Open—M. Payette, R. Thonney, S. Stewart
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166 Lord, Thou hast drawn us after thee. Now let us run and never tire. What in thy love possess we not unchangeable thy gracious love?
166.
I enjoy going to conferences.
And I'm particularly peaceful when I can sit in an open meeting and not have my heart start racing.
And it's racing now and, uh.
I'd just like to ring before you what the Lord has set on my heart.
First Corinthians, chapter one.
Just a few comments on the 1St chapter of both epistles to the Corinthians.
You notice in scriptures that the epistles to the Corinthians are the only epistles addressed to an Assembly of God.
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The Assemblies of Galatia didn't say Assemblies of God. The Assemblies of the Thessalonians doesn't say Assembly of God.
There were some of these that got of course, but the Spirit of God is recorded for us.
Those two books.
For us to consider collectively.
Us two are being together and how we function together.
But in the first chapters of both of these books we have that which establishes our souls individually.
And so we have in First Corinthians chapter one.
Verse 30.
But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us.
Wisdom, righteousness, and sanctification.
And redemption. Now, if you're familiar with the book of First Corinthians, you find that there's so many things.
In Corinth, it needed to be addressed and corrected and their their state was terrible.
Yes, they were believers in the Lord Jesus, and God had made Jesus and the Lord Jesus to be for them wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption.
And young people and young believers in the Lord Jesus.
This is what Christ Jesus has been made from, God's part for you.
Is made wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption. That's what he is to you. Every believer in the Lord Jesus has these things. They belong to him because Christ has made that for you and for me.
Wisdom.
If you read the first official, you find there's a foolishness of the world because by their wisdom they cannot know the true God. They're hid from them.
But it pleased God, through the foolishness of preaching, and the preaching as the preaching of the cross, to save them that believe.
Righteousness. None of us in ourselves are righteous. We ruined that in the epistle for the Romans. And yet Jesus Christ our Lord is our righteousness before God. We couldn't be more righteous before God. What a privilege. Sanctified.
Set apart. We had that question this morning, but what was the same as saying that someone set apart?
How we set apart. Well, you and I are believers in the Lord Jesus. This afternoon we're seated in heaven, in the Lord Jesus. Momentarily, we're gonna be sitting seated there with him. That's our position. That's how God has sanctified us. And redemption comes last because I believe it. It brings before us the redemption of our bodies. And so when the Lord Jesus comes from heaven, all those that he purchased with his own blood, he's gonna change and take to the Father's house and see we're gonna be sitting in the heavenlies.
With him then, So this first epistle to the Corinthians before the apostle Paul addresses many issues that needed to be brought before them. He brings before us what the Lord Jesus has been made for us by God so we can rest in peace and enjoy and be exercised to carry out in our life to be wise and righteous and sanctified and act as those that were purchased at such a price.
I go to the Second Epistle of Corinthians, chapter one.
2nd Corinthians, chapter one.
Verse 18.
But as God is true, our word toward you is not. Yeah and nay.
For the Son of God, Jesus Christ.
Who was preached among you by us? Even by me and Sylvanus and Timotheus was not yeah, and nay, but in him was yeah, for all the promises of God. In him are yeah, and in him are men unto the glory of God by us.
Now he which establishes us with you in Christ, and that anointed us, is God, who had also sealed us and given us the earnest.
Of the Spirit in our hearts.
Not first chapter. We have these four things, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Here we have 4 things again coming from God again through Christ Jesus. God establishes us together in Christ. He anoints us, He seals us, and He gives us the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. Again, I believe things that belong to us individually on God's part, to the Lord Jesus.
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It says here our word for Jew is not gay and nay.
It's not yes or no with Christ, it's it's yes.
You can ask someone. Do you know the registered services? Yes. You're going to heaven. I don't know.
You have eternal life. I hope it's not yay and nay with the Lord Jesus Christ. It's yes I'm going to heaven. Yes, I'm a son of God through faith in Jesus Christ. Yes, God is my father. Many things we can affirm not based on us.
