Lawrenceville Conference: 2011
Table of Contents
Luke 24:1-24
Reading
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Luke 24 and the two on the way to Emmaus.
But I put it forward as a suggestion, and if others have something else, then uh, I will be very happy to defer to them.
In suggesting this, I realize that it is not a perhaps a doctrinal path, although there are many things that can be brought out of it. But I might suggest, and I think others would be of the same mind, that.
While it is wonderful to know more and to learn more, sometimes what we need is what these two needed, and that is to recognize first of all who the Lord was, that He was with them, and that His presence was everything in their lives. But what do others think about that?
I think if we're gonna take up this chapter, we ought not to miss what's in the first part of the chapter either, because it's beautiful to consider the resurrection and Mary Magdalene and her heart as well.
And that would be very nice, Jim. I think it'd be nice if we could read the whole chapter. I just suggest, and again, this is something we're all aware of that if we get.
Two.
Taken up with the details in some of the beginning of the chapter. We'll never get to the end of it, so let's remember that. But is, is, is that, uh, is that all right?
Luke's Gospel, chapter 24.
Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came under the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared.
And certain others with them they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre, and they entered in found not the body of the Lord Jesus.
It came to pass, as they were much perplexed there about the old, two men stood by them in shining garments, and as they were afraid and bogged down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead?
He is not here, but is risen. Remember how He spake unto you when He was yet in Galilee, saying, The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified in the third day. Rise again. They remembered His words, returned from the sepulchre, and pulled all these things under the 11 and to all the rest.
It was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and other women that were with them, which pulled these things under the apostles.
And their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not.
Then arose Peter and ran under the sepulchre. Stooping down, he beheld the linen clothes laid by themselves.
And departed, wondering himself at that which was come to pass.
And behold, two of them went that same day to a village called Emmaus, was from Jerusalem, about 3 score furlongs, And they talked together of all these things which had happened, and came to pass that while they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near.
Went with them, but their eyes were holding that they should not know him.
He said unto them, What manner of communications are these, that ye have one to another as he walk, and are sad? And one of them, whose name was Cleopas answering, said unto them, Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem has not known the things which are come to pass there in these days? He said unto them, What things they said unto them concerning Jesus of Nazareth?
Which was a prophet mighty indeed in Word before God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death, and have crucified him.
00:05:03
We trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel.
Beside all this, today is the third day since these things were done.
Yeah, and certain women also, our company made us astonished, which were early at the sepulchre. When they found not his body, they came saying that they had seen a vision of angels which said that he was alive.
Certain of them which were with us went to the sepulchre and found yet Even so, as the women had said, but him they saw not.
Then he said unto them, O fools, and slow of heart, to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them, and all the Scriptures, the things concerning Himself.
They drew near under the village, whether they went.
And he made as though he would have gone further. But they constrain him, saying, Abide with us what is toward evening in the days far spent? And he went in to tarry with them. And it came to pass, as he said, to meet with them. He took bread, and blasted and brake, and gave to them, and their eyes were opened, and they knew him, and he vanished out of their sight.
And they said one to another, did not our heart burn within us while he talked with us, by the way, while he opened to us the Scriptures, they rose up the same hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found the 11 gathered together, and them that were with them, saying, the Lord is risen in need, and has appeared to Simon. And they told what things were done in the way.
And how he was known of them in breaking of bread.
And as they thus speak, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and said unto them, Peace be under you. But they were terrified and afraid of them, supposed that they had seen a spirit. He said unto them, Why are you troubled, and why do thoughts arise in your heart?
Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself handle me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have.
When he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet.
While they yet believe not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have you hear any meat? They gave him a piece of a broiled fish, an oven honeycomb, and he took it, and did eat before them. He said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you while I was yet with you.
That all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses.
And in the prophets and in the Psalms concerning me.
Then opening their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures, and said unto them, Thus it is written, And thus it behooves Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day. And their repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. And ye are witnesses of these things.
And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you, but carry in the city of Jerusalem.
Until ye be endued with power from on high. And he led them out as far as Bethany, And he lifted up his hands and blessed them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them.
And carried up into heaven, and they worshipped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.
We're continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Amen.
00:10:03
So just a couple.
Of preliminary remarks perhaps, uh, and that is that.
First of all, our brother Clarence Lundin used to remind us, and I've often appreciated it, that more than any of the other Gospels, Luke is the introduction to Paul's ministry.
And we know, of course, that the Spirit of God used Luke to write not only the book of Luke, but also the Acts of the Apostles, which.
We might say is the bridge between the two dispensations, the bridge between the Lord's ministry on earth and the ministry of Paul, which was presenting the heavenly calling of the church. And so with that in mind, here at the end of Luke, the Lord gives us first of all the story about the women that came to the tomb of the Lord Jesus, and then these two on the way to Emmaus.
And both of them, it seems, were feeling pretty badly, and perhaps feeling pretty bad, I should say. And we're discouraged. And the women, of course, their affections were drawn out. Even if the Lord were in the grave. The two on the way to Emmaus were going away, thinking that their hopes had been dashed to the ground and everything they had looked for was not going to happen. And what to do now? And the answer to both?
Was the realization that far from being the end of all things, the cross and the resurrection was the beginning, and far from dashing their hopes to the ground, it was only to give them that which was far better than an earthly Kingdom, a heavenly Kingdom, and.
Instead of losing the Lord Jesus as they thought they had in death, His resurrection had restored him to them.
But in an even more wonderful way. And so the Lord Jesus here presents himself to both. And in both cases it results in joy and blessing to their hearts. And I guess my thought was that you and I, if we could speak of it in this way or living in times that are somewhat similar in the thought, in this thought that here these people were living.
You might say on the bridge between two dispensations, God was working in a way to set his earthly people aside for the time being and to bring in heavenly blessing to bring in the truth of the Church.
None of which had been revealed yet, but the Lord hath spoken that it would be revealed. And these people were living, you might say, on the edge of a change that was about to take place. You and I are too. We're seeing events all around us that show us that the Lord's coming is near. And we're seeing signs of coming judgment, which we know is going to make incredible changes in this world and usher in that glorious millennial scene.
You and I, of course, will be caught up long before for heavenly blessings.
But at the same time, what was the answer to all the difficulties, all of the discouragement, all of the problems? It was the Lord Himself, the realization that he was not dead, but that He was alive.
The realization that His presence was everything to them and at the very one who had hung on Calvary's cross was alive and therefore them, and was the answer to all of their difficulties.
All of their disillusionment, all of their discouragement.
Christianity sets us in relationship with the Lord Jesus in a very unique way as it's introduced to us here. And there are two things that are unique to Christianity that you don't see in anything previous or anything else that is practiced today, as we might say the so-called religions of the world. One is what the chapter begins with, the other is what the chapter ends with.
One is that, first of all, it sets Christianity, sets us in relationship with a living Savior. And it's interesting as you go through the four gospels that you find in each gospel, things that are unique to the gospel and the ministry of the evangelist and the way he presents Christ. And in someone gospel you'll have something that isn't mentioned in another gospel, or it may be mentioned in a couple of gospels but not in another, and so on.
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But there's one event in the work, life and work of the Lord Jesus that is brought out in all four gospels very, very clearly, and that is the resurrection. Every gospel brings out with a number of verses, the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ because it is so vital that, don't misunderstand me, not that every part of the work of Christ isn't vital and important.
But lest we miss it, he brings it out, Because if Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain, and ye are still in your sins.
And the Spirit of God is very clear that we are now associated with a living Savior.
There's many today who will bow down to someone who's in the tomb, and they'll pray and look to someone who's dead for assistance and deliverance. We have a tomb too, but it's an empty tomb. But the other thing that is unique to this dispensation is that we are set in relationship with Christ in resurrection. I'm sorry, in ascension. And that's what we're going to find at the end of the chapter.
He blesses them, He lifts up his hands, and His feet leave them out of olives, and he returns to the glory. And brethren, the realization of those two things in our souls is what is going to encourage us to go on in the path of faith and service. As has already been said, there's lots of difficulties. The great work of the enemy today is to discourage and dishearten the people of God in one way or another. But what we need to keep focused on is the fact that we have a living Savior, one who came from the tomb.
But not only so. One who is seated at the right hand of God. In ascension we are not associated with Christ the way they were in Luke's Gospel, the way the disciples were and the other believers were in the days of the Lord Jesus.
Though we knew Christ after the flesh, henceforth know we Him no more. No, we don't know Christ after the flesh the way they did down here when He was down here.
But we know him in a far, far more wonderful and intimate way, associated with him as the ascended man.
First creation ends in death.
New creation.
Uh, begins with the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. He is the head of new creation in resurrection. And I must say, like you mentioned, Bill, so often we get our hopes, our thoughts shattered, and it seems like in a certain way it's necessary so that we can grasp God's thoughts.
His thoughts are so much higher than our lives, and we hear things as they happen in the world today, and we don't have an explanation. I find that we as Americans try to figure things out perhaps more than other peoples in the world, and we struggle with it. How in the world does this fit? I don't understand. And that's true, we don't. But God has his thoughts, brethren, and He wants us.
To think His thoughts. That's why we have the word of God in our hands, to see His thoughts. But it's so evident that the Lord told them so often that He was going to go up to Jerusalem, that He was going to be crucified, and that He was going to rise again the third day. They didn't get it because they were intent in their thoughts of thinking of His establishing an earthly Kingdom.
And so when it all happened, they were shouting, their hope was gone. That was it. They were totally discouraged. Brethren, when God allows our God to be shattered, it's because He has His thoughts and He wants us to understand those thoughts in a measure at least. Notice that when these two, these women are encountered by these.
To angels they tell them that the Lord had told them that, and verse eight it says they remembered his words.
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Over evidence. May the Lord help us to think His advice.
Brother Bob, at the beginning of these meetings you read the 23rd Psalm.
And read some other verses in the 70s song and umm, you know these verses of Scripture that we've been reading of in the 24 chapter of which really have to do with the discoveries as well. A Good Shepherd given his life that are sheep. And so we find that that good comfort went through the cross-border judgment for our citizens now in prison at the very first day of the week, the very day that he had risen from among the dead.
When we work for them, dude, and umm, here it is the very beginning of a, a new dispensation as where the church was going to be formed approximately, I think it was 50 days after this resurrection. And then we have in verse 13, the work of the Good Shepherd now beginning in connection with the restoration of two that are going in the wrong direction. And then you have the ascendant shepherd at the end of the chapter. So perhaps in three parts the story is told, but it's really a story about before Jesus system.
And, uh, so you have, uh, these ones that, uh, you'll do bring us, let's say, didn't remember verse six that says he had risen, remembers verse eight. They remember his words. And one of the things that will help us to, uh, recognize his hands and aiming for his commitment to determine his work because for ignorance with the word of God, then we're going to follow our same errors, the same difficulties that they follow against themselves. I just want to re refer to, uh, Luke's not, uh, chapter 18.
There and that that portion of Scripture that the Lord Jesus spoke to her most said that he was going on to Jerusalem verse 31.
Luke 18 and verse 31. Then you look under exam the 12 and said unto them, Before we go up to Jerusalem, all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished, for He shall be given her none of the Gentiles, and shall be marked and spitefully entreated or insulted.
Pitted on and they felt surgeon and plays against them. The third game he shall rise again. And they understood none of those claims, these things and this same was hid from them. Neither knew they the things which were spoken. And so he told them faithfully, but they happened this prophetic scriptures and they should have turned to the scriptures. And you already have the fact that during the first both part of this, uh, chapter that they hadn't turned into the scriptures. But we find a little bit later on that the Lord himself opens up the scriptures and that's what we need to have the scriptures to word of God open to us.
When perhaps in any dispensation, in any kind of religion, we need to have orders on work because we have construction and incurred in an applying at the end of the dispensation, the time of loan state and the times of disheartening events, a time of great peace and spiritually and departure from the truth, we need to have the word of God.
The Spirit of God is careful to instruct these people.
We saw the Lord go up. If you look at Acts chapter one, Luke talks about the farmer, Theo, the Porter, Creedus. That's Luke. Now he's right to ask. And in the first chapter of Acts, it says very carefully.
When they ask the question.
The Lord will tell this time restore the Kingdom to Israel. That's.
In the end of the sixth verse. Then we'll read in the seventh verse a few verses.
X-17 is headed to them. It is not for you to know the times or the cheese which the Father had put in His own power, but He shall receive power after that. The Holy Ghost is come upon you, and you shall be witnessed unto me, both in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and in all Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. That's where we live. And when He had both of these things, He said it to them.
He was taking already be held. He was taken up and the proud regime out of their side, and while they looked fantastic toward heaven, he went up. As he went up, behold 2 of men.
Stood by him in quite a peril, and they said you met him Galilee.
00:25:03
Where you stand looking up into heaven.
This ain't Jesus, would you take it up from you into heaven? Shall so come in life manner as you see them go into heaven. What a remarkable thing that they saw the Lord going out. We're the ones that are going to see Him come down. It's a greater thing to see the Lord come down.
We're we're here to waiting for that.
Luke 24 is full of discouraged people.
It's the characteristic of Luke 24. It's full of discouraged people. It's 53 verses long that it's not until the 31St verse. It's almost 60% through this record before we find a single person that recognizes the Lord Jesus.
It's significant in it, brethren, in this way.
They all had expectations. They all were expecting something. And when their expectations were shattered or broken, they became discouraged. And it's no different in our lives. When we have expectations of certain things and they don't come to pass as we expect them to, it brings on, it tends to bring into our hearts a discouragement.
A depression upon the soul because what I expected, I don't, It didn't happen. I don't have it. And that's the discouragement of the people here. We trust that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel. We've had verses before us. Why didn't they understand the prophetic scriptures and so on.
Because those things were not where their expectation was.
When my expectations are not where God's expectations are, it's a good recipe for paint for me. And so they had to learn something. They had to learn an extremely beneficial and important lesson in their lives. That in the chapter is with worship.
It ends with praise and Thanksgiving, but there is a process through which each of these discouraged people had to go.
In order to arrive at that point.
Their expectations had to do with themselves. The prophetic scripture had to do with himself.
And when the Lord Jesus speaks to them, he does not immediately make himself known to them because He has to change their focus. The focus that they had was upon themselves and what they were going to get.
Through Him, yes, they appreciated him, yes they loved him, but they also had expectations for themselves in connection with it. And so when the Lord Jesus meets these two discouraged souls on the way to Emmaus and he starts to speak to them.
He what does he start to focus their attention on?
Himself.
They didn't recognize himself in it because that's not what they were looking for. They were looking for somebody to comfort them in their loss.
And what they had expected and the Lord Jesus very graciously and very patiently more than once in the chapter not only on the two to Emmaus, but also in the those that he makes himself to on later on who can't believe it.
They can't even accept that when they see them face to face because their focus wasn't the path of peace for their souls, but when they gradually learned through the chapter the expectation is himself and what related to himself and what was going to take place concerning himself and that changed their focus of their thoughts and their attention.
To himself. And then they began to understand.
And their understanding came in something more important than understanding how things affected themselves was how things affected himself.
Because he is the only one that you can center your expectation in that will not find this kind of discouragement. Sooner or later, every single human expectation that relates to self and is centered in myself is going to be subject to being bringing sorrow along with it because of the nature of the world in which we live and the sin that exists in it. And so.
00:30:25
When they see himself in resurrection, they have an object now before their hearts that can provide them with a joy and an expectation that will satisfy their hearts without discouragement. And the end result of the chapter is when that has process has taken place in them, then there's worship and there is praise and brethren.
Process that's in this chapter, in smaller or greater extent, is going on in the life of every single person in this room, except perhaps the most young ones who haven't gotten started yet in these things. But I'll say at least every adult in this room is going through Luke 24 in a practical sense in your life with respect to the expectations that you may have concerning this life rather than concerning that which concerns himself.
Which goes beyond this life into eternity.
And what you allow to brother Dawn that sometimes perhaps we have the proper expectations, but the wrong timetable. And that was another difficulty, wasn't it? Because as our brother Buchanan read to us in Acts chapter one.
They said, Wilt thou at this time restore the Kingdom to Israel? And the Lord had to say to them that it was not for them to know the times and the seasons. In a sense, there was the right expectation, but the wrong time. It wasn't perhaps the right expectation for themselves, as you say, but it was the right expectation in connection with God's purposes, because there will be the restoration of the Kingdom in a coming day in Israel, in a coming day, in the full exaltation.
Of Christ here in this world and His rightful place and so on. But that wasn't for them at that time. And sometimes aren't we like that, brethren, we get ahead of the Lord. Perhaps we have something that we feel should unfold in our lives and we get ahead of the Lord.
And I often think in a practical way of that verse in the 37th Psalm that says, Commit thy way under the Lord, trust also in him. And then it says, and he shall bring it to pass. But brethren, it may not be to pass in the way that we had fought or hope, or in the timetable that we had thought or hope. And one of the great difficulties with human nature is we spend perhaps our whole lives trying to learn the lesson of patience or waiting on on God.
It's against human nature. We like things and especially brethren, in the day in which we live, we like things instantaneously. We're used to everything being at our fingertips and an 800 number and a speed dial and an instant this and an instant that. And then we get frustrated when it doesn't work properly. Brethren, we need to realize that God doesn't work on the same timetable that we do. And those in this chapter, they had to realize that God had the Lord had purposes.
He had a timetable, but it wasn't necessarily according to their timetable and that those purposes weren't necessarily for them directly, as Brother Don has brought out. God had something different for them at this time. And these women and the disciples, the two on the way to Emmaus, they had to learn this. It was difficult for them. And brethren, we shake our heads at them as we read this chapter. We shake our heads at the women. We say, well, they should have known.
Mary Magdalene should have known especially the apostles, the disciples. They should have known they.
We're closest to the Lord during its public ministry. They've heard that what he had said.
They should have known the two on the way to a Mass. They ought not to have been on their way to a Mass and been discouraged and so on. But brethren, instead of shaking our heads at them, we need to learn from them. Yes, and I trust we will. But instead of shaking our heads at them, let's examine our own souls this morning. We're far more responsible than they were. We have far more than they do. They were living at the during these events that were unfolding.
00:35:04
They didn't know what was they had. They couldn't look back in retrospect. They couldn't read go ahead and read the book of the Acts and read Pauls epistles and see what was going to unfold as to Christian blessing and position. They didn't have the Spirit of God in the same way that we have as an abiding presence here with us and in US. They didn't have the completed scriptures. We are far, far more responsible and rather than.
There is no excuse for discouragement in your life and mind. Is there discouragement? Yes, there's plenty in my life often, and none of us can say we've arrived. But rather, when we think of what we have, a risen Christ, an ascended Christ, the complete word of God, the Spirit of God, all these things that are ours as present possessions now we have no reason to be.
Discouraging. Discouraged. In fact, we have every reason.
To be encouraged. But as we brought out the reason, there's some of the reasons we get discouraged are we lose sight of Christ, we lose sight of what is ours, and we lose sight of His purposes and His timetable.
It's nice to see.
Not just the the perspective of man or what they were looking for and disappointed because they didn't see realize that there's two ways of looking at the chapter that stand aside and how they went through that discouragement. There's God aside that purposefully allows things to happen the way they did so that he could keep them about his resurrection and of new creation and it's so wonderful to.
To ask for example, the Lord says uh in verse 26 off comprise you have suffered these things into into his glory.
God's timetable of being perfectly fulfilled here and he was working all these things out. It's so good to, to step back and let God show his money to go on his, uh, way of dealing with us as we go through life.
When we go through life, it's not usually enough just to know doctrinally what Christianity is about. We usually have to learn it by going through an experience that really makes it come home to our souls. And that's what this chapter is doing. It's putting them through circumstances about resurrection, about death and resurrection. And not even just resurrection, really new creation, that is.
Not just Christ risen on earth, but Christ who is preparing them to know Him by faith and in the breaking of bread and so on. That's why he did it the way He did, because He was preparing them for the time when he would be gone. And that's for our instruction. Then we don't see it. A risen man here on earth, the Lord Jesus in power and glory, doing, wielding his power and setting everything right.
We're still waiting for that part, but we must see them in heaven. But we do see in the circumstances that allows us in our life, it will step back and let Him show us now that He is risen and that we need to trust Him even though we don't see Him right here on earth.
It's amazing to see how he meets each one differently.
Too. And uh, we're all individuals. We all have our particular personalities.
And God in his wonderful patience, is working with us, each one accordingly. We know that He appeared first to Mary Magdalene and resurrection. We know here in verse 34 that there was a time when He appeared to Simon Peter. We don't know anything more than what it says in verse 34 about that.
Encounter We have quite a bit about these two on the way to miss.
It was 3 score furlongs. Uh, I calculated it's about 7 miles.
Lord was not in a hurry. He asked them what they were troubled about. He had time to listen, and then He had time to open their hearts to the scriptures. And it's just amazing how He takes each one of us the way we are, rather than deals with us accordingly according to the need that He sees.
00:40:15
And then you have them collectively in the midst in verse 36 and 37, another need and he meets that accordingly. So it is wonderful to see, uh, these not frustrated with our discouragement, but it's going to work with us according to the need of each one. I think that's so important, Bob, because as Jim has said.
There's no excuse for being discouraged, and that is true.
We could equally say there's no excuse for sinning either either.
Which one of us would stand up and say is to use Jim's expression that we've arrived? And so the Lord has made provision if we sin, and He's made provision for discouragement too. And it is beautiful to see the way he meets each one in this chapter.
According to their own individual circumstances and needs, according to the degree of intelligence, according to what they had to go through in order to get to the right point. And he meets each one of us today in that way. As Dawn has said, every one of us that is mature enough to be able to understand is in some way going through what these experienced in this chapter and God's whole purpose with your heart and mind.
If we could use the expression, which is somewhat common today, is to get us In Sync, synchronized with God's thoughts, with the Lord Jesus Christ. Because all too often our thoughts are different. And sometimes, as we've had brought the force, we don't understand completely God's ways with us. But what a wonderful thing it is to be willing. And these were willing here each one of them received.
You might say the blessing the women who were at the sepulchre.
Simon Peter is an individual. Eventually all the apostles, the two on the way to Emmaus, whatever it was, the Lord was willing to meet them where they were, was willing to look after what needed to be done in order to remove the discouragement, in order to bring them into, you might say the same wavelength with his thoughts and what he was doing. And again, we don't pretend that we all understand perfectly. I think your remark about us in North America, Bob and.
Allow us to include Canada in that a little bit too.
We wanna figure things out. We've got technology, we've got the ability to look at things. We think we can figure everything out. And then the Lord allows situations and difficulties that we can't figure out, whether in the secular world or even among believers. So what does that do? It casts us back on the Lord, doesn't it? And that's what He wants. He wants us to walk with Him on His wavelength and in simple trust and dependence on Him. And we can all still do that today.
In the measure that we're willing to let him work with us the way he did in this chapter.
Like I said.
On your On the encyclopedia.
I believe circumstances.
They had lost their their Lord Mancinos crucified and they weren't able to really enter into God's plan, the purposes that he had in mind. And so the sorrow that they were going through was not wrong. It was, it was national.
But the problem came in when sorrow mixed with unbelief.
That turns into discouragement.
And that is the case whenever we become discouraged, our sorrow is mixed with unbelief.
And so that's what we have to lay hold of God allows.
Very, very sorrowful circumstances in our lives.
But in our heart is established in great, and we don't doubt it, the heart of God.
In our circumstances.
00:45:00
We realize who he is and how good he is.
And we don't stop. We are able to judge unbelief. It comes into our our unbelief is terrible dishonored to God.
It lowers his glory.
And not when we have that type of an attitude towards God. We can't expect to rise above our system stances. We keep God in his proper places. Grace will always do.
Then our sorrow will not turn to unbelief.
And thus become discouragement. Hmm.
It's the heart of kindness that the lioness, umm, reveals and results that the deals of each one of these individuals this week to, to see, to understand, to enjoy. And I just want to point out that, uh, the Lord had desired that, umm, they would understand these things and enter into the joy and joy and umm, I've seen this in the spring. So along with that.
He began to open things up to them. It had been a close book to them before, as it were.
They weren't in 12 but the Spirit of God they could understand in some measure, but as soon as he was raised, then he began to open things up to them and just point out that there are seven things that are opened in this chapter. Perhaps some of notice before, but in chapter 24, verse 2, the first one that opened is the tomb itself. They found the stone rolled away from the Tupac. He was raised from among the dead. The second thing that is opened is in verse 27, the beginning at Moses and all the prophets he expounded unto them and all the Scriptures that things concerning himself.
So the Scriptures were open to them as being a closed book in a sense before that. And then you have verse 29, an open home. They constrain him saying, abide with us for it is toward evening and the day is far spent and he went in to carry with them. Not wonderful to have them. Scripture is open and have the Lord in the home. And then you have umm, another opening in verse 31. Their eyes were open and they knew him, and he vanished out of their sights.
The 5th opening is in verse 45. They open that open to their understanding that they might understand the Scriptures. That's one of the things that characterizes Christianity, the understanding of the purposes of God in the heart of God. And you have the 6th opening in verse 51. It came to pass while He blessed them, He was parted from them and carried up into heaven. So is ascension. The heavens opened and received the Lord Himself.
And then in verse 52, as was already being mentioned, the last opening of where the heart was opened and uh, the worship flows freely. They worship him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy. And so at the book, it's a chapter of openings, new beginnings of, uh, Christianity. And I know the church wasn't formed until the day of Pentecost, but really you have an transitionary period, the kindness and the love of the Lord Jesus.
Being brought forth and told out to his people as he enjoys, as he umm, works with each one individually that they might come into share that joy that he has.
Well, I know, Brother Bill, you had the exercise to spend some time on these two on the way to Emmaus. And it is significant, isn't it, that as the ITS story opens up their journey here, there are really two things that are immediately brought before us that cause them to be discouraged and saddened as they talk together, by the way.
The first one is in verse 14, they talked of all these things which happened. Now you say, well that was good. Yes, it's good to talk about events and happenings in our lives. And sometimes on an occasion like this, we when we're together, we talk about things and we get caught up as we say. And certainly not nothing wrong with that, but I suggest that what we learn from this verse is the absence of their talking, bringing the Lord Jesus into the circumstances.
And brethren, if we simply talk about happenings in our lives and our experience and we leave Christ out of the circumstances, out of the circumstances, we don't bring Christ in, we're going to get sad and discouraged too. We're going to lose sight of who it really is. That allows everything in your life and mind. And so they didn't bring Christ in as they talked. You know, there's a nice contrast in connection with the the believers in Malachi's day, that little company.
00:50:14
They talk together too, and it says they spake often one to another. The Lord hearkened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for those that feared the Lord and that thought upon His name. I take it from that, that scripture that when they spoke one with another, they brought the Lord into the circumstances. They brought the Lord into the conversation. And isn't that what's necessary? The Saints in Malachi Day, they were right at the end of a period of time too, and right at the end of the Old Testament.
And things were pretty bleak there. Things were pretty difficult, and much was wanting in the things of God and so on. But they spoke, they brought the Lord into the circumstances, and they were encouraged to go on in spite of what they found around them. But here we find that they spoke of all that had happened, but no mention of bringing the Lord in. The next difficulty is in the very next verse, and that is, they didn't realize who was with them.
And isn't that our great folly, brethren? At least it is mine. I guess I can only point the finger at my own soul. But so often I go through the circumstances of life and I get very discouraged, even afraid, because I don't realize the Lord Jesus is right there. Why? Here they were discouraged. Jesus Himself drew near and went with them. He didn't forsake them, but they didn't realize who it was enjoyed or been exercised by.
The disciples on an earlier occasion when they were on the boat and there was a storm and the wind was contrary, you have it in Matthew 14 and they see the Lord Jesus walking on the water and they cry out for fear. Why? Because they didn't recognize who it was. And what really brought comfort to their souls on that night was the words of the Lord Jesus when He said, it is I. And brethren, if they could have just realized that here it is I.
The Lord Jesus with them.
Like that he was with the disciples in the storm that would have brought a different perspective to their souls as they walked along and and spoke together. And so I say we need to be exercised rather than that in all that we speak of together, we bring in the Lord into every conversation and circumstance. Not that we don't enjoy natural things together. I don't mean that. And then to realize that in the difficulties of life, whatever it may be.
He'll never leave us nor forsake us, He said to them later on before he left them. Lo, I am with you always. Even under the end of the age and even when we're discouraged, even when we get far away from the Lord and we don't recognize Him, He draws near and goes with us.
When are two people?
That we read in their verse 14.
Walk together to aminos, it says.
They talked together all these things, which is act.
Now all these things.
That could have included a lot of also those things that happened in the trial that the Lord Jesus had to go through and how he behaved and what he said.
I just wonder how they could enter into his store.
While they were walking together.
I'm thinking of umm.
The last few months we had the rating and Matthew and we ended up with the trials of the Lord Jesus and what he said on the cross. We entered into some of the thoughts that we might have thought that these thoughts asked any questions and there was a wonderful time. It was a time of very serious thinking. So Treasury when we consider the Lord Jesus on the cross.
And in this month of work that we are able to save our time, we are very privileged that the air is meeting. We have a whole hour every Tuesday to talk about the Lord Jesus, which we did in the last three months and it was wonderful when we got to the place.
00:55:12
Where the Stonewall was rolled away.
And these angels set there and explained that he he was there. And then we had to think about he looked at already risen. That store didn't have to be rolled away. He had already ResMed. He had come out. And then when we reached here now these two people.
What must, uh, must they have all talked about? We talked about many things about things that happened that we read in the Old Testament scriptures that talk about the Lord Jesus. And we enter into his thoughts from that standpoint too, from these scriptures. And we have much joy in our hearts doing these things. And when we come home, we can meditate on this thing.
It's a wonderful privilege, dear brother, if we can take time out and do that and have it like run to reach, uh, once an hour every week and then also have it at home.
It's a joy, of course, when you're retired, you have more time than when you walk. You can be occupied with these things before you come to meet, and then you should have thought about it. It's all having thoughts about the Lord Jesus, which makes us happy when we can leave all the things that these two men are. These two people there got cancer. They got all these things to answer, and we get a lot of these answers when we come together.
Ask questions.
And have thought about.
The weight of the lower visual and this water is being resisted. It's helpful to see that wisdom of the Lord Jesus in dealing with discouragement. When he talks to the two on the way to Emmaus, He lets them talk first. He doesn't give him the answer. He knew immediately the state of their hearts.
And what their need was.
And in his perfect wisdom, their need was to get it off their chest. As we say, they had to get out what was going on in their souls. And in fact, at one point they asked him a question and he turns it around by another question. He doesn't even answer their question. He doesn't even defend himself. And the question that they ask him, well, don't you know about what went on in Jerusalem?
He turns around and he says what things and they talk some more. And brethren, it's the wisdom of God. When a soul is discouraged, it has to get it out and it can't listen until it has a chance to to dump it out and get it on out. Yes, the Lord Jesus addressed the issue of their faith and not understanding. He gave the answer of the occupation they needed, ought not Christ.
