Michigan Family Camp: 2016
Table of Contents
Hijacked
Children—Tim Roach
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.
We do not have any books. Does anybody have a song they'd like to sing from the children's book by heart?
Awesome. OK.
What can wash away my sins? Not to God.
Well, that's my 1.5 Christian name. Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Now it's just a problem.
At our store. Somebody can help me get that started?
So yeah.
Mr. Rice, what are you doing?
You're giving away my candy.
Hey, you're hijacking the Sunday school.
What? What? What's going on here?
Stealing my candy.
Continue on where I left off you. You may you may continue.
Can't you read my sign? What does my sign say?
Boys and girls.
You ate my candy.
But what is done is done. You took my candy.
Let's sing.
First verse of Intuit.
95,000 Ray's graduation, retirement, falling through me. That's all about it.
00:05:08
To what's called high speed evangelism. And when we're driving along the road, we see some people on the side of the road. We hold out some gospel tracks and they see we're holding them out and they and they all put their hands out and we let them go. And you try to make them so they land right at their feet. Sometimes you do, sometimes you don't. But they run, they get the tracks and they start to read them. And one time the guys were with me, There were three or four guys with me and they got a big bag of candy and they.
Now the people there in the village, they can't afford penny candy. They don't have money. And so when we throw the candy out, they run and get the candy and they enjoy it. Well, we have a lot of candy available to us in this country and we can have it anytime we want it. Even today some of you have taken or eaten some of my candy, but you should not have taken my candy.
The sign says do not eat the candy.
Let's sing when he cometh, the first verse when he cometh, when he cometh.
In this world. And it was good. God created man. He created man special, boys and girls He created you special. And he formed man out of the dust of the earth. And God made man in his own image. And God breathed his life. He breathed life into man.
Let's sing, John 316.
John.
This is chapter 2. We're told that God told Adam to eat any fruit of the garden.
Of Eden, except for the fruit of one tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And if they ate of that tree, they would surely die.
God didn't want them to die. God created Adam and Eve, and he created you, boys and girls, to be his friends.
Well, when Adam and Eve were in the garden, God came down from heaven, and he came down into the garden in the mornings when it was still cool in the day, and he visited with Adam and Eve.
They enjoyed a good fellowship. They were good friends.
In Genesis chapter three, we find that man and woman, they had good lives in the Garden of Eden. They had no real work. There's no hunger, there's no thirst, no pain, no tears, no sorrow. There was no death. There was no sin. There was no sin. So they didn't even wear clothes. And they were not ashamed.
God gave God gave Adam. He gave them control and authority over creation.
And God told Adam to give names to all the animals. I don't even know how many animals there are, and I don't know half an or I don't know a little fraction of the names of all the animals. But Adam, he named all the animals, and he named the big important animals, the ones like the lions and the elephants and the donkeys. And then he named the little insignificant animals, like the fleas and the ticks and the cats.
And the roaches.
Well, God talked directly to Adam and Eve, and God told them not to eat the fruit of that one tree that was in the middle of the garden. And if they did, they would surely die.
00:10:10
Even when she went close to that tree and she started looking at that tree, she wanted to check it out. God said not to eat of it. Why not? Well, Satan, the serpent was there and he called her come over and he tempted her. And he said to her, Did God really tell you that you should not eat of the fruit of the garden, of every tree, of the garden? And you said, yes, if we eat of the tree, of that one tree.
The tree, we will die. Ah, said Satan. You will not die. Satan lied to her, and that woman looked, and she listened to Satan, and she saw that the tree was good for food.
And it was pleasant to the eyes. You look at this candy. It looks pleasant to the eyes, doesn't it? Well, Eve, she was deceived. Well, she ate the fruit. And then she took it to Adam. And she tempted Adam with the fruit. And Adam ate the fruit. Where is Adam today?
Adam is dead. God told him you would die if you eat that, and so they are dead. Where is he?
She is dead. God warned them. He said do not eat the fruit, but they disobeyed and they ate the fruit. There's a sign up here that says do not eat the candy. But what did some of you do?
You took the candy. What were you thinking you're gonna do with that candy that you took? Are you gonna eat it? Some of you ate my candy and the candy was sweet to eat. But now you feel terrible inside because you disobeyed the sign. You disobeyed me.
Look at the signature here.
That doesn't say Tim, right? That says Tim Roach.
You disobeyed my side.
And you listen to Tim Wright.
And you ate my candy. Genesis 3, verse 6. And when the woman saw the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her. And he did eat. Adam and Eve disobeyed, and immediately they began to die like a leaf.
CV.
Look at this leaf, it looks good.
Looks like a nice leaf, but it has no life in it. Adam and Eve, they still look good on the outside.
But inside they were sick with sin and they were dying. They became sick with sin. Adam and Eve, they had children, just like your mom and dad had children. Adam and Eve had children, but the children were sick when they were born. Just like you. When you were born, you were sick.
You were sick with sin, and when, just like Adam and Eve's children, you were born sick, sick with sin, sick with a sin with a death sentence because of your sin.
You will die and you do sins. Everyone of you, you do sin. I don't know what sin you do. Maybe you disobey your mom, you tell lies, you fight, you disobey, but you do sin because you were born sick with sin and all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. God says that the person who sins will die, and he says that the wages of sin is death and the wrath of God abides on you. You are damned. He's condemned you to death because you are a Sinner and you're damned to the lake of fire to a loss.
Eternity. All because you were born a Sinner and you have sin in you, and you are slowly dying from your sin. Look at this leaf.
We know that leaf is dead because it looks dead. This leaf has no life in it, but it still looks good.
You are slowly dying from sin, and soon your end will be death and hell.
When we were living in Malawi, sometimes the the ladies, they have babies and they don't want the baby. So what are they going to do with the baby? Sometimes they take the baby and they put it out in the Bush and they leave it there and let it die out in the Bush and maybe the wild animals will come and eat it. But one time sometimes they they, they have outhouses, they don't have toilets like we do that flush. But they have an outhouse in a toilet with a hole in the floor and sometimes they don't want the baby. So they put the baby down in that hole and they push it down, they push it down into the toilet.
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Well, one lady, she did that, she didn't want her baby. And they put the base, she put the baby down there and the people from the village heard the baby crying and they went and they they couldn't get to the baby. So they had to take the whole toilet building apart and pick the floor up and reach down and rescue the baby. Well, they took the baby, they cleaned the baby all up and they give her clean clothes. They gave the baby food to eat and the baby looked good, but the baby was sick on the inside.
You could not see that the baby was sick by looking at the baby because the baby looked very healthy. But slowly the baby was dying and a few months later the baby died.
You boys, you look good here this morning. The boys and girls. The girls look good too.
But you're dressed nicely.
You look like this leaf. Maybe you even had a shower this morning or last night. Or yesterday.
And you look good.
You're you're clean, you're quiet, you're happy. You look like Christians, but you took my candy.
Oh yes, you have a good excuse. Mr. Wright made you do it wrong.
He made you take my candy.
But no, you saw the sign.
You obeyed, Mr. Wright, and you took my candy. You ate my candy.
Adam and Eve, They took the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, and they knew when they took that fruit. They knew right then that they were sinners.
And they looked at themselves.
And they discovered they're naked and they were ashamed. And so they made themselves clothes from leaves. Do you think they took a leaf like this or a leaf like this to make their clothes? Well, I'm sure it wasn't long before those nice leaves look like this.
And they didn't. It didn't cover them very well when they dried up like that.
God came down to the garden to talk to Adam and Eve.
And he couldn't find them. He looked, he says. Adam, where are you? And Adam was hiding behind the Bush, he says. I'm hiding.
I'm Naked.
God said. Who told you that you were naked?
Did you eat the fruit of that tree?
Adam confesses, and he blames God, he says. That woman that you gave me, she may gave it to me and she made me do it.
God looks at Eve.
And she blames the devil. The devil made me do it, she says. But no, they were guilty because Adam and Eve disobeyed, and so God had to cast them out of the garden.
You boys and girls, you are also a guilty Sinner.
But God will not cast you out of the garden.
God will do something far worse with you.
He will cast you into hell.
The soul that sins, it shall die. The wages of sin is death, and whoso is not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. Then God looked at Adam, He looked at Eve, he looked at Satan, and God pronounced punishment and a consequence. And now man is going to have to work, he has to sweat, and the land will bring forth thorns and things isn't aren't going to grow as well.
And the woman, she's going to suffer in childbirth when she has a baby. The Bible says it is appointed unto man once to die and after death, the judgment. But God, God doesn't want to. He doesn't like the judgment part of that responsibility. So God has a way of escape. He wants to give you a way of escape. And for Adam and Eve, God has provided A Redeemer, a promised Redeemer.
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So they can be rescued. Well, God has a Redeemer for you. He has a promise, a Redeemer for you, boys and girls, so that you can be rescued from the lake of fire. Genesis 3, verse 15. I will put enmity between thee, the devil and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed. It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
The devil's seed and the seed of the woman the devil's seed are the wicked people.
Their father is the devil. The devil is the father of lies.
But the seed of the woman? Guess who the seed of the woman is?
She had children. They had children all the way down to Mary and Mary had.
Jesus, the seed of the woman in this prophecy of the Redeemer.
Is Jesus, Adam and Eve needed a Redeemer And you need a Redeemer too, A Redeemer. Jesus. Jesus is the way of escape. Jesus says I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me.
Satan and the seed of the woman would one day meet in a battle at the cross.
And Jesus would die. Jesus was put on that cross, his hands were strung out, he was nailed to the cross, and he hanged there.
While he was there, he was punished.
And there was a battle there at the cross, and Satan thought that he was the winner because Jesus died. But no, it was the plan of God to use this time at the cross to punish Jesus.
For your sin.
God knew that you would be here today, and so 2000 years ago, God punished Jesus.
And then three days later, Jesus rose from the dead. They buried him, but he rose from the dead and he defeated Satan. Satan thought he was the winner. But no, Jesus is alive. Jesus is the winner. And so one day, Satan, the loser, will be cast into the lake of fire that was prepared for the devil and his angels.
Well, Genesis 3, verse 21 We find that God was merciful to Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, and God made clothes for them from the skins of animals to cover the effects of sin. And in verse 21 it says unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothe them.
God covered the results of their sin through the death of an animal and the blood that was shed, and this reminds us of the death of the Lord Jesus who died to take away your sin and if you admit boys and girls.
Boys and girls, if you would admit that you are a Sinner.
And you repent towards God, and you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you will be saved.
The animals, they died instead of Adam and Eve, but Jesus died instead of you.
You boys and girls, listen now. You boys and girls have sinned by taking the candy that did not belong to you.
So there must be punishment.
I will need to execute judgment now.
You so you'll each need to come up and stand here before the table.
One by one and receive your punishment.
Why don't we start with that boy down there? Cameron, you come up here.
And you can all follow Cameron, come up to the table.
I'm gonna have to punish you, Cameron.
This is the process.
Bend over. This is the candy that you stole here. Just bend right over right into the candy.
No, no. Wait.
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What? I don't think it's what I said, But my son, I love you. Why would you? Why would you take this boy's punishment? Because I love him.
I love all these buildings.
Oh, do you hear that Cameron? Boys and girls, Kyle is going to take the punishment for you.
Thank you.
Say thank you to Kyle and after I beat him, Kyle, come up here. I'm going to have to beat you.
This candy is the sin of these boys and girls. You must take this sin upon yourself.
OK.
Oh, Cameron said. Thank you, Kyle.
Maybe all you boys and girls should say thank you, Kyle.
Boys and girls.
Kyle came up here and he took the punishment that you deserve.
Now I am able to forgive you for taking my candy and for eating my candy.
You are forgiven, and only because Kyle was willing to take your punishment for you. And so if you can accept Kyle's payments of taking your punishment for taking my candy, and I can forgive you, and we can be friends again.
One Corinthians 15 verse three says Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. The Lord Jesus he has taken the punishment for you boys and girls at the time he was hanging there.
On the cross, and he died on the cross, and he shed his precious blood to wash away your sins.
Now.
Jesus wants to be your friend. Now is the time for you to accept Jesus Christ as your Savior.
And your Lord.
Will you accept God's forgiveness for your sin against Him?
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
And you will be saved.
And you can pray. You can pray to the Lord Jesus. Tell the Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus, I am a Sinner. I want to be saved.
And I believe that you took the punishment for me and that you died on the cross.
And that your blood was shed to take away my sins, I believe. I believe I receive you, Lord Jesus, as my savior. Can you do that? Do you want to do that today and ask the Lord Jesus to save you?
Well, after the meeting, because Kyle took the punishment for the people who disobeyed my sign.
You're all welcome up to come up and take a candy.
After the meeting.
Everybody may come and take one.
I think we have time to sing some songs.
Someone have a song you'd like to sing that we might know?
Yes.
She just loves the little children.
Oh, maybe Joel knows how that one goes.
Let's have a song like the same. Yeah, Drew, 82 What is 82 what?
What's the new word? Tell me the old, old story.
For one more Isaac.
Jesus loves little children like that one.
Nsnoise.
A little ship was on the sea.
OK, let's see if we can.
00:35:12
98 00 1/6.
Our God and Father we give thanks for the Lord Jesus who came into this world to take the punishment for our sins and we just give thanks and honor and glory to you, Lord Jesus for for doing that for us. We give thanks for the story of Adam and Eve that shows us how our sin separates us from God and how that the Lord Jesus in his death and his blood that was shed draws us back into the relationship with God his father. We just give thanks and just ask that the children would come to know the Lord is their savior at an early age. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
OK.
Gratitude
Address—Michael Anderson
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.
Good evening, shall we start the meeting tonight by singing a hymn from the hymn book? 297 When all thy mercies, Oh my God, my rising soul surveys transported with the view I'm lost in wonder. Love and praise, verse 310 Thousand thousand precious gifts. My daily thanks, employee.
Nor is the least a cheerful heart to taste those gifts with joy.
Because some brothers start #297 please.
Let's ask for his help.
Our God and our Father, we come before thee this evening we have a opportunity to open my word and to hear what a spirit has to teach us. We ask that that will help the speaker to bring forward a message that will be of help and importance to each person that's here. We have to double help each of us to mold our lives to be more in conformity to thee. But I always learning more from thy word about thee.
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We thank Thee for all thou hast done for us, from the very thing that Allah has allowed us to become thy sons and daughters, to the everyday, every moment, every second of our lives that Thou art with us and art here to help us and to direct our paths. We ask that that will help us to remember this and to depend upon Thee. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Most of you are probably familiar with the uprisings that occurred in Ferguson, MO. Uh, it's a town near Saint Louis. I can tell you I vividly remember the 9th of November 24th, 2014. That was the night that the grand jury returned to NO and returned no indictment.
That night, 25 buildings were set ablaze, 2 police cars and many others were burned, 61 People were arrested, one person was shot and burned in their car.
It was a.
Might have mayhem in Ferguson, MO Kind of a kind of alarming here in the Midwest and this area of the country. We don't usually see that yet. I remember that evening well. I was sitting in Midway Airport awaiting my flight to leave Chicago and go to Saint Louis. It was a late flight. It was the last flight of the day.
And we got onto the plane. The door was closed.
Which is usually a good sign the jet bridge was removed.
And our flight was canceled.
Unfortunately, the uprisings, uh, unbeknownst to me, were right at the end of the runway in Saint Louis. Ferguson is positioned very conveniently that way, and with shots being fired in the air and other things going on, they didn't feel comfortable having planes come in for a landing. So they opened the doors back up and let us all back off the airplane and all stand in one single line.
For one remaining gate agent.
That was still there that evening to rebook each one of us.
That's took quite a bit of time. We all got off the plane and many people were angry.
Many were demanding that the airline pay for their hotels, pounding fists and making comments under under their breath.
Some I I even heard one man that was blaming the African American race for our plight.
And the fact that we were not on a plane headed to Saint Louis.
Sure, I had responsibilities the next morning I had meetings that I was supposed to be at.
But I felt strangely peaceful.
I was thankful that I was going to be able to fly there in the morning.
Thankful that my home and family weren't part of all that mess.
Thankful that I was a frequent traveler with the know how and options that come with having that behind you. And thankful that I didn't feel angry like everyone or many of them around me.
That feeling of peace and thankfulness was part of what kind of inspired my thoughts about this evening.
I was umm.
In a meeting, umm, earlier this year, one of the companies that I work with, I helped put together an all employee meeting where they brought everybody together into one place. There were several speakers, myself being one of them. We brought in a couple other, uh, consultants that I have acquaintance with. One of them that spoke was, uh, former Blue Angel pilot. Some of you may have heard of the Blue Angels, may have seen them at an air show. Blue Angels are kind of famous because they're some of the best.
Pilots that there are they fly their planes 36 inches wing tip to wing tip.
Upside down.
On top of each other.
Very precision flying. So this gentleman was talking and the topic that he had was glad to be here, glad to be here is a phrase that apparently is very meaningful to the Blue Angels. They use it a lot and it really is a sense of gratitude. And he was applying the concept of gratitude as it applies into a company environment. I know that he and his partner.
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Both very accomplished people involved in aviation.
Are both very strong Christian gentlemen and umm, always find an opportunity when they speak to work in, uh, some of God's message and a testimony into their messages. And as I listen to that, and I thought about the feeling that I had when I was sitting in the airport and the message that they delivered, those were a couple of things that brought to my mind the concept of gratitude.
And gratitude.
That we should feel as Christians.
I know that this study, I'll just say this up front, has been more for my own benefit than for yours.
It's apparent to me that when you take on the responsibility of speaking, the Lord puts you through some pre exercise, some opportunities to grow and to learn yourself. And then hopefully sharing some of those things with you will help you to inspire some of those same thoughts as well.
It was a quote I came across, thought it was interesting. It said. It's it is not happy people who are thankful, it's thankful people that are happy.
That's backed up, I think scripturally in Philippians chapter 4, verses 4 through 7. I will pause for a few of the scriptures. Some of them I'll just read. You're free to turn if you wish to rejoice in the Lord always and again I say rejoice. Be careful. I would say anxious might be a a term there for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving. Let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God which.
Path of all understanding, so keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
When I think about gratitude, I thinking about the story in Luke 17 where there were 10 lepers who met Jesus and they asked to be cleansed. You remember the story Jesus?
Sent them off to the priest to present themselves all cleanse, but there was only one that turned back and praised him and thanked him for doing that. One of 10.
Which one would I have been?
Which one are you?
As we talk about gratitude, I think we need to think in terms of gratitude is something that has maturity, has growth, has opportunity for, umm, change. I don't think it's an on off switch. It's not you're either have gratitude or you don't. I think there's a, a continuum of it. I think that gratitude starts with being thankful for what God has provided.
It starts with being thankful for what?
God has provided turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter 8 of a few verses to read here.
The, uh, setting here is, umm, a speech being given to the Israelites after they've gone through it a lot and right before they're about to realize a great promise.
About to realize an opportunity that they've been waiting for, that God is going to take them into.
And there's a little a little talk here Moses gives on things that need to be thought through.
Verse seven. For the Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land. A land of brooks, of water, of fountains, and depths that spring out of the valleys and hills. A land of wheat and barley, and vines and fig trees and pomegranates. The land of olive oil and honey. A land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarcest, thou shalt not lack anything in it. A land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass.
I would imagine if I was an Israelite back then that would sound pretty cool.
That's a lot of what I was looking for and a lot of what I was wanting. A great provision, a promised land they were about to enjoy.
And after explaining that that's what they're going to receive the next verse, verse 10, a request that they have gratitude. And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless. I will say thank the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
00:15:06
An important step. God provides provision.
We say thanks and then a warning against self preoccupation versus 11 Through 17. I think there've been enough experience with the Israelites at that point to recognize that this type of warning was probable, unnecessary. Take care lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today.
Lest when you've eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them.
And when your herds and flocks multiply, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God. Who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the House of slavery. Who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water? Who brought you water out of the flinty rock? Who fed you in the wilderness with manna that your father's did not know?
That he might humble you and test you to do you good.
In the end, here's the warning. Beware lest you say in your heart, my power and the might of my hand have gotten me this well.
God's gifts alone are not able to bring you joy.
They only bring you joy when they're combined with your gratitude.
What we're saying here is that perhaps what we don't need we are not in need of is more accomplishment and more accumulation.
But instead, more appreciation.
That appreciation was what allows you to convert what you have into joy.
Who here has a job?
Who here has a family?
Who has clothing?
Who isn't hungry?
Who has more to be thankful for than they realize?
In First Timothy 6, Paul says to be content with food and clothes alone.
We have a lot to be thankful for.
Some have said that this is the time in the history of the world where there's more to be thankful for and less thankfulness than ever before. I don't know whether that's true. I wasn't here back then, but it could be. We have a lot to be thankful for and a lot that we probably forget to be thankful about.
I'd like us to turn to another, umm portion, and we're going to kind of come back and forth to this portion a couple of times this evening. I'd like us to turn to the book of Jonah.
We're gonna start out reading in the first chapter, Jonah, and we'll end up near the end of the fourth chapter.
Now, before you get concerned, I'm not going to read straight through. We'll skip a lot of verses.
And, uh, it'll be spread out through the rest of the talk.
In Jonah chapter one verse 15.
Joan is in a real trouble, it says. So they took up Jonah and cast him forth into the sea, and the sea ceased from her raging.
So as a background, Jonah's doing the wrong thing. Jonah's on a ship, God stopping it, and Jonah realizes it and says I need to be cast off if you want this to to stop. And so they do. They put him into the middle of the ocean. I don't think they had life preservers back then.
So he was in a world of hurt. He's floating out in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea and he's, umm, really not got a lot of options. Probably unswimmable.
But God had a solution. God had a solution.
And he provides it in verse 17, says, Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow of Jonah.
Now, the word prepared there is kind of like provided and it has a similar meaning. Other translations were translated as provided. And in fact, if you take a look at that word, it exists four times in the book of Jonah. That word, if you go back to the Greek, is a word, umm, I'm not sure how to pronounce Greek, but it's uh, like manna, mayonnaise, something like that.
Mani think AH.
00:20:00
Uh, very similar to the mana that we heard about that they had in the wilderness, which was a provision for them, something that God provided to help them to not be hungry and to last through the years that they had in the wilderness.
But much like this children of Israel and their manna, Jonah wasn't too pleased with the approach to the solution that God brought forward. He starts to complain. And in chapter 2 verses two and three, we see some of that. He says, I cried by my, by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord. And he heard me out of the belly of hell, cried I, and thou hurts my voice, for thou hast cast me into the deep in the midst of the Seas and the floods compassed me about all thy billows and thy waves.
Over me. I'm not sure that it's what we want to do to read the rest of that.
There's a lot of complaining, a lot of lack of positivity, if we can put it that way, and not much gratitude.
That takes me to talking about the first common enemy of gratitude that I want to mention tonight, and that is that sometimes even when God provides.
Umm.
We let, uh, we, we, umm, even times, even sometimes when he provides, we let our pickiness get in the way.
We not sure that what he provided is exactly what we wanted. It isn't exactly where we wanted to go. You know, I had a student in my, uh, in my class I, I teach collegiately and umm, I was down in uh, Cabo San Lucas and I had uh, issued a midterm to the students to take online.
And I watched the, the students were taking them online and completing them because I can see online that they're doing it and they have a time period within which to do it and it's a few days that they can take, uh, any time in there that works for them. There was one particular student, a rather, uh, rather good student actually. So I noticed hadn't, uh, taken the assessment, the assessment had closed. That meant she was in a zero position with her test. And as I kind of expected, I started getting, uh, umm, within a few hours. I got some emails and some.
Smells and other things desperate from her umm, because she really wanted to take that test. She didn't want to take a zero, uh, in her grade for the mid term. And so I contacted her and I listened to what she had to say and I said, I I'll open the test for you and you can take that tonight.
Oh, I'm so glad, Professor Anderson. I'm just so happy.
But you know, it's rather late here. Would it be possible for you to open it up for me to take it tomorrow?
Because it'd be a lot easier and better for me to take it tomorrow, see how quickly she went from being relieved and thankful that I opened the assessment. She'd gone from a zero to something she could score, and all of a sudden now it's tomorrow. And then the next day after I did that, there was a part of the assessment she was supposed to, uh, scan in and, and put online for me that way, but she didn't have scanning.
And she was gonna use their scanner to school they can use, but she wasn't gonna go to school that day. So she wondered if she could go scan it tomorrow, the next day after that, because she wasn't planning on driving all the way to the school that day.
Have you guys have any situations like that in your life? I know I have. Like I said, this is more about me.
Have you got a job? But not one that's all you hope for?
Got a husband that would be perfect with just.
Something extra.
You got to go on a trip, but you didn't like the flight times that you had to fly.
You know, provision, that which God gives us, the manna that was provided in the wilderness.
They complained because they didn't want mana, they wanted meat.
And I would just in re in relation to this enemy of gratitude, I would just leave, leave you with this thought. God's provision does not always come wrapped in your preferences.
It's interesting to see that Jonah eventually changes his frame of reference by verse nine. We see. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of Thanksgiving. I will pay that that I have vowed salvation is of the Lord. He finally changes his tune and uses the word voice of Thanksgiving.
And I don't think that it's ironic at all that the very next verse, verse 10, the immediate next verse, we have in the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon dry land.
00:25:08
When we move past whatever our complaining is and we move into that spirit of gratitude for what He has given us, He is able to continue with the provision. In fact, I would say gratitude opens the door to God's provision. Without gratitude, our heart is not able to pick up what God's providing and use it appropriately.
But with gratitude.
It opens the door for us to use His provision as He would in our lives.
You know the next use of the word prepared or provided in Jonah is for the shady plant which moves us all the way over to Chapter 4.
So if we turn to chapter 4, and we can read about that here, starting in verse five and through verse 6.
So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city. And the Lord God prepared a gourd. There's that prepared, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd.
I gotta say, I kind of understand this. I don't like heat either.
And the heat I'm used to is nothing compared to what it would be in the desert of Assyria.
So a little shade would certainly make you happy. And God provided it for him. It was a good thing. It was a wonderful thing. Even though we see that he was doing something that was disobedient to God, God still provided.
We will see later as we continue through Jonah, that.
God was kind of setting up the dominoes so he could knock them back down, no pun intended.
I would like to share with you a story that I'm going to kind of give in some parts. The one consultant that spoke, I'm glad to be here at that, uh, at that employee meeting, there's another consultant, a friend of mine that, umm, he's also very accomplished. Umm, and you'll learn that as I talk a little bit about him. He especially, uh, has made his, his goal to, uh, spread.
His story and his experiences.
As a testimony to the Lord and what the Lord can do, both in a gospel sense as well as an encouragement for Christians.
This, uh, gentleman, I will, uh, I will, uh, umm, give you his name. So, you know, when I'm referring to him, his name is Admiral McCabe. Umm, and he was, uh, interestingly, the director of Top, uh, Top Gun. He was in charge of the Top Gun training, uh, segment. Umm, there was a movie made about that, uh, number of years ago and he was actually the director at the time they made that.
But into his story a little, umm.
His dad had been a World War 2 Navy fighter pilot in the Pacific and, uh, was killed in the Korean War. But he, umm, really wanted to be, uh, a fighter pilot. Umm, as he was growing up and, umm, the, uh, time when he got to the right age, the Navy believed that Vietnam was winding down and was cutting aviators. Umm, So it was kind of unfortunate because he was really hoping to get involved in that.
And so he was put onto a list of waiting a seat in the squadron.
And was assigned to one of the original Top Gun instructors.
Umm and umm. Then some things changed. The Navy hadn't been engaged for about four years and they decided they needed to re engage in Vietnam, in, in in flying submissions. And somehow he was added to the squadron without ever going through the normal training. Instead he was added to the squadron and he was one of the first students to go through Top Gun training.
They started back the flying missions and unfortunately, umm, they weren't, uh, very successful. Uh, by way of contrast, in all the desert wars that we're familiar with, uh, the Navy has lost five airplanes in Vietnam, over 530.
Maybe hadn't been doing well at that time either. 25% as good as they had in World War 2.
The month, uh, that, uh, Admiral McCabe started flying, the Navy had gone one and one in fights with the North Viet N Vietnamese.
The same week that his father was killed, he was sent out on a mission. In that mission, he engaged 4 Migs near their capital and shot down two of them, and they sent more Migs to uh, uh, to defend, which was the first time that it ever happened in that war. He won the Silver Star and the Singlish Flying Cross for what he did.
00:30:19
After that day, the Navy went 25 and one on their on their missions.
The first, as he calls it, Glad to be here. Share out why he's grateful he survived over 150 combat missions.
Over 30 years of flying, lost 25% of his squadron, lost through three roommates and had to take care of two widows of friends that were killed.