On our quality of life, on our well, we followed the pathway, but based on what God has given us in Christ and made us to be in Him. And I believe this. God gives us energy, power, renew, renewed desires to please Him and to carry out that which is pleasing in His sight. All the promises of God in Him are yeah, and in Him are men unto the glory of God by us every time we say Amen to those things that belong to us because of the Lord Jesus.
It gives glory to God.
God is a giving God, and when you say thank you for what he's given, he gets glory. When you tell others what he's given you, he gets glory.
Well, there are four things here that are mentioned in connection with the things that God has given us now, he which establishes us with you in Christ.
And had anointed us.
Is God.
I enjoy the way it Mr. Darby translated it in French, he says.
He that binds us together with you to Christ is God.
God has bound us together through Christ.
Beautiful.
By extension, we can think of the day of Pentecost when the Spirit of God came down and baptized all the believers into one body and linked us together, one to another, into our heavenly head, the Lord Jesus Himself.
Bound us together through Christ.
And then it says.
He hath anointed us.
Well, you've given us ability by His Spirit to enter into the very thoughts of God about His Son or what He's made of and His Son, what belongs to His Son and to us by extension.
He's giving us that ability by His spirit, and that's why the natural mind cannot understand these things because they don't have the anointing.
And some Christian circles they make they make something else of anointing. But we read in first John chapter two that is anointing teaches us that's how we can understand someone speaks of the things of the Lord and you receive it. Somebody else speaks of the Lord and.
You're not receiving it because the Lord is not teaching you that. Maybe because you're not ready for that, or maybe it's slightly off and it doesn't fit where the Lord wants you to understand His word. Then it says He hath sealed us.
We have that in first, the first of Ephesians. We read that this morning.
Let's go back to that infusion chapter one.
You've got the earnest there too.
Pieces one and 13. In whom ye also trusted, after that he heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. In whom also after that ye believe you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance, until the redemption of the purchased possession unto the praise of His glory. Chapter 4 tells us that we've been sealed unto the day of redemption.
That redemption of our body.
We have a little cottage meeting in our home on on Wednesday night and we have believers coming from.
Different backgrounds. We had a man come in last Wednesday.
Been saved I would think.
For 20 years.
Yet you did not have the assurance.
I'm going to have.
He had Matthew 24 and 13, drilled into his mind, into his soul.
He that persevered to the end shall be saved.
And he has salvation connected with perseverance to the end because of misinterpretation of the thoughts and teaching in that chapter.
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Sealed unto the day of redemption. I gave him that verse, and he said, Unless.
It's yes and no, yay and nay. It's not yay and nay, it's yes.
Because it depends on the work of the Lord Jesus and it's finished. It's never going to change.
And it's so complete, it got put his seal on you that you're a son of God through faith in Jesus Christ and you can call him ABBA Father.
And he's never not going to be your father again. He's always going to be your father. That's never going to change. Born of God forever. Wonderful. The seal of the Spirit gives us assurance. We understand and we're assured. And it says in the last part of Second Corinthians, chapter one there that last clause and has given us the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. Verse 22 of chapter one of the Second Corinthians.
Someone has said the Earnest is like a it's like a deposit, you know?
And I use the examples as you're going to buy a car, you give a deposit and the person knows you're going to come and get it because you gave him some money.
But I don't believe that's it really, because after giving the deposit, let's say the car, the car cost $500, you give them $500.00 or $5000, you give me $500, that's 10%.
You haven't paid for the car, you just give him a deposit.
You and I, we've been paid for in full. He paid the whole price to have you in heaven. If you needed to pay more, he would have stayed longer on the cross. He doesn't need to pay more. He's paid it all.
But he hasn't come to take possession of that which he paid.
So what he's done is giving us His spirit as the account, but He's gonna come and take you home for the redemption of the possession. It says in Ephesians chapter one. Let's go back there.
It's not too tiring, the pages are pretty light. Ephesians chapter one.
