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We read a verse in Acts.
Shall we turn to Acts chapter 10?
In the middle of verse 33. Acts 1033.
Now, therefore.
Are we all here present before God to hear and then chapter 17.
When Paul had come to Thessalonica.
17.
And.
Verse two at the end of verse 2, Paul reasons with them out of the scriptures.
And verse four and some of them believe.
And then in verse 11 Concerning the Bereans.
These were more noble than those in Thessalonica in that they received the Word with all readiness of mind and search the scriptures daily whether those things were so.
Therefore, many of them believe.
Yeah, I can read and Romans chapter 15.
Romans chapter 15 and verse 4.
For whatsoever things were written at four times were written for our learning that the way through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have both now the God of patience and consolation drank you to be like minded one toward another according to Christ Jesus. He made with one mind and one mouth glorified God, even the fog through of our Lord Jesus Christ.
And also in the.
Deuteronomy chapter 19.
First Aid.
And if the Lord thy God enlarged thy coast, and as the sworn unto thy Father's, and give thee all the land which he promised to give unto thy fathers, if thou shalt keep all these commandments to do them which I command thee this day, who love the Lord thy God, and to walk ever in his ways, then shalt thou have three cities more for he.
I would suggest that a portion in the Old Testament.
Uh, First Chronicles.
Half to four.
The well known portion, uh, has been uh.
This one book written on that has been very popular in the state.
Nothing I agree what was written or not. I just uh, it really has touched my my heart is the portion. It's in First Chronicles chapter 4. It's in verse 9.
And Jabez was more honorable than his brethren. And his mother called his name, Jabez saying, Because I bear him with sorrow. And Jabez called unto God of Israel.
Saying, oh, the dog would have blessed me indeed and enlarged my coat.
And that's thine hand might be with me, and that would escape me from evil, that it may not grieve me for costing. And God granted him that which he requested.
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I would suggest rather than that we in considering Jay Baz, that we also read Hebrews 11.
The last couple of verses and the first few verses of chapter 12.
No doubt.
And God answered that faith in his earthly blessing.
In Hebrews Chapter 11, were we given get another list of those who.
Uh, lived and died in faith. Uh. It concludes the list with these words, verse 39.
And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise.
God having provided some better things for us, that they without us should not be made perfect, wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses.
Let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily does so easily beset us.
And let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus.
The author and finisher of faith, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and they sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Or consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest she be wearied and faint in your minds.
There's a very noticeable difference between the story of Jfaz and.
While this Chapter 11 ends up, many in Chapter 11 gained their objective, the their earthly possession that they sought. They sought by faith and they obtained it. But the list doesn't stop with those that gained their here while here on earth what they sought after.
Some live by faith and never saw the answer on earth to what they looked for. They died in faith.
The the last two verses give us the reason.
That they without us should not be made perfect.
God was going to bring in a heavenly and God was gracious and gave it to him. But we noticed something very different. Different here in Hebrews.
After the list of faith and those who gained their.
What they sought by faith and those who didn't.
We find that the Lord Jesus is the one who is going to give everyone.
What they get?
And so it's kind of a comparison and a contrast. Yes, the faith of Jabaz is a wonderful thing.
I believe that the present use of it often today is mixed up, though, with seeking after earthly things and pursuing it with lots of enthusiasm.
And it is used as a means.
To obtain in Christianity.
What was really promised to Israel?
We know our blessings are not earthly, they are heavenly.
And so.
I just suggest this as an introduction.
I think that's very good, Doug, because as you have pointed out, in the Old Testament there were material blessings, and it was a real mark of God's blessing when a man was prosperous in natural things.
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And I believe that's why when the Lord Jesus came to this world and began to show his disciples, for example, that it was difficult for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of heaven.
They wondered, well, this is very strange because we have been accustomed to looking at those who are wealthy and prosperous as being those who were faithful and who in consequence had earthly blessings. And so it was.
But it's beautiful to see how this chapter brings out those who at the end here, that is Hebrews 11, were tortured, not accepting deliverance to those who didn't get the promises down here. And God is reserving them for blessing, but not until He has brought you and me into that supreme position of being part of the church.