His perspective is that the Lord took care of him for a reason. There was something in his future that he wanted him to to use that story for. And he says that sometimes what the Lord gives and takes away doesn't make sense until you take the Longview backward.
So the 1St and simple level of gratitude is to say thanks for the provisions that we see that we've been given. I would say that this doesn't require much faith, it's really just good manners.
And of course, we've also learned that we need to avoid putting our own standards on God's provisions and getting picky about what it is that He gives us.
The Lord desires our thankfulness. First Thessalonians 5 says in everything, give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. When we're thankful for the goodness of God in our lives, it touches the very heart of God and encourages Him to shower even more blessings upon us. A thankful heart is truly a floodgate to the blessings and goodness of God in our lives.
Psalm 37 verse four says, Delight thyself also in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.
Are you living in and enjoying provisions that used to be your prayer requests and haven't even said thanks yet?
As we move on to the next level.
I say that gratitude matures with being grateful for why God has purposed the thing. So the first level starts with being thankful for what God's provided, and the second level is being grateful for why God purposed the thing.
Level one is where you learn to thank God for what you can see. Level 2 is where you learn to trust God with what you cannot see.
It's the Lord's will that we're thankful, even for the things that seem bad for us in First Thessalonians 5 verses.
15 through 18.
It reads, See that none render evil for evil unto any man whatever. Follow that which is good both among yourselves and to all men. Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing in everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
Everything. Even the things that seem bad for us.
Last year I, uh, spoke on another topic, and one of the things I explained at the beginning of that talk was that the first half of 2015 had been one of the busiest that I've ever had. After that, not not too long after I left camp umm, I found out that one of the customers that I've been helping decided to skip paying my bills.
In one e-mail that I received.
About $50,000 went up in smoke.
And the reason was they've been bought out by a new group who had not worked with me and really didn't have any care about the previous owner's obligations, didn't want to pay the bills that have been left behind when they when they bought the the company.
Unfortunately that wasn't very good for me. It's UMM, wouldn't help my family much.
It really kind of put a hurt on my situation and at that point, honestly, it was hard to see what there was to be thankful for in all the work and all the time away from my family and.
Nothing.
Are you feeling lonely? Perhaps feeling like you don't have any friends? Did you just lose what you perceive as a great job? Have you worked real hard on a class and really yet received a terrible grade?
00:35:11
Maybe you or someone else that you know is going through a hardship that you just doesn't seem like they deserve.
Let's take a look at how the Apostle Paul viewed a situation like this.
I'm going to read out of Philippians 1 verses 17th through 18. I'm going to read from the Darby edition.
But those out of contention announced the Christ, not purely supposing to arouse tribulation for my bonds. What is it then? At any rate, in every way, whether in pretext or in truth, Christ is announced. And in this I rejoice. Yang, also I will rejoice.
You see, Paul sees the end. He in fact articulates it to us. He sees the purpose. He sees that even if the motives are wrong and hurtful to him, God is getting his purpose accomplished. And for that he's joyful and he's grateful.
So he's joyful and grateful, even though they're stirring up trouble for him in bonds. By the way, this is while he's changed 24/7 to a Roman guard sitting in jail.
I often find that we are not so visionary.
We must depend on faith in God. After all, he says in James 1 verses 2 Through 4. My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations or trials, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect an entire wanting nothing.
Count it joy when you fall into trials.
I was at an event once where we were listening to a speaker talk. Well behind him, an accomplished artist was painting.
So imagine for a moment that this.
Beautiful ensemble was an artist painting.
The plan was for the artist to be finished with the painting at about the same time that the speaker got to the end of the points that he was making.
In the end, the picture was to be a perfect rendering of the main message the speaker was sharing.
However, as I sat there and watched this, listening to the speaker, watching this painting.
All I saw was seemed to be a mess of paint. It was I, I didn't see any of the genius in this picture at all. It, it was, you know, roughly like this from my perspective. Now, I've told you before, you may have heard that I, I'm, I'm not a great art art aficionado. I, I don't, I probably should have taken that appreciation for art class in college or something, but I definitely thought I would be able to see something.
Now about 2/3 the way through the talk.
The artist who was painting it reached up and did this with the painting.
The artist had been painting it upside down for the 1St 2/3. They were painting the sky and other things that were here and the picture was big and they were painting it upside down. So when they flipped it around, multiple people, a little audible, got gasps, you know, including myself, because all of a sudden we saw what the artist had been painting, what it looked like, a mess of paint.
Became a picture that I could see where it was going, where they finished the last third.
I give you that as an example because I think that we have to have enough faith in God that I didn't have in that painter to praise Him and thank Him while the picture is still upside down.
And while it's still being painted.
While we're going through that trial, while we're going through that thing that we don't understand and can't imagine being grateful for, we've got to have enough faith to believe that God has a plan for it. And when he flips it upside down, we're going to see it.
That's what we have to be willing to understand. I'm going to continue with the story of Admiral McCabe's life and some of the things that he lists out in his talks as things that he's that he's very grateful for in his life. Most of you know the date, September 11Th, 2001.
You probably, when you think of that date, you think of the Twin Towers and the airplanes running into them.
00:40:00
But there was another building that was hit that day with an airplane.
You remember the Pentagon?
Now, if you start connecting for a moment in your mind what I said about the Admiral and where I might be going with this, you might imagine that he had become, by that point, the director of air warfare for the Navy. He was in charge of everything that the Navy did that had anything to do with lifting off the ground, including ships that they take off from, etcetera, etcetera.
Where was he sitting that day? His office.
And his staff were on the 4th floor of the Pentagon.
The plane that hit the Pentagon came in and hit the side right underneath his office and blew out the 1St 3 fours of the Pentagon right underneath him.
In a split second, I want you to imagine this. Imagine if there was a plane that came in and hit the basement of this building. Imagine the mayhem, the fire. There were tiles on the floor that were popping off because the heat was so high that it was like a popcorn machine of tiles popping off all over the place, smoke everywhere. Nobody even knew what had happened.
Why all of a sudden was did you go and then one to two seconds?
Fire, heat, sounds, everything falling apart.
They couldn't figure out where they were, where they needed to go for safety.
Now I want you to, as you're sitting there in that moment, I want you to ask yourself.
Who here would feel grateful in that moment?
Grateful for the circumstance they're in.
Now the story obviously ends because he's out speaking with him. We're getting everybody out of there and removing them to safety.
One of his friends that was a fighter pilot that was driving down the Interstate saw the plane come out overhead and saw the plane come down and said the plane hit the ground just before it hit the Pentagon.
If that plane had instead kept in the air before it hit, the before it hit, it would have been 510 feet higher. If three floors below them were knocked out, what would have happened? That plane hadn't hit the ground first. He wouldn't be here today. And I think, as he says, that's a clear reminder that we need to be grateful to God for every last breath we take.
Sometimes we think in our first.
Level of simplicity and gratitude of the things that are good that are happening to us.
It's hard to remember sometimes that every breath we take is a gift from God. If we go back to Jonah again, Jonah's sitting outside of Nineveh under the shady plant. God now prepares or provides him. Another thing. We see that word for the third time in verse seven of chapter 4. But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day and it smoked the gourd that it withered. And then the fourth time as that word is used in chapter in verse 8.
And it came to pass, when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement E wind, and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished himself to die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live.
I'm not sure that if you and I were writing the story that we would use the word provided. God provided a worm. He provided a hot wind that made me want to die.
But Jonah, who probably wrote this account long after he'd learned his lessons, was able to reflect back and say God provided that for me because it turned me around. God's plan was to use those circumstances to turn Jonah back to doing his work.
And as soon as that lesson is learned, you'll notice the book of Jonah closes and is done.
In this situation, Jonah was able to see the thing.
Afterwards, that was a part of God's plan. As I said earlier, he set the dominoes up to knock them down so he could bring Jonah into compliance.
Our family has had the opportunity to sit and read some books together over the years, and one of the books that we read is a story that you may have read as well by an author named Corey 10 Boom. She was a Holocaust Christian, Holocaust survivor who went through time in the German concentration camps. Umm, we read this. We had the opportunity as a family to visit a concentration camp when we were in Europe.
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Two years ago, and we read this story before that, umm, to give us some better understanding of what we were seeing. I want to share with you one excerpt out of that book, a story that I call Cory 10 Boom's Fleas.
She and her sister were pushed into the Barracks 28 at Ravensbrook, a work camp for prisoners. There were stacks of wooden sleeping platforms, 3 high, and they were deep, covered with dirty thinking straw. There wasn't even enough room for you in each of the bunks to sit up without banging your head.
They had just arrived after a long train ride where they'd had eighty women crushed together in one freight car. And so they were exhausted. And they went in to try to get into these, into these stinky bumps. Excuse me, bunk beds. Excuse me. And umm, tried to lay down. And within moments, Corey sits up and says, please, this place is crawling with them. I, I don't know how I can cope living with such a terrible place.
Imagine sleeping.
On straw that is embedded with tons and tons of fleas.
You might be discouraged.
But her sister says, Corey, I think God's already given us the answer. Her sister's name was Betsy. She says, what was that verse that you read from the Bible this morning? It was the one we read earlier first in First Thessalonians chapter 5. Rejoice, Pray without ceasing and everything give thanks.
Corey says to her sister, says that's too hard in a place like this. Her sister says come on, let's, let's, let's try, let's, let's try to think of what we could be thankful for. What are we thankful for?
Well, we must be thankful in this awful place. I guess I'm thankful that we are together.
And their sister added. And that the guards didn't find that Bible that you have hanging around your neck.
Maybe, says Corey, we should thank God for how crowded we are in here because that way more women are going to hear the word of God when we read it aloud.
That's right, Betsy says, not getting the, uh, sarcasm. And she adds. And thank you, God, for the fleas.
Oh no, no, Betsy, I cannot thank God for the fleas. There is nothing good about them.
Her sister says, well, we'll just have to wait and see.
Every day they awakened at 4:30 AM and they went outside to stand in the cold and be counted. Often times we learned when we were at the concentration camp that the counting could take if they, if they were off by one, they would start over again. And so it could take two to three to four hours sometimes to do the counting. They would be sanding there at attention that time in the morning with very little clothes, uh, in the cold waiting. Well, they got counted.
Then they would work an 11 hour day. They got two meals, black bread.
For breakfast and thin soup of turnips for supper. We get a little bit more than that here at this camp.
A lot more, umm. The only thing that they had to look forward to was when they would stumble back to their bunks at night. They could get their smuggled Bible out and spend some time reading His word.
At first they posted lookouts because if they got caught with a Bible, the person caught would probably be killed.
So they posted lookouts in case anyone was coming in so they could put it away quickly and not be caught with the Bible and have it confiscated.
But after time, they realized no one was coming. They weren't getting caught, so they extended to two readings a day.
One day.
Umm, Betsy grabs Corey's arm and says, You know what I I just figured out? I figured out why no one's bothered us with our Bible studies. I was listening to the guards and overheard one of them saying that none of them want to come into Barracks 28 because of the fleas.
Corey laughed or wanted to said, All right Lord, thank you for the fleas.
Sometimes while we're in the experience of whatever God has for us to experience, we can't see his mind yet, but if we just muster a bit of gratitude.
What's the PS here for His perfect ways and for the purpose that He has for our pain?
We will feel peace.
00:50:02
A second common enemy.
Of gratitude.
Is that it's hard to be grateful to God when we're too preoccupied with ourselves.
A quote that I would share again.
Gratitude is the ability to experience life as a gift. It liberates us from the prison of self preoccupation.
The reason that Jonah that we've been reading about was outside the gate of the city was because he was angry that he was going to be made look to look foolish. He'd been saying loudly that God was going to destroy and God was not going to destroy and this was going to make him look foolish and he was very upset about that.
He was occupied with himself.
In verse one of chapter 4 it says, But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. And he prayed unto the Lord and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country, didn't I tell you that you were going to do this and put me in this position?
Pride is an insidious enemy of joy and gratitude.
After all, God says that our righteousness is a filthy wrecks.
So after we get done being prideful of focusing on ourselves about how great we are and we eventually look long enough to see what God said is true.
Then we come to the same conclusion with him, and then what sets in?
More self focus discouragement.
Whatever we focus on in our minds is gonna drive what we do externally. Whatever we think about and we focus on is going to drive externally. So if we're focused on ourselves.
It's not going to be that. We're going to find it easy to be expressing gratitude outside of ourselves when we're focused on ourselves, which can either be positively, as I said, prime, or can be the negative version of that, which is discouragement.
Anyone here been depressed?
Been spending a long time in front of the mirror printing.
Can't remember the last time you did something for someone else just because.
Maybe this enemy is affecting you.
Maybe you have too much self preoccupation and that's getting in the way of you being able to be.
In a state of thankfulness and gratitude.
When you realize that God's purpose for your life isn't just about you.
You'll have something real to be thankful for.
When you realize that God's purpose for your life isn't just about you, you'll have a real reason to be thankful.
In conclusion, we've looked at levels of gratitude.
As I review the two levels, I want you to think about where are you living?
Where are you living today? Are you at a point where you can say solidly? I have arrived at level one where it starts with being thankful for what God has provided. You feel that very confident that the things that God has given you on a regular basis, you are very thankful for and expressive of that.
Are you potentially moving from step one to level 2?
Where gratitude matures by being grateful for why God has purposed the thing.
You know we can never live up to the perfect example of gratitude that is in Christ, but we can grow in our emulation of Him.
And enhance our joy at the same time. So I asked the question, where are you living in terms of gratitude? We also took a look at the two common enemies at at 2 Common enemies, it's not the two, but two common enemies of gratitude. Which of these two is most likely knocking on your door?
Enemy number one was when we get picky, God provides and it's not quite what we were looking for. Enemy number two was when we're too preoccupied with ourselves, either pride or discouragement.
I'd like to finally bring an end to the last chapter of the story of Admiral McCabe.
00:55:01
He calls it his third Glad to Be Here shareout.
Four years ago he went to the doctor thinking he had kidney stones, as did the doctor.
When he went there, they found a large mass and they scheduled surgery for just two days later.
Over that weekend, several got together and prayed earnestly for what was going on. They didn't know for sure until they opened up and got in there, didn't do any biopsies. They saw the Mass and said this, this needs to be operative.
And he said that a piece came over him and it reminded him of that piece that he felt of God's hands on him when he was in the airplanes, back in the fighter pilots. He knew the Lords. He was in the Lord's hands when he went in for that surgery. They removed a 10 LB cancerous tumor, his kidney, a part of the pancreas and everything else on his left side. 20 LB surgical removal.
Two top class world surgeons were in there and they called for 1/3 to come join them because it got so complex.
He shouldn't have survived the surgery.
After the surgery though, no complications, no chemo, no radiation, cancer free.
The surgeons obviously did a biopsy later and looked at exactly what kind of cancer was, and they said based on the type of cancer and the growth rate, it had to have been growing in him for 25 years.
And that six more months, they would estimate it would have cut something off that would have ended his life.
As he puts it, he's straight. As the doctors actually put it, straight up act of God.
His words, miracles happen, and thus I'm grateful and glad to be here.
The conclusion? There is 150 combat missions, 9/11 attack one floor down and a 20 LB cancer.
Quite a lot for one guy to be grateful for surviving.
He says that's why I'm in pay it forward mode and asking the Lord to point me wherever he wants me to engage. And Admiral McCabe has multiple outlets through history, spreads his story and is a great testimony to the Lord, to Christ's goodness, to Christ's all sufficiency, and the gratefulness and peace that he has as a Christian.
Even though our lives may not be filled with such extraordinary challenges and miraculous provisions of God.
What's interesting is that each one of us.
Is just as important to him.
Let's make today the day we go to the doctor with a capital D if I may, and have him find our 20 LB cancer. That part of us that's been holding us back from being filled with gratitude.
And let's get it out.
Let's make a sea change in our mindset, in our mindset, and let's commit to censoring ourselves in gratitude for what provision God has granted and the purpose that He has yet to reveal.
I'd like to conclude with another quote that's in the form of a question.
Don't get too technical with answering the question.
Just think about what it means.
What if you woke up today with only the things that you thank God for yesterday?
Let's close in prayer.
Our God and our Father.
We come before thee, and such gratitude and thankfulness for everything that thou has given to us.
We ask that.
For each of us, they're facing different things in life, whether it be that.
We haven't been thankful enough. We haven't been bringing ourselves to the point of remembering that life isn't just as it as it as it is, it's as thou wouldest. And to be thankful for each and every breath that we take, we ask that that would help us to take that perspective and to drill it deep into our into our beings so that we are in a better state of.
Emulating the gratitude that Jesus has.
And in showing the the gratitude that thou deserve us.
There may be some here who have gone through some tough times and are having a really hard time seeing past it and having a feeling of gratitude toward thee and toward others around them. We ask that that would help them to see through that, that they would return to that joy that Paul talks about when he sees thy purpose, even though something negative was happening to him.
01:00:17
We think the that everything we have, including our ability to become grateful, is from the.
And we asked the for the help for us as feeble humans here attempting to live our lives as best as we can before Thee, and to be a light shining out of thy love to all those around us. They ask Thee to help us with these things. We thank Thee for all thou are and all thy love. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Session #1
Doing Business God's way
Address—Tim Roach
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.
129.
Awake each soul. Awake each tongue. The subject is divine. The Saviour's love demands our song that all his people join #129.
There's been no longer in the sunlight. In God, thighs are on the path of the.
Let's ask the Lord's help our God and Father. We give thanks for this day that we've had to enjoy fellowship with one another, get a little bit of exercise, enjoy some food. And now, Father, we just ask for help as we consider your word and we just ask for help that it might have some practical effect for our lives. We just commit this meeting to you, Father. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
This meeting is going to be a little different, the subject that we'll take up. But I think the word of God has much to say on it. And so I think it's going to be valuable. And I'm going to talk about doing business God's way and how our employment and our family life relate to Christianity. And so we'll talk a little bit about motives to begin with. And I want to ask, why should you get a job or why should you start a business? And there are some good reasons and there's maybe some that are not so good reasons.
For earning money, or should I say? Or how we should spend our money. And so both our motives and our actions should all bring glory to God. Your desire may be that you want to make more money. What would you do with that money? Maybe you would think, oh, I would just buy a nice car. Now it's nice to have a nice car. That's OK. But maybe you're doing it so you can measure up to have status.
With your friends, maybe you're going to You want more money so you can pay the bills, and that's a good reason to have employment.
Maybe you want to use your money so you can indulge in entertainment or a bad habit. Some of you maybe have struggled sometimes with drinking or drugs, or you like to party and you like to spend your money on that and you need to have employ income in order to do those things. Or maybe you use your money and you want to invest in idols, which could be activities, desires.
00:05:16
Associations, leagues, sexual immorality, anything that replaces Christianity and lures us away from the love of Christ. We read those verses. Keep yourselves in the love of God.
Maybe your motive for a job or or a business is to be successful and have lots of money so you can spend and become rich. And we may get to the point where we have are so successful and we have so much money that we have become rich. We have need of nothing and the richer we get, it's just important for us to understand that the the richer we get, the harder it is for our kids to be saved and the harder it is for our kids to practice.
Christianity.
But the most important reason, I believe, to be gainfully employed is so that you can provide for yourself and your family. Let's look at first Timothy 5.
This talks about providing for our families. First Timothy 5, verse 8, we'll go through quite a few verses, so we'll try to move along fairly quickly. First Timothy 5 verse 8 says, but if any provide not for his own and especially for those of his own house. He has denied the faith and is worse than an infidel. So God expects us to work, he told Adam. You have to now work by the sweat of your brow. And so Adam had to work and that gets handed on down to you and I.
We have to work for our living. We have to work to provide for our families. Then Ephesians chapter 5 and verse 23.
Verse 23 says that the husband is the head of the wife. He's the head, and that means that he's the leader. He's the provider until the husband and the father needs to work to fulfill his responsibility. The word of God. It tells. It says Occupy till I come. It tells us to be occupied with our responsibilities until the Lord comes to take us with him to be in heaven.
And so it's a good thing for us to have employment and to have a job or a business, because if a man does not work, the verse said God says he should not eat. Now we realize employment is necessary. We need to have a job or have our own business in order to generate money. And it's good if we can use our money that God allows us to have to provide for our families and also to further.
The Kingdom of God.
Some Some of your employees, some of your business men and some of you have your own business. But let's talk about employees 1St Ephesians 5, if I'm sorry, Ephesians 6.
And there's a certain conduct required from employees. When you have a job, you work for somebody else. Ephesians 6, verse 5. Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh.
With fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart as unto Christ.
Then there's another verse in one Timothy verse 6 or chapter 6 verse one.
I like these verses that are very clear and they explain themselves and we don't have to talk too much about them. And so first Timothy chapter 6 and verse one says, let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honor that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed.
Anybody have their windows open in their cars? Supposed to have a storm coming through?
They might wanna go closing. OK. If your boss is a Christian friend, he is required according to his position to tell you what to do. You must as an employee, you must be subject to his authority. Your relationship with that with with him should not be as one of a colleague. Maybe he's your friend, maybe even a brother in the assembly or sister in the assembly. And but your relation should not be that as a call of a colleague or a friend, but that is a servant.
A servant to a master, and you might like that brother or that sister. You might like them as a friend, but maybe you don't like them as a boss, because when he has to tell you what to do, and he may have to tell you how to do it, or when he needs to correct the way you do what you're doing, The boss has the right to have things done according to his pleasure and according to his understanding. So we need to remember that when we're working for the boss, we are just the employee and we are required to be subject.
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To our boss at work. So it doesn't matter if your boss is easy or if your boss is a tyrant.
Verse two is for you first Timothy 6, verse two and they that have believing masters, let them not despise them because they are brethren, but rather do them service because they are faithful and beloved partakers of the benefit.
So we need to be subject to our boss. Now there's a question, maybe some of you have should you get a job or should you be self-employed when you work for somebody else? There's some things you need to consider about that. When you work for someone else you are controlled by your bosses, his agenda, his ethics, his morality. And however if you are, if you are self-employed, you will develop your own agenda, your own ethics.
In your own morality?
But let's look at some verses about ethics and morality and let's go to firstly to 2nd Corinthians chapter 8.
And first, we'll speak about honesty.
Two Corinthians 8.
And verse 21.
Providing for things honest, providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men.
If you are in business, you need to say you need to do what you say you're going to do. And then if you're doing a job for a customer and you break something, you need to fess up, even if you have to pay for it out of your out of your own pocket. You need to tell the customer, look, I'm sorry I broke this or I damaged that. And you need to remember that if you're in business, the customer is always right, usually.
Another part of honesty is accurate measures, and there's a verse about this in Deuteronomy chapter 25.
Deuteronomy 25, verse 13 down to 16.
Deuteronomy 25, Verse 13. Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers waits a great and a small. Thou shall not have a thine house. Divers measures a great and a small, but thou shalt have a perfect and a just weight, a perfect and just measure shalt thou have, that thy days may be lengthened in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. For all that do the such things, and all that do unrighteously, are an abomination unto the Lord.
So you need to be honest in your business transactions, you don't say that you have that you're set when you're selling something you put a little heavier scale weight on the scale. So, so you're you need to be honest in in Malawi when you're building a house.
You give the Co the contractor, you give him enough cement to do the job and they they do the concrete mix and they use more sand than they should and they steal the extra bags of cement. And so then after you they build the wall, the wind blows and that's Brother Tim here. He knows the wall falls down when the wind blows because they use too much sand in the mix and they steal the sand and so.
The wall falls down and you know, you really have to have sand to do something like that. And so let's don't pay our bills with extra hours or extra materials or extra sand. Another thing that we need to do, if you're in business, you need to pay your employees. Or if you hire somebody to do a job around the house, you need to pay them. Leviticus 19.
Leviticus 19 And so if payday is every Friday, don't make your hired person wait until Monday to get the check because you didn't have enough cash in your bank account, and don't make them wait for any other reason. If payday is on Friday, you pay them on Friday. And so verse 13 that Leviticus 19 says thou shalt not defraud thy neighbor, neither rob him the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night.
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Until the morning. And so we need to. When we owe people money, we need to pay them. When they're when we have people working for us. Uh, the next thing. Let's go to Romans chapter 13. And this has to do with paying taxes. It's I know it's easy to cheat on our tax returns. It's easy to, uh, change what we really make and make it look like we're making less. Now I know the government gives you lots of tax deductions, especially if you're a businessman.
And so you need to take advantage of those and be be a faithful steward with the money that you have. And so the less you're able to pay the government, the better. And then you can use that money to to help serve, to help.
The in the to use it in the Kingdom of God. And so but it is necessary for us to pay taxes. The Lord Jesus paid his taxes, He and Peter paid them together. So Romans 13 verse one, let every soul be subject unto the higher powers.
For there's no power but of God. The powers that be are ordained of God. And there's another verse over in Luke 20, verse 25 And he says he said unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar's, and unto God.
The things which be gods. So the Lord he tells us you must obey the government, you must pay taxes and not cheat in your tax returns. OK.
Every one of us here who has a home, a family, you had to get a job, you had to support your family. Maybe you're graduating from high school or or university and you need to get employment. Well, sometimes it takes thinking and preparation for your life's work. And if you're going to start your own business, what do you need to think about before you choose the business and before starting a business? Umm, it is. It is perhaps the same thought process that you should go through before going to university.
Uh, will there be a job available when you complete your studies Because you don't want to start life in debt? You can have school day, you can have car debt, you can have entertainment debt, you can have house debt, you can have credit card debt, and it just keeps growing. The debt keeps growing in direct proportion to the amount of covetousness that's within our soul. Proverbs 28, verse 8, Proverbs 20, verse 18.
Is a good verse to show us that we need to prepare.
Before we plan, as we plan for our employment.
Proverbs 28, Proverbs 20 verse 18 says every purpose is established by council, so it's good for us to get counsel before or as we are planning for our future employment. So if you're going into business, you need to ask yourself a few questions before you invest money to go into business. You'll need to know what type of business will you do, What is the need out there.
How can you fill the need?
Are there others doing the same business? How profitable is that business for other people? You know, sometimes if there's too many people doing the same business, there's gonna be less profit for you.
But if there's a lot of work in that type of business, it's better to have a lot of competition because you know that you can do a better job. You do better work than the competition. And so it's an open door for you if there's enough work in that field. Now you need to also ask, will I need an education? What will I need to learn before I get into business? And then you'll need to know where you're going to buy your products.
Are there better suppliers out there that you can get your products from. And then here's another important thing that you need to ask yourself when you go into business, what could happen to make you have a loss? Because you may do all your planning and you go into business, first thing you do is you get a loss. How? How are you gonna, how you how are you gonna make up for that loss? Are you gonna be able to continue business or are you gonna is your business gonna fail within the first year or so. And so you need to take time to figure out all the angles and the possibilities and that it's so it's good to have counsel before you start. Proverbs 21, verse 5.
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The thoughts of the diligent tend only to plenteousness, but of everyone that is hasty only to want.
The thoughts of the diligent, you know your mind is the most powerful asset that you have in business. And if we use our minds to search out perhaps some wise information to get all the facts and the figures, then we'll be more able to provide for our families when we do go into business.
Another thing that is important is that you will need to be able to change with the markets. If there's a recession, people are more likely to repair and clean rather than to buy or replace their things with new new.
Equipment or or new appliances or whatever it may be. So if you're not willing to be flexible to change with the economy again soon you'll be out of business.
Now I know there's lots of people here, and I know it may be boring for some of you who are not in business, but these principles go away beyond business because they are applicable in many ways to everyday life. God's principles and standards for life are good for you no matter what you are doing, no matter what job you have, no matter what business you are in, or maybe you aren't even in business. They're good principles for us to live by.
And when you live by God's standards and you practice your business according to God's principles and standards, then it's highly likely that you'll be successful in your business.
So another thing we need to talk about is financing.
Whether you're a man or a woman, financing is a big part of running a household or or running a business.
You might have the best business plans, You might have the best house building plans. You might have it all figured out. But before you can begin, you really need to have a source of capital. And so when you start a business, you should have money in the bank or under your mattress, wherever you like to keep your money. The bank doesn't give you much interest these days, so it doesn't make much sense to put it in the bank unless you think it's safer there. But it's not gonna be long before the government's gonna do a bail in and they're gonna take all the deposits to pay their their.
Well, I'm not trying to scare you, but.
So do not go into business without enough money to buy the proper tools to be able to complete a job and to be able to do a good job. Luke 14 tells us this. Luke 14.
Verse 28.
