and then a little better or not so good At least we recognize the things of the soul, the things that are self-conscious among ourselves and others. But very often, when we have little comprehension is the matter of this, the spirit in which things are done, And that spirit is that which connects us with God.
Makes us God conscious and so we're thankful when the Father of spirits sees what we don't see and puts his hand on it for our good.
I'll make one comment that's been helpful in my own life in this matter.
And there are three words.
That have been a great benefit to my own soul when I reached the point of saying them with honesty and personal relationship with my God and these matters. And when in a circumstance where we have a sense that the Lord has put His hand on our life, it brings tremendous relief and blessing to be able to say thank you.
Lord. And if we can reach in our hearts in the middle of a situation that we recognize as the Lord's hand and say with sincerity about it, thank you, Lord, it's a path of real rest and it's a path of benefit.
00:30:14
In that connection, I might mention something that a brother asked me about just in the, uh, break between the last meeting and this one, and I believe it works in here. I suggest that that is somewhat of the of the same thought as we get in Hebrews 4 with the throne of grace.
Who is on the throne? God himself.
And what is the thought in connection with a throne? The thought is of the the connection start again.
The thought of a throne is in connection with one who is in authority and who exercises administration, and God on his throne exercises that administration. A perfect administration in everything in your life and mine. But what kind of a throne is it? It is a throne of grace, as has already been brought out. It is.
God dealing with us not to punish us in that sense, but for our prophet. And of course connected with that in the verse is mercy in spite of his government, which of course was shown to Job and was shown to Paul and so on. When Paul had a thorn in the flesh, what did he find? That yes, there was a throne that gave him that thorn in the flesh, but there was grace that was sufficient for it because God had a purpose of blessing in it.
And so that all I suggest ties in a little bit with what we have here.
Thought but it I think I find it my own soul. I forget it sometimes Believers never experience the wrath of God. We do experience chastening, but it's in grace. It is not in wrath. How bad are we we're so bad we don't deserve God's chastening is chasing is not rap it's for our blessing and and we just have a way to to forget that and again that we don't thank God enough for all things. That's what we're told in Philippians chapter 4 that when we pray to pray with Thanksgiving.
So a problem comes and our first impulse is to do like the disciples did in the storm and to inform the Lord as if he didn't know, and to basically accuse him of not carrying. Our first impulse should be when we have a trial, is to thank God for it and for whatever solution he has. Perhaps he'll give us wisdom to solve it, and perhaps the means to solve it, or perhaps he'll give us grace to Barrett and again to pray as a a again. Sometimes things that are very simple and seem almost corny can be profound. The brother told me once.
When you're in trouble, don't pray, Lord, Get Me Out of this. Pray, Lord, what would you have me to get out of this?
Important, isn't it? It is, yes. So often when we get into an illness or a problem, our thought is, what's the best way to get out of this? And we don't wanna miss what he has to say with us, because if we despise it, he may have to speak louder. And he is faithful, brethren, and his dealings with us. The verse that Bill read yesterday and the address.
In Hebrews 412 speaks about the word of God and it really drew my attention. The end of the verse says that the word of God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, so that so often we make judgments on people and we are mistaken in our judgment because we don't know the intense the purposes they have.
But the Word of God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, and many times God is dealing with that. Brethren, we do not know our own hearts and.
Says in Jeremiah 17.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it? Ay, the Lord.
00:35:01
Search the heart and try the reins. To me, it's interesting that that word the reigns in the Spanish. It's the kidneys. I've heard that it's that in the French too, and I'm not totally sure, but it's that which purifies the blood God is dealing. He sees things in us that we don't see in ourselves. We think we're in full control.
Brethren, the Lord help us to thank God's thoughts to recognize His hand when there is chastening, when there is scourging.
I'm gonna give a simplified version of chasing and scourging that I think a lot of us in this room can relate to. Might be slightly oversimplifying, but I think it's a helpful way to see something when I was a boy.
My father and my mother.
Saw the need frequently to chasten me by a word of rebuke.