There's actually more.
Similarity.
Then contrast if we look carefully at JBEZ and its application to us.
What we have here in First Chronicles 4 just to look at it again.
It says, and I'm reading Mr. Darby and Jabez was more honored than his brethren. And his mother called his name Jabez saying, because I bore him with sorrow or with pain. The name Jabez means sorrowful.
It means pain.
Here's a mother.
That has a son.
And she?
His pain connected with it.
The Sun.
Seeks blessing of God and he seeks it in faith.
Keep that in mind for a moment and back what we have in Hebrews 11.
Where there were those who in faith looked on beyond the presence to something that was from God.
That was the blessing of their souls.
Proper Christianity promises us nothing in the world.
But it tells us that we are immensely blessed.
In Christ in the heavenlies.
But to properly enjoy what is ours, we have to enjoy it now by faith. And this is getting to the point I want to make, which I think is very important.
Very often, in the ways of God, the path of the present enjoyment of blessing is through sorrow and pain.
Say that again.
Very often in the ways of God, the present path of the laying hold of the blessing for us is through sorrow and pain.
There's and I can't remember. Somebody can give the reference perhaps, but, and I think it's Mr. Darby's translation on it is in pressure. Thou hast enlarged me.
In pressure thou hast enlarged me.
Often God puts upon us the reality and the value.
Of that which is before us in faith. That is the enjoyment of our blessings that are to be enjoyed now and to be realized in their fullness when we're in heaven.
Very often the weight of them, the value of them, the importance of them to our souls is very often brought to us through pain and suffering.
Someone who has a loved one and the Lord takes them.
It weans the soul from earthly things and gives it more of a sense of the reality of the eternal and.
In the future, and I believe for myself that this little picture of Jabez in the Old Testament is partly to from a Christian application to remind us and bring before us the fact that sometimes it's the pain, it's the suffering that God is using to bring in reality and wait to our souls that which is really.
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The same that they had in Ephesians and so are in in Hebrews 11 and then in the 12Th chapter, the perfect example of the Lord Jesus. He looked at the presence and he despised the shame because he had something before his soul that was beyond it and outside of it.
And uh.
J Bezzin figure and picture form brings before us that pain that in faith looks beyond and says, I want the blessing, and God says you want the blessing, then I'm going to enlarge in your soul that which you seek.
It it really for us, has nothing to do with prosperity or present advantage or gain.
As an application, the truth of it has to do with what's really ours.
Which is in the heavenlies in Christ.
First, you're looking for Don is Psalm 41.
The world has expression that's worth remembering for the believer, too. The coaches of the athletic teams often use it. No pain, no gain. And it's true in the Christian life.
Real.
Look at verse.
Five of uh, First Chronicles UH-4.
Or verse 19, verse 10. I'm sorry, verse Chronicles 410.
All that thou wouldst bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast.
All the hath blessed me indeed, and enlarged my coast.
Are we willing?
To say to the Lord Lord, whatever pain might be necessary in my life to fulfill this desire.
Please do it.
Please do it.
We want the blessing.
Do we want?
The Lord's way to the president enjoyment of it. Do we really want to say that?
That's a real test to the reality of what we want to lay hold of. It's a little different point, but some of her demonstration of a brother that went to another brother and he said, Lord our brother, he said I want you to pray for me.
That I will have patience.
Your brother said, Are you sure you really want that? Yeah, he said, I, I want you to pray for me. I want patience. So the brother prayed, Lord, give him tribulation.
Give them some tribulation because scripture says tribulation worketh patience.
Well, that was a little harder to take. He he the the brother wasn't so sure that's what he really wanted to ask for that way, but sometimes.
The Lord knows what really makes good in our souls, the truth of God, and there is often connected with it, if we would humanly speaking, say a price.
The Lord Jesus, the one who brings the blessing as an example to our souls. What price did he play?
That we might be blessed.
And if we appreciate the tremendous blessing that the Lord Jesus has brought into our life, would we despise?
