Talk—Bill Prost
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Well, just while we're handing out the the handouts, just to remind everyone that the copies are not unlimited. So please keep your copy for the rest of your time in camp and if you find it hard to keep track of it if you're sleeping in ATP or something.
Excuse me, No problem bringing it up after the meeting and we'll just.
We'll just add it to the stack and.
Sorry.
We'll just add it to the stack and give you another one at the next meeting. So but.
We would politely, politely ask that you not leave them lying on seats or on the ground and so on, where they get messed up and wasted and so on.
OK, well let's have a word of prayer and then we'll go ahead. Our loving God and our Father, once again we thank Thee for all Thy goodness to us. And now we look to Thee for our time together with Thy word open before us, and we pray for Thy health.
We are considering, we know a subject that ultimately will last for all eternity, and we trust our God that we recognize this. And so we pray that as we open Thy word, Thou wilt bring us to a.
Closer relationship with thyself and with our Lord Jesus Christ, that we might know Thee better and that we might follow Thee in our Christian lives more closely.
We pray two very specially for any here who are not saved. We ask our God that thou wilt work in each heart, that each one might realize his or her need of a Savior and come to Christ. So we commit all this to thee, and we ask all, Lord Jesus, in thy alone, worthy and precious name, Amen.
Well, it's getting more and more difficult to do a recap as we get on in the subject, but for those that haven't been at camp.
What we are considering is knowing God.
And we have looked at a number of aspects of knowing God and how important it is, not merely for us, if we could say it was reverence, but for God himself.
Because, as we said once before, God is sufficient unto Himself in everything except in his love He must.
Have objects to love and he created you and me in his image.
In order that we might have a relationship with them.
He has sent His beloved Son into this world in order that the question of sin might be addressed.
In order that you and I, through His mercy and grace, might be restored not merely to the kind of relationship that existed in the Garden of Eden, but in a much closer and fuller way.
And so today we are ready for I don't remember the number.
Eight, Section 8, we are going to consider the Trinity.
People have argued for centuries about this.
Because the word Trinity does not exist in the Bible, but the truth of it exists. The truth of it is told out right from the beginning. In fact, let's read the first verse in the Bible.
The very first verse in the Bible, Genesis one and verse one.
In the beginning God created the heavens and it should be plural there the heavens.
And the earth. Now I am not a Hebrew scholar.
For those who know Hebrew, tell us that in Hebrew there is a word for God as one God, there is a word for God as two gods or dual, and there is a word for God in plural.
The word used for God here in the first verse of the Bible is the word for God is more than two. Why is that? Because in anything that God does, he does in Trinity, whether it's creation, whether it's giving the law to Israel.
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Whether it's in redemption, whether it's in judgment, whatever it is.
God acts in Trinity.
And the truth of this runs throughout the Word of God. Look at another verse in Genesis here that brings that before us.
Just one moment.
Look at verse 26 of chapter one.
And God said what let us.
Make man in our image after our likeness.
Let us God acted in Trinity, in the creation of you.
And me, and without belaboring the point, we find throughout the word of God.
That the order is like this. It's always God the Father who is the originator.
Of the purposes and counsels it is God the Son, the Lord Jesus.
Who carries out those purposes and counsels? And it's the power of the Holy Spirit by which they are carried out, and that is invariably true.
Again, people have argued very much about the Trinity. Why? Because ultimately it is beyond man's understanding. How can God be one God? And sometimes the word is used in the word, in the word of God, the Hebrew word for God.
Is LEL and it's used as one God when it's in contrast with idols. But many times in the Old Testament that word that is used in the first verse of Genesis, where God is more than two is used to bring before us the Trinity.
But man cannot understand how there can be.
Three persons in the Godhead Co equal with one another, and yet all constituting one God. The human mind cannot understand that, and sad to say, there are. Well, let me rephrase that. There are many things in the Word of God that are beyond our understanding as we had in a previous meeting.
And man's natural mind says, But I will understand it, I've got a good mind.
I can reason things out. And so he reduces what God's Word gives us.
To something he can understand and in so doing introduces error.
Give you an example and I don't like to label people but.