For which of you intending to build a tower sitteth not down 1St, and counteth the cost, whether you have sufficient to finish it, lest happily, after you have laid the foundation and is not able to finish it, all that behold, it begin to mock him saying.
This man began to build and was not able to finish.
So if you're going into business, you need to have money to operate a business. If you're gonna buy a house, you need to have the money and wherewithal to be able to pay for the house.
So then there's another big decision that you'll need to make with finances. Should you get a loan or should you operate without a loan? Well, I I prefer to operate without loans if at all possible. And if there's a question about getting a loan for myself, I like to find it. I find it helpful first to decide whether the loan is for a liability or an asset, and I suggest that you don't get a loan for a liability.
Only use loans to buy an asset.
So your banker, he doesn't know what an asset is.
The bank is in business to make money and they want to give you a loan for any reason and they consider a boat or a car an asset. Some they even consider all houses as an asset. But does a car make you money? Unless you're a taxi, does a boat make you money?
Unless you're a fairy or a fisherman.
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Does your house make you money? Unless you're in rentals, my definition of an asset is something that makes you money. A liability is something that loses money. So if your house or your car or your equipment is making you a positive cash flow, then it's an asset.
And if your house costs you money?
Taxes, insurance, maintenance, new roof, interest. Then your house is a liability. And so.
It might be a good idea to not consider your house that you live in as an asset. The house you live in is a necessity and so generally speaking a house is not an asset because for most people it does not provide a positive cash flow.
So don't go beyond your means for a place of your residence. Even though your house is a necessity, it is still a liability. And let's look at Proverbs chapter 22.
If you get a loan for an asset, you usually need to have something for collateral or if you get a loan for anything and so this means you sign the rights over to the bank for something that you own, like your house. You can get a loan against your house and you can go buy a car, a liability, you can go buy a boat, another liability, or you can buy some electronics. More liabilities.
So.
You need to sign over those things that have more value than what you are getting the loan for. And then if you default on your loan or you're unable to pay off your loan, the bank they can come and take away your assets that you've pledged for security for your loan. And Proverbs 22, verse 26 warns us about this banking procedure.
Says be not one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts. If you have nothing to pay, why should he take away your bed from under you?
So this verse is saying don't get a loan if there's a possibility that you have to default or go into foreclosure.
Let's go to Psalms 37.
Now I know there's, I know there's a lot of situations.
A lot of circumstances that can make you.
Have to default on a loan or or foreclose on a house, but it's really a bad thing to get a loan if there's a chance that you can't pay it back, so.
I know a few years ago there were a lot of foreclosures in America because people were were getting bigger and better houses and they were they were getting loans without any collateral, they were getting loans without putting any money down and and they couldn't afford it and they were, they wanted to live beyond their means. I know some people got stuck with their houses because that's just the way the market went in, the area they lived in, but others were living above and beyond their means and so there were a lot of foreclosures.
And so covetousness is about people who live beyond their means. And Psalm 37, verse 21.
The wicked borrows and does not pay it back again, but the righteous show mercy and they give.
Then there's another verse in Romans chapter 13.
Romans chapter 13 and verse 8.
Oh, no, man, Anything but to love one another, for he that loveth another has fulfilled the law.
According to this verse, when you borrow money, it must be repaid on time.
If you're renting a house, your rent needs to be paid on time. Don't let it go beyond the due date. If you make an agreement with somebody, you must honor your word.
Let's talk about another aspect about working in the business or working at your job. And the one thing we wanna talk about here is diligence.
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Let's go to Proverbs 22.
Diligence is not to be applied only to business, because diligence is required even for the even for doing chores around the house, for your mother or father. And it's good to learn diligence at home before we reach the age where we can get a job. And so, Proverbs 22, verse 29, Do you see a man diligent in his business?
He shall stand before kings. He shall not stand before mean men. Mean men, that means the average, the low class, the insignificant people in the eyes of the world, the mean men.
But if you are diligent in your work, you will come into contact with important people, and this means that God wants to use you in mightier ways than you can imagine, and so if you do good quality work.
You will get good customers, and you will be classified by your customers as one to whom they can trust, and then they'll recommend you to others. And you know that the more customers you get, the bigger your audience is for you to share the gospel with, through tracks or calendars or company newsletters, or just by verbal communication if the Lord opens up that Ave. So be diligent in your line of work and you become. You can become a.
Testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ.
One day you will stand before the ultimate master, the Lord of Lords, and the King of Kings, and and he will reward you with great responsibility in his Kingdom.
Another point for employment.
Don't be lazy or rude.
Let's go to Romans 12.
So do not be lazy in business and serve your customer or serve your employer the same as you would serve the Lord Jesus if he if the Lord Jesus came into your shop or if he hired you to do a job you want to do. Do the work for the customer just like you would for the Lord Jesus. And it says in Romans chapter 12 verse 11.
Don't be slothful in business. Be fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.
Another point is we need to work hard.
Don't be lazy, but we need to work hard. And so when you're doing business or you're working at your job, you should work hard to please the Lord the customer or the OR the employer, the boss. He might not see you all the time.
And so he may not know if you're busy. He'll know by the amount of production you're doing, whether you're doing where you're working hard or not. And but the Lord sees you all the time, and he expects you to work hard for your boss. Let's go to Colossians Chapter 3.
Colossians Chapter 3 and verse 23.
And whatsoever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not unto men. Yes, you're working for a man, you're working for a woman, for your boss, You're working for them. But really you need to do your work as UN heartily as unto the Lord, not as unto men. And if you're doing your work as unto the Lord, then the men the boss will be will be happy. Another point in business is that you need to charge fair pay for Fair Work.
Customers will ask you how much does it cost.
You need to charge so you can make a profit, but don't lie or cheat your customers. You need to make sure that you charge enough so that you can afford to do good work.
And you can charge more When you have a good reputation, people are willing to pay more for honesty. They're willing to pay for a good job. And if you're under charging people for your services, people are going to start taking advantage of you. And so as a businessman or a businesswoman, it's the hardest thing and the most stressful decision to raise your prices. And so.
People are willing to pay more than they pay other people if they know they're gonna get a better job, better work. But do you know, just for mathematical thought, if you double your prices and you lose half your customers, you're gonna make more money because you're gonna have half the amount of expenses you're gonna have. You're gonna be able to work less, you're gonna have more time. And so that's just just a thought.
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If you work for another company, you don't work for yourself. Don't overcharge the customers. I was in Nigeria a couple years ago and there was a a man, a young man, who came to the meeting. And jobs in Nigeria are very scarce. There's 197 million people or so in the country and there's not a whole lot of jobs. But this young man, he was thankful, grateful that he had a job. Well, he was told by his employer to overcharge the customers.
And to charge them for procedures that hadn't been done. And so as a Christian, he was in a dilemma. Was he gonna cheat the customer and keep his job? Or was he gonna be honest with the customer and lose his job? So he was in a battle of ethics.
There, and that's gonna be the same for you. As you go through life, you will have the challenge of ethics. And so you'll be tempted to do to do the wrong thing when you know you should be doing the right thing. And sooner or later you will be tested in your moral, your ethical morality.
John the Baptist, he was talking to the to the publicans who came to him. They wanted to be baptized and maybe they're like the IRS tax officials and they and and they said to John what must we do for repentance. And he told them don't charge only to charge the set amount and so there should be no corruption in a Christian. Uh, John the Baptist in Luke chapter 3 and verse 12 and 13 it says then came also publicans to be baptized.
And he said unto and said unto him, Master, what shall we do? And he said to them, exact no more than that which is appointed you. So we need to be honest when we charge our customers, don't cheat them. Let's go to Matthew, Chapter 5.
Matthew chapter 5 and verse 37.
But let your communication be A, a, and nay, nay, for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.
From this verse we understand that when we are giving a quote to do a job, we need to learn to estimate jobs properly the first time.
After you and after you give a quote, you need to do the job for what you quoted. Don't raise the price after you start the job just because you forgot to count it, right? I know that happens all so often in in When we were living in Malawi, you asked somebody to do a job for you. How much is it going to cost? They tell you how much it's gonna cost. Are you sure that's everything? Yes, that's everything. It won't be any more than that. Then when they finish the job, they come to you with the bill and it's two or three times what they told you because they didn't estimate it properly. But that's.
That's not the way a Christian should be doing business. If you're gonna do a job, estimate it properly and don't raise the prices. After that you start the job. You need to let your yes be yes and you know be no. But then if the customer adds more work, then you can charge accordingly. But don't add to his bill just because he made a blunder in judgment. The next point we wanna talk about is serving the Lord in your business or in your job or in your home practices. We can serve the Lord, You know, there's two kingdoms that we deal with in this world.
One is the Kingdom. One Kingdom is the Kingdom of God and is guided by the Spirit of God.
And the Lord Jesus said, He said, My Kingdom is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight?
And so we're not put here in this world. This world is not our home, and we're not here to make it a better place. We're we are here. We are pilgrims, and we're strangers here until the Lord comes to take us home to His Father's house in heaven.
And so we're so whether you have your own business or whether you work for someone else.
Or whether you're running your own household.
Keep your perspective on Christ. Don't become friends with the world because the Prince of the other Kingdom of this world is Satan.
Whose Kingdom?
Do you serve? Let's go to Psalm, Chapter 10.
Psalm 10.
And this verse tells us about the businessmen or the employees and their wives who serve Satan's Kingdom.
Psalm 10 verse 3.
The wicked boasts of his heart's desire and blesses the covetous. That's the greedy person whom the Lord abhors. Now compare this person with the with the businessman or the OR and his wife who served the Lord for the Kingdom of God. Let's look in Psalm 112.
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Psalm 112, verse five A good man showeth favor and lendeth. He will guide his affairs with discretion.
If you have your own business, you have many more liberties in which you can use have opportunities to share the gospel as compared to an employee who needs to be careful how he conducts himself in his in his job, when he's in subjection to his boss and so. But when it is applicable, you can use your business to serve the Lord.
You you may you may receive some reproach for serving the Lord in your business. You may lose some customers, but that's OK. The Lord has other customers for you. So whatever your job is, maybe you're a housewife. Maybe you're a retired person. When the Lord puts money into your hands for discretionary use, how are you going to use it?
Let's.
And then we need to remember that when when the God gives us money into our hands, we need to remember that we need to save some of our budget, some some of it or a portion, some of it, to give to the Lord to further his King the Kingdom of God with the Gospel of Christ crucified. So let's go to Luke chapter 16 and verse 9, Luke chapter 16.
It's an important concept in this verse because when you use your money to help get the gospel out and a person gets saved because you gave to the Lord, you are making to yourself heavenly friends.
Through the giving of that money and when you get to heaven.
You will be introduced to all those people who are saved through the support of through your support of the gospel. And so God tells us this in Luke chapter 16 and verse nine, he says, And I say unto you.
Make to yourselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness, that when you fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations. So this verse is telling us to use our money, the unrighteous mammon, to help disseminate the gospel, to help share the gospel around the world. And it says that when you fail, that is when you die. Those people who were saved because of your honor, using your unrighteous mammon, they may receive you into the everlasting habitation.
This verse means that there's going to be a party in heaven, there's going to be great rejoicing, there's going to be a happy reunion when you meet for the first time those people who were saved because of your sacrifice for the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so that's.
That's Luke, chapter 16, verse nine. OK, now let's get back to talking about debt. There's an extenuating problem with debt, and it may be that God wants to use you in the mission field someday and when you have loans that must be repaid.
You're limiting your availability to do the service of the Lord if he ever calls you to the mission field. So it's important that you don't let your employment control you or your time. Then don't let your financial decisions that you make now control and incapacitate you for the masters use in the future, because God wants you to put Him first in your life and put him first in your business.
And to put him first in your job, including where you were and what days and what nights you work and what you do for work. I know, I know that in today's job market it can be very tough to be able to find options for work and options for work schedules.
But I have this to say which humbles me because I have often. I often have many excuses as to why I did not achieve to a different level in business and. But the sad truth is that sometimes I'm lazy and I'm not motivated to do what is needed to get the job done or to win that contract in the business. And I didn't always perform the due diligence that was required.
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And sometimes the the opportunity was missed. I know I like to enjoy life. I like to play sports. And I always, Al was not always committed to do what I knew that I really needed to do in order to succeed or to get that job. And sometimes, sometimes I think I was afraid to be successful. And these these attitudes and these, these.
The the conduct that we do, it can affect our Christianity as well, because if we're lazy in business, we're going to be lazy in spiritual things too. And sometimes we may put spiritual things above our natural needs in life, and so that's not good either. But it might be that we become dissatisfied with with our situation in life. But if we're not willing to do our due diligence, we cannot blame God for the predicament that we get ourselves into.
Proverbs 29 verse 18.
Proverbs 29 verse 18.
Where there is no vision.
The people perish. It might take a year or two of updating your resume and sending out applications before you're gonna find a suitable job. And having said this, I don't wanna take away the importance of dependence on the Lord because the Lord knows the end result from the beginning of time. And the Lord He has a plan for your life. But life, life does not just happen.
Just because you are alive.
There are steps that you must take to provide for your family. We have responsibility to be diligent. Let's go to Proverbs 13, verse 4.
Proverbs 13 verse 4.
We know that a lazy person may want something but he will not get it. But Proverbs 13 verse four says the soul of the diligent shall be made fat.
You may go from job to job, business to business, looking before you can get work, and so that you can find a schedule that is acceptable to you. But whatever job you're in, whatever business you are in, be diligent to honor God in all that you do. And whatsoever you do, do it heartily as unto the Lord. So as much as is possible, it's important for us to arrange our work schedule so we can be obedient.
You may need to change your line of work.
So that you can fulfill the desire of the Lord. I've had to do that several times.
Umm, because I've gotten into situations where my with my employment where I could not obey Jesus because of the work that I was doing and my work schedule. For a while I worked, I was a man. I was a manager at McDonald's.
And serving lots of hamburgers. And I had to work nighttime, so I never got to the midnight. The the midweek meetings, I had to work Sundays, so I was missing.
A lot of Sunday meetings and.
It was hard to be obedient to the Lord because of my work schedule.
And then and then another time I had a job driving a truck, the semi across the country, around the country. And I for a while I had a good job I it would be just a 10/12 hour day, just a half a day's work and I'd be able to get out and get back home.
In one day and I still have time for the family. I can still make it to the meetings in the midweek, I can still make it to the meetings on Sunday. But then they change the the schedule and I had to be out for 3-4 days and I had children at home and I couldn't do take my responsibility as a father. The father is told to bring your children up in the nurturing, the admonition of the Lord. And so I was missing from home and so sometimes it's necessary to change the job and or change the business that we are in. And now I know that sometimes that's not easy to do and maybe it's not practical to do.
But in any case the Lord is looking at our hearts desire. And He says, he says in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 25, Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhort one another.
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And so much the more as you see the day approaching. So it's important if possible to arrange our work schedule so that we can get to the assembly meetings. That's important. And like I say, we are not under law that you must be at every Bible meeting, every assembly meeting. We're not under law for that. That's more a desire of the heart even if you're not able to get there and still should be the desire of our hearts. And so when it's possible, it's it's good to be at the assembly meetings.
But we're not under law to be at all the assembly meetings. But God has given a scripture to show us that it is His will for us to be in His presence where the assembly meetings are conducted. And so we should be there for the assembly meetings for the apostles doctrine and fellowship, that we should be there for the breaking of bread and we should be there for the prayer meetings.
The assembly meetings are where God, by the leading of His Spirit, is able to teach the things that are needed in your life, but when you're not there.
When you are, you are missing out on what God has, the spirit of God has for you, and you're also missing out on being a help to the assembly. And you're. And it's also a discouragement to others who are there and you are missed.
And the Lord knew that discouragement would come in, and he knew that the numbers in the assembly would slowly be reduced. As you can see in your own assembly, some assemblies are growing, but many assemblies people move away. They stop coming. They want to go to a church if they're too busy. And so the Lord knew this discouragement would come, and he knew the numbers and the assembly would be reduced. And so He made provision for when there is only two or three who are gathered together.
In his name for them to come together for the assembly meetings.
Many Christians today, they treat assembly meetings as optional disruptions.
To the service of themselves. And there's TV, there's sport leagues, there's movies, there's friends, there's family reunions, and there's so many things that that press for preeminence over God's assembly, and they take the place of our instruction in righteousness.
We each have opportunity to set our priorities, but too often.
The Lord Jesus has given a very low priority.
But that's OK because there's a lot of encouragement for you to miss the assembly meeting.
And even you even have a cheerleader every time you miss the assembly meetings because you have better things to do.
The Prince of this world, he dances with Glee when he sees a Christian give Jesus a low priority in their life.
But that's OK, because as you live your life in this present world, it will help make life go easy for you.
For a while.
But spiritual lethargy? It will catch up with you.
And you might make it to heaven just fine by the mercies of God.
But what about your children?
Satan will not be so likely to attack your person to discourage you.
And Satan waits patiently to alter your priorities, because he knows that when your kids see that you occasionally give in to something else and give it priority over the Lord Jesus, Satan knows that the kids will give Jesus even less priority in their life.
And so This is why it's so important to continue in the faith with all diligence. Not just the breaking of bread, but the fellowship meeting and the reading meeting and the prayer meeting, too. Acts 2, verse 42.
Acts 2 verse 42. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers.
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I just had these few thoughts to share with you about doing business God's way.
And how our whole employment schedule effects our Christianity as we try to live out our faith in this world that hates the Savior.
Now I know I've said some fairly hard and.
In blunt statements about work schedules and all, and I know sometimes it's not possible.
But again, I say the Lord's looking at the heart. He knows the desire. Even if your schedule is such that you can't be at the meetings all the time, the Lord He knows your heart, and he can see the desire that you want to be there as often as is possible, and so as it is possible for you to be there. The Lord appreciates that very much, and so do you. So do your brethren as we continue on faithfully for the Lord Jesus. Let's close by seeing Him #256.
256 Praise the Savior of life with your hands, Light when I was trying to make you.
All.
An hour.
New York SE RX 200100 1.
Our God and Father we give thanks for the instructions we have for our practical life. We just ask that it would help us to not only live and to provide for ourselves, that we might also live by these standards in our Christian lives. In serving the Lord and being faithful to the Lord and and Father, we just ask for help the remainder of this day. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Session #2
Seek ye first the kingdom of God
Address—Tim Ruga
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.
Good evening everyone, and welcome again to the meeting.
I'd like to start tonight by singing hymn #5 in the appendix.
And I would like to sing this him at a good tempo, so I'm gonna start it that way and don't slow me down.
Come down.
And you can have a great day at the end of the day. Oh, 42651000 dollar Bradley.
Let's pray, our God and our Father, we thank Thee that we can come before thee tonight, that we can open Thy word, and that we can there find precious instruction from myself, things that can be a help to each one of us in our lives.
And to for any here.
Who doesn't yet know the Lord Jesus? We pray that tonight they would also think of their eternal destiny. We just commit this time to thee and ask for thy health in the name of the Lord Jesus, Amen.
Let's turn to Matthew chapter 6 and verse 33.
I want to speak on something.
Basic tonight, but very important and.
Perhaps there won't be much new, but it will be important. And so let's just start with this verse that perhaps most of us know quite well, Matthew 633.
Says, Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.
What are we talking about in this verse? Well, first it mentions about a Kingdom, and a Kingdom is something that has a ruler, one who is in authority and his authority is acknowledged. And so this is speaking about a place for the authority of God is acknowledged.
And then it's speaking also about God's righteousness, that which is right according to God.
And the verse is telling us that we are to seek first that Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and then it says, and all these things shall be added unto, you know what are all these things? Well, we have to look at the verse in context. And so if we just go back up a little bit, we can see that verse 30 it says wherefore of God so close the grass of the field, which today is and tomorrow is cast.
Into the oven shall he not much more clothe you. Oh yes, little face, we are for take no thought saying, what shall we eat?
Or what shall we drink? Well, wherewithal shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of all these things, but seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. And So what is he talking about? He says, Your Father, your heavenly Father, knoweth that you have need of these.
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He's talking about things that are needs.
Things in our lives and our needs, and we all have them. Even the young children have needs, although they may be mainly met by their parents at this stage in their life. Yet it's so all the way through our lives to the end. As long as we're here in this earth, we've got needs. And this verse is telling us something about those needs. It's telling us, in short, that we are to put God.
And his things first and He will take care of us if I could paraphrase it. And that is my subject tonight that I don't want to start there.
Until I make something clear, this is not the gospel.
This verse is spoken to those who are already believers and if you haven't believed in the Lord Jesus Christ.
What we're gonna talk about tonight isn't gonna help you. There's something else first. Now just to show what I'm saying, if we go back to Matthew chapter 5, we'll see something there. This verse is found in the middle of three chapters, Matthews chapter 5-6 and seven. And these three chapters give us the so-called Sermon on the Mount when the Lord Jesus went up into the mountains and he began to teach.
And there are things that he taught when he was there. And it says here in verse one, it says, seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain. And when he was, when he was set, his disciples came unto him and he opened his mouth and taught them saying, so this is not the gospel. This is something that the Lord Jesus was speaking to the disciples. And there's something that he says a little bit further down that's actually quite remarkable.
Go to verse 20. He says, Where I say unto you that except.
Your righteousness exceeds, shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees. You shall in no case enter into the Kingdom of heaven. So what is he saying here?
The scribes and Pharisees were the religious leaders of that day, and they were priding themselves in how much they followed God and did what God was asking. And the Lord Jesus said, unless your righteousness succeeds theirs, you're not going to enter the Kingdom of heaven. So what does this mean? That you have to be better than scribes and Pharisees to go to heaven?
No, it doesn't mean that at all.
The Lord doesn't go on to explain it here. This was written or this was said, these verses were said. This sermon was given by the Lord before he went to the cross and after he went to the cross and died.
Then we have further revelation about what the righteousness of God is and what it means to have righteousness like that.
And it comes from believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. And so I want to start right here tonight.
If you haven't believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, not only will the remaining of the thing, uh, remainder of what I intend to speak on tonight do you no good, but you're on the way to hell. You don't have the righteousness of God. You don't have any way to ever get to heaven unless you accept the gospel. So let's go and see what that gospel is in particular in connection with these ones who consider themselves to be so righteous.
Just turn over for a moment to Romans chapter 10.
And these verses were written by the apostle Paul, and he's writing about these very same ones, these Jews who were so religious.
He says, Romans 10/1 Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved, for I bear them record.
That they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.
They thought they were pretty good and they were trying to be good enough for God. And many people today try the same thing. And it could be that somebody could come and take their very words that we're reading and think, well, I just have to be a little bit fatter than they were and God will accept me. And that answer is no. These Jews were trying to establish their own righteousness, and there never has been anyone.
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Or never will be. Anyone who can get to heaven by trying to establish their own righteousness. It won't work.
He says they have not submitted themselves into the righteousness of God. For verse four, God for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. It's no longer a matter of people trying to be good enough for God, but the Lord Jesus Christ is coming. He put an end to all of that. He died on the cross because it was impossible and now he's the end of it.
And so it says, going on from here in verse six. But the righteousness which is of faith.
Speaketh on this wife. Now we have something new introduced the righteousness which is of faith believing something brings righteousness. That's what it's saying here verse 8 WhatsApp it the word is Nighy even in thy heart and in thy mouth thy mouth and in thy heart. That is the Word of Faith which we preach that if thou shalt.
Confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised them from the dead. Thou shalt be saved.
For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness.
And with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. This is the gospel.
That God counts those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
As righteous and there's no other way to be righteous before him tonight we start there. If you haven't believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, you need to do that there's nothing else for you no other help for you without that you're doomed and I don't care how young you are. If you can understand what I'm saying then go and do that now, right now in the meeting. Don't wait till later, but trust that the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross for.
And that he was buried and rose again the third day according to the scriptures.
And now he's raised again so that God can make you just That's the gospel. Go back for a moment to Romans chapter 3.
Romans 3 verse 24 says being justified freely. You know what that means? Means being made just, God counting you as righteous freely by the grace, by his grace, God's grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. It's through this redemption, the fact that Christ died on the cross. That's how God can do it.
It says then whom God has set forth to be should be a mercy seat. Mercy can come to you as a result of this fact.
That the Lord Jesus Christ died.
To be a mercy seat through faith in his blood. That's what God is looking for. You can't be righteous. You can't be good enough for God. All you can do is this. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ in his shed blood in the cross of Calvary. Believe that he died to your sins and now God counts you as just as a result of that. He says through faith in his blood to declare his righteousness.
For the remission that means the forgiveness of sins that are passed through, the forbearance of God to declare, I say at this time His righteousness, that he might be just.
And the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus, again I say, if you haven't believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, you don't have the righteousness of God and you are not good enough. You cannot go on yourself before God. Now when one believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, as so many of us have here in this room, then God counts us righteous. That's what these verses are telling us. And not only that, but.
He does much more. I'm not going to take the time tonight to turn to it, but He gives us up His Spirit and causes His Spirit to dwell in US. And what I would like to turn to Galatians chapter 2 and verse 20, it tells us there that God does even more.
Galatians 2 and verse 20 Paul says I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh. I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. And so Paul is saying that I was put to death when Christ died. That was me before God. I died, but I had a new I.
00:15:05
New life, and it's not my life, but it's Christ living in me. And so you know what this means?
You believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, God counts you righteous. He gives you a new life, the life of Christ, and he gives you the Holy Spirit so that you can live according to that life. And that's where I want to begin tonight. Let's go back to Matthew 633.
Matthew 633.
Seek you first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.
You've trusted in Jesus Christ. You now have the life and the power to do what it says in this verse.
God is the one who's got the authority. You submit to his authority. That's what it means when you confess him, the Lord Jesus Christ as Lord, and his righteousness is now something that you can do. That is what is right according to God. And you find that all through the verses leading up to this one. For instance, just turn back.
A little bit earlier in chapter 6 and he says in verse 24 no man can serve 2 masters for either.
He will hate the wine and love the other, or he will hold to the wine and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon.
It's an impossibility to serve too, but the believer has the strength now to rise above.
And to seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness again, I say.
The verse means, in short, that to put the Lord first in your life and He will take care of us in our life. That's what it means. And we have the power to do it. We can put Him first. I want tonight to talk to the various classes or stages of life that are here in the room. I wanna start with the UMM. I know there's a lot of young children here. You've been doing the craft. You've been having a very good time.
And that's nice, and I think it's good that you're at a place like this and able to have fun and play and be with your friends and do all those things.
I trust that you've done what we said tonight, that you've accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior. Again, if you haven't, that is number one. You must do that. But if you have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, you're not too young for what this verse says to seek ye first the Kingdom of God. Put the Lord first in your life. Are you old enough to read? Do you have a Bible?
And take out that Bible and read it, even if it's just a little bit. Try to read it every day.
Are you saved? You only got that way by talking to the Lord in the 1St place. You know how to pray. You pray every day.
You know, put the Lord first in your life. As early as you understand who the Lord is, start putting this into practice in your life. You know, the Lord Jesus Christ himself, when he was age 12, he went out and he started to do what was his Father's business. And they came and they said, where have you been? He said, didn't you know I had to be about my father's business?
The Lord Jesus wasted no time in his life, and I'm sure it didn't start at age 12. It started very, very young.
And there's no reason why the youngest who can understand these things can't put that into practice in their life where they're going to say, yes, I am going to do the things that I do, but I'm going to put the Lord first in my life and I'm going to do everything according to what He wants. That is something you can do.
You know, I'm going to tell an illustration that many who are older would know, but I think it's a powerful one and it might be helpful. It's about a teacher.
Who one day got a a big jar and put it up in front of their class and they had to decide a whole lot of stones and they started to take these stones and put them. The teacher put these stones in the jar until the stones went all the way to the top of the jar and it couldn't get any more stones in that jar. And the teacher asked the class, he said is the jar full?
And the class said yes, the jar is full.
And teacher said, no, not full. He brought out another bag and there was some much smaller stones there, and he took from that bag and put them in. And those stones, of course, ran down in between and started filling up until he couldn't get any more of those in. He said, is the jar full? And I said, yeah, it looks full now. He said no, he got another bag and there was sand in that bag. And so he started pouring sand in the jar and shaking it, and that sand was all going down.
00:20:24
And then he asked when he could get no more and he said, is the jar full?
And by this time, they were catching on. They said, no, no, He said, you're right. And he got another a picture and there's water in the picture. And he started pouring the water in there until the water went all the way to the top and there was no more air in there or anything. It was fall. And he said he asked the class, He said, what is the lesson that we learned from this?
And someone said, well, it shows that no matter how much you shove into your life, you can always put something more in. The teacher said, no, no, no, no, that's not the lesson at all. The lesson of this jar is that unless you put the big things in first, you'll never get them in at all.