Learning a little more sincerely in our souls, even if it's nothing like it in real, and the depth of it passing through a little bit of difficulty and sorrow that we might realize what it does take to bring blessing.
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Or is our natural self? Lord, Take Me Out of this.
In other words, yes, all the blessing that we have is 100% the work of the Lord Jesus. But sometimes, umm.
I'll be honest.
To try to be very personal, an example.
A night or two, brother Al Coleman was talking to me and and was telling me a little bit about what he's been through in the last six months.
And I could listen.
My my mouth was sealed because.
There's not a thing that I could say from personal experience to say, brother, I understand.
But when we go through a little bit at least.
Sometimes in our lives, then at least it gives us a tiny little.
Uh, sense in our souls of what the Lord Jesus went through that we might have the blessing.
And it's profitable. It's it's beneficial to our souls.
To appreciate it and go through it.
In Philippians 3 and verse 10.
All right that I may know him.
And the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings.
Being made conformable unto his death, if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.
One brother said this tenth verse is experienced in reverse order.
Umm, but there you get something of.
The lesson we all have to learn to make progress, and that is what.
Self is.
We need to learn to judge.
So Paul had written in Romans 7. I know that in me, that is, in my flesh dwelleth no good thing.
But trials often expose.
What that is in US?
To us.
Sometimes even in sorrow, we awake to the fact that.
We've been weeping for ourselves instead of before the Lord.
But the God of all comfort wants to be our company.
Not just having us think of the loss.
Our earthly losses, heavens gain.
End.
You think of Paul. His desire was to pass through.
What Christ passed through.
That he might know him better.
Imagine that morning, dear brethren, when the Lord shout.
Brings us into everlasting day.
Oh, what a wonder it'll be to all of us.
And Paul is going to experience.
The literal resurrection.
And you'll know something more of Christ than the rest of us.
If we are the living, which remains.
You'll have an ingredient in his recipe.
That you and I won't have if the Lord comes while we are alive.
But still, he wants to experience it all, to know him.
Sometimes we go and visit.
Uh, maybe there.
Family farm where we were reared and.
Walk over lands where?
Our parents walked or something to try to relate to life as it was but.
How much more?
The Lord of glory.
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The Lord Jesus Paul wanted to know him in every way he could experience the same things.
How much his life showed.
That as trial increased, Christ is more his object. One brother said it. The Lord put him in prison.
So that he wouldn't waste his energies on trying to straighten out what was slipping in the church.
But to be occupied with Christ?
And write things that would be to the health and blessings of the Church in all ages.
One point Brother Lemoyne just made.
What the apostle Paul is saying is.
Thank you. What the apostle Paul is saying is.
If passing through death.
Going through the same experience of death that the Lord Jesus went through.
Makes me know him better by that shared experience.
That's what I want.
And we look at death often as the ultimate pain.
The ultimate sorrow connected with this light.
And yet the apostle Paul is saying, if I can know him better because I passed through the same experience that he passed through, I want to do it.
It's because our sights are set beyond death.
In that eternal day, that's what we are called for, brethren, and and faith lays hold of that, doesn't it?
Says in the beginning of Chapter 11 of Hebrews, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen so often in trials down here we.
Try to analyze it. I find that we as Americans have a more of a problem with trials than sometimes in other countries, because we're always trying to analyze it, trying to figure it out.
Why is God allowing this?
He's preparing us for something up ahead and sometimes we're not going to understand it. Sometimes there's going to be sorrow like you were mentioning, and pressure.
It's not always outward pressure either. I can say to blow up a balloon, you put more pressure on the inside of that balloon.
That's the way it gets blown up, and sometimes the Lord puts inner pressure on us. We don't understand these things, but if we can accept them from His hand and continue in the first verse of chapter 12 of Hebrews, we're encouraged to lay aside the weights.
And the sin which doth so easily beset it.
We're on a race.
It's not a time to be relaxing and taking it easy.
Not on a race.
And you don't take when there's a race going on, you don't take breaks, you keep going.
