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Come around and pray and color and peace and to all the answers.
Ever liked me?
As well, I hear they are working hard and Holy Land.
May the scripture in First Chronicles 15 and.
Share a thought that was mentioned at the recent Dorothy meetings.
First Chronicles 15, verse 26.
And came to pass when God helped the Levites that bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord, that they offered seven bullocks and seven Rams.
Believe if we go to.
Samuel that it was every six paces, which would have been about 30 feet or thereabouts.
And the thought was that there had been difficulty before with moving the ark, and when they saw the Lord's help even making it another 30 feet.
That they offered to God and gave thanks.
And I was impressed by the prayers this morning. There were a couple about Help Us Today and Fresh Grace.
And may we have the spirit of this, that even if we go 30 feet, we feel the Lord's help, that we would have that sense of praise, Thanksgiving, and just.
Acknowledging the Lord's help and encouragement.
Let's pray.
Our Father.
App.
Lithians chapter 3, beginning at verse one. Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you. To me indeed is not grievous, but for you it is safe. Beware of dogs, Beware of evil workers.
Beware of concession, for we are the concession which worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh, though I might also have confidence in the flesh, if any other man thinketh that he has, whereof he might trust in the flesh. I more circumcised the 8th day of the sack of Israel of the tribe of Benjamin.
And Hebrew of the Hebrews as touching the law, a Pharisee concerning zeal, persecuting the church, touching the righteousness which is in the law blameless. But what things were gaining to me, those I counted laws for Christ, ye doubtless. And I count all things but loss for the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things.
And do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having my own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith. But I that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death.
If by any means I might attained unto the resurrection of the dead, not as though I had already attained either were already perfect, but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus, brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended. But this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind.
00:05:18
And reaching forth unto those things which are before I press toward the mark.
For the price of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore as many as be perfect. Be thus minded. And if in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule. Let us mind the same thing, brethren.
Be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an example for many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you, even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, whose mind earthly things.
For our conversation is in heaven.
From whence also we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working, whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself?
A little, just a little quick outline. My son-in-law gave me this just a few minutes ago. In the first chapter going out with the gospel, Second chapter going down to a lowly Christ, third chapter going up to Christ in glory. The 4th chapter is going on by the Spirit. I like that.
This third chapter is sort of a parenthesis.
You can see that when you turn to the 4th chapter and he.
Picks up the threat of things that he had been dealing with in the second chapter, namely the contentions that were mounting in that assembly.
In this chapter, as you see, we have the upward mind. He's going to bring before us the motivation for living the Christian life. He's told us the the spirit in which we are to live it in the second chapter is to go down and imitate the loneliness of the Lord Jesus. But the motivation for living is to pursue after him in glory. So this chapter brings that out. It's pursuing Christ in glory and he brings his own history in to illustrate how that.
Pursuing Christ in glory has such a power that it can transform a person's life even if someone is entrenched in a certain course of things like he was. That there is such a power in pursuing after Christ and glory that it can produce a radical change and even someone who is such a zealot as he was.
It seems just to add to this, like in the second chapter, verse three, it says let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in loneliness of mind by each esteem other better than themselves. He has the whole epistle interspersed with that, those thoughts. It's not just the third chapter or the 4th chapter, but there it is in the second chapter, and it's beautiful to see how I couldn't help but I read through the epistle.
Several times this morning was several times with the King James and then with Mr. Darby's translation. I recommend you do that every day you read this epistle. It is so needed by every one of us.
It's interesting to see how he begins by commanding us to rejoice in the Lord. Believe that foundation of all, isn't it? Often we may want to rejoice in the things that we do ourselves. Sometimes we may rejoice in the people that we like. Sometimes we will rejoice in the circumstances that we are put into or that we are proud of. But here he said, rejoice not just being, not just to rejoice, but he said, finally, brethren, rejoice in the Lord.
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That's the end of the race. That's the goal before the soul. Finally Christ.
The word finally is in the third chapter, it's not in the 4th. So it's the ultimate or ultimately rejoice in the Lord.
And he could say that not from an armchair, but from a dirty dungeon in Philippi with Silas.
Convert chapter 4, verse four says Rejoice in the Lord alway.
Did you listen to that again? I say rejoice. It's important, brethren.
It like has been said, or cannot joy sometimes in circumstances or problems that we have. But brethren, we can always rejoice in the Lord and all that we have in him. We have every reason to be rejoicing, and I think the rejoicing of the Christian is not.
Merely a bubbly exterior, visible joy. It's something that runs deep in the soul. The Lord Jesus when he was rejected in Matthew chapter.