Verse 14, which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchase possession unto the praise of His glory. We are the purchased possession. The price is paid in full, but He hasn't come to get us yet.
He will. He will leave none behind.
One of the children of Israel left Egypt.
It says in my French Bible it didn't leave a fingernail behind.
You're not going to leave any of those that he paid at such a price behind. There's no not such a thing in the scriptures as partial rapture.
Now you and I, brethren, we have a wonderful privilege.
We have the word of God in our hands.
And the Spirit of God has convinced us that this is the word of God.
From cover to cover, we can read it with confidence and learn from it.
And obey, understand, rejoice in what we understand from it by the Spirit of God.
I speak to brother Derek yesterday and the expression he used I brought back to him, he says.
He was thinking a bit outside of the box and I.
Enjoy that thought because you know he wasn't referring to the word of God. Not thinking outside of the word of God, but sometimes since we only know in part.
If all your understanding was what I understood, you would be limiting yourself to me as my box or to another brother here who would know so much more of the Scriptures than I do. But that's still partial knowledge. And so we should be ready to understand from the Word of God, perhaps something that's different. And I'm look not looking to say anything different or to bring anything different before this thing.
But I have exercises of souls, brother.
And I'd like to talk a little bit about.
Geometry.
Now, I know some of you are younger, haven't gone to these, uh, complicated formulas to figure out the circle and.
The pyramids, all these equations and letters, you have to know what they're. I'm gonna keep it pretty simple. And I talk about lines. You know what a line is? You know what a straight line is.
But you and I, we have a straight line to glory.
And ask the Lord Jesus himself.
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You have a straight line to glory. I have a straight line to glory.
And God, who has bound us together to Christ, we have together a straight line to glory.
But it says bound together to Christ.
And that's a person. That's not doctrine.
That's not scripture, that's a person.
We are not to worship the book.
But the book needs us to worship the Father and the Son.
If I worship the book, you could call me an idolater because I'm worshipping. That's it.
Now if you have a straight line.
And you have another straight line right beside it, not too far. That's called a parallel line.
You know, sometimes our lines of thoughts are parallel lines.
And good parallel lines, I think we could call orthodoxy perfectly right. We can say things that are right and things that are just say, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But the only thing is when we've finished going down that line.
I'm not any closer to Christ than when I started. I know more up here.
But I haven't done anything down here.
It's a parallel line. I'm listening to you. Yeah. Hey, man. Yeah, that's a parallel line.
It's good to have parallel lines.
But you know, it's printing a a track with your sister yesterday on my printer and it had two sides to it. So I'm not too familiar with my friend. I don't use it often enough. So I I put the sheet in and I printed one side and then I thought it needed to be turned around to go through a second time to print the best. And umm, when it came out it was pretty good. It was only printed on one side and the same page was exactly over it, but it wasn't perfect lineup.
You can see there's a little bit of a spill there. The letters weren't perfectly lined up.
They're pretty close.
Now I know I'm not perfectly lined up.
Things in my life need to be realized. Sometimes you get your car realigned. But we need our lives realigned all the time, every day.
And as close as God can make us. But it's close. Not parallel over here, but parallel really close. Maybe, you know, to consider 2 lines that can happen. God can conform you to the image of His Son. So somebody that meets up with you is meeting up with a reflection of the Lord Jesus. That'd be wonderful. Well, let's not be parallel lines.
Let's be we can smear a bit, but I mean, let's be really close to the original.
The other one bothers me a lot.
Is the tangent.
You see the tangent? It starts at the same place.
But it's kind of gets away from the first line, you know? And in the beginning you can barely notice there's a distance there.
But when time goes by.
Well, there's quite a distance.
You know, they says in Second Timothy of the.
5 leaders I believe it says in my French Bible. He went away from the truth.
I think the word enriched means he swerved. That's more than a tangent, it's just like.
You kinda get complete the resurrection already happened.
And I'm sure none of us here with the knowledge of Scripture that we have, we say something like that. So the enemy does things he cannot bring among us.