We all know about the so-called Jehovah's Witnesses, a cult that was founded by a man by the name of Charles T Russell back in the 1800s and they cannot wrap their mind around the Trinity so they don't believe it.
They look at human reproduction and they say a father must always exist before his Son. Therefore, according to them, God the Father must have existed before God the Son, and God the Son must be a created being, created by God the Father. Blasphemy.
They can't understand how that there could be God the Father and God the Son.
Both Co equal with one another, both of them having no beginning and no ending, and yet be father and son.
I said once to a Jehovah Witness. I said, have you ever studied zoology or biology? Yes. Do you know what an omeprazole is? Yes, I do. I know what an amoeba is. I said, would you, do you understand how an amoeba procreates, how they make more of them? Yes, I learned how that happens, and we won't go into that detail here. Many of you know that.
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I said, would you ever compare the reproduction of an amoeba to the reproduction of a mammal, especially human reproduction?
They're so vastly different as to be almost unable to be compared.
She didn't know what to say. I said when you are going to deal in the things of God?
Don't reason from man up to God, start with God.
And then come down, because God is infinite and you and I are not able to understand his being.
But we can enjoy and appreciate who He is and what He is by divine revelation.
But the Trinity wasn't revealed in the Old Testament. God revealed himself in different ways.
Revealed himself as.
Lord God.
In the Garden of Eden to Abraham, he revealed himself as God Almighty, to Israel he revealed himself as Jehovah, and so on. But the full truth of the Trinity was not revealed until the Lord Jesus Christ came into this world, and you and I.
Now have the full knowledge of God as to who He is.
You know, that is the most, one of the most wonderful things in this dispensation. Yes, in the Old Testament they knew a little bit about the Holy Spirit and he is referred to in the Old Testament, but it wasn't totally clear. But did they know about God the Father and God the Son? Not really.
They had occasional little glimpses.
Someone has characterized the Old Testament like this and I thought it was a good illustration. Some have said the Old Testament was like a dark night in which occasional flashes of lightning came and for a moment or two.
Sorry for a moment or two illuminated the whole countryside, but then all was dark again, and that is true.
So that many of the Old Testament prophets did not understand.
What they were writing to see that turned to first Peter, chapter one.
Excuse me for a moment while we're finding that place.
First Peter chapter one.
And here we find a reference to some of the Old Testament writers.
And notice what it says.
And we'll read verse 10.
Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently.
Who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you, searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ?
And the glory that should follow. And what answer did they get? Verse 12.
Unto whom it was revealed.
That not unto themselves, but unto us, they did minister the things.
Which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. Which things the angels desire to look into.
You know, you and I live in the most wonderful time of the world's history because we are living in a day when the whole mind of God has been revealed, all the counsel of God has been revealed, and we might say, well, let's turn to it. Colossians, chapter 3.
I think it's chapter 3, but just one moment.
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No chapter one, Colossians one, sorry.
Here's Paul speaking, the apostle Paul.
He says in verse 25. Colossians one and 25.
Whereof I am made a minister according to the dispensation of God.
Which is given to me for you to fulfill or complete.
The word of God.
Paul completed the word of God. There is no new revelation.
After Paul. Now, yes, Peter wrote after Paul, Probably. So did John, very definitely. But they didn't reveal any new truth. All they did was fill in a few details.
I'm going to be specific if a man by the name of Joseph Smith comes along and says that he found golden plates buried in the ground and that he translated them into the Book of Mormon, and the Book of Mormon is just as much the word of God as the Bible.
Can't be true because Paul completed the word of God and the Book of Mormon proposes to have new revelation.
If Ellen White comes along, who founded?
7th day Adventism. Thank you if she comes along and says I have a new revelation from God. I am a prophet from God and I have new revelations, impossible.
If Mary Baker Eddie comes along who founded Christian Science and says I have a new revelation.
Can't possibly be true. And on and on it goes.
The Word of God is complete, but what we are getting at this morning is that the Trinity has now been revealed by the coming into the world of the Lord Jesus.
Let's turn to a verse that shows that in John's Gospel.
John's Gospel.
Chapter 14.
Verse 7.
If ye had known me, ye should have known my father also, and from henceforth ye know him and have seen him. Philip doesn't get it. Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.
Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and hast and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hast seen the Father. And how sayest thou then show us the Father, Believe us thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me.
The words that I speak unto you, I speak not of myself.
But the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.
Now he come down a little. Verse 15.
If ye love me, keep my commandments and I will pray the Father and He shall give you.
Another comforter that he may abide with you forever.
Even the spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it and seeth him not, neither knoweth him, but ye know him, for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
There we have the Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
And you and I are brought into a relationship now, in this time of God's grace.
To know God as Father.
No one before the cross really knew that the Lord Jesus revealed the Father.
But it was until after he rose from the dead, and he gave Mary Magdalene that special message.
Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father.
And your Father and to my God and your God. And now you and I know the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior. We know him as our bridegroom. We are the bride of Christ. That will not be true of people that lived in the Old Testament, no matter how godly. They will not be part of the bride of Christ, you and I, if we're saved.
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Are part of that bride no one before.
The day of Pentecost was ever indwelt on a permanent basis by the Holy Spirit.
Now the Lord Jesus says here.
As I just read.
He dwelleth with you. That means he was there in the Lord Jesus.
And shall be in you. That occurred on the day of Pentecost. If you are truly saved, the Holy Spirit of God dwells in you and He will dwell in you forever. That is a marvelous truth. Even in the Millennium that will not be true. Even the most exalted St. in the Millennium will not be permanently indwelt with the Spirit of God.
Neither did any St. of God in the Old Testament.
Abraham, Noah, David, Isaiah, and all those wonderful Old Testament Saints, Moses, and so on. Yes, the Holy Spirit came upon them for periods of time.
That's how the Bible was written. Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, but then the Holy Spirit left and they didn't have the permanent indwelling of the Spirit of God.
Now I want to make sure that I cover what we have.
Said here.
Yes, I think we've pretty well covered it all. We'll only mention a few verses in the 16th of John just to complete things a bit because one of the most blessed things as I have just said is the fact that you and I are indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God and notice what He is going to do.
What he is doing with you and me today. John 16.
Verse 12 I have yet many things to say unto you.
But ye cannot bear them now. Why? Because they didn't have the Holy Spirit.
To make them intelligent in the things of God. Don't be too hard on the disciples when you find them. Hearing things from the Lord Jesus and not being able to get it, not being able to understand. And yet suddenly on the day of Pentecost, Peter picks verses out of the Old Testament, ties them all together in a wonderful.
Coherent message. What made the difference? The Spirit of God.
The Spirit of God is in you and me if we're saved.
Verse 13 Howbeit, when he, the spirit of truth is come.
He will guide you into all truth, for He shall not speak of Himself.
But whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will show you things to come.
He shall glorify me, for he shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you, and so on.
If you are truly saved, the Spirit of God is there to minister the things of Christ to your soul, to give you joy in your soul, to help you to understand this book. Now don't get me wrong, that doesn't need, that doesn't mean that we don't need one another. That doesn't mean that God doesn't put teachers in the church and pastors in the real sense of the word.
An evangelist to preach the gospel and so on, but ultimately the power in it all.
Is the Spirit of God.
One more point before I sit down.
There may be some here, even if there is only one.
That isn't saved.
To you, I say, the Spirit of God has something to say to you too, because the Spirit of God not only.
Dwells in every true believer individually. The Spirit of God is also here in this world today, and let's see what he does earlier in that same 16th chapter.
Let's read verse 7.
Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it is expedient.
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For you that I go away, for if I go not away, the comforter, that's the Holy Spirit.
And by the way, that word comforter, it's one of the good English words that we can use, but we don't have an English word that encompasses all of the meanings of the original Greek word. And I am not a Greek scholar. Anyone can look this up, but the Greek word for comforter here is Paraclete.
And in another part of the word of God in first John, it's translated advocate.
But the word really has the sense of one who takes charge of and looks after all of your affairs.
Just imagine a person of the God had to do that for you and me. That's quite something, isn't it?
The comforter will not come unto you, but if I depart, I will send them unto you.
And notice what happens here. And when he has come, he will reprove the world of sin.
Of righteousness and of judgment. It's very solemn of sin because they believe not on me.
If you don't believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and know Him as your Savior, the Spirit of God.