11 He rejoices in spirit. I think that is so impressive to see that our joy is not dependent on circumstances. You mentioned that.
The first day, I think. Larry, didn't you?
Yes, I'm just enjoying so much this thought here that in this first verse finally rather rejoice in the Lord, as you have said, in spite of the circumstances, as we see the warning that he's giving in these first three verses. Beware of dogs. Well, the end of the first verse two, to write the same things into you to me indeed is not grievous, but for you it is safe. Beware of dogs.
Beware of evil workers, beware of the concision, for we are the circumcision which worship God in spirit and rejoice. We can always rejoice in Christ Jesus and when we may feel like everything is going wrong.
All I think of dear ones, dear Saints of God in prison.
As the Apostle Paul here miserable circumstances.
Everything that, naturally speaking, would make us unhappy and.
Troubled, but yet even there. And that's why he speaks with power. Doesn't he rejoice in the Lord? I need that.
It's good to remember that the Philippians were actually going on fairly well. They were a happy assembly, but there was a danger of.
The contention rising among them.
And so he deals with that in the second chapter, giving the remedy there, of course, to follow the Lord Jesus.
In this downward path. But in the third chapter he speaks of another thing that they were in danger of, and that is Judaizing teachers coming among them and encouraging them to put confidence in the flesh whereby they would only spoil the joy that they did have. So he deals with that in this chapter. I was just looking at Bruce at Galatians 5, verse 5, verse 15. He says if you bite and devour one another.
Take heed that she be not consumed one of another. This I say, then walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.
That's characteristic of a dog. They bite and devour, don't they? And that's why he says dogs beware of dogs. There were legalists there that were trying to upset their their foundation, which was grace, wasn't it?
This particular case, the difficulties really is coming in from the within among themselves, not just from the without. So we distinguish these three different categories in their viewer of dogs and I believe these dogs here would be Speaking of a picture of people that as the word, as they put it, shameless evil.
And then they go on and he talked about the evil workers and I believe.
Is a picture here of the false doctrines that are being brought into discourage the things. And then of course it go on and it go and it says be aware of the concisions. And I suppose, as some have put it is that would be those with a spiritual pride. And often it's from the within that the enemy knows the suddenness coming in to distract us. But it's nice to see that he begins the chapter by saying rejoice in the Lord, and then after he'll tell them about the problems that could come in from the within.
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In verse three there he said we are the concessions which worship God in spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh.
The difference between the concision and the circumcision. I think it's this. What's been said is good. Notice the two words are very similar.
We're right at the time of the years when people make New Year's resolutions. I'm not going to smoke anymore.
Not going to drink anymore. I'm not going to swear anymore. And they can go on and on. And they make, in other words, they say I'm going to deny myself in these in these areas. But the circumcision, which is a cutting around getting rid of everything that is of the flesh is different. It's not picking out one or other. The legalist always picks on some point and and hammers upon it and ignores other things because when we put ourselves under law, we're all guilty because we all fail.
You know, if you're under the law, you you've got 10 commandments. Well, which one didn't you break instead of which one did you break? Did you make? But I think that's the difference between concision and circumcision. Do you agree with that? Yes, I do. The very word of the expression, the little part of the first part of the word con means right, and then pro would mean four, right? So they were against.
Cutting off fully con would be against, right? And so there was against the cutting off of the flesh altogether. It was more of a mutilation of the flesh. And it's almost like pruning. You know, when you prune back something, what happens is it only springs forth with more vigor and that's the flex. Excuse me, You can't fix up the flesh. That's it. I found it helpful just to think of concision is cutting at the flesh. Circumcision is cutting off the flesh.
So Judaizers make room for the flesh. They put up rules to control it, but Christianity is completely cutting off the flesh, leaving no room for it at all any longer. That's really where we are in our Christian position.
Is that not the the the theme that comes out here in the passage is that?
God has set aside the 1St man entirely. Now there's there's nothing good in the flesh, whether it be ecclesiastically or in any other way. The systems around us, they presume that there there's something good in the flesh and.
They allow it to intrude into the into the fellowship, into the order and the meetings and so on. But our rejoicing is in Christ Jesus. God has set it aside the flesh entirely in the work of Christ. He's not looking for anything good from the flesh now, and we shouldn't either. It's been set aside and now we have a new standing, as Brother Bob said, in Christ. And our worship now is.
From the Spirit of God, the Newman.
Which does not need a law. The old man cannot keep the law, and the new man doesn't need a law. We're an entirely new position in Christianity. There is liberty.