She's gonna try something more subtle.
I wanna bring it before you, brother, because it's on my heart. I had this, my heart racing. What can I say? I don't wanna bring it up, but I'm gonna bring it up.
I was in a couple of years ago.
And some of the Saints gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ had come from a group of believers.
They're around in America also. I think they publish Echoes of Truth.
And one of.
Their main teaching.
Is predestination.
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That's all they interpret Ephesians chapter one and verse 4.
And verse four yes, according has he had chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that he we should be holding him without blame before him in love, having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure.
Of his will.
Now.
We met with uh.
A leader of that group because we had an entrance to him and we we shared the scriptures with him and.
Wanted to bring before him the balance in scripture that we find responsibility.
And so he wouldn't receive it, of course.
And his way of seeing the gospel is this way.
God has chosen people to be saved ahead of time.
And so when you preach the gospel, you're just going through the motions.
Because it's all been settled before the foundation of the world.
God chose some, and too bad for the ones he didn't choose.
And I can't live with that, brethren.
Because it's not honoring to my God.
A God of love who wants all men to be saved, achieving the book in so many pages. You cannot change the words. It pleases him to save those that believe, not those that he chose.
No, this is not a review, brethren, but please, I have often heard among us.
Chosen before the foundation of the world.
I don't find that in my Bible.
I found Chosen in him before the foundation of the world.
God's counsels are not centered on me or on you. They're centered on Christ.
The mystery, the wonder is how it happened in my life, I don't know.
I heard the gospel and God worked miracles by His word and His Spirit, and He produced life there.
Because if he did that before the foundation of the world, which is going through the motions in the gospel.
And I believe there are ones that if we think that like they do, they just preach the gospel. Whoever was chosen before the foundation was going to come tonight and he's going to believe.
It's all settled ahead of time.
I think it's serious, brethren, because.
It's the glory of God that's involved, not a matter of you think this and I think that.
I said it before you because I believe it's a tangent.
And it's a tangent that shows up in.
Our burning desire for souls.
Because if God has already determined ahead of time, I mean.
They're all gonna get saved anyway, whether you preach alright, alright, somebody else does. You don't give them a track, somebody else will. Because God has written his name in the book of life before the foundation of the world.
I believe there's other ways of reading these scriptures.
Accordingly, He had chosen us in him.
It's all about him. That's what this chapter is all about. Him, us and him, of course.
Because you wanted us to be holding without blame before him in love.
It was through him.
God and his love had a counsel of bringing sinners to glory. Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. That's why he came.
But you want all men to be said. He does.
You share with him the earnest for souls.
Well, verse 5, having predestinated us into the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself.
That election that we find in Christ had her purpose to bring many sons to the glory.
And when you and I believe the gospel, we become children of God. We're pedestrian for adoption, and you're gonna come from heaven because he purchased us. We belong to him. Well, you're once I don't want to provoke anything, but I do want to set it before you that if every time you read Ephesians 3, you including him, I don't have a problem. When you forget about the in him, it reminds me.
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That some believers have done away with responsibility.
And I believe doing away with responsibility makes God a respecter of persons. And I believe it's dangerous ground for us because I don't believe God is a respecter of persons. How do the scripture says he wants all men to be saved, not desire. It's not. He desires all men to be saved. The same word as what Lord Jesus says. I will that thou be clean, Father, I will that Thou given me to be with me where I am. John 17 and 24. Anyone saw a man to be safe, So dear ones.
Perhaps we're not on a tangent. I'm I'm happy.
Let's be careful, but we don't go on tangents and receive things.
Say things, promote things that the Scriptures would not promote. And leaving out a word or adding a word sometimes suggests to us something that's really not really in line with the heart of God our Father, with the heart of our Lord Jesus who died for the world to be saved, not for a part of the world to be saved. He's a savior of the world and he wants all men to be saved, not just those that some would say were chosen.
Before they were born.
