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40.
Language.
For us, everyone and Braveheart strong.
I do.
Comment was made on that, but.
Lord.
Chapter 13 and verse 5.
Let your conversation be without covetousness and be content with such things as you have.
For he has said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee, so that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God, whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation. Jesus Christ the same yesterday and today, and forever. Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines.
For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace, not with meats which have not profited them that have been occupied therein. We have an altar whereof they have no right to eat, which served the Tabernacle. For the bodies of those beasts whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin are burned without the camp. Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood.
Suffered without the gate. Let us go forth therefore unto Him without the Kent, bearing His reproach. For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come by Him. Therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually. That is the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. But to do good and to communicate, forget not.
For with such sacrifices God is well pleased. Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves. For they watch for your souls as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief, For that is unprofitable for you. Pray for us, for we trust we have a good conscience, and all things willing to live honestly. But I beseech you the rather to do this, that I may be restored to you the sooner.
00:05:09
Now the God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do His will, working in you that which is well pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. And I beseech you, brethren, suffer the word of exhortation, for I have written a letter on to you in a few words. Know ye that our brother Timothy has sat at liberty, with whom, if he comes shortly, I will see you.
So all them that have the rule over you and all the Saints they have, Italy salute you. Grace be with you all. Amen.
Rear slide. New translation.
In one phrase, satisfied with your present circumstances.
I think it puts it very well for us because.
It gives an expression or it gives a fullness to the thought here that goes beyond simply money.
There's something in us that often says if only.
And the if only brings to at some change in our present circumstances that if only they were different, then we would be content.
But I want to.
Share with you something that is was a great lesson in my own soul with respect to this, that perhaps illustrates to some extent that this can be something that every one of us needs to.
Have right with the Lord.
Quite a few years ago, for a number of years, I went to the country of Peru at their conference time and was with the brethren, and I noticed when I went down in the first years of going there.
The brethren were, many of them extremely poor.
I can quite visualize going to one home that had the four outer walls, but no inner walls, no roof.
Accepting at the back of the four walls, there was a temporary space and there was sort of a little separation for what we would call the bathroom area. In other cases, there were brethren that had.
Quite literally sticks that you would pick up at the side of the road, interleaved with cardboard to foreign the walls of their homes.
Some of the homes had dirt floors.
And in visiting in those homes with those brethren, there were sometimes a different spirit.
Among them as to those present circumstances, and I will remember in particular one home that as it were the first time we were in the home and they.
Showed hospitality to us and gave us a meal that the conversation had in it. This thought. If only.
We had a concrete floor to replace.
The dirt one, we could be content.
A year or so later, visiting again in that home, there was a concrete floor, but the conversation had shifts slightly and it said if only we had a refrigerator.
We would be content.
I visited.
Two years ago, and some of those same parents are at that time had children growing up in their homes, and now their grandparents, those children have grown up and in some cases are in the assembly and they have children of their own. And in every one of the cases that I can think of in my mind, the present circumstances of those specific brethren and all of them that I mentioned are.
00:10:05
Now, 30 some years later, still in the assembly there, their circumstances are substantially better.
But I also can say this from the observation of those 30 some years, that some of them who at that time were not content with the present circumstances and were laboring to change them over the course of this time, pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
Others who were not so can I say who are more content with their circumstances. They have changed.
But they have not suffered in their lives in the same way.
It's a lesson for us, brethren, to be sure that we take or let take hold of us the truth that's given to us in verse six of our chapter. With respect to it, it says, we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper.
That is, here the Spirit and the thought of it is regardless of present circumstance.
Can I conscientiously or with consciousness in my soul, say, well, yes, I have present circumstances, but I have a helper and it's the Lord?
And therefore I can be content.
I can rest in the assurance that I have one who is there to help me, and yes, if he so chooses and according as he sees the need, he can change those circumstances. But if I myself have a spirit of discontent and my focus is on the change of the circumstance that I am presently in, I will be neither thankful.
And I can motivate myself in such a way that I bring harm to myself and to those that I love, my children.
The seventh verse is not unconnected with what our brother has just said, but very much so because there are those who have walked in the pathway of faith, content with their circumstances, who have spoken the word of God to us out of the reality of a life of faith that would cause to go on, maybe in difficulty, and we see what the end of that manner of life was.
And so those are the ones to whom we are to look.
And so the Lord is my shepherd, and the Lord uses those that have spoken the word of God unto us, and we follow their faith, their pattern of life.
And it's, it doesn't say follow them, but whose faith follow. And we consider what the end of that pathway of life was. There are many who have been successful in this world in business, and you can really see it was a work of the Lord in their life. The Lord didn't give. There were the sons of Gershom, Murari and Kohath, and some he gave ox carts. To some he gave more, and to some he gave none, according to the burden that they had to bear in connection with the Tabernacle.
And so there are brethren, that the Lord has given much, and as her brother is said, But if my desire is to have more than what I've got, so I can do more, I'm going to Pierce myself through with many sorrows. But there are those that the Lord has given a ox carts to.
And so that is not the issue of how much, but what is the desire of my heart and what has been my walk of faith in connection with the guiding of the Lord. And so if I simply seek to follow those that have been successful in this world, I'm just going to follow down the same wrong pathway that somebody else has. But we are to remember and we are to consider those who have walked in the pathway of faith, that is they've taken up the word of God in connection with their circumstances.