And the worship is not by ritual and ceremony, but it's by the power of the Holy Spirit. I think that is the point that everything is now in the second man Christ the the 1St man has been entirely.
Put aside.
In the new translation, verse three, it says we worship God by the Spirit of God. It's the IT is the.
New position in Christ, isn't it? And it really is helpful to understand. Sometimes young people don't understand why don't we use music in our services.
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We could sing a little bit more on tune and we could keep up a little better. Well, those are desirable things perhaps. But we are not here to please ourselves, brethren. We are here to worship God.
And what pleases him is worship in spirit and in truth. Musical instruments are not spiritual. They are powerful in moving emotions, and so people like to listen to that. I enjoy listening to instrumental music. But when we are worshipping God, that is not the character of Christian worship. It doesn't really have any place there. What pleases God?
As he looks down into our company is worship in spirit, by the Spirit of God and in truth. It's important to realize that's the character of Christian worship.
It said, isn't it that as we go through this wonderful epistle, we compare it with what's going on in Christendom and just about everything that's going on in Christendom that violates these principles that we're looking at?
And we need to be exercised, don't we, brother Chuck, that these, we don't let these things slip ourselves because we can go right into the same direction. Absolutely.
When Joseph and Mary went today's journey and so on and they couldn't find their son, they went back. It took them a while to find him. Why didn't they know where he'd be? He was just a young boy of 12. Finally they went to the to the synagogue and there he was. That's where he and and and Mary, she was upset. She said, why is that dealt with us? We've we've sought the sorrowing. How is it that she sought me? Didn't you know? This is where I think I'm going. I'm about my father's business.
Where is that?
Yeah, they should have known that.
That's where a spiritual boy would be.
The Apostle Paul was right at the top of the ladder in human righteousness, wasn't he? No one could exceed his attainments here that are recorded, but he found in Christ a righteousness that was infinitely more superior than anything he could produce in the flesh.
But Paul was a man that everyone would look up to. No one could point the finger at him as touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. How few could say that?
Morally and religiously, he was at the very top of the ladder.
And yet when he found Christ as his object and his righteousness, he considered it all as dumb.
I was talking to someone that is very dear to me.
Who has left us and on the system?
And I said to her.
I said the Lord has asked us to remember him.
In his death, when did you last do that? Did you do it last Lord's Day? No, listen to a sermon. They've replaced. Is he? Satan hates the Lord Jesus. He hates it when we no, don't sit down for ministry, but we sit down to give him his place, to worship him, to adore him, to remember him. I said to her with tears. I said.
He's asked you to remember him. Is there anyone here that has sat there, even at the table, but didn't remember him? It's the one thing he wants you to. It's not a command. Some have erroneously said that's a command. No, it's not. He didn't command us to remember him. He expressed his desire that we remember him. He wants response from our hearts to remember him.
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That was of all the meetings that we've had here, the most important meeting was Lord's Day morning.
When we were around Him to give Him His place to worship Him, you see these signs come and worship with us. And that's not worship. They don't even know the difference anymore between worship and ministry. Ministry is from God to us. Worship is from our hearts to Him. And what a privilege that is.
And the sisters can worship just as much as the brothers, not audibly, but they can worship in their hearts. This is what He wants. He wants to see the outflow of our redeemed souls to the one that has redeemed us. I've often thought the Son speaking to the Father when we were around him and giving him his place. Father, think of what they're saying of me.
What they're saying of me, they're worshiping me, and me too. That's our greatest privilege, isn't it? The little hymn.
Part of it, the merits of the Lord appear, they fill the holy place, and that will be our sweet enjoyment throughout eternity. The merits of the Lord and what an object for our hearts now. No confidence in the flesh. And yet even saying this, preaching this, how subtly the flesh will show its ugly head.
But the merits of the Lord appear. The more we're occupied with Him, the more it will.
Stripped the world from us and how we do need do we not each one young and old.
To have eternities values before us and when we value him it puts everything in the right order.
You see, the apostle here listed a few things that he pride himself of and he know that those things he have to set behind. In fact, I believe it listed eight things here that he pride himself up, that perhaps we can look at that. And then once he put away those a things that he prides himself because of the flesh.
Then we find that he knows him. He learned there are 7 new desires that he needs to in order to follow after Christ. Let's look at verse five there. The first thing I believe here was he was proud. He was proud of the fact that he was circumcised the 8th day of the stock of Israel. He knew his origin. He was proud of just that. And then he even go on and say not just the fact that he was circumcised on the eighth day, he said of the tribe of Benjamin, the smallest of the tribes, but yet he was able to be proud of that. And then he go on and he said the third thing here was that he was the Hebrew.