And this race, this Christian race, is all our life down here until.
We get to the glory. That's where the Lord Jesus is now. He ran that race before us and we are called to run a 2 but in this race.
There are ways.
And there are sin. There is sin that besets us as well.
Weights. They suggest their things that in themselves are not wrong.
But that hinder us from running properly as a Christian.
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Brother, I really believe the Lord is allowing times of difficulty in our country.
That we can evaluate things in the light of eternity and lay aside some of the weights.
That weighs down.
It's evident. It's interesting to say that it seems like the Christian testimony is going down in this country. That's the way it seems. Meetings are getting smaller, some are disappearing. Why is that to really believe One reason is is that we are allowing the weight we're trying to cling to the.
Things that are weighing us down, We're told here to lay aside those weights, whatever they might be in your life. I can't tell you what they are, but you can evaluate them and know that there are things that don't let you run properly as a Christian. What are they?
Lay them aside.
The Lord help us, brethren, in looking on to that glory that's ahead of us like the Lord Jesus did.
To lay aside the weights, the sin too that defects.
I'd like to comment too on the other side of that.
That is an exhortation to us.
From our God.
But sometimes we don't heed that exhortation.
And the Lord enters into our life.
The trial.
And in the trial, he takes those weights.
From us because the trial itself produces such a greater weight in our souls that those things that previously were preoccupying us and hindering us.
Become trivial or unimportant to us. Perhaps because we're in a life and death situation, or we're in something that is so great upon our souls for ourselves or someone we love, that suddenly the things that occupied us previously are easily set aside, in fact forgotten, because we are focused, as God has allowed it, on something else that is far more pressure.
Upon our souls. And so even in the larger sense of what we're talking about sometimes, when we don't volunteerily put aside that which is hindering our progress and enjoyment of spiritual things, the Lord knows how to do it in love for our souls.
The faith is that which would give a soul to.
Continue on in spite of the trial, the pain and the PR and the difficulties. And, and throughout that list of, uh, in Chapter 11, you, you have, uh, their faith expressed in many different ways. And we've already mentioned about Jbaz and he, uh, I believe it was his faith that gave him to say the words that he did and to pursue it. Umm, sometimes it's like in a man like Jacob, it's hard to see what distinguish between the scheming and the faith.
I believe it's that way with us often times.
But our faith in the end desired end.
And everyone of us brethren, is all going to depend on what the Lord can give us in the end. And that's why this Chapter 11, after Speaking of many different people and, and the way they lived in faith and how they overcame or didn't overcome, still went on in faith. The answer to them all is the Lord Jesus Christ. And he's the only one that's really going to give them what they live for.
Whether in the Old Testament or in the New. And This is why it's so important to connect this all up with the first verses here of chapter.
12 Because that brings us before the Lord Jesus, brings before us the Lord Jesus.
And, uh, introduces him and he's a prime example. And I would just like to go ahead and connect it with what we had the day before yesterday, Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever. That is, there were all these previous examples and cases that God gave throughout the history of the Old Testament.
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But when the Lord, when the Lord Jesus comes upon the scene, he is the true fulfillment of what all those others spoke of.
And he is the one who's going to give the answer.
To the faith that the different ones sought to live by including ourselves. And so it and then it that verse really means that there's never gonna be anybody that's gonna replace him as that one that is the same. He's gonna be the same and God isn't going to bring along somebody different. Jesus is the the final fulfillment of it all and he's never gonna change.
Jabez praised something tremendously wonderful.
That we want for ourselves.
Says and that thou wouldest.
Uh, and that thy hand might be with me.
When the Lord Jesus was here.
He loved the company of the disciples.
They didn't fully appreciate or understand the importance of his presence with them.
He valued it more than they, he said. In the end year, they which have continued with me, he appreciated their presence.
With himself, their hands, with him, and his hand upon their lives. The Lord Jesus recognized it in such a significant way that when he was leaving them and concern for them and making provision for them in his separation from them, He said, I'm going to send the Spirit.
To manage the affairs of your life as I have managed them up to this point.