And so he turned the conversation from themselves to himself after, but it, it doesn't start there. We may see a discouragement in another and we think, well, I know what's wrong. I have a word for that. And so we tell them the solution, umm, to their need as we see it. Uh, but that's not the wisdom of God in many times, and we have it perfectly expressed here in the Lord Jesus.
He allows them to run on, if you will, until they run out, and then having done so, their minds, their hearts are capable of responding to something coming in. May the Lord help us to help one another in that way.
100 and 51151.
Lord Jesus.
When waiting for.
I made it more.
Call.
Stand
Address—Don Rule
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Pending 10 days, yeah, up here there's harassed and appalled.
Yeah, since the gracious Lord is here, backward they go and fall.
Before behind around they set their fierce already to fight and force me.
From the ground.
A long life, narrow way.
#12 in the appendix.
Call 58949.
Turn with me first to Romans.
Chapter 5.
Romans, chapter 5.
And verse one.
Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
By whom also we have access, by faith.
Into this grace wherein we stand.
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Note the word stand.
And rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
Now turn over to 1St Corinthians chapter 15.
Verse one.
Moreover, brethren.
I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received.
And wherein you stand. Notice the word stand wherein you stand.
I'll turn over to Galatians chapter 5.
Galatians, chapter 5.
And verse one.
Stand fast.
Therefore.
In the liberty whereeth Christ hath made us free.
This afternoon.
We're going to consider.
Standing.
And we're going to look at those things that keep us from standing and the provision of God to stand.
The Word of God gives significant emphasis to the matter of standing.
We all, and it's still a prevalent expression in the world in which we Live Today. We still understand.
And umm, we know what it is. For example the expression when someone says I have to stand before the judge.
That they're going to have to come and face a judge. We know what it is when Scripture tells us about people who have to stand before God.
In Revelation chapter 6 it speaks, It says, uh, the wrath of the Lamb has come, and who shall be able to stand?
There were times in the history of the children of Israel when God said you're not gonna be able to stand.
When we look at the epistles in the New Testament, in almost every single epistle.
We will find that God communicates with us.
Some truth places us in it and tells us to stand in that place in which He has put us.
Just to show, we took the 1St 3 epistles.
In Romans we are brought into a relationship with God.
By His grace we are justified by the work of Christ, and we are brought in to a standing into a place with God.
And later on, we're exhorted. Now stand there.
Stay there, don't give it up. It's a place in which I have put you and you are to remain in that place.
In First Corinthians we have the gospel, as we call it, as God calls it, presented to us, and he has brought us into a relationship with himself.
By that gospel. And he then says to us, he exhorts us through the apostle Paul. This is where I have placed you. Now stand in that faith.
In which you have been placed.
In Romans.
In or in Galatians, which is the next epistle, we are brought into that place of that God has taken us out of a relationship that is man, the Jew particularly, but where instead of what man can do for God under a set of rules, a law, God says, I have delivered you out of that place.
00:10:14
Into another one.
Which is one of freedom and liberty from that. And he says that's where I brought you. Now you stand there.
You remain.
Firm and fixed in that position into which I have brought you.
It's a subject in itself. We are only looking at the 1St 3 epistles to establish the pattern. A lot of what's going to be said this afternoon and the time that we have to go over it will be more in an outline sense.
But I will encourage you to study it out for yourself. You can go on to Galatians, yes. Then you can go on to Ephesians and Philippians and Colossians. And you will find in every one of those epistles that God has brought you into a relationship or a place of truth with respect to Himself. And then He exhorts you in the epistle.
Hebrews, for example, when it presents the material, it says be ye steadfast, immovable. Is that not a place of standing? Peter? It's not just the epistles of of Paul.
Peter and his one of his epistles he says this is the true grace of God wherein you stand.
It's amazing it was to me at least, for having has read the Bible quite a few years, to find how consistent this pattern is and how important a pattern it is as well, to see that we are brought into something by God and different aspects of the truth of God. And then he puts us there, and having put us there, then he exhorts us stand.
Stand fast.
Stand firm, be immovable.
Don't be tangled again into that that you were previously a part of.
But.
It's incredibly difficult, really.
To stand.
It is a tremendous conflict.
I was.
Surprised by the wording of the divine scripture in Ephesians, it calls it a struggle.
You know what it is to have struggle.
Is there anybody that's an adult in this room that doesn't know what present struggle is in your life?
Turn with me.
To Ephesians.
Chapter 6.
Ephesians chapter 6.
And verse 11.
That ye may be able to stand.
Verse 12 We wrestle.
Verse 13.
That you may be able to withstand.
Having done all to stand.
We're going to spend much of this time together in this chapter.
Because it gives us the provision of God to be able to stand.
The primary.
You you know what it is when someone says to you, What do you stand for?
What do you stand for? What position do you take on this matter or that matter?
You live in a world where, where do you stand? What position have you taken in this world? Well, that's the positions and we don't have time to look at all the details of them, but I stand and you stand before God in a relationship to himself as his children.
00:15:18
He says you stand and I stand in opposition to a world system that Satan has established that's against him.
And we stand against it.
And so on.
But here he's giving us the provision to enable us.
To do it.
Every one of us have enemies.
You have enemies.
If you don't, you're asleep.
Or you're asleep in Satan's control.
Or you're dead in your sins.
But if you're alive to God, you have enemies.
And they're serious, constant conflict with the enemy.
In the struggle of life.
The primary enemy is Satan.
The biggest fall of your life is.
He makes use of your flesh.
To seek to defeat you.
He has set up a system.
Called the world to manipulate you.
And to keep you from the standing and walking in the position in which God has placed you.
He uses whatever means because sin has come into the world. Death is an enemy.
And he uses death as well, the fear of death, the power of death, to seek to manipulate.
Subtly against us.
And so we're going to concentrate this afternoon particularly on Satan and the other means that he uses and this chapter, Ephesians chapter 6. And the provision of it is particularly to defend us, to provide for us in the conflict against Satan.
Before we concentrate on it, though, I want to go back to Genesis chapter 3 and see how he works so that we can understand a little bit of the importance of the armor that is provided for us to stand against him.
Genesis chapter 3, verse one. We'll just read it and make a few comments about it to enable us to recognize some of the method that's used.
By the enemy.
Now Satan was more subtle.
He is.
Be subtle.
He's clever.
He works indirectly many times. He doesn't come out always face to face. He deceives.
That's his character. He's a deceiver.
Yes, these also can act as a roaring lion, but usually he has already gotten some power over us.
And then he comes out as the roaring lion. But the character of Satan is primarily, to begin with, subtlety. He comes subtly into your life. He comes subtly to you with temptation that will separate you in your fellowship with God.
He was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yeah, hath God said, You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
Satan often works by producing initially questions in the mind.
He focuses the thoughts on certain things.
And makes us start to think about them and question them in our lives.
He doesn't start right out and say that's not true, that's a I'm going to lie to you. He starts out and brings something into the mind that starts the mind at work to question. The intent is to separate the soul from God. He wants you, He wants me. He wants to separate us from our fellowship with our God.
00:20:20
And yet he begins with something that is going to raise a question in the mind, and when it raises the question in the mind, it starts the thought pattern that leads to unbelief.
He's subtle, he's clever. We're not always aware, in fact probably seldom, if we are aware of what's coming.
So he says.
Shall shall ye not eat?
Oh well, later I better think about why don't I? She never had. He didn't have the question about that before. Until the questions arise through the enemy.
Why can't I?
Says the young child.
After it suggested to them.
So he says, the woman says to the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it lest ye die. She does two things here that are part of the problem, that of the enemy, that he works on us. First she adds to what God had said, and starts to have her own thoughts about it.
And second, she weakens what God says, lest she die. It was an absolute you're gonna die. But she weakens it and says, well, maybe we die lest we die.
The work of the subtlety of the enemy is to make you and I not believe in the seriousness of the consequences of not standing with God.
And so.
He says to the woman, verse four, He shall not surely die.
A direct, contradictory statement to what God had said. Ye shall surely die, God says. Satan says ye shall not.
Run, brother, sister, When you hear a statement that you know God has said the contrary to it, stop the conversation. Flee it.
Don't play with it.
Young person, when you know that the word of God has said something and someone else. I don't care who the someone else is.
They're consciously or unconsciously a servant of Satan, even if they're a fellow believer.
They're a tool of Satan against you. If God has said it, that's it.
But she continues the conversation.
For God doesn't know that in the day you shall eat thereof your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
As far as it goes, that's a true statement.
But it wasn't the whole truth.
It was a statement intended to deceive, and it did.
He didn't say. And this will be the consequence in your life if you go ahead and do it.
The woman saw.
She no longer is focused on what God says, she's focused on the thing that her mind and her attention has been focused on. And so it is with the subtlety of Satan in our lives. He draws our attention away from our relationship and our position with God, all slowly step by step on to something else. And then we focus on that something else and we start to evaluate it.
It's good.
It's pleasurable. It's to be desired.
And it destroys.
But that part is not set, it destroys.
Satan is more clever than we are.
00:25:00
We need the provision of God. We can't match wits with Satan.
We are guaranteed loser if we try.
And so.
Having separated her in heart and thought from what God has said, she takes, He takes.
And the separation is complete.
Now let's go to Ephesians 6 and see God's provision.
For the working of the enemy.
Ephesians chapter 6.
Verse 10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord.
And the power of his might.
Starting point.
We have no strength.
We have no chance.
Against the subtlety of Satan.
None. There's not a single person in this room. There's not a single person in this world.
That can one-on-one face Satan.
And when?
We're weak.
We need a strength.
That doesn't come from ourselves. We need a strength that only God can provide.
Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.
It's.
Detention center I go to with John quite often. I'll say to the kids something like this and say, have you ever done something and you decided after you did it that was bad, I don't like the consequences. So you said to yourself, I'll never do that again.
And you did.
And so you thought about it and you said, oh, I'll never do that again. And you did.
Again and again and again.
Is that not true of you?
Have you not said in your life at one point or another I'll never do that again?
And you have.
And you have.
Be strong in the Lord, It sometimes takes a lifetime.
Not to recognize one's own weakness, but there is no defeat, there's no standing against the enemy in our own strength. And so it's part of the lesson that is necessary for us before we realize the degree of the enemy's power and we recognize the need.
For the armor.
Put on the whole armor of God. You can't leave any of it out. You have to have the whole, because Satan will use any aspect of your life, any part of your life. You may do very well in this aspect and that and another, but there will be one part that no, you haven't. And that's where you, he's smart, smarter than you and I are, and that's where he will attack you.
On the piece that you don't have on, so we're told, you not only need need it, you need the strength that the Lord can give.
But you have to have it all.
That you may be able to stand against the Wilds, the subtlety, the cleverness.
Of the devil.
For we wrestle.
Not against flesh and blood.
But against spiritual wickedness.
In high places.
So again, verse 13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day.
Do you recognize it? Do I recognize that you live? I live in an evil day.
If we don't realize it's an evil day, we will not think what we have to do with is all that serious or important or consequential.
00:30:11
And so we go.
I've heard more than one young people young person in my life make a comment like.
Oh, I want to experience life.
It inevitably leads to sin.
And serious. And too.
The moment I think I live in a Sinner or an innocent world that is to be experienced.
Satan has already got the advantage over me.
He's already won essentially the battle.
It's an evil day. It's a day of real, serious wrestling and conflict for everyone. No exceptions, whether you're young or whether you're old.
First piece of armor I believe the armor is given in a moral or a important order we.
Won't take time to develop that thought particularly, but I believe that God is giving us the series of things that we need to put on in an order that is significant. And the second thing we need to say about it is you need it on before you get into the conflict. Don't go out the door in the morning and say, Oh well.
When I have a problem, I'll put on the armor.
You think soldiers do that?
The soldier go out to battle and get in the battle and say, Oh yeah, I think I better go get my rifle now, or I better get my flak jacket on or some other thing. That's foolish, isn't it, to think that way for a soldier? Well, you're a soldier. You're in a conflict. It's foolish to not put on the armor before you have to enter into the conflict, because if you enter into it.
You'll be wounded.
And before it'll be, it'll be too late, OK?
Verse 14 Having your loins skirt about with truth.
John 14, says.
Speaking the Lord Jesus, speaking, I am the truth.
John 17 says thy word is true.
That's the truth.
That's the truth that you need.
The Lord Jesus, the person I am the truth.
Lord Jesus in Psalm 17, saying thy word, Speaking of the Father, God's Word, Thy word is true.
It's real important to recognize here these are practical things about our lives. This is not.
The statement of doctrine that exactly, but it is the application of it to our daily life that's in view here and it's important to get the sense of this application of putting on the girding.
Of the loins with truth.
This doesn't mean that I read my Bible.
When I get up in the morning, I read a chapter, I say good morning, Lord, take care of me today. And then I go off and have my breakfast and I'm out the door and I live my daily life.
It is.
The Cultivation.
Of a relationship.
Of affection between your soul and the truth.
It is living in the present practical enjoyment.
Of the Lord Jesus.
In your life.
It is having a love affair.
00:35:00
With God speaking to you through the Word.
It's the beginning.
Of armor, because if the Lord Jesus.
And you are enjoying one another in your life.
If His word is a delight to your heart in that way, then everything else that you are exposed to is judged by it. Satan comes along, and Satan is the opposite. He's the lie.
And if you are in the enjoyment of that which is true and real, then what he has to present to you doesn't attract.
Because you have something that is better for your heart.
The best illustration of this I learned, I received. I didn't learn it, but at least I received it into my head. At the time, I was about 17 years of age.
And my parents allowed me, for the first time in my life, to go to a conference like this by myself. So I got on a bus to the Greyhound bus, and I went to Iowa, to a Des Moines conference.
And I remember one statement.
Of that conference.
At that time, television was a rather new phenomenon.
Hadn't developed yet to what it is today.
There was a brother in a meeting and a reading meeting made a comment like this.
He said in the room at the hotel where I'm staying, there is a television set and he was making kind of a play on the word vision.
In the word television.
He said if you knew the vision.
That fills my soul.
You would know I have no interest in turning on that machine.
It's not really useful to me for anything but to put my coat on.
No law there is there.
There was a person whose life, and I can say it, showed it.
That was reality.
The enjoyment of that brother's heart.
In the truth was so strong and attractive.
That what was offered as an alternative.
Had no claim on him.
Because it was worse than second best.
That girding the loins.
The girding sense has the idea of you have to be careful because you have to use restraint because you live in a world where you can't let your affections go out unrestrained.
You have to be careful what you set your heart on in the world because it's not an innocent world.
And so it's let the loins be gird about with truth.
Second piece of armor.
As it says they're having on the breastplate.
Of righteousness.
Scripture often connects righteousness with a good conscience in a practical living out righteously, and I want to present it to you as living.
A transparent life.
If Satan hasn't manipulated you. If you are walking in practical righteousness.
You can live a transparent life.
No deception.
Is another way of saying it.
When someone walks in the room when you are on the Internet, do you change what's on the screen?
If you have your iPod out or your cell phone and someone walks into your presence, is what's on your cell phone needs to change?
00:40:10
If someone comes to your house to visit you, is the occupation and the activity change?
There is.
Serious problem that Satan gains the advantage of.
First John chapter one, we're told.
Umm.
Blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin.
And it also says, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The characteristic is, is if I give up a good conscience, if I allow something in my life which is not of God, I enter Satan's realm of deception. I become a deceiver. I try to deceive my parents. I try to deceive my brethren. I try to deceive my husband, my wife, my relationships at work.
To cover that which is not righteous within me.
That's working in my life, and without righteousness there is no standing up to Satan.
He will manipulate a life. He does manipulate a life.
That is not or cannot be lived transparently.
When Abraham decided to go down into Egypt.
He was forsaking the place of faith and his his son Isaac followed him and did the same.
He started to deceive.
He started to try to deal with the circumstances in which he was placing himself, and so he deceives, he says about his wife. She's my sister, Isaac said about Rachel. She is my sister.
Because Satan was at work using the separation of the heart and its righteousness with God. Practical righteousness.
To bring in that which was not of God, and to make deceiving and being deceived the character of the life.
I'll just comment that these first two characteristics are developed. These first two pieces of the armor can be seen in more complete way in John's gospel and John's first epistle. So if you wish to study them more, to understand them more, you find Cain and Abel are brought out in first John and the matter is righteousness between them. Why did Cain hate Abel?
Because Abel was righteous and Cain was evil, he was unrighteous.
And the characteristic of evil is that it hates righteousness.
And I say that it's a serious thing because in Second Timothy chapter 2, we find that we're exhorted to walk with the Lord out of a pure heart. But if we don't?
And we give it up, and we allow unrighteousness in our lives. Satan uses us as a tool to oppose truth.
There's many a Saint of God who's become a tool of Satan because the minute I embrace error.
Put on me by forsaking truth or becoming unrighteous. I'm going to in unconsciously, perhaps to myself and my focus on that error or that focus on self protection of my unrighteous ways. I will oppose truth.
We have a clever enemy.
And sadly, a rather successful one.
Verse 15 and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace.
Are you a peacemaker or a peacemaker?
00:45:00
Conflict Producer.
While Satan's happy to use that.
A development of what's in verse 15 is found in the book of Philippians, and we have in the book of Philippians that which teaches us how to walk in peace in our own hearts with God, and as a consequence, how to be a peace faker in our relationships with others.
Just as a practical expression, be wise.
Concerning that which is good.
And simple concerning that which is evil, if we are to walk in peace in this world and to have a message of peace, this isn't the gospel of the grace of God that's here. The thought isn't that, but it is that which would present to us a path through life that we would walk in peace with God practically, and we would walk in peace.
With our fellow man and Philippians 4 particularly is given to us to help us to understand how to put on that armor and uh, to walk in it.
So may the Lord help us to do that.
We otherwise.
We'll find ourselves irritated.
With the foibles of one another.
And we will walk in a way that Satan will subtly manipulate us so that instead of being the man of peace, the woman of peace will be ones that have conflict with our brethren and with our fellow man at work and school and so on.
And he knows how to use whatever draws us.
Away in heart from that fellowship with God that gives us the peace of God in dealing with one another.
I think it's Mark's gospel. It says, umm, have salt in yourselves and have peace one with another. I would comment that if you have your loins, gird about with truth. If you have on the breastplate of righteousness and your feet shod in this way, you will fulfill that verse. Have peace and have salt in yourself.
And uh.
Walk within peace.
With one another.
Verse 16 above all, taking the shield of faith, where which you may be able to quench the fiery darts of the wicked.
Turn with me over to, uh, First John Chapter 5.
Keep your finger here. We'll be right back to Ephesians 6.
The end of First John. First John, chapter 5.
Verse 18 We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not, but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not. And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness, or if you have the Darby translation, lieth in the wicked one.
Here in verse 16, the fiery darts of the wicked one.
The world is Satan's lie.
Set up to deceive.
To destroy.
Our lives.
Every day.
We get a barrage of fiery darts shot at us.
The whole world in which we live is set up of Satan to disconnect our souls.
In the constant moment by moment enjoyment of our fellowship with God.
To distract us into occupation with that. The fiery darts is that which penetrates and then creates a fire that expands. That's the way they're designed to do, and that's the way that Satan's fiery darts are intended. Everything in advertising and in the system of men is intended to.
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Draw upon lust, upon the desire to have.
And we live in a world that's evil.
I was somewhat astounded the percentage of people that wake up in the morning and they turn on their cell phone before they get out of bed.
That sound innocent.
Might to you to might to me, but it's not.
It's not innocent.
It is the avenue that man is so taken up with being wired with the world that he can't live without it.
You can't live.
Without the cell phone in his hand.
Because it gives them instant access, but access to what?
I'm not saying a cell phone is evil.
But I am saying it's a tool that can easily be used.
To keep and separate the soul from God.
That the constant barrage of fiery darts to access the heart, the mind, the will that separates it.
Into Satan's world the whole, as it says in John, the whole world lieth in the wicked one.
Separate your heart, your life from it. Be watchful. Be careful.
Don't unnecessarily occupy yourself.
With that which?
Satan uses on you.
Life is a struggle.
It needs a provision of God.
Verse 17 Take the helmet of salvation.
The helmet of salvation is found in Colossians.
The whole book of Colossians you will find if you read it, and you read it quickly with this before you, you will see that it's the full understanding of the will of God and the mind of God. You're exhorted. Set your mind on things above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God.
Stand, hold your finger here. Just read one verse. That's the conclusion of it. We don't have time to look at all the verses connected with it, but.
Uh, noticed in the last chapter where you get the standing part.
Umm Colossians chapter 4.
Verse 12 Aprofis, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, Pseudosyou, also laboring fervently for you in prayers, that ye may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God. You won't get the will of God from Satan.
You won't get the will of God from the world.
You won't get the will of God from your human mind.
Get it from God.
And only from God. And you need on that helmet that practically goes to God.
To receive from himself the light that you need to live by the wisdom, the knowledge of himself and His will.
You have 5 minutes.
Go to the Word. You'll get more out of it in 5 minutes than you can if you spend 50 years in man's wisdom.
You may stand take the helmet of salvation.
And the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Here it's often used for the benefit of others. You can't use this book if it's not a living reality to your own soul.
It isn't good enough to know that it says something.
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If it's to be used as the sword of the spirit, it really in the exhortation sense of it, it has to be the living reality of your own life. And then it can.
Be used to the Spirit. The Spirit can use it independent of us, of course, but the sense of it here is for you as a user of it should be an instrument of the Spirit of God in fellowship with Himself, so may the Lord.
Help us, each one, to have our own lives lived out in that.
Personal.
Enjoyment.
I speak to you this afternoon, but the sword is A2 edged sword.
It says the same things to me that it says to you.
Why do I say some of the things I say to you and the way I do? Because face answers to face and water.
If it's in my heart, I'll think it's in yours.
Sword is sharp.
Verse 18 Praying always with all prayer and application or supplication in the Spirit, watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for All Saints.
I want to encourage you in your prayer life in a very practical and very specific way.
Young people.
I encourage you.
Speak to the Lord.
Every day for your brothers and sisters and your parents.
Every day, everyone by name.
Mothers and fathers.
I encourage you not only to pray every day by name.
For your own children.
But for all the children.
Of your brothers and sisters.
As well As for them. Your family tree, in other words.
You who are older.
Who have a care, you say, and I'm sure you do.
For the assembly where you are.
I encourage you to pray each day by name.
For every single person in the assembly where you are.
With perseverance.
With perseverance, all perseverance and supplication for All Saints.
May the Lord help us to help one another.
We can.
We can not only put on the armor for ourselves and live it out, but also we have the privilege of caring for one another.
In this way there's no limitation.
We may not always have a word to say to the person, but we always have a word to say. We can with God.
Many have heard this statement. Prayer is based on the immense privilege of having common interest with God.
Does God have an interest in your brothers and sisters?
Sure does.
You have an interest in your brothers and sisters. I trust you. Do you share a common interest with God then?
Talk together.
About it each day.
Likewise in the bigger family. Likewise in the assembly. Let's pray.
Our God and Father.
We do ask that each one of us may apply.
Luke 24:25-35
Reading
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Yes, yes, yes it is.
Shall we go on with Luke 24?
If you'll tell us where to start.
But we discussed a lot of this in a very general way. It's kind of hard to know how far we got.
But I would suggest perhaps verse 25. Is that going too far ahead though?
Verse 25 then of Route 24.
Luke's Gospel chapter 24 and verse 25.
Then he said unto them, O fools and flow of hearts, to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ who has suffered these things, and to enter into His glory? And beginning at Moses, and all the prophets, he expounded unto them, and all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. And they drew nigh under the village, whether they went.
And he made as though he would have gone further, but they constrained him, saying, Abide with us. 40 evening, and the day is far spent. And he went in and cherry with them. And it came to pass, as he sat at meet with them, he took bread and blessed him great, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him.
And he vanished out of their sight.
And they said one to another, did not our heart burn within us while we talked with, while he talked with us, by the way, while he opened to us the Scriptures. We rose up the same hour and returned to Jerusalem, and finally 11 gathered together. And then there were with them saying, The Lord is risen in thee and has appeared to Simon.
And they told what things were done in the way and how he was known of them in breaking of bread.
And as they thus speak, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and set unto them, Peace be unto you. They were terrified in a frightened, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And he said unto them, Why are you troubled, and why thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.
Handle me and see her Spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have and.
And when he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet.
While they yet believed not for joy and wonder, he said unto them, Have you hear any meat? And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and a honeycomb, And he took it, and did eat before them. And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you while I was yet with you.
That all things must be fulfilled.
Which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning me then open to either understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures, He said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behooves. Christ suffered, and to rise from the dead the third day, and their repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name.
From all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.
Ye are witnesses of these things. Behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you, but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye be endued with power from on high. He led them out as far as the Bethany, and he lifted up his hands and blessed them. And it came to pass, while He blessed them, he was parted from them.
And carried off into heaven, and they worshipped him.
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And returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and we're continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Amen.
Before we embark on the, uh, portion that we've just read, I'd like to just add a comment or two to something that we said this morning in connection with our circumstances and how what really triggered the discouragement of these ones on the way to Emmaus and perhaps even triggered their turning and from Jerusalem and traversing the road to Emmaus, where those two things that we mentioned.
That is, they simply were occupied with the circumstances without bringing Christ into the equation, and they failed to recognize when he did join himself to them who was really with with with them. And so, as we mentioned, this can often then bring about sadness and discouragement in our lives. But there's something else in that portion. If you just notice in the middle of the 15th verse, we find that they reason.
And I just want to say a little word about that because it speaks to my own heart. Brethren, so often adverse circumstances arise. Things don't always pan out the way I had hoped or thoughts that they should. And I begin to lose sight of the Lord. I begin to just look at the circumstance and what is the result? I start to reason it out. And I say, well, if I'd only done this, or I'd only done that, or if the Lord had only allowed this, or the Lord had only allowed that. And we begin to reason it out.
And what does it lead to? It leads to a lack of peace in our souls. It leads to getting discouraged, sometimes going the wrong direction in the path of faith and service. And brother, we can't reason things out in our lives. What we need to do. And again, I suppose there's none of us here would say we've arrived. But what we really need to do is to bring Christ into it and to submit, even if we don't understand what's going on.
And there are many things, brethren, many circumstances in our lives that you and I are never going to see the fruition of until we get home to glory. There are some things, perhaps we're just going to have to wait until the judgment seat of Christ to understand why. And I remember standing up one time to take a funeral. It was a very, very difficult situation. And there were a room for the room full of young people there.
And I knew those young people had come from different parts of the continent looking for answers. And I said at the in my opening remarks, I said I don't have the answers. I don't know why God has allowed this difficult circumstance. But I said even if we did have all the answers to why God has allowed this, even if down the road God gives us the answer as to why this has been allowed amongst us and in our lives.
I said without submission to his will and without bringing Christ into it, it still wouldn't give us peace. And so, brethren, what really is going to give us peace in the circumstances, what is going to encourage as opposed to discourage is to bring Christ in. And if we don't, it's going to lead to reasoning all those things out. Maybe there's someone here, you're going through a difficult circumstance and you're starting to reason. You say, well, if just this and that and I'd done that or somebody else hadn't done that.
Things would be a lot different. Rather we can't second guess God. We have to submit to his will. I'm not saying it's easy, it's difficult. I know it's real. I'm not saying that it's easy. But it is in the end what gives us peace. And it was in the end what turned these two around as they saw who this was with them, as they got a little bit of a, a begin to get a little bit of understanding.
Of what he was doing. It turned them around. And as we said at the end of the chapter, it produced worship, it produced joy, and it produced Thanksgiving.
What grace there was with the Lord to walk with him all that way without. He never said you're going the wrong direction, never said go back to Jerusalem. But it was when, like you said, Jim, when they got a glimpse of him, the whole thing turned around. And I think it's so beautiful, brother, and that with those that go astray.
00:10:11
If we could have the same grade.
To show him it's not reasoning. Sometimes there are questions that need to be answered fairly in the light of scripture, but it's not reasoning.
That there needs to be that grace to show the glorious person of the Lord Jesus. As soon as that was clear, they got up and went back all that way that very night. No complaining about distance or anything. It's such a beautiful way that the Lord.
It works in their soul.
And could we say in connection with that, Bob, that?
The Lord Jesus revealed himself in a way.
That showed the if we could say it this way.
The change that was going to come about in their knowledge of him.
As we mentioned, he walked all that way, 7/7 and 1/2 miles, something like that, and it wasn't until at the end of the journey he reveals himself to them and as soon as they recognized him, he vanishes.
We'll get to that, but.
Why does he do that?
He wanted them to see the truth of it all and who he was from the scriptures. They were going to know him in a different way. Now. They weren't going to have him here bodily on earth. And we know that ultimately Mary Magdalene, she wanted to re establish that relationship that she had known and loved. And so the Lord has to rebuke her gently. He says touch me not for I am not yet ascended to my father.
She was going to know him in resurrection and in ascension. She wasn't going to have him back in the same way as she had him before. And So what does the Lord direct them to the Scriptures?
And we know, of course, and we can sympathize with them. Those dear, uh, Jews had, as someone who said the glories of the coming Kingdom so dazzled their eyes that they just blew right by Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22 and Zechariah 14 and many other scriptures, that would have been very clear as to the Lord Jesus having to go to the cross. So what does he do? He turns them to the Word of God.
And what a lesson that is for you and me today. How often?
I speak to my own heart. We don't seem to be able to find the Lord.
And sometimes you read the word of God, and perhaps we don't find the comfort in it that we ought.
I enjoyed this, it came from one of the family.
Probably most here knew that our late brother Dave Lundeen, from Kirkland or Tacoma, I should say, went to be with the Lord and not too long before he was taken hold, he used an illustration for the children in Sunday school. He said if you got lost in the forest and you went a second time and you got lost and a third time and you got lost, what would be the best way to avoid getting lost?
And I don't know whether the children supplied the answer or he had to. He said frequently for us, a little more often. And then you'll know your way around and it won't be such a forbidding place. You won't get lost so easily. Well, it was a good point. And so the Lord would have his own know him through His word and by faith, of course, as we know, He was going to send the Spirit of God down to reveal Himself to them.
So he doesn't immediately reveal himself here, but rather he goes back to the Scriptures and their heart burns within them as he goes over them one by one and shows them that it was all of God, it was all there in the Old Testament.
A foundation stone of man's relationship with God is faith.
And without faith, there are things that man cannot enjoy with God. As soon as Adam and Eve disobeyed God, their fellowship with God was broken and had to be restored in its measure. And so was their understanding of God in His heart separated from Him them because of sin. And we see the pattern of it in this chapter in that.
00:15:18
There was a difficulty in these discouraged ones that was grounded in the fact that they didn't believe something that had been said to them by God through His word, through the Lord Jesus directly. And the consequence of that, unlike of belief in them was, as he says he doesn't exactly say, unbelief. In one sense, he says slow to believe that lack of faith in them was the cause for them not to see Him.
In the circumstances not to recognize his presence with them and it also because it hindered them from communication or communion with him. They couldn't understand either. And so when there's discouragement and here in the case of the Lord Jesus, He has to present that to them which will bring them to that place where there can be faith in Himself.