You should not have done that. And uh, I was, you might say, judged in that way for something I had done.
But being the boy I was very often, I didn't pay very good attention to the rebuke.
And so sometimes it was my father taking me into the bedroom.
And he had his way. I appreciate it now as I didn't then, but he would say to me, take your belt off.
And he then used my belt.
Through chest scourge me give me a spanking and then I put my belt back on and I can tell you I was pretty conscious of the belt I wore.
Uh, when I had thoughts of doing certain things later.
I look back as that was love of my mother and my father to chasten me. But if I didn't listen and I didn't heed it, then something more significant or severe was used. And I'm using the word scourging to help me learn that lesson. And they also gave me, at least my dad said, the reminder of it to carry around with me, to help protect me from repeating it.
So in verse 12 it says wherefore lift up the hands which hang down and the people knees.
When we see.
Those who may be discouraged.
Because they are passing through.
The discipline, the chastening of the Lord.
Rather than we need to be very careful about.
Making judgments on the Lord's dealings with others. It's what happened to Jobs. Three friends they thought they knew. And you have to hand it to those three friends, They came.
When Joe was afflicted the way he was and they sat for seven days without saying anything.
In sympathy with him, that's that's saying quite a bit.
They were his friends.
But then they made the mistake of thinking they knew what God was doing in his life.
Oh brethren, Lord, help us to learn from Job's experience and his three friends. To me it is beautiful to see. Even though they made a mistake, God had a another one that had his mind and got him going on the right track.
And the Lord followed on after he spoke.
But then Jobs affliction was not relieved until he prayed for his three friends, so that there couldn't be in Job's heart any bitterness against those three friends for all the things they had said against him, although they really provoked him during the course of the book of Job and his answers to get stronger and stronger, until finally they're all quiet.
00:40:04
Well, God used that to bring out what was he was dealing with in Job. It was something that none of those three friends saw in him.
So when we see those, they were going through trials. We need to learn to encourage in the proper way.
Lift up the hands which hang down.
There's discouragement, the feeble knees. People don't want to get up and walk in the way they should any longer.
We need to say don't be discouraged. The Lord has something for you in this and it may take a while before you understand it.
But let's encourage our brother and that are going through trials.
It's interesting to see here with the hands that hang down and the devo knees is a very obvious position when somebody is either discouraged or under the, the, uh, correction hand of God. I believe there's a lesson in there for us too, that do we notice our brethren who are going through trials? Can we be of a help? Can we be more so of an encouragement?
To lead them on, to point them toward Christ, to look upwards. You know, hands that are feeble, but yet as feeble as we may be, we can still help them to look up. That's where the help is from, is from the Lord himself, as Steve over the knees. May be we can help together to be on our knees before the Lord to ask for help.
Make a comment of further comments on Job in the book of Job.
Joe's friends.
Tried to help him from their own ex perspectives.
Some by experience, and they had a lot of experience in the world and so they use that experience to try to tell Joe what his problem is. Some of them considered themselves as equal and uh, as such, they felt quite qualified to tell him.
What he needed to do and how to fix himself.
A wonderful thing about Job as you go through his difficulty very often. In fact, most of the time when he started to answer them, he would answer them for a while and then you find out by the end of his speech he's talking to God, not to them.
When the one that could and did the use of the Lord to help Joe start to speak to Job. He did not start from his own perspective. He he in fact, he said you're all older than I am. I'm not I'm not like the rest of you. But he had recognized that what was being said did not give God his place. And so when he spoke, he said, Joe, were you there?
And so on. And he said you're not honoring God. And so he immediately started to help Joe by letting Joe understand what God's view of the matter was. And the wonderful thing about it is after he's halfway through his speech, or we would say his speech without any transition, God is speaking to Job. He just, it just the flow of it.
Is Elijah speaking and he doesn't even get done, we would say. And God is speaking to Job and Job knew it and it was used for his blessing. And so, brethren, may the Lord help us if we're trying to help each other, to bring one into relationship with the thoughts of God. And if I could put it this way and let God finish the conversation, it's not us that can really in the end help another.