Whether rich or poor and walked in that pathway according to faith and those that faith, we are to follow and we are compassed about a great cloud of witnesses. And as our brothers spoke, we can all close our eyes and we can think a brethren who have gone before now with the Lord, who have walked in the pathway of faith in a variety of circumstances, some in good health, some in poor health, some in wealth, some in poverty. But they walked in the pathway of faith and they've been a help to us.
But if we simply follow those who've been successful in education or successful in business or whatever, there were Zenith was a lawyer, Luke was a beloved physician, there were those that had good educations, there were those that were wealthy and the Lord, that is all of the Lord. But where is the faith we are to follow not the success of a man.
00:15:13
Good. Before we get too far from the fifth verse, I'd like to draw attention to the last two phrases which we really haven't discussed. I will never leave the nor forsake thee.
We appreciate, we count on, we cherish the presence of the Lord with us. It is our comfort.
Because He has said I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. Now for years I thought this was just the Lord saying the same thing in two different ways, just to as a way of affirmation. But He's really saying two different things here. I will never leave thee. I believe the proper understanding of that is it relates to His presence.
He will always be present with us.
But then he says, I will not, nor forsake thee.
That's his attention. I can be sitting beside my wife in meeting and totally unconscious of her there.
But the Lord is always not only with us, but attentive to us.
So He will never leave us or forsake us. He is always present with us and always engaged in our welfare.
We have this brought before us in Philippians 4 as well, do we not? I think our brother.
Referred to this previously in these meetings, but.
In Philippians 4.
The apostle speaks.
In verse 11 he says, not that I speak in respect of want, for I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content.
And it was something apparently, that didn't come to him immediately, but he had learned.
That this was.
The proper way. I know both how to be a face, and I know how to abound everywhere. In all things I am structured both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.
And then he says in verse 13, I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me. So I believe the apostle recognized that he had one that was with him at all times who would never leave nor forsake him, and would help him to endure even the most adverse circumstances.
Whether it be to be hungry, to suffer need, or whatever the circumstance might be.
And so in our chapter.
Here in verse six he says, we may boldly say the Lord is my helper. So how wonderful that we can just rely on our companion who will never disappoint us. If we're willing to let him help us, he will.
And how he desires to help us because He loves us so very much.
That's his choice as to how he will help us. The is I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. This is a conscious thing. It's what he was saying. He doesn't.
Or John.
He doesn't forget that we are here and we are here in need and.
All power is given unto me in heaven and earth.
The Lord Jesus says.
And we are his servants to.
Do at His bidding, as He leads and as He directs, He will give us the answers that we need, the wisdom we need, the power we need, the money we need. If it's His work, He's in charge and he delights to use a yielded servant to do the to do His bidding.
00:20:00
Just submit.
That that's the secret of it all. I will do what thou wouldst lead me to do is really the attitude that I should have always submission.
It's a beautiful thing.
In Scripture we had the Lord is my shepherd and it comes up twice in Hebrews. It doesn't come out quite clearly in the King James, but in I think it's Acts chapter 3, Peter charges him with killing the Prince of life, the originator of life. Man is busy looking for the origin of life in Mars and the very origin of life that you have proceeded from the Son of God.
And man killed him. And then he's a Prince and a deliverer. He's a very originator of Israel, if I may put it this way. He's the one, the one who called Abraham out of Irv Chaldeans, and they slew the originator of their state.
And then we have an Hebrews that just think of brother Jennings comment. He learned obedience through the things that he suffered is that he was the originator, the captain of our salvation. He was the originator of our salvation and he learned what the difficulties of this pathway were like. We may ask our child to do something and we've never done it ourselves and pick up a load or something and.
But he knew he will never ask us to do something that he does not now know.
What it is like to experience both the difficulty in doing it as a man and the results of doing it, the reproach that may come from doing it. And then he's the author and finisher. He's the originator and finisher of faith is that he's marked the pathway. And so there are others who have walked in that pathway. We have here and we know how their pathway ended. We're living in a day of virtual Christianity. A man told me, yes, he said, I, I did church on Sunday on I watched TV, church on Sunday.
I watched it on TV.
And we live in a day of virtual Christianity where people are learning the truth from ones they don't know, the end of their conversation. You don't know whether the man you're listening to on the radio lives in an $8 million condominium in Hawaii or not. We're to learn the we're to know the get the truth from those that we've known. The end of their conversation, their manner of life, and with all their freckles and warts and all the rest of it. We, we, we consider what their conversation is, what the matter of the outcome of their life has been with respect to the path where they have taught.
Because the result of not doing that is we don't want to skip over the eighth verse, but as we're going to be carried away by divers and strange doctrines that we get taken up with issues rather than Christ. And that's where the 8th first comes in. True ministry will point Christ as to Christ.
But man gets taken up with issues. What's going to happen in Y2K? What's going to happen in this and what's going to happen to that? And people are all taken up with these things. If you could go into the basements of many believers stocked with freeze dried chicken and all kinds of things and freeze dried food to get ready for Y2K, well, they followed them down somebody down that path. And now I don't know what the latest fad is. People are running off in this direction and that direction. It's not really following Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
And so real ministry will point us to Christ and cause us to walk in the pathway that would follow the Lord Jesus Christ and to cause us to walk in the pathway of faith.