That's a powerful lesson.
Unless you put those rocks in first in that jar, they'll never get in there. You're not gonna go put the water in and the sand and the Little Rock and then the big ones get them in last. It's not going to happen. And the same thing is true spiritually. You young children, you're not too young to start, and this is the right time.
Unless you put the Lord in your life, because that's the biggest thing of all, unless you put him in first, you may never get him in at all.
Let me say that again, unless you get the Lord in your life first.
You may never get him in at all. I'm talking now to Christians. Yes, you're saved. Yes, you're going to heaven, but there's a life to live on earth as long as he lives you, leaves you here. And the question is, what are you going to do with that life? Is it going to be a life for yourself or is it going to be a life that the Lord can use?
You start off early in life and start taking other things and shoving them into your life and guess what? You won't find time for the Lord. And I'm not saying that in His grace later on. He can't make a change.
But don't tempt God. Don't tempt the devil either.
Put the Lord first in your life. As soon as you can understand it, you know there's another thing too.
Witness for the Lord.
Naman had a maid, I don't know how old she was, I guess the impression she was pretty young. She spoke out and she said what she knew and it was a real blessing to others. You can put the Lord first in your life and you can speak to others about the Lord. Don't wait till you get older. Now for teenagers and adults, just going on to another category, maybe going all the way up depending who we are here.
This is where it gets hard. You know something? You.
All right, now, no longer a young child and you young children, this is coming. So listen, keep listening.
There's decisions you now have to make, important decisions and others that aren't as important as it seems, but they are actually very important. Like what kind of music should I listen to? Who should my friends be? What clothes should I wear?
These things may not seem so important at first, but they're actually very important and.
This is something where we can take it up again even as Christians and say well.
I think I know what I prefer. I know the kind of music I like, I know what I want to do.
I've got this under control. I can handle it. That's wrong.
Seek ye first the Kingdom of God in His righteousness, and all those things too.
Will be added unto you.
Let's go to Acts chapter 22.
Apostle Paul is speaking about when he got saved.
And it's most instructive what he says.
Acts 22.
Verse 7.
Oh, verse six speaks about that a great light came around him. Verse seven, I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why? Persecutor found me, and I answered, Who art thou, Lord?
00:25:00
The Apostle Paul, as he later came to be known.
Saul, as he was then, did not know the Lord. He wasn't saved. He didn't have faith. At that moment he had faith. He realized that this one was his Lord.
The Lord answered.
He said I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest.
And then he tells what happened verse 9. But then what he said in verse 10. And I said, what shall I do?
Lord and then the Lord told him, See immediately when Paul.
Had faith when he trusted in the Lord that he didn't know before. The first thing he did was become a disciple. And he says Lord, he acknowledged the authority of that one who spoke to him, and that one was Jesus Christ. And what's the next thing he says or what does he say there? He says, what shall I do?
This is Kay. Young people, all of us. I don't you want to just teach to the young people. I can tell you I'm talking to myself too, because I forget this. What shall I do, Lord?
Think about it. What's the question we often ask? I'm not saying it's absolutely wrong to ask this. In fact, most of the questions that come in the camp in one form or another. Along this line, is it OK?
To do this right, that's good, we need to know from scripture is it OK to do that?
So I'm glad that people put those kind of questions in the box and we wanna keep answering them. I think it's very good.
But there's a more fundamental thing, even if we want to ask that question, which is OK because we go to the word of God and say, is it OK to do that? What we really should be thinking is that what the Lord wants me to do? And of course if he lays it out in his word and he says very carefully, thou shalt not steal or as you have it repeated for Christians and Ephesians chapter.
Five or four at the end of the seasons. Four. Let him the soul steal no more.
You know, then we get a direct answer from the Lord. OK, I don't steal and but it's more fundamental than that.
Why will thou have me to do, Lord? If you ever do that, stop and ask the Lord what do you want me to do? Or do we say I have it under control? I know what I'm going to do, I know what I like, and unless somebody can prove to me that this is really against what the Bible says, I'm going to go do it.
Where is the Lordship of Christ in that?
Where is anything about asking him or putting him first, seeking first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and that?
You know that verse?
For tonight seek you first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you has to do with needs in our life. And there comes times in our life when we feel very much those needs. And every time when it happens, if you're a believer, what do you do? You turn around and go to the Lord and say, Oh Lord, help me.
I have done that.
And I've heard the Lord saying, what about the first half of that verse?
Oh, he's not mean. He helped.
But what about the first half of that verse?
I want your help, Lord, but I don't want to listen to what you have to say.
Is that right?
Is that how we're gonna live our lives as Christians?
You say if I have to live my life like this, where I have to ask the Lord about everything, there's certain things in my life that I like to do and there are a lot of fun for me, and I don't know that I want to ask the Lord about that. And if I have to do that, it sounds like that.
It's true. It's death.
Go to Matthew chapter 10.
As Christians, we need to face these things.
Matthew 10.
And verse 39.
He that findeth his life shall lose it.
He that loses his life for my sake shall find it.
00:30:01
The verse before that.
Middle diversity that loveth. I'm sorry, verse 38. He that taketh not his cross and followeth after me is not worthy of me.
The Lord Jesus said these words, and these words are true.
There is such a thing as losing our life. There are things that we like to do.
Because when we accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior, we did get those things we spoke about. We did get a new life, we did get the Holy Spirit, but we also kept that old life that we had, the flesh.
And that flesh likes to do certain things that are not according to God. They're not right according to God, and we need to die to that. And so this verse is speaking about that. It speaks about it like taking up a cross.
And following after the Lord Jesus Christ. And then he says.
In that verse 39, he that find it, his life shall lose it. You know, you've got to say, well I don't care, I want to take life.
And I want to live life to the full. I'm saved, I'm going to heaven. But as long as I'm here, I want to enjoy those things.
The Lord Jesus said not, so you can't do it.
You find your life like that, you're gonna lose it. You pursue that life.
I have at times in mind. You pursue that life and you'll find an emptiness that gets emptier and emptier and emptier until you've got nothing left there at all, he says. You'll lose it. It'll be a wasted life, a wasted life for you, a wasted life for those around you, a wasted life for the Lord who died to redeem you.
Why waste your life?
Here in this world.
You have the opportunity right now to put the Lord 1St and His promise is what we have in the rest of this verse. He that looseth his life shall find it.
You lose those desires, those wrong things. Instead, take up with the Lord. Put His things first in your life, and guess what? You'll find something there that you can never get any other way. You find a true joy and a true delight in Him.
So in everything, take the Lord and put Him first in your life. Practically all the little things.
You're getting older. Time to go out and find a car and buy it. You go into the sales lot, there's a lot of beautiful cars there and you look at them, you say, well, this one will do well. Well, this one, wow, I really like this one. I think it'll give me what I need. The salesman comes over and talks to you, says, Oh yes, I'll give you a great deal on this car. You can see you like it.
And he tells you about what that car does and how great it is, and he tells you what he can do. He gives you the deal. And then he says you buy this car now and I can take another $250 off of it or whatever.
OK, I love that thing. I want it.
Is that what you do? Where's the Lord in that? Practically, where is the Lord in that?
Say no, I don't care if I lose the $250. I need to pray about this. I do like this car. I'll be back. I.
Maybe back if I feel I should get it.
We made that a policy in our life and it served us very well. I don't think we ever lost the $250. That's just a scheme they come up with. The point is you go away and you talk to the Lord and you say, Lord, you know, I like that car.
That might be a problem, Lord.
What do you want me to do?
That's the important thing, that's what he wants.
He'll give that answer. Maybe he'll send you back there that day to buy that card. Maybe he won't.
But you put him first. He values that. He appreciates that. He's going to take care of you. He's not gonna let you fall down on that matter. He knows if you need that transportation or not. He's going to take care of you. And you honored him by putting him first in that matter. What about school?
00:35:00
School gets pretty busy sometimes, right? Sometimes you're working on the class project, you've got an exam, and that exam is tomorrow, or the project's due tomorrow. Tonight, the assembly meeting.
Well, if I.
Skip the meeting, Keep preparing for that exam. I'll do better, right?
Where's the Lord in that?
Do we need the Lord's help on exams?
Or do we do them in our own strength? Are we Christians?
We can make a legal thing out of this and say you must go to every assembly meeting. Her brother was talking about that last night. But what has the Lord done? He set up assemblies and he put people in them and he himself is there.
Said you say, Lord, you know I need the time on this exam.
But Lord, I want to be there at that meeting because I need to be where you are. You think the Lord values that. You think He can make that up to you on that exam or that paper or whatever it is.
If you don't think that, I don't think you're a Christian.
Now you might think that and ignore it like I did and say well I'm going to do it anyway.
Don't it costs too much.
It costs too much to lead the Lord out of your life, to try to do well on an exam, or to try to do well on a paper.
Even if you do well, it costs too much. Don't put him second. You put him second. At that point in your life, you may never get him into your life at all.
Mysterious business. Young people, older ones, all of us. This is serious business that we're talking about.
Satan works. He'll make every excuse to take us away. I can tell you, I hate to give an experience of my own, but that's the one I know the best, and it doesn't make glory of me. I'll tell you, when I went to school after three semesters in university, I was doing very poorly.
The school wrote a letter to me and they said you have failed the standards of this university by three.
Different criteria.
It is our prerogative to let you go. We should.
We're advising you to seek counsel to continue in this school. They let me stay.
I didn't know what to do.
Except I knew to get on my knees. I went to the Lord and said, Lord, what should I do?
The Lord brought this verse before me.
I said OK, Lord, how?
He said you go back to the school.
You take out your Bible.
You read it.
I wasn't sure I heard that right.
I thought, Lord, that you were going to tell me to go and to study harder and to be more diligent.
You know, the Lord speaks to His Word. I was reading His Word and He kept bringing before me those verses, not the ones about diligence, but about the ones to take up the Word and to seek Him first and let Him take care of that. I didn't understand it. I knew in my heart that that was the right thing, but I thought I blew it. And This is why it's important. Perhaps you've gotten to this point in your life and you haven't done what that verse says.
We serve a God of all grace.
He gives second chances. You can start now and put the Lord first in your life. I went back to the school. I went to my class. After the class, I went to the library. I took out my Bible and started to read it, and I read it and I read it, and I also studied my books as well.
As that semester went on, I learned more of my Bible than I ever had before. It was a wonderful time.
I don't know what happened with the rest, it was the strangest thing. I still can't really explain it. All the classes got easy and.
Like they were made simple somehow. I don't think they were, but that's how what happened.
The exams that sometimes would line up three in a row weren't that way anymore.
I had no trouble finishing school. I won't say more than that.
I got through just fine. The Lord took care of me. He proved it.
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And I had a precious time with him the remainder of those school years.
That's a promise. Seek you first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. It's a promise from God. I want to say right now, though, it's not a charm. You can't go pretend at it. You can't take some stab at it and say, OK, I'm going to do this and now I expect to get this. No.
If you get nothing more than a closer relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, you've gotten what you need.
But God never comes short on His side of the promise. I'll just leave you to discover that for yourself. He says what he means.
There's something else about putting the Lord first, at your age, at my age, at the youngest age, where you can read.
Take out the word of God and read it first thing in the morning. Don't give it up till later. You know the manna was given in the morning.
They went out to get that food early in the morning. They might eat some of it later in the day, but they collected it then. They first took of it. Then that is when we are to take out the Word of God. Don't wait until the day gets on to take out the Word of God and read it. When you get up in the morning, start with the Lord, Read His Word, talk to him, pray to Him.
Get what you need for the day from him.
Give him the 1St place and then see what he's going to do in the day.
But you already have started with a blessing just by being with him. You know this.
Idea of starting with the Lord early in the morning. This is in the scriptures in more than the manna. He turned over to Psalm in chapter 63.
Psalm 63 and psalmist says in verse one.
Oh God, thou art my God.
You hear that longing in his voice. He's come to know something, something that we all should know. Look what he says early. Will I seek the My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longest for thee, In a dry and thirsty land where no water is.
Brother and sister in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is where we start with the Lord. In the morning He gives what is needed for the day. We are in a place where there isn't that which can satisfy us, but He can.
And we need to start there. And he gives the answer. The answer is in Proverbs chapter 8.
Proverbs 8, verse 17.
I love them that love me, and those that seek me early shall find me. You want to find the Lord?
See Him early, don't wait till later in the day. Other things come in and crowd out the mind. By then you take up with the Lord first thing in the morning and you see that you'll find Him. You'll get His guidance, you'll get His direction, you'll get His assurance through the day for all that you have need of.
Well, I want to go on, talk to another group. We don't have much time left. Talk to those who are considering marriage.
I think there's quite a few of you here.
Tonight it may be that not all of the unmarried are, or maybe that you are, but.
There would be something else. First, I just want to say, you know, it isn't that if you're not married that you must be married. The Word of God speaks about the single state and it speaks about it with honor. First Corinthians Chapter 7, and it's interesting what it says there. It speaks about the two cases that the one who is not married cares for the things of the Lord.
How he may please the Lord.
That's your case right now. You're not married.
It's also the case, but it's contrasted a little bit there with those who are married. He that is married cares for the things of the world, how he may please his wife or her husband. There's something else that comes in. But what I'm going to say next, I don't want to take away from the unmarried state, but I do want to go on and talk to those who are considering marriage.
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And I just want to say, if you are unmarried and the Lord calls you to go.
And to, umm, go to different parts of the world and use your money for things that he's called you to do. That's wonderful. Please do it. That's what he wants from you if that's what he's called you for.
But one thing that we are never to do is to please ourselves.
We aren't left here in this world to please ourselves. The Lord is our Lord. We're left here to please Him. And there's a wonderful verse that's spoken about him in Romans chapter 15.
Because he's the supreme example in everything when it comes to what is right.
Romans chapter 15 and this is spoken of in con in connection with helping others.
First two it says let everyone of us please his neighbor for good to edification. Then verse 3 for even Christ please not himself, who did he please?
Number one, he pleased God. Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. And then it shows how he was in doing the will of God. He was here to help others.
His his own self wasn't there at all. He didn't please himself. The one thing we know that he didn't please was himself.
And that's the contrast that we're talking about here tonight.
When we act according to our own desires, the one thing we are pleasing is ourselves.
But we are to do please the Lord, to put the Lord first in our lives. And this goes on to helping others as well. So to those who are considering marriage, number one, don't please yourself. And I say this about a great many things that we can do. You can spend your money in a whole host of ways. In the spirit of the age right now is that you know what, you're young, you've got a job, you've got money, you're not married.
That this is your time. Go out and use it. Travel the world. Buy this, buy that. You're never gonna have this again. You're gonna be married, and then it's going to be a time where you're tied down and not be able to do all of that.
What is that?
If it's not self pleasing.
I'd encourage you if you're considering marriage, consider marriage. Consider that one day you're gonna be married to someone. And the worst thing to come into marriage with is that.
The worst thing is to not have prepared at all and to be in marriage with high debt. Sometimes you can't help that. Sometimes we get into debt and it's too late.
Sometimes we cross these very boundaries we're talking about and we get into debt and debt as a whole, it's a terrible whole. It's the number one cause of divorce, money troubles.
Don't go there. What are you doing as a young person to prepare for marriage? You know, Satan wants to destroy marriage everywhere, but especially Christian marriage. If you can, and if he can turn you aside right now before you're married and get you thinking about yourself and not putting the Lord first in your life and not preparing for what the Lord has for you. He will. He wants nothing more than that. And he easily works with us to say, oh, you know, you want to do this thing. Oh yes, I do. And off I go and do it. Never ask.
Why it's failure?
This is serious business, young people. You're considering marriage. Think about what the Lord has for you. How are you going to prepare for that? And you say, OK, I heard so many other things. I heard what Tim said last night. It sound like there were a lot of good things in there. But do I have to get this all figured out in my mind? The answer is in part, yeah. You know, Tim was talking about principles from all over the word of God.
And you need to start from the earliest age and get to know the word of God so that you know what God says, so that those things that were brought out, you get them ingrained in your knowledge. But it's actually more basic than that. It's more basic because you we need to seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. Get that principle right before anything else, and then everything else follows.
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Proverbs, chapter 3.
Proverbs 3 verse five. Trust in the Lord.
With all thine hearts, and lean not to thy own understanding, and all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy path. Another promise in the word of God, and he means that.
Maybe you don't have everything figured out, but what you can do is keep one simple thought before you. I'm gonna put the Lord first. I'm gonna seek Him first. I'm gonna acknowledge Him in all my ways, and I'm gonna let him direct my path. And He's gonna lead you in that.
You know, what job are you preparing for? Is it a job that will give you enough to prepare to provide for your family? It's very hard on a single wage earner income these days.
To provide like that.
Is there, is it a job that will allow you, like Tim said last night, to get to the assembly meetings?
Is this a job that's going to allow you to be steady with the Lord's people, with your family?
We need to think about that. Ask the Lord, put him first and He'll guide in it. I want to speak to the married as well. We say if you are married.
In fact, you give some advice.
Live below your means, live well below them.
The Lord will give you what you need.
Take the same verse again into your marriage. Seek ye first the Kingdom of God in His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. You look around you see oh so many other people have this and that. I have to have it too. No, you don't.
As a Christian, what you have to do is seek first. The Kingdom of God is righteousness. He knows what you have need of. Your Heavenly Father knows what you have need of. He'll give it.
He'll provide it. Don't go into debt.
Proverbs 22.
Telling us about that.
Says in verse 7 the rich ruleth over the poor and the borrower. The borrower is servant to the lender.
And this is true.
Going to that and now you're no longer free. You're not free.
To be with your family as you ought to be. You're not free to help others. You're not free for the Lord. You're now a servant to someone else, A servant of men. Because of what? Something that you allowed yourself to get into debt over? Don't do it. Put the Lord 1St and let him provide according to his own mind. Young families. And what about you?
If I could give one piece of advice to young families and I go back to even preparing for marriage, what are you doing with the Word of God?
Are you taking it up? This is not just young brothers, but young sisters, What are you doing with the Word of God?
If the Lord gives you a family one day, it's not just a matter of having a job and being able to put food on the table.
But it's a matter of taking the precious Word of God and being able to present it to your family.
What are you doing to prepare for that?
Young families, do you have a family Bible reading?
Does each one here have a family Bible reading?
If not, why not?
Do you have a supper meal?
A lunch meal? A breakfast meal you eat as a family. Why would you do that and not take out the word of God?
It's spiritual food and father and mother, it's your responsibility to provide this food.
For your family, it's very important. And I want to say something else too about the assembly meeting. They're vital. Don't give them up. The Lord put us into assemblies. He didn't put us off by ourselves. He didn't put us just into families. He put us into assemblies and He provided for that assembly, and that's where He gives special instruction from himself.
We already given our families, we are to take it off individually before the Lord, but it's also there collectively in the assembly. And if we don't come to the assembly meetings, we met much.
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Of what God wants to give us. I want to go back to that verse that Tim I think quoted last night, Hebrews chapter 10.
Verse 25 says not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. You know we're right at the end of this meeting. But young families, you need to get your children out to the assembly meeting and don't leave them out.
You need to get there with them. We had time to go over to Acts chapter 21. You see they have a prayer meeting in that chapter and they all go out with the apostle Paul and they go down to the seashore and it says specifically the Spirit of God puts that detail in. They went out with the women.
And the children and they knelt down and prayed there at the seashore.
Very important to have your children out of the meetings. Put the Lord first in your family and let them know that the Lord is first. You know something you cannot make a pretence at Matthew 6 verse 33 either it's true with you or not. And when you get to have a young family, a family with children.
And you're making a pretense at putting the Lord first, but it's not real in your own heart.
You're just getting them after the meeting.
They're gonna see through that.
They're gonna know it's actually pretense. You need to be real. What are you doing? How are you spending your time? Do they see you getting up and spending time with the Lord? Do they see you consistently presenting the word of God to them?
Where do you spend your time? Where do you take your vacations? Do you go to Bible conferences? Do you go to a camp like this? Well, obviously you do, and good job. Thank you for being here.
So I keep doing it. This is good.
This is one of the ways, but it's not the only way. We need to do it in every part of our life to put the Lord first. This goes all the way up to later life as well. I just want to skip on to those who are older.
And I don't have advice for them. Instead, I look at the older ones among us as examples of those who have put the Lord first in their life, in its precious.
Sometimes we pass over it almost unnoticed. How is it that these ones who have aches and pains in their bodies, they struggle out to the meeting and often times when there's so many younger ones not there?
These other ones are, and they're there consistently and faithfully, and they're sitting through the meeting.
And they're sitting quietly, too. They're sitting right quietly, attentively through the meeting, not running out to the bathroom or whatever other distraction might be made.
No. How did that come today?
It's because those ones put the Lord first in their life.
And they got used to putting themselves last. They didn't please themselves and they got to this point where they could be a good example. And I thank God for everyone of them who is a good example to us. But it didn't happen overnight.
Many never made it to where they are.
Tell you a sorrow so many that I've known never made it to where these examples are.
They put themselves first.
And you, the youngest of the ones that are here, you have this opportunity.
Don't try to put those big stones in last. Don't put the Lord first in your life later on. Don't think this is something for another day. I'll please myself now, but I'll get it right later. You may not have that opportunity. Put the Lord first right now and see what He will do. Oh, He will give you such a portion. You'll never regret that decision.
Well, let's close in prayer our God and our Father.
We thank thee.
With thy faithfulness and thy goodness, we thank thee. For the Lord Jesus Christ, we thank Thee.
That we have ever known him, we don't deserve the least of thy mercy.
Let alone to know such a wonderful Saviour. We thank you for the redemption we have through him We pray.
That that would get a hold of every one of our hearts strongly and firmly, That each one of us who are here would live our lives that day and give everything to thee.
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We owe it all to thee, Father.
Lord Jesus, power worthy, we thank Thee for all that, Alice John, and we thank Thee in thy most precious and worthy me. Amen.
Session #3
Gathered to His name
Address—Jim Hyland
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I'd like to start the meeting this evening with hymn #22 in the appendix.
Thou holy one and true our hearts, in thee confide and in the circle of thy love as brethren we abide hymn #22 in the appendix, if someone could please start it.
Uh.
Let's ask God's help and blessing our blessed God and Father. We are indeed thankful this evening for Thy beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we thank thee that that blessed One came into this world, went to Calvary's cross, and there offered himself without spot to the We rejoice, too, to realize that he's risen, ascended, exalted, and glorified at Thy right hand our resources. We go through this world in the path of faith and service.
And now we're thankful too, for thy living word. We thank thee that thou hast not left us without light and instruction.
Even for these dark, difficult days, we thank thee that thou hast given us refreshment and encouragement for our pathway.
And so, as we have thy word before us, we pray that it might be that which would encourage that which would build us up. Comfort, exhort, admonish, correct, whatever the need might be our God. We pray that there might be that in the power of the Spirit that would speak to the heart and conscience of each one of us. So we ask Thy help and blessing. We only have no might of ourselves, but we look to the beseechingly for much blessing this evening, asking it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and for his glory.
Amen. By way of introduction to what I have on my heart this evening, like to read 2 portions of scripture to begin with. The first one is in Hebrews chapter 10.
Hebrews, chapter 10.
And verse 24.
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And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the day approaching. And then a very familiar verse in Acts chapter 2.
Acts chapter 2 and verse 42.
And they continued steadfastly in the apostles, doctrine and fellowship.
And in breaking of bread and in prayers, so often when we take up the truth of God.
We take it up in connection with our individual responsibility before God.
And that which has to do with the path of faith and service individually.
And it's certainly a wonderful line of truth, and I suppose, as though I haven't been here, that you've no doubt had some ministry in that regard. There's often two ministry in connection with the family and our responsibility and privileges in connection with the family circle. And again, that's a wonderful line of truth as well. But this evening I have it on my heart to take up that which ought to, I trust, encourage us collectively.
As the Lord's people, because this has often been pointed out whenever you have a truth.
Concerning the individual aspect of things, there's always a comparable truth concerning the collective side of things.
I'll just give you a couple of quick examples completely out of context. But for instance, individually we can echo with the Apostle Paul, the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. What is the comparable truth as to the collective side of things? Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. And so you see, there's the individual position we have before the Lord, but there's the collective side of things as well.
And as I say, that's what's on my heart. And I read this verse, these verses in Hebrews to introduce my subject.
Because if we were to read the context of the chapter, I believe we have days very parallel to the days in which we live now.
And he is encouraging the Christians in his day.
To go on together, to provoke unto love and good works.
To go on in harmony together and fellowship together, and to not forsake the assembling of themselves together.
As he says here, as the manner of some is, but it's interesting he adds this little comment and so much the more as you see the day approaching. Now the day he's talking about here, in the context of what follows, is not the Lord's coming, although what we have that follows points to the fact that we are getting close to the Lord's coming. But the day he's Speaking of here is the day of apostasy, the day of turning away from the truth. It's also a day of discouragement for the believer, a day when the enemy is subverting the souls of the Saints and many are giving up and fainting.
And not trusting the Lord like they ought to. Later on in the chapter he says cast not away, therefore your confidence.
For of such as great recompense of reward, and I believe everyone of us here can see very quickly.
The These are the days in which you and I find ourselves. We're the day of utter weakness.
We're in a day of spiritual and moral ruin, but the encouragement of the apostle here was.
That the Saints of God would go on together, not just individually. That's true, Paul, when he wrote to Timothy in the second Epistle, he wrote two of days, very parallel to the days in which we find ourselves referred to there as the last days and perilous times. And he encourages Timothy, on the one hand to continue thou that's individual. But he also encourages them to go on with those that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
In other words, he says Timothy, there's still a path of faith collectively as well.
And I want to encourage our hearts in that regard. There's so much today to discourage. The enemy comes in to seek to divide, to scatter, to weary the people of God. But I believe all the resources are there for us to go on, even in together, even in days of utter weakness and ruin. And so we find in the early chapters of the Acts that what characterized the believers back in the day of at the day of Pentecost.
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We find that they continued steadfastly, or if you notice another translation, they persevered.
Because it does take perseverance to go on together. In the days in which we live, the enemy doesn't want to see us encourage one another. He doesn't want to see us go on in happy fellowship with the Lord and with one another.
Nor eat, seek to smash that if he could. And so they continued steadfastly. They persevered not just individually, but what we have listed here, or what we might say are the assembly meetings. They continued steadfastly in the Apostles doctrine. Now I want to notice the order here, because as I've often said, when God lists two or more things in His word, that they're never listed randomly.
You know, sometimes we make lists of things we need to do or things we need to buy at the store. And someone might say, well, why did you list those things in that order? Well, it was just as they came to mind. It was rather random. But God doesn't list things in that way. Just give you a little hint that will help you in your study of the word of God. When you come to a list of two or more things, stop and consider why they are listed in that order. And the order that these things here are listed in is very important. In fact, it's vital.
They continued steadfastly, first of all in the apostles doctrine, because that was the basis for everything else.
It was the basis for fellowship. It was the basis for breaking bread. It was the basis for prayer.
And so, if we're going to go on together, collectively, in a scriptural way for the Lord's glory.
It must be on the basis of that which has been laid out as to the foundation principles.
In God's Word, because those principles don't change. The foundation of God standeth, sure.
And to go back to the word of God to, as we say, first principles.
It's important. And so this was the basis. Now I realize when it says the apostles doctrine here, it wasn't Paul's doctrine. I realize that because Paul had neither been saved nor written by inspiration at this point. But there was that which was given to the early apostles and they taught here and it was the basis for them meeting in this way. And so the apostles doctrine and fellowship, this is what we might say if we can apply it this way. Meetings for ministry of the word of God, you know we need that.
Because God has given ministry in the assembly in a way that we get a balance.
Not that the Bible needs a balance. The Bible is the only balanced book there is in the world.
But it's we who need the balance. And when we avail ourselves of ministry in the assembly on an ongoing basis, as weak as it may be in your home assembly, you're going to get a balance. You know, I have found that those who do not avail themselves of ministry in the assembly, they become like what it says about Ephraim. Ephraim is a cake not turned. You know, if you put a cake on the griddle and you don't turn it, it gets too well done on one side and not enough on the other.
And if we don't avail ourselves of ministry in the assembly, I believe we can often go off on tangents. We get on one side of the truth or the other. We sometimes press certain points at the expense of others. But when the spirit of God is given liberty in the assembly and different ones are led to minister, then I believe we can get that balance and that correction. That's not to say that every meeting for ministry is balanced, but in the overall scheme of things.
You're going to find that there will be balance and correction and so they continue steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship. And then there was breaking of bread. This is the meeting where we come to remember the Lord Jesus as he has asked us to do. Do we really value that meeting? I'm just going to pause here a moment because it's fresh on my in my soul I have just come from a country where it is illegal to meet like we are here this evening.