We want that, brethren. We need it. We need the Lord Jesus by the Spirit.
Every day of our lives that we may walk together in companionship.
And that we have one like in Psalm 23, thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. We want someone who cares so much about us that he says, I'll go with you all the way.
And as needed, I'll put my hand upon you, I'll steady you, I'll draw you back as needed. One of the worst things that could happen in our lives is if in the government of God, as it were, the Lord Jesus has to withdraw his sense of his presence from us and we learn what it is to try to live a life without him. And that can happen in God's governmental dealings. But.
Oh, the desire that.
We might walk through each day with His hand upon us, whether it's in comfort or whether it's in admonishment or whether it's in protective care of us. It's something that we we would stand with Jabez and say, Lord, that thy hand might be with me. It's a tremendous blessing that He promises that to us. He recognizes the importance of it more than we do.
But Moses is a wonderful example to us when the children of Israel were to go up into the land.
And we're gonna have to go through the desert.
The Lord said they're stiff necked people and I'm not going.
Moses said to the Lord. Well, Lord.
If you don't, go with us.
Serious, not offense. We can't go if your hand is not with us. And the Lord said, OK, Moses, I'll go with you. May we have that spirit never to say, Lord, please step aside. There's some things I want and I need them, and you don't seem to want to give them to me, so let me have them.
No, we want the Lord's hand upon us in life.
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To what to keep me from evil that?
A little, uh, like saying, I guess, uh, he does not have compensation realizing that he's tweak and he can't do nothing without the water. Is that correct?
Uh, brother, I didn't.
At least us and to temptation since the role of what it's time again realizing it is weak. You can do nothing without the door.
It's important that.
We can't keep ourselves from it. We're not strong enough.
And uh, and so it's not wrong to say lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil. And the Lord is the only one with us that can give us a safe path.
In in the path of faith through life. And so he said that, he said.
What does evil in our lives do?
It grieves the Lord, as he says here, that it might not grieve me, that evil that comes in both without and from within. It grieves the Lord, but it grieves us too, if we have right hearts before God, that is, if we have eternal life.
The evil that comes into our lives is not only a grief to God, but it's a it's a grief to our own souls as well. It produces significant depression and and pain in the soul and.
His prayer is Lord preserved me and we need that prayer.
We need the prayer of Jabez that we might in faith walk with the Lord with His hand upon us and with His protective care over our souls, not only externally, but as Bob said, the greater pressures of life are generally what's inside of us and what's outside of us. Most of us have more struggles in our lives concerning what goes on in US than the outward things that go on outside of us, even though they be evil.
It can be our prayer to ask the Lord to keep us from evil, but if your comfort to know that the Lord has the same prayer for us. If you look in John chapter 17 and verse 15.
He says, I pray not that thou should take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil.
They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. And so the Lord, he's, his prayer is that we would be kept from the evil in this world. He knows that we're not part of this world.
It's this is not where our future is.
Our brother mentioned earlier that.
The pair of Jay beds has become popular in the United States. Why is that?
There they have more of an idea that.
The Church is Israel in this world and that our blessings are going to be here in this world.
We are not His real brethren. We are the Church. Our blessing is in heaven. Our home is in heaven. The Lord Jesus is in heaven.
And we're going to be with Christ. We're not looking for a blessing on this world. And so the Lord, he prays that we be kept from evil in this world, their spiritual evil and their moral evil. And we need to.
To be trusting the Lord and to follow His word. He says I am the way, the truth and the life. We need to follow the Lord as the way we need to follow Him and the truth.
And then we can live in the good of the life that we have.
I believe in the First Peter chapter 2 There's a verse that goes well into what we're saying honestly. First Peter two and verse 11.
Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul.
It is important, like you are mentioning, Tim, that we understand that our blessings are not material. And there is a real movement in Christian circles that preaches the prosperity gospel and says if you are really living like you should, you'll be prospered down here.
00:45:19
But I don't know how they explain what happened to the Apostle Paul who lost everything.