I just say one other thing that in connection with this eighth verse, Jesus Christ the same yesterday and today and forever. You say, well didn't he raise the dead and heal Even they would take handkerchiefs from the apostle and heal ones. The power of God is not changed, but the day in which we live, the manifestation of that power has changed. Let's just turn to Colossians chapter one. I think it is because we see that how the power of God is manifested.
Today.
Colossians chapter one and verse 11.
Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power.
Under raising from the dead, and healing the sick, and so on. No, it says, strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power unto all. Patience and long-suffering with joyfulness. Jesus Christ is not changed, but the power of God may well be manifested in the day and weakness in which we're living. Is it just going on, perhaps, to see one dying in sickness?
00:25:07
Or you see one going on in a difficult situation in the assembly or going on in a difficult situation in the home. But we heard about joyfulness. But just going on and taking those circumstances from the Lord. And the power of God has manifested. It's the same power of God that raised Lazarus from the dead as to go on in a difficult situation at work for the boss. Maybe you get passed over for a promotion because you're a Christian, or you won't work on the Lord's Day or something like that.
It's the same power of God.
To see you happily going about your work when everybody knows you're being mistreated.
Perhaps a connection can be made with verse 7.
Remember them that have the rule over you or your leaders.
Like to turn over to Hebrew or first Peter chapter 5.
I believe there's a connection with this verse and this chapter with in a Broadway with the 23rd Psalm.
That we had before in the 23rd Psalm. The Lord is my shepherd.
And here in first Peter, I think we are five, We have something that's a little more detail and a little different view of it from what we have in our chapter. But to read the 1St 4 verses, the elders which are among you, I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed.
Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof not by constraint, but willingly.
Not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, Not as Lords over God's heritage, but being in samples to the flock. And when the Chief Shepherd shall appear, you shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. The Lord is our Shepherd, and we've had it before us in the previous.
Time in a particularly personal way.
But also, it's nice to see in the Word of God and someone has used the expression under shepherds, the Lord is given to some of the flock of God to have that responsibility for himself of seeking to feed the flock of God and to shepherd them. And he makes it very clear to them as he's instructing. Peter was one and he was speaking to fellow believers who had this responsibility given to them.
Of the chief shepherd to care for the flock of God and to do so they were not to be motivated by money, they were to be doing it As for the care of the flock and as it were in our chapter. The opposite is being taken. It's saying you that are sheep appreciate and respect and take the guidance given to you by those the Lord has raised up to.
Feed the flock of God and to act in the rod, if you will, the the the rebuke sometimes whatever it may be that would help us to walk in the path that's given to us. It's also nice in the Spanish actually in our chapter where it says leaders it it in the Spanish it uses the word pastors, those who had that pastoral care.
Of the flock of God.
But it goes on to say about them in our chapter in verse seven, it says whose faith follow. There may be, as already mentioned, their warts and wrinkles, an imperfect representation of the chief Shepherd in their way of administering the help that they're responsible to give to the flock of God. But one thing that does characterize and is constant in such really tends to be the faith.
And it's the faith that is seen in them that follows even after they're passed on into the presence of the Lord. I'm sure there are many of us in this room that have the memory in our souls.
00:30:02
Of certain ones that the Lord used and benefit and blessing to us. And also we continue to think of the faith and can I say, would seek to imitate it in our lives as well. But then he almost seems to me that when he gets to the eighth verse, you can say, as it were, puts them aside for a moment and he says, but there's one who's perfect and unchanging.
From the beginning.
The end. He remains Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever. And what a wonderful thing for us, brethren, to always, as it were.
Benefit from one another in whatever capacity. The Lord may use us, but we always need to return to the rock of our salvation, the one who is the Lord.
Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.
I'm glad you mentioned that two sides of the coin, if I may put it that way, in connection with pastors, because we have a responsibility to, as we see down, obey those that are our guides and God has marked them out over which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers. You can see in their lives that by the way they've conducted themselves.
That the Holy Ghost has put them in that position the.
Tendency of man is to choose his own leaders or to choose his own pastors, but God by man's experience and manner of life marks ones out and we're not to make that job difficult. There is a warning to them that that because they must give an account of themselves and Moses. He lost patience with the people of God and that the meekest man on the face of this earth. But the responsibility is don't make the job difficult.
I remember I may even have been brother Chuck, but years ago, a dozen or more years ago or maybe 15 years ago, a labouring brother was coming to the assembly and somebody said, well, I have an exercise that when laboring brothers come, they should do this or that. And I turned them and I said you can't have an exercise for anybody else. You can have an exercise as to how you behave. I can have an exercise as to how I behave. I can't have an exercise as to how somebody else behaves. The doctor says, Neil, you need more exercise.
My wife can't go out and get the exercise for me. And so there are two sides to the coin. And so there is an exercise that we, as what we have in this scripture is to remember and to consider what the end of a man's conversation is. And when we pick up a book and we read a book of ministry, we can get real value of, But it's good to consider what happened to the person who wrote that book and where where that direction that took them off on and where they wound up.
Because it's we have that instruction from Scripture. Well, you see what happens in Christendom and the tendency of our own hearts were part of it is we can get carried away with issues and causes and they may switch from week to week or month to month or year to year, but it does not really establish us in the pathway of faith.
And set ground and settle us.