In the case of the two on the way to Emmaus, he uses the Old Testament Scriptures. In the case later on, he shows them his hands and his feet and so on. And in both cases he's bringing them to the point where they believe. And once they believe, then there can be a fellowship between themselves and himself, and he makes himself known to them. But you can't know God. You can't have fellowship with God if in your heart there's a state of unbelief.
Even as a believer, I mean, even as trusting in the Lord Jesus, the principle is the same. And so they had to be brought to this recognition that what He had said and what the Scriptures had said was true and they had to believe it. But once they believed that, once He brought them to that point in their souls, then He makes Himself known to them. And in the second case it says after they saw his hands and feet.
Then he says to them in verse 45. Then opened he unto them their understanding. If you want to have understanding with God, you have to have fellowship with him. That's what fellowship is. It's sharing. It's common thoughts being shared one with the other. Well, God can't share His heart with us as long as in us we're separated by a state of unbelief or a lack of faith.
And in these believers, that is, these were saved souls, but in their state of their soul at that moment, there was something in them that was hindering, and that was they hadn't believed what had already been said to them. Umm, sometimes in difficulties we have to go back then that which discourages us, and re established with God our confidence in Himself.
That God is what he says He is. He is love. He is perfect in that love.
And we have to accept that in faith. And then the Lord makes himself his presence with us, something that brings, uh, comfort and confidence in our hearts and sometimes understanding as well.
Perfectly for that fear, because fear has torment. God doesn't want us to go in the state of unbelief.
Perfect love cast out fear because fear has torment. He wants us to be at peace.
You say that umm unbelief and he is away, but something else also can be in the way that can be said.
Wisdom and we know that there is a way that seems right to them at the end of the way the death. So they were headed for death. And, uh, if they had, they probably, I mean, it doesn't say, but it looks like that when they didn't, uh, didn't have any fellowship there. You'll probably still intend on going ahead. And they said, stay with us and spend the night with us as if we'll work here. Also. We're still going on again, it's safe.
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What do you think? Do you think we should go back?
There was none of that until they finally realized who he was.
Well, we know of course, that that whatsoever is not of faith, it's sin. And so, as you say, perhaps there wasn't in that sense real rebellion in their heart. There wasn't in that sense a stubborn will that was wanting to go against the Lord. But there was unbelief. And what is so nice here is the graciousness of the Lord in meeting them there.
And as we mentioned a few moments ago.
We find Him directing their hearts to the Scriptures.
But I know what's anticipating. But when the Lord takes them, or they take the Lord into their home, and then the Lord.
Reveals himself to them. And we can talk about that in a moment, but it's beautiful to see that he reveals himself to them. They know him, they recognize him. They spent all that time. How fast did they walk? I don't know.
I've sometimes tried to keep up the pace of four miles an hour and it's it's, it's, it's pushing it. At least at my age, anyway.
So they probably had several hours on the road here. Would that be reasonable?
And can we only? I sometimes try to imagine what it would have been like to have the Lord Himself open up the Scriptures to us. But He did, and I am sure that was a wonderful revelation. Their hearts burned within them.
So then what happens as soon as they recognize the Lord, He vanishes. That is, He is not going to give them further joy, further revelation, further light in a wrong place. And so we find in our own lives, the Lord is gracious with us. The Lord meets us where we are. We don't say he condoned their discouragement, but he understood. He knew what was going on in their hearts. He met them where they were.
And in grace he walks all that way in order to minister to them.
But then he gets to a certain point where they recognize him and as it were, he says now.
If you want more, there's something that needs to be straightened out, and I think that's what you're mentioning, Brother Thompson. There's something that needs to be done. You're in the wrong place. And so it is in our lives. We can go so far with the Lord and grace, but then he puts his finger on something that needs to be corrected. And here there was no problem, no lack of energy, walking all the way back, even though it was probably nightfall, in order to be where they knew they would once again.
See the Lord and receive more from Him.
He was gracious, but he was faithful too, wasn't he? Yes. I think of his words in verse 25, O fool and slow heart to believe. It's fairly sharp, but I think that's sometimes needed, brother, to get souls to listen properly. Do remember, brother, Eric Smith.
Counseling on how to deal with souls.
He says you've got to listen 1St and he did quite a bit of listening, didn't he even drew it out of him when he says in verse 19 what things and then he listens for quite a while. They tell him the whole story. Brother Eric Smith's comment was if you don't listen first, then souls are not going to be listening to you. They're just waiting for you to quit so that they can continue on.
They need to get out what's troubling their souls and so.
They were able to get it out. And then he gives them a word of reprint.
Pools slow apart, brethren. We all fit there. I have to say I do for sure. But that's where we are when Scripture is so clear and we need to listen more intently about what He has in mind.
Perhaps there was one exception to.
00:25:00
The disciples in general, I wondered. Brother in Mary of Bethany.
Who sat at Jesus feet and heard his words? I wonder if she got the message that he was going to die and rise again. She came before he was taken to be crucified and anointed his body and he gives her credit for doing it for his burial.
And you now find Mary of Bethany at the cross, nor at the grave. I wonder if Mary really got the message like nobody else seemed to get. She was intelligent that he was going to rise again. We don't know specifically, but I wonder that, uh, it's wonderful. We, we need sometimes a word of reprove to get us to listen properly.
What we don't get from the written word is the tone of voice or the intonations with which this reproof was made.
And I just suggest as you go through the Gospels and you hear words from the Lord Jesus that on the written page perhaps seem very harsh, try to picture in your soul the tone of voice, the expression on his face. Yes, he was faithful on many, many occasions, but I suggest that when he said these words, O cools and slow apart and so on, that the expression on his face and the tone of his voice.
Just help to melt them. Yes, no doubt it's stung. And they, as you say, Bob, they needed a reproof and we often need those reproofs or even rebukes in our lives, but to hear them from the Lord Jesus in the spirit in which he always gives them. I think it's beautiful. But I just like to say that this in that regard, and that is when we seek to encourage or reprove one another, because we do, we're to exhort one another and so on.
We need to seek, brethren, to do it in the proper spirit. We can say the right thing in the wrong spirit and it will not have the effect that it is it is intended to have. And so we need to be careful that when we speak, it says, let your words be always with grace, seasoned with salt. Salt stings. You put salt on a wound, it's going to sting. But I remember my mother, when we were growing up and we skin our knee or something, she had some ointment, some kind of ointment or disinfectant, I don't remember what it was called, and she would put it on that wound and it stunned.
We, we dreaded that ointment being put on the wound, but she said it was necessary for the cleansing and healing of the wound. But when she put that ointment on that she knew was going to sting, it was tempered by her kind words of love. I often think of that in connection with our words. Always with grace, seasoned with salt. Yes, sometimes we have to speak, and we have to speak very firmly and faithful.
But let's remember that when the Lord Jesus gave rebukes and rebuffs, He always did it in the proper spirit. And these things are recorded for our learning as well.
I happened to look up before our meeting started and Vine Dictionary the word pool and there are several words, some of which are quite harsh. The word that our Lord used here was not nearly as harsh as the others. It just simply means lacking and understanding. Uh, we read in the Sermon on the Mount there was a place where the Lord said to call someone thou fool and put into you in danger of, uh, damnation if that was not the same word for pool. It is that much gentler.
Term here that we have.
Here was really setting aside some portions of the word of God because he says here that umm Bull's heart to believe all.
That the profits have spoken and so they believe those things in connection with the glory of the Kingdom and that he was the king. They believed that he was Jesus the Christ, the Son of the living God and umm, they accompanied him, uh, during his umm soldier here for those 3 1/2 years. They enjoyed his company and they believed his word. They trust them offend their confidence is being lost and were in him in verse 21. We trusted him to be which should have redeemed Israel. They are a confident he has shaken and here he comes the to them on the first day of the week.
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And I've often thought that the how he didn't send an Angel to encourage them. He could have sent an Angel could have sent those that would minister to them. But he came himself, the ones who was upholding all these umm, forums that that the universe came himself. He assigned to these two himself on top of how it performed judgment, judgment for their sins. And he was coming to ministership to encourage them and to.
Uh, collector, uh, kind of. And So what he really brings before them is that they were to leave all the scriptures and to be restored into fellowship with not only to be restored to common thoughts with the Lord himself, but to have common instructions. Now that we're going to be brought in distinct as the term as used earlier, their thoughts were going to be synchronized to themselves as to his future glory and his purposes. That there was a purpose that these things had taken place in Jerusalem. He was unfolding that purpose to the municipation of Christ.
We don't really deserve to know, but uh, he desires to bring us into the knowledge of his higher purposes. And now they were able to not only to be restored in fellowship in the capital comma common objective within.
As they walk along the way, they were sorted right in that way. And then when they came to the upper room in verse 36.
I believe now they have a objective that we do the right adjustment.
I would like to make just a small comment on verse uh 29. But they constrained him.
The love of God is a constraining love. We are constrained by that love. There is in US when there's new birth, when we have eternal life. There's a nature which is constrained by that love.
But brethren, it's nice here. The Lord loves to be constrained as well. They are. Hearts have that affection for Himself that would constrain Him as well as the greater, infinitely greater power of God's constraining love to us. We read that their hearts were burning with Him when He opened to them the Scriptures. But I think it's nice to see dude on that.
He made as if he would have gone through.
So he draws out their hearts in constraining him to stay with him.
Beautiful how he deals with.
Well, it's very nice to see the the way that the Lord desires their company doesn't, and He desires our company too. The Lord wants our company. He doesn't want us to walk at a distance from Him. But as you say, He waits to be invited. He waits for them to make the move, even making out as if He would go on further. I've said this before, but I think others will bear me out here that.
This kind of thing, this kind of scripture, has, in my experience, even more force in the East than it does with us in the West. Hospitality, I know it's important here and we value it, but if I could, if I could say it this way, it's even more important in many Eastern countries, and it would be utterly unheard of for a stranger who had walked with them for several hours.
To be left just to wander on. There wasn't a Motel 6 or something that he could just go to, and it would be unheard of to leave even a stranger go going on that way. But the Lord doesn't force himself on them. But I suggest there's something, at least to me anyway, very beautiful here. Because when the Lord comes into the house, what happens? They had constrained him. He had come as a guest in that home.
And of course, the question arises sometimes, what was it that made them recognize the Lord all of a sudden? What was it that suddenly made them know who He was when all that time they hadn't been able to see Him?
Well, we know, of course it says their eyes were holding, and we understand that God was in it. And others have suggested, and I enjoy the thought, that perhaps when he took that bread and went ahead and broke it, that they saw the nail, for instance, in his hand. And that may well be true, but I wonder if there's something more here.
00:35:22
I have had the privilege with my wife too, to be guests in many homes.
And I don't recall that I have ever sat down at the table and started distributing the food in someone else's home. That is not my place. I'm a guest. That is the place for those in whose home I am visiting, as the place for the father in the home in some cases, and maybe the wife and mother. But if I sat down at the head of the table as a guest in your home and started.
Making sure that everything was passed and all the rest of it, you'd say, well this, this is strange. What's he trying to do?
But here was one who, without assuming anything, without presuming anything.
Very consciously took the first place.
He takes that bread, He distributes it. Why? Oh, He was showing them, I believe that He must have the first place in their lives, their thoughts, their ideas, their hopes, their wishes. Yes, they had them. And as a result, they were to use the expression again synchronized with the Lord. But the Lord shows them, I believe, that He must have that first place. All through His pathway on earth, He had taken that place. He had LED them, He had guided, He had been the one to whom they looked for.
The next step, what do we do now? But here He consciously and in the full dignity of who He is, sits down and He sits in their home and takes the 1St place. I suggest there's something in that for our souls. Whether that was the reason they recognized him, I'm not sure. Scripture doesn't say so. It may have been a combination of several things, but it's something that speaks to our hearts, doesn't it? He must have the first place in our hearts and in our lives.
There were very few homes in the pathway of the Lord Jesus where he was really welcome. We know he was welcome at the home of Martha and Mary and Lazarus. And so often he turned his weary feet there and sat down in the presence of those that refreshed him in his pathway. But here was another home where the Lord Jesus was welcomed. And I'd like to just follow up Bill's remarks by saying that in this chapter, really the perhaps one of the key words is himself.
That's really what it doesn't that. Isn't that what it boils down to, brethren, himself. How much is the Lord Jesus really the center of every sphere of our life? Now when they were on the road and I again, I want to make a little application here. I know they were discouraged. Perhaps they ought not to have been going the direction of Emmaus, but on the road it was himself. He drew near and went. He Jesus himself drew near and went with them.
He expounded the things concerning himself from the Old Testament Scriptures. That was on the road. You know, wherever we move about from day-to-day, do we have a conscious sense of himself? They didn't, but we ought to. And do we take a portion of the Word of God concerning Himself with us as we move around in the busy activities of the day? And then as the day ended here and they came to the home, and again I realized they didn't know who it was yet if they constrained him to come in.
But they wanted him there in the home and whether Bill brought out who was the center who took control of the of the meal that was shared at the table. The Lord Jesus himself when we come home, is the Lord Jesus the center of our homes? Is he welcome in our homes? Is he honored and given the preeminence? And then later on in the chapter we're going to find when they return to Jerusalem and they're gathered together with the other disciples who had remained at Jerusalem.
Jesus himself came and stood in the midst. And so when we come together collectively in the assembly, is it Himself that's before our souls? Why are we here today, brethren? No, there may be many reasons. If we were to go up and down these roads and we were honest, there are perhaps many reasons. And that's OK because the Lord uses many reasons and many things in our lives. But I trust that down deep all of us.
00:40:03
Had a desire to be here this weekend because of himself to know that he was going to be in the midst of his own and that are the desire of our hearts would would be to give him the joy of being in the midst of a few of his own this side of heaven. But what wherever they were on the road in the home later, shall I say in the place of corporate obedience gathered with the other disciples. It was himself and brethren, we need to keep that before and if we keep him self before us, whether it's the activities of the day.
Whether it's the difficulties that arise in the home or maybe problems even in the assembly, if we have himself before us, we're going to be encouraged to go on in spite of it. I was thinking when you were talking about the spirit which holds something that.
There are two epistles that end up this way. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. One of them is Relations and the other is Philemon. I know in Philemon you can understand why that would sell because what even had had Odessa as a slave before he was saved?
And then, uh, he'd gotten saved and Paul was gonna, uh, advise him to go back to his master. And that would be a hard thing to do if he wasn't saved himself. And so the Lord is always the perfect major and the perfect model for us, the Lord of himself. Be with your spirit.
The spirit which you hold faith.
So I'd like to add a little bit to what Brother Bill said about, uh, in, uh, in that, in that, umm, home he came here, says that Mister Darby's translation haven't taken the bread he blessed and having broken it, gave it to them. I think it's wonderful too, to see that he blessed what word was spoken. He just spent that time with him on the roads. They've spoken of all the scriptures.
Thanks to that meal, after that walk, Wyatt, uh, was one of those things I believe that uh, God used to open their eyes to see the sweetness of the creator, the Son of God, the Lord Jesus who had entered their holiness and umm, it was used, it was used as God to restore them. So he blessed what Thanksgiving.
I found it interesting too, brother, in thinking about resurrection.
The Lord Jesus was resurrected and in resurrection body.
But it is interesting to meditate that almost everyone who stopped in the resurrection did not recognize him.
Immediately.
Mary Magdalene was the 1St to see him. We have the scripture and she didn't recognize him. She thought he was the gardener but it was when she when he said Mary.
And immediately she knew who it was.
Here it was.
When he took the bread and broke it that their eyes were open even when he appears.
Amongst the disciples gathered together in verse 36.
They didn't recognize him immediately.
And it is interesting to think about it. I think This is why you mentioned earlier, Bill, that the Lord said to Mary, touch me not she wanted to have him back as she had known him in life down here. And he was in effect, Saint Mary. No, you're going to know me now in a new relationship, a far more intimate and deeper relationship than before.
You're gonna know me in resurrection. And so it says in Second Corinthians chapter 5 that I should read that because I think it's important.
00:45:02
And verse, uh.
16.
Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh? Yeah, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no more. We know Christ in resurrection now, not in the same way as He was known before.
That was Mary, why he said to her touch me not, but go over to 1St Corinthians 15 because I find they're a little, uh, thing that Paul presents about resurrection and the body and resurrection. I get a lot of questions asking me when in my travels are we going to know those that we have known down here and have gone on to Gloria where we know them in resurrection?
But here's a little verse here that I think shows.
And it's verse, uh.
36.
The fool what which thou That which thou sawest is not quickened, except it die. And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not the body that shall be, but their grains. It may chance of wheat, or of some other grain, but God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him into every seed. His own body gives the example of weed. So you put a little grain of wheat into the ground.
And it sprouts and we know what we looks like, but we're not looking at what was put into the ground. We're looking at something different in resurrection, figure of resurrection anyhow. And I think that is an illustration. We're not going to see those that we have loved and have gone on to be with the Lord in the same way we have known Him down here, but there will be that which we will recognize in them.
And know who they are.
That's why they knew Moses, then Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration. Ever seen them before? But they didn't, so it's an interesting thing to think about.
Very, very, very important to recognize.
And I think most of us in this room, if not all, do Jesus Christ rose in a physical body, the body in which he had died. But I have been amazed at trying to present the Lord Jesus to my fellow man. How many people in the United States, when they think of the resurrection, do not?
Consciously think about the Lord Jesus as physically in the body in which he died.
And that was the difficulty here of these, they, they were troubled when they first saw him in resurrection. And they, they didn't know whether they were looking at a spirit or what it was that they were looking at. And so the Lord Jesus administers to them and shows them to look at him, at his physical person and to look at, as Thomas said, uh, unless I'm in the other John's gospel, unless I can see those nail prints.
In his hands and his feet. And they're still not quite sure. And so he asks for some food so that he might eat it in their presence here, so that they would have the absolute assurance that the person before them was truly the Lord Jesus Christ.
In, as Bob has already mentioned in others, on a different terms now.
That is a new creation and beyond depth and immortal he was when he was with them, as he had previously been mortal before his death. And so there is change, but at the same time, it is the same person and it is in the body in which he, he died. And it's extremely important. I, I think if I want to encourage you in presenting the Lord Jesus to others.
00:50:03
Not to take for granted.
That what you is so obvious to you is necessarily obvious to them. But umm there the when the preaching of the gospel is given in the book of the Acts.
The one fact of the gospel that is found every single time that the words of the preaching are recorded, it is the resurrection. The resurrection is a cardinal truth of Christianity. As to the fact of it that Jesus Christ died according to the scriptures and was buried and rose again the third day according to the scriptures. It's an important fact to emphasize concerning Himself. And they had to.
Come to the full appreciation that the person before them, the one that could eat in their presence, could talk to them, uh, could be touched by them and so on, was a lie.
On other contrast, not particularly brought out in this gospel, that it's connected with the truth of resurrection here.
John and I also believe in some sense why sometimes the Lord disappears from them. Uh, so that they don't see him as he does in the end of the chapter.
Uh, Thomas?
When the Lord presents himself to Thomas, he said, I won't believe unless I see him.
Thomas had to physically see the Lord Jesus. That is the characteristic of Judaism. Judaism was a religion of God that was based on belief and what was presented to be seen.
Christianity and contrast is what is for man to believe without seeing 1St and so when the Lord tells them here what their work is going to be, they're going to be witnesses for him and that they were going to witness to His resurrection because those who they witnessed to, like you and I, are witness to today.
We see and accept a word without actually seeing him physically, and we must do so. Nobody can be saved in this room and without accepting a truth that you cannot see with your physical eyes. And that is the truth of the resurrection. And that's what the characteristic is of Christianity in that way that separates it from Judaism, and so the restoring of the Jews in the Tribulation.
Is going to come about in that they're going to have to believe in the final work of it is to actually see him and then it will be complete in them. Well, what's the difference is why is one different than the other? Well, it's all the sovereign work of God. But brethren, we have the better part.
To see and connection with faith is for earthly blessing to.
Except without seeing my faith is the heavenly blessing we have the better part?
In the body that, uh, the body of the Lord Jesus, when he came forth in resurrection, the one marked difference was he retained the marks of atonement in his body. And that's made clear, very, very clear here. And it's interesting what you say about Thomas recorded in John's gospel because John Thomas not only said that he, he had to see to believe.
Or that he wouldn't believe if he didn't see. But he said, except I see the print of the nail and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe. Thomas wasn't going to believe unless he saw those marks of Calvary. And we know that Thomas did. And the Lord said, reach forth thy finger and thrust and thrust thy hand into my side, and so on. And that's what the Jewish remnant will see in the coming day, isn't it? They're going to look on him whom they pierced. They're going to say, what are these wounds?
And He's going to tell them exactly where he received those wounds, the wounds that I received in the House of my friends. And so here he shows unto them his hands and his feet. And when they saw those marks of atonement retained in His body, then they could rejoice. And it was a confirmation that He had bodily the one who had gone to the cross and laid down his life, had bodily risen from the dead.
00:55:22
And brethren, we're going to see, I believe, those marks of atonement in His body as well. We're going to, in a coming day, be occupied with a lamb as it had been slain, and what rejoicing that's going to give to our souls in that day. But brethren, as we look up into the open heavens and we see Him by faith where He is this afternoon, yes, we see a risen, glorified man, but He has retained those marks of atonement in His body. And doesn't that rejoice our hearts to realize that there is a man at the right hand of God?
Who went to the cross and accomplished atonement and eternal redemption to the glory of God?
And God has raised him from the dead, and seated him at his own right hand with those marks of atonement. Because the resurrection, the ascension, and the glorification of Christ are God's Amen to the work of Calvary. You want proof that God is satisfied with the work that His Son accomplished, and that He has bodily risen him from raised him from the dead as a result? Just look up by faith and see where he is now.
And those marks of atonement. So here what calm, what peace it brought to their souls. As he says, Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. See again, it's all himself. It is I myself. And this confirmation is what brought peace and joy to their souls. Well, rather than it will do the same thing to our souls as well.
I know it was mentioned before, but it bears a further emphasis too, in the part of the chapter we're taking up.
Verse 34. The Lord is risen indeed, and half appear. Assignment.
Those two on the way to Emmaus weren't the only two that were perhaps a bit discouraged. Poor Peter. Where did we see him last?
Weeping outside the power of the high priest because of that look that the Lord gave him. A look I'm sure of love and compassion, but a look nonetheless that broke him down.
And poor Peter, I'm sure wondered, well, is it all over with me, all over with any customary I can be for Christ, all over with me as to anything I can do for the Lord?
And how beautiful to see that of all those in the among the disciples.
The Lord singles out Peter for a private meeting.
Someone mentioned this morning the details aren't recorded. What the Lord had to say to him isn't recorded because the Lord has an individual restoration for everyone, whether it's a failure, very, very public and very serious, as Peters was, or whether it's something that's not quite so public and perhaps in a certain way not quite so signally outstanding as this one. The Lord has an individual restoration. The two on the way to Emmaus.
They needed a walk for a number of miles.
They needed that particular attention of the Lord. And so it is with you and me. I don't suppose anyone in here would stand up and say I haven't failed. Have we failed? Yes, we have.
Has it been serious? In some cases, yes. Is the Lord willing to restore? Yes, He is. And there are no qualifications or restrictions on 1St John One and nine. And what an amazing thing to find on the Day of Pentecost and afterwards.
That Peter lays on the guilt.
So those Jews, you denied the Holy One from the just and preferred a murderer. So on what Peter, you telling other people they denied the Lord? Yes. Why? Because the restoration was fully complete.
And So what a wonderful thing it is to see this year. And again, the details aren't recorded, we don't need them, but they're individual for each one of us and are available if we'll come. As Peter did, no doubt, and owned his face.
No, it's not. Yeah.
I'll be home.
For life.
The Blood
Gospel—Jim Hyland
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I'd like to begin the Gospel Meeting this evening with hymn #14 on the Gospel hymn sheet. Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing power? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb? Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb? He's going to stand to sing this hymn #14, and if someone will, please start it.
Have you been?
What are you thinking about?
It ain't no.
Problem.
For your heart and I pledge allegiance.
No, I didn't watch in the blood of the light.
When the grind was causing the mirror frozen, being one in the red light in my life.
Whoever's only.
What? I'm crying, finally watching the one on the fire.
Let's ask God's health and blessings, our blessed God and Father, how thankful we are this evening for the Lord Jesus Christ, and how thankful we are that He came into this world, went to Calvary's cross there, laid down His life, and shed His precious blood. We're thankful, too, to know that he has a risen Savior, that He lives at Thy right hand, does that Savior of sinners. We're thankful for the gospel message.
We're thankful for the fact that it is going out around this world in many ways today.
But oh, how thankful we are too, that we can present it once again right here in this building. We thank thee that, uh, we can hear the good, good news that Christ is indeed that wonderful Savior. And so our God, we pray that if there's someone here tonight who does not know the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, that their ears might be open to listen to the message, and that thou at work by thy Spirit and draw them to thyself, we pray that there might be.
Simplicity, that there might be clarity, and that thou work mightily in this room. Tonight we pray that none might go out of this room still lost and in their sins. So we ask for help and blessing we ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and for his glory. Amen.
00:05:00
Before we go to the New Testament this evening, I'd like to, by way of introduction to what I have on my heart in seeking to present the Gospel read. A verse in the Old Testament is found in the book of Leviticus.
Leviticus, chapter 17.
Leviticus, chapter 17 and verse 11.
For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar.
To make an atonement for your souls. For it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul in the presentation of the gospel. Tonight we're going to seek by the grace of God, by turning from one scripture to another to speak much of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because tonight we have sung that question over and over again. Are you washed in the blood of the lamb? And really that's what it boils down to the this evening.
Are you washed in the blood of the lamb? I'm not going to ask you any other question tonight.
I'm not going to question you as to your social standing. I'm not going to question you as to your church attendance. I'm not going to question you as to your upbringing or how good you feel you are on the scale of humanity and where you fit into society. Because those things tonight are irrelevant in connection with the gospel tonight. It boils down to are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
But before we speak of that, I want to mention something else, because a few minutes ago I was talking to a 7 year old boy.
Who just purchased a Bible from one of the shelves at the back of this room?
And he was pretty excited about that purchase. And I was thankful that he was excited about the purchase of a Bible. And he pointed out that it had two markers in it that could be used during a meeting to mark a place so you wouldn't have to hold your finger and so on. And I was really interested. But you know, it made me think of an experience that we had a few weeks ago, Brother Han Buchanan and Garvin Seymour and I had the opportunity to go for the first time.
To Guyana, South America, it's a little country right on the South American coast. It's bordered by the sea on one side, the north. It's also bordered by Suriname, Venezuela and Brazil. It is probably one of the poorest countries that I have ever visited. And if you look on the world scale of things, it's right up there as to poor countries. And you know, I was impressed and almost overwhelmed as we went from place to place.
And met with many believers, zealous believers, believers who really have a desire to get the gospel out, to learn the truth, and to get good solid material into the hands of their fellow Guyanese. But you know, it was almost overwhelming because there really isn't the Bible to buy hardly in Guyana, even if you had the money. In fact, I wouldn't have believed it if we hadn't seen it for ourselves. But I searched through Georgetown, Guyana, which is the capital.
And it was confirmed what had been previously told me that there isn't a bookstore of any kind in that city.
Now there were we saw a few little shelves of books here and there in other shops and so on. But secular or Christian, there isn't a bookstore. Very, very difficult to get a Bible even if you had the money. And we had so many believers tell us that there was a real need for the word of God and saying that they would even pay what they could if we would just get them Bibles and Christian material.
I only say that because I don't think we often realize the privilege we have of sitting.
In a room like this, with a Bible in our hands, and many of us, thank God, going to the back shelf.
Earlier today in purchasing an A Bible and if we were to go home to our homes and we were to go through the bookshelves, I think we'd be surprised how many copies of the Word of God there are on our bookshelves. Do we really value it? Do we appreciate the privilege tonight of sitting here with the Word of God open to be able to take up the story of the gospel and to present from the pages of this living book?
00:10:00
This book that lives and abides forever the glorious story of God sending his son.
And the Lord Jesus coming into this world and going to Calvary's cross, laying down his life and shedding his precious blood. It is a great privilege. And I know I look into the faces of many children and young people who've grown up with a stack of Bibles by the kitchen table and a Bible in a Bible case handed to you as you go out the door by mom or dad to make sure you have that Bible when you get to meeting. But you know, there are many people in this world.
Yes, there are. Believe it or not, there are many people in this world that would just love to hold a copy of the word of God in their hands. And so tonight we're going to go to the Bible, we're going to go to the word of God, and we are going to speak, as I say, particularly concerning the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I began back here in the book of Leviticus, because we learn all through the Scriptures from the Old Testament to the New Testament.
That if there is blessing for sinful fallen man, it is always on the basis.
Of the death and the shedding of blood of an innocent victim, I know it's not mentioned specifically. That is the blood in the Garden of Eden when man first sinned, when Adam reached out in disobedience and took the forbidden fruit, and he and Eve ate of it. And we know the sad consequences. The New Testament tells us by one man's disobedience, sin entered, and death by sin. So death passed upon all, for that all have sinned.
And I know it's not mentioned specifically, but if you read that story carefully, we find that immediately God took and clothed Adam and Eve with coats of skin. And if you're going to be clothed with coats of skin, it necessitates the death of an animal. It necessitates the death of an innocent victim or victims.
And God announced there, too, that the woman's seed would bruise the head of the serpent. He was looking ahead to the time when his son.
Would come into this world as that supreme sacrifice and offer himself. At Calvary's cross. We just come over a page or two in the word of God, and we find Cain and Abel, the first two brothers. And we find that Cain brought a sacrifice from a cursed earth. He brought the fruit of the ground. But God didn't accept that no Abel had a better sacrifice than that of Cain.
Because Abel understood by faith very clearly that if he was going to bring a sacrifice and approach God, it again must be on the basis of death and the shedding of blood. And we find then, as we come over through the pages of Genesis, there are sacrifice after sacrifice after sacrifice. And then we find that God looks down in the book of Exodus and he sees the children of Israel.
Under the ******* of Pharaoh and Egypt, a picture to us of Satan and his hosts.
And God said he was gonna deliver his people. But again, if God was going to deliver his people, it must be in a way that made them realize two things, their guilt and his provision for them. And God provided the Passover lamb. And God said very clearly, when I see the blood, I will pass over you. And most, if not all of us in this room have heard the story of the Passover lamb in Exodus 12 from the very early days of our youth.
And then we find a redeemed people, and God in the book of Leviticus gives them these various sacrifices. And these various sacrifices speak in different ways of the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished on Calvary's cross. But here we find he speaks specifically of the blood. You know, we often speak of the different gifts that God has given. We speak of the gift of his Son.
The Apostle Paul could say thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.
We speak of the gift of eternal life. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. We often quote that verse in James chapter One. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the Father of Lights, with whom there is no variableness nor shadow of turning. But you know from this verse I take it too, that one of the wonderful gifts that God has given to us is the blood now, not the blood.
00:15:08
Of a sacrifice in the Old Testament, like we have here, but the blood of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
I say that because there's a hymn we sometimes sing, not all the blood of beasts.