I'd like to go to Ephesians 4. This morning it was mentioned that the 1St 3 chapters of Ephesians are the teaching of the epistle, and when we get to chapter four we get something of the practical exhortations that follow.
I would like to point out that in chapter four we do have doctrine as well from verse four through 16. It's not exhortation, it's Speaking of what is. Notice verse four. There is one body and one spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling. Interesting, but I think it is.
Important to notice that, but my desire this afternoon is not to focus on that, as it is to give some of the practical exhortations in view of the preciousness of the truth that we were meditating on this morning.
Oh brethren, God grant that these things would sink into our souls. Takes meditation sometimes to let it happen.
You know, we tend it's North Americans to try to comprehend something in the mind and sometimes we think once we understood it, we've got it.
You really don't have it until you have it in your heart. That's the proper dwelling place of the truth of God. And to get down into the heart, it takes meditation and it has to pass through the conscience. In other words, I reflect on whether I'm walking in it. Is this real with me or is this just had knowledge?
And I must say, rather than I have been challenged by my dear brother and in Bolivia, where we spent a number of years.
Amongst them.
You know, if you'd ask them a specific question, sometimes I don't know that they could give you a very good answer.
But it was so evident to me that.
In practice they knew it and it was a challenge to me because I came along. Maybe I could explain a little better than others, but was my walk in line with my talk?
The Lord knows, and I leave that judgment with Him, but I'd just like to read especially the 1St 3 verses of chapter 4 because they have spoken to me tremendously in connection with this truth. There is one body.
And it was mentioned this morning.
It in chapter one, it's our individual position with the Lord, but it does go on to mention the body at the end of the chapter, the Lord Jesus in his position of exaltation and glory.
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His head over all things to the Body, which is his church.
So there you have the body in chapter 2, you have the church as more of the house aspect. It's the dwelling of God through the Spirit. So there you have two aspects of the church and which are true.
But here are these first three verses. Let me read them. I therefore the prisoner of the Lord.
Beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called.
With all loneliness and meekness.
With long-suffering forbearing one another in love.
Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Oh brother, in these verses have searched me and I want to present it to you because of the reality of these things. You know, verse four says there is one body. You'll notice that there is there's an italics you could read it 1 body. It's the truth. Brother. Here we are living in 2015.
Quite a few years after the day of Pentecost.
Still the truth. One body.
And there is no more than just one body, even today, when the public testimony would suggest otherwise. One body.
Precious, precious truth. Remember when, when we first went to Bolivia, we lived in Montero, which is in the Amazon basin, for about 10 years and then we moved to Cochabamba.
Which is in the valleys of the Andes Mountains, about 8000 feet altitude. And in that area there's a lot of missionaries. And so I would often get asked, what did you come here to Cochabamba for? It must be you're gonna start a new church.
I said.
No, not gonna start any new church.
If I do meet together with Christians, it will be recognizing the only church that scripture talks about, the church that began on the day of Pentecost by the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
That's my desire to recognize only that one church and God, it continues to build that church. Wonderful, wonderful truth. But that idea of starting something new prevails in a lot of areas. Brethren, it's not the truth. There is one church, and if we're going to build and each one of us are builders, don't be looking at certain ones that are named laboring Brothers.
This is a room full of laboring brothers. You're all laboring in different ways.
In different contexts, but all laboring in the building of this.
Church.
According to First Corinthians chapter 3 that we had read to us, but.
Notice here Paul speaks here as the prisoner of the Lord, and I like that, you know, he might have said because he was a prisoner of the Roman Empire, he might have said, I therefore the prisoner of the Roman Empire.
But he looks beyond the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire was just a means that God used.
To bring him as a prisoner.
And I, I find this very interesting because, you know, in today's world, we have emphasized to us that everyone has their rights and that you need to respect other people's rights.
OK.
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Let's go to the prison.
Do those prisoners have their rights that they cannot be denied? Can they say to the jailer, excuse me, I'm gonna go out to get a sandwich outside there?