And yet was rejoicing in what was before his soul. And I think it is so important for us to understand that our blessing is characteristically heavenly. And that's why in the first verses of this 12Th chapter of Hebrews we are looked at as on a race. We are pursuing something. There is something before our souls.
And it's not down here, brethren, it's it's interesting to think of it that the Lord Jesus was never prospered down here in his life materially. He never had an answer in this life. He died crucified as a criminal and in a certain sense it was never rectified in the life down here.
God's answer is in resurrection.
On that side, the Apostle Paul in the like way.
During his life down here, he lost everything. It looked like total failure, his life, all those in Asia, including those in Ephesus that were so blessed.
They abandoned him and I'm sure many said, Paul, you're just too extreme. Look where your life has led you. There he was in a prison, ready to have his head taken off. And Timothy, he writes to him and he says, remember Timothy, Jesus Christ of the seed of David, raised from the dead according to my gospel. And brethren, let's remember.
That we are called for that side, not anything great or wonderful down here. We should be running in view of the goal, and the goal is Christ in glory. Notice it in verse two of Hebrews 2. Who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down.
At the right hand of the throne of God, there's the goal, brethren.
It's not in this life, it's in that. And so that's what we're running towards.
And we need to be encouraged to continue on. Things look discouraging down here. Yes, they do.
But we need to be encouraged to run, brethren. The goal on the other side is well worth it. It's interesting how it puts it here. For the joy that was set before him.
I remember you mentioning it in an address one time. I think it was Dawn. I'd like you to elaborate. What was that joy that was set before the Lord Jesus that encouraged him to through all that awful ordeal of the cross that He did not turn aside? Not one.
Go ahead.
Well, I'll tell you what I remember of it and then you can elaborate maybe a little bit more.
But what so thrills my soul brethren is the joy that was set before him. Sometimes it says it's been said that it's to have us with him, and I'm sure that's included. But there's something much more blessed in my own soul brother, and it's when he was able to go.
Into the presence of God.
And say the word that thou gaveest me to do. What must it have been when the Lord Jesus as a man went back into the presence of God in the virtue of a work that was completely done to God's own glory?
00:50:10
The glory of that moment, we just don't have any concept of it.
But we stand in all the blessedness of that work, brother. But I think that was the joy that was set before him.
To be able to go into the presence of God and present himself before His Father and say in the words that we have spoken in John 17.
Father, I have finished the work Thou gavest me to do. Who of us can ever say that when we get to the end of our lives? Perhaps the Apostle Paul was the closest.
He could say I finished the course.
But will you and I be able to say, because the Lord has given us something to do too down here, brother, are you going to be able to say, and I think we should desire this.
The work that we've been given to do. What about that work? May the Lord exercise our hearts. But that's what I've enjoyed. And maybe you wanna go a little different direction, but.
In John 17, going back to the evil for a moment that Tim mentioned to us and read the verse like to call attention to the very next couple of verses in John 17. We don't have to turn to it. I think we're familiar enough that we just quoted that.
When he says keep them from the evil.
Then the Lord says.
Sanctify them through the truth. Thy word is truth.
We have to have truth.
To be separated from evil if you have error, if you have corrupted profession of truth.
It's tainted. We, we had that before us, maybe Saturday.
But and everything in this world has that character. It's all messed up. Man doesn't know what truth is anymore and he he can't present it either because it's so mixed with sinfulness. But the Lord said keep them from the evil and then he presents to them and we have pure unadulterated truth in the written word of God, which is more than written. It's a living book.
It has a living effect upon our souls and it's it's essential to us for preservation from evil, among many other things. It's life giving and so on. So it says, set them apart by truth. But the other thing, immediately after that, he says, I sanctify myself.
Maybe I better turn, maybe we better turn back to it just.
Worth reading seeing with our eyes in John 17.
In John 17.
And verse umm 19.
For their sake.
I sanctify myself that they also might be sanctified through the truth.
I'm going to connect that to a verse in Psalm 16.
Psalm 16.
And verse 11.
That will show me the path of life. In thy presence is fullness of joy. At thy right hand there are pleasures forevermore. I want to read the middle part of the verse in the new translation.