On Jewish altar slain could give the guilty conscience peace or wash away its stain. But Christ the Heavenly Lamb took all our guilt away, a sacrifice of nobler name and richer blood than they. And so we're going to go to the New Testament and we're going to read a number of scriptures that bring before us the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because I want to stress again before we do that, that the great question tonight is.
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Going to tell a little story before we turn to the New Testament that perhaps illustrates the importance of being washed in the blood of the lamb and as a result having your name written in the Lamb's book of life.
Ruthanna Mitzler is a well known singer and composer in some circles and she has written a great deal of Christian music and lyrics and so on, and she is often called upon.
To sing at various functions and as the story goes, Ruthanna and her husband Roy were invited to attend a wedding and she was invited to sing at this wedding in Seattle. This was the wedding of a very, very wealthy man, and the wedding invitation indicated that the wedding and the reception would be held on the top two floors of the Columbia Tower.
In Seattle, I think it's the tallest building in the Northwest.
And Ruthanna and her husband were rather excited about attending this function. They knew that it would be a great deal of pomp and ceremony, and that nothing would be spared for the comfort of the guests and the family and guests. And so the day approached and they did indeed attend the wedding. And Ruthanna did indeed sing at the wedding ceremony.
And then came the reception, and the stairs to the top floor of the Columbia Towers was cordoned off by a ribbon of silk. And as the bride and groom approached that stairs and the guests filed in behind them, someone ceremoniously with the scissors cut that silk ribbon, indicating that the reception was about to begin. The bride and groom ascended that ornate stairs to the top.
And that's the top of the stairs. There was a maitre-d' with a bound book, and as the guests filed up that stairs, he would ask them for their name and he would check in that book to make sure their name was registered there as guests at the wedding feast.
And as Ruthanna and Roy approached, he asked them their name and Ruthanna told him, I'm Ruthanna Metzger and this is my husband Roy.
He checked under the Ms. He ran his finger up and down the column. He said. I'm not finding it here. Could you spell it? She very slowly and carefully spelled her name. He checked again, he said. Your name is not here, she said. But I'm the singer, I sang at the wedding.
Surely there must be some mistake. My name must be here.
The maitre-d' looked at her and he said, Ma'am, it doesn't matter who you are or what you've done, if your name is not in this book, I cannot allow you to to attend the reception of this wedding.
Ruth Ann and her husband looked around. They could see tables loaded with luscious hors, d'oeuvres.
Waiters and waitresses and tuxedos were moving about the crowd, offering drinks and other sweets and so on and.
Appetizers. The tables had beautifully carved ice sculptures. The orchestra, in dazzling white tuxedos, was tuning their instruments, getting ready to play and the maitre-d' motion to one of the waiters. And he said, will you escort this couple out?
And without further ado, the waiter motioned to Ruthanna and Roy to follow him. They followed him to the service elevator. He pushed G for garage. They were ushered inside, swept down to the garage level to pick up their vehicle.
00:20:23
They rode in silence for several miles.
Finally, Roy reached over for his wife's hand. He said. Sweetheart, what happened?
Tears filled her eyes, she said. When the wedding invitation came, there was an RSVP card, but I was busy and besides, I was the singer. I didn't think I needed to return the card and so I set it aside and I never did return the RSVP.
I've thought about that story since I first heard it. You know, there are so many in this room tonight.
Who heard the gospel? You know what you need to do. You need to.
I want to speak ever so carefully and reverently. You need to RSVP. God is inviting you to the marriage of His Son. Everything has been provided, The blood has been shed to cleanse your sins away. God, as it were, is waiting with His pen to record you in the Lamb's book of life tonight.
It doesn't matter who you are or what you've done.
You must, you must respond.
To God's invitation and accept it by faith.
And then, when the marriage supper of the Lamb takes place another day in heaven itself, there will be no question as to your acceptance there. But let's go now, first of all to the book of first John.
First John chapter one.
First John chapter one and verse 7.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. I want to notice first of all the cleansing power of the blood of the Lord Jesus.
I'm sure we've all gone in our mind's eye to that scene at Calvary's Cross where, after the Lord Jesus for so many hours, had been treated so cruelly.
Being on trial and shuffled back and forth from one to another.
And they finally take him, and they lead him out to Calvary. And we read he bearing his cross went forth. Yes he did. He went forth, no hesitation there. He went forth for you. He went forth for me. And there they took him, and they nailed his hands and his feet to that cross. And there he hung on that cross at that crossroad and.
There after man had treated him cruelly once more.
Even giving him vinegar to drink. And there were those who passed by and reviled him. Others sat down and watched him suffer. There had been the conversation between the two thieves.
And then God is at worst said that's enough. And the sun was darkened at noon for three hours.
Three hours in which I believe with all my heart that the Lord Jesus bore my sins in his own body on the tree.
Afterwards he cried at his finish. He laid down his life, you know, he said of his, could say of his life. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received to my father. Nobody took his life from him. He was the only one that had power to lay it down in that way.
And then we read in John's Gospel, and it's the only gospel we read of it.
A soldier with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.
I love that word forthwith. To me it's just as if God was in a hurry to bless, and shall I say, the crowning act of man against the dead body of the Lord Jesus and all the hatred of man. He pierced his side and immediately forthwith came throughout blood and water. And as I say, it's only John's Gospel that records that. And then we turn to 1St John.
00:25:15
And the Apostle John further declares the blood of Jesus Christ his Son.
Cleanses us from all sin.
You know, if we had turned back just a few chapters in the book of Leviticus, we would find there what we often refer to as the law of the leper or the cleansing of the leper. You know, it's interesting because leprosy is used invariably in Scripture as a very graphic picture or type of sin and man's condition without God and without something brought in by grace.
And it's remarkable to me that it is the only.
Disease in scripture that is referred to as being cleansed. You know when the Lord Jesus was here, he healed the sick. He gave sight to the blind, He gave hearing to the death, He healed the sick, but he cleansed the leper. You remember with Naaman. What were the instructions given to Naaman when he came to the prophet's door? Go wash.
If we were to reduce the gospel to two words tonight, those are perhaps the two best words that sum up man's responsibility in connection with the gospel and his sinful condition. Go wash now. For Naaman, of course it was to go wash in the river Jordan, his nephew needed to be cleansed because it is a picture of sin. It needed to be cleansed. And we're not going to tell you tonight to go wash in some river.
No, it's go wash in the blood of the Lord Jesus. I suppose all most of the children here have sung from the very early days of their childhood.
That beautiful Sunday School song. Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb?
And what can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood.
Of the of Jesus. Are you washed? Are you washed? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb and the Lord Jesus. He cleansed the leper, and it's cleansing that you need tonight. It's cleansing in the blood of the Lord Jesus. There was a young man one time and he attended a gospel meeting very similar to this, and the preacher was seeking to impress upon the audience the need of being washed in the blood of Christ and the cleansing power that there is in the blood that was shed at Calvary's cross.
And as the meeting progressed, this young man stood up and he interrupted the preacher, He said. Sir, I don't understand.
He said How can blood cleanse sin? I don't understand that.
Well, the preacher had never had a question like this asked to him before, and so he paused a moment, sent up a swift little prayer, and then he said, I'll ask you a question in return.
There was a glass of water on the podium, as there is here tonight. The preacher held up the glass of water and he said to the young man, how does water quench thirst?
The young man was a little bit taken aback and he said.
I don't know, but I know it does.
Just so, said the preacher. I cannot tell you how blood cleanses sin, but I know it does.
And I know there are just so many here this evening who will attest to the fact that the blood of Jesus has cleansed them from all sin. But I want to make this as simple and plain as possible, because there's a little word in this verse that we have often enjoyed again and again, and that is the word all. If it said the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth from sin, that would be wonderful.
But the Spirit of God has added another little word all, all sin, you know, That removes any doubt, doesn't it? I've been washed in the blood of the Lord Jesus for some 46 years, and I have no doubt in my mind that it's taken care of once and for all that every stain, I'm not afraid, thank God of one charge of sin ever being brought up before me because of that word all.
Going to use again a simple little illustration that we sometimes used for the boys and girls. Do you know when my girls were little, they like to go out and play and sometimes they get pretty dirty.
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We had a little expression in our house, clean dirt. But my girls would go out and play and they would come in and those T-shirts and those white socks, they'd be pretty dirty mud and grass stains ground right in.
And so my wife would take those shirts and other laundry and put them in the washing machine.
And then add a generous portion of Tide or Cheer or whatever happened to be on sale that week.
She would run it through the cycle, pull them out, and that's when we talked about clean dirt.
Not every stain was removed, No, some of those stains were ground in, and no matter how many cycles and how much detergent you used, you couldn't get those stains out. But, you know, those were just plain clothes, and the girls would wear them again because it really didn't matter. But you know, when it comes to the blood of the Lord Jesus and one who is washed in that precious blood, oh, I say there's not one stain.
Of sin left, but you know it has to be applied. I remember one time a brother was trying to illustrate this to some Sunday school children and he brought in with him a basin of water and I was there on that occasion. But he brought in a basin of water and he had some soap. Fact he had two or three different kinds of soap there on the table.
And he had a bag, a zip lock bag, and in that bag he had some mud.
And he read this verse. The blood of Jesus Christ his Son, cleanses us from all sin. And then he opened the zip lock bag and he took his hands and he rolled them around in that mud and he got them very dirty. And then he held them up. And he said to the boys and girls, he said, I really believe that this soap and water on this table.
Can wash my hands and get them clean.
And he waited a few minutes and he looked at his hands and he said, I can't understand why my hands are still dirty. I I really believe that this water and this soap is what is needed to get rid of this mud on my hands. Well, you can just imagine the boys and girls and the consternation on their faces thinking, well, he's an adult. He should know a little better than this. And so some of them started to put up their hand. And Mr. You need to use the soap and water.
It's not gonna do you any good just sitting on the table.
And you know, eventually he did. He took a generous portion of that soap. He dipped his hands in the water with that soap, and he swished them around and held them up. And sure enough, his hands were clean. And you know, that's really the point tonight, isn't it? The blood of Jesus cleanses from all sin, but it must be applied. You'll never get your hands clean of mud if you don't apply soap and water, and you'll never remove your stains of sin if the blood of the Lord Jesus.
Isn't applied, but oh, make no mistake about it when you receive the Lord Jesus Christ as your savior.
He has promised to cleanse you not just from your sins, but to cleanse you from every stain. Every stain is gone. It's all sin. And now I'd like to turn to the book of Ephesians, Ephesians, Chapter One.
Ephesians chapter one and verse 7.
In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace. We have spoken of the cleansing power of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. But now we want to speak for a moment or two in connection with forgiveness, because it's through the blood of the Lord Jesus that we have forgiveness. Are your sins forgiven tonight?
You know, I was interested in some tombstones in various places here in the United States. Tombstones in certain graveyards that have no name on them, no date, no information about the person who was buried there, except one word I was reading about a tombstone in a certain cemetery that simply has the word saved on it, You know, That's great, isn't it? That's wonderful.
00:35:19
Would they be able to put that on your tombstone? And there were several others I came up with, but one rather impressed me. Somewhere, I think near New York City, there is a large cemetery called Evergreen Cemetery, and there is a tombstone in that cemetery that has one word on it, forgiven.
Would they be able to put that on your tombstone apart from any other information?
Would you be able to have that as an epitaph on your tombstone? The words simply the word forgiven.
If you know the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, then your sins are forgiven. And you know it's only on the basis of the blood of Christ that sins can be forgiven. That is the only righteous basis. You know God doesn't forgive us, forgive us without the matter being taken care of in a righteous way. You know, I'm afraid sometimes I have forgiven.
My children or others, and it hasn't always been on a righteous basis.
But you know God Forgives because the Lord Jesus took up the question of sin at Calvary's cross and shed His precious blood. And so God has, if I can put it this way, every right to forgive someone who comes realizing.
That it's on that basis. But again, this is very, very personal, isn't it? You know, it's easy really to say Christ died for all. It's easy to say God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. But what we want to try to impress upon your soul tonight is the fact that it must be personal again with the children of Israel back in Egypt, the night that the.
First born was going to be slain. It was very personal. Every house had to have a lamb. Every house had to have the blood on the door. It wasn't enough to know that somebody down the street or next door had killed the lamb and taken the blood and sprinkled it around the door. No, it was a very, very personal thing. And so there's forgiveness tonight.
There is forgiveness, and not only is there forgiveness, but it tells us in the book of Hebrews.
That thy sins and iniquities I will remember no more.
You know God doesn't forget.
That's human weakness. But there are things he chooses not to remember. Only a divine person can do that. Because the things I want to remember, I forget. And the things I want to forget I remember. That's human weakness. My grandmother had an expression. I forgive and forget, but I always remember. And isn't that often true that it's there? You can't get rid of it. But so far has he removed, He's removed our transgressions as far as the East is from the West.
They're gone. God has set them aside, blotted them out. They're gone. He'll remember them no more when we're forgiven on the basis of the blood of his Son, the Lord Jesus. Let's go to First Peter now.
First Peter chapter one.
First, Peter, chapter one and verse 18. For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation, received by tradition from your Father's, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot, who verily was for ordained before the foundation of the world.
But was manifest in these last times for you. We've spoken of the cleansing power of the blood of Christ. We've spoken how there's forgiveness through the blood of the Lord Jesus. But now we're going to stress for a few moments, redemption. We often say that to be redeemed is to be bought back, but it's far, far more than that. To be purchased is to be bought. To be redeemed is to be bought.
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To be set free. Not wonderful. Do you realize tonight that if you do not know the Lord Jesus as your savior?
You are in *******. You are like the children of Israel when they were in Egypt under those cruel taskmasters directed by Pharaoh. It tells us in the Book of Proverbs that we're holding with the cords of our sin. Satan is not your friend. Satan is not going to set you at liberty. No, it's the Lord Jesus through the blood, His blood that will set you at liberty. The blood has been shed to buy you back, to set you free.
Redeemed.
Not with corruptible things as silver and gold. This was driven home to us recently as well.
Because aren't we thankful those of us who know, Christ, that our redemption isn't based on something that changes in value? You know, if we were to go on Monday morning and check the stock market and the opening of the of the the world markets and if we were to compare the US dollar and the euro and the Japanese yen?
Compared to how the markets closed on Friday or how they opened last Monday, we might find that those things have changed in value and precious commodities, silver and gold. If they change in value sometimes from day-to-day and hour to hour, depending on the stability that there is in on the world stage at anyone given time. Again, we were just in Guyana.
Diana has a currency that doesn't trade on the world market. It's a currency that is very devalued. It's really worthless. In fact, they knock a few zeros off the end of it every once in a while and I think they had done that not long ago. And so when we were there, it was a Guyanese dollar was worth half a cent US.
Pretty worthless. Trouble is, the largest bill they print is $1000 bill.
You stay in a guest house or something and it adds up pretty quickly. You've got to have a stack of money to pay. It's not worth very much, and it is so worthless and so much. Does it change in value sometimes, several times a day, that no other bank or institution will take it outside of Guyana? Absolutely worthless. But, you know, there was a time when Guyana was a very prosperous country.
When their money was worth something. Guyana has some of the richest bauxite resources in the world. They have veins of gold, they have diamonds, they have very fertile soil in the north, they have huge cattle ranges. It was at one time a rather prosperous country, but through corruption it has become what it is today. But I thought of this verse and I thank God that I'm not redeemed with something that changes in value from day-to-day or year to year.
I'm redeemed, and many here rejoice, to know that we're redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, something that is as precious to the heart of God tonight as when it was shed at Calvary's Cross. Because when it says precious here, it's not so much our estimation of the blood of Christ. And thank God again. Our redemption is not based on our value or appreciation of the blood of Christ. Because that.
Could be very limited at best, and sometimes our appreciation of the blood of Christ may change too.
Some days we may have more appreciation of it than others, but it is God's appreciation.
Of the blood of Christ on which we rest our redemption and God says.
It's precious. It's precious to the heart of God. Is it precious to your soul tonight?
We've all studied in history, I suppose, the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, the great Emancipator of the slaves.
You know, he was assassinated just five days after the South surrendered.
There on April 14th, 1865 at Ford's Theater.
00:45:04
Shot at point blank range and carried across the street, and a few hours later he expired.
But the story goes and.
Some of us have traced this out.
The story goes that there was a lady, actually her name was Clara Harris. She was, I believe, the daughter of Senator Harris and they were invited to join the.
Lincolns in their presidential box at the theater that night for the production, and they responded to the invitation. There were others that have been invited who couldn't make it for one another, but they responded and Clara head on a white silk evening gown.
On that occasion and before, they were able to carefully move Abraham Lincoln across the street.
To more comfortable quarters.
Clara took the head of the dying President in her lap to make him a little more comfortable until they could get him moved, and things calmed down. When she returned home later that evening, she found that her very, very expensive silk dress had been stained with some drops of the blood of the dying President. Her first thought was to have the dress laundered and see if those blood stains.
Could be removed. On second thought, she decided against it and she took a scissors and clipped out of that dress an 18 inch square of white silk with the blood of President Abraham Lincoln. She boxed it up very carefully and sent it off to the city fathers of Springfield, IL and they were very, very thankful to get that piece of silk, and for many years it was displayed under a glass Dome.
In a museum in Springfield that was dedicated to that president, President Lincoln. As far as I can tell from research, that silk cloth is now carefully put away and preserved in the archives of the Smithsonian Institute.
And I have thought a great deal about that because that is the value.
That the United States people and the city fathers of Springfield, IL.
Placed on the blood of Abraham Lincoln, the emancipator of the slave. But oh, tonight we're not talking about someone who shed their blood in the service of humanity, or someone who was assassinated for one reason or another. Oh no. We're talking about the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, if the blood of Abraham Lincoln was of that importance and value.
To the people of the United States, how much more? The blood of Christ. You know, for the most part this world is trampling under foot the blood of Christ. No value for it, no appreciation of it. But our prayer is tonight that there is no one in this room who has no appreciation for the blood of Christ. Our prayer is that it is precious to every heart here.
And that you have availed yourself of it, and that you are redeemed.
By that blood.
But now let's go back to the book of Ephesians, this time to the second chapter.
Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 12. That at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world, but now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were afar off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
You know sin separates.
When Adam sinned and acted in disobedience, it separated, didn't it? Adam received a conscience, and when God walked in the garden in the cool of the day, Adam with that conscience, he and Eve hid themselves behind the trees of the garden. A separation had come in the leper of whom we spoke of earlier, when that spot of leprosy was diagnosed in the leper.
00:50:05
He was to go outside the camp, away from brethren and family and friends.
Resigned to a dreary life of solitude and to hold his hand over his upper lip and to cry unclean, unclean.
But you know, God has made a way so that man can be brought back into his presence.
How is it that so many of us here tonight look forward to being in the presence of the Lord Jesus in the Father's house? How can that be the blood of Christ? You know when you turn over to the fifth chapter of Revelation, the song of the Redeemed is the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, the blood of the Lamb, because that is the only way of blessing for man.
That is the only way that man can be brought back.
Into the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ is through.
That precious blood.
Are you far off from God tonight? Are you at a distance? Are you a little uncomfortable? And as this hour is drawing to a close, are you squirming and saying, well, I wish he'd just wind it up and we could get out of here and we wouldn't have to speak about it anymore. You're uncomfortable in the presence of God and His word tonight.
If you are, you need to examine yourself as to whether you're really washed in the blood of Jesus or not, because it is through that blood that we are made nigh no other way. At this juncture, I'm going to tell another little story.
The story that really brought tears to my eyes and I don't know if I can recount it the way I read it, but I will give you at least some of the details as they come to mind.
The story about a man named Robert Halbert. And Robert Halbert was studying to be a physician and he was very interested in being a surgeon.
And on his 21St birthday, he received in the mail by registered mail a small package.
And he opened that package, defined carefully wrapped in tissue paper, a surgeon's scalpel.
And though he could see at a glance that it wasn't brand new, it was in very good condition and it was evident to his trained eye that it was an expensive surgeon scalpel.
And there was a note with it.
From a family friend and physician.
A Doctor Who had cared for he.
And his brother and his sister, all of whom had no mother.
And this doctor had cared for their medical needs all their lives, as well as being a very close friend of the family.
And the note was from this doctor, who was himself a skilled surgeon.
And this note began by telling him that this scalpel had been saved for him.
For his 21St birthday, and that this doctor had been waiting to send it to him.
And that this knife had been used in surgery.
21 years before.
On a patient of the doctors described by the doctor as a beautiful young woman, the mother of a six year old boy and a three-year old son who was anticipating the birth of her third child.
And this knife had been used and as a result of the surgery.
This woman had died.
Robert didn't know if he really wanted this.
Knife or not, kind of put it back in the box. He didn't know what to do with it. A knife sent to him on his 21St birthday that had been used in surgery that had taken a young woman's life.
But he decided to read on in that letter, and that letter went on to explain.
That, that young woman.
00:55:00
Was very, very excited about the birth of her third child.
But that she realized, too, her condition was very serious, and that as she went into surgery, she realized that it may be either her or the child, and that she had made it very, very clear to the doctor that all was to be done to save the child's life.
Even if it meant her own life.
And the doctor went on to explain that everything had been done, that the utmost care and skill and all that was available at the time had been put at this woman's disposal, but she had died.
And he had been born.
I just can't imagine the emotions that must have gone through this young man's mind as the truth of what was taking place swept over his soul, realizing that his mother had died in childbirth and that she had requested of the doctor.
That if it was a question of her life or the child, that the child was to be spared.
And that this was the very knife that has taken his own mother's life he had never known.
Why he had no mother. As he grew up, he had never known how she died. But you know, this young man too. Further than that began to think about his soul, and he heard the gospel many times, But he was not saved.
And he realized that while his mother had given her life to save his body, another had given his life.
To save his soul.
And he got down on his knees.
Right there with that knife in his hand that had taken his mother's life.
And he came to know the Lord Jesus as his Savior. He availed himself of the death and the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. That knife took on a little different aspect of things. The knife that halfway through the notes seemed so repulsive to him and that he wanted to castaway became very precious to him. But more than that, the cross of Christ that he had spurned so long.
Became precious to him. The blood of Jesus became precious to him.
And this gospel meeting is over tonight.
And there's one who desires your soul salvation far more than anybody else in this room.
The Blood of Jesus is available to you tonight.
It's as precious as when it was shed at Calvary's Cross. It's as powerful as it was in the days when the apostles recorded these beautiful statements by inspiration, and it is as available as it has ever been. But oh, I would be less than faithful at the end of this meeting if I didn't warn you.
That if you refuse the blood of Christ tonight, there's a day coming when you will stand.
In a place where there will be no blood available.
Called the Great White Throne. No blood there, no mercy there, no salvation, no forgiveness or redemption offered them.
And no opportunity to draw nigh to God or to the Lord Jesus, but to be taken and cast out of his presence into the lake of fire for all eternity. But oh, tonight the blood of Jesus cleanse us from all sin.
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb? Let's pray our God and Father our souls are stirred at the end of this meeting to think that there may be someone here who's still not washed in the blood of Jesus.
Impure Thoughts That Distract Us
Time and Eternity
Children—John Kaiser
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And he called, and he called all the oil, and he wanted to be always.
To to see our new I see you again. I have all there and not much away.
Now I got a question for you. You gave up to him. You know what tidings are glad tidings I bring.
Tidings are new. That's a big word for news, good news. I bring that Jesus come to save me, and I am certainly glad that he came to save me. And he calls, and he calls all the girls. What are those?
Girls. Yes. And he wants all the boys. Two. What are they, boy? Yeah. All right.
To TRUST in him. What does that mean? Trust and have all their sins not washed away. And you know, I trusted the Lord Jesus when I was very, very young. I wonder, boys and girls, I'm going to ask you a question. I want you, boys and girls, to observe how many people here, adults receive the Lord Jesus Christ when they were very young.
Isn't that wonderful? Look at that.
That's the time to receive the Lord Jesus Christ when you're young. All right, How about another? Yes #47 when he comes. When he comes.
Here may come, here you won't all give you all his jewels.
Are the 2 old crash of jewels with love and healed life. So it's gone. The morning here's riding around the door in there shall shining.
Her beauty for all your jeans for you.
The second verse of this hymn says he will gather. He will gather the gems for his Kingdom.
All the pure ones.
All the pyramids.
What does pure mean? What does pure mean? PURE. What does that mean?
Nobody knows. Yes. What's pyramid plane? Yes, clean.
Now.
Suppose I've got a bottle that's clean on the outside and dirty on the inside. Is it? Is it pure?
Is it really clean? What do you think?
No.
I see boys and girls here this morning that are nice and clean. Their mother or father has trained them or done the work themselves to make them clean. They have clean clothes on. They they have clean faces and clean hands.
00:05:12
What about the inside?
He says he will gather all the pure ones.
All the bright ones his loved.
And his own argue his own this morning. Are you sure you're his All right? I need a song from a girl.
Had two boys choose this morning and the girls want to choose a song.
Yes #41 all right.
Around the throne of God in heaven will merely children save.
In shining from the bottomless whining, one will be arraigned.
Worrying everlasting life and joy that never.
Anything in glory. Glory.
Glory, glory to God.
On heart.
What brings them to that world that hands over right and there, where all the faith and joy and love are in those gentlemen? They're singing glory.
Glory.
Glory made to God.
Oh God.
Being on the finger Shank is what difference away there says no worship that no precious Lord people and quiet and clean singing pouring glory.
Glory there to come on.
Now, before we sang this song, we talked about being pure, being clean. Who can tell me how we get clean in the sight of God? We're not talking about clean hands or clean clothes or clean faces, but how do we get clean inside before the eye of God?
How to get clean? Yes, we trust in him, but how does he do it? We just sang in this song here.
Because.
Yes.
Yes, the Lord Jesus died for us. What is the last verse of this song say because the Savior.
Shed his blood.
To purge, purge.
Away our sin. You know, purging is more than just outside washing. That's getting the inside clean something. When you purge something, you get down deep.
Purge away our uh, their sin now washed in that most precious blood. Behold them white and clean. You say, how does it happen? Well, our brother Jim was up here last night and he said, he explained how another preacher said, I don't know just how it happened, but God says it happens and it does. It works.
So we expect to see.
Millions of people in heaven someday, pure and clean through the blood of the Lord Jesus.
Now let's ask God's help this morning. Let's pray.
Our God and Father, we thank you this morning for the gospel, the good news that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and he did it.
00:10:07
He accomplished when he came to do.
We pray that each one here this morning.
If there is one here who has not trusted the Lord Jesus, and we are afraid there may be.
That he or she might trust the Lord Jesus this morning. Just simply receive your word.
We ask your help and blessing in Jesus name, Amen.
Now, I know most of you get Sunday school papers, and there are Sunday school papers. I saw them last night over on the edge of the bleachers there. So if you want one today, somebody will. If they're not there, they'll have them for you somewhere else. I know most of you get Sunday school papers and then the Sunday school papers. Every week there is a memory verse. Does anybody know what the memory verse was for today?
Yes. What was it?
Go ahead, you say it. Yeah, yeah.
That's right. Very good. I, you know, I'm just always relieved when the children agree with me.
Because I know what I prepared for. Anybody else want to say their memory verse this morning? All right, let's go to you next. Yes.
Yes. Anybody else?
OK.
All right. There's no obligation. Go ahead. Yes, Sir.
Alright, go ahead.
Yeah. Anybody else? OK.
All right. Anybody else?
Go ahead.
Very good. OK.
All right.
Yeah, I I remember when I was young and I went to trouble learning a verse and then I didn't get asked to say it. I was disappointed. So I don't disappoint anybody this morning. And I got bad eyesight, so I missed somebody. Somebody else helped me. Yes.
All right, OK.
OK.
Go ahead.
Go ahead.
Someone there wanna say the verse?
Anybody else?
Go ahead, thrill here.
OK.
OK, very good.
OK, sure.
Yes, that's right. OK, very good. Anybody else?
Now with so many children saying the verse, we're glad it wasn't the long verse. One more. Who else? Go ahead.
OK, very good. By the way, we're speaking about time this morning. Do you know why we sing and sing at the beginning of Sunday school? Well, I know. Yeah. What? Why?
Because what?
Oh, you know, well, I'll tell you one reason we sing is because we should sing and we need to sing and we ought to sing. We have lots to sing about. But another reason is sometimes I think we sing. We make a point of singing at the beginning of Sunday school to give time for those to get here who were not on time.
And I'm talking about time. This morning we only have 1/2 hour. We had a short verse and it says it is time to seek the Lord.
So I want to talk about this verse.
I'll move this microwave, excuse me, the microphone move to the side here and it is time to seek the Lord.
And it's in the Bible. God says so. Hosea 10/12. We just quoted it. We could look it up in Scriptures. Let's look it up just real quick, Hosea, those of us that have Bibles.
It says Hosea chapter 10, verse 12. So to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy, break up your fallow ground, for it is time to seek the Lord till he come and reign righteousness upon you.
00:15:07
It is time to seek the Lord right now.
But that is what time is for. That's why I press upon you. This is what time is for.
Because someday there's not going to be any more time. What is going to come after time is gone? What?
Well, maybe we might want to talk about it that way. But so that might be a hard question for a child. What comes after each time after time is gone? What judgment. Oh, that's something to think about. How about what you say the Lord? But I remember, I just say who I said what?
Eternity. Eternity. That's not time.
You know, we all think about time.
Who knows?
What this is? What is? What is this?
Well, that's sort of a clock. Who knows what kind of a clock it is, Yes.
A sundial. Can you tell what time it is on that sundial?
No, you can't excuse no sun.
No sun sundial is no good if you haven't got a son to cast a shadow. That's that's the first kind of clock. I think it's the first kind of clock that human beings ever had was a sundial. And the sun would shine on this little projection on top of this little table and it would it would create a shadow on the marks on the table and tell time now inside this.
There's a verse. Who's gonna read the verse for me?
Go ahead.
Right. Remember now, thy Creator in the days of thy youth. That's right. Now, Remember now.
This is important. All right, then, another piece of something else. We're telling time. Who can tell? Tell me what this is. What is it? An hourglass? What time is it? Or how much time is left? You can't tell because, see, this is the hourglass for eternity.
Sand is all gone. You know when they make an hourglass, they put sand in it and then you turn the thing upside down and the the sand that was in the bottom is in the top and it flows down. And by how long it takes for the sand or whatever is in the hourglass to go down, they can tell time. But someday there's not going to be any time.
Who's gonna read the verse inside this alright?
Yes, come now, come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord Isaiah 118. All right, now we all know what this is. You know what? Oh yeah, what is it?
O'clock, how many clocks have you seen like this one?
I hope not too many.
What time is it?
You can't tell no hands on this clock. We have hands on clocks that they go around and point to the numbers and we know what time it is.
But this is the clock for eternity. No time. There's going to come a time when there is no time. I don't know. There's going to come a the end of time. To say there's going to come a time when there's no time, it's kind of a a illogical statement.
Alright.
All right, God, now come in. Oh, man, everywhere to repent. All right, now, what's this? What is it? A watch? Wristwatch.