I have come from Egypt where we had a week of meetings, first of all in Cairo, and every night we had a meeting in a different brothers, in a brothers, a different brothers apartment in a different part of the city. You've got to realize now that Cairo, if you Google it, you'll find it is Greater Cairo, not Cairo proper, but Greater Cairo is now a city of 27,000,500 people, and so we would have a meeting in different parts of the city.
00:15:21
For different for a couple of reasons. One is it would allow different brethren from different parts of the city to come each evening. But there wasn't even more important reason those meetings were held illegally. I would be invited to a brother's home in the late afternoon. They have lunch between 5:00 and 6:00 there, and so I would be invited to a brother's home for lunch. And then between that and about 9930, rather than who were going to be able to come for a meeting that night, would kind of trickle in. They wouldn't all come at once.
When they decided that everybody that was able to come that evening had arrived, we shut the doors and windows. We didn't sing because we didn't want to raise any attention. We had a meeting for a couple of hours and when the meeting was over then they opened the doors and windows and immediately served some refreshment. So it looks to the neighbors like a social gathering. And then about 11:00 they serve dinner tomorrow night. The meeting was in another part of the city, in another brother's home. They never have it two nights in a row.
In one place we had a week of conference, which I've just returned from by the grace of God. They had it out on the Sinai Peninsula in a very, very isolated place and in a compound up the Red Sea, where it's one of the few places that is licensed for something other than Islamic gathering. And those brethren value those times perhaps more than I do, because they realize those times are far and few between.
And those times are times when they often put their life on the line to have the word of God before them and to have fellowship one with another. And brethren, we come to night and we have this camp, but we don't have to bar the doors. We don't have to pretend we're here for some other reason than the Bible meeting.
How much do we value the privilege we have in a country like the United States and Canada Where I come come from, When you go home from this camp to your little assembly meeting, they're going to value the privilege of being gathered to the Lord's name and meeting with a few believers of like precious faith without any hinder other some reproach connected with it. But what is a little reproach compared to soldiers breaking down the door and coming in and arresting?
Or shooting some of us. Oh, I say those brethren in those countries, they value those times. Not only that, but on a typical night in Cairo, only about 1/3 of the assembly can meet. For several reasons, one geography, the other expense. Most of those brethren couldn't afford transit fare to come every week. Some of them only once, once or twice a month can come afford the transit fare. And when they can, they really value the time. Well, that's just in passing. And then we have prayers.
And so it's not so much individual or family prayer here. It's a collective prayer like they had in Acts 12 where the apostle Peter was in prison and it seemed like things were really against him. And it says prayer was made for him by the church without ceasing. And they came together on those nights for prayer. And one night God answered their prayer and Peter showed up at the door. So what I'd like to do now is I'd like to go to a little incident later on in the book of Acts.
Because it's often been said, and rightly so, that in the Epistles we have the principles of Christianity.
But in the book of the Acts, God has given us a pattern, a pattern of things at the beginning.
And brother and I realize we're not in the day of Pentecost. We're not in the Pauline days of the church. I realize we're right at the end. But the pattern and principle of things laid down for us still stands. And I believe we can act on those things that God has established for us, even though we find ourselves on the other end of the church's history from these early brethren. And so I want to go to a little glimpse.
Into an assembly way back in the early days of Christianity.
And to see what took place there on a particular Lord's Day, let's go to the 20th chapter.
00:20:01
Chapter 20 and we'll begin reading at verse 6.
When we sailed away from Philippi after the days of unleavened bread, and came to them to throw unto them, to throw, as in five days.
Where we abode 7 days and upon the first day of the week when the disciples came together to break bread.
Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the Morrow, and continued his speech until midnight.
And there were many lights in the upper chamber where they were gathered together. And there sat in a window a certain young man named Eudicus.
Being fallen into a deep sleep, and as Paul was long preaching, he sunk down with sleep.
And fell down from the third loft and was taken up dead, and Paul went down and fell on him and embracing him, said.
Trouble not yourselves, for his life is in him when he therefore was come up again in a broken bread.
And eaten and talked a long while even till break of day, so he departed.
And they brought the young man alive and were not a little comforted. Well, as I say, we get a little glimpse here of a particular Lord's Day in the early days of the church in this city of Croaz. And I don't pay particular attention to names and their meanings as they appear in Scripture, but some of them seem to jump off the page. And I have been interested to realize that the name Troas means penetrated or bored through. I don't want to go too far with the application of a meaning of a name.
But I have thought of it in this way because history tells us that Troaz in those days was a dark, heathen city. They were worshippers, particularly of the God Jupiter. But the light of the glorious gospel had penetrated that dark city. And not only had it penetrated that dark city, but it had penetrated many dark hearts. Aren't we thankful for the light of the glorious gospel that has penetrated into our heart?
In fact, if there's someone tonight who's not saved or what to God, that the beams of the gospel would beam into your heart by the Spirit of God, and that you would be turned from darkness to light. But here were these ones who had been saved from heathendom, and now they rejoice to be able to meet on the first day of the week, to remember the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread, and to enjoy happy fellowship, one with one with another.
We find here that as this scene opens, Paul and his fellow travelers have arrived on introads. Now I believe if you notice closely, they arrived on a Monday. I say that because we realize they have owed 7 days and they left on the day after the first day of the week. So they must have arrived on a Monday and I want to make a simple suggestion as to why they remained a whole week in Troas.
I suggest that so much that they value the privilege of remembering the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread with others in fellowship of the Lord's table, that they remained there that week. So they would have that blessed privilege before they traveled on. Does that privilege mean that much to you and to me? You know I have had the opportunity and the privilege. My wife and I are visiting our brethren in other parts of the world.
Some who are very isolated, who only can break bread when someone visits them, maybe two or three times a year at the most. Other little assemblies where they're so spread out that they can't on every Lord's day get together to remember the Lord. We've broken bread sometimes with a sister who's isolated on a Thursday afternoon or a Friday evening because we were able to be there that particular day.
There was an elderly sister. She's with the Lord now, but she used to always keep a little role and a little flask of wine in her cupboard. And whenever a brother came through, she was always ready to sit down in fellowship with her brethren. And remember the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread? That sister really valued that privilege. You know, for most of my life, I've lived 10 minutes or less from the meeting room in Smith Falls. I can't say I value it like I ought to.
But here we find that they came together on the first day of the week and noticed. The Spirit of God is very quick to tell us their primary purpose for coming together.
It wasn't to enjoy happy fellowship together, although they did have that privilege. It wasn't to sit under the ministry of the Apostle Paul, although they had the that privilege on that particular Lord's Day. It wasn't just a visit with those who were traveling through the city at that time. They had that privilege too. It wasn't just to partake of a meal, although I believe they partook of a meal on this particular Lord's Day together. No, the Spirit of God tells us that the primary exercise and purpose.
00:25:22
As they assembled in the third law, they came together to break bread.
Now I suggest that they came together in at night, like many of our brethren in other parts of the world still do. I don't think Paul preached as long as we think he did. Most of us are used to having breaking of bread in the morning. But again, I've come from a country where Lord's Day is not a holiday. Our brethren there have to get up and go to work and school on Lord's Day, and so they meet at 8:30 at night when their responsibilities are done.
And real you have to realize that these brethren were employees or servants, maybe even slaves to ungodly masters.
Lord's, They wouldn't be recognized in the same way that we've been thankful it's been recognized in Christian countries over the years.
They probably had to work on this particular day, but when their obligations were over.
Oh, I can just picture those brethren winding them their way through the dark streets of Troas with one thing in view, a third loft where they were going to meet around the Lord Jesus to remember him in the breaking of bread that day. And so they came together to break bread. Now, I'll just mention this. It's not my primary thought in taking up this little incident. There is, I believe, a bit of a dispensational character to what we have here. That is the joy and exercise of the brethren in the early days of the Church's history.
When they came together to remember the Lord, we find them here appreciating Paul's ministry.
Then we find that Utica sits in the window. He wearies of that he falls down to the street, perhaps referring to that time in the Church's history as the Dark Ages, when much of the truth that we have, I trust, appreciate and enjoy collectively was lost. Then there was restoration, and they broke bread till break of day and so on. I just mentioned that in passing, and we may make a comment or two in that regard as we go along.
But we find here that Paul preaches to them and I want to apply this.
In connection with the the collective side of things and to the heavenly calling of the believer, you know this is a day, sad to say, when Paul's epistles to a great degree are being given up by many Christians today. A brother said to me one time, he said, you know, I don't read Paul's epistles anymore. I believe the Gospels are the most important. Well, we certainly need the Gospels. They give us the life of Christ, the example to follow in his steps, and so on.
But I don't believe we'll ever understand what how we can meet collectively and go on together as gathered to the Lord's name. Without Paul's ministry will never understand the real calling of the church as a heavenly entity. If we don't read Paul's ministry, we'll never understand about the Lord's coming and the difference of the Lord's coming for his Saints and with his Saints and so on. Those things, the meat of those things, are really brought out in Paul's ministry.
And why is there so much confusion today in many Christian circles as to some of these precious things?
It's because they've neglected Paul's ministry. But we find here that these early brethren they listen to and appreciated.
The ministry of the Apostle Paul. We read two of the Berean Brethren.
They were more noble than those of Thessalonica because they searched the scriptures daily to see if these things were so.
What things? The things that the Apostle Paul brought before them. Now the Thessalonians were noble. They listened to Paul's ministry. But the Bereans were more noble because they searched it out from the word of God and confirmed it from Scripture. And that's what we need to do with Paul's ministry. We need to listen to, administered on occasions like this, and then we need to search it out for ourselves. And we need to seek to walk in the good of it and tenaciously hold on to those foundation principles.
Because Paul spoke of himself as a wise master builder, The other apostles and New Testament writers too, as we get in Ephesians.
But Paul is the one that lays down the real meat of Christianity.
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And we're going to miss it if we don't go to Paul's ministry. And so we find Paul preaches unto them, ready to depart on the Morrow. Now I know this was literally he was considering leaving Troas the next day, and that's certainly what happened. But again, I believe we can make a little application because Paul's ministry always brings that character of things before us. The Lord's coming. Are we ready to depart, not just tomorrow, but this evening? Do we have that hope before us?
Again, it's something that perhaps has been confused and misconstrued and many Christians aren't looking for the Lord Jesus to come at any moment. More lot many Christians are looking for better things down here. And the king establishment of the Kingdom and so on. Well, there will be better days down here. There will be the establishment of the Kingdom. But there's something before that ready to depart. Let's keep that truth before our souls. Brethren, what's going to encourage us to go on individually?
As families and collectively as gathered to the Lord's name. If the truth of the Lord's coming, it's the realization that he has promised I will come again and that he's going to fulfill that promise at any moment. And then we find He continues his speech until midnight. As I say dispensationally, I believe it speaks of that time when the truth of Paul's ministry and the Lord's coming, and so on and meeting.
In the Lord's name was lost, thank God, through the dark ages that were individuals in the enjoyment of those precious truths. In fact, we have some hymns written by individuals during that time, who from what they wrote we see were individually in the enjoyment of these precious things, but generally it was lost. But now I want to make a little application from the eighth verse where it says there were many lights in the upper chamber where they were gathered together.
Now, no doubt they were candles or oil lamps or something of that nature because remember, it was the middle of the night by this time, and so they needed that light. But again, I want to make a little application. You know, there's many lights in this room and I'm not talking about the ones on the ceiling either, because every one of us here are to be lights for Christ. But you notice these lights were in the upper chamber and you noticed earlier it was a third. Law three speaks of separation, death and resurrection. It's a very.
Marked degree of separation here is the upper chamber, because if you and I are going to be true lights for Christ in this world, we must walk in separation from it.
We must walk in the truth. We never shine for Christ. We never reach souls by compromising. It's always by walking in separation. We see it with the perfect example of the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus was the most accessible man that ever walked on planet earth, but he was He as as a man. He walked in complete separation from this world and he told his own at the end, ye are not of this world.
Even as I am not at this world, and there is a way that we can walk so that we can shine for the Lord.
You know, when the Lord Jesus was here, he spoke of himself as the light of the world.
But before he left this world, he said to his disciples, Ye are the light of the world. The Lord Jesus is not the light of the world. Tonight we're left here as lights in this world. And it says that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as light in this world. We're here in a in a in a wicked world, the moral and spiritual darkness is deepening every day.
But we ought to be light, bright lights in a Dark World to shine for Christ. So there were many lights in the upper chamber. But now I want to speak for a few moments about this young man named Utica. Now it's interesting again that Eureka's name means well off. And you know, I look into the faces of those of us tonight who are well off. Here was a young man that was well off. He was a young man who I have no doubt the light of the glorious gospel had penetrated his dark heart. He belonged to the Lord Jesus Christ.
He was associated with the believers gathered to the Lord's name in Troas. He had the privilege, no doubt, of remembering the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread, and he had the wonderful privilege of sitting under the ministry of the Apostle Paul. He was a man, a young man who was well off. I wonder if you young people know how well off you are. Now I realize some of you here were not brought up in Christian homes. There's perhaps some here, and your parents aren't even happy that you're at this camp, but I realize I look into the faces of many.
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Who have been brought up in Christian homes and are being brought up in Christian homes.
How much do you value that? There was a man who was well off, but you know he wearied of it all, and not only did he weary of it all, but he decided to sit in a dangerous place. He sat in a window. Now I have no doubt this third loft had become stuffy after a time, probably hot and stuffy, and he decided that he could have a breath of fresh air. But I believe there's a far deeper lesson that we can learn from this.
Because I suggest that Eudicus decided he wanted to keep one eye on what was going on in the world outside, and one eye on what was going on in the room where the Brethren were meeting. One year tuned to the Ministry of the Apostle Paul, and one year tuned to the world outside. And you say, wasn't there a 5050 chance that he would fall either in or out of the window rather than? It doesn't work that way. If we leave our hearts open for the world, it's going to pull us down.
We're not going to fall in the window, so to speak. We're going to fall out of the window. But I want to say this too, because.
You know yourself. If you're sleepy and meeting, you're never wide awake one minute and sound asleep the next. It's a process of things. You're weary and your eyes closed. Your head goes down, then it comes back up. Then you repeat the process. And if you allow the process to be repeated enough, ultimately you're going to find yourself sound asleep in meeting. And I have often wondered as Utica sat down in the window and as he began to nod off to sleep.
Why wasn't there someone who saw the plight of Eudicus? Someone who saw him nodding off? Someone who saw him leaning toward the street? Someone who could have gone over in love and put their arm around you to kiss and said, Utica, you know you're in a dangerous position and you're falling asleep. There's a chair over by me. Why don't you come and sit by me? I'm not excusing Utica, but I'm saying, why is it brethren, so often we wait?
Till someone has drifted away from the Lord's table.
Maybe even sin has come in and there has to be some action on the part of the assembly. Why is it we wait until then to try to encourage someone as to a course that they're on? Again, I don't want to read more into this than there really is, but perhaps if someone could have gone over and encouraged you to **** before he was found asleep, before he fell down, it might have saved him this bitter experience. He might not have appreciated it. And maybe if you try to encourage someone in a course, you won't be appreciated.
But it could might spare someone the course that they're on the end of the course that they're on. And so we find that Utica see drifts off to sleep. He wearies of the ministry of the Apostle Paul. He wearies of what's going on in the the room where the assemblies meeting and he falls down to the level of the street and when they go down he he, for all intents and purposes outwardly he looks dead. You know, I have grown up. I grew up with many young people.
That I have to look at their life now and say, you know, there once seemed to be real faith, there, real desire for the Lord. But I have to bow in the language of Timothy and say the Lord knoweth them that are his. What a sad thing it really is. And a lot of times I it's to my shame as well because I haven't carried out what I've just said. Well, Utica falls down, but I want to notice what happens here. We find in verse 10 that Paul went down and fell on him and embraced him.
You'll notice here that Eudicus didn't embrace Paul. Paul embraced Uticus. Because I believe when there's Restoration, and I want to speak of Restoration for a moment. When there's restoration, it's really the truth of God and the power of the Spirit. Getting a hold of a soul. We sometimes say, and I know what we mean by the expression, well, they really got a hold of the truth. I have no problem with that expression. But perhaps it would be better to say the truth got a hold of them.
Because, you know, if there's the onus is never put on our part, put on us in Christianity, it's always whether it was our salvation, whether it's any desire to go on for the Lord. It's God that works in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure, whether it's restoration. David had to say he restoreth my soul. Whatever aspect of the Lord's dealings, it is with us. When we get to heaven, we're gonna realize that it was all his working.
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In US and and for us. And so we find that Paul goes down and embraces him, and he confirms to the brethren that his life is in him. Now brethren, what I want to say next, I want to say very circumspectly, and I trust I can balance my remarks as I go along, because I realize that if there is going to be restoration on for a soul to the Lord and to their brethren, it has to initially.
Be a work of the Spirit of God in the soul. I understand that fully. I also understand.
That we can get in the way. In our zeal to see someone restored to the Lord's table, we can sometimes get in the way. We can bring someone back before it's the Lord's time. And if we do that, it only adds to the problem, It doesn't help it. We don't help the person and we cause confusion for the assembly. But brother. And there's a balance in this because you notice when Eudicus was restored to his brethren.
It wasn't the apostle Paul who was visiting on that occasion, or any of the other visitors that restored him to the third loft. The Spirit of God is very careful to record, and they, the local brethren, brought the young man alive and were not a little comforted. Paul went down and had the initial contact. Paul was the one who embraced him. Paul was the one who confirmed to the brethren that there was life.
But it was the responsibility of the Brethren to restore him to the third loft. Again, I want to balance this. We don't want to get ahead of the Lord. But if I can just say this with ever such caution, when a sheep wanders away from the fold, it doesn't come back on its own. It does not come back on its own. And brethren, it's not a happy thing that one go out and another come in and we wash our hands of a situation and say, well, it was only a problem.
Anyway, that's not what God wants. When we go to 1St and 2nd Corinthians, we get again the balance.
In One Corinthians they erred on the side of holiness, but in Two Corinthians they erred on the side of grace.
Yes, they had to excommunicate the individual for the clearing of sin from the assembly, for the Lord's glory, and for the exercise of the individual as to what he had done.
But when Paul wrote to them the second time, he said, what's the problem? There's been true godly repentance evidenced in this man's life. And if you don't restore him now to his brethren into the Lord's table, he's going to be swallowed up completely. And brother and I believe we need to be watchful and careful so that when there is a work of the Spirit of God in a soul, we are there, ready to be used of the Lord in connection with restoration. Now I know we can't draw rules.
I know that the Bible is a book of principles rather than rules. The Bible is not a self help book. We don't get from point A to point B in 12 easy steps. I realize that circumstances alter cases and so on but I believe it was a happy thing here in Troas when there was this restoration and so we we find they come up and it says in verse 11 when he therefore was come up again and had broken bread and eaten and talked a long while now.
I don't believe they repeated the Lord's Supper here, because to break bread is an Old English expression to partake of a meal.
And so they come up and now there's happy fellowship together. And then it says even till break of day. And so he departed. However, I want to make this application because in the dispensational character of things I believe God has inserted this little expression to show that even at the end, till break of day, till the Lord comes, there will be the privilege of remembering the Lord. And notice where they where where it was. It was back up in the third loft. It was the very place that they had been in the beginning.
You know when it says in One Corinthians 11 ye do show the Lord's death till he come. He wouldn't say there till he till he come, if he wasn't going to provide a scriptural basis on which to do it. The Lord never asked us to do anything without providing A scriptural basis on which to do it. And so this little as I say, I believe they really particular meal, but they broke bread till break of day, showing us that there will be that privilege in the very place where it began.
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That is, as to the principles that were laid out in the beginning.
Until the Lord comes. And then it says, And so he departed. You know, we talk about the Lord's coming. Paul anticipated departing, and the moment came when he did. You know, that moment, I believe, is closer than we realized. I can't tell you tonight when the Lord is coming, but I know one thing. We're closer to the Lord's coming at this moment than we've ever been before. Now, before we close, I'd like to turn over to another little portion in the book of Acts, this time in the.
28th chapter.
I'm sorry, Chapter 27.
Chapter 27 and verse 41 And falling into a place where two seas met, they ran the ship aground.
And the four parts stuck fast and remained unmovable. But the hinder part of the was broken with the violence of the waves. Now we don't have time, but if we were to read this little account in this chapter of Paul's shipwreck, we find that in their travels they came upon this storm. God allowed a storm that was so violent that the ship broke up. And we find that everyone was saved. Everyone made it to shore.
Albeit on broken pieces of the ship. That part speaks of the individual responsibility.
And resources that are given to us even for the days in which we live, because, as we said earlier, the last days are characterized by individual faithfulness. But I believe too, that God has inserted something very precious here in the verse we read to encourage us as to the collective side of things, even though the ship which would perhaps speak to us of testimony and fellowship, even though the ship had been broken up here.
I want to bring this out because I have been saddened to find that this incident is used, has been often used to justify a certain line of things that I believe is not according to the word of God. And that line of things, in short, is that, well, it doesn't matter at the end, everything's broken up and in ruin, and as long as we're individually faithful, it doesn't matter. There's no collective testimony anymore, and it's all just individual.
But I believe there is something inserted here that guards against that, because we find that as they fell into this place and the ship falls apart.
We find that first of all, at the end of the verse. It's true that the hinder part of the ship was broken with the violence of the waves. Now that's where we are now, outwardly, and I stress outwardly, things are fragmented and broken up. And so, sad to say, and to our shame, we find Christians today in various pockets and fellowships of Christendom. Behind her part has been broken with the violence of the wave. I'll just say this is a safeguard. The church is not in ruin.
You know, sometimes we say the church is in ruin, and I understand what we mean when we say that. But if we say the church is in ruin, what we're really saying is the Lord has failed in His promise in Matthew chapter 16, where he said on this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. What is in ruin is the testimony as to the truth of the one body. That's what's really in ruined. But the church is not in ruin, thank God.
There is one body. Thank God he hasn't committed the keeping of the church or the one body to us or it would be in ruin. I just say that in passing and so outwardly, yes, things are broken with the violence of the waves. The enemy has been ultra successful in seeking to smash things in that way. But before he speaks of it, the.
Hinder part of the ship being broken by the violence of the waves. The Spirit of God has inserted this little expression here.
That the four part of the ship stuck fast and remained unmovable. If the hinder part of the ship speaks to us of where we are now, then I suggest that the four part of the ship speaks of what was laid out at the beginning, both the pattern of things and the principles that were laid out at the beginning of the Christian era and that has stuck fast and remained unmovable.
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Nothing can change that, thank God. And if that is true, and I believe with all my heart, it is true.
Then, brethren, can we not go back and act on that which was established at the beginning? I believe that we can. We can go back, so to speak, to the third loft. We can go back to those foundation principles because those principles haven't changed. And I believe that God has given us all the resources that we need to act even today on those principles.
Now I realize that it's not a popular path. I have no doubt there's some sitting here and saying, well, Jim, it's all right for you to talk about these things from the word of God, and we understand it. But what about when we go home for to our little assembly? You know, the people at work, my Christian friends, those of my Christian neighbors in the community, they just don't understand when they asked me where I go on Sunday. And I kind of hem and Haw and tell them I go to that little hall down the street or I meet in someone's home to break bread and remember the Lord.
Just don't understand, you know. There's going to be a reproach connected with being gathered to the Lord's name. It says in Hebrews, Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, and we might there reproach. That is not what it says, bearing his reproach, But I enjoyed what an older sister in my hometown of Smith Falls said many years ago. Someone asked her, where do you go on on Lord's Day? And she told them, and she said, you know, they said to her.
You know, up at that place, they don't even take a name. Oh, she said, we do take a name. And she said, what more wonderful name could we have than to be gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ? I thought that was very precious. Isn't that enough, brethren? Isn't that what we really want to be associated with him? Because I want to stress at the end of this meeting that God has made a way, the Lord Jesus has made a way, so that we can enjoy.
His company collectively this side of heaven, he wants to enjoy our company individually. And lo, I am with you always, even under the end of the age. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. But you know when Israel was redeemed and brought into the wilderness.
Jehovah looked down and he said, let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell amongst them. You know, he knew that in the coming day when they got into the land, that Jerusalem would be chosen as the spot where they could come and meet with the Lord collectively and.
The temple would be built and he would dwell there amongst his people and so on. But to me it's just as if he looked down.
On a redeemed people and said, I don't wanna have to wait that day. I don't wanna have to wait 40 years or more to dwell with my people collectively. I want to be in their midst every step of the way. And so, brethren, he wants our company, not just individually, but he wants our company collectively. But you know, it really is a matter of the heart. We can speak of these principles, we can talk about it. But you know, it really is a matter of the heart. And it's more than just principles. It's the truth as it is in Jesus.
You know when we see the Lord Jesus there on prayer meeting night on occasions for ministry of the word, when we come to remember the Lord Jesus in the breaking of bread, if we really see by faith who is there in the midst, don't we want to be there? Don't we really want to be there where he is and to enjoy his Co company collectively? There's a place called the Father's house where all the redeemed are going to be together, but he wants us to go on in the meantime in that place.
Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I. In the midst of them there is a place.
Where the Lord Jesus delights by the Spirit of God to gather his own around himself, and if you and I are truly exercised, He not only brings us to that place, but he preserves us at that place for our blessing. Yes, but first of all for his glory, for his glory, and for his delight. Brethren, if it brings joy to your heart and mind to find ourselves by the grace of God, and it's only by the grace of God.
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But to find ourselves by the grace of God, to be gathered to the Lord's name where he is in the midst, if that brings the light to our hearts.
His delight, his joy far outweighs any joy and delight that by the grace of God is in your heart and mind. Well, brethren, may the Lord preserve us, and may we seek to go on for the Lord's glory individually as families, and collectively as gathered to the Lord's name, until we look into his wonderful face. And by the grace of God he can say, well done. Thou, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. Let's pray our God and Father.
How thankful we are tonight for thy word and for those wonderful patterns that thou hast laid out for us in the book of the acts and those principles that have been laid down for us in the epistles and our God we pray that we might seek grace to meditate on these things give ourselves holy to them and then we might seek grace and energy of faith to walk and that which thou hast laid out for us until the Lord Jesus comes so we ask thy blessing and blessing on the rest of our evening together?
In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Session #4
Young Men
Address—Bernie Roossinck
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.
Well, let's, uh, I know that everybody's getting settled in and it's been a long day and a warm day, but let's start by singing together #259.
#259.
Let's, uh, look to the Lord in prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father.
We come before thee this evening to quiet our hearts before they.
And to open Thy word, our Father, we pray that there would be blessing.
Father, as we consider each person in this room, how we marvel at the value that thou to see in each one.
Lord, there's many needs here.
We pray for an encouragement from Thyself. We ask that Thy Spirit would put the words that He has into my mouth.
Father, I need your help.
And I just.
Come before you at the beginning of this message.
Independence Word Each of these children and young people need the and we just pray that we would find encouragement, comfort together from thy word.
We ask this in Jesus precious name, Amen.
So when Tim asked me to talk.
I got on my knees.
And I asked the Lord.
Lord, what shall I say?
These are.
Difficult times, young people that you're growing up in.
These are tough times in our assemblies and we need encouragement, and the Lord put that on my heart as a burden to try to encourage you.
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And I have before me a number of young people in the scriptures.
That I hope we can be comforted by and encouraged by.
But the Lord gave me another burden tonight.
So before we get into.
The encouragement and the comfort.
The Lord gave me this burden.
As I look at you.
Young people, I just.
I hardly know how to.
Tell you.
How I love you.
I believe that almost everybody in this room knows and loves the Lord Jesus.
But this came upon me very strongly. They have not all believed the gospel.
Turn with me to Second Samuel 18.
This is a young man.
Name Absalom.
And Absalom was born into a kingly family. He was a Prince in Israel.
Absalom had tremendous opportunities.
And instead of walking with the Lord, he rose up in rebellion.
And in the course of trying to overthrow and steal the Kingdom from his father, David.
He was killed in battle.
Read verse 32. I have often set in gospel meetings beloved young people and asked myself this question.
The king said unto Kushiyaki, Is the young man Absalom safe?
Of course you answered the enemies of my Lord the King, and all that rise against thee to do thee earth. Thee is, that young man is.
Oh, what a what an answer.
And the king was much moved.
And went up to the chamber over the gate and wept. And as he went he said, Oh my son.
Absalom, my son, my son. Absalom, what God I had died for thee.
Oh, absolutely, my son.
I ask you boys and girls and young people tonight.