Thy countenance.
His fullness.
Joy. Thy countenance is fullness of joy.
In John 17, when the Lord says I sanctify myself, he's saying I'm in heaven.
And I put myself separate there.
As the object of my people's hearts.
And because I'm not on earth, but they love me, they're going to have their eye on me where I am in a sanctified place separate from evil, and the attraction of their hearts to myself is going to preserve them from evil.
00:55:12
Connected with Psalm 16. Brethren, can't you in your soul? Can't I in my soul this morning by faith look up?
And see a countenance of joy in the face of the Lord Jesus.
Our beloved one, as it were, saying to us. Here I am. I finished the course.
The end of result is perfect joy.
Come on, keep coming. You'll soon be with me here.
And if we could only in our hearts lay hold of his countenance of joy.
Toward us, with the realization that perhaps this morning we're going to see them.
What is it going to be to look face to face upon us the joy that is in his face as he looks at the fruit of the travail of his soul? And even now he wants us to see him with that countenance of joy. And we know what it is. You get a you get a little child and and there's mommy or daddy and it's learning to walk and it can't walk very well. But they stand there with their arms out and say, come on, come on.
Come and the little child gets his eye on the mother father and starts to take those few halting steps until it can take the last step and it reaches them. And it's as if the Lord Jesus knows the haltingness of our steps. But he looks at us with with joy, with with anticipation in his own soul of what it's going to be to be together, what it's going to be as it were individually to put his arm around us and embrace us and say we're home, we're together.
Forever. And if that lays hold of our hearts, it makes the world and everything seem pretty.
Pretty small, pretty unsatisfying. The one that.
Loved us and gave himself for us. The one who's in heaven this morning laboring, just get us safely with himself. And now he says.
Our its fullness of joy is true, but and we'll have a happy face.
But his will excel.
Patrick, that's really our verse too, Don the, the, the Lord Jesus that sanctified himself. He set himself apart from our, uh, this world, an object there in heaven. Uh, and, and, and it is so beautiful to see him that in that way, looking to be able to look to him who sanctified himself in that way. And it's, uh, he, he's presented there, uh, not only the sanctified, but.
One, but he's presented the author and finisher and he, he tells us there in verse two that of how he got there. Uh, he's the author and finisher and the glory is the finish. That's where he is, but he's the author. That is, he designed it. And then it speaks about how he got there. Uh, which is the path that we go to in following, uh, The Who endure who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross.
Not only putting up with the shame, but despising it. You could only despise shame if you've got the, if you've got the glory before you. Uh, that principle comes out in the, in the children of Israel when they reproach of Egypt was cast off. It was only as they got to the cross the land of the river Jordan and into the, into the land of Canaan that they could look back on the things of Egypt.
And and that there would be insulted against them and and, uh, cast it off.
And so with us, it's a vision of glory of the Lord Jesus there that gets us to put, to put up with the what is along the way. Despise it. And, uh.
The difference between us brethren and the Old Testament Saints is they had to look forward into faith too, uh, to the answer to what they live for and what they went through and, and endured in different ways. The difference is they didn't have the conscious knowledge that the Lord Jesus was already at the end and he was the finisher of it. We do.
01:00:19
MMM, so everything here is in Christ as an example for us, isn't it?
The Lord Jesus is presented four times in Hebrews as having sat down, or being sat down at the right hand of God. Three of those times He stands alone when He had by himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, and then going on with His priesthood in the 8th chapters and in the 8th chapter. He stands alone in that.
And then again in the 10th chapter we find that.
He had offered one sacrifice for sins and then sat down at the right hand of God.
But here the atoning sufferings are clearly left out, aren't they?
The atoning sufferings are not here. In the 12Th chapter it says He endured the cross, despising the shame.
The atoning sufferings, I suggest, are not brought in here because He is an example for us. Now I agree you cannot separate the atoning sufferings in one sense, but at the same time, it's the shame of the cross that's here, similar to what we get in Philippians 2. There. Once again, the atoning sufferings are not brought in because here, as Doug has presented, it's Christ as an example for us.