Most this is a picture of a digital wristwatch. I drew this picture 20 years ago. They don't even look this cheap anymore because they got a lot more features. I made a few little pictures 20 or 30 years ago.
And wrist watches were a lot simpler. What time is it on the watch?
Yeah, someone says time to replace the batteries, but, uh.
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Time is it? There's no time on the watch.
I want to impress on it the importance of time, and I'm gonna do it another long way. Oh, I forgot to check the verse inside. Who's gonna read the verse inside for me? Uh, someone who hasn't read a verse yet?
Got upside down. That makes it difficult.
Go ahead.
Right. Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now. Notice all these verses say now, because now is God's time. Now is the time the Lord has given us. It's time to seek the Lord now.
I imagine not too many people knew these things were up there.
Most podiums don't contain balloons.
I'm gonna get one or two more. I actually have more up here.
Now, how many have ever had a balloon?
You all had a balloon.
OK, now.
And how many got a balloon sale over a year ago?
Yeah, where is that balloon now?
It popped. Goodness. And So what happens if you don't pop a balloon? If you don't pop a balloon, what happens? You tell me.
Yeah, yeah, you're looking at these three balloons here.
And these balloons are like our lives. They don't last forever. We all know that balloons are things that pop, things that shrink. They don't last forever. And they're just full of air, like little bubbles in the atmosphere. Balloons like bubbles, bubbles pop. And our lives are like this. Now let's pretend that these balloons are boys or girls who would like to name a balloon.
All right, which one you want to name?
The blue one. And what's his name?
Who?
Hammy. Hammy. OK, that's a different name. All right, This blue in here is Hemmy. How about name another balloon, just for the fun of it? Yes. Which one you want to name? The green one? What's the green one's name?
No, I'm not gonna use that name. How about another name?
Too long.
Yeah, the grade. What number? What name?
And we're, I know we named the blue one, didn't we have blue one's Hemi? And, uh, there's the green one here and the red one we're saving. Save the orange for another little story. So we got two boys here. I don't know why we, I assume. Have you had me a boy? Yeah. OK. And they're both boys.
Pretty tough look at that.
Yeah. And you know, we, we start out our lives with plans. How many here? How many have already made some plans of what you'd like to be someday? What would you like to be?
So you're asking me, OK, oh, a doctor and a Macquarie, a fish doctor. That's interesting. All right, we, we all like and you know, I want to be a doctor. When I was a boy, I thought it'd be wonderful to be a doctor. I still think it'd be wonderful to be a doctor. But, umm, the Lord didn't leave me that way. We all have plans. We think about what we're going to do. And so maybe it's, uh, Hemi here wants to be a doctor and he goes to school and.
And he has these plans.
And things been going pretty well for him and.
You know, things like that happen in life.
And what we name this fellow here, George Washington, most of the George Washingtons that have ever lived.
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Our dad, Our lives are short.
Uh, George Washington, it was a George Washington who was the president of this country and most other George Washington's were probably named after him. And uh, I want to say I just recently read a biography of George Washington and he, he was a God fearing man. I'm not sure he was a believer in the Lord Jesus, but he talked like it. I will say that can't, can't judge for sure.
How about you? Some of you talk like it too.
Are you saved? But George Washington, he, he, you know, people thought he was amazing. George Washington, the Indians said he was the man that couldn't be destroyed. They tried to kill him. They shot him. He had a horse after horse shot out under him and bullets just went by him. He never got shot, but he died.
You laugh because these are just balloons, but this is what time is like. Like time is coming to an end for every one of us. Every one of us. I'm looking forward to it.
But some people aren't ready.
Now you know what? Serious.
It says here it is time to seek the Lord, but what happens if I take time away?
And to write something else.
It is. What is it saying here?
Yeah, that's what it says. Now that is not in the Bible, so I'm going to take Hosea 1012 off in here too.
It is not yet too late to seek the Lord, but now is the time. That's what time is for. It's time to seek the Lord. That's what time is for. Everything counts, every moment counts. Everything we do counts for eternity, every moment of our lives.
It is time to seek the Lord and you know.
Time start again.
Time and our time is about us I just gonna mention that I have we use calendars to remind us the time and I have calendars recount anybody who wants a free calendar afterwards can come up and get it and our time for Sunday school is up you know there's a verse in the Bible that says the.
Harvest is over, the summer is ended, and we are not saved. I wonder this morning, is there somebody here who's late?
Late getting saved, but you're not too late yet. But you could be. The Lord Jesus could come any moment, and time will be past now.
I if I had more time I would have used more balloons.
There's more balloons in the back and I will give away the rest of the balloons I have, but not till at lunchtime. All right, lunchtime you can collect. If you want to come get a balloon, you can get one out of the back of this podium, or you can get one from me to blow up. I have extra balloons. I don't. I find that if I keep them too long, they're good. Anyway, now the idea is to remember the importance of time. It is time.
That's what it's for. The time the Lord has given you this morning. It's time to seek Him. The verse in Psalm 22, it says.
They shall praise him that seek him. Let's pray.
Our God and Father this morning, we ask. I'll press upon.
Cushi & Ahimaaz
Fathers
God's Sovereignty in spite of Our Failure
Luke 24:36-53
Reading
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Peace be unto you. But they were terrified in the frightens, supposed that they had seen a spirit.
And he said unto them, Why are you troubled, and why do costs arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself Handle me, and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and blood.
Phones, as you see me have.
And when he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet.
And while they yet believe not for joy, and wondered, he said unto him, Have you hear any meat?
And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish and of an honeycomb.
And he took it, and did eat before them, and he said unto them.
These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning me.
Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures, and said unto them, Thus it is written, And thus it behoked Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.
And you are witnesses of these things.
And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you, but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high.
And he led them out as far as the Bethany, and he lifted up his hands and blessed them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them and carried up into heaven.
And they worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Amen.
We were commenting a little on some of these verses in the previous reading meetings, but.
It's beautiful here to see, isn't it, how that the Lord Jesus appears to them and says, peace be unto you. He had met first of all with the women who had come to the sepulchre to see him. He had met with Simon Peter in a private way.
00:05:02
He had met with the two on the way to Emmaus.
And had ministered to each as the need was. And how beautiful that is.
How beautiful to see that the Lord Jesus eats each one of us in our need, whatever it might be. And as we remarked the other day yesterday, these were discouraged people. These were those who had difficulties and problems, and the Lord was working to bring their thoughts into line with his thoughts.
But then, in keeping with the aspect of this gospel, which, as we were reminded yesterday, is really the.
Gospel that most introduces Paul's ministry and the truth of the church.
I suggest we find the corporate aspect brought in here, those two on the way to Emmaus. As we remarked yesterday, if they wanted to know more, there was a place for them to be.
Simon Peter no doubt, was here too, and perhaps others. But.
The Lord Jesus.
Appears in their midst and says, peace be unto you. But there was still a difficulty. The resurrection still wasn't a reality in their hearts. The resurrection still hadn't gotten through to them. They're terrified. They're frightened. They had been accustomed in the Old Testament to things that perhaps were frightening. They had been accustomed to spirits. And sad to say, over the years, Satan had no doubt brought things in that had frightened people. And we know that he holds many in the world today in ******* through that means.
How beautiful to see how the Lord reassures them that it is He Himself.
He has a body of resurrection now. It's a body of flesh and bones, not flesh and blood, but he's real. He can be touched, He can be spoken to, He can eat in every way. If we could say it reverently, He is just as much a man as he was before, and he remains a man for all eternity in order to enjoy your company and mind and in order to be head over all things as God has directed as man.
In connection with your comments about the corporate side of things, I think it's beautiful to see the language here because it changes all of a sudden from what we have earlier in the chapter.
It's a little parenthesis, but just this little hint that helped me when I was younger in studying the Word of God. And that is to realize that when we read scripture, there are two lines of proof that run through scripture.
There's the individual aspect of things and there's the collective side of things. And I think it's helpful to discern as we go through Scripture, which is being brought before us. And sometimes there's been a great deal of confusion and difficulty by confounding the corporate side of things with the individual and vice versa. And it's interesting that as you have the two on the way to Emmaus, there are a number of statements that speak of the Lord being with them.
Because the Lord Jesus is with every individual. Wherever believers are today, the Lord Jesus is with them. He could say, before he left the disciples, and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age. It tells us in Hebrews, He'll never leave us nor forsake us. And even when we get into a path of self will, or we go in a direction that we ought not to, though, we lose a sense of the Lord's presence.
He's always there with us. He never leaves us. And the two on the way to Emmaus, perhaps they ought not to have been going to Emmaus. They ought not to certainly have been. They certainly ought not to have been discouraged and allowing the thoughts to arise in their hearts that they had. And on that road they were really not conscious of whose presence it was with them. But it says, and I want you to notice this.
Jesus himself drew near and went with them. He didn't leave them. They were conscious of who it was. And the Lord is always with us, even though we're not always conscious of it. And when they got to Emmaus, he went in to carry with them. And it says as he sat at me with them, you know, wherever believers were today, even gathered together to perhaps partake of the Lord's Supper, the Lord was with them because he's with every individual.
00:10:12
Every believer he's with. And so he was with them. Now, his brother Bill pointed out the other day, as soon as they knew him, recognized him, he vanished, because they ought not to have been at a man. And so he vanished out of there. And the same day and evening being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the mix.
Verse 26 after eight days again his disciples were within Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and set peace be unto you. I think that's a very important point to realize sometimes.
We say inadvertently, brethren, I think that the Lord is not with all believers. That is not true. He is with all believers. But there is a place where He is in the mix. He is the reference point in connection with the Lord's table. It's His table, not ours. And I think it's because we live in a world that has been so tremendously affected by.
Humanism that we have been LED in our thinking to shift and we make ourselves a reference point in connection with the truth of God.
And we get off on shaky ground, brother. We need to get our focus back on the Lord. It's He that is the reference point and we need to keep that in view. And it's interesting to go through the word of God and see how often.
That expression is used.
Perhaps one of the first times is in Genesis chapter 2, where.
You have the tree of Life in the midst of the garden, and you find it in the very last chapter of the Bible. There is the Tree of Life transplanted to the heavenly Jerusalem in the midst of the street of it.
Beautiful brother, the Lord Jesus is the one whom God has determined in His eternal purposes will occupy the central place. God has a gathering center in this world.
Against the Lord Jesus. Let's not make it ourselves. It's the Lord Jesus, and if it's his glorious person, there can't be two or three rivals.
Places, but it's keeping the focus on him and I find that.
When we inadvertently start making ourselves a reference point, we caused quite a bit of offense, and I don't think the Lord is pleased with that either. Brethren, we need to keep the focus on Him.
I tried to make some comments on where it's 35.
In a safe choice for our things were advanced in the way and how he was known of them in the middle of my friend.
No, that was very interesting. He was thinking all the things that he thought on the way and he explained to them.
In all of his scriptures that spoke about himself.
That was really dead with my eyes, his ear.
How he was known of them in the breaking of bread.
And I saw three to ourselves how important the breaking of bread is to us.
I talked to cable of Last Amazing Things and I had them, uh, what is so important to you now and what catches that you're important and what do you like in the place that you are going now?
The answer I get is, well, we have such a nice pastor and there's such a nice man who shakes hands with everybody of us and he is so dreadful and he is such a good man and that is really what we like there.
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And I thought, well, how is that possible? Because.
The breaking of bread is what the Lord Jesus himself.
Increases among us.
Did he say?
That he would be in the midst of us.
With two of three agenda together in this name that you would be in the midst of us and we are when we are together to break bread. We believe that he is in the midst of us, Godfrey.
And if we don't have that, how, how can we then say it would be in the midst of us?
I have heard some say it's a commandment that we have to be together for the breaking of bread because the God said that the Lord said this drew and remembers of me so we have to do it. But that's not true.
We don't have to do it. Our heads is drawn toward him and we want to do it. And what if we don't have it? We are missing something.
I know when we were I think so we decided becoming an appointment know the Lord and the resurrection of life.
And they had known him on earth as an earthly man, and now he was a recent man. And this was a new relaxed form of relationship. And this is the way, the basis that we know the Lord too. We know him as the rich of man. He's not even on earth, He's in heaven, but as being born again and having the same life of nature from himself by the Spirit of God, we.
Learn to appreciate him and relationship to have him as.
The one in the midst.
Umm, if we might just go back and treat briefly and in loop when he was born in the second chapter it says verse 14. Glory to God in the highest and on earth he.
Goodwill Lord men.
The Lord came bringing patience in the world on earth. It was there for them, but they rejected him. Chapter 12 and verse 5051 It says, Suppose He that I am come to give peace on earth. I tell you nay, but rather division.
What a sad consequence here is developed because of their rejection. He becomes the dividing point and uh, there is not peace on earth anymore.
Where is the case to be found? It's on a new planning. It's on the resurrection ground. And so these disciples, it says where we read through fear of the Jews. They were in the gathered shop with the door shut. You might say they were afraid. Well, well they might if you make a piece on earth.
But the Lord is showing them a new ground where peace can reign and where it can dwell.
That put himself in the midst and so it's it's it's as we behave, you know, collectively having him before us at that E can be enjoyed.
It says here in this chapter that's umm in verse 33, that they rose up the same hour and returned to Jerusalem and found the 11 gathered together and then that worked with them.
And so the name Jerusalem, I believe means the, uh, possession of peace, talking one of the believers not just to have peace, fail on the peace mean peace, perfect peace, nothing that can be added to it. But Jerusalem means the possession of peace. It also has the meaning of, uh, the abode of harmony. Not nice. It's a picture of the divine Saturn. And God wanted his people to dwell in peace with himself amidst.
00:20:07
There's something else that's, uh, very precious to my own soul. Perhaps you've enjoyed it, that if you turn to act chapter one, you see there the prominence that in Luke's writing in connection with the Upper Room. And so it's, uh, Max chapter one and verse 13 Verse. Let's read from, uh, verse 12.
Then return May unto Jerusalem from the Mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem, and when they were coming.
They went up into, they should say the upper room where both both Peter and James and get in the hole of the company that was there in the 1St 14. All continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus and with his brethren. And then you get in chapter 2. I believe that they were this statement that they were with the volume with one accord. Chapter 2, verse one, when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
And perhaps it was in that upper room in a church was formed.
And, uh, we have this little indication perhaps that you just that it was in the upper roof. And that's the Lord himself. And that's, umm, they had left the company at their brand new. And how he, he just gives them to understand, gives us to understand, gives us this encouragement that we need one another. And Lord would desire to gather us to where it is in the midst and we need one another. We need everyone. And, umm, the Lord is, uh.
Precious characters. Shepherd waited for these dear ones to come, and they were there when he appeared. He waited for them to arrive. And so it's a very precious thing. Not only that he wanted to be with them in the midst, but he wanted those two to be there.
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Put it down to the, do we thank the Lord from the assembly? Do we thank the Lord that, uh, we see him in the midst by faith? It's a wonderful thing to take him to, uh, enjoy a conviction of the Lord himself, His heart club. He introduced them to that upper room and, uh, it's his provision and the day. It's great that we might see in his presence and enjoy him in the midst. We often thank him for it.
And I like the spirit in which you put that out, Brother Robert, because.
Sad to say, let's be honest.
This precious truth has become an object of much controversy and argument and bad feeling and offense.
But it's presented in this chapter.
In a totally different life, it's presented as.
The focal point of healing and comfort for those that on the one hand, had experienced a great deal of difficulty, has seen their hopes, their aspirations and everything seemingly shattered.
And yet the Lord was revealing to them in a far more wonderful way that which would supersede in every way what they had hoped for. They were looking for an earthly Kingdom. The Lord was going to give them a heavenly Kingdom. They were looking for something that would be established down here. The Lord is going to give them something that was far better up there. They were looking for a continuation of everything under Judaism. The Lord says I have something far, far better.
That was, and I admit that it is not revealed here. It's later on, but the seeds of it are here. The Lord is at worse as I'm going to reveal something that has been hidden in God from long before the foundation of the world, and it's about to be brought out, the councils of God concerning the church. And so the Lord's presence here is not given to us as something which is to create controversy and division. Sad to say, in the hands of man. It has done that.
But it's presented here as the one who.
As he had met their needs and met their problems collectively or individually, now he is going to become, as we've had it, the focal point collectively. And what a beautiful thing that is. He'll be, if we could say it, the focal point up there in heaven. And every believer recognizes that. How wonderful that he wants to have that place down here among his people.
00:35:36
Union with Christ could not be experienced when He was down here in this world was good. It was consequent upon His death and resurrection and ascension into glory that now we are brought into that wonderful position of union with Christ and glory. It's a reality, brethren, you and I are intimately connected with the real man of flesh and bones in the glory of God.
He is the head of his church, and we are the members of his body. But I enjoy this in verse 39 says, Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself handle me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have noticed in First Corinthians chapter 15 and verse 50.
The apostle here says now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, neither does corruption inherit incorruption. What characterizes life in our bodies, our natural bodies down here in connection with the first creation is flesh and blood. The life is in the in the blood. You read that?
The other night in Leviticus 17. And so that's what is characteristic of life in these bodies today. But in new creation, and I like to think of it, brethren, it's not the second creation, it's new creation because it is characteristically new. It will always be new. It cannot be corrupted. It cannot die. Its connection with incorruption and immortality.
Wonderful to think of a never age, never ever.
Any, uh, thought of dying in connection with new creation? And so the Lord Jesus in new creation says a spirit hath not flesh and bones. So it's very real body that he had he said handle me and see.
Yes, they can touch him. He was very real.
Physically, but not in flesh and blood. It was in flesh and bones because it was a connection with new creation.
I'm sorry. Excuse me? You're gonna finish your remark. Go ahead. No, you go ahead.
But only going to reiterate what was said the other day and that is that what a thought it is to our hearts that the Lord Jesus.
Has a resurrection body today, and he ascended up to heaven with that resurrection body. And when the Lord comes for us, you and I too will have a resurrection body. And as you say, Brother Bob, there will be nothing.
In that resurrection body to remind us in any way of sin.
I remember being at a funeral quite a few years ago.
And a husband and father had gone to be with the Lord, and his body had been wasted by a long boat with cancer that had sold, shall we say. I don't know whether the word disfigured is right, but so wasted his body that he was scarcely recognizable, and to such an extent that the casket was closed.
00:40:12
And I remember saying to his son, who was about my age, I said to him, his name was Bob. I said, well, Bob, I said, the next time we see your father, it will be a body of glory. And he responded beautifully because he knew the Lord, too. And he said, oh, yes, Bill, won't it be wonderful? And I said, your father won't even have Gray hair.
Well, his father was one of those people who had had a full head of hair all his life.
But he had gone prematurely great, so that his son had never remembered him with anything but Gray hair. Oh, he said. I never thought of that. He said. My father without Gray hair.
But suddenly it dawned on him. Yes, his father was not born with Gray hair. His father didn't have Gray hair in grade school. His father would have not one little aspect of sin when he saw him again. Well, that's intended to be a practical encouragement to our hearts.
But there is one that will have marks in his body up there, and that's the Lord Jesus. He'll have those marks, the only one that will have any mark that will remind us of this world and shall we say it, of sin in order that we might never forget that He suffered force. This morning we had a loaf and a cup of force, and we won't have that in heaven. But there will be those nail prints in that spear mark in his side that will always remind us we're all eternity.
How are we there? Because he hung on Calvary's crumbs. Sorry, Bob, Go ahead.
Well, I was just going to ask the question. In verse 40 it says he showed them his hands and his feet.
Why is it in John's Gospel he shows them his hands and his side? Why the difference?
Well, it is John, and only John that records that a soldier with a spear pierced his side and forthwith came throughout blood and water. And it's John who later on in his epistle takes up the ground of our fellowship and communion. Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ, and as a result, fellowship one with another.
Brought into that circle of fellowship and what is the basis of it? The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sins. We use that part of that verse in the gospel last night. I used to wonder why it was that that that statement was there where he's speaking about fellowship and communion there in the first chapter of first John. But that's really it, isn't it? It's the basis of our fellowship. How can we have fellowship with the Father and with the Son? How are we brought into the circle of fellowship with one another as a result?
It's the blood of Christ that's the basis. So John is the one who records the soldier with a spear piercing his side. And John, he shows them that mark that he had received at that time when forthwith flowed throughout blood and water. But in Luke, he's the perfect man in the circumstances of life down here. And so it's his hand, his hands and his feet, those hands that had served and dispensed blessing on every hand.
Those feats that had traversed the dusty streets of Palestine as the perfect man, they had been pierced. And so, as Bill said, he's going to retain those marks. I think it's illustrated, very beautiful in the what we often refer to as the law of the leopard, where you have the two birds. Remember, in Leviticus 14, one of those birds was killed in an earthen vessel over running water. That bird speaks of Christ going into death.
But then there was a second bird which speaks of Christ in resurrection and ascension, because after the first bird was killed and his blood was shed, the second bird was let loose in an open field. But before that bird was let loose in the open field, the blood from the first bird was taken and sprinkled on the feathers of the live bird, And as that bird winged its way to the open heavens, it bore.
Chapter 26.
Proverbs, chapter 26.
And verse two. Now I'm going to read this in Mr. Darby's translation.
00:45:02
Progress 26 and verse 2 as the Sparrow for flitting about as the Sparrow as the swallow by flying. Going to stop there because that's what I want to point out, the Sparrow flitting about, the swallow flying. Now let's go to Psalm 84 where you have those two birds brought together again.
Psalm 84 and verse 3.
Yeah, the Pharaoh has found in house.
And the swallow anest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God, my wife likes to feed the birds in the winter. And we have a bird feeder outside our kitchen window. And if you watch those sparrows as they come to the feeder, they're continually flitting about. They seem like a very nervous bird. They just never seem to stop. And they they're on the feeder and down on the snow and on the branches continually flitting about.
The swallow is brought before us in Scripture as the restless bird. We used to watch them at the cottage when I was a boy. They'd come out at the twilight and they'd just swoop back and forth across the lake, no doubt getting those insects that fly at twilight a very restless bird. But here we find in the 84th Psalm that the nervous bird and the restless bird have found a place of rest for themselves and for their young.
A place of peace, a place where there can be that rest and sustenance that's needed. And rather, that's what the assembly ought to be. You notice in the 84 song, even my altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God. And when we come to the assembly, brethren, do we make it a place where there's contention? Do we come with a lack of something to offer for the sustenance of ourselves and for our brethren? Or are we?
Exercise that rather than it being a place where everybody's nervous about what's gonna happen or be said or some problem where everybody's.
Restless because of things that are going on. No, that ought not to characterize the assembly. Well, I know we've got a little way. It's just an application. But I just thought he said peace be to them, peace be unto you. It ought to be a place of peace. And he said, have you any meat, brethren? Do we have any meat when we come to the local assembly?
Can you say, Jim, that the Lord could have produced it, which is true, but it is interesting and even in his life down here.
He is the means that were at end and even though they were perhaps something that was so small like this. 5 loaves and two fishes.
Got that little boy brought.
What was that in comparison with the need? When that was put into the Lord's hands, it became enough to feed all. And there was.
Something to take back with them when they went back 12 baskets full. And I, I think that's an encouragement too to us. You might say, what do I have? I don't have anything.
Don't despise small things. Put it into the hands of Lord. You younger brother, you have a question. Sometimes a question opens things up in a very good way in an assembly meeting. But he exercised in the Lord's presence what little you may have.
To bring it out so that the Lord can take it and use that with our souls. I think that's an important point.
The Lord seemed to be establishing well his communion and fellowship with him in the act of heat this year. There's something about when you need together that the bonding is more close and it's it's the way of it one way of expressing fellowship, isn't it? They actually even the world recognizes this principles and they were they were having a hard time getting this confidence of the Lord of our lives.
And and that in that invitation he built was near them, incapable of enjoying fellowship with him.
No, we don't see the log in our edge, but it's C is taking great care, especially in asking them for food. That's one thing they produce the food, but it's another thing to ask them for the food. They contributed to food, and then he took it and ate it before them. That really bonded them together, didn't it? And uh, so how it shows us how the Lord desires our fellowship.
00:50:19
Hmm.
Well, going on here, we find that the Lord then begins to speak to them.
In verse 43, he takes what they had offered and eats it. As you say, Doug, it bonds them together. But then he points out that all of this was what he had said to them. It was only a reflection of what had been given very clearly in the law and the law of Moses and in the prophets and in the Psalms.
What a wonderful revelation.
He had no doubt gone over all of that with those on the way to Emmaus, but now he reminds his disciples, and what does he do here? He opens their understanding.
Sometimes you and I find a bit of fault with the disciples, at least I do, in not being more intelligent. The Lord had over and over again told them he had to go to the cross, He had to suffer, and that he would rise again the third day. They couldn't seem to get it, as we would say in modern language, and even after he had obviously risen from the dead and the evidence was very clear, somehow, as we see here, it was very hard for them to.
Understand what all of that meant.
But we need to remember too that they were operating as we might say.
On Old Testament ground, they hadn't yet received the Spirit of God. What a difference it means when the Lord opens our understanding. Now we know, of course, that the Spirit of God didn't come down until some time after this, on the day of Pentecost. But what a difference it is when the Lord opens our understanding. And I would suggest that there is an order here that is important to us.
On the one hand, we find individuals who are in difficulty, individuals who didn't understand, individuals who evidently were in the wrong. Maybe there's more to it than that.
No, I think that's to me. Anyway, that's right on Jim, because it's we Get the facts of the go of the Lord's sufferings and the Gospels. You get the breathing of his heart and how he felt inwardly, whether from himself, from the sufferings from man, or shall we say it with reverence, His sufferings from the hands of God in Psalm 22. You get that in the Psalms and that involves.
Our hearts getting close to him, doesn't it? It draws out our affections.
It's not merely head knowledge, it's heart knowledge.
Don't we see in his head just questions are also just to come back a little bit to the hands when to speak again. His hands he used for blessings when he touched the label, nobody was supposed to touch. He touched the level and was healed. He got his uh, babies that were brought to him into his arms, but.
Disciples were trying to hinder them. He documented his arms and he stroked him as a lead and and he blessed them. How much of A joy in my fantasy for the mothers when they could say, well, this baby has been in the eyes of the Lord and thank you to that. What what a joy of the whole life as much as I've been.
No.
Cruise probably blank by the lower fees and so I agree our first time last tribe when we are written in his presence when we come together we have blessed by him and we we might not realize it, but it is true and when we take up his fee.
How many trips did you make with his he? He went all the way up to tire and came back. How many times did he come back from Jerusalem again just to do a service for his people? How many extra trips did he do all walking with his feet and then when he made he had no horse ever that you read them?
00:55:13
And when we think of the software also when they drove those nail shoots, his hands and his feet, there were suffering involved for everything that if that should ever happen to us, the suffering that this would cause and the suffering that also caused the cause for cause to him and the enemies, they must have done that on purpose. Then they were just using hands and the fees to nail him on their own nutrition cause of extra suffering.
On the one hand, as we well know, we can never share anything to do with the sufferings that brought us to Himself. We know that, and in Philippians 3 there. The fellowship of His sufferings, I believe, is in connection with knowing Him.
That I may know Him in the fellowship of his sufferings. And then something that doesn't seem to fit the power of his resurrection, but the power of His resurrection is mentioned first. It says that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings.
A brother made this statement many years ago, and I repeat it because it's worth remembering. He said all our blessings come through the obedience and suffering of the Lord Jesus.
And our enjoyment of those blessings comes in the same way. And so I would suggest that in following a rejected Christ, we are going to appreciate Him and appreciate our blessings through suffering.
Not very pleasant in one sense. Not very pleasant to think about, but yet that's the way the Lord works with us.
But then there is the aspect of service and that's brought in next in the chapter here, because what we have here in verse 47 and 48, I would suggest is properly the Commission to the church today. There are other commissions given for example, in Matthew that have more of a Jewish context to them. And we don't of course object in any way to their being used in application today. But the fulfillment really awaits the.
Tribulation period and the ushering into the Millennium. And so that's why the Lord says I am with you in Matthew 28 until the end of the age, Not I am with you until I come, but till the end of the age, But here in Luke, as befitting the character of the Gospel.
It's really the Christian Commission. And where does the blessing start? Right in the very place where the Lord had been crucified. What a what a tribute to the grace of God. The very place where there had been the worst opposition to the Lord, the worst acts of hatred and enmity against God's beloved Son. There God says, as it were. And I'm going to start right here where the worst sin has been manifested.
The blessing is going to begin, and that Commission goes on with you and me today. We have that responsibility today year, witnesses of these things, remission of sins preached in His name among all nations. Is there going to be suffering in connection with that? Yes, there is, in one way or another. We don't feel that much of it in these favored lands, but we feel it. And some of our dear brethren that are late, peace be unto you.
But they were terrified of the frightens. Suppose that they had seen a spirit.
And he said unto them, Why are you troubled, and why do costs arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself handle me and see. For a spirit hath not flesh and blood bones, as ye see me have.
01:00:13
And when he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet.
And while they yet believed not for joy.
And wondered, he said under him, Have you hear any meat?
And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish and of a honeycomb.
And he took it, and did eat before them, and he said unto them.
These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning me.
Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures, and said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behold Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.
And ye are witnesses of these things.
And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you, but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high.
And he led them out as far as the Bethany, and he lifted up his hands and blessed them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them and carried up into heaven. And they worshipped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.
And were continually in the temple, praising and blessing God. Amen.
But we were commenting a little on some of these verses in the previous reading meetings. But.
It's beautiful here to see, isn't it? How that?
The Lord Jesus appears to them and says, Peace be unto you. He had met first of all with the women who had come to the sepulchre to see him. He had met with Simon Peter in a private way.
He had met with the two on the way to Emmaus.
And had ministered to each as the need was. And how beautiful that is.
How beautiful to see that the Lord Jesus eats each one of us in our need, whatever it might be. And as we remarked the other day yesterday, these were discouraged people. These were those who had difficulties and problems, and the Lord was working to bring their thoughts into line with his thoughts.
But then, in keeping with the aspect of this gospel, which, as we were reminded yesterday, is really the.
Gospel that most introduces Paul's ministry and the truth of the church.
I suggest we find the corporate aspect brought in here. Those two on the way to Emmaus. As we remarked yesterday, if they wanted to know more, there was a place for them to be. Simon Peter, no doubt, was here too.
And perhaps others, but.
The Lord Jesus.
Appears in their midst and says, peace be unto you. But there was still a difficulty. The resurrection still wasn't a reality in their hearts. The resurrection still hadn't gotten through to them. They're terrified. They're frightened. They had been accustomed in the Old Testament to things that perhaps were frightening. They had been accustomed to spirits. And sad to say, over the years, Satan had no doubt brought things in that had frightened people. And we know that he holds many in the world today in ******* through that means.
How beautiful to see how the Lord reassures them that it is He Himself.
He has a body of resurrection now. It's a body of flesh and bones, not flesh and blood, but he's real. He can be touched, He can be spoken to, He can eat in every way. If we could say it reverently, He is just as much a man as he was before, and he remains a man for all eternity in order to enjoy your company and mind and in order to be head over all things as God has directed.
01:05:20
As man.