Yes, God, who is the power to make the necessary changes?
Thinking of a man named Apopress.
B has a special way of helping he pray. He said that. Let's just turn to that in the Colossians chapter 4.
00:45:01
But it's very interesting in his prayer. Colossians chapter 4, verse 12. Let me just read that verse together.
Aprophus, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, salute you, always laboring fervently for you in prayers. Now let me just stop there. The reason I stopped there was often. That's all I know about that verse. That's all I think of Acrofest the one.
Praying for us it it's interesting to see it's it's one of us too. It's not just some stranger. Isn't it nice? But yet that verse didn't quite finish where I left it off. There's more to that verse, even though it says he was perfectly for you in prayer. But what did he really pray for? Let's finish that verse. He says that he may stand perfect and complete.
In all the will of God, what a precious prayer that he have for his brethren, that we may stand perfect and complete in the will of God.
Umm, I can't. I can't properly attribute where I've heard this statement, and maybe it's been commonly stated for many years, but I've heard the statement that all discouragement is of the devil.
And I, I just put that out there. Do you think that's accurate in Scripture or or is that way too simplistic?
I would suggest, Bruce, that it is accurate because.
Discouragement really stems from expecting something, sometimes from man, sometimes even from the Lord, and not getting it. And then I'm discouraged. That is, I lose heart. I don't want to go on in the pathway. And I can still remember reading.
And this comes from the pen of a servant of the Lord back in the 1800s who said I can thank God that I cannot honestly remember within my.
Reasonable memory being discouraged.
Uh, he said. Burdened, yes. Brought to tears, Yes.
So burdened that in some cases I could not sleep at night.
But not discouraged. And so I believe discouragement is from the devil because it is really saying.
I don't accept this from the Lord. I was expecting this to happen or that to happen. I was expecting either man to do something or sad to say in some cases, God to do something and I didn't get it.
And because of that, I'm no longer able to go on. That is really what happened to Job. He was expecting certain things from God and suddenly everything took a turn in a direction he didn't want. And he did get discouraged. He said I need a a middleman between me and the Lord because there's some mix up here. Something's gone wrong. And if only I could get the Lord here and we could talk it out, I'm sure we could get it straight.
No, what he needed was first of all, to justify God.
Accept the circumstances from the Lord and then do just what we've been saying all along here. OK, now where do we go from here? But I believe it's always of Satan to question God's dealings, whether through man that is allowed of God or whether directly from the Lord himself.
So wouldn't you, even though I agree with you that it's from the devil, that it is a fleshly reaction, So we have to get over that, don't we judge it? And I think that's what you're saying, isn't it? And thank you, that's very good. I don't need the devil to allow the flesh to get get me discouraged. That's what you're saying. And that is very true. Satan is behind it. But I'm good material for them. Yes, sometimes I hope not all the time. You don't need to listen to the devil's suggestions.
00:50:01
And sometimes we do.
Well, verse 14 is important. Or verse 13 I should say.
There is a need to make straight paths for our own feet.
Not that the lame have any excuse for being turned out of the way, because if the eye was on the Lord, that wouldn't happen. But as we have always heard, and it's true.
No man liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself, and So what I do and how I live my life will inevitably have an effect on others, either for good or for bad. And so.
How very important to pay attention to my own life. I may see the feeble knees, I may see the hands hanging down, but then I have to look at myself and say, And what kind of an example have I provided for that individual? What has my walk done for them? Has it been an encouragement, or has it tended to be that which drags someone else down?
And that's the grace of God, isn't it? To those who are lame, not that they continue lame, but that they be healed.
Lord help us to be helps in that direction.
I think it's important too, that verses 12 to 17, in our thoughts and in our responsibility, we include all men, not just fellow believers. Umm.
Umm, it's important for us at work to make a straight path for our feet. And, uh, it's important for us if we have contacts with a neighbor who met profession of Christianity. Maybe it's real, maybe it's not, depending on how well we know them and are sure one way or the other by their walk. But as Bill said, no man is, uh, lives to himself or dies by himself. Our lives have.