You know that he does not have such rights. And brethren, if we're gonna walk in the truth of one body, we're gonna have to understand that we.
Have given up our rights and that the Lord Jesus is the only one that has the right. Think of it, the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, the only one that never sinned in all his life.
When it came down to the end of his life down here.
He stood before Pilate, and Pilate unjustly condemned him to the death of the Cross.
You know.
Pilate said to Jesus, don't you answer me. Don't you know that I have power, the right to condemn you, to crucify you, or to release you? The Lord Jesus said, Thou couldst have no rights or power against me, except it were given thee from above. In other words, the Lord Jesus in that moment realized.
That there was a hand of his Father that was allowing it all, and the Lord Jesus submitted to the Supreme.
Injustice of crucifixion.
But oh, the blessing that has resulted. Brethren, do we know what it means to lay down our rights for God, for the Lord Jesus?
For his people do you have rights? When I look at the Lord Jesus on that cross suffering for me, brethren, I cannot say anything else, but this heart of mine is a prisoner of Jesus Christ.
He won my.
I can no longer insist on my rights is what's done. This is what's said about me, right? I can leave that with God. He is going to rectify everything in its right time.
Do we know what it means, brethren, to be prisoner of Jesus Christ? I suggest that if we don't know what that means, we are not going to be able to walk worthily of the vocation we have been called in one body.
Notice verse 2.
With all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love.
What interesting words, brethren.
Loneliness. Meekness.
Long-suffering.
Forbearance.
Love.
Loneliness.
You know the Lord Jesus said, take my yoke upon you and learn of me.
Meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest to your souls.
Am I meek and lolly?
I would like to learn those traits, yes.
But it says here, with all loneliness and meekness, anybody want to volunteer and say I've got it all, brethren? I don't think so.
Now we all are learning and no pace better to learn it than.
In the yolk with the Lord Jesus. And it's a personal invitation to each one of us. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me.
You know what a yoke is?
It still is yolks of oxen, sometimes yolks of Burrows in Bolivia, and it's interesting to watch.
We've often seen a man plowing a field with a yoke of oxen.
One time when we were hiking through the countryside came upon kind of a local fair and there was a man training a new ox for the yoke. It was very interesting and instructive and I watched it for quite a while. They take an old ox, it was well accustomed to the oak one side, and then they put the new ox that has never been in a Yup.
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On the other side.
And of course, it's tied to their horns on their head, and then they just merely let them go.
Wow, what instruction it was that new Ox did not like that constraint on his head and threw that up and down and shook his head and rushed forward and went backwards.
And I watched that old ox just suffer for so long. I don't know how long it was half an hour or so. Finally that new ox just got so terribly tired of it all. They just bowed his head and accepted you. I said, Lord Jesus.
Is that the way I make you suffer in this yoke? You've invited this?
To take on us, O brethren, do we know what it means?
To learn loneliness and meekness. Meekness, you know, Moses is called in the Old Testament the meekest man in all the earth. I think it's in Numbers chapter 12.
And it's that chapter where.
Miriam and Aaron were complaining about him because of the wife he had taken. They said it's only the Lord spoken by Moses. Hasn't he spoken by us? Do.
Evidently we're upset at him.
Do people get upset at you? How do you handle it?
There's the test of meekness.
What did Moses do?
Doesn't say he reacted at all at first.
But the Lord defended his servant.
And evidently it was Miriam. She was the oldest of the family of those three children.
And she might have started the murmuring against Moses.
And the Lord smote her with leprosy.
Pretty severe for speaking.
Against Moses.
Moses, what are you going to say about it? You know what he said.
Lord, heal her now, isn't that beautiful? Doesn't seem to be any resentment on his part for what she had said against him.
Do people speak against you?
How do you handle it?
Rather than these are important things if we're gonna walk together as members of one body.
Very important.
Oh, loneliness and meekness.
Then it says with long-suffering.
I'm sure many of you remember.
Dear brother **** Gorgeous, he used to say. We don't pronounce that word right.