I noticed this word conversation is used in verse five and also in verse 7.
I take in verse seven. Conversation refers to the contest of the darkness. What about verse 5?
O'clock.
I just thought it might be well declared I just work conversation because it's not simply our words but manner of life, our behavior.
I'm not saying in every instance where the word is used, but.
But I've enjoyed verse 8 because I believe because of the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ is the same.
We can't trust Him. His power and love will never change and we know what it is perhaps to put our faith in.
00:35:02
Mirrors human and find that.
As the years progress, perhaps they don't have the same physical strength that they once had and they aren't able to help us, although perhaps they would like to, but they just don't have the power. And then you have some that perhaps you might think they have a love and care for you, but you find that perhaps they backed off from you.
And we sang that in him, I believe how that earthly friends.
Will fail and leave US1 day soothed the next day grieve us.
This friend, this one that we're speaking about here, who is the same Jesus Christ, He'll never leave us. We can trust Him, knowing that he loves me just as much today as when he was hanging on the cross, suffering there in agony on the cross of Calvary. And he'll love me forever, and you too.
And his powers unchanging.
The apostle in writing this epistle.
Was writing it to.
Jews who had accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Messiah and Savior and become Christians.
And she wanted to confirm them.
In what they had in the better.
But they had to lay hold of it by faith, because in Judaism they had a religion in which they could see many of the things physically in which their beliefs were centered. They had the temple and so on, and those things that they looked to. But now they had to, by faith, look to a man who they could not physically see. And it was written.
Partly to well, strongly to encourage them to go on and not give it up and go back to what they had previously, he says to them and warns them very strongly there's no hope if you give it up and go back for you and so.
One of the things that's so important is you have Jesus Christ.
The same yesterday, today and forever.
Don't give him up for some strange doctrine. As he says in the next verse, don't be carried about by thoughts that are going to rob you of himself.
And.
One of the things that.
It's often been said that it's important for us when we hear something that's perhaps new to us as a teaching or as a doctrine. We can ask ourselves the question, does this teaching I'm hearing honor the person?
Of Jesus Christ does it honor the work that the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished? And if it does, it's not of himself, it's not of the Spirit. Every true teaching and doctrine will honor the person and the work of the Lord Jesus. And so he's telling him, don't be carried about with divers and strange doctrines. And then goes on to comment. The heart is established with grace.
An old brethren, it's the characteristic of the dispensation and so important for us to recognize that the present work of the Spirit of God in this world is God displaying to man His grace what God can do for man now, in contrast to what man and responsibility sought to do for God in the Old Testament. And so he wanted his brethren to be confirmed in their hearts, not in their minds.
So important it's that the heart be established in this way that we have that rock solid enjoyment in our souls of the person of the Lord Jesus and the grace that has been brought to us through Him. And that we not, as it were, be robbed of it by allowing other thoughts or other things to come in and make us drift away or be drawn away by that which will only rob us of our place in Christ.
00:40:03
He doesn't just say with grace, but not with meats. And that suggests Romans 14 where the apostle says to these Gentile Christians.
Let us therefore follow verse 19. Follow after the things which make for peace, and things where with one may edify another. For meat. Destroy not the work of God. All things indeed are pure, but it is evil for that man who eateth with the fence.
It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby thy brother is offended or is made weak. And here is a very good portion. Hast thou faith? Have it to thyself before God, happy as he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth. And he that doubted his damned, if he eat, because he eateth not of faith. For what is not of faith is sin. So it's really warning against legalism.
Which brings in things of like meats and what you can eat and what you don't. You can't eat grace and grace establishes the and all foods are clean. Now to the Christian there are none that are you can't eat in a in a in a way that's going to defile you. All things are pure and I believe that's when it says not with meats which have not profited them that have been occupied therein.
You you find that all through Christendom.
Things that people have set up as no nose, you know, but grace is enables us to set aside those things and live for his glory, what is pleasing to him. I remember Clem Buchanan said 18 years ago at a Regina conference, he said if cabbage doesn't agree with you, don't eat it. And I think what he was simply saying is we need to be very simple about these things. And Christendom has gotten taken up with a lot of things.
And it does not establish the heart in grace, but there is that that's a physical condition. That's something physical. But this is talking about what, a ceremonial, that type of thing. Well, that's right. And the other thing is with the young people often, and I was young, we were all young at one time.
We go to our parents and say, what's wrong with doing this or what's wrong with doing that? And if you ask a legal question, you're going to get a legal answer. And really, grace is to say, what would the Lord have me to do? Did the Lord direct me to do that? You want to do something. And you know, before you ever go and ask your parents that they're not going to like it. Ask yourself one question, is the Lord directing me to do this? Or is it my own desires and lusts getting me to do this? And that's really what it is to establish in grace because.
The Lord's my shepherd, he's leading us and he's not going to lead us into a pathway of sin. And if you can say, well, the Lord led me to do this whatsoever is not of faith as our brother read his sin. And if you can't say that the Lord led you to do something, then don't do it. Don't always ask what's wrong, because if you start to ask what's wrong with this and wrong with that, you're just going to be constantly taken up with what's wrong. But if we walk in a pathway that desires to please the Lord.
Then we're going to avoid all kinds of pitfalls.