And so the joy in that sense is not so much the joy of having us with him, although there is a wonderful joy.
But as it was, as was brought out, the joy is primarily the joy enduring the Father's will, and having the sense in our souls that as Christ perfectly did, the will of the Father.
So you and I follow him in that path again, as Bob has brought out, there was only one who could say.
I have finished the work which thou gave us me to do.
And none of us at the end of the journey will be able to say those words in that way.
But I trust as we've had brought before us, that we'll be able to say along with Paul, I have finished my course, I have fought the good fight, I have kept the faith and that's what we have brought before us here. There is a pathway. The Lord is encouraging us as an example and says now you follow me in that path and that joy is before you.
Verse three of Hebrews 12 Says consider him.
I love that, brethren, it's.
Having our thoughts on him.
The Spanish, the old version and the Spanish puts it. Reduce your thoughts to him.
And we need to this is what Christianity is, to have our thoughts directed to Him.
And it will transform us, brother, It's being occupied with him. Now you can look at yourself and you can be occupied with all your shortcomings. And at times we have to be brought up to judge ourselves. But that's not what's going to transform you. It's to be occupied with Him that will transform you. And so consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.
You often find Christians that are weary, just weary of the struggle.
Saint, consider him. He went through far more than any of us will ever go through. So often we're down because we think of how we've been treated and the set of our circumstances. Brethren, let's be delivered from thinking about ourselves.
Let's consider him. That's what Christianity is, and I think we'll find that it'll be a real help and an encouragement in our souls. Go on. Was he misunderstood? Yes, he was, far more than anybody else. Even his own disciples didn't really understand him when he was talking about being crucified. They were squabbling amongst themselves about who was to be the greatest.
01:05:25
Oh, brethren, is that characteristic of our hearts? Yeah, it is. Let's consider him. How different. How blessed.
Thanks, welcome to Jesus.
A good runner will look ahead, won't look down or behind. Otherwise you might stumble or you might make others some stumble.
I've enjoyed the story of Eric Little, uh, Olympic runner in 19. Early 1900s I think it was.
And somebody made him fall down as he was running in the Olympic race. And he quickly got up again. And with determination he went and he won. We need determination. We need to have a focus on the Lord and the diverse. I enjoy first John chapter 2.
First John chapter 2 and verse 10.
Peter loves his brother, abides in the light, and there is no occasion of stumbling in him.
Uh, this, uh, verse would say with me, uh, there's no stumbling that it you will not stumble and he will not make utters and stumble.
#12.
#12 I'd like to, uh, share a few more things. Just, uh, 5 minutes more or less. You can be patient with me. Umm, Eric Little, I mentioned was uh, uh, a runner in the Olympics.
He was also a Christian and uh, he finished his race, uh, his life, uh, serving the Lord. He finished uh, the course the Lord gave him to, to run. He was, uh, a missionary in China. He had a very good testimony.
And I'd like to read one more verse in the the chapter we were looking at the First Chronicles 4.
The the same verse we read before.
Uh, verse ten of First Chronicles 4.
What I heard about that first is it's pretty much the same verse as first John chapter 2. We read that there is no stumbling. There can be read both ways that it may not agree with me.
Nor it may or it may not really bothers. So I really enjoyed that job. And if you don't mind, could we sing 35 in the back hymn #12 Sing without ceasing sing the saviors present grace, how all things shine in light divine for those who've seen his face.
Verse four such here on earth we are, though we in weakness Rome are placed on high God's self so nigh His presence is our home, And stayed by joy divine as hireling fills his day Through scenes of strife and desert life, we tread in peace our way.
Hymn #12.
Sing Welcome to the.
Glory to life.
Oils and being here and praying.
01:10:39
800 and $1000.
I saw you.
Know there's a wireless wireless Brave.
A lot of our friends.
Of a purpose, things are great.
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01:15:59
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Uh, but I probably don't. I don't know if it's crazy.
Uh, let's go. And all my life, let's go all the way home. Oh, OK. Oh my God.
Oh.
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