A an effect on everybody that we come into contact with, and that should be in effect for good and not for a hindrance to them. I've heard the comment made someone said of another. Well, if that's what a Christian's like, I sure don't want to be one. And uh, that's what can happen if we don't make straight paths for our own feet.
In verse 10 it mentions Holiness. It also mentions Holiness. In verse 14 it's.
We know in Scripture that there are certain places it speaks of our position, which is a position of perfect holiness. But here is, I think, practical holiness, the partakers of His Holiness. So there is a need to be correction, be corrected so that we would be partakers of His Holiness, holiness.
Is a word that.
Seems like it's kind of not real popular.
And sometimes people shrink from using that word. But there's a expression in the book of Psalms that I enjoy. It's called the Beauty of Holiness.
I've thought about it. Holiness is separation to God from evil.
It's separation to God from evil, and so it's beautiful to think about. I I sometimes use the illustration of a marriage and how many people love to go to a wedding.
You go to a wedding. What's so attractive about a wedding? People get married every day. What's so attractive about it? Why do people like to go to them? Because it's there where a woman separates herself to one man and one man separates himself to one woman.
And we find that beautiful.
Brethren, the Lord finds it beautiful too, when there's separation to Him.
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Lord exercises. Yes, we are holy in His sight, but there is, as in Second Corinthians Chapter 7 it says, perfecting holiness in the sight of God. That's the practical side and that's what we are to be exercised about.
Cleanliness required the walkers we already mentioned, to obtain ourselves from evil. But it also, it tells us a little further. There's also the practical side. Perhaps I'm jumping a bit further down. We see the picture there at Mountain Sinai, there where even when an animal walked towards that mount, there were actions to be taken because that was a holy place.
So the Lord used His own to act on that. So even if an animal unwillingly walked toward that, they would have killed that. So require actions on our part too, to maintain God's holiness, don't we? So we find here not just for ourselves, but to maintain that, perhaps for lack of better work or even for us as an assembly. And then when we jump ahead to the end of the chapter, it tells us that.
Where to reference that regarding here and I believe, brethren, is something that perhaps you said already, but it's something that we forget. We often concentrate on the love of God, but then we forget the fear of God, the governmental side of God, that God is light.
Yes, it's an important balance to keep, isn't it? The emphasis here, of course, is on the grace of God, and that's why it says in verse.
15 Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God. It's easy, and we all know what it means to see, either in ourselves or in others, a root of bitterness develop.
And what an awful thing it is when that bitterness goes on and on, and many, as it says here, can be defiled with it. Well, the grace of God.
Ought to be able to deal with all of that because often times the bitterness.
Well, it is sometimes covered up by the excuse that it's for the Lord's glory. I speak to my own heart. In reality, most of the time it's because my feelings have been hurt or I have been offended or some kind of thing like that. And how?
Different it is from the Spirit of Christ.
When he was here on earth, they threw every possible insult at the Lord. They said to him, Thou art a Samaritan.
What an insult for a Jew.
They also said one that was perhaps even worse. They said we be not born of fornication.
Casting an aspersion on the virgin birth of the Lord, as if fornication had been involved in His birth. What does the Lord answer to those miserable jabs? Nothing.
Nothing.
Now in the first case, when they said thou art a Samaritan and hast the devil, to accuse him of having a devil was an insult to God the Father. It was an insult to the Holy Spirit in whose power he did his works of miracles. And everything that he said, He answered that, but not the personal insult. And how often those roots of bitterness start out with that which really?
If I'm honest with myself is a personal offense either that I can overlook or if necessary, if it really has to be done, I can act on Matthew 18 and go to the individual. But.
What should govern it all?
I need to look out that I don't fail of the grace of God.
But lest, as you say, Dave, the grace.