In connection with your comments about the corporate side of things, I think it's beautiful to see the language here because it changes all of a sudden from what we have earlier in the chapter. I just, this is a little parenthesis, but just this little hint that helped me when I was younger and studying the Word of God. And that is to realize that when we read Scripture, there are two lines of proof that run through Scripture.
There's the individual aspect of things and there's the collective side of things. And I think it's helpful to discern as we go through Scripture, which is being brought before us. And sometimes there's been a great deal of confusion and difficulty by confounding the corporate side of things with the individual and vice versa. And it's interesting that as you have the two on the way to Emmaus, there are a number of statements that speak of the Lord being with them.
Because the Lord Jesus is with every individual. Wherever believers are today, the Lord Jesus is with them. He could say, before he left the disciples, and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age. It tells us in Hebrews, He'll never leave us nor forsake us. And even when we get into a path of self will, or we go in a direction that we ought not to, though, we lose a sense of the Lord's presence.
He's always there with us. He never leaves us. And the two on the way to Emmaus, perhaps they ought not to have been going to Emmaus. They ought not to certainly have been. They certainly ought not to have been discouraged and allowing the thoughts to arise in their hearts that they had. And on that road they were really not conscious of whose presence it was with them. But it says, and I want you to notice this.
Jesus himself drew near and went with them. He didn't leave them. They were conscious of who it was. And the Lord is always with us, even though we're not always conscious of it. And when they got to Emmaus, he went in to carry with them. And it says as he sat at me with them, you know, wherever believers were today, even gathered together to perhaps partake of the Lord's Supper, the Lord was with them because he's with every individual.
Every believer he's with. And so he was with them now, his brother Bill pointed out the other day, as soon as they knew him, recognized him, he vanished because they ought not to have been a demand. And so he vanished out of their sight. There was a work in their hearts that drew them back to Jerusalem. And now as they join themselves to the other disciples who were gathered together in Jerusalem, it doesn't say Jesus came and stood with them.
He came and stood in the midst. There's quite a difference between the Lord Jesus being with believers individually and being in the midst collectively. And it really is only in the path of corporate obedience, as we often point out, the man bearing the following, the man bearing the picture of water, the Word of God applied in the power of the Spirit, that we can claim to have the Lord in the midst collectively. And so when it's the midst, it's the focal point.
You know, there's been lots of brethren together with us here this weekend, but there's only one person we've spoken of as being in the midst of being the focal point. No other brother or sister has been the focal point of these meetings. They've been with us and we with them, but it's the Lord Jesus I trust we see in the midst that's the focal point. It's the hub of the wheel that we often use the illustration of. And so it's beautiful now that when they return, their hearts burn within them. They return.
There's the others gathered together. The Lord comes and he stands in the midst. Maybe we compare some development of that.
Same in John's Gospel chapter 20. I think it's beautiful to see that point.
In verse 19.
And the same day of evening being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut, where the disciples were assembled for privileges, came Jesus and stood in the mess.
01:10:13
Verse 26 After eight days, again his disciples were within Thomas with him. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, peace be unto you. I think that's a very important point to realize sometimes.
We say inadvertently, brethren, I think, uh, the Lord is not with all believers. That is not true. He is with all believers, but there is a place where he is in the mix. He is the reference point in connection with.
The Lord's table, it's his table, not ours. And I think it's because we live in a world that has been so tremendously affected by humanism that we have been LED in our thinking to shift and we make ourselves a reference point in connection with the truth of God.
And we get off on shaky ground, Brother, we need to get our focus back on the Lord. Is he?
That is the.
The reference point, and we need to keep that in view, and it's interesting to go through the word of God and see how often that expression is used.
Perhaps one of the first times is in Genesis chapter 2, where.
You have the tree of life in the midst of the garden, and you find it in the very last chapter of the Bible.
There's the Tree of Life transplanted to the heavenly Jerusalem in the midst of the street of it.
Beautiful brother, the Lord Jesus is the one who God has determined in his eternal purposes will occupy the central place. God has a gathering center in this world. It's the Lord Jesus. Let's not make it ourselves. It's the Lord Jesus, and if it's his glorious person, there can't be two or three rivals places, but it's keeping the focus on him and I find that.
When we inadvertently start making ourselves a reference point, we cause quite a bit of offense, and I don't think the Lord is pleased with that either. Brethren, we need to keep the focus on Him.
I tried to make.
Comments on Work 35.
And they told what things were advanced in the way and how he was known of them in the Express.
No doubt it was very interesting. He was thinking all the things that he called the on the way and he explained to them.
In all the scriptures that spoke about himself.
About 12 years and that took my eyes this year while he was known of them in the breaking of bread.
And I thought that to ourselves, how important is to us?
I talked to Pablo of Last Amazing and I asked them, uh, what is so important to you now and what catches that your importance and what do you like in the place that you are going now?
Yes, or I get is.
Well, we have such a nice pastor and there's such a nice man who shakes hands with everybody of us and he is so dreadful and he is such a good man and that is really what we like there.
And I thought, well, how is that possible? Because the breaking of bread is what the Lord Jesus himself.
Initiated among us.
01:15:01
Did he say?
That he would be in the midst of us.
With two of three agenda together in his name, that He would be in the midst of us and we are when we are.
Together to break bread. We believe that He is in the midst of us Daughtry.
And if we don't have that, how, how can we then say it would be in the midst of us?
I have heard some say it's a commandment that we have to be together for the break in your breath, because the God who said that the Lord said this drew in the remembrance of me, so we can do it. But that's not true.
We don't have to do it. Our heart is drawn toward Him and we want to do it. And what if we don't have it? We are missing something.
I know when we were underway and we didn't break bread anymore, we were very sad because we were missing the Lord in the main among his people and we were going back to the place where they were very impressed.
And then we could be happy again.
And I believe that is actually the central point, that when the Lord Jesus is through in remembrance of me, that we do that out of the innermost of our hearts, not just because we are them. It just has to be there.
It's it's because of the atmosphere, because our hearts are draw towards the road. That's why we want to be there and that's what I saw.
And be so important in this world. How he was known of them in the breaking of breath.
As long as we recognize who is in the midst, then we're going to be preserved there, aren't we? That's what's going to keep us. I've noticed that sometimes you have a young person, or maybe someone not so young, who comes to the meetings and they see from Scripture and the power of the Spirit that the Lord is in the midst, and they're thankful to see it. They asked to remember the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread, and they speak of the Lord's table and so on.
And then perhaps time goes on, but you never heard someone say when they left the assembly that they were leaving the Lord. You ever hear someone say, well, I'm going to leave the Lord, I'm not going to come to meeting anymore. No. Why? Because they have lost sight of who it is that's there. They've got their eyes on something else, maybe people, maybe dear brethren. And thank God they are dear brethren. Maybe some circumstance. Maybe as Brother Eckert said, they see something out there that has attracted them.
Uh, more, but they really, the, the bottom line is they've really lost sight of who it is that's in, in the mid. And brethren, if we can keep Christ as the focus or the reference point, as Bob has said, that's what's going to preserve us even amid difficulties in the whole pathway of the Lord Jesus. When the disciples had the Lord as the focal point, they went on happily together when they got occupied with one another or some circumstance or something that was going on in with some others.
Then there were problems, then there were fears, there were conflicts, there were troubles, there was bickering amongst one another, but as long as they had the Lord Jesus as that reference point, that is what kept them going on together happily with the Lord Jesus and brethren, that is what is going to preserve us. To tell you a little story, I knew a sister, she's with the Lord now, but there were some difficulties in the assembly where she was and.
She had told the brother that this was it, she wasn't going to come to meeting anymore and not to expect her that next Lords day at the breaking of bread. Well the brother didn't say much to her but he simply said to her remember one thing sister, he hath done nothing amiss amiss and that it is he who is in the midst. Well this brother told me himself. He said 5 to 11 came and always seemed to be there and he looked around and he thought well she's not going to come and.
01:20:09
Set at about one minute to 11:00, the door opened, my sister walked in and sat down at the Lord's table, and she was preserved there till the day the Lord took her. I had the privilege of taking her funeral. But she realized through that statement that it was the Lord there that was the drawer, it was the Lord that was the gatherer. And as long as we keep that, brethren before us, I say we'll be preserved and encouraged to go on. Not that we become indifferent to difficulties. Sometimes they arise and they need to be dealt with.
But if Christ is really the focal point, then we're going to be there. And can I just say this too, before we pass on from this subject, There is a day coming when the Lord Jesus is going to have all of his own around him. And in Revelation 5, he's going to be in the midst of the heavenly company. And if we were to go back to the Old Testament, there's a day coming when he's going to be in the midst of his earthly people as well. And you get that in Zephaniah and and other of the Old Testament prophet. And what a joy it's going to be to his heart to be in the midst of his own.
In the coming day and their unhindered, he'll be the object. But brethren, he doesn't want to have to wait until that day.
He wants the joy. He wants the joy now of having.
His own around himself and being the reference point and being in the midst, He wants the joy. And brethren, if it brings joy to His heart, think of what it will do to our hearts to seek grace, to be there to satisfy His heart until He comes.
I think there will be disciples as becoming an appointed know the Lord and resurrection of life.
And they had known him on earth as an earthly man, and now he lives a ruthless man. And this was a new, relaxed form of relationship. And this is the way, the basis that we know the Lord too.
We know our mental man, he's not even on earth, he's in heaven, but as being born again and having a life of nature from himself by the Spirit of God, we.
Learn to appreciate him in a relationship. We have him as, uh, the one in the midst, umm, if we might just go back and trace briefly and in loop when he was born.
In the second chapter it says verse 14 Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, goodwill toward him the Lord came, bringing peace in the world.
On Earth, it was there for them, but they rejected him.
Chapter 12 and verse 5051 It says, Suppose ye, that I am come to give peace on earth. I tell you nay, but rather division.
What a sad consequence here is developed because of their rejection. He becomes the dividing point and uh, there is not peace on earth anymore.
Where is the beach to be found? It's on a new plane. It's on resurrection ground. And so these disciples, it says where we read through fear of the Jews, they were in the gathered shut the with the door shut. You might say they're afraid. Well, well, they might if you think of peace on earth.
But the Lord is showing them a new ground where peace can reign and where they can dwell.
That with himself in the midst.
And so it's, it's, it's as we've had, you know, collectively having him before us that that piece can be enjoyed.
Says here in this chapter that's UMM in verse 33, that they rose up the same hour and returned to Jerusalem and found the 11 gathered together in them that worked with them. And so the means Jerusalem I believe means the UMM.
Possession of peace gauging 1. The believer is not just to have peace. Salem is peace, mean peace, perfect peace. Nothing that can be added to it. But Jerusalem means the possession of peace. It also has the meaning of the abode of harmony. Not nice. It's a picture of the divine Saturn. And God wanted his people to dwell in peace with himself amidst there's something else that's, uh, very precious of my own soul. Perhaps you've enjoyed it. But if you turn to Acts chapter one.
01:25:24
You see there the prominence that in Luke's writing in connection with the Upper Room. And so it says that's chapter one and verse 13. Let's read from, uh, verse 12.
Then return the unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem, the 7th day's journey. And when they were coming, they went up into it should say the upper room, where both both Peter and James would get the whole of the company that was there. And the 1St 14 all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren. And then you get in chapter 2.
I believe that they were this, uh, statement that they were with, uh, all and with one and four, chapter 2, verse one, when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one important one place. And perhaps that wasn't that upper room in the church was formed and that we have this little indication, perhaps I suggest that it was in the upper roof and that's with the Lord itself and that, umm, they had left the company of their brand new and how he just gives them to understand, gives us to understand, gives us this encouragement.
That we need one another, and Lord would desire to gather us to where He is in the midst and we need one another. We need everyone. And umm, the Lord is the precious character to shepherd waited for these dear ones to come, and they were there when He appeared. He waited for Him to arrive. And so it's a very strange thing. Not only that He wanted to be with them in the midst, but He wanted those two to be there. And then He himself will say that He's not in there.
I would just ask that do we thank the Lord for the assembly? Do we thank the Lord that we see him in the midst by faith? It's a wonderful faith to take into, uh, enjoy provision of the Lord himself, His heart club. He introduced them to that upper room.
And, uh, and this provision and the biggest, uh, great that we might see in this presence and enjoy in the midst, we all be thankful for it.
And I like the spirit in which you put that out, Brother Robert, because.
Sad to say, let's be honest.
This precious truth has become an object of much controversy and argument and bad feeling and offense.
But it's presented in this chapter.
In a totally different life, it's presented as the focal point of healing and comfort for those that, on the one hand, had experienced a great deal of difficulty, has seen their hopes, their aspirations and everything seemingly shattered.
And yes, the Lord was revealing to them in a far more wonderful way that which would supersede in every way what they had hoped for. They were looking for an earthly Kingdom. The Lord was going to give them a heavenly Kingdom. They were looking for something that would be established down here. The Lord was going to give them something that was far better up there. They were looking for a continuation of everything under Judaism. The Lord says I have something far, far better.
That was, and I admit that it is not revealed here. It's later on, but the seeds of it are here. The Lord is at worse as I'm going to reveal something that has been hidden in God from long before the foundation of the world, and it's about to be brought out, the councils of God concerning the church. And so the Lord's presence here is not given to us as something which is to create controversy and division. Sad to say, in the hands of man. It has done that.
But it's presented here as the one who.
As he had met their needs and met their problems collectively or individually, Now he is going to become, as we've had at the focal point collectively. And what a beautiful thing that is. He'll be, if we could say it, the focal point up there in heaven. And every believer recognizes that. How wonderful that he wants to have that place down here among his people.
01:30:07
Union with Christ could not be experienced when He was down here in this world was good. It was consequent upon His death and resurrection and ascension into glory that now we are brought into that wonderful position of union with Christ and glory. It's a reality, brethren, you and I are intimately connected with the real man of flesh and bones in the glory of God.
He is the head of this church and we are the members of his body. But I, I enjoy this uh in verse 39 says, behold my hands and my feet that it is by myself. Handle me and see for a spirit.
That not flesh and bones, as ye see me have noticed in First Corinthians chapter 15 and verse 50.
The apostle here says now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, neither does corruption inherit incorruption. What characterizes life in our bodies, our natural bodies down here in connection with the first creation is flesh and blood. The life is in the in the blood. You read that?
The other night in Leviticus 17. And so that's what is characteristic of life in these bodies today. But in new creation, and I like to think of it, brethren, it's not the second creation, it's new creation because it is characteristically new. It will always be new. It cannot be corrupted. It cannot die. Its connection with incorruption and immortality.
Wonderful to think of it. Never age, Never ever any.
Thought of dying in connection with new creation and so the Lord Jesus in new creation says a spirit hath not flesh and bones, so it's very real body that he had he said handle me and see.
Yes, they can touch him. He was very real physically, but not in flesh and blood. It was in flesh and bones because it was a connection with new creation.
I'd like to hear a mark. I'm sorry. Excuse me. You're going to finish your remark. Go ahead.
Well, only going to reiterate what was said the other day and that is that what a thought it is to our hearts that the Lord Jesus.
Has a resurrection body today, and he ascended up to heaven with that resurrection body. And when the Lord comes for us, you and I too will have a resurrection body. And as you say, Brother Bob, there will be nothing.
In that resurrection body to remind us in any way of sin. I remember being at a funeral quite a few years ago.
And a husband and father had gone to be with the Lord, and his body had been wasted by.
Along both with cancer that had so shall we say? I don't know whether the word disfigured is right, but so wasted his body that he was scarcely recognizable, and to such an extent that the casket was closed.
And I remember saying to his son, who was about my age, I said to him, his name was Bob. I said, well, Bob, I said, the next time we see your father, it will be a body of glory. And he responded beautifully because he knew the Lord, too. And he said, oh, yes, Bill, won't it be wonderful? And I said, your father won't even have Gray hair.
Well, his father was one of those people who had had a full head of hair all his life.
But he had gone prematurely Gray, so that his son had never remembered him with anything but Gray hair. Oh, he said. I never thought of that. He said. My father without Gray hair.
01:35:03
But suddenly it dawned on him. Yes, his father was not born with Gray hair. His father didn't have Gray hair in grade school. His father would have not one little aspect of sin when he saw him again. Well, that's intended to be a practical encouragement to our hearts.
But there is one that will have marks in his body up there, and that's the Lord Jesus. He'll have those marks, the only one that will have any mark that will remind us of this world and shall we say it, of sin in order that we might never forget that He suffered force. This morning we had a loaf and a cup of force, and we won't have that in heaven. But there will be those nail prints in that spear mark in His side that will always remind us for all eternity.
How are we there? Because he hung on Calvary's crumbs. Sorry, Bob, Go ahead.
Well, I was just going to ask the question. In verse 40 it says he showed them his hands and his feet.
Why is it in John's Gospel he shows them his hands and his side? Why the difference?
Well, it is John and only John that records that a soldier with a spear appears to his side and forth with came throughout blood and water. And it's John who later on in his epistle takes up the ground of our fellowship and communion. Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ, and as a result fellowship one with another.
Brought into that circle of fellowship and what is the basis of it? The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sins. We use that part of that verse in the gospel last night. I used to wonder why it was that that that statement was there where he's speaking about fellowship and communion there in the first chapter of first John. But that's really it, isn't it? It's the basis of our fellowship. How can we have fellowship with the Father and with the sons? How are we brought into the circle of fellowship with one another as a result?
It's the blood of Christ that's the basis. So John is the one who records the soldier with a spear piercing his side. And John and John, he shows them that mark that he had received at that time when forthwith flowed throughout blood and water. But in Luke, he's the perfect man in the circumstances of life down here. And so it's his, his hands and his feet, those hands that had served and dispensed blessing on every hand.
Those feats that had traversed the dusty streets of Palestine as the perfect man, they had been pierced. And so, as Bill said, he's going to retain those marks. I think it's illustrated very beautiful in the what we often refer to as the law of the leopard, where you have the two birds.
Remember, in Leviticus 14, one of those birds was killed in an earthen vessel over running water.
That bird speaks of Christ going into death, but then there was a second bird which speaks of Christ in resurrection and ascension, because after the first bird was killed and his blood was shed, the second bird was let loose in an open field.
But before that bird was let loose in the open field, the blood from the first bird was taken and sprinkled on the feathers of the live bird. And as that bird winged its way to the open heavens, it bore on its feathers the marks of atonement. And so we sometimes sing that hymn. And his own wounds in heaven declare the atoning work is done. And when we see those wounds, brethren, it's interesting that it never refers to them as scars.
You know, a scar is something that heals over, a wound is something that's fresh. And even the God's earthly people, when they're restored in a coming day, what do they say? What are these? Not scars, but what are these wounds? A wound is something I say that's fresh. And rather, there will be a fresh reminder for all eternity of what the Lord Jesus accomplished on Calvary's cross for the glory of God and for our eternal blessing. And we're never going to forget for all eternity the basis on which.
We have been brought into eternal blessings.
Was that your thought too, Bob? Do you see it that way? Hmm.
I'd like to make just a very, very practical application, brethren, in connection with something that we've already said and spoken of at great lengths. And then the fact that the Lord Jesus says to them, have ye here any meat? Now we've been speaking about the assembly and the corporate aspect of things and so on. And perhaps there's a hint here that in this chapter that there are two things, other things, but in this chapter two things.
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That ought to characterize the place where the Lord is in the midst. One is peace, we've spoken of that, and the other is food or sustenance. And I just want to say a word to those of us who are a little further along in the past and have responsibility. I know there's brothers here who have responsibility in your local assembly and so on. You know, we ought to keep this before our souls at all times.
Are our local assemblies a place of peace and rest for ourselves, for our families, and for our brethren? And are they a place where the Saints of God can come and be fed? Notice he says to the disciples, he could have produced something to eat, as he did on other occasions. But he says to them, Have ye any need often think of that We go home, you know, we come together on an occasion like this, and.
Been some good things before us to feed our souls. But brethren, what about on Wednesday night? What about in the local reading meetings? In the local meetings for ministry, are we exercised that we would come with some meat that there would be food for, for those that are there? I want to, if you'll allow me, I want to connect 2 verses in the Old Testament in this regard that I've exercised my own soul. Going to read them. They might seem like strange verses, but we'll make a little application.
The first one is in Proverbs chapter 26.
Proverbs, chapter 26.
And verse two. Now I'm going to read this in Mr. Darby's translation.
Progress 26 and verse 2 as the Sparrow for flitting about as the Sparrow as the swallow by flying. Going to stop there because that's what I want to point out, the Sparrow flitting about, the swallow flying. Now let's go to Psalm 84 where you have those two birds brought together again.
Psalm 84 and verse 3.
Yeah, the Sparrow hath found in house.
And the swallow and nest for herself where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God, my wife likes to feed the birds in the winter. And we have a bird feeder outside our kitchen window. And if you watch those sparrows as they come to the feeder, they're continually flitting about. They seem like a very nervous bird. They just never seem to stop. And they they're on the feeder and down on the snow and on the branches continually flitting about.
The swallow is brought before us in Scripture as the restless bird. We used to watch them at the cottage when I was a boy. They'd come out at the twilight and they'd just swoop back and forth across the lake, no doubt getting those insects that fly at twilight a very restless bird. But here we find in the 84th Psalm that the nervous bird and the restless bird have found a place of rest for themselves and for their young.
A place of peace, a place where there can be that rest and sustenance that's needed. And rather, that's what the assembly ought to be. You notice in the 84 song, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God. And when we come to the assembly, brethren, do we make it a place where there's contention? Do we come with a lack of something to offer for the sustenance of ourselves and for our brethren?
Or are we exercise that rather than it being a place where everybody is nervous about what's gonna happen or be said, or some problem where everybody's restless because of things that are going on? No, that ought not to characterize the assembly. Well, I know we've got a little way. It's just an application. But I just thought he said peace be to them, peace be unto you. You don't have to be a place of peace. And he said, have the enemy, brethren, do we have any meat when we come to the local assembly?
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Can you say?
Jim that the Lord could have produced it, which is true, but it is interesting and even in his life down here He is the means that were at end and even though they were perhaps something that was so small like this. 5 loaves and two fishes.
Got that little boy brought. What was that in comparison with the need when that was put into the Lord's hands?
It became enough to feed all. And there was.
Something to take back with them when they went back 12 baskets fallen. I I think that's an encouragement too. To us. You might say, what do? I don't have anything.
Don't despise small things, put it into the hands of Lord. You younger brother, you have a question. Sometimes a question opens things up in a very good way in an assembly meeting, but the exercise in the Lord's presence with little you may have.
To bring it out so that the Lord can take it and use that with our souls. I think that's an important point.
The Lord seems to be established as well with some union or fellowship with them in the act of need this year. There's something about when you leave it together that the bonding is more close and it's it's the way of one way of expressing fellowship business.
They actively even the world recognizes this principle and they were they were having a hard time getting this concept of the Lord of Allah and that in that notation he be killed was near them incapable of enjoying fellowship with them. Now we don't see the Lord in our midst, but it's he is taking great care and especially in asking them for food. That's one thing they can produce the food, but it's another thing to ask them for the food they contributed to food and then he took it and ate it before them.
That really bonded them together, didn't it? And uh, so how it shows us how the Lord's desires our fellowship.
Well, going on here, we find that the Lord then begins to speak to them.
In verse 43, he takes what they had offered and eats it. As you say, Doug, it bonds them together. But then he points out that all of this was what he had said to them. It was only a reflection of what had been given very clearly in the law and the law of Moses and in the prophets and in the Psalms.
What a wonderful revelation.
He had no doubt gone over all of that with those on the way to Emmaus, but now he reminds his disciples, and what does he do here? He opens their understanding.
Sometimes you and I find a bit of fault with the disciples, at least I do, in not being more intelligent. The Lord had over and over again told them he had to go to the cross, He had to suffer, and that he would rise again the third day. They couldn't seem to get it, as we would say in modern language, and even after he had obviously risen from the dead and the evidence was very clear, somehow, as we see here, it was very hard for them to.
Understand what all of that meant.
But we need to remember too that they were operating as we might say.
On Old Testament ground, they hadn't yet received the Spirit of God. What a difference it means when the Lord opens our understanding. Now we know, of course, that the Spirit of God didn't come down until some time after this, on the day of Pentecost. Well, what a difference it is when the Lord opens our understanding. And I would suggest that there is an order here that is important to us.
On the one hand, we find individuals who are in difficulty, individuals who didn't understand, individuals who evidently were in the wrong path, and the Lord meets them, as we have said, where they were and brings them back. Then there is the collective aspect brought in. The Lord brings them to the place where He is in the midst.
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And what is the result? He opens their understanding.
I appreciated what our brother Don said in the address as to how busy Satan is today seeking to turn souls aside from the pathway of obedience, seeking to draw us into error, and how much error there is in the world today. How many strange ideas there are concerning even the Word of God. How many winds of doctrine as we get in Ephesians 4 there are blowing around and how many deer Saints of God there are being caught up in it.
Is there an antidote to that?
I believe there is. We don't have to be that way. Are we willing to again use that word synchronize? Are we willing to be synchronized with the Lord's thoughts? Are we willing to have Him show us His mind? Are we willing to be where He is?
Then we'll find that he will open up our understanding, I believe.
Nice to see here too, that he says to them in verse 41, how do you hear any need? And they gave him a piece of broiled fish and even honeycomb, and he took it and didn't eat the four of them. And so I suggested as his portion, he desires to have a first place, a place of preeminence. And he comes into the assembly and he is to be missed. And he desires a portion for his own heart. And what a privilege it is for us rather than to be in the presence of the Lord and to give him a fortunate rightfully is and is a sweetness to his own soul.
And means to himself.
And so it's a privilege not only to come and they seem to be fed ourselves, but uh, what approved it is to give them a portion for his little soul. We find too, that on the road to Emmaus He expounded unto them from Moses and the prophets. But now there's something else, isn't there? Moses the prophet and the Psalms. Now I can't say I fully enter into why if the Psalms are added here and why he didn't expound to them from the Psalms on the Emmaus Rd. But.
I suggest that perhaps their hearts weren't in a condition for Him to expound from the Psalms on the Emmaus Road, and that it took being back in the place, if I can put it this way, of corporate obedience before He could expound to them in that way. Because it is the psalms, the sufferings of Christ in the Psalms, that largely bring out our affect. Our hearts tug at our heartstrings.
It's often been pointed out that in the Gospels we have the facts concerning the life and work of the Lord Jesus, but we must go back to the Psalms to get the feelings and expressions and the innermost breathing of the Lord Jesus. Expressions that you don't have in the Gospel Gospels are brought out in the Psalms. And isn't that why, brethren, on Lord's Day morning, when we're together to remember the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread, we often go back.
And read those psalms, the 22nd Psalm, the 69th Psalm, the 102nd Psalm, and so many of those psalms that bring before us the expressions of the Lord Jesus as He took up the work of the work of atonement.
Expressions concerning His sufferings at the hand of man and at the hand of God. And that is what really tugs at our heartstrings. But it seemed like it wasn't until they were back with the others now.
And their hearts had burned within them. They were in the place of obedience, He in the midst. Then he brings out the things concerning himself, not only in Moses and the prophets, but in the Psalms. But maybe there's more to it than that.
No, I think that's to me anyway, that's right on Jim, because it's we Get the facts of the God of the Lord's sufferings in the Gospels. You get the breathings of his heart and how he felt inwardly, whether from himself, from the sufferings from man, or shall we say it with reverence, His sufferings from the hands of God In Psalm 22, you get that in Psalms and that involves.
Our hearts getting close to him, doesn't it? It draws out our affection. It's not merely head knowledge, it's heart knowledge.
Don't we see in his his questions? Also, just to come back a little bit to the hands and the feet again. His hands he used for blessings when he touched the leopard who nobody was supposed to touch.
01:55:12
He touched the lever and was healed.
It goes through babies that were brought to him into his arms, but his disciples were trying to hinder them. He told me through his arms and he stroked him as a lease and and he blessed them. How much of A joy in my fantasy for the mothers when they could say about this space has been in the eyes of the Lord.
Thank you to that.
What? What a joy for the whole night that you must have been.
So no land trials is crucially blessed by the gorgeous and so I read all personally blessed by him when we are living in his presence. When we come together, we are blessed by him and we we might not realize that that it is true and when we think of his fees.
How many trips did you make with it? He he went all the way out his tire and came back. How many times did he come back to Jerusalem then just to do a service for his people? How many extra trips did he do? All walking with his feet. And then when we laid, he had no horse. Ever Let me read them.
And when we think of the suffering also when they grow those Mayo shoes to hand and their feet, there were suffering involved police. When we think that if that should ever happen to us, the suffering that this would cause and the suffering that also caused.
To him and the enemies, they must have done that on purpose, that they would just use his hands as a peaceful nail in my hair on the trees cause an extra suffering.
We see these shows in the hands of his feet and then he he has fellowship with them. He says, do you have any food? And and they give him some food they need to eat and then he eat it. That's like having a fellowship with them. It's preparing them before to send them out and serve as witnesses to him. But he shares to them the suffering that he has to endure. And I want to suggest that. So let's first go over to.
Her computer, Chapter one, chapter 2.
It's the Lord puts on your heart to serve Him.
Prepared to have fellowship in his suffering, and I believe that may be why he showed it. I think that his hands were to speak to show them that he had to suffer for them. And he says here in first Peter chapter 2.
And verse 21 For even here unto where you fall, because Christ also suffered through us, leaving us an example that he should follow and finish steps. And so if you're going to fall in the steps of the Lord to serve him who may encounter some suffering. And I'd like to turn to a verse in Matthew 26.
Lord Jesus here and inverted 3036 onwards. He's in prayer to the Father. Verse 38 He says my soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto death.
And he still says he praised the father of the father. It could be possible.
If this comes in, I'll pass away from you, except I drink it. Thy will be done.
02:00:25
And the Lord is comparing his disciples. He gives them the message He understands, so they understand what the sufferings were, so they could present the gospel, and so that they might know that they could have to have fellowship.
Suffering, we may have to take up the truck and follow the Lord Jesus when Abraham the Lord told him.
Take your son and offer him up on the mouth, and I shall tell him.
As a service that Abraham was doing.
But cost him. It cost him the life of his son and he suffered during that encounter. The Lord preserved his son, but Abraham had to sustain. And the Lord is going to. He wants to work with us to get us to the point where where our malignant is the same as his life. And we may need to go through some suffering before we get to that point.
And then one of the thirds in, uh, Roman chapter 8.
Roman Chapter 3 and 3017.
If so, be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together.
And so the Lord Jesus wants to guide us and direct us.
And and prepare us for for service for him. But it's not for all about us. It's about the Lord Jesus and his glory.
In that connection, Tim, I would suggest that there are two aspects of.
Sharing.
The fellowship of the Lord's sufferings. On the one hand, as we well know, we can never share anything to do with the sufferings.
That brought us to himself. We know that. And in Philippians 3 there the fellowship of his sufferings, I believe, is in connection.
With knowing him, that I may know him in the fellowship of his sufferings, and then something that doesn't seem to fit the power of his resurrection, but the power of his resurrection is mentioned first. It says that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings. A brother made this statement many years ago, and I repeat it because it's worth remembering. He said all our blessings come through the.