There's a big difference between what is morally wrong and what was to the Jew ceremony ceremony wrong. And we're not under that. We're not under that. But what is morally wrong is always true. It's wrong. And whether you're a Christian or a Jew or whatever you are, it's wrong and it's against God's nature. But some things like here.
When it says not with meats, that's that's not something that's morally wrong.
Likes like someone will say, well, I can't eat pork. Well, that's Jew would say that you can't eat pork. It's an unclean animal. Well, hast thou faith have it to thyself before God have happy seed. He condemneth not himself and the thing which he alloweth. But there's nothing more wrong with eating pork.
Nothing to do with morals, it has to do with ceremonies and we're not under that. So all things are pure for the Christian that's been set free by grace.
But it was in First Corinthians 8 and verse 8.
But meat commendeth us not to God.
For neither if we eat, are we the better? Neither if we eat not, are we the worse.
Well, I believe the Jew is under the impression that by eating certain meats and abstaining from other meats, they would improve their position before God, their acceptance before God. But you know, this ceremonial cleansing does not change the heart one bit. It's only through grace.
00:45:09
And that's unmerited favor, God showing us favor that we don't deserve unless we accept.
God's salvation by grace, we have no standing before God, but if we accept it, we are brought into a position of unspeakable favor before God. And you know in Titus it says that grace teaches us that.
That denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live.
Righteously, godly and soberly. And in this present world, so.
So that's what changes the heart that would what is it that makes us act in a way that's pleasing to God? It's not rules and regulations, but it's grace, the appreciation of grace in our souls, what God has done for us in the person of His Son.
What is the difference between law and grace? Not too many years ago, we still had the Lord's Day Act in Canada, and it was forbidden certain commercial activities on the Lord's Day. And a man started in defiance of the Lord's Day Act, started to sell cars. And so of course, there was quite a bit of going back and forth in a public letter to the newspaper. And he said we're not under law, we're under grace, meaning I can sell cars in the Lord's Day. A lot of Christians have that idea. Well, though, grace got rid of this awful thing, the law.
So we go through this conflict, and yet every right conscience knows that every word of God is pure, and so that we don't want to set aside the word of God. Mr. Darby wrote a very helpful pamphlet, Is the Law dead or am I? But what is the difference between law? Law looks for something, but all it can do is condemn because it condemns. If I depart, it can never justify anybody. I may have never murdered anybody, and the law says, well, Neil's not a murderer, but it doesn't say I'm not capable of it.
There's a lot of difference between I shall not kill or thou shall not commit adultery. Those are morally wrong. And thou shalt not sell cars on Sunday. There's a huge difference in the well, I'm just using this as an example, but grace law looks for something in man, but it can only condemn. But grace acts towards man according to what is in the heart of God, and God is holy. And so God acts towards man in holiness and he realizes the first thing.
That there has to be as a purging of man's sin and that it's going to set them on a pathway that is pleasing and separate from sin. That's what grace does. It doesn't look for something in us. It's not looking for goodness in us. It brings it to us.
The law gives us do's and don'ts that make us accept more acceptable to God. If we do the do's and don't do the don'ts, that makes us more acceptable to God. That's principle of law. But grace is God bestowing favor upon us from Himself. It all comes from Himself. The only one of the 10 commandments that is ceremonial is the 4th one. Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. There's nothing moral about that. That's just that's that's a ceremonial law. All the rest.
I shall have no other gods before me. I shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. I shall not bow down to an image. Worship it. Children, obey your parents, and that shall not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Thou shalt not lie. All of these are moral things. And but we're not under law doesn't mean that those things that we're free to do because those things that are moral, they're all incorporated in the New Testament.
Not as law, but as the the outflow of the Christian life.
Grace produces in US what the law required. When you're under law, then it's to your account, it's to your favor, it's to your credit. But when it's just the outflowing of the life of Christ by the Spirit of God, it's to the credit of God.
And what was permissible under the law may be unthinkable under Christianity. I'll just give you an example. People say, well, the grace is have the idea that grace somehow brings us into a lower standard. Supposing a man left here and he got into a car accident through carelessness, he killed somebody's son. Well, under the law, the parents of that child could chase that man until he got to a city of refuge and kill him for doing it.
But such a thought, I think, to every Christian heart, is unthinkable here to pray for your enemies and those that do you harm and.
And so we see an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. If you were working with somebody who was careless and he put out your eye, under the law had the right to go after him and put out his eye too. That's fair and square, as the world says. But to grace that is that that thought is abhorrent.
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So grace is not a lowering of the standard, but it's simply God bestowing on us out of His heart of love. And if we're truly walking in, grace will manifest the heart of God.
Towards men.
What it says in verse 10 is to move on. We're not going to get rid of this chapter through this, this chapter we have an altar where they have no right to eat, which serve the Tabernacle. That's the that's the Jewish order. Those that serve the Tabernacle, they don't have any part in the Christian altar. Everything, everything in Christianity speaks what what we had, what the Jews were familiar with, what the altar speaks of Christ. That's the place of sacrifice.
The priest speaks of Christ. He was the priest. He offered the altar, He offered the sacrifice. He's the sacrifice. He's the priest, He's the altar. Everything answers to him. And when it says we have an altar, we Christians, it's not the Jewish altar, but it's Christ himself who has offered himself without spot to God and brought us into a place of favor and relationship with God that's all founded upon himself in his work.
All right, George.