It's long-suffering.
Yeah, that's true, brother.
We maybe have learned something that cost us, uh, 1020 years to really properly learn, and then we want somebody else to learn it in a few minutes.
Brother, how long-suffering has our God been with us? Should not we use those same principles of long-suffering with each other?
How it searches my heart, brethren.
Another one forbearing.
What does that mean?
It means that when there's something in my brother that just rubs me the wrong way.
Instead of acting to try to put him in order.
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I simply bear with it. That's for bearing.
You know, we like to talk about discipline of other people sometimes. How about discipline our discipline ourselves? That's what it really comes down to, Forbearing one another and then in love.
Oh, brother. And this is something that really.
Really searches me too. How much do we know what love is? This is the agape love. This is the love that loves not because of the object, but because of the source. He loves us. Why does he love us? He loves all the world. Why does he love the whole world? Because of who he is in his own glorious person.
God is love.
Oh, it's wonderful.
You know when we go into the prison where we are there in Lawrenceville, IL, I like to ask the men sometimes, why does God love us?
First answer, General, is because we're his children. I say, well, if you're not born into God's family, you're not his children, but he still loves you.
You have to receive the Lord Jesus to be one of his children.
So the next answer they give me because we're His creatures, Yes, that's true, and I'm sure He loves us. But there's a better answer. God loves us because God is love. Now that's the same love that's in you and me if we are born into God's family, brethren.
And so our attitude toward one another is love, How important that is. Sometimes you can't show love outwardly, but love should even then be felt.
Oh, how important that it be in love.
Then notice verse 3.
Endeavoring that.
Involves some effort.
To keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
You and I are exhorted to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
There is one body formed by 1 spirit.
There is a unity.
And you and I, if we walk in the Spirit, are going to keep that unity in the bond of peace. But if I let my flesh get.
Out of out in the open and acting, I'm not going to keep the unity of the Spirit.
Remember some time ago I was speaking in a reading meeting, I think it was, and I made this statement. I said we need to be careful not to break the unity of the Spirit.
Brother came up to me afterwards and said we don't break the unity of the spirit.
What in the world does he need?
It's like you were saying brother, sometimes it just didn't get across to us. At the moment it was 3 weeks later in a meeting in a totally different part of the country, the brother made a comment that made it all come to light. What he meant. Either we keep the unity of the spirit or we don't keep it. But the unity of the spirit is never broken. It is a unity maintained by the Spirit of God.
And either I keep it.
Or I don't keep it. May the Lord help us, brethren. May the Lord keep us.
Endeavoring means putting energy into this question. We have an enemy that wants to cause problems and ruptures amongst his people. Don't let yourself be an instrument in that.
Yes, the truth is the truth. That's the standard. We cannot compromise it. But let's.
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Walk in such a way that we are keeping the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. What I had on my heart. Brother like to leave some time for somebody else.
I'd like to read a verse in Amos.
3rd chapter.
I guess 3 verses.
Amos chapter 3, verse one.
Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against your children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, sang You only have I known of all the families of the earth. Therefore will I punish you for all your iniquities can to walk together.
Except they be agreed.
And another verse in First Peter.
First Peter chapter one.
Speaking of Christ, well, it's reverse 19.
And 20.
But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, who barely was foreordained or should be translated. Mr. Darby translates it for known before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you.
Romans.
Chapter 8.
Verse 28.
And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God.
To them who are the called according to His purpose, for whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate, to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first born among many brethren. Moreover, whom He did predestinate, them He also called, and whom He called them He also justified, and whom He justified them He also.
Glorified.
I'd like to talk a little bit about this word.
4044.
God is omniscient.
He knows everything.
Nothing, but he does not know.
God is, and here's a word that perhaps we're not quite familiar as much with omniscience, prescient. He knows all beforehand that is going to take place.
This little word for no is neither omniscience, God knowing all things, nor prescience that he knows all ahead of time.
Because of that was the case, it says whom he did *****.