Are you safe?
I know that you were raised in a Christian home. I know that.
You were brought up to hear the gospel, but I ask you tonight, with all the sincerity that I can, is the young man I want you to put your own name in this. Is the young man Isaiah safe?
Is the young man Daniel safe?
Oh, what a question.
Start over to Ecclesiastes Chapter 11.
Verse 9.
Rejoice, oh young man, in thy youth.
Unless thy heart shear thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes. But know thou that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment. Therefore remove sorrow from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh.
For childhood and use their vanity.
Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come, that nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them.
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Here is a young person.
That is walking in their own way.
Are you doing that tonight?
Rejoice, O young man or young woman in your youth. We like to do that, don't we?
Left eye heart, shear thee all the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart and the sight of thine eyes, But know thou that God will bring you into judgment.
I want you to look at your knees right now. Just look at your knees.
You see those knees?
Your knees, those knees are going to bow before the Lord Jesus Christ one day, maybe tonight.
And you're going to meet that man.
As your Savior or as your judge, your knees are going to bow your mouth. Think of your mouth. You will confess Jesus Christ is Lord.
Is it gonna bring supreme joy to your heart to say my Lord and my God, or are you going to say it with hatred?
Jesus, Lord.
Young people, your eyes, the eyes that you're looking through right now are going to look at that man.
It says every eye shall see him and they also that pierced him. You're going to see your savior or you're going to see your judge, I ask you.
What's it, What's it? What is it tonight? Are you safe?
Proverbs tells us there is a way that seemeth right to a man.
But the end thereof are the ways of death.
Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful, and the end of that mirth is heaviness.
You know Satan wants to tell you put it off.
Have a good time, live for now. Rejoice in your youth. There's plenty of time for that later. Don't listen to that.
There is a way that seemeth right to a man, but what a critical word. But the end thereof are the ways of death.
We read in Luke chapter 12 of the rich man whose goods were increased, right? And he, he says, uh, what shall I do? I will tear down my barns and build greater.
And what did God say to him? That night? Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee. And then who shall those things be?
Oh, young people, I just, I just look at you and I just, I long for you to.
Do you love the word Jesus?
Is he real to you?
You can fool me. I'm easily fooled. You can fool your parents. You never fool the eye of God, young people, He looks into your heart and he knows right now.
Are you real? Are you safe or not?
Think about the work that the Lord Jesus did on the cross for you. I know you all weren't here on Sunday, but a lot of you were. What did you want to do?
When Kyle came up here and took Cameron's punishment, what did you want to do? You know what I wanted to do 2 Things. I wanted to weep.
And I did do that and I wanted to stand up and clap.
I didn't do that.
But Christ is real.
Lord, Jesus loves you.
You believe that? Believe it, young people, of all of the chaos in this world, of everything that's going wrong.
There's one person that can anchor your soul.
One person that can take away all of the guilt, all of the penalty, one person that is absolutely, totally trustworthy. You're going to put your faith and trust in him. Please do that.
00:15:11
Think about the heart of the Lord Jesus right as he's walking through the land of Israel, and he comes to Jerusalem and he's looking out over the city, and he begins to weep.
Because how often would I have gathered your children as a hand gathers her six under her wings? And you would not. Oh, don't let that be you.
You would not, it says in the Psalms. The fool has said in his heart, no God.
Is that where you are tonight? I hope not. I, I hope that I'm wasting my time here. But I just have this burden on my heart that they have not all believed the gospel. Oh dear children and young people and older ones too.
Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. He loves you. He went to Calvary's cross and died to take all of the blame for every wicked thing that you and I have ever done. The blame was poured on his blessed head and God had to say, I blame you for all that stuff that Bernie did, and here's the punishment that you get for it.
You accept that, You believe that. Oh, believe it, young people.
It's such a marvelous thing. Believe it. Trust him.
Here's another question that came before me this evening, another question that King David asked. There was a man named AB uh, Abner, who was a good man and he was about to, uh, help bring the divided Kingdom of Israel under David, God's man. And in the course of battle, uh, a person was killed.
And that man's family was angry, of course, and they began to plot and pursue to take Abner down.
And God gave the city of refuge right, And Abner was right at the gate of Hebron, city of Refuge. And Joab, says Abner, just a minute before you go, in just a minute, I have somewhat to say today. Stand up, Lucas, please.
Let's go and tell you something. Just took us sword and he's right there. Laid him down dead. Thank you, Lucas.
This.
This is what King David what meant was Diet Abner is a full diet.
Right at the door.
There he was, dead, right at the door of the city of Refuge. He could have went in.
Diet Abner is a fool that Can I ask you young people, are you going to die as a fool? Well, we have to say that at your funeral.
This person dies a fool that they say no God and you may say in your heart, I'm going to get to that later or soon. I just need to get this thing done or that. Do it now. Do it now.
OK.
I just really have that pressed on my soul.
So Lord, Jesus loves you.
Yeah, when you stand before God.
That's the center.
There may be a lot of little Sims on the list, but you know the sin that's going to condemn you to a lost eternity? It's unbelief.
And the question is posed to you, What have you done with my son Jesus?
I don't believe.
Says in John three, he that hath the Son hath life.
He that hath not the Son hath not life, not the verse. I was thinking of John 3.
He that believeth on the sun hath everlasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life. That's you, friend.
You stand before God and he has to say, I never knew you depart from me. Oh, don't let that be you friends, please.
00:20:04
Believe.
He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.
You want that tonight, It's yours right now. Do not wait till 8:30 if you do not belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. Friend, I don't care who's looking at you right now. Bow your head and open your heart to Christ, please. He loves you, He died for you.
OK, another young man turned to March 13.
By the way, ladies.
I couldn't find very many examples that were women. And I'm sorry, but I want you to hear me say this. I love you and the word loves you. And these examples that we're using of young people are just as applicable to you, OK? Just know that the person that died in Calvary's cross for you is the object.
He loves you. Never mind that I'm using young men here. God loves young women.
Mark 13.
14 I'm sorry.
This story This is an incident that's already mentioned once in the scripture.
The scene is the Lord Jesus is being carried away to be tried and to be sent to the cross of Calvary. All of his disciples had just took off and forsook him in flood. Verse 51 There followed him a certain young man having a linen cloth cast about his naked body, and the young men laid hold on him, and he left the linen cloth and fled from them naked.
The linen cloth here speaks about.
Practical righteousness.
So that's Speaking of the salvation of the soul. I don't believe. And here's a young person.
That follows the Lord and when times got tough, when he was challenged on it, He dropped it and ran and there was absolutely nothing underneath, nothing naked. The scripture tells us in Hebrews chapter 4 all things are naked and open unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do. You will face Christ as your Savior or your Judge. You have to do with Him.
Now you can have a linen garment on today. You can speak in meeting. You can.
Fool everybody in this room, but you never fool the eye of God, friends. And here this young man, when he's challenged, all of his righteousnesses were gone in a split second, and it was revealed that there was nothing there of reality. Oh, young people.
Don't do that. Be real.
Be real.
In Luke 24, there's a feast talked about, and we're not trying to read this, but uh, there's a marriage feast and the invitation goes out for supper. Come for all things are ready, right? And they begin with one, uh, consent to make excuses. Well, I have to, I just bought this. I have to go check it out. I just did that. I got married. I can't all these excuses, right? And the Lord says, go out into the highways and hedges and compel them to come in.
Umm, let's turn over to this just for one verse. Loop 14.
Verse 24. Oh.
Friends, let this sink into your soul.
For I say unto you, that none of those which were bidden shall taste of my supper.
Think about that.
None of those that were bidden that didn't come will taste of my supper. You may think I'll get saved later. I'll have a second chance, friend. Scripture teaches that we are expecting the Lord Jesus to come at any moment and ****** us away. I hope that if the Lord came in the next moment that there would be everybody here gone.
But I ask you.
If that happens.
And you are still sitting here.
What are you going to do?
It's too late, You will pass eternally ruined into Sinner cell. And I say that with as much love as I can, because I don't want anybody in here.
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To fall into this verse, none of them will taste it by supper, that one no second chances.
You can't fool God. You may look pious, you may know the verses, you may give out songs in meeting, whatever.
And believe me, young people, it thrills my heart when godly young people are growing in the truth and they are participating. It's a beautiful thing. But I ask you in all sincerity, are you this young man? Are you clothed in a linen garment with nothing on it underneath? I hope not.
OK, now let's get to the positive.
I want to share first a young person that I've really been enjoying in the last few months in Jeremiah.
Now.
If you haven't read Jeremiah Young People.
It is fairly heavy reading at times.
But do it. There is a ton of encouragement for you in this book and I'm going to give you just a couple of things that I have enjoyed by this by no means an exhaustive list. And I want you to I want a Wester appetite is what I'm trying to do here. OK, and encourage you OK, Jeremiah 1.
The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah, of the priests that were in.
And in Austin, the land of Benjamin, to whom the word of the Lord came in the days of Josiah son of Ammon, king of Judah, in the 13th year of his reign. It came also in the days of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah king of Judah, unto the end of the 11Th year. Of Zedekiah the son of Joe, Josiah king of Judah, unto the carrying away of Jerusalem captive in the 5th month.
That's the background.
The time that Jeremiah was living is very much like the day we're living in today, right at the end.
Uh, Jeremiah lived through several Holocaust, if you will. When the Babylonians came twice and thousands of people were killed. We read in the book of Jeremiah, there will be nobody to bury these people. They'll lay there on the ground.
Anyway, what I'm trying to say to you is this young man.
Was living his life at a time very much like ours. OK, verse four. Then the word of the Lord came to me saying, before I formed thee in the belly, I knew they think about that for a minute. Before I formed you in the belly, I knew you.
Let's speak to the sanctity of life, by the way.
How could you argue that?
Before I formed thee in the belly, Melissa, that child you have 10 years ago, Laura could say I knew you.
What a great thing. Hey, Tom.
Before thou came, as forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.
Now, young people, I'm not suggesting that you're going to be a prophet to the nations, OK? Don't miss don't take that from what I'm reading. I'm I want to encourage you as a young man that received a call from God and he did it with.
With the passion and obedience.
Verse 6 then said, I Oh Lord God, behold, I cannot speak.
For I am a child and that day, uh, you would be considered a child until probably your mid 20s. And if you trace back the history of this young person, he was probably around 14 when this call came to him. OK, any 14 year olds in here?
Or higher.
Right, OK. Oh Lord God, behold, I cannot speak Brian, a child.
But the Lord said to me, say no, I am a child.
For thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee, thou shalt speak.
00:30:00
Be not afraid of their faces, for I am with thee to deliver thee. Set the Lord. Then the Lord put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the Lord said unto me, Behold, I have put my words, and I mouth.
Young people.
God has left you in this world. I'm speaking now to believers. If you are still in your sins, bow your head and take care of that please. Now I'm speaking to those of you that know and love the Lord Jesus.
God has left you here to do something.
God is not surprised with your circumstances.
There's work to do.
We don't in today's times often get a message directly from God like.
They did in in the Bible times, but yet I can say based on Romans where it says the things that were written the 4th time were written for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. They just quote that right.
That's why we're reading about this young man, because God is giving him to you as an example.
And here he says.
I have set you into where I want you to be. Before you were born, I had a plan for your life. You believe that?
OK.
Don't be afraid and by the way, here might have lost to be afraid about.
Let's read the rarity red verse 8-9. The Lord is giving him protection. Now did Jeremiah have a, uh, swimmingly easy life? And, uh, he kinda meandered around the swimming pool area and mentioned Jehovah's name and the people were glad and they brought him food and is that how his life went? No.
But Jeremiah obeyed God. He's called the weeping prophet.
Sometimes they think that I'm a weeping prophet too. I'm sorry, rather, and it means a lot to me.
Turn over to Chapter 3.
This is a question the word asks.
Verse 4 Wilma, thou at this from this time cry unto me, my father, thou art the guide of my youth.
All young people, we need a guide. You need a guide when you're young. You need it a lot more when you're old.
Life is complex and here the Lord says, take it on your knees and cry to me, say Father.
Thou art the guide of my youth. I need you. And he says I will guide you. You believe he will do that. He will, Young people, he will.
Get on your knees and say, Lord, I want you to be my God. I need you.
I can't do this alone.
Chapter 15.
So I know I'm just skipping through the book and possibly cover this book in a month of meetings like this. Chapter 15, verse 16.
Thy words were found, and I did eat them.
And thy word was sent to me, the joy and rejoicing of my heart, For I am called by thy name, O Lord God of hosts. OK, you know what happened here.
Uh, during the rain of Josiah, who was a godly king, they began to, they did, uh, quite how to say this, They, they were cleaning the junk out of the temple is what they were doing and refurbishing it. And they found the scroll in there and the priest dug it out of the dirt and the dust and he opened it up and read it. What was it?
It was the word of God, It was the first five books is what they had then.
And the scroll and the priest rent his clothes. He said we gotta read this to the king. They bring it into the king and he they read it to him and.
And, uh, he rents his clothes. Why? Because they realize we're so far off base.
What was Jeremiah's response? Thy words were found and I didn't eat them. Young people, eat the word of God. Not literally, figuratively. Open it up and pour it into your soul. Please do that.
00:35:11
Moms and dads, it should not be a surprise to our kids to see you pouring over the Word of God. Thy words were found, and I did gobble them up.
And they were the joy and rejoicing of my heart. Oh, the word of God is so refreshing and so powerful and so important and so needed. And here's Jeremiah says, Lord, they found the scroll and I gobbled it up and it was great.
It's the same.
The Lord has given us much more than the first five books. Open the word of God and let it be the joy and rejoicing of your heart. It's worth it. It takes time. I get that to sit there quietly and it's and we're in it. We live in a world that is so filled with distractions. So a lot of you know that I work in agriculture, right?
So in April, May and June.
The phone starts ringing at 6:30 and it rings literally every two minutes, almost for the whole day.
It's very distracting and defiling sometimes not, not in a bad way, but just it's overwhelming. I'm thankful to the Lord for the work that I do. The Lord has given me work that I enjoy, but at that time I need time to.
Get washed up if you will, and the Word of God can do that.
So in the interest of time, let's keep going. I just want to whet your appetite. There's so much more here, so I'm not giving you an exhaustive list here.
Uh, chapter 17, verse 5.
Thus saith the Lord cursed thee, the man that trusteth in man and maketh.
Flesh his arm, and whose heart departed from the Lord, For he shall be like the heath of the desert, and he shall not see when good cometh, but shall inhabit the parts places of the wilderness, and assault land, and not inhabited. Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord.
And whose hope the Lord is, for he shall be as a tree planted by the waters that spread out our roots by the river.
And so not see when the heat cometh, but a relief shall be green.
And shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from bearing fruit. You want a fruitful life, young people, I know that many of you do. And I want that for you too. Trust in the Lord.
It's so tempting, especially at our age, to say I got this.
Now, I'm not speaking against competency or.
Encouraging somebody to do a good job, but when the core of your being says I don't need God, I got this myself, you're going to find out that you don't.
Trust in the Lord.
And then your life will be blessed with endurance, the ability to stand through the hard times when you're trusting in the one person that's totally trustworthy. You know, if you trusted in me on anything, you'd be sadly disappointed by it. Probably tomorrow, maybe tonight, certainly by the end of the week, you would be. But you'll never be disappointed when you put your trust in the Lord, young people, and He guarantees that.
Chapter 19.
Sometimes we get in a spot where things are really tough.
Chapter 19 or Chapter 20, I'm sorry.
Verse 9 Jeremiah was in a place in his life where things are going very poorly for him.
Then I said I will not mention of him nor speak anymore in his name.
But His word was in mine heart as a burning fire shot up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.
00:40:09
Don't quit.
Sometimes you're tempted to quit, right? It's like, all right, Lord, I'm, I'm not going to try this anymore.
Young people, when the Spirit of God lives in your heart, it's a fire set up in the bones and it pours out. You can't stop it, and the Lord is in it.
Don't quit, go to the Lord on your knees. Say Lord, I love you, help me. And here it says Jeremiah was in this place where he says his word was in my heart like a burning fire. Shut up in my bones. It's a drive, it's a passion, a love for the Lord Jesus Christ that he will not disappoint.
It says he says here I was weary with forbearing. I couldn't stop myself. I had to.
I could not stay, don't stay in that place. I I get that some days are hard or you try to do something for the Lord and you meet with mockery or somebody's like, oh, you're crazy. I don't believe any of that.
Young people, the Lord will honor you. It's in your being. Let it come out. The fire set up in the bones.
Chapter 33.
And verse 3.
Call upon me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not.
That's the God that you are serving, he says. Call upon me.
And I will answer thee.
And show the great and mighty things that you didn't know.
Now, this is not a golden key. We already had that question earlier in the week. Obviously we are asking, uh.
In the minds of the Lord. But think about the times when you're in a quandary in your work or in school. You're not sure what to do. There's a fork in the road.
You just roll the dice. Is that seeking first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness? No, we had this the other night. Get on your knees, call upon me and I will answer and show you great and mighty things.
You know, I look back over my youth. I grew up in a in a missionary family.
And they were I I don't have time I'm I'm running out of time here to tell you things that we got on our knees as a family about in the Lord interacted intervene in such a tremendous way. That's the God you're serving.
Believe it, rebel, win it, love it.
He will not cast you aside. All right, a new young person now.
Matthew, Chapter 11.
This young person was spoken of by the Lord Jesus as the greatest born among women.
John the Baptist.
I know that some of you are not even teenagers yet, but John the Baptist ministry and his life were over when he was in his very early 30s.
That that means for me, I would have been in the grave.
For 13 years already down the Baptist ministry. Was that sure? This is a young person. OK, verse 2.
Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples, and said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?
Jesus answering, answered and said unto them, Go and show John again those things which he do hear and see. The blind received their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have the Gospel preached unto them. And blessed is he, Whosoever shall not be offended in me.
Now it's easy for us to beat up John the Baptist and go, what? What are you thinking, man? You were the guy who said, behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. You were the guy that said he must increase, but I must decrease.
00:45:17
And now John is in prison, about to be murdered by Herod for the entertainment of a sensuous party.
So I'm not going to beat up you on the Baptist for that because I think John the Baptist have been reading in Isaiah and other places about all these things that have been happening, except one didn't happen and that was he would open the doors of the prison.
And so John is saying, Lord, don't forget about me over here.
But John's work was done.
And so the Lord didn't say you go tell John to toughen up.
No, he didn't say that. He said you go back and tell John about me and that will be enough.
Right you go tell them about me. Oh, young people learn to know and love the Savior.
Learn that says here, blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in me. You know, you might sit in your assembly or in your home. Maybe, uh, there's a sickness in that you're dealing with that nobody knows about and you're thinking Lord, umm, don't forget.
Don't be offended in the Lord Jesus, He loves you. Don't be offended young people by him. Just think about who he is.
It's like the Lord said to John, he didn't beat him up. He says you go tell him about me. That's where we get.
Relief from depression, and I'm not minimizing depression. I think that there are people that really suffer. Umm, that's where we get peace. That's where we get occupy yourself with the Lord Jesus and who he is and what he has done and don't occupy yourself with your own circumstances. It's a deadly thing because it only goes down, down, down. So I don't want to beat up John the Baptist. I just want to.
Encourage you, don't be offended in the Lord Jesus.
Love him, think about him.
Soak up all that he is. Think of the moral perfection. Uh, think. Yeah, it's just everything about him is perfect. This is our savior.
OK, next young person, I hope I'm wetting your appetite. Third, John.
This is a a person that I have enjoyed meditating on a good deal.
OK, Third Gen. The elder unto the well beloved Gaius, whom I love in the truth. By the way, I have no idea how old Gaius was. He might have been 80, but we're going to call him young because he was younger than the Apostle John, apparently.
Is that OK? They yelled there. Until the well beloved Gaius by the way.
Uh, I think it's a terrible shame to wait to tell somebody that they're well beloved until their eulogy.
OK, they can't hear that. Tell them no and they can't. I'm not saying to boost people's ego and pump them up and and appeal to the flesh, but it's not wrong to just go to somebody and say I saw what you did there. I appreciate that. Well done, good job.
And here the apostle John could say to Gaius, You are well beloved. Isn't that nice?
Verse two Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health even as thy soul prospers. OK young people, think how much time and effort and money is spent on.
Fitness and health, uh, any of you that, uh, live here in the US have, uh, for the past four years, we've gone through endless debates about health care and the cost and the fairness of it. You know what? How is your soul doing? I get that you need to be somewhat healthy, but what about your soul? And here the apostle could say to Gaius, I hope you're doing as well as your soul is.
Isn't that nice that he could say.
I hope you prosper in your health even as your soul is prospering. Oh, it's, it's so encouraging to go to a camp like this or a conference or go to a wedding or an you're on vacation. You go to another meeting and you see people that are prospering in their souls and they love the word Jesus and it means a lot to him and you. And the fellowship is so sweet, right?
00:50:20
And here this person Gaius was prospering in his soul. What a great thing Covet that work at it.
Verse 3. For I rejoice greatly when the brethren came and testified of the truth that is in thee, even as thou walkest in truth. For I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.
You know, especially you boys and girls.
So I'm just going to practice what I was preaching John and Rebecca.
I don't know how long you've been working downstairs, but good job. Thank you.
Many of you young people have set in this basement in this facility.
Or over at Camp Calvary.
Learning the truth? Are you walking in it?
Oh, it's a tremendous joy to go to a place or interact with with our brethren and see that they're walking in truth, especially with children. We love you guys.
The Lord loves you.
And it what a joy, what a joy. Verse 5 Beloved, thou doest faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren.
And to strangers.
Which had borne witness before the Church, whom if thou bring forward on their journey after a godly sword, thou shalt do well.
I just want to encourage you young people to serve the Lord with gladness. It's an honor to serve. It's a blessing and do it not to be noticed by people. Do it for the Lord. Think of what he did. It says in the in the Gospels, even the Son of Man came to serve and not to be served. And here this well beloved, gayest the apostle could say.
Beloved, thou doest faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren and to strangers.
That's a good encouragement for us. There's things to be done.
And do it for the Lord with joy. What an encouragement it is.
The last young person.
For sympathy for.
First Timothy 4, verse 12.
But no man despised thy youth but thee thou. An example of the believers in Word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.
What does it mean when it says, Let no man despise thy youth?
I don't think it means to stand up in your assembly and elbow the elder brother out of the way and say this is the way it's going to be now. That's not what it's saying. What it's saying is.
What, uh, commendably as an example, so that when you as a young person they're contributing, they can say?
What a valuable addition to our assembly.
What a valuable addition.
Oh, the Lord loves that.
What no man despised that you are you living your life where when you walk in the door people say, oh, there's that guy?
In a bad way that's dishonouring to the Lord. I guess that people are in the tour because I was really in the tour when I was a kid. But strive young people, ask the Lord to help you in your life, that no one would despise your youth. What a blessing it would be if you walk in the meeting room door and say oh good.
Here's here's a young person that is just so on fire for the Lord and as an example of of the believers in love and faith and purity. Oh, what a what a commendation. I hope that's true in your life. The Lord Jesus wants that in your life. It's worth it. What a goal.
00:55:00
OK, let's go down a little bit more till I come give attendance to reading through exhortation to doctrine.
You know, you can invest your time and money on all kinds of things in this world. And believe me, the list is endless. All these voices calling pay attention to me do this, do that. If you're not eating this or drinking that, you can't possibly be happy, right? If you're not driving this car, then you're a loser. And all of the messages, the advertisement, the, the whole sphere of the world.
Is to say invest time in me, me, I'm important. Do this, do that.
You know, invest time in this.
Give attendance to reading. Oh, it's so valuable.
You have attendance to reading, to exhortation, and to doctrine. Invest time and what really matters.
I hope it's OK if I share this Joseph and Lydia.
And you have no idea what I'm about to say to you.
So recently we were at your wedding and two people made separate comments that really impressed me. I wanna thank you for these. And that was both of those young people were noted to be seen with their Bibles open.
Thank you.
Invest time, young people, in the Word of God. The Lord Jesus is worth it.
All that other junk that's being crammed down your throat will just drive you down. Invest in heavenly things. What really matters, what lasts forever. You know, you can sit there and go. You know, I achieved level 985 in Candy Crush. So what? Memorize the book of Ephesians that last forever. I I hope I'm not being overdramatic.
Invest in what really matters, the right things. You won't be disappointed.
You know, I so I'm at a point in my life where I'm watching my dad in his last years. That's hard to watch. Many of you have already done that with your dad's.
And you can't read very well. His eyesight is bad, but you know what comforts his soul?
All of the things that I word, if I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against Thee. You take the Word of God and you hide it in your heart, and then you're sitting there unable to do what you used to do. And the Spirit of God can minister to your soul, but you can't bring out what you never put in. Invest in what really matters. Your time is so valuable.
OK, the last thing about Timothy and we're done. Neglect, not the gift that is in the young people. I'm just thrilled to look across your faces and see the gift, the potential for the Lord Jesus, the potential for families, the potential for your assemblies, for the gospel for for so many things. Don't neglect it. The Lord has given you a gift you you may not know what it is, but he will show it to you. Get on your knees.
Say, Lord, I want to serve you. Show me what I should do. It might start. He might say, Sean, I want you to wash the forks for the next year at fellowship meal. He could say that, right?
Are you willing to do it?
I hope so. I don't know what the Lord would ask you to do, but He has something for you to do. There's a gift that He has for you to do Do it. Don't neglect it in the next epistle, if I still had to tell him. Now stir up that gift that you have.
Stir it up, use it. It's no good to have a gift all shoved under the bed, in the closet somewhere. Don't neglect it. You're valuable, young people. The Lord Jesus says work for you to do. You're so needed. You're so we love you guys.
This is the happy path.
Trust in the Lord.
With all thine heart.
The Lena and I know an understanding.
You may say I blew it. My life is already screwed up, and maybe it is. But you know what?
The Lord Jesus is there.
Best fixer of all that.
Love him, serve him, and one day when your knees are bowing before him and your face was lifted up and your eyes are looking at his.
01:00:05
Be worthless.
OK, I'm done now. I hope I've wet your appetite for this, and I hope that if you are like Absalom then you're not safe. But when you leave those doors that you will be. The Lord Jesus wants that for you too.
Let's close with #23.
Hymn #23.
That's great.
Our loving God and Father.
We pray for each one of these young people.
Oh Lord.
I pray that thy Spirit would convict their hearts of the value and the worth of the Lord Jesus your Son.
And that there would be none at FSA when their knees are bowed.
Would have to say in anger.
And confess his name by force. O Lord, we pray that our hearts should be knit together with the Lord Jesus. Lord, it's these are hard days.
There are many distractions, there are many discouragements, but Lord, we fix our eyes on you.
And we praise you for what's passed, and we trust you for what's coming.
Oh Father, I just pour out my soul.
For these young people.
That they would know they and love they.
We ask this in Jesus name, Amen.
Session #5
Dinah
Address—Craig Hayhoe
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.
Let's begin our meeting tonight with him #181.
Going to read the 1St 2 verses.
When Satan appears to stop up our path and fill us with fears, we triumph by faith. He cannot take from us the loftiest tried, the heart sharing promise the Lord will provide. He tells us we're weak. Our hope is in vain, the good that we seek.
We ne'er shall obtain, but when such suggestions are spirits of tried, this answers that all questions. The Lord will provide #181.
Uh-huh.
Yeah.
Then we have gone.
One day.
And then I'm.
Saying.
Love the Lord and our power and power flow.
Oh my God.
Let's look to the Lord for His help, our God and our Father. We come before thee tonight and great great weakness, owning Lord, Thy grace, thy mercy and thy goodness that has found us in the position that we are in. We thank Thee, Lord Jesus, for the cross of Calvary. We thank Thee, O Lord, that I'll just go there to suffer, bleed and die and pay a great price to put away our sin.
And Lord, we thank thee for each one here that is saved has been washed in the blood of the Lamb.
When, O Lord, thou has left us here for our journey.
Until thou just give the shout, or till thou dost call us home individually, O Lord.
We pray tonight that was helped by Thy Spirit, that we could look at a few things from Thy word and be encouraged to go on in a pathway that would please thee.
00:05:08
You think, O God, of how Satan appears in our path so often.
And tempts us.
And tries to get us to step off the path, A narrow path.
O Lord, we ask thee that we would be built up in I word tonight it would be encouraged to go on for the.
We seek help from above or God, and thank thee that the Lord will provide. And so we just count on thee, O Lord, for the time ahead, and give thee thanks thy precious name. Amen.
I'd like to take a look tonight.
Genesis Chapter 34.
Genesis Chapter 34.