Of the Hebrews Ah is a but that's still not enough. He said. Then you go on further and they said he was as touching the law. He was a Pharisee. You can see that he's getting higher and higher for his own cells as if it were. And then even as a Pharisee, the fifth thing he goes on is just concerning zeal. Boy, how many of us can say we have zeal for the Lord? He did concerning zeal persecuting the church.
And then you still go higher yet touching the righteousness which is of the law. He can say blameless. Oh, from the human standpoint, we see this a qualities there and say, wow, how many of us can even come close to even claiming one or two of this? But what was the result? He said, but what things were gained to me those I counted laws for Christ, all that pride, all that human pride that the flesh would desire.
He counted it all but laws and then let's just jump down to verse nine. He learned quite a few other things actually, the the latter part of verse eight. He said after all this he wanted to set it aside as dumb. He said that I may win Christ. That was the first new desire that he won that he may win Christ and then in verse nine and be found in him. Found in him for what? Not having my own righteousness, which is which is of the law, but that which is true faith of Christ.
The righteousness which is of God by faith. He wondered when Christ he wanted to be found in him, not by his own words of righteousness, but Gods, and then and.
And then we can go down to verse verse 10 there then he said that I may know him. Is that a desire we have this this weekend here as the Lord has brought us here under the sound of his words that we too can say that I may know him or to know more.
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Of Him and then the power of his resurrection.
Do we not find that often, even among Christians, that we forget the power of resurrection? We preach the death, we talk about the death and sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ, but how much more so we have to be reminded that resurrection power. And then they go on and it says the fellowship of his sufferings. And then the sixth thing here is being me conformable unto His death. We're going to be conforming to His image in that future day. But here we can say this too, being conformable.
Unto his death, and one more. I believe the 7th one is further down in verse 12.
Not a part of verse 12.
I follow after that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.
Interesting to note that.
All of them elaborate much of these eight things regarding his.
Earthly upbringing.
Where we had before, he's top of the 3rd Heaven sees those glories and says I can't describe the things you received there. He has certainly described those to us as we have all these epistles. And I'd like to make a connection between the third Evan and the third law that Eudicus was in.
I think it's the same in the sense we are there in that third law and how important it is to move faster those things and enjoy those things.
Keep them. If you fall asleep through them, we are going to take that tumble down. And as it was with him, the life is still in them. We can't lose our salvation. We certainly lose the enjoyment, the things that we have before us here, all those things that Paul brings before us.
In the epistle to Timothy, in contrast to this list that he gives in Philippians three of the things that he was proud of as a Jew and hatred filled his heart against Christians. In first Timothy one verse 12, he says, I thank Christ Jesus, You have enabled me for that. He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry who was before a blasphemer.
And a persecutor and injurious, but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love, which is in Christ Jesus is the faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. So in our chapter he's just listing.
That there wasn't anyone that could outdo him in his hatred towards the Christian people, towards Christians. Now he despises all those things and he becomes the most hated by the Jews, the most hated and persecuted man than he used to be. The Lord said to Ananias, I will show him this Saul of Tarsus, how great things he must suffer for my name.
The things that he was doing to Christians, now he's going to get that all back or we reap what we sow. And he got it back in in increased intensity. They did everything they could to get rid of Paul the apostle.
It's interesting to see that in Romans 11/1 he quotes this fact again that he was of the tribe of Benjamin. Someone has said that in Romans 11 he quotes it as saying it was the tribe that was almost wiped out. The grace of God was there and took him up.
Here he quotes it as being the only tribe that didn't effect from the right position.
That's in the cleavage in the days of Jeroboam.
Perhaps it also connects as well with another saw that was of the tribe of Benjamin. I'm thinking of what we have in First Samuel Chapter 9.
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The first 2 verses. Now there was a man of Benjamin, whose name was Kish, the son of Abuel, the son of 0, or the son of Becarath, the son of Aphia of Benjamite, a mighty man of power. And he had a son whose name was Saul, a choice young man and the goodly. And there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he.
From his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people.
Well, Paul here establishes in Philippians 3 that he was from his shoulders and upward higher than any of the people religiously know, that Saul, who was the 1St man, he was set aside by God. God would take up man. That was after God's own heart. And David, he was taken up with a second man. And so just as the first king of Israel saw must go, Saul comes to the point here in Philippians 3 says the 1St man must go.
There is another man. It's the second man. It's Christ and glory that he would set before our hearts. And so all these things he elaborates here are simply a badge of honor and it all must go. I'm thinking of those comments Mr. Chapter Macintosh made when someone is commenting to him. He says, well, you have the flesh among you just as much as we have it among us. And he says, yes, but we realize it is a thing to be judged, not a thing to be honored.