He predestinated for blessing, and if it just means all that he knew ahead of time and all that he knows altogether, he knew all men, and therefore all men would be predestinated to glory. It's not true.
For we know there are those who are going to a lost eternity. What is this word for known mean?
We read an Amos.
You have I known of all the families in the earth. It's the same word, but in Hebrew.
You only have I known.
Does that mean he didn't really know anybody in this world but Israel?
Of course not.
It means a class of persons.
Israel called of God, He said you only.
Of all nations have I know he called them for blessing. What about Peter?
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He speaks of Christ, that lamb foreknown from before the foundation of the earth.
This foreknown just mean that God looked down the long Ave. of time.
And so that Christ would decide, the Son of God would decide to come to be the Lamb of God.
Or does it mean it was determined from a past eternity?
That the eternal Son of God would come into this world to be that Lamb to give himself.
A sacrifice for sin on Calvary's cross. It was all determined from a past eternity. And when we come to Romans 8 when it says whom he did foreknow, it doesn't mean God just looked down the long Ave. of time and saw who would believe. It's a class of persons that he set his love upon. He foreknew you.
And me.
From before this world was ever founded.
And in time he called us by the gospel.
Whom he did foreknow, he also did.
Predestinate.
To be conformed to the image of his son.
We read in our chapter in the readings chosen in Christ from before the foundation of the world.
God's sovereign choice of His elect.
And then he says predestinated.
Unto Sonship.
Election is God's sovereign choice. Predestination is His purpose to bring us into a particular relationship with Himself.
But he called us in time.
By the Gospel, Why?
Because as we were born into this world with a nature lost in sin, not one of us would come to God.
Chapter 9 of Romans.
Verse 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy, on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion.
Upon whom I will have compassion, so that it is not of him that willeth.
No inward determination of human nature, no matter how strong. It's not of him that willeth.
Nor of whom that runneth no outward efforts on the part of man in any way.
Not of him that runneth.
But of God.
That showeth mercy.
It's just because He said His sovereign love upon you and me.
We would not have come otherwise.
Gospel of John.
Chapter One.
Verse 10 And he was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.
And he came unto his own, and his own received him not.
But as many as received him to them gave he power.
To become the sons of God or the children of God, The right, it really should say, or the privilege.
To become the children of God, even to them that believe on his name.
In believing on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, He has given the right, the privilege for those that believe to know themselves in a relationship with God as His children and to one another, something unknown in the Old Testament.
But now that Christ is coming, he's brought in something new, a relationship for those who have faith that was not known in the Old Testament.
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Verse 13 which?
Were born.
Not of blood.
Look at the emphasis which were born those who came, those who believed were those who were born of God Going to hold our place here and read one verse in James chapter one.
Verse 18.
For of His own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.
Of his own will.
Life was imparted and those who were, were born of God.
Were those who came by faith. They had a life given to them.
That they might have ears to hear.
Faith to receive and when they did believe on his name, they were brought into a relationship that they had never had before.
John's Gospel chapter one again, which were born not of blood, not by natural descent, not by any human or earthly relationship of any kind.
Not by blood.
Nor of the will of the flesh. Again, not of any inward purpose or desire on my part. As I was born into this world, I had no thought for God. He came into this world, and the world knew Him not, and I was among them, and you were too.
Not by the will of the flesh.
Nor of the will of man, nor of the purpose of any other person acting upon you.
Nor of the will of man.
Thought of God.
Whom he did for now.
Then he did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son.
That little portion in Romans goes from eternity to eternity, for it ends then he also glorified, for which we are waiting.
Sing #2.
#2.
Father twas my love and good luck.
On the day, come on before.
I came up to Jesus, I prayed to come back by his breathing. I praying for my life and wealthy.
98 10-4 10-4 10-4 080 10-4 10-4 10-4 oh 10-4 10-4 oh 10-4 10-4 10-4 820-120-0000 oh oh oh oh oh oh oh 59004 10-4 10-4 oh 10-4 oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh Glow praise grey.