Obedience and suffering of the Lord Jesus.
And our enjoyment of those blessings comes in the same way. And so I would suggest that in following a rejected Christ, we are going to appreciate Him and appreciate our blessings through suffering. Not very pleasant in one sense, not very pleasant to think about, but yet that's the way the Lord works with us. But then there is the aspect of service, and that's brought in next in the chapter here because.
What we have here in verse 47 and 48, I would suggest is properly the Commission to the church today. There are other commissions given, for example, in Matthew that have more of a Jewish context to them, and we don't of course, object in any way to their being used in application today. But the fulfillment really awaits the tribulation period and the ushering into the Millennium.
And so that's why the Lord says I am with you in Matthew 28 until the end of the age. Not I am with you until I come, but till the end of the age. But here in Luke, as befitting the character of the gospel, it's really the Christian Commission. And where does the blessing start? Right in the very place where the Lord had been crucified. What a what a tribute to the grace of God.
02:05:02
The very place where there had been the worst opposition to the Lord, the worst acts of hatred and enmity against God's beloved Son. There God says, as it were, and I'm going to start right here where the worst sin has been manifested. The blessing is going to begin. And that Commission goes on with you and me today. We have that responsibility today year, witnesses of these things, remission of sins preached in his name among all nations.
Is there going to be suffering in connection with that? Yes, there is, in one way or another. We don't feel that much of it in these favored lands, but we feel it. And some of our dear brethren that are laboring for the Lord in other places are feeling a lot more of it. But nevertheless, this is the pathway that the Lord has given us. And so they're suffering in two senses. First of all, in knowing Christ, in identifying with Him and suffering with Him.
And learning of him, learning the power of his resurrection.
But then there is suffering for him in service. Both are part of the life of the believer, aren't they? And then he tells them that he's going to give them the power that's needed in his absence to go forth with the message and to suffer. And whatever was ahead for them, he wasn't going to leave them without power. And so he tells them to remain at Jerusalem until they were endowed with power from on high. And we know that on the day of Pentecost, the Spirit of God descended.
The Lord Jesus had explained it in John's gospel in the upper room, how He wasn't going to leave them comfortless, He was going to send the Spirit and he would abide with them and in them and so on, and that he would be the power for their lives in His absence. And isn't that wonderful, brethren, to realize that whatever He puts before us, we have all the power that's needed. We spoke of the power of His resurrection. The same power that raised the Lord Jesus from the dead is not our disposal the Spirit of God.
Innocent with us is the power for us to go forth with the message.
We often speak of how when we present the gospel, we pray that we'll do it in the power of the Spirit, because it's the Spirit of God that is the mighty energy in which God has always worked. And So what a comfort this must have been if the disciples understood it fully. What a comfort it must have been for them to realize that he, well, he was giving them a Commission here he says, I'm going to give you everything that's needed. You know, I might give one of my children a task to do.
Or I might be in business and give one of my employees a task to do, but I may not give the mall the tools that are needed to do it, may not give the mall the resources that are needed or be able to. But the Lord Jesus, he doesn't set this before the disciples and then say, now figure out how to do it on your own. Or you go out and round up some power to do it. Now he says you stay right here and the moment will come when you'll get the power the Spirit of God will be given, and then you can go forth in that power. And so when we come to the book of Acts and Luke develops and gives us this, the pattern of things in the early church.
We find that it probably would be probably better to call it the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the apostles. Not so much the Acts of the Apostles that they were the instruments, they were the players at the time, so to speak, but it's the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the apostles and that Spirit is with us until the work is done. Can I just say one thing on that? I want others to take part too, but I think this is important.
That power is at our disposal.
When we are in the mind of the Lord and in the pathway of obedience.
We can do much with human energy.
A believer in China who had spent some time, and this is not a slam at the United States, He probably would have said something the same in Canada. But America being so much bigger, of course, he was here in the United States for a while and someone asked him. He was a believer. Someone asked him, he said, and what impressed you most in the United States? And his answer was revealing. He said what impressed me was how much Americans can do without God.
What did he mean? He meant that they were confident. And again, we don't pick on the United States. We're guilty of it in other nations, too. But there is a tendency where we have a lot of things at our disposal, a lot of resources, a lot of wealth, a lot of technology to rely on that even in the Christian pathway, and much can be accomplished. That man spoke from a Chinese perspective where they didn't have all that, at least not the believers anyway.
02:10:16
And what they had to accomplish, they accomplished in God's power and independence upon Him, because they had nothing else. And that's what you and I need, don't we? If we're in the pathway of the Lord's will, if we're in the pathway of obedience, all His powers behind us, far, far more than human energy.
That should encourage us to do what we can with what's before us. And each one of us. Don't wait for somebody else to do it. If the Lord lays it on your heart, you do it. The Lord will open it up in the measure that you are faithful in what He has put into your hands. Oh, I have seen so much blessing in Latin America by ones you would least expect, but they in their measure used what God gave to them.
So it's an encouragement to us all.
The sequence that we see in these verses is, uh, is, is very revealing. If there's that we talked about the corporate relationship, our relationship to the Lord in a corporate sense and, uh, going into him.
Comes first, followed by the understanding being opened, followed by the Commission to serve him, and that's a sequence that we all should be following.
If we're going to be, umm, faithful servants, because, uh, without that, it's so likely to be in our own strength. And we see plenty of that where the, the sequence has been reversed. And among certain kinds of fellowships where the preaching of the gospel is absolutely number one and it's only relegated to a pretty minor position. The occasional remembrance of the Lord going into his presence. I think the power comes from.
Following the sequence as it's outlined in the scripture.
While the chapter began, our time is almost gone. The chapter began with resurrection, the empty tomb, but now it ends with the open heavens to receive the Lord Jesus in ascension. And that's important, isn't it? Because Christianity not only sets us in relationship with Christ in resurrection, but ascension Christianity connects us with a glorified head of the right hand of God.
And so on the day of Pentecost, as Luke will takes up in the second chapter of Acts, we find that the Spirit of God descended and connected those believers that were gathered there in obedience to the word of the Lord. He told them to remain at Jerusalem and there were about 120 there in that upper room, and it linked them, connected them with the man in the glory. And so Christianity sets us in relationship with the man in the glory.
And someone has said, I think you've said it rather, Clem, that Christianity starts the other side of the cloud. Maybe you can give us something of that. Yeah. Perhaps. Yeah. Because it. Yeah.
So that's where we're going.
The glory. But it is beautiful to see Him. The last they saw of Him as He went up, His hands were uplifted in blessing. And so now we can look up into the heavens by faith, and see Him there with His hands still uplifted, His interceding for us brethren. There His service goes on, and if it wasn't for His.
The power of his intercession as our great High Priest.
To help us in our weaknesses and our advocate when we fail.
Two of us would be still here. You and I would not be here if it wasn't for the power of His resurrection. Not because of our abilities, not because of our strength, but because of that man and the glory that we can go on by. The Lord leads us down here.
And that we read and he let them out as far as the bathroom.
And you live through that. And then the last seven it says.
You let them as far as preventative, there was quite a stretch to go. He didn't just say, OK, now it's time for me to go and go leave. No, he left them first.
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And that must have been quite a few of them that followed there on their way. Just a word for us to be led by Him and to follow Him.
And then spread the production that also comes those who were left behind, they did not receive the blessings.
So they are more and I believe they are difficult. And he sent to follow him. He left him out as far not as close as far as the Bethany. And there you have stood up his hands. And today what a wonderful.
Day on instant redmanship range to stand there and be blessed by him.
And those that were left behind, there were three things characterized them, worship, joy, and praise. And that ought to be what characterizes us. We have a man in the glory with, as Bob said, with his hands uplifted for us, interceding for us the right hand of God. And as we realize that, brethren, does not produce worship, doesn't that give us joy in the midst of difficult circumstances? Doesn't that create praise in our souls? It will if we're really looking up.
And occupied with that man, you'd think that they'd be sorrowful in his absence, that there would have been sorrow. But when they realized what had taken place, I say there was worship, there was joy, there was praise. And as we leave this place, we've taken up this chapter, we've enjoyed some things together rather than I trust that there is that result in our souls as we've got a fresh glimpse of the Lord Jesus and where he is now.
That there might be that worship and joy and praise in our souls as well.
It says the 22nd of Revelation worship God.
Worship Him, give him the 1St place.
295.
Holy Savior, we adore thee.
Holy slave, your will an only.
Threatened.
On the throne.
Of God.
Save your Wimbledon.
What I'm saying by the sea.
Message to Two Kings
Gospel—Robert Boulard
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I feel like.
It's not the one that's great.
If they're painted and they're doing what I'm doing.
I'm going to give you a dear.
I received.
A call on everything I thought I'd love. Me all the way to all Hilary.
Here far ahead and ask God blessing our meeting.
I'd like to turn to a couple of passages of scripture and I'd like to read them first before we begin to speak about them. Second Chronicles, chapter 34, I'm going to read a couple of portions of scripture in the Old Testament and how God had a message for a couple of kings of the of Israel and how each one of those kings 2 Kings. We don't have much time tonight, but 2 Kings and how they reacted.
00:05:11
What their response was to a very special message given from God himself to these kings. Let's read in chapter 34 verse one second Chronicles. Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem one in 30 years. And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord and walked in the ways of David his father, and declined neither to the right hand nor to the left, for in the eighth year of his reign.
While he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David, his father.
And in the 12Th year, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places and the Groves and the carved images and the molten images. Well, let's skip down to verse 14.
It says there that when they brought out the money that was brought into the House of the Lord Hilkiah, the priest found a book.
Of the law of the Lord given by Moses. And Hilkiah answered and said to Shafan the scribe, I have found a book of the law in the House of God the Lord.
And Hilkiah delivered the book to Chaffin, and Chaffin carried the book to the king, and brought the king word back again, saying, All that was committed to thy servants. They do it. And they have gathered together the money that was found in the House of the Lord, and have delivered it into the hand of the overseers and to the hand of the workmen.
Then Chaffans the scribe told the king, saying, Hilkiah, the priest hath given me a book, and Chafan read it before the king. And it came to pass, when the king had heard the words of the law, that he rent his clothes and commanded the king. And the king commanded Hilkiah, and Hikam the son of Schaeffen, and Abdon the son of Micah, and Shaifan the scribe, and Isaiah a servant of the king, saying, Go, inquire of the Lord for me, and for them that are left in Israel.
And in Judah concerning the words of the book that is found For great is the wrath of the Lord that is poured out upon us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord to do after all that is written in this book. And then down to verse 30. Well, let's read verse 29. Then the king sent and gathered together all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem, and the king went up into the House of the Lord, and all the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
And the priests and the Levites and all the people great and small, and he read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant that was found in the House of the Lord. Now just turn over to Jeremiah chapter. I think it's chapter 29.
No. Chapter 36. Jeremiah, Chapter 36.
We'll read in verse one. It came to pass in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah.
King of Judah, that this word came unto Jeremiah from the Lord, saying.
Take the role of a book and write there in all the words that I have spoken unto thee, against Israel, and against Judah, and against all the nations, from the day that I spake unto thee, from the days of Josiah, even unto this day it may be the House of Judah will hear all the evil which I purpose to do unto them, that they may return every man from his evil way, that I may forgive their iniquity and their sin. And then read down to verse 20.
Jeremiah 36 verse 20 They went into the king, into the court, but they laid up the role in the Chamber of Eli Shaima the scribe, and told all the words in the ears of the king. So the king sent.
To fetch the role. And he took it out of Eli Sharma, the scribe's chamber. And Jehudai read it in the years of the king and in the years of all the Princess which stood beside the king.
Now the king sat in the winter house in the ninth month, and there was a fire on the hearth burning before him, And it came to pass. When Jehudai had read three or four leaves, he cut it in with a penknife and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth, until all the role was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth. Yet they were not afraid, nor rent their garments, neither the king nor any of his servants that heard all these words.
And I'd like to read in John's Gospel chapter 12, right at the end of John's Gospel chapter 12.
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Verse 44.
Jesus cried and said he that believeth on me believeth not on me, but on him that sent me.
And he that seeth me, seeth him that sent me. I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on him should not abide in darkness. And if any man hear my words and believe not, I judge him not. For I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that rejecteth me receiveth not, and receiveth not. My words hath one that judges him the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him.
In the last day, for I have not spoken of myself, but the Father which sent me, He gave me a commandment.
What I should say and what I should speak. And I know that his commandment is life.
Everlasting whatsoever I speak, Therefore even as the Father said unto me, so I speak then.
I just have one other passage that I'd like to read. Just one little sentence actually, in chapter 10 of John's Gospel, verse 36.
Just the end of it.
John 10 and verse 36. Just the last sentence I said I am the Son of God.
Dear friends, tonight.
God went through a lot of effort.
He went to a lot of expense to give you his word tonight.
He went through a lot of effort to have these meetings.
Organized and to have the liberty of the Spirit.
To have His word presented in faithfulness to you, to your soul, tonight and the day is just about up.
You know what we read in Second Chronicles chapter 34, a little boy, Josiah, who is 8 years old, and when he received a word from God, he received a copy of the book of the law. He was I believe 20 years old, says in verse chapter 34, Second Chronicles, that he was eight years old when he came to reign the 8th year of his reign. When he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David, his father, and then it says in the 12Th year.
That he began to work and the energy of faith to cleanse the land. He was 20 years old when he began to do that work.
And 12 speaks of the age of responsibility, oftentimes in Scripture. But we read or we heard last night of a boy who was seven years old who bought himself a Bible.
Every one of us has a Bible here.
Everyone of us, you know that there are some boys in this world that don't have a Bible.
Some girls that don't have a Bible, some in North America that don't have a Bible.
This man grew up in a country that was the most religious country on the face of the planet.
It was a place, it says, in Romans, it says, What advantage then hath to do much in every way, Because unto them are delivered the oracles of God, that God Himself.
Had spoken to his people and had given him, given them the word of God so that they might walk in light instead of darkness. But you know, at the end of the Kingdom of Judah, in Josiah's day, they had lost it. And here comes a man to the king of Judah, and he says, I found a book of the law.
And he read it to him, and it had an effect upon him, because, you know, God was Speaking of judgment.
But he spoke of love too. You know, the last letter that the Lord spoke, the last prophecy that He gave to his people. He says this.
I have loved you, saith the Lord.
A little later on he says I'm the Lord, I change not.
Not nice. I'm the Lord I change not I have loved you, sayeth the Lord, but you know the Lord loved his people enough that he was going to discipline them if they required discipline and they couldn't live in the land of Israel without him. He had said to them, you know that. Let's look at it in just hold your place there in Second Chronicles 34. Let's look in Deuteronomy and read that verse of Scripture that the Lord quoted in chapter 8.
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He quoted when he was in the wilderness and was tempted of the devil.
Deuteronomy chapter 8. We're just gonna read the last part of it.
He that he might make thee know, that man does not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord, that man live.
Did you know that when man fell into sin?
He sinned against God, he disobeyed the word of God. He lost his ability to think straight. He lost his ability to find God. He became blind, he became dead and trespasses and sins. And God wanted to have a relationship with man, and he gave him a word that was a word that could give life, a word that could give power with power, and a word that would present himself and his love to his people.
And point them to that road of repentance and in the Old Testament.
He gave them an offering that by the blood of an offering they might have atonement.
We read that verse yesterday. I believe it was given in the gospel.
I have given you the blood upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls.
For it is the blood that maketh an atonement.
Oh, God has made every provision through His work of the Lord Jesus on the cross of Calvary and the shedding of His precious blood to cleanse us from all sin.
Well, you know this man Josiah, he got a copy of God's Law, the Word of God, the first five books of the Bible that you have in your book in your Bible.
He got a copy of it and what did he do? He read it.
And it had an effect upon his soul.
You know, there's men and women in this room.
By the grace of God, brothers and sisters in Christ.
And you can say honestly in your life that the one thing that made a difference in your life.
Is that you read the Word of God and you believed what he had to say and it made an effect upon your life that changed the course of your life. You know, when God gave this book to Josiah, this book of the law, it had a change. They created a change in his life and he wanted to walk in obedience to what he read in the Word of God. You know how long it takes you to read the word of God from cover to cover.
There was a man.
Who is under deep conviction of sin?
Exercise of soul and he wanted to know what this book said.
Once you get when he was under conviction and he began to read and he read the whole Bible through, it took him 40-5 hours.
Not very long.
He read the whole letter and he got saved. It had an effect upon his life.
Has it had an effect upon your life? You've heard that God commandeth all men everywhere to repent.
Because he has appointed a day in which he will judge this world by that man whom he hath appointed.
The judges appointed and God is presenting tonight in love to your soul, an opportunity to confess that you're a Sinner before Him and to come into the light and to receive the Lord Jesus as Savior.
You'll pardon the personal illustration little story.
Everyone of us that know the Lord Jesus, we got saved. Everyone of us has a different story.
And my father was brought up in a Roman Catholic home.
And at 8 years old, he lived in Timmins, ON.
And cold, cold place. They had a little farm there, my grandpa Bouillard, and he lived next door to a farmer, a believer, an old man.
An old woman, childless.
Love the Lord. Man had asthma, he could hardly work, his wife did the farm chores, and he would argue with my grandpa Boulard about the things of God and the old farmer. He said to my Grandpa Boulard, he said, could I give the boys Alan or Roland and real My father's name is real. He said, could I give the two boys a Bible? I can't afford to buy 2 Bibles, can I give them one Bible?
00:20:06
And the old man?
My fault, my grandpa said. Yeah, it's all right. It's a good book. Can't hurt them.
And so, you know, Roland, my uncle Roland didn't have too much of an interest, but my dad was eight years old and he took that little Bible.
At four years old, he had cried all day.
It was his birthday and he cried all day. You know why he cried? He said he was going to die and he wasn't ready to die.
He didn't know that he would pass into eternity and pass into the presence of the Savior. He was afraid to die at four years old. He cried all day. They couldn't console him.
God doesn't want you to be afraid tonight. He wants you to be afraid of perishing. But he doesn't want you to be afraid of him. Because God so loved you that he gave his only begotten Son. He gave everything that he had that he might present you with life, eternal life.
That you might have your sins forgiven. He gave everything.
That you might not perish.
Do you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior? My daddy, when he was four years old, didn't know Christ and he was afraid. Well, he went up to his room with that Bible at 8 years old and he started to read it. The old man had told him to read in John's Gospel in Romans.
And he started to read in John's gospel, and he came downstairs a little while later. He said, Dad, dad, he says, you know what this book says? And he started to tell him, give him the gospel.
And, umm, Grandpa Boulard said, well, you know, you, you can't understand that book if you read it. You have to read it 10 times before you could understand it. And so we went up into his room and he read it 10 times, the same passage.
And he came downstairs, he said, Dad, it still says the same thing.
And Grandpa Boulard said, well, you know.
If you read that book, the Roman Catholic priest tells you that you'll go crazy.
And so, you know, my grandpa, my dear, dear daddy at 8 years old had begun to read the word of God. And he said to himself, he didn't answer his daddy, You know, he said, what good is a book if I read it?
That I can't understand it. If I do read it, I go crazy. And so he put it aside and he didn't read it.
For 12 years, he didn't read it.
And then, you know, he started to work on the railway and he came to live in a rooming house and he lived.
Came into a room and they had two rooms in the bunkhouse. 2 beds in the same room.
He started to put his stuff away in the drawers and so on. He took this Bible with him and he put it on the night stand.
And there was a man in the next bed, lying on his bed. His name is Bert Hoole.
And Bert Hull looked at that Bible, said, do you read that Bible? He said, no, I can't. If you read that book, you can't understand it.
Bert Hull said this to him. Don't you know that the Roman Catholic priest tells you just a big pack of lies? That's all it is, a big pack of lies. You need to read God's word.
Well, dear boys and girls, young people, have you read God's Word?
I'm ashamed of myself, and I stand here and tell you the truth, I'm ashamed of myself. I did not read God's word from cover to cover until after I was 18 years old.
Have you read it? Have you read God's message? Have you believed it?
You take in Christ as your Savior. He's telling you the truth.
Find the way, the Truth, and the Life. No man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
This king, when he got a copy of the Word of God, it was read in his presence and it had an effect upon him, changed his life. I want to tell you this young person, child, tonight, if you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior and you read this book, it'll change your life. It'll change how you think, it'll change how you act.
And by the grace of God, if you read it in His presence and dependence upon Him.
You'll use your life for His glory instead of wasting it in this scene.
Are you wasting your life?
00:25:00
Do you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior? Have you believed the message? This king believed the message? He wept.
It says in.
This umm, Second Chronicles chapter 34.
That in verse 19 it came to pass, when the king had heard the words of the law, that he rent his clothes.
And then he wanted a message from God. It had an effect on his soul. He repented. Have you repented? You know where repentance is.
It's really a French word. I I think of it as a French word. Maybe it's the same word in Spanish and some other languages, but.
Needs to rethink.
Man doesn't think right, can't think right apart from the word of God.
He needs the light of the Word of God so that his conscience is brought into the light.
Has your conscience been brought into the light of the Word of God? Have you rethought and begun to think the way God thinks?
The soul that sinneth it shall die.
God doesn't want you to die in your sins. He made every provision to have you in eternity with Himself.
Well, you know my daddy when he went to work 20 years old on the railway, he took this Bible with him and one day there was a holiday weekend and they had a pass on the railway because they worked for the railway. Bert and my father real took the train and Bert said why don't you come over to my place, to Arundel, to my parents house near Rockaway Valley, Quebec.
And so they took the train.
Their three boys 3 Who'll boys?
Bert, Claude and Gabriel.
And my dad and they there was a bar 2 doors down from my grandma who's house and they spent all day in the Saturday at the bar.
And then they spent all day Lord's Day at the bar.
And on Lord's Day evening, my grandma who sent my mother over to the bar, she says.
Boys, Ma says you're driving her to the gospel meeting.
And they said, no, no, we can't do that. We've got our buddy Real here, and he's Roman Catholic.
He can't go.
Well, she said, Ma said you're driving her to the gospel meeting.
And those boys didn't want to go to the gospel meeting. I tell you today that there's, I believe all three of them were saved.
I don't know if they were saved at that time, but they didn't want to go to the gospel meeting. They didn't want to hear the word of God.
But my mother said Ma says you're driving her to the gospel meeting and they knew the gig was up, that they were going to drive her.
And so they worked my dad over to go and he said no, no, he says, I'm a Roman Catholic. I can't go to a Protestant place.
Roman Catholic priests would kill me.
No, he wasn't going well. They worked them over and finally he said, well, I will go. I'll sit at the back in the back row right by the door and as soon as the preacher says Amen, I'm going to stand up and I'm going to walk out the door.
And that's what he did. There was a man there that preached the gospel that night. His name was Mr. McDowell.
I said to my dad, what did he preach about? He says I don't know, but when he said Amen, I stood up.
And I turned around and I was almost out the door and this big hand reached down on me, on my shoulder and turned me around and started to talk to me some more and put some gospel tracks in my shirt pocket. One of them was the matchless Pearl. And he says I got saved reading the Matchless Pearl.
Are you saved, boys and girls?
Have you read the Sunday School paper and believed the message of the Sunday School paper? The grace and the kindness of our God to give you light as to the way of salvation.
Here's a man 20 years old, never heard the gospel of the grace and kindness of God.
Then, you know, he went back to the bunkhouse and he started to read that Bible.
At 20 years old.
And it made a change in his life.
00:30:01
I say tonight.
Year one in this audience if you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior.
There's one thing that the soul that knows the Lord, the believer that knows the Lord, the lifeline to Christ himself, the lifeline to God himself is the Word of God, and there is no substitute for the Word of God. Are you reading it?
I quoted a verse of Scripture not too long ago to a young person and they said, well, that's just your opinion, that's just your interpretation.
Oh, it grieves me to the heart.
God went to great expense. I say great effort to give you this message. Have you read it? It's not just an opinion. Don't treat this book as a divine suggestion book, but as the word of the living God. Well, let's look at Jeremiah chapter 36.
This man, the king, had a different.
Reaction to the Word of God.
Did you know that God?
The Son Jehovah.
Dictated a letter to Jeremiah, and Jeremiah dictated it to.
His scribe, Barrick and Barrack wrote it by hand. A scroll.
How'd you like to have a letter written directly from the heart of God?
To you I want to tell you he wrote 7070 books, if you count the five books of Psalms. The Lord Jesus, who loved you and gave himself for you, gave you 70 letters to read 70 books.
Three score and 10 palm trees. Have you read them?
Just read a part of the letter of Brother Jim last night, spoke of a letter that he wrote read. A man read, he read. Part way through the letter, he said, boy, I don't, I don't like this.
I don't like this story. I don't think I'm going to finish reading this letter. Well. His curiosity perhaps got to the best of them, and he began to read the rest of the letter.
Well, this man here, Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah.
Got a letter?
Do you know who got a letter from?
Jehovah.
You know, in the French translation, maybe it's the same in the Spanish translation Italian and so on, but doesn't use the name Jehovah.
The Eternal 1.
Oh, the eternal one, the one who dwells in eternity, The one without a beginning, without an end, The one who knew us before the foundation of the world.
Eternal 1 dictated the letter to Jeremiah for this king, the son of Josiah.
I see some boys here that are sons of fathers.
This boy.
Had a real privilege. He lived in a privileged life. He was the king of Israel, or the king of Judah, I should say.
And God loved him.
God loves you, doesn't want you to perish in your sins. God loved this man so much he had his prophet Jeremiah write a letter to him.
He says in verse three of Jeremiah 36, It may be that the House of Judah will hear all the evil that I purpose to do unto them.
And that they may return every man from his evil way, that I may forgive their iniquity.
And their sin.
It may be.
That the reading of the precious Word of God tonight in your ears will have an effect.
God never gives us His Word as a source of entertainment or a source of strictly knowledge.
He desires to speak to our hearts.
He desires to speak to our consciences, He desires us to know His thoughts, His intents and all things are naked and open under the eyes of him with whom we have to do well. This man, you know, he got a letter because God loved him.
And it says in verse 23 that he cut as the letter was being read. I think in Mr. Darby's translation it says column by column, after a column or two was read, he took his knife and he slid it and he put the page into the fire.
00:35:19
He didn't want to hear it. We find later on in this book, next chapter, I think it is that.
The letter was re.
Written exactly the same thing. God is not going to be defeated. If you don't want to hear His word, God is going to bless.
Is there a portion of the word of God that you don't like to hear?
That you don't want to read.
You know, dear brother Gordon Hale used to say to us as young people, that's the very portion of Scripture that you need to get into the presence of God with, get into your room all by yourself, on your knees.
Were to open up your Bible on the bed and read that very portion of scripture. Cry to the Lord for help to submit to that one portion of scripture that your heart will not yield to.
Will you yield to Christ tonight?
Lord, I have loved you, saith the Lord. I am the Lord, I change not. Oh the Lord desired this man that would have blessing. But you know what happens to a man that doesn't receive the word of God? He goes out into a lost eternity. And it says in chapter 37 verse one, it says the king Zedekiah, the son of Josiah reigned in the stead of Konaya the son of Jehoiakim, whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon made king in the land of Judah.
Well, in this little passage we're not told how this man Jehoiakim died.
But I believe he died without the knowledge of the true God.
He didn't repent.
And you this evening are sitting in a place where we have an open Bible.
To be able to speak of the Lord Jesus and the love of the Lord Jesus and how.
Even as young boys, even as young girls, we can buy a copy of the word of God and read it and have a message from God himself and thank him for that message.
You know, there was a man that I used to do business with.
Whose daughter got saved?
We did business for years and every now and then we would sit at a restaurant or sit in his car and we would talk about the Lord. And one day his daughter got saved. God works in families. Isn't that nice? God was working in Josiah's family. Josiah loved the Lord. God wanted his family to go on.
But this man, you know, he came to my office one day and he was crying.
Fathers, it's good that your sons see your cry sometimes that things mean something. It's all right.
Don't you think there were tears shed as those two walked from Emmaus?
From Jerusalem to Emmaus, don't you think there were tears shed? Don't you think there were tears shed as they walked back to Jerusalem?
I believe there was some real feeling. Well, this man came into my office and he said his daughter got saved and she sent him a letter and she sent him a Bible.
And he said, what does she mean she got saved?
Please tell me what she means. She got saved.
Do you know what it means to get saved?
It means to be saved from the judgment of a holy God who hates sin and can never have a Sinner in His presence that's unclean. It means to be saved on a righteous basis because the Lord Jesus died on the cross of Calvary so that we could have our sins washed away in His precious blood. It means to be saved from judgment by the Lord Jesus by His precious work on the cross of Calvary.
That man that day that he got that Bible in the mail and a letter from his daughter sat in his car in the rain.
On a Friday afternoon. And he determined that he wouldn't leave that place until he got saved himself. And he took Christ as a savior. And he began to read that Bible. It's made a change in his life.
00:40:06
Made a change in the way he thinks. Made the change in the kind of friends that he has.
Made a change.
Dear friend, tonight you know the Lord Jesus.
As your savior.
Or if you haven't tonight taken Christ as your Savior, won't you accept him, receive him as Savior? You know, I read a little bit earlier and later on in John's gospel, he's the Lord Jesus says I am the Son of God.
He sent a message himself to you, said I am the Son of God.
He that believeth in me shall never perish.
Well, let's sing one more human closing #12 let's stand for this.
And while we stand and sing this little hymn, if you don't know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, pray to him. Tell him you want to be saved from judgment and receive the gift of God, eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord #12.
00:45:21
Umm.
I want to tell you the conclusion of that little story that I told you about my father.
That godly grandmother who went home to be with the Lord in 1961.
And she prayed for those boys.
And there was fruit. God answered her prayers. And there are some grandmothers here, and there are some others. And the boys are spending all day long in the bar.
Or worse, pray for them. God hears the prayers of mothers and grandmothers.
And if there's a young person here that's going on with the drink going on with things that shouldn't be going on with.
Be sure your sin will find you out.
The little clocks of drink became a big fox for Bert Khoole and it took his life before he was 70 years old.
It's a serious thing.
To presume upon the grace of God. Now we're going to bow our heads.
And ask the Lord's blessing and as we close, if you don't know the Lord Jesus as your Savior.
Won't you just ask him tonight? Tell him that you're a Sinner. Plead for mercy?
The last message that Joy had, Kim got. He burned it up and threw it in the fire.
Don't do it, cry for mercy. Our loving God and our Father, we thank Thee for the love.
Lord Jesus, we thank Thee for the love that Thou hast shown.
Songs
Open Mtg. 2
Open—D. Buchanan, T. Kever, B. Prost
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Umm.
This weekend.
I saw brave upon him until the ground away.
One time I gave it to him.
00:05:13
I would, I would like to, uh, pass on some comments local brethren have.
Asked me to do this morning. Regards the character of this meeting.
As most of you know, for many years we've not had an open meeting.
Much exercise developed over the course of the years and not having an open meeting.
And this year?