Is working with you and wants to work with you to make you realize that you are a Sinner and that you need a Savior.
Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more.
The world thought they could get rid of the Lord Jesus, but he rose from the dead.
And his resurrection from the dead was the proof of who he was.
And of the Father's approval of the work he'd done on the cross. Men have tried to discount the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. It doesn't work. It doesn't work. There were too many witnesses, too much proof.
Of the resurrection.
There are those here that have been to the land of Israel. I've never been.
But many years ago, probably 100 years ago, there was a man who didn't believe the Bible. I won't say he was an atheist. He may have believed in a God, but he didn't believe the word of God.
But in order to be reasonably well educated and be able to talk intelligently, he thought I, I at least ought to have the common sense to learn a little bit about this Christianity, as he called it, just so that I don't seem like an ignorant fool when people say things. And he visited the land of Israel.
For those who have been there and visited, it will corroborate what I'm going to say.
The so-called garden tomb, which is very, very close, probably to where the crucifixion took place.
Has for I can't remember exactly how long, but probably 150 years has been owned by the British and it's administered by Christians so that no one who is a guide in that garden and to the tomb there, which it may or not be the exact place where the Lord was buried, but if not, it's very close.
Yes, there's another place they call the tomb, and a Roman Catholics have built a big church over it and so on.
It's not clear, but anyway, the Garden Tomb, all the guides there are believers.
And so this man went to the Garden Tomb.
And he went inside and he was there with half a dozen others. And he began to mock. He said, what did you bring us here for? There's nothing to see in here. What did you bring us here for? What's the point of coming here? There's nothing here.
Well, in modern language, he shot his mouth off once too often.
The guide was up to it. The guide threw himself up and said, Sir, thank you for that remark.
You stole my Thunder. Yes, you are perfectly right. There is nothing here. Do you want to see a tomb with something in it? Go to Mecca. There you can see Mohammed tomb and whether he's buried there or not is a moot point. But you want to see a tomb, go to the head of any other religion.
And you can see a tomb with something in it. You want to see the bones of some religious leader? Go anywhere you want, but Christianity can show you an empty tube. And the man that was once in this tomb rose from the dead to the glory of God the Father. Yes, you are quite right, there is nothing here.
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Wow.
You know, God used that. That man thought, really, could it be true? How could he rise from the dead? That's impossible.
But he was honest enough to go and get hold of a Bible and read an account of the resurrection. And the more he read it, he said it's got to be true. All the people that saw him afterward. Somebody would have leaked the truth if it had all been a put up job. 500 people at once in First Corinthians 15. How could 500 people all conspire to some grand lie?
He said it's got to be true.
And he got saved. Wonderful. The resurrection of the Lord Jesus.
Well, now we'll go back to John 16.
I.
And then it says finally in verse 11, again Speaking of the Holy Spirit reproving the world.
Of judgment, because the Prince of this world is judged.
You know, the Bible doesn't call Satan the God or Prince of this world until the Lord Jesus was rejected. But now Satan is the God of this world religiously, and he's the Prince of this world politically.
And God gives him an element of power so that he carries out things.
But, you know, all he does ultimately is carry out God's purposes. Everything he does carries out God's purposes. Satan sometimes is a bit of a bit illogical, and I may say that.
He's very smart, but he's also illogical. And you know, you will find, just as a side comment, you will find in this world that there are many smart human beings. But if they allow Satan to get hold of them, which many do.
They are sometimes very illogical. A man made a remark 150 years ago. He said we talk of common sense, but man forgets that it is God that gave it to him and God that maintains it for him. And if man gives up God, often he loses his common sense. If an unbeliever doesn't act with real common sense, don't be surprised.
The point is.
The Spirit of God is here to convict of judgment because the Prince of this world is judged and Satan knows it. Judgments been pronounced. He knows what the Bible says about him. He knows where he's headed. When the demons were on earth here, they said to the Lord Jesus, Art thou come here to torment us before the time?
They knew there was a time coming when they would be judged. The Prince of this world is judged.
But I say without hesitation and yet with sorrow in my heart, if there is someone here who isn't saved.
You are going to fall under the judgment of God because of your sins, but the Spirit of God is here and now to convict you of the fact that you need a Savior and to lead you to Him.