And Dinah, the daughter of Leah.
Which he bear unto Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the land.
And when Shechem, the son of Hamor, the highlight Prince of the country, saw her, he took her and lay with her and defiled her.
And a soul clave unto Dinah the daughter of Jacob, and he loved the damsel, and spake kindly unto the damsel.
And Shekhar was spake unto his father Hamor saying.
Get me this damsel to wife. And Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah, his daughter. Now his sons were with his cattle in the field, and Jacob held his peace until they were come.
And Hammer, the father of Shekhar, went out unto Jacob to command with him.
And the sons of Jacob came out of the field when they heard it, and the men were grieved, and they were very wroth, because he had wrought folly in Israel in lying with Jacob's daughter, Which thing ought not to be done? And Haymark commune with them, saying the soul of my son Shechem.
Longest for your daughter. I pray you give her him to wife.
And make ye marriages with us, and give your daughters unto us, and take our daughters unto you, Ye shall dwell with us in the land, shall be before you dwell, and trade ye therein.
And get you possessions therein.
Shechem said unto her father and unto her brethren, Let me find grace in your eyes, and what ye shall say unto me I will give.
Ask me never so much dowry, and gift I will give according as ye shall say unto me, But give me the damsel to wife the sons of Jacob answered Shechem, and hammer his father deceitfully, and said, because he had defiled Dinah their sister.
They said unto them, We cannot do this thing to give our sister to one that is uncircumcised, for that were a reproach unto us. But in this will we consent unto you. If you will be as we be, that every male of you we circumcised, then will we give our daughters unto you, and we will take your daughters into us, and we will dwell with you, and we shall become one people.
But if ye will not hearken unto me to be circumcised, then will we take our daughter, and we will be gone, And their words pleased Hammer and Shechem, Hammer's son.
And the young man deferred not to do the thing, because he had delight in Jacob's daughter, and he was more honorable than all the House of his father.
A hammer, Shechem's son, came unto the gate of their city, and commune with the men of their city, saying, These men are peaceable with us. Therefore let them dwell in the land, and trade therein for the land. Behold, it is large enough for them. Let us take their daughters to us. For wives, let us give them our daughters. Only herein will the men consent unto us for to dwell with us to be one people.
00:10:03
If every male among us be circumcised, as they are circumcised, shall not their cattle and their substance, and every beast of theirs can be ours only. Let us consent unto them, and they will dwell with us.
And to hammer and unto Shechem his son hearken his son hearkened all that went out of the gate of this his city. Every male was circumcised, and all that went out of the gate of the city came to pass on the third day, and they were sore. The two of the sons of Jacob, Simeon, and Levi died. His brethren took each man his sword, and came upon the city boldly.
I slew all the males. They slew Hammer and shook him his son with the edge of the sword, and took Dinah out of Shechem's house and went out. The sons of Jacob came upon the slain.
And spoil the city, because they had defiled their sister. They took their sheep and their oxen and their ***** that which was in the city and that which was in the field, and all their wealth and all their little ones and their wives took their captive and spoiled even all that was in the house. Jacob said to Simeon and Levi. You have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites.
And the parasites, and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me, and I shall be destroyed. I in my house, they said, should he deal with our sister as within harlot.
And one more verse. Please just hold that spot. One more verse in uh Second Corinthians.
2nd Corinthians 11.
2nd Corinthians 11 and verse 2.
For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy, for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin.
To Christ.
Well, this is a serious chapter that we have before us.
Like to talk a little bit about tonight?
And it shows how quickly something can go wrong in a family.
Something very fast can go wrong.
A child, Uh. Of Jacob.
Who was the Father in Israel?
He had twelve sons and he had a daughter. Not sure if there was another daughter or not, but he had a daughter, Dinah.
And something went wrong in that house.
You know when we become saved.
Satan doesn't stop attacking.
The brother who spoke last night had a real exercise in his heart in connection with.
Someone in this room does not know the Lord as their savior.
You know, I share the same exercise. I don't know. Very many people here probably know less than half.
I can't tell if you're saved or not.
You know, God said to Samuel, Man looketh on the outward appearance, and God looketh on the heart.
God can look down inside your heart tonight, and he knows.
If you accepted his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, as your Savior.
If you repented of sin, you know I can't understand.
Why a child brought up in the assembly?
And going to Sunday School and enjoying the benefits and the privileges that we enjoy in our individual meetings and conferences and times like this could ever refuse or reject the Lord Jesus as their Savior. I can't. I can't understand how it would be possible.
Maybe perhaps someone here tonight thinks I just, I'll just put it off.
I'll just deal with it later on in life. Maybe they don't think it's really real.
Oh, it's so real. It's the most important decision you'll ever make in your whole life.
It affects eternity for you.
I trust that if there anyone here who does not does not open their heart for the Lord, that they will realize that they need a Savior. You know, if we turned over, we're not going to to Genesis chapter 3 and we read about Adam and Eve.
00:15:16
And we saw how the serpent came along.
And tempted Eve.
And all she did is commit one sin.
And she was separated from God, Adam and Eve. They just committed one sin. That was it. And they were pushed out of the Garden of Eden.
And they didn't have fellowship with God like they had before. All it took was one sin. You know, all of us have sinned. At least more than once. A lot more times. I'd be ashamed to tell you how many times I've sinned. I couldn't count. I don't want to think about it. So we have sin on us. We need to be forgiven for it. We need to save your. We need to be saved.
Brother came to her assembly in Pine Grove. He gave this short little poem regarding John 316. God loved, God gave you believe and you're saved.
Pretty simple, easy to understand. God love, God gave you believe and you're saved. You know if you haven't accept the Lord Jesus tonight, just pray these simple words, Lord Jesus.
Forgive me, I'm a Sinner and he'll save you if you trust in him.
Well, here we have before us. Story here.
You know Satan doesn't stop.
He slithered into Adam and Eve's life, and it'll slither into yours and mine.
There's lots of things for us to tempt us.
To draw us off a narrow path.
Lots of little things steal away our time.
Take our heart to have it occupied with things all around us.
Lots of things in this world will defile us. You know that word is quoted in this chapter about four times defiled.
That's what Satan wants to do, want to particularly speak to the dear young people.
He wants to defile you and tempt you into sinning.
He wants to corrupt that which the Lord.
Has for himself. He's given you a new, a new, uh, a new nature that wants to please him. If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new.
But he still works away at that old nature and he wants to draw us aside. He's got lots of tricks, he's got a lot of time and he's had a lot of experience. I was struck recently in Revelation.
It calls him that old serpent. I wonder why he calls him at the end of the Bible, that old serpent.
The beginning of the Bible calls in the serpent Genesis 3 believe it's because he's been around. He's had a lot of experience.
And he's had a lot. He knows the ways to get into our minds and fill us with things that distract us.
And keep us from enjoying the Lord and communion with him.
You know, here in our story.
It says and Dinah the daughter of Leah.
Would she bear unto Jacob?
I'll stop there.
Each of you have a father and a mother.
And probably a praying father and mother.
Probably someone who has nurtured you from a very young age and who loves you and has tried to guide you and direct you into paths that would be best for you.
When I was growing up, I didn't like a lot of things, my father said. He had too many boundaries.
I'll say it like this. If he had boundaries, it was about like this circle of boundaries. And the circle of boundaries for my friends at school was about like this.
A lot bigger and I didn't like the boundaries he set up.
There are many times where I snuck out.
00:20:03
And I did things that I shouldn't have done and went against his will, My father and mother both of them.
And at first.
Perhaps it was pleasurable.
But after that it became the same old same old.
And I was trapped, sometimes addicted to things that I shouldn't have been addicted to.
But I have had a praying father and mother.
I I suggest that that Dinah had a praying father and mother too.
Sometimes boundaries are set in our life.
That we don't like.
But God gives them to us for a reason.
He wants us to be kept from the defilement of this world.
But you know, there's a responsibility on their part of Jacob as well.
If we turn back further.
Jacob was told to leave and go back to the land of his fathers, but he didn't go back. He stopped part way. If you look at the chapter just before.
It says uh verse 17 and Jacob's journey to succeth and built him a house and made booths for his cattle. Therefore the name of the place is called Suckas and Jacob came to Shalom, a city of Shechem which is in the land of Canaan. When he came from Padanaram and pitched his tent before the city, and he bought a parcel of a field where he had spread his tents.
Jacob settled down in a place.
Where God didn't instruct him to settle down, he made a decision on his own.
He didn't go back to Bethel. He didn't go back to where he should have gone.
And he chose a place, and he bought a piece of ground.
You know, his father, Abraham was a very wealthy man.
And Abraham? The only piece of land that he bought was where he buried his wife.
But Isaac? He settled down.
You know that speaks to me.
Because I feel that for myself and my generation.
I settled down in this world too quickly and in generations ahead of me. They didn't settle down and have such an easy life as we have today.
As a parent, it speaks to me because I can put my children in a place in a position.
Where perhaps they're close or too close.
To some that might defile them, some that might tempt them.
Too close to a place where really they shouldn't be.
And so it says, And Dinah the daughter of Leah, would she bear unto Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the lands.
You know, we need to be very careful.
Who our friends are.
Because they have a tremendous impact on our life.
Good to have our friendship within the assembly, the Christians we know and can trust.
It doesn't say why Dinah went out to see the daughters of the land. Perhaps she didn't have too many friends.
Perhaps her friends that she had weren't very good to her.
Doesn't say. Maybe she wanted to buy some things and see what they were wearing.
I don't know.
Nevertheless, she made a decision to go out and see the daughters of the land.
Need to be very careful.
Says in James, friendship with the world is enmity with God.
You be careful who our friends are. If we go out into the land, we go out into the world. If we go past that boundary.
That God has set for us. Our parents have set for us. There's danger. Danger lurks.
And we don't expect it often either, but it's there.
And So what does it say?
And when Shechem the son of Hamor, the highlight.
Prince of the country saw her to stop there.
00:25:04
Doesn't say that she went out to see Shechem.
When she went out to see the daughters of the land.
She had no intention to see Shechem.
But he saw her.
She went out to see the daughters of the land.
But Shechem saw her.
And he liked what he saw.
And you know, it's interesting. It says he's the Prince of the country.
You know, I'm not just speaking to the to the ladies here. This is to the guys, too.
But wouldn't we all like ladies like a Prince for a husband?
Sounds romantic, doesn't it?
The Prince of the country.
And the guys likewise.
When we like royal blood.
And we like to marry into that. Wouldn't that be special?
You know what? We're already have that we're children of the king.
The king is in his rejection right now.
But you're a child of the king.
Don't go into another Kingdom is danger.
She didn't expect to meet Shechem. She never intended to meet him.
You know.
There's a verse. Maybe we can turn it quickly in Ecclesiastes 10.
Ecclesiastes 10 verse 8.
He that digeth a pit shall follow into it, and whoso breaketh in hedge.
A serpent. She'll bite him.
I believe God puts a hedge around our families and around our homes. We return to the Book of Job and Job. Chapter one will find that God put a hedge around him and his family.
Set the boundaries around him and protected him.
And I believe that God has put a hedge around our families and around your life and around my life.
But when we breakthrough that hedge.
And go to into the land or into a place where we shouldn't go, says a serpent shall bite him.
That's the enemy.
Unintentional consequences. She didn't mean it to happen.
He saw her, he took her, he lay with her and defiled her.
How tragic.
Where was the power? She broke through a hedge, as it were. The power's all with him.
He saw her. He took her. He lay with her. He defiled her.
You know when we go beyond the sphere of where we should be.
In this world, we breakthrough the hedge and go to places we shouldn't go to.
Go into portals that we shouldn't go to, we breakthrough.
The powers with the enemy.
To be very careful.
Completely unintentioned by Dyna.
But it happened.
She was taken.
The file.
Then it says in verse 3, and his soul clave unto Dinah the daughter Jacob.
And he loved the damsel, and spake kindly unto the damsel.
Shechem spake unto his father, Hammer, saying, Get me this damsel to wife.
You know when sin comes into our life.
It doesn't just happen and then it's over.
1St 2 verses in this chapter deal with.
The sin that happened.
And then there's all the fallout afterwards.
00:30:01
And affected the family.
It affected those around and it caused them to sin too.
You know, when I slip up in my life.
I affect others around me.
Often in a bad way.
And so this young man, he loved her and he wanted to marry her.
We are not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers.
We know when we bend the rule once, we fall into something once or twice.
We begin to justify things in our life.
And we begin to say.
You know, I look at it a little bit differently than you.
Hammer here. Sorry. Shechem here.
Wanted Dinah for wife, her wife.
And then it says verse 7 and the sons of Jacob came out of the field. Sorry.
UH verse 5.
And Jacob heard he had defiled Dinah's daughter. Now his sons were with his cattle in the field, and Jacob held his peace until they were come.
I don't know about the wisdom of Jacob, How wise he was. Reminds me a little bit about David, how he dealt with Tamer.
And he tells his sons here what happened.
And the sons of Jacob and verse seven came out of the field.
When they heard it, the men were grieved. They were very wroth. They gave wroth folly in Israel, and lying with Jacob's daughter, which thing ought not to be done?
The whole family was stirred up.
How unsettling. How unhappy.
When we fall into sin.
It hurts those around us.
It hurts assemblies. It hurts families.
We all feel it.
And often the 1St.
First reaction is anger.
We're upset.
You know my heart.
I have a a heart that.
Wants to please the Lord.
Sometimes, but sadly, the old nature takes over.
An awful lot.
And I.
Want to do things that I shouldn't want to do and I fall pretty quickly sometimes.
And has had its effect on those around me.
Need to be very careful dealing with a situation like this.
And so.
Council Assad of Jacob and his sons and they decide.
What to do regarding this situation?
And so they lie, and they're deceitful.
And they con as it were.
Shechem.
Into doing something and say, Oh yes, you can come on into our family.
Just go and get circumcised.
Just go out and return your act like you're one of us.
But they didn't want them want him to. They didn't really want him. They just wanted to trick him.
And you know, it says here about Shechem that he was more honorable.
In verse 19, the young man deferred not to do the thing because he had delight in Jacob's daughter.
And he was more honorable than all the House of his father.
00:35:02
You know.
Sometimes when we take up with men and women of this world, we don't always take up with the worst of them. We take up some with some of them.
That, in our estimation, are fair, fairly honorable.
But the standards of this world are different than the standards of God.
And Shechem wanted to do the right thing.
But he was tricked.
And in the end.
They came upon him.
And destroyed him and killed him.
The brothers and sisters. Oh, sorry, uh, Jacob's son. Two of Jacob's sons.
They took them.
In verse.
Verse 26 or verse 25.
It came to pass on the third day, when they were sore with the two sons of Jacob, Simeon, and Levi down his brother, and took each man his sword, and came upon the city boldly and slew all the males. And they slew Hammer and Shechem his son with the edge of the sword. And Dinah went out of Shechem's house and took Dinah out of Shechem's house.
And went out. The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, and spoiled the city, because they had defiled their sister.
And so the position of Dinah was no longer that.
She was in the family at this time.
She had moved out and she was with this man who had committed sin with her.
And you know.
As I said before, when we go into the world and we breakthrough a hedge.
The power is on the other side, it's on the enemy side.
And they have control.
Or they can have control.
In such a way.
That they can affect us and our life and our decision making.
And it can change the way we think.
And here the brothers come and breakthrough and take her back.
It was wrong for them to do what they did.
What was wrong for Dinah?
To go out like she did.
You know it says of Jacob 2IN connection with this.
It says verse 30 And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, You have trouble me to make me stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the parasites, and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me.
And I shall be destroyed I in my house.
You know, we don't read of Jacob being concerned so much for his daughter.
He's concerned of how he looks.
That's a sad thing.
Sad thing.
You know, we see that in Reuben, his son, later on when Joseph was taken and sold.
Ruben said.
Aye, aye, aye. It looks bad on me.
Jacob here was concerned about himself.
You know the reason I.
Talk about this story tonight.
Is because I fear.
For you younger ones.
That the enemy is making an effort.
To tempt you and draw you.
Through a hedge in your life.
Through a boundary that has been set up in your life.
And he wants to bring you into a realm where he has the power.
Where he can defile?
And he can corrupt your mind.
You know in.
In the New Testament.
00:40:01
The word uncleanness is mentioned in Galatians 5. It speaks about adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness.
Which is perversion, We'll say lasciviousness.
I am concerned.
About uncleanness.
You know, I mentioned that in Romans chapter one. Let's just turn to that.
Romans chapter one, verse 24.
Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness.
Through the lusts of their own hearts to dishonour their own bodies between themselves.
This is talking about the world.
I don't like that word uncleanness.
Doesn't sound quite as serious, perhaps, as adultery or fornication.
But it sounds very serious.
So does the word defile.
I think we need to be very careful to look within.
And question ourselves what is going on in our lives.
What are those things that we hide that are hidden?
That perhaps fit into this category of being unclean.
Things that we might not want those in the assembly to see or our parents to see.
That have a defiling effect on our life.
This world.
Is on a tragic horse.
Spiraling downward quickly.
And despite the efforts of.
Perhaps political leaders, although essentially they have been given over.
The momentum of the course of this world is gathering speed.
You know, you have here in America an election coming up.
And quite frankly, I don't envy your choices.
And both parties are offering.
And telling what they will do to help make your life better.
I don't believe it.
You know, I had a interesting American political experience happened to me this past year.
I was, uh, I'm from Canada and I happened to have a convention.
In Atlanta, GA for my work.
So I uh, I went down to Atlanta to let this convention.
And uh, it was at the UH, Georgia World Trade Center, I think it's called, and I went into it and UH, part of it was blocked off.
And I couldn't get into the place I need to get into because there were cops there and they blocked part of it off. And so I had to walk all the way around and get in. And finally I asked somebody, I said, what's the matter? What's going on here? Why couldn't I come in properly?
They said oh, Donald Trump is coming tomorrow.
So I said, and I went about my business and I went to my UH seminars.
Went back to hotel, got up the next day and more of the Convention Center was blocked off.
And there were police everywhere, and there were dogs everywhere and.
And I uh.
With surprise.
So I went up to another fellow there and I said, you know what's really going on here? He said.
Donald Trump's coming. You got to come and watch him. You got to come and see him. This is history in action.
So, I said. Hmm.
And I went to my seminar and I sat in my seminar. It was really long and boring.
00:45:05
And then I went outside at lunchtime.
There are even more cops there.
And there's this huge line of people, tremendous line of people. And I thought, that's crazy.
So I went back inside to another seminar.
But all the while I was thinking, MMM hum.
The last seminar is pretty long too. I don't know if I wanna go to that one.
So I went outside.
And I saw the line was starting to move.
So I said, OK, I'll give it a whirl.
So I stood in line at the back of the line.
And started sneaking through the line long time.
Got up to the front. People were talking, by the way, about Trump and how great he was. And got to the front and got to the door and there were these Secret Service guys and they went all through my briefcase and they put wands up and down, me and all kinds of stuff. And then they said, OK, go in. So I went in with crowds, people.
Went down into the convention hall where I wasn't supposed to go, apparently for my convention.
And I went to this cavernous giant room and there were thousands of people. The thousands of people.
And over the front was a stage with American flags, and in front of the stage with lots of TV cameras and people with signs. And so I just sat there.
I was wondering what to expect.
So I had to wait quite a while.
And someone came out to the front and said, OK, now we're gonna sing God Bless America. So we sang God Bless America.
And they said, OK, now we're going to take the Pledge of Allegiance. Well, I'd never taken the pledge because I'm from Canada.
So I put my hand here and mumbled something and pretended I fit in.
I didn't really fit in, but I just mumbled along.
And then?
And then a little while later.
There was a huge roar of the crowd. I hadn't heard a roar like that in a long time.
And up onto the stage walks old Donald Trump.
And he's waving to people and they're roaring.
And you know, he proceeded to give a speech on how he was going to fix all the problems of America.
He was going to make America great again, and people were clapping and roaring and cheering, and he was going to build a fence and people were roaring and cheering. He was going to fix everything that ails America.
You know, after a while I got a headache and I left.
It was so loud. It was crazy.
But you know, I thought, that man is not going to fix America.
There's only one man who's going to fix America, and unfortunately, America and Canada and all the other nations.
The right for judgment.
You know, speaks in the end of First Peter about this world being reserved unto fire against the day of judgment.
All the material things that you own and that I own.
All those things we spent, we spend our time on.
All those things that we try to accumulate.
They're gonna be burnt up.
You know, I was speaking to some young people.
Couple weeks ago and read a verse. I'd like to read it. Matthew chapter six I think it is.
And you all know it.
Matthew 6 verse 19.
Lean out up for yourselves, treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves breakthrough and steal.
But lay out for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust.
Doth corrupt and where thieves do not breakthrough nor steal.
But where are your treasure? Is there where your heart be also?
The light of the body is the eye. If therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.
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You know all of us in this. Not all of us.
Say I don't know what age, but a lot of us have bank accounts.
And often we're very aware of how much is in that bank account or how little is in that bank account, I should say because it comes in and it goes out awful fast, quick, quicker than it comes in.
But we're aware of what is in the number in the account pretty often in our life.
We're aware of what we own, we're aware of our material possessions.
Well, you know, I like to think of it in connection with this.
You know how much is in your bank account here on earth?
And perhaps you're laying up treasure for your retirement and your bank account here on earth.
But what are we laying up for?
For our bank account in heaven, as it were.
Lay out for yourselves treasure in heaven.
I wonder if that if we think about that.
How much of our day is spent on things that will never last?
Material things.
Possessions.
I'm not saying that we shouldn't go to work, because we sure we sure should.
But how much of our extra time is spent on creature comforts? This strikes me to the core.
And things that are going to be burnt up and how much time of my day.
Is spent on laying up treasure in heaven for the Lord that he can use.
That I can take that.
Though that gold, silver and precious stones that is referred to in First Corinthians 3.
Things that won't be burnt.
If her eye is single, her whole body is full of light.
There's so many distractions around us these days.
In my pocket here.
I have the world.
There it is, my smart phone, click of a button and I'm online. The world is in my pocket.
And I spend too much time looking at the world.
Far too much time.
How much time do I spend laying up treasure for the Lord? Is my eye single on him?
It's a challenge for me.
You know it speaks of the Narrow path and the broad Rd.
Is spoken of.
In Scripture.
You know, the thing about the broad Rd. way that leads to destruction? This is a downward course.
And if your eyes are focused downward.
That's not the place for them to be.
As we travel downward in this world, whenever you walk down a hill.
After a very short time, you don't hardly have to walk anymore because you're gathering momentum.
And you're moving automatically as you go down the hill. There's no effort involved anymore.
And this world is gathering momentum going downhill.
But the Lord wants our eye to be single on him.
Keeping our path narrow and upwards course.
Focused on things above and not on things around us.
I urge each one tonight.
Keep our eyes single on him and to lay up treasure in heaven, spend our time on laying up treasure for him.
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I urge us each one and dear young people.
To be very careful.
About breaking through a hedge.
In our life about going and visiting those who are of the land.
She went to see those of the land.
But it ended up that someone saw her and took her.
Be careful of the boundaries that are set in our life.
There's danger on the other side.
We may feel that the boundaries set are too tight.
But if our path is narrow and our eye is single.
It won't be too restrictive.
Living for the Lord.
Means saying no.
An awful lot to things of this world.
And it's not easy to say no. I fail out too often.
Well, you know, we, you and I are down here in this earth for.
Short years, maybe 50 years, maybe 85 years, maybe 100 years.
That's all we have to do something for the Lord for all eternity He'll be doing for us.
Will share his glory, will be with him forever.
We have a few short years to do something for him.
Satan is subtle.
He's Slytherin around.
He's tempting you. He's tempting me.
Let's keep our eyes single.
Our paths narrow.
Let's not go visit those daughters.
Men and women of the land.
Let's show kindness to one another in our assemblies.
Go out of our way for one another.
Let's build up one another.
And encourage one another.
We see someone going astray or breaking through where they shouldn't be.
Let's grab them back.
It's tough to do.
Someone mentioned the verse that we mentioned the other day. Faithful are the wounds of our friend.
What wounds are in the Lord's hands for you and I?
Isaiah 53 says he was despised and rejected of men.
I'm not very despised amongst those in this world.
Lord was despised.
Can we be reproached a little bit for the name of Christ?
Don't breakthrough a hedge.
Keep yourselves in a narrow path.
I would encourage each one of us to please the Lord in our life and keep our eyes single on him. Let's just pray.
Our God and our loving Father.
How we thank the for that precious word?
We thank you for the stories in it.
We thank you, Lord, for the examples that we have in it. We thank you for the verses that speak to us, O Lord.
And our Father thou can see inside.
And can't see our hearts.
Lord, you know the struggles that we each have and that we each face.
And how difficult it is.
Sometimes to keep our path narrow and our eyes single.
How often her eyes are running to and fro all over.
And we're distracted and we're caught up with things around us.
Or God keep us, we pray.
We pray. We build one another up in our incur in our fellowship together. We pray Lord in our home assemblies that we would watch out for one another.
We pray, Lord, that we would honor those boundaries and those hedges that have been put in place for us.
And then we would reach out.
And pull back any of our friends or that we see who perhaps are breaking through.
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O Lord, we are aware.
Of what a foe Satan is.
Help us, O Lord.
To let thee live through us.
We pray that we will be kept for the Eola. We ask thee for thy blessing on each of the young people here, on each one here. Keep us free, we pray.
We ask you for a blessing on the time together for the remaining time that we have here.
And thank you for this occasion, O Lord, in thy precious name. Amen.
Session #6
Walk in the Spirit
Address—Tim Ruga
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.
Good evening.
Welcome everyone again to the meeting.
Could we start by singing hymn #174?
O patient spotless one, our hearts and meekness trained to bear thy youth, and learn of thee, that we might rest Obtain 174.
It's just, uh, OK, I'm gonna come back together again, so.
I'm finished.
It's prey, her God and our Father. We just thank Thee for that blessed One who has such beauty. We thank Thee, Father, that Thou hast put it into our hearts to see that beauty, to know Him, to know that finished work by which He not only redeemed our poor, worthless souls.
But brought thee such glory, and so.
We ask that as we open Thy word tonight, and that would just help us, help us, that we may learn something there and through the time that we spend here before that there might be something more. Yeah. To his glory and to thine, we ask his Father in the precious and worthy name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
So here we are, homeless at the end of camp, not much time left, and we've been through a lot of things together. And I have, yeah, another burden on my heart brothers before me have. But I just want to say it's not my purpose tonight to preach the gospel. But the gospel still goes out. We're still here. And so that God who loved the world still loves you.
And He gave his only begotten Son, so that if.
You will believe on Him. You will not perish but have eternal life. I'll just say that much.
You can still be saved right now, but I'm going to go on and I'm going to speak to the believers in the room tonight. And you know, as we have been taking up a lot of questions over this past week, I think as it occurs to my mind, a lot of the questions have sort of been.
Along the line of what about this or what about that? And the answers have often been, you know, the word of God says this and we shouldn't do this and we shouldn't do that. It hasn't been all that, but there's been a fair bit of that. And as the answers have been given, I know different brothers have been trying to take the positive side as well. And I want to just speak to that a little bit.
Umm, you know Christianity is not negative, although there are negative.
There, but Christianity is positive and tonight I have the positive side. More on my heart. So let's go over to Luke. I'm sorry, Matthew, chapter 12.
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Because it's not enough.
To say throw all these things out of my life. We talked about a number of things that might be wrong for the believer to have in their life.
And I want to start with.
A parable the Lord gave.
And maybe illustrates his point a little bit. Matthew chapter 12 and verse 43. He said, when the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and find us none. Then he says, I will return unto my house, into my house from whence I came out. And when he has come, he finds his head empty, quest and garnish.
And then go with he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits.
Worth more wicked than himself. And they enter in and dwell there. And the last state of that man is worse than the 1St.
Now the Lord is talking about something of that day, and tonight I'm making an application because there's a principle here in the principle is true. You can take all of the things that might be wrong for a Christian to do. You can get all of those things and collect them up and throw them out of your life.
And yet end up in a worse place where you were before. And so to take off those negative things only by themselves isn't going to do any good. Instead, we need to have something else put there. This man was in a better state for a short while, but he never took the time to fill that space with something that was positive. And so the demon came back with others.
That we're more wicked than himself and that man ended up in the worst case. Now it's not exactly the same with us.
Believer doesn't have the demons like that, but it's the principle of the thing. You can throw the bad things out of your life, and if you don't go and you fill your life with what we need to put into our lives from the Lord Himself, then we can have those bad things come crowding right back in the same way. And they will. It's simply a principle. It happens.