You know, the, the the pencil purpose of the epistle, like Don was pointing out, is to the danger of those that were associated with Christianity as Hebrews, some real, some not. And so the expectation in chapter 6.
About those that would apostate would turn away. But here we see, you know, and and point by point through the epistle, the apostle is showing how Christ would answer. You pointed this out how Christ would answer and that which was better and I think the word better is mentioned something like 13 times in this epistle.
And so how wonderful to realize that we're not dealing with Judaism and a mixture of Judaism. And that's one of the dangers that that continually attack us as believers is a return to some form of Judaism. And how wonderful what we don't deal with, with meats which have not profited them that have been occupied therein. But we're to be established hardest to be established with grace.
Today in Christendom, talk about the judeo-christian faith. Well, the Christian faith is not Judaism. They're totally different. And the one is not an improved Judaism. Anything that Christianity is just an improved Judaism, it's altogether different. One is the principle of law, the other is the principle of grace. They're completely different. If it be of grace, it is no longer of works. If it be of works, it's no longer of grace. The two don't go together.
And to put them together, which is being done. And that's, that's what leads, that's what leads them to promote voting and getting involved in politics and all this. The, the Christian faith is heavenly. We, we, we partake of the heavenly risen life of Christ and the Spirit of God unites us to a heavenly man and our citizenship is in heaven. We're not of the world. The world hates us and doesn't have any use for us if we live a proper Christian life.
We'll experience the the, the intensity of persecution that comes from the world, but as long as we become a part of the world and join in with all of its activities in that, then we're OK. And that's a mixture of our Christianity with Judaism.
And that's, that's really watering down the truth, isn't it? That's that's what the camp is when it refers to this in the 13th 1St let us go therefore unto him without the cap bearing his reproach is that under Judaism they had a place. The Samaritan woman could say, the Lord say you said it's a Jerusalem where you ought to worship. All you needed was a map to know where you could worship. You knew the building.
But there was a reproach connected. There's a reproach connected with following with Christ everything in Judaism, every symbol, every ordinance.
Had was a picture of something heavenly.
And there was everything in Judaism to act on man in the nature to try to bring good out of them. Judaism gave man a perfect moral code, it gave him a perfect order of service for man in the nature, it gave him perfect.
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Expressions of human feelings in the Psalms. It gave him all of that. And what was the result of that? They crucified the Lord and they said away with this man. We will not have this man to reign over us.
But when we mix those things back into Christianity and we say, well, if we just have better music, we're going to get people into the church, as they say, or into the meeting. Or if we do this, if we act on man in an external way, if we have a beautiful building, we're going to get more people in. If we're acting on people in an external way, then really that is what the camp is. But there's a reproach to saying, well, I'm just gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. What's the name of who's your leader?
Well, Christ is our leader.
You know, where's your altar? We have an altar. We do, but we don't have a physical altar not made out of marble or stone or famous with costly stones associated with it. And so there's a reproach connected with that, with simply following Christ. He was rejected by those that the chief priests and the Pharisees, and he suffered without the gate, and that is where we are associated with Him.
Like to just make one more comment or two with respect to law and grace?
The root principle of law is found in the verse.
This do and thou shalt live. That's the root principle of law with God. This do is human responsibility to God.
Based upon the person who is under it thou.
And the result, if kept is life. And the whole law is on that principle that I am acceptable to God.
That is, if I were ever under the law, I am acceptable to God by doing the requirements of it, and if I do them, I live in contrast to that. The root principle of grace I believe is found in Ephesians chapter one, and I just like to read the verse.
Ephesians chapter one and verse 6.
To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the Beloved.
Here, the root principle of grace is our acceptance before God.
In his son, on the basis of what he has done.
And it's a wonderful position to be in with God. I stand. You stand before God today on the ground of His own heart of love manifested to us by the action of what He has done. We call it His grace and we are accepted.
Not in what I have done or can do, but what the beloved is to God in what he has done. And so in our chapter were referred to himself in such a way that he says follow him. Have your heart established in that relationship that is yours accepted before God in the beloved on all the virtue of what God himself does.
Through his son, and consequently, as he says, they have an altar.
That our altar, they're not allowed to eat of it. That is, Judaism under the principle of law was not allowed into the blessings of Christianity.
We get to enjoy things that were never theirs and never could be theirs.
Did a Jew dare come into the very presence of God to worship?
He never had the right to do that.
You and I have the blessed privilege and grace accepted in the Beloved of coming immediately into the presence of God to offer our Thanksgiving and worship and praise.
Oh, we have the best time in the history of mankind to live and to look forward to that moment, perhaps today, when the Beloved.
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Says come, let's go to the father's house.
I'd like to read it just one verse in Romans 11 Connection with what he's just said. Verse six. If by grace, then is it no more of works? Otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace? Otherwise work is no more work. Two are mutually exclusive. One of the other grace is God giving, doing it all, works as man doing it all.
If Moses had kept the law, he would be alive today. This do, and thou shalt live. And the fact that he died proved that he had not kept the law, proved that no one kept it, no one involved that they all died. And a man says, well, if I follow the holy golden rules, God will accept me after I die. The fact that he dies proved that he didn't.
There seems to often be a difficulty with us because of bringing up the subject of law and grace, the matter of obedience.