Goes in the other direction where I use the grace of God as an excuse for sin. I have to remember that our God is still a consuming fire. He's still a God of holiness. Whether I'm an unbeliever or a believer, He will not bring His wrath upon me for sin. But as Dawn has already pointed out, there may be some scourging that'll have to take place if I despise His grace.
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And use it as an excuse for sin.
Number of occasions it wasn't with us here, It was actually one of my clients. He came in to do some business with me. He's, uh, a minister at a Pentecostal church and we got sidetracked and talking about scriptural things and he started telling me that how their church are able to bring in a lot of people for the gospel. And I said, oh, how so? He said, well, what we do is we bring in professional wrestlers and it draws a great crowd.
And I don't know exactly how my comment was. Oh, I remember what his wife finally said. Boys were here to do business. So we have to stop that conversation. But obviously that was brought very bad taste to my mouth in a sense where they bring in professional wrestler, where I felt that was entirely if we were to do so, you might say, well, I can justify that because a lot of people come in. But the act that they did.
Grace of God properly applied, does not, uh, minimize the holiness of God. It recognizes it. You go to the cross. Where was the question of sin more fully addressed than at the cross? Where was the grace of God shown more fully than at the cross? And so one does not deny the other does it? It's important that be the two things, but I think it is so important, brother, that we.
Watching our relations one with another.
So easily, roots of bitterness come in. You know our route is down under the ground. You don't see it on the surface, but there they are. And what does it say?
Many be defiled. Oh brother, and I do believe that this is very common amongst us as brethren gathered to the Lord's name we allow.
Those roots of bitterness, we don't address them, we allow them to go on and it continues to be a stumbling block and a problem amongst brethren. I often think of the.
Little parable that the Lord spoke in Matthew chapter 18. Matthew 18 is a chapter we often quote for being gathered to the Lord's name. Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. But in that chapter it addresses the matter of personal offense.
Is there such a thing as personal offense between us, brethren?
Yes, there is.
And sometimes we can simply let it drop. We can overlook it. We can bear with them. But there are times, like Bill was saying, then it has to be addressed and we are to go. Doesn't say wait for them to come to you, says go.
And brethren, these are important matters in our relationships with our dear brethren. But when I want to get to in this chapter 18 of Matthew is the parable the likeness of the Kingdom that he speaks from verse 23 on in verse 21 and 22, Peter asks how often shall I forgive my brother that sins against being He says seven times.
The Lord says, I say not unto thee until seven times, but until 70 * 7.
That's why it's so important, brethren, that we don't fail of the grace of God. How often have we been forgiven rather than I have no clue how many times I may have sinned each day, but think of it over our lifespan.
The amount of sin that there's been and how has he forgiven me? He frankly forgave us all. And now in our relationships, one with another, here we have this parable of a man that was forgiven 10,000 talents.
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And.
When he supplicated his master, his master was moved with mercy and forgave him the debt in verse 27.
He thought, he said to his master, have patience with me and I will pay thee off. You know what, it really makes me think that he had no clue as to the size of the debt that he had, and so he thought he could pay it back. But it was a debt that really in his whole lifetime he would never be able to pay back. And who of us could ever pay back the debt of sin we have had? But then he goes out and gets a hold of one of his fellow servants.
And takes them by the neck. And he has a small debt, something that was a minimal amount, and he won't forgive him, but he casts him into the prison till he shall pay the debt.
But notice what it says in the 35th verse of Matthew 18. So like I shall my heavenly Father, do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive. Not everyone His brother, their trespasses. Of course, it's talking about governmental forgiveness. And if there's not that forgiveness.
That grace, brethren in our hearts, if we're lacking it, then there will be a root of bitterness, and that shows itself very strongly in continued problems about amongst those who.
Profess to be members of the body of Christ the Lord. Help us brethren to recognize the importance.
Of not failing, Of the grace of God. Oh, how much He has forgiven us. How can we be hard on our brethren? The Lord help us.
We think 275.
275.
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The scenes of strike like graves of us.
Our desert.
Path has been.
But here, O Lord, we've learned to draw.
And.
Loving the one sin.