Circumstances arose, her brother communicated to us of a desire to minister on a particular need that he felt on his heart, which led us to look to the Lord in prayer about how to handle the character of that meeting, and the decision was to have an open meeting.
As it says in First Corinthians 14, let the prophet speak, two or three or two or three prophets speak, and the others judge.
We have been in much prayer about this and waiting and trusting that the Lord will indeed guide us. And I would like to turn to a scripture in the Old Testament.
In connection with the liberty of the Spirit and the Prophet speaking and who should speak and who should not speak, this may seem a bit strange, but I'd like to take an application from Second Samuel.
Chapter 18.
And then we will.
Have a word of prayer before we begin the meeting.
In Second Samuel chapter 18, we have, after the death of Absalom, who had been slain, the issue of who's to bear the news to the king.
We'll read from verse 19.
Second Samuel, 1819.
Then Sam said, Ahemias, the son of Zadok, let me now run and bear the king tidings. How that the Lord hath avenged him of his enemies. And Joab said unto him, Thou shalt not bear tidings this day, but thou shalt bear tidings another day.
But this day thou shalt bear no tidings, because the King's son is dead. Then said Joab to Kushai, Go tell the king what thou hast seen. And Kush I bowed himself unto Johab and ran. Then said to Jaime as the son of Zadok, yet again to Joab.
But howsoever, let me, I pray thee, also run after Kushai.
And you have said, Wherefore wilt thou run, my son, seeing thou hast no tidings ready?
But howsoever said he, let me run, And he said unto him, run. Then Ahamiyaz ran by the way the plane and overran Kushai, and David sat between the two gates.
Now I dropped down to uh, verse 28. And Jaimez called and said unto the king, All is well.
And he fell down to the earth upon his face before the king, and said, Blessed be the Lord thy God, who hath delivered up the men.
That lifted up their hand against my Lord the King.
Verse.
31 And behold, Kushai came, And Kushai said, Tidings, my Lord the king, For the Lord hath avenged thee this day of all them that arose against thee. And the king said unto Kushi, Is the young man Absalom safe, who shall answer the enemies of my Lord the king, and all that rise against thee to do thee heard be as that young man.
00:10:05
I would like to call attention to three things here.
First of all, the desire of the heart to be the bearer of the news.
Second, the ability to run and carry the news.
Thirdly.
The ability to present the message in the right way according to the need of the king.
And may the Lord guide us in these three things here.
This this afternoon, it isn't just the matter of who first has the desire in this case.
Could uh Ahmiez had the desire 1St and he was told that he would not bear the news and he chose someone else and so.
Uh, hi Miaz had to learn to sit and wait and.
Post second.
There must have been a blessing to his soul in doing so, because when he he got to the King, I believe he gave the best message for the moment.
He sheltered the king from what would be hurtful to his heart, whereas Kushai.
Seemed willing and ready to bear the bad news.
Secondly, the second point was that, uh.
Who is the best runner?
You know, it's a wonderful thing to have gifts, but gift alone? Just because we're the best runner doesn't mean that we should run first when Jaime has had to wait second.
The Lord enabled him to run the best as well, and so I I see a lesson for us in that and that waiting on the Lord for His guidance and health in connection with these three parts of industry.
And with that, I would like to encourage our brethren that have a message from the Lord, our brother that wrote, wrote and communicated to us. I trust you will have liberty. I trust that maybe others the Lord has put a burden on your heart. And we're we're very thankful to have a medium to to wait and hear what the Lord would give us. Let's just ask his help.
Our God and our Father, we thank you for the guidance of the Spirit of God among us and that we can have a meeting here now and wait to whom thou witch guide Lord, to speak to our hearts. And we pray that we'll encourage those brothers that have a message from thee Lord, to indeed step up and be the bearer of the news without us. Give us, Lord, at this moment.
And we would pray, Lord, that Thou wilt hinder any fleshly activity among us too.
That has often been a reason of grievance to our hearts. Uh, we confess this an owement, but we're counting on the Lord for thy guidance. And we are encouraged to see how thou didst help Ahemias, even though he had to wait. And yet thou didst give him a time to speak what thou is heaven to speak. And it was very effectual. And so we would pray this for ourselves here now this afternoon.
We wait upon the Lord Jesus and give thee thanks in thy precious name. Amen. Amen.
We would like to encourage whoever speaks to stand up to the podium, please.
Stop.
00:15:31
Brother, you put a weight on a guy.
Let's ask help, Lord.
We pray that you might.
Energize your word to go out.
And that you might, umm, cause us to change our ways. We ask in Jesus name, you know. Amen.
I don't have to say much about kids.
We all know if we would bring that subject up, that would be a lot of opinions given there would be some real vociferous talk and.
It might even, among some people, be arguments.
Kids today are big subject and even sometimes.
People don't want to talk about it.
I wanna talk to young fathers today. I've done this before.
Some of the things that I'm gonna say I've said before, but some of the things are a little different. It's still on my heart.
Still on my heart I was a teacher for.
Almost 40 years and I saw a lot of kids, all ages.
Uh, some in Europe even.
All, uh, several different races.
And they're all the same.
They're all they all have foolishness bound up in their heart.
More or less.
The more or less sometimes depends on the father.
Of the child. And that's why I want to address the fathers, because fathers are the ones that that God addressed.
You know, I I've heard this thing about learning the Bible at my mother's knee. Well, that's OK if there's no father. Mothers do it if you have to. But really, it should be at the pot as me.
That's where we should be learning our Bible, you know. We know that.
Umm, the Bible says.
Fathers, provoke not your children wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Doesn't say very much more than that I looked.
Umm, but it does say bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord and that's, that's what we're supposed to do. So today I would like to just talk to you a little bit about, uh.
Some of the facts the Bible says.
Some some of the facts are evident around us and would cause us to have those discussions that I mentioned before. They're based on lies the world is telling us. Do you listen to them? You can be exposed to them if you read newspapers, magazines, watch newscasts, listen to newscasts on the radio, listen to opinion pieces on the radio, public radio, commercial radio, wherever.
You can be exposed to these lies.
Here's one Kids are small adults.
They have rights and they have wisdom.
I won't go very much further. I don't have a lot of time. I'm taking the padding out of my message because most messages have a lot of padding, but I'm gonna strip it down and try to get out the the bare essentials. I wanna let somebody else speak too if they if they're here.
You don't own your kids. That's the another lie. You don't own your kids.
And umm, so who do you think you are to try to tell them which way to go?
Wow. And this is blatant. You know it, you've heard it.
Umm.
I heard one woman in a Christian School said to me, because I was teaching Bible there, uh, she didn't like the fact that we didn't spend any time on Islam and she was a purported Christian. She said, you know, I thought we were going to cover all the religions and I, I'm just really unhappy because I said you would you really want your son exposed to those things? Yes, I do because I'm letting him choose his own way.
00:20:26
Letting him choose his own way.
Is that what we should do, Father?
OK, fathers, first of all are the head of the family, right? First Corinthians 11/3.
The order is clear. We use this order a lot. Lord, let's see, wrong book.
First Corinthians 11/3.
I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of woman is man, and head of Christ is God.
So we know that.
Man is the head of the woman. Wow. You know, we talked about that a lot and that could we could have a lot of discussion about that too, but we're not going to get into that today. What I would like to just say is it, you know, if you're if you men are the head of your wife, then are you head of your children? It doesn't say that, but I think it's I don't know what we need more than that to know that we are in charge of our children. We really are. Mother is too.
But we are the final responsibility. The way our kids turn out, that's us. That's on us.
And, you know, sometimes kids are raised by their mothers and they're raised really well, and then the father gets all the credit.
That's kind of too bad, but you know, if if they go bad, then you know he should get the get the blame too.
But umm, what kind of a man are you, young father?
Are you, umm, a workaholic? Are you home at all?
Some, you know, I noticed that nowadays guys have to work my sons in law and sons have to work way more than I did. They don't ever get home at 5:00. I used to get home at 5:00 every day. Uh, they don't to keep their job, they have to work a lot more. And I know that's true of many of you, but uh, workaholics a little different.
Do you have a lot of hobbies? Spend a lot of time in the shop?
Because you wanna make stuff and when the kids come around you say hey, umm, could you go and play? Uh, I'm busy.
Do you watch sports on TV? Are you into the brackets? The basketball brackets right now? Are you checking between meetings on your iPad? We'll order. You know who's beating who.
Uh, do you like to detail your car?
What kind of guy are you really? It's a good thing to consider.
Uh, what we are because the Bible says that we are supposed to, uh, examine ourselves.
First Corinthians 11/28.
Says, But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup.
So, you know, we doesn't say let a man exam himself and then go and improve and then when he's good enough, he can either the bread and drink it a cup. It says let a man examine himself. We have to know what we are. Our brother here was talking about that a minute ago. He didn't know it, but he was talking on that subject too, when he said when he's talking about the the guys who run.
We need to know.
The truth? We need to be brutal with ourselves. Examine ourselves even if we're not getting ready to go to meeting. Examine ourselves all day long. Examine ourselves periodically. Maybe when we're, uh, quiet before sleep.
Sometimes we examine ourselves too much. I got woke up for almost a year at 3:00 every morning and challenged about who I was.
00:25:04
And finally, I wasn't getting anywhere with it, so I assumed it was this, it was the enemy. And I told him to go away and I didn't get woken up anymore. So we can be too inward as well. So I'm not, you know, there's a balance there. You know what, you're going to have to go to the Lord about that too, and talk to him about what? What he wants to do with you, with yourself. I have to.
Our brother here was talking about this, this guy who wanted to speak today, He was talking about me and I was sitting in the back and I said well, you know.
All the big guns are here today got umm, I won't I won't mention names, but you know they are and the the speakers that speak are here and I'll no, you're going to get up there and talk come on. Umm, but the Lord seemed to pride me to do this and.
He's been prodding me to do this.
Umm, at different times. And I don't know if if this is something that I've got umm, umm, burden to do or what, but I'm still struggling with that. And I'm, I'm like the guy who wanted to run. You know, I'm, I'm thinking, well, is this me that wants to run or is this the Lord that's prodding me? So I made a little test. I said, well, uh, I am. I'm not gonna sit in the front row.
And after the meeting starts, I'm gonna count slowly to 10. And if nobody gets up before that, I will get up and walk up there. So I did. And you might have saw that I did walk up here. And then my brother got up and took the microphone. He didn't see me coming. And so I had to go back. I thought, well, he's gonna speak. And then he had me really confused. He started. He gave a very, very, very good message.
I really think we should maybe take an hour and just sit and sit quietly and contemplate the things he said. It was very good and it caused me to again examine myself.
He prayed. And then I thought, well, what am I supposed to do now? I'm not gonna go up there.
I'm not gonna book there, Bill. Pros will get up and and we'll have a really nice, nice message and nobody will ever know that I had anything or they won't miss it either.
But the Lord seemed to say, why don't you just count again? So I count it again, and I got to 10.
And I thought, oh, OK, so if you don't like what I say today, I'll be glad to listen to you. I'm, I'm open to criticism. I'm open to correction. I'd rather be corrected than go on in, in ignorance and, you know, with the wrong idea.
My e-mail address is.
[email protected] Uh, if you wanna write that down, I'll just give it to you a little bit easier. B Like boy.
RAN like Nancy IK Brandon 4 the number four at I couldn't get branch one. I wanted Branick one but I think they saved that. They don't give you the the one.
So I got [email protected] so if you want to write me something and and you know tell me I'm wrong, I'll be very glad to to read it. And I checked my e-mail every day.
Down in the next.
Four versus downstairs 4IN verse 31 for if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged OK along with the examining.
Brothers, do you judge yourself?
When you see what you are, do you then call things by the right name?
And instead of, you know, making excuses for ourselves, we've got to call things what they are. If, if we.
Have been lying even a little bit. We have to own up to it. I don't mean that we have to tell everybody, but you know, unless the Lord lays in our hearts to confess it somehow, but you know, we we have to know ourselves what we're doing and judge it and say, you know, that's sin. I've been sinning and go to the Lord and say, Lord, what should I do about this?
It's the same thing I I did last week and the week before that and two weeks before that. I'm having a problem. Lord, what can I do?
00:30:05
If you want to be ahead that can be trusted, you've got to do this. You've got to examine self and judge self and I don't know how good you've got to be. I, I, you know, we're all at different stages of goodness, so.
Maybe you'll be, maybe you're really good and you just need to improve a little or something. I don't know. Maybe really bad if anything would be an improvement. But the Lord will still use you as a head.
He needs you to be the head in your house. Please don't abdicate.
Ephesians 6/4.
And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord. Now that's Part B Bring them up into training and admonition of the Lord. I'd like to just limit it to TO664B.
And I'd like to have that take us right straight over to Deuteronomy 11.
I know I'm not saying anything new, but I just think, you know, we need to be reminded of some of these things once in a while and especially in the current situation. We're in a crisis situation with kids today.
Do you know what kids are doing?
Just they are, they're, they're just not yours maybe. Oh, no, never mind. That's the thing we had in school. You know, parents would say, I wish they'd be a little more tough on those kids. They need to control those kids a little better. So then we would control them a little better and the parent would come and say, what are you doing? You know, my kid wasn't doing anything. Why are you picking on him? It was always control the kids, but not mine.
And every parent felt that way just about so we couldn't control anybody. You can get sued now for touching a kid like this. That's that can be assault. It can be used that way.
Even if you didn't intend it to be.
That's how things have gotten to be in the public schools, Elisa, and maybe even the Christian and the private schools.
We're at a crisis stage and we've got to be, we've got to be doing something a little bit different, I think if we want to maintain, uh, what uh, has always been our blessing, uh, as Christians who are trying to go on in simplicity and trying to just obey the Lord and not try to put on a show or anything we need.
To to, to really tighten up. I think at this point that's why I think I've got this burden.
So right over to Deuteronomy 11, verse 2.
Know today that I do not speak with your children, who have not known and who have not seen the chastening of the Lord your God, His greatness and His mighty hand and his outstretched arm, His signs and His acts, which He did in the midst of Egypt. To Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to all his land. What He did to the army of Egypt, to their horses and their Chariots. How He made the waters of the Red Sea overflow them as they pursued you, and how the Lord has destroyed them to this day. What He did for you in the wilderness until you came to this place, and what He did.
To date, an antivirus sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben. How the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up, their households, their tents, and all the substance that was in their possession in the midst of all Israel.
I don't talk to your children. Your children have not seen this. Have your children seen this, Father? Do you tell them what the Lord has done for you? If you're in the midst of an exercise, let's say you're out of work, do you share with them? I don't know, maybe not the three-year olds, but do you share with the, you know, the 9 year olds? This is what I'm doing. This is what's going on. I'm really worried about this. I shouldn't be. The Lord says not to be so concerned, but I can't help it. We might lose our house.
You know, and on and on and on. And there are other exercises. There's maybe great sickness, maybe grandpa's sick and gonna, we're gonna have to, somebody's gonna have to go there and stay with him for The Who knows what the issue might be. But do you share it with your kids? Do you tell them what's going on and show them how God works so that they can see where the struggle was and where the crisis was? And then later you can say to him, you know what the Lord did about that. He did this and this and this. And then it's proven to them. They see the.
00:35:13
Even though they, you know, if they weren't there for your, uh, salvation, they, they see the, the, how far you're their salvation goes.
So, umm, there is this, this, umm, situation where the kids don't know what they should know. Look at verse 18. Therefore you shall lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, Speaking of them, when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, when you rise up.
You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land of which the Lord swore to your Father to give them, like the days of the heavens above the earth. For if you carefully keep all these commandments which I command you to do, to love the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways in the whole fast him, then the Lord will drive out all these nations from before you. So excuse me.
So the word of God.
Is to be kept and we need to give it to our kids and help them to keep it. We have a plaque in your house that says that's for me and my house. We will serve the Lord. Uh, we have a little discussion in a meeting a couple weeks ago about that. Umm, your brother said he has a plaque like that, but he, he feels conscientious about it that, you know, it's, it's ostentatious. He's saying that he serves the Lord well then he said, but on the other hand, it's my wish and my prayer that I would be that.
And the truth is, if we put these plaques around, they remind us their own testimony to visitors, but they also remind us that that's what we're supposed to be doing. That one that I have that in my office. And it was always a challenge to me. OK, Are you is are you following or is it?
So you know, it, it, it was there for that and it and then says to write them on the door post. Put it between your, your eyes, put it on the back of your hand. And of course, we know the Orthodox Jews do things like that. Umm, maybe you know, we need to do something like that. Maybe it would be good to write a verse every day on your hand. Don't you write? I write on my hand all the time, especially in the night when I want to remember something. Next day I write and I don't write it here because in the morning I wash my hands.
Is gone. So I write it here. Maybe we wrote a verse just real small there. You know, we'd be working throughout the day. We look at it. It would be nice to be kind of like what he said here, wouldn't it? But if we could talk to our kids about it while we walk by the way, while we sit in our house, while we lay down, when we get up, if we could do that, then, you know, we'd be doing what what he told them to do and it could, you know, really be helpful.
Especially in making the word of God more.
Relevant Are you driving down the street with your kid in the car? And, uh, you know, you see things and they see them too, and you can make them an object lesson out of them. You can, uh, make a comment from the Bible to them about the things you're looking at. You can, uh, bring truth out in a simple way for them. You know, they're not little adults, but they can understand a lot. And one thing that kids want is truth.
The kids that are here today are looking for two things, a mate and truth. Now I don't know how much of each each one is looking for or how they rank, if the mate is first or if the truth is first, but they're looking for sure. You don't have to worry about the main thing. They'll take care of that. But the truth, They want the truth and they're sitting here hoping they hear it. They don't. They don't want some stuff about.
You know, some all kinds of doctrinal things that, that they can't understand, that some of it might not even be really true. Uh, you know, I've been guilty of that. Had to go back and say, you know what? I, I taught you wrongly. Umm, they want truth. I'm not saying that they're not getting it here. I'm sure they are. And, and, and in most conferences, I'm sure they are, but they're looking, they want it. And in a lot of places they're not getting it and they can tell they know when it's not so.
00:40:02
Kids know I think sometimes that that better than adults because they haven't had time to to get all corrupted inside. I know they've got some nature, but sometimes it's in nature gets a lot of experience in that it gets corrupted and you can't tell what's truth and wouldn't like Pilot, you know what is truth, he said.
So.
Kids are looking for truth and, uh, they'd like to know about God. They'd like to know about the Lord Jesus. And if we can tell them what he likes and what he doesn't like and what he said about this and that, uh, do it, why not? Why talk about something else? Why not talk about that?
At at this age they are, you know when you can start to talk to them, they're starting to get pulled away from you. Kids today are in a culture of their own.
They've been there for a while. It's that started back when I was a kid. I remember Elvis just a little bit before Elvis. They started having their own culture. And I've been doing a little study on that and and we can have a whole meeting on that, but that's that's really destructive. That has done a lot of damage to our families and has opened the door to the Satan to get in with kids. Really, really.
Why? Why don't we go for him there?
So when we start talking to them now, rather than talk to them about worldly things, we should talk to them about the Lord, You know, umm, what? There are things that that they're really being encouraged to go after at this age. They're being encouraged by everybody at school to do good in school, to get a scholarship, to get all A's. That's really important. And what, how do they translate that then?
That's really number one in my life right now. Wait a minute, who's supposed to be #1?
Jesus Christ, what we make education number one in this country, even though we don't live it, we say it's number one and it's being pushed in our kids left and right. And it's no wonder some of them start to worship it. And they will worship it for a long time and not Christ. And they will get to the point where they will listen to educators instead of preachers because educators have.
Some kind of, uh, we got a degree on the wall that, that says that they know something about science or about, uh, math or about something that that is concrete and we've never seen God. Umm, so you know, that's the honest truth. They, I mean, you know what, when you were a kid you had this question. Well, I don't, I don't have any proof from anything but, uh, cause professors have proof they demonstrate, they make a big deal out of demonstrating it because.
So many of them don't want your kids to follow God.
Sports. We make a big thing out of sports. You're gonna go out for football, aren't you? You're gonna go out for soccer, basketball, whatever.
We, we, I, you know, even I used to say that we are, have, I should have, my, my kids should have one sport every year in school could be the same one. But he had to have something because I wanted to be busy.
Umm, so sports have become very important.
I don't know. You're gonna have to go to Ward about where you you draw the line with your kids about that and about education.
And technology, all, all this technology we have.
It's easy to make a God out of that, and a lot of our kids do.
So we have a problem and umm, we have to, uh, uh, be putting the hands of the Lord so that we can be fit for them to fit their, their problems and their situations. And number one, we need to be really concerned about them. We need to be really interested in them as as a prime, I don't say put make them the center of family. Oh my goodness, that is so.
Wrong. They cannot be the. What do you do when you're talking to an adult? Your kid comes up to you and asks for something or says something to you? Do you stop talking to the adult and look down and say, yeah, what? Or do you say I'm busy right now? OK, wait a minute. Now you know if he's bleeding or something. You can tell if it's a serious matter. But I don't know how many adults I've been with that have little kids. Sweet little, adorable little kids. But.
And maybe even a little bit bigger kids. But when they come up and I'm talking, maybe we might be talking about something very important. It's over. Yes. What would you like?
00:45:12
And then it's usually they want permission or some extra piece of candy or something. Hey, don't let them be the center of the family. Because once they start knowing that they are, then they're gonna work that and umm, you know, gotta be careful.
These entertainments that they want.
The technology, the sports, and a lot of the other things, even some novels, television, those are adult entertainment. You know, we talked about adult entertainment when I was a kid, and that meant that it was something not fit for kids, but fit for adults. And usually it wasn't fit for adults either. But in fact, most of the things that kids used today for entertainment is adult entertainment.
And I'm not talking about anything that's blatantly uh.
Immoral. I'm talking about, you know, adult ideas.
Umm, that they might get out of books or they might get off the television. Uh, plot or a movie plot. Many kids don't have television on their lot, watch television, but they go to movies. Sometimes their parents don't know they go. Sometimes they see the movies on the computer. Sometimes they see the movies at their friend's house.
I wouldn't let my kid have his own computer.
It's too hard to police. My daughter says she's got parental controls on it and it works great and her kids only allowed to use a computer too, say one hour a night.
One hour a night? Umm, can you do that?
We're in such a serious situation, uh, smartphones. You could have a smartphone. Do you know where he goes? What he, what he does on it? I mean he can do anything. He can go anywhere on it. He can see anything he wants to see.
Do you have parental controls on those? You can get them. You have paid for them, but you can get them. And you know, I myself would give my kid a tractor, you know, $15.00 a month and that's it.
Whether he receives a call or sends a call, he pay. It's, it's, you know, it comes off the the credit. So, umm, don't be afraid to be strict like this. Don't be afraid to take some things away and say, I'm sorry, but we just can't have that. I don't know, maybe you can really trust your kid. And like one parent told me, oh, I can trust so and so, so, so I let her have an iPhone and I know she's not do. OK. Yeah.
If that's true, then great, that's an adult. Your, your daughter is an Admiral adult now maybe that'd be great if she, she's already a vandal, Uh, at 17?
Don't forget my e-mail address if you disagree with this stuff.
So I guess what I'm saying is, fathers, first of all, be worthy of trust so you can be ahead. A head has to be trusted. When we trust Christ as our head, it really requires a lot of trust, he says.
Give me your body, he says in Romans one. Your body.
Give me your body. And if he's got our body, he's got everything. If we just give him our thoughts, that's it. It says to do that. But if we just give them that, then he doesn't have a lot of other things that he really needs to have control of. Give him everything we need to be, we need to trust him. We need to be able to leap into the dark and know he'll catch us.
He's capable.
Uh, I'm impressed about today. I really am like.
I'm, I'm blown away again. I love that. I love to have God come into my life and, and do something, **** ** away, make me shake my head and just smile for days after that. Think about the way he showed his arm or his hand or even just a finger and umm. And then I, I had little kids. I'd tell him about it too, and I'd get a big kick out of seeing their reaction and they'd know it was true.
So.
Fathers, are you with me? Can we do it? Can we pull together and uh, you know, I didn't get into this and I won't, but it does say in umm.
00:50:07
In, uh, proverbs, that, uh, we should.
Spank them. The only thing that God tells us to do with our kids is spank them. He doesn't tell us to take away their bike or ground them. Doesn't he says thank them and you know why? Because it's over quickly. And then we take them to our in our arms and we see now you know that's you got the spanking because you did this and so on.
Now it's old and now you're, you're OK again And, and we're going to be all right. You know, you comfort them, then they go play and that's it. But this sitting in the room without the computer, without anything.
Dad's real rat. I hate Gad.
That's what they do, just like guys in jail, right? You guys in jail sitting there and say, you know, this, this jail time is doing me really good because I'm, I've been thinking about how bad my life is and, and when I get out, I'm I'm gonna be good. I'm gonna be a real citizen. Is that what jail does?
See, that's jail and put it in a room like that. God knows that he just said do one thing and that is great, use the rod. He says don't stop. If he cries, you will not kill him. Now I don't have to tell you guys that there's a way to spank and there's a way to not to spank.
There's all kinds of things that you can pray about and get with the Lord about and get and, and use your common sense about and you'll be fine as long as your kids know you love them and, and as long as you do love them and they know it, that's 3/4 of the battle. Even unsaved people can have good kids, you know, and they can, they can have them if they do that.
But we've got to have good kids.
For the Lord, yes.
Thanks for your attention.
We have about 5 minutes.
1520 Could I comment briefly on what Brother Doug said? Sorry, we have a little more than that, don't we? 15 minutes. Maybe I'll only need 5. I'd like to comment briefly on what Brother Doug said at the beginning of the meeting, and it ties in with what Tom brought before us.
He mentioned how that when a Hemi Ahimez came from the battle.
At first, Joab didn't want him to be the bearer of tidings and so Kushai was allowed to come.
Are allowed to go rather. But then we find that Ahemias begged to be allowed to go, and it turned out that God gave him the strength to be the better runner so that he got there first, and I believe that was of God.
00:55:08
Thomas brought before us the failure that perhaps some of us as fathers have to realize before the Lord.
And it's a needed word today because the wisdom of God's Word is being much laid aside and departed from.
And as a result, believers are finding themselves strongly influenced by the culture around us and.
Instead of by the word of God.
To turn to a verse in First Kings.
That, on the one hand, shows us.
What had been going on, perhaps in David's family?
That may have resulted in some of the failure.
First Kings chapter one.
And verse 6.
Perhaps read verse 5 to get a connection.
First kings one and verse 5. Now this is remember when David was very old on his deathbed and he had made it very clear, and I believe the Scripture makes it clear that it was of the Lord that Solomon his son would succeed him as king.
Verse 5 Then at Anija, the son of Hagen exalted himself, saying, I will be king.
And he prepared him Chariots and horsemen, and 50 men to run before him.
Now notice this verse.
And his father had not displeased him at any time in saying, Why hast thou done so?
And he also was a very goodly man, and his mother bear him after Absalom.
Again, you and I don't wanna be sitting here thousands of years later throwing stones at David.
But at the same time, what is written here is written for our admonition, our learning, and here we find that the Scripture records that there was very clearly failure in David's life.
Here was a young man, a goodly person, and we might say that the Spirit of God also records the same of Absalom. No blemish in them. We won't bother turning to the verse. But no blemish in him, it says from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.
And so it seems that there had been a failure in proper discipline. As a result, there was trouble in David's family.
We know, of course, there were other reasons for it. We know that David had sinned seriously and his sin with Bathsheba, and as a result the Lord said that the sword would never depart from his house.
And David became the recipient of the judgment he pronounced on himself, because he told Nathan the prophet, that the man that had taken the lamb from the poor man instead of that is the rich man who taken the lamb from the poor man instead of using his own, would pay for full.
And David did pay 4 fold in his family for that awful sin.
But on the other hand.
There is encouraging, there is encouragement.
Absalom died under the government of God because he had lifted up his hand against his father. The king had his father failed, and happily, rather seriously, and in Absalom's case particularly.
And we won't go over the details today, but you can read it how that?
There was very serious immorality between.
Absalom's full sister and her half brother. And how that dear David, godly king though he was, and the man of God couldn't seem to take the situation in hand and deal properly with it. And you can see the transpiration of events.
As they move along and how poor Absalom gets so so upset that finally he figures this man, my father, is not fit to be king any longer. Was that a right attitude? No, it was wrong. He was God's chosen king and Absalom had no right to try and remove him in spite of failure. But David paid heavily for that failure in his family.
But I suggest that to go back to what our brother Doug mentioned, that Ahimez was a man of God.
01:00:05
And when he wanted to run.
Why did he want to run, particularly, why did he offer himself?
Oh, because he knew in his heart what David would be going through. He knew what had been said very clearly by David to Joab and the other captains, the other captains of the army.
Telling them to deal gently with the young man? Absolutely.
And we know the history that Joab did anything. But was it righteous in the eye of God on Joab's part? Indeed it was. And Joab was going to make very sure that that rebellion was squashed and that there would be no more of that. And he knew that if Absalom were left alive, that there was still a very big following in Israel.
And so he made sure that Absalom was killed.
But that left something out.
It left something out and a Jaime has realized that it would be a very nice thing if someone came along and cushioned the blow. If someone came along to David and cushioned the blow before Kushai came with a cold, hard truth.
That sent David.
Into terrible weeping and grief.
But there's encouragement.
Turn back to Second Samuel 23.
1St 3.
Second Samuel 23 verse three the God of Israel said the rock of Israel spake to me. He that ruleth over men must be just ruling in the fear of God.
I have a feeling that David, in saying these words at the end of his life, realized that there had been failure in some of that. We wouldn't want to call David an unjust king, but there had been times when he had let things go because he had been overruled by considerations that were not of God.
But notice verse four. And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds, as the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain. And notice this, although my house be not so with God, yet He hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure, for this is all my salvation and all my desire.
Although he maketh not to grow.
If you look in your Darby translation, there's a footnote to that verse that it could read like this.
And all my salvation, and all my desire.
Would he not make it to grow?
Oh, David looked on. Because the one that he speaks of here is Christ, ultimately.
A morning without clouds, the one that will come in millennial blessing there and bring in a Kingdom, that glorious Kingdom. Of course, David we know didn't have, shall we say the vision that you and I have since we've received the revelations from a risen Christ in glory, but he recognized his failure and encountered on God. And I say to parents here today.
Maybe there is more than one.
And we feel our failure in carrying out the responsibilities that have been given to us, and we do not see our house with God the way it should be.
What a wonderful thing to look on for that one who is as the light of the morning when the sun rises even morning without clouds.
For one.
In absolute perfection to whom we can look.
And as David said, although my house be not so with God, yet we do have God's promises. And he says, and again I'm quoting from that Darby rendering all my salvation and all my desire. Would he not make it to grow?
It's a wonderful thing to be able to trust the Lord because there's no parent here.
01:05:02
I don't think that would stand up and say, look at my kids, they are examples of godliness and of Christianity in every way, and it's because I did what I was supposed to in the word of God.
And so there they are.
Oh no, Oh no. God reminds us that we have responsibility, but He also reminds us that any blessing is on the ground of His pure sovereign grace.