I'd like to make a couple of comments because I know for many, many years in my own soul I was confused between law and grace and obedience and the difficulty in my own thoughts with respect to it. And I just want to share a little bit maybe for some that are a bit younger with respect to that.
Man as a creature.
Has a place of obedience to God.
From creation through eternity.
We are never and will never be in relationship to God, in which obedience does not have a right place with respect to it. Adam was never under law, but he had been given in fact, in the Garden of Eden to establish this very principle. He was not allowed to eat of a specific the fruit of a specific tree. That was a law.
Adam, it was a law, OK? It's the only thing that he couldn't do it. Go ahead. You said he was never under a law, so he was under one law. I'll accept that he was. I'm going to say he was under the principle of obedience to God in his relationship.
That we come in Christianity and so on into expressions like if you love me, keep my commandments and so on. And in heaven we will never be independent creatures of God. We will always recognize God's authority with respect to us. And so the matter of law and grace is not direct. Yes, obedience comes into it, but the more foundational issues between law and grace is the foundation of my standing with God.
And under law, my foundation is I must do.
And under grace it is God through Christ the Beloved has done. And that's the foundation of my acceptance with God for eternity. But I'm also a child of God, and children of God obey their Father.
Who was speaking to another brother? Another aspect of it, if you will.
In Romans 10 it says, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in thine heart, God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. The moment I accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, I am putting myself into a relationship of absolute complete submission to Him, to obey, if you will, His every command.
With respect to my life, and so here in our chapter, even it says not Jesus is my helper, not the Savior is my helper, but the Lord is my helper.
And so why am I content with circumstance? Well, my Lord, he calls. He decides on the circumstances. He provides for them, whatever they may be, whether in sickness or health or whatever, as under His Lordship.
And authority and claims and rights over me. I can be content.
Even if called to die, even if deprived of things that others may consider important. And then?
The Lord himself shall descend with a shout. That same Lord is the one who by his power and authority with respect to me.
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Who enter and now in that relationship to him, he takes me to heaven as Lord.
And he will always be my Lord.
It will never change. He won't cease to be my Lord when I'm in glory. And so I will. And you will forever be in that relationship. And thankfully there the submissive obedience will be perfect because of a new life and a new nature without the flesh to hinder it.
Grace puts us into the place where we say I delight to do thy will, O God. That was the that was the delight of the Lords heart. The idea that the Lord could have sinned. The very thought of his sinning is abhorrent, was abhorrent to him. He rejected it totally and utterly. He was holy and he couldn't he couldn't even entertain such a thought. He was it was totally contrary to his nature and it's contrary to the new nature that we have and in the new nature we cannot sin. That's a wonder of of being in in glory as we will be in a position where we can't sin.
We can't send any anymore.
First, John 5. His commandments are not grievous because it's a new man, isn't it?
Not grievous to the new man.
Of if the Lord gave us a commandment and we had the choice that I'll do it or I won't do it, who would? Which Christian in the room raise your hand would say I won't do it any raise miss Absolutely. It's important to us, isn't it, because we look at it in the Newman.
This fourteenth verse is connected with the 13th verse, of course, for we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come. One of the aspects of the camp is they can seek a continuing city here.
And what does that servant do? If he said my Lord delayeth his coming, he begins to beat the men servants. Why? Because he's wanting to establish something here.
And we have a city, but we don't have a continuing city here. And so we're not trying, we're not here to try to straighten out the world. We're looking for a city whose builder and maker is God. And that delivers us from, as our brother Chuck was saying, from involving ourselves in correcting the evils of this world. Not that we shouldn't speak to men's consciences.
About what is going on, but we're not here to beat the men's servants, but we're here to give me to due season and to prepare the hearts to be with the Lord. And that will really produce praise in our hearts. And there's a sacrifice connected with it by Him to give thanks for our we've heard about our circumstances in which the Lord has put us, and to give thanks continually, to give thanks to the Lord.
For what he has done.
I loved what Gordon said about the gospel and connection with worship and connection with this because he said remembering the Lord in his death, we tell the Father what we think about his Son. And in the gospel we tell sinners what God thinks about his Son. It's not merely telling people how to get saved, but it's telling sinners about what God says. And it's not. There were bells and pomegranates. There was fruit, but there was also the bells to announce that truth. And men are ignorant of the facts of the gospel. They're ignorant of to who the Lord Jesus Christ is. They're ignorant of what he has done.
And so I can just say this, not as one that's particularly gifted, but to say this was helpful. When you preach the gospel, preach facts. Sometimes a young brother in the meeting room will stand up and is given the gospel. He says, I don't know what I'm going to speak about. Speak about the facts of Christianity. Men are ignorant of them.
Our brothers spoke at the funeral, Stephen Stewart spoke at Brother Tom's funeral and he spoke on resurrection. Moreover, shall my hope rest, and my flesh rest in hope? And it was astonishing the number of believers that had come.
Up to him afterwards and said you mean we're going to have real bodies in heaven.
I talked to a pastor and his son, I'd known him since he was very young, a dear couple, and their son had died in a car accident. And I hardly knew how to comfort him. And I said, won't it be wonderful to sit down with him in the glory and recount the ways of God? And he said, do you really think we'll know each other in heaven? And so Christians are ignorant of the facts. So if you're given I, I don't want to stray from this verse, but it's talking about the fruit of our lips. We have so much to be thankful for when we consider what we have in Christ.