And so we need to have our lives filled with what is from God. Romans chapter 13, we are told that we need to put off the works of darkness, cast off it says the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. And that's the way Scripture talks is always a positive. It's not just getting rid of the negative, but we have to have the positive to fill the life or else there's a great void there that.
Is going to ultimately be filled again by that which we seek from pleasure.
Galatians chapter 5 says walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. And that's what's in my heart, on my heart tonight. This first was mentioned a few times. Tim might have mentioned it today and the question and answer, we've referred to it several times over the past week.
That to walk in the Spirit is what we need to do, and the question naturally comes up then, and often we don't adequately answer it. What does it mean to walk in the Spirit?
I understand that they shouldn't walk after the flesh, but what does it mean then to walk in the spirit and how do I do that? And so that's really what my subject is. And before I take that up, we'll we'll go to Galatians 5. But before we do, there's some things that I think we need to understand.
And the first thing is that all of us have an evil, wicked nature. And without understanding what God says about things, we're really not going to understand how to walk in the Spirit and how to get victory over sin in our lives. So let's go to Romans Chapter 7 and just look at this sinful nature that we have. See what the Word of God says about that.
Romans 7 and verse 18 says, For I know that in thee that is, in my flesh dwelleth no good thing.
Period. There's no good in there. Every one of us, when we were born, we were born with a fallen sinful nature. And that nature is, to put it bluntly, evil. No good in it at all. If you go over to Romans chapter 8 for a moment and look in verse seven, it says the carnal mind. That's the mind of the flesh.
00:10:14
Is enmity against God? Who does not subject to the law of God? Neither indeed can be.
So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
This is where we start out naturally before we're believers at all. All we have is the flash, and what we've read in this last verse is they're in the flesh. This is someone who's an unbeliever. They're not saved. They are only in the flash and there's no possibility of pleasing God. However, when we accept the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior, we now are no longer in the flesh because we have something else, as we'll see in a moment.
But still that flesh that's in US cannot please God. It's no better. There's no improving it.
And we need to know that very important because it has everything to do with how we're going to live our Christian lives and recognize how sin works. Now, if we go back to Romans Chapter 7, just look down at verse 22, we'll find out something else about us as believers.
He says, for I delight in the law of God after the inward man. Here is something different. It's an inward man. This is.
Something that just loves what God says and wants to do it and that we have as well. Her brother mentioned it last night in his meeting. He was talking from Second Corinthians chapter 5. If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. That's something new. You believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you get that new creation. In Galatians chapter 2 verse 20, the apostle Paul refers to it.
And he says, I live, but nevertheless not I, but it's Christ that lives in me. And so that new life that I have is actually the life of Christ that's in there. And so every one of us as believers, we have these two things. We still have that flash, that old nature, and we have a new nature, which is a new creation, which is the life of Christ himself. Now there's something else we need to understand.
And that is that there is a struggle there between these two things, and we have that presented.
Here in this chapter as well, let's just go back to verse 18 and start there again.
For I know that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present with me. But how to perform that which is good, I find not. For the good that I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but then that dwelleth in me.
I find a law then.
That when I would do good, evil is present with me, for I delight in the law of God after the inward man, but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
Oh, wretched man that I am.
Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
In context, this is talking about someone who hasn't come into full deliverance, but as believers, when we don't walk in the spirit, and we're gonna take that up in just a few moments.
This is a good description of our condition as well, that we have this very same struggle. And when I was reading these verses, did you recognize that struggle? Has that gone on inside of you?
If it hasn't, you're probably the first Christian that it hasn't. OK.
It rings so true, doesn't it? You want to do what's right. You're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. You know that He died for you. You want to please Him. And yet there is something there that's pulling the other way, isn't it? And that brings me to the next thing that we have to understand as believers. We don't just have a loss, fallen, sinful, old nature, and we don't just have.
A new nature that's the life of Christ, but we also have the spirit of God and that makes a tremendous difference. It makes all the difference really. Let's just go over to Romans 8 a few verses verse two says for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
Now here's something else. It's a law, and it's of the spirit of that life.
00:15:03
We've got that life of Christ. It's the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. That's how the Spirit of God is viewed here. And it's this, the law of the Spirit, that power that he has that now sets us free.
And the question still remains, how does that work? How does the Spirit set me free? And we'll look at that. But first of all, we need to know we have that Paul is saying here that that spirit of life set me free.
Go to over to Ephesians chapter one verse 13 and he says there and that when you believe the gospel of your salvation, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise.
Everyone who believes is sealed with the Spirit, and so we know as believers we have the Spirit of God.
And it's important that we know that. So knowing these things, understanding these things, let's go over to Galatians Chapter 5.
And we'll look at that first verse, 16.
This I say then.
Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.
Simple fact, walk in the spirit.
Still, the question remains, how do I walk in the Spirit?
But first we need to know that that is the answer. It's not gonna be something else. It's not gonna be some self help or five steps or this thing or that thing with the Word of God says. It's by walking in the Spirit. And so we start there and we need to understand that that is what God says. There's something else we need to understand as well. We need to know.
What causes about the sin? Because if God says to walk in the Spirit, we find that there's also something saying no.
You're not able to do it. So I want us to go and look and see what God says about the sin before we actually look at the details of walking in the Spirit. Let's go back to, uh, Romans chapter 6.
Romans, chapter 6.
And verse 6.
Knowing this, stop right there.
Knowing this, that's why we take the word of God out and read it. We need to know the Lord Jesus said you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. It's not good enough to make up things or have a Christianity sort of formed by consensus of opinions. We need to get the word of God and when he gives something and he gives it to us plainly from his Word, then we have.
Thus saith the Lord.
Knowing this, it says in verse six that our old man.
Is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Read a little earlier, you'll find out we're dead. We're crucified with Christ.
You say that makes sense, the person who died is free from sin, but he says that we are free.
And we need to know that.
This is really, really important because.
Satan is going to come to you and say no, that's not right. There's no power there.
Sin is something you haven't been able to resist. The sin is going to come again and you're powerless before it.
You're going to yield to it all over again. And you know what else? God made you that way. So ultimately, if it's anybody's fault, it's not yours. It's God's fault.
That wicked spirit blasphemes God if he can and says things like that. And you need to know what God has said, not only Satan, it's the flesh that's inside of us. That flesh is saying, you know what? If you try that, your life's over. No more fun.
It's gonna be a horrible life.
Don't listen to it. Satan lies. Your flesh lies. God tells the truth. We need to know what he says. Let's go down.
Verse 11 Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Christ Jesus our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that you should obey us in the lust thereof.
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You know this is the other part of it, he says. Reckon yourself. You know what that means, except that it's true. Believe it. You began your life as a Christian.
By faith, God said you were a Sinner. God said you needed a savior, and you believed that. That's how come you're a Christian today. There's no other way.
Now as a Christian, you need to believe God again if you haven't laid hold of these verses.
I can plainly remember the time when I hadn't, and there came a time when I had to read these verses and I had to say that is what God is saying. I need to reckon that is accept, count it to be true.
It's so when we were sitting there one time having a great struggle with a certain sin of my life, and the Lord brought these verses before me for the first time, I told them that way and I said OK, then God is true.
And if it's so, then it's so. And I don't know whether it was Satan or the flesh came right back again with that thing. And I said, I don't have to listen to you. I'm free from sin. And it went away. What can I say?
What could it possibly say?
God says this, God means this, and it's true, and we lay hold of it by faith. And that includes addictions too. You have an addiction, that's sin in your life.
The power is here. These verses are true. Let's go to second Peter chapter one.
Second Peter one verse 3.
According as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, to the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue.
You know, there's nothing left out here. It says all things, and it's His divine power that's given it, and it's for what does it say here? Things that pertain unto life and godliness. Is there something in your life, a struggle in your life, something that would keep you from godliness? The world will say you need this, this and this.
God says no, He's already given you that divine power. Romans chapter 6 is true.
You go back and read Romans 6 again. You find out that that came through death. That death came through being crucified with Christ.
This is a result of the work of the Lord Jesus Christ on Calvary's cross, and all the power of God was involved in that.
And it was there for you. God gave it for you, and he gave it for me.
And that power is sufficient for that sin in our life.
You know, remember reading years ago about what happened as the World Trade Center? You remember there were two towers hit and the first tower was hit, I think pretty much dead on. And there was nobody above where that plane hit that lived. The second tower was different. It was hit on the corner of the tower. And because of that, it weakened it more in itself first, even though it was hit second. But the interesting thing about that was that the.
Corner from where that plane went into the tower was not cut off by fire, but there was a lot of smoke there. And there I read about a man who went up through that smoke and he got up at the top of that smoke and he found people. They were all confused and not knowing what to do. And he said, look, there's a way down on this stairwell and those people listen to what he said.
And some of them said, no, the smoke is too much. It's too hot there, I'm afraid.
And they went up looking for relief. Others followed him and they went down into that smoke and they found life.
That's what we're talking about here.
Your flesh might be screaming that these things are not so. Satan is lying, he says. These things are not so. It's smoke. There's no fun. There's no joy in it. It's just going to rob you of everything in your life. You might as well die now.
God says itself.
00:25:01
You gonna accept what God says and go in spite of the lies, in spite of what your flesh is telling you inside, and just simply believe Him and follow Him?
There's another thing I believe we need to know that is when it comes to this issue.
A victory over sin and walking in the Spirit. We have no strength of our own.
And we'll come to walking in the Spirit. Sorry about taking so long to get there, but it's not walking in the spirit. And then our own strength too. And I want to deal with that part of it. We don't have the strength to deal with this issue on our own. In fact, we have no strength and we need to recognize that early on. Let's go over to Psalm chapter 16.
Psalm 16, verse 8.
I have set the Lord always before me.
Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
We need to forget self. The Lord is the one that we need in this.
If we're going to walk in the spirit and walk to please Him, we have to leave ourselves entirely. And this is really important to understand because we get so occupied with self. In fact, everything around us is about self. It was brought vividly before me not long ago when a few of us went to a beautiful garden that are not far from where I live.
And I was a little bit ahead of the group and as I was there.
Just walking along and I saw a lady in front of me.
And I watched for just a few minutes and I couldn't believe what I was saying. There was really some very nice vegetation over here. And she looked at that and then she got in front of the vegetation. She arranged her hair all very nice, and then got out her phone and did this. And then there was some other vegetation there. She went over there and she got herself arranged and did her hair again and did this.
And then she went down, did it again and again and again. After a while, the ones that were with me came to where I was. They said look, and they looked, I don't know how long. It was a while. My wife was with me. It was a while that we watched this until she went right out of sight. Every single thing, she took this picture.
Is she that much worse than us? Well, maybe, I don't know. It's pretty bad. But we're pretty occupied with self, aren't we? It's not good. In fact, it's the flesh. It's evil at its root. We need to think about that. Anyway, there's no help in it, and we can't help with that at all. I've seen some of you, by the way, going around the camp. I think with the the verse Philippians 4 to 13. I can do all things through Christ, which strengthens me.
Beautiful. That's the point, isn't it? But sometimes I'm afraid we take that verse and think, well, you know what, I can handle a lot of things, but there's some things that really take a little extra and I need that turbo boost, you know, So I'll use Christ for that. That's not what the verse is talking about. It means all things, every single thing I need Christ for. He's the one who gives strength for it. Let's go over to Romans chapter 15. See a verse there?
Romans 15 verse 5. Just the end of the verse only.
The Lord Jesus says, For without me you can do nothing.
I like to think maybe another version of that verse.
I could do no things without Christ, who strengtheneth me.
That and put it together with this first. And, and really you have to accept that when it comes to this walk of faith or really walking in the spirit, we need to remember that it's not walking in our own strength with the help of the spirit, but we have to leave ourselves aside, forget self, judge self. We need to actually put it behind and walk in the spirit.
Another point I just want to make before we go to walking in the Spirit is don't hold back anything when it comes to walking in the Spirit of God. You can't hold out some part of your life to yourself and say, well this is my little garden where I want to have my pleasure.
00:30:06
Sometimes, but the rest of it I give to the Lord, and I'm going to live for the Lord.
During these periods of time, but sometimes at least still, I'm going to hold out this little piece. And if the flesh can't get anything else it wants, at least that don't do it. You need to give it all up. Let's go back to the verse we've already looked at several times.
Matthew, Chapter 6.
Matthew chapter 6, verse 24. No man can serve 2 masters.
Either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon.
Can't do it. We've often said it's a moral impossibility.
May try to do it, often times we do, but God won't allow it. He demands.
Desires I think is what the verse says. Truth in the inward parts, but he requires it too. It doesn't work any other way. You can't just hold out a part of your life for yourself and give a part to God. And he says it right here. No man can serve 2 masters. He's worthy of every part of our life and he must have it.
We need to take everything and examine in our life, is this thing for my flesh or is this thing for the Lord? Now, I just want to be clear. Scripture speaks about another possibility too, and we've been enjoying that a lot here at the camp. That is the natural thing that they're not wrong. In fact, they're very good. They're right. God made them. When we play volleyball, when we swam or enjoy food together and enjoy God's creation. These are natural things that God.
Given to us, and I'm not talking about that, but I'm talking about those things that please my flesh and those things that want to tend towards sin because that's what they ultimately do. If we leave them, we need to have. Is it what it says here? A little further up, your brother mentioned this last night too in verse 22. The light of the body is the eye.
If therefore, thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of life, and if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness.
It's a light that is in thee be darkness. How great is that darkness? And what's he talking about? Our brother told us. He said a single eye is the eye that's single for Christ.
The evil eye is what? Well, it's the other. It's the eye that's not single for Christ. Even if it's partly on Christ and partly on something else that I desire, it's evil.
And He says, if that light that's in you is darkness, how great is that darkness? That's total confusion. We can't do it. We need to take this issue to the Lord and we need to take every part of our life and just turn it over to Him. We can't hold part of it back for ourselves.
There's another way you can do this. There is a way. I used to do this in my life and that was I would live for the week for myself and go on say to Saturday night. Saturday night comes, it's free.
And go watch some movies. Not good movies. Oh boy. Well, I watched them. They're a little worse than I pretended I thought they were. And what do I do now? Tomorrow is Lord's Day, so.
I get on my knees at the end of it. I tell the Lord, oh Lord, please help me to do better.
And then I go off and break bread. If you're at the Lord's Table and relate to this.
And well, knowing that the next week I'm gonna do it again, can't do that.
That's a stupid, stupid game to play with God. Don't play games with God. He sees your heart. He knows what you're thinking. You're not fooling yourself. You made-up the silly game.
Should speak about myself. I'm sorry I'm speaking to you. I wasn't fooling myself. I made-up the silly game.
And God sure wasn't fooled. If you are playing any games even remotely like that, don't play them. It's only gonna be to your heart, and God loves you too much to leave you that way. I thank God he didn't leave me that way.
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Sooner or later, he's gonna do something about that.
But don't play games with God, Give everything to Him. He is worthy of it. Now let's go to walking in the Spirit. First thing. We need to live in the sphere of the Spirit and see that. Let's go to back to Romans chapter 8.
And while we look at these verses, I want you to remember.
Again, the flash that is in you is Satan. They're going to scream at you and tell you that these things are not so.
He's gonna lie and tell you there's no joy, there's nothing in it, you can't do it. Your friends are gonna laugh at you, and in the end you're gonna be embarrassed.
Why we need to see what God says and why we need to take these things by faith. Romans chapter 8, verse 13.
If you live after the flash, you shall die.
For the PA through the Spirit to mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live.
This is talking about two spheres of life, the one where there's living after the flesh.
And that goes on and as and what's he say you shall die, not physical death here, death in the spiritual sense of separation from God. And what happens is we live after the flesh and we do those sins as we go on more and more in that we get more and more down this road of separation from God and we become spirit spiritually more and more dead.
But on the other hand it says here, if ye through the spirit do put to death, that's what mortify means, the deeds of the body, you shall live.
How are we doing it? By the Spirit?
And so there's these two areas that we can live our lives, either that area which pleases myself and seems like so much fun to my Flash.
But let's be honest, it's empty, isn't it? You go and you do those things that I was talking about a few minutes ago, and what happens there when you're done? Do you feel fulfilled? Do you feel joy? You say, wow, that was so good. I'm just really happy now.
Or do you feel empty?
You feel empty, don't you?
That's the deceitfulness of sin.
And Satan will work hard to make you forget that with the next thing. He just keeps doing one more thing after the other out there, you know, keep you going down that road because he wants to take you down this sphere of life where you're ministering to your flesh. But the other is what you're putting to death, those seeds of the body. That's what we were talking about about back in Chapter 6, that we're dead and we need to reckon itself and we're just counting it to be dead.
The temptation comes along and says I'm not listening to that, I'm dead to it.
And how are we doing it in our own strength?
No, he says by the Spirit.
So how does that work exactly?
It's kind of nice because it's answered in good part right in the next verse, verse 14.
For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
You know.
The verse says very plainly, if anybody if the person who's led by the Spirit of God, that person is the Son of God.
Or we might say the other way around. It's perfectly true. If you're a son of God, you're led by the Spirit of God. So every single believer in the Lord Jesus Christ in this room is led by the Spirit of God. Very important for us to know that.
That He leads us. He said I don't feel the leading of the Spirit of God in my life. OK, and you might not, but this doesn't change what this first said. This isn't talking about feeling the leading of the Spirit of God in my life. It's saying that the Spirit of God leads me.
He leaves, that's what he does. Whether I follow his leading or not is a whole other matter, but he's always there leading in my life.
And because he is leading, he is leading me on a path that leads me.
Where I need to go to walk in the Spirit means that I'm going to follow where the Spirit leaves me. And the first thing I need to know about that is what it says in this first, that the Spirit of God does this. Elite, do you accept that the Spirit of God leads?
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Have you felt his leading in your life?
If not, we need to talk more about that. How are we going to feel? How are we going to get the leading of the Spirit of God in our life? Well, we could turn to various verses and the Word of God. And what we'll find is that the Word of God, the Spirit of God are always found together. And so the first thing I suggest to you when it comes to the leading of the Spirit is that we have to be reading the Word of God. We're not going to get the leading of the Spirit.
Without the Word of God, it's not going to happen. We need to take up the Word of God and we need to read it, and then we need to talk to the Lord as well. So we have the reading of the Word of God and we have prayer. These two things are vital and the starting point for how it is that we walk in the Spirit. You are not going to walk in the Spirit. Without that, it's not possible.
To walk in the Spirit, to have the leading of the Spirit, we need to have prayer to talk to him, to say what we need, and we need to have the reading of the Word of God because without that, we're not going to hear what he's saying back to us. It is possible for the Spirit of God to lead me in my life, maybe through in some way circumstances or a feeling of peace or something like that. But by and large, He's going to lead me through what the Word of God says. And the only way I'm going to know that.
Is I have to take it and I have to read it and I have to read it regularly. You're not going to have the leading of the Spirit in your life. If you're just reading it on odd occasions. It's not going to happen. You're going to have these big areas where you're getting no input from the Spirit of God who wants to lead you in your life. So number one, I say take out your Bible and read it. And if you especially maybe some of the younger ones here say I've tried that, but.
It's difficult, it's really tough to get into the word of God and understand what it's saying there. And so I try for a little bit and I get frustrated and I give up.
Don't keep on going, persist in it and you wait and you see what happened, what will happen. You'll find that the word of God, it will start to grow on you. It will get in you. You'll find the things that before it seems almost a little disjointed or you didn't know how they fit together. You're going to start to see, wow, that goes together with that. I see what the Lord is saying here and even before you get to that point, the Spirit of God is going to bring before you.
A verse or part of a verse, something that's going to answer a need in your life. He knows what you need. He can give it to you. No matter how little you understand of the Word, just read it and ask Him to show you. That's part of it too. You're asking the Lord to show us. We're not told to speak to the Spirit. The Spirit leads us. We have to do with the Lord Himself.
We pray to the Lord, we ask him for that guidance, and he is God. You say, I don't understand how it works. It's OK, we're poor, failing humans, we're weak. But he's God and he knows how to reveal himself to us. He knows how to guide us. He knows how to lead us from his word. There is no limit to his power. So don't take your own failings or limitations into this question. God has said.
That His Spirit leads and guides us and He means it. He has the ability to do it. And so take up the Word of God and see what He'll say to you.
Next thing is we need fellowship. We need fellowship with other Christians. We're here for that purpose in part, aren't we? But it's very important. Again, I'm gonna go back to Brother Craig. Last night he was quoting from James, Chapter 4. Remember, he said enmity or friendship with the world is enmity with God.
That's true. I'm not gonna dwell on that. Negative. This is the opposite. So we need the fellowship of Christians. We're put together with other believers.
In one body, God didn't just save us through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ and put us out on our own, but He put us together.
And we find throughout the Word of God that we are put together for a reason, and that we are to help each other and to minister to each other, and that there's joints of supply through which the needs come, and that we're all then built up and edified together until we come into that perfect man in Christ. Go read that to yourself when you get a chance in Ephesians chapter 4.
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We are not to be here by ourselves.
Struggling on that, the leading of the Spirit would have us together. We know this from the Word, so that's part of it as well. Another thing is to serve the Lord. We need to spend our time desiring to know what He wants us to do. Remember, we took this up earlier in the week. The first thing the apostle Paul and Acts 22 asked the Lord as Lord, what shall I do?
And that should be the desire of our heads too, to be idle isn't going to be a useful path, umm, for the Lord. We're not going to follow the Spirit that way. He doesn't lead us into idleness. And so it's a desire to know what he wants us to do is very important. And the Lord Jesus says, I think it's in John 15. He says he that service.
Me, him will my father honor he.
Appreciate that He wants it and it's a path that we have to walk with Him. It's a privilege that we have to do. Let's go over to see another thing, John first John chapter 3, and that is the coming of the Lord.
We're given a hope.
And we need to think about that hope. And there's an important reason for it as well.
Has to do directly with victory in our lives and that work of the Spirit to give us power there.
First John, chapter 3.
Verse One, Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we shall be called the sons of God. Therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.
Below now are we the sons of God, and it shall, and it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see him as he is. Now this is saying, when the Lord Jesus appears, one day we're going to be exactly like him, because we're going to see him as He is there in that glory.
But then it goes on here to say something wonderful.
In verse 3, every man that hath his hope in him, everyone who's got this hope in that one who's coming, the Lord Jesus says.
Purifies himself even as he is pure. The Lord is coming. He is going to meet us in the air. He's going to come back here and appear in glory and reign in this world. We're looking for that day.
And my brother and sister, you need to think about that.
There's a crown of righteousness for loving that appearing, and there's a purification that comes from being occupied with that one in glory. Even right now, we look up before He comes and we see Him there. And as we see him as he is in glory by faith, what happens to us? We get purified, and that brings a great deal of this victory over sin.
In our lives.
This is part I submit to you of walking in the Spirit and hopefully turned over to 1St Thessalonians chapter one and the 10th verse. We find out there that there were some young believers in that city of Thessalonica and the apostle Paul says to them, he says.
That he turned to God from idols. That's what we started out with, isn't it? They didn't just turn away from idols and have a big void.
But they turn to God. That filled the void with God.
And then what?
To serve the living and true God. They didn't just say idol or they didn't just say in self seeking and pleasure going down in that sphere of the flesh and just enjoying it and saying, oh, it's OK, I'm saved now. I'm safe for eternity, but while I'm here I'm gonna have a good time. They didn't do that.
Says to serve the living and true God and what and to wait for his Son from heaven. That was their occupation.
And 5th, I submit to you, it's very much what it means to walk in the spirit, you know?
These are some things. There are other things you can find too. The first thing that I mentioned was to read the Word of God and you'll get the full answer of what it means to walk in the Spirit. He's going to guide you through that.
But one more point I want to make before we're finished tonight is that we need to bring him into every single sphere of our life. That is, examine everything. I'm not talking about holding out some part now, but I'm talking about actually actively saying where is it?
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That the Spirit of God can take over in my life and for this I just want to look again at that another well known verse.
Proverbs chapter 3 and verse 6.
Proverbs 3 verse six. And all thy ways acknowledge him, He shall direct thy path.
All thy ways, every sphere of our life, we need to take up with the leading of the Spirit.
We might be tempted to think again that there's certain areas that are just automatic and we don't have to bring them into it.
That I suggested every part. And if we're gonna do that, I'm gonna go back and say this again. We need to start right off the beginning of the day. Sorry for repeating that, but it's important. Suggest get up. Get up in the morning. Things are gonna come in. The day starts quickly enough. Things are gonna come in and crowd into your mind. So get up before that.
If you need it, get a coffee and get yourself wide awake. Then go get yourself good and comfortable.
And take out the Bible and start to talk to the Lord. Make sure that this is a really nice experience. And read the Word of God and pray. Talk to the Lord with a clear mind before those other things crowd in.
Make it the best part of your day and then go from there.
And follow his leading right from that point all the rest of the day when you leave that point and maybe you're driving to work or you're going somewhere else and you see the sunrise or you see something beautiful.
Stop right there, Say Lord thank you. Wow, beautiful.
Get a little further, something nice happens to you. Stop.
Thank you, Lord, for that. That's wonderful. I really appreciate that.
A little further, something bad happened. Thank you, Lord, for that. I needed it. I really appreciate that You didn't forget me and you gave me this lesson. Now what is it? And talk to Him, you know, all through the day. That's what He wants. He wants communion. He wants to have a living relationship with us all through the day. That's what it means to walk in the spirit and go right through to the end of the day like that, bringing Him into every part of your life.
Let's see if it isn't a path of joy. Now you understand I'm not talking about victory over sin anymore.
Yes, it is that, but it's so far beyond that. Christianity is not negative. Those lies at the flesh tell the lies that Satan's house, what lies they are, they're awful lies. Christianity is wonderful. You come to know the Lord like that and you start taking His word and it's just Absolutely Fabulous. It's a joy and a wonderful thing that you cannot possibly have with the pleasures of sin.
There's nothing remotely like it. Take it up and see.
If it isn't so, let's look at another verse in that regard. Psalm 104.
We're almost done here.
Psalm 104, verse 34. My meditation of Him.
Shall be sweet. I will be glad in the Lord.
This is an incredibly wonderful thing when you can go through the day with the Lord and talk to Him and then think about Him and get a sweetness coming back that you can never, ever, ever know until you try it.
And then he says, here I will be glad in the Lord, and it fills you with joy and praise. Believe me, you will never experience one moment of emptiness there, not for a moment.
It will be incredible peace and joy and sweetness of meditation with him.
There's another verse. We already read it a little bit earlier in Psalm 16. A little further down, though, it says.
At thy and thy presence are pleasures forevermore.
We tend to think about that as heaven, and it is, oh, no question about it. But my brother and sister, we don't have to wait for heaven.
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We can have that heaven right now.
And when we do, we'll say, I found a truer joy. And then the lies of Satan, the lies of the flesh, they'll lose their hold, and they'll be a truer, greater thing that will take their place. We'll all have it when we get to heaven. But why wait till then? You can have far more than victory over the flesh now. You can have that joy and that peace.
In your life right now? Well.
Let's just close and ask the Lord's help.
Lord, I was heard these things.
We have found them in thy word.
Let us know, Lord, the weakness of the vessel who spoke them.
We pray that those who are here.
With themselves each one. Go and try thee, and see if these things are not so.
We pray, Lord, that that would bring us each one into a fuller.
Deeper realization of thyself and that joy of communion with thee.
So that's in would fall off like autumn leaves and allies, and that we could be to thy praise and thy glory on this side of heaven.
Lord Jesus, we thank Thee for all this Thou has done every part of that work that founders accomplished at the cross. We thank Thee, Lord Jesus, that we can have Thee now and that we will have thee for all eternity. And we praise Thee and thy most holy and worthy name. Amen.
Q&A #1 1)Asked of Lord, Not received. 2)Are we always obligated to obey parents.3)Christian Warfare
Q&A #2 1)Pokemon Part 2. 2)Did Jesus have choice to go to the cross?. 3)If Satan knew the scripture, Jesus would die for our Sins, why was he active to destroy Jesus. 4) Why would Satan use Peter to turn Jesus from the cross?
Q&A #3 1)Providing during illness. 2)Books Christian Dating. 2) Assembly discipline
Q&A #4 1)Does God love Satan. 2)Violent Video Games.3)Role of beleiver in Restoration. 4)Devine Sinlessness. 5)Talking to Atheist. 6)Submissive wife.
Q&A #5 1)Talking with Parents. 2)Updating Hymns of Little Flock. 3)Not touching a woman or Man? 4)Requirements for the Lord's Table
Q&A #6 1)Predestination Heaven or Hell. 2)Addiction to pornogrophy. 3)Role of young Brother & Sisters as Preist