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And many believers, ourselves included, often are ignorant of the extent of what God has done for us.
And it produces praise in our hearts, and it produces a readiness to tell others.
I think it's beautiful to see how the Lord Jesus sanctified by his own blood in the 10th chapter, by one Watford, He is sanctified forever.
Them I'm sorry by one offering he has perfected forever them that are sanctified, and I believe one who is sanctified is set apart unto God and is a St. and our brother George he.
Had an interesting thought. He brought it to me the other night.
On that podium up there, it says Saint Louis. Well, when our brother Jim was speaking, it could have been Saint James.
Brother Chuck spoke. Could have been Saint Charles.
As we go down the rows, everyone who has put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, I do believe is a St. and has been perfected by that one offering. So this is a wonderful thing to realize that it's not according to our works, not according to our doings. The.
You know, the human part is that no one can consider themselves a St.
Apart from what others might think of them. I recall speaking to a man one time in Lambert Lake and he spoke of Saints so and so and Saints so and so, and I said, well, I'm a St. And he looked me up and down, and he was rather taken back, that I could be so presumptuous to consider myself a St. But you see, it's the work of Christ that we're seeking to.
Exalt and what he has done.
Has perfectly satisfied God with respect to our need as sinners, and brought us now into a position of holiness before him. And it's all because he was willing to shed his own blood, and he suffered without the gate. And as we contemplate this, let us go forth therefore unto him. And another brother Mark. I encourage him to bring this out himself. But.
Mark Bremen, he said, you know, in this chapter, the very center word you might say of this chapter is the word him.
In the 13th verse, 25 verses in the chapter, the middle verse.
And the middle word of that verse.
Him So may we keep our eye upon him because we know that.
Enthusiasm. There was much to attract the natural eye. There's a beautiful temple and the stones and the gold and the silver no doubt was awesome. And the vestments of the priests and so on, and the music, the choir. I suppose it could take your breath away. It was so beautiful. And so we find that today too, in Christendom, that which is appealing to the senses, but it's not Christ. And the important thing I think Apostle Paul is bringing before us here.
Is the focus not on these external things, but on Christ and Him? Because He suffered for us, Let us go forth unto Him without the camp, bearing His reproach. What are we willing to suffer for Him? I saw a sign on the road. He died for me, or He died for us. Will we live for Him?
And then we have, I think, the thought of sacrifice coming in here over in Romans 12. It tells us there that.
We are to offer our bodies as living sacrifices. It's our reasonable service as we contemplate the sacrifice he made for us. But we also have in this chapter the sacrifice of praise.
That goes up to God.
And then we have the sacrifice of in verse 16, our possessions, our substance. Are we willing to give up for the Lord?
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That which we have.
Well, all of these things, I believe it can be done as we keep before us the Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrifice.
That we're decade in verse 16 to do good and to communicate the thought is of your substance in helping on the word work of the Lord or whatever it might be. Forget not for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. So it's not just what you do with your mouth. The sacrifice of praise of verse 15, but then the other kind of sacrifices of taking care of the needs of others.
To me it's most remarkable in this epistle that sets forth the crisis. Christ is the apostle that it brings in this thought in the 17th verse. Obey them that have the ruler, or that your guide. Submit yourselves, for they watch for your souls. The greatest sign of humility towards God is humility before men.
And I may say, well, I only want to do what the Lord wants me to do, but.
Unless there's the humility of obedience to our parents and to submit to those that have been guides.
To us and the pathway of faith, then there's really no evidence of submission to God.
And we never want to substitute a man for the Lord, but we have this clear instruction here and it's manifest in a very plain way. And so the Lord said, wish ye not that I be about my father's business, but he went home and he was subject to his parents. And so those two things are joined together. And very often when a brother gets older and.
Is stubborn in care meeting? It's because he was a stubborn child.
And so we need to learn these things as our brother Don was saying that it was characteristic of Christianity, his submission and obedience. The Lord was subject.
He wasn't inferior, but he was subject and he was characterized that man shall not live by bread alone, but every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And there's we had our brother Jim quoted that verse again, and I quoted again, Sin is lawlessness. It's just this. I'm not going to obey. I'm not going to be subject to anything. And if it's not right, don't submit to it. Well, that's the complete antithesis of what Christianity is. We see the spirit of Christ. We're compassed about a whole host of witnesses.
From Joseph to Daniel to a whole host of witnesses of those that subjected themselves to that which was wrong.
And manifested the spirit of Christ in so doing it. But here we're told to obey those that are our guys. And so it's A2 sided coin because we make make it very, very difficult for those that would seek to guide. You know, sometimes the parents trying to plead a child somewhere and the child's wriggling so hard that practically pulls the parents arm off. And we can do that in the assembly too. And then you see the parent lose patience. Well, there's no profit for those that are our guides. They have to give an account of themselves to God.
For their own actions, each man bears a responsibility for his own actions, but we may make it so difficult as with the people of God, they provoke Moses and he lost his temper with them. And so there's a dual responsibility there to make it easy. And for those that are the guides, and it's for the guides to to, to do it in patience.
Jesus, before thy face may fall, our Lord, our life, our hope, our all. For we have nowhere else to plead. No sanctuary, Lord, but thee. 309.
Jesus free for life.
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And.
The we have.
I was saying.
To.
21 Now the God of peace, and brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do His will, working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.