So when Saul of Tarsus got his second name Paul, it means little.
Quite appropriate, isn't it?
That I enjoyed thinking the things here he gloried in verse five and six.
When he came in contact with the Lord Jesus Christ.
Everything changed. Everything changed, brethren. It's not attacking those things of the flesh that's going to get people to leave them off. What is it that will cause a change so that they will be willing to leave it off?
It's showing them the glories of Christ. Nobody was out there in the road to try to convert, fall and say, hey Paul, all those things you do, righteousness are not worth anything before God. No, he got one glimpse of Christ in glory. Everything changed, he says in verse seven, What things were gained to me? Those I counted lost for Christ.
Past tense.
Notice verse eight. He grows in his apprehension. And now verse 8 is not past tense. It's present tense. Yeah, doubtless, and I count.
All things but lust for the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things. And now it's not merely lost, but he counts them but dumb.
Get it out of here. It has no place around me. I want to know of Christ. He's the one that is enraptured my heart and my soul. Now the rest is done. It's the it's the principle that you mentioned, Bruce, yesterday or the day before of displacement. And I think that's an important principle, brother. And sometimes we attack those things that we see that are not right.
In Christian circles, and I don't say we shouldn't recognize that they're not right, but what in what way can we be a help to others? It's in showing them the glories of the person of Christ. They will see too, that these things that we glory in naturally in the flesh will have no place once you get the living, glorified, exalted Christ before your soul.
That's our standing, isn't it? Be found in Him not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law. That's the standing of the believer.
Not his state here. So we have now a divine righteousness suited to the very presence of God. We we are accepted in the beloved and.
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We have that robe of divine righteousness before God.
The same as Christ has.
Just want to comment a little bit more on verse eight that's going back a little bit here, but.
What he says here, brethren, the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus.
My Lord, I think that's so beautiful, the Excellency. There's nothing more excellent than knowing him. He pursued it, and that's what we have in this portion is.
Paul pursuing the goal. What was it that you want to know more? Paul want to know him better. But don't you know him? Yes, but all the more I learn of him, only what's my desire to know him more and more. And brethren, that's Christianity. I often think that Judaism.
Its focus was on man and what he could produce.
Under a God-given set of rules. And how did that test end up? That test ended with the creator of the universe hanging on a cross. What a story of what man is in the flesh. God in effect said the test is over. I'm not going to test man any longer. Now I want to show you.
My heart. And so in Christianity, the focus is entirely changed. It's not any longer that man that we're looking. We're looking at God and that man who came to make us know who God is. And so Christianity is getting to know him. I really believe, brethren, that we need to be aware of the fact that we are living in a culture.
That is humanistic, and it is constantly pointing back at yourself.
You owe it to yourself. You see that so often in advertising.
Give yourself a break.
Do what you like to do. It's the humanism of our culture. And sometimes I don't believe we're aware of the fact that we are unconsciously being focused back on ourselves. That is not Christianity. That is what was the focus under Judaism. And that's why I really believe we see so many of our young people totally confused. They don't understand.
What are we doing down here?
They're unsatisfied. The comment I hear from so many young people. I'm bored. Why do you get bored? Because you're looking at yourself. You're thinking of your own pleasure. Christianity is something else. Turn around. Look at the Lord Jesus. You're not going to get bored if you're really occupied with Him.
So important that we're aware of the fact that our culture is doing that to us.
And sometimes our young people go off in other directions. Are we aware of the fact sometimes we fall for those humanistic advertising as well? We fall for it, brethren. We need to be aware of the fact we're passing through this culture and we are affected by it. I'm affected by it, brethren, I have to confess. But let's seek in the measure that we can to turn around and to be occupied the.
Excellency of the Knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord.
Something was said the other day about Two Corinthians 12 where Paul was caught up to the 3rd heaven.
Brother And it is fascinating to think about. I mean, there's no way that we can understand very much that side of things. But I I like to think of the fact that fossil Paul saw things there and he heard things there because he talks about visions, which is something you see, but he doesn't say anything about what he saw. He only says something about what he heard.
00:45:07
What he says is he heard unspeakable words.
Oh, brother. And we get up there, I'm convinced to the fact that we're going to be wondering what in the world was I so terribly occupied with those?
Toys down there in that life to have the living God before our souls revealed in the person of the Lord Jesus, the Excellency of the knowledge of our God.
And here we are down here playing around with our toys. Lord help us to get our vision refocused.
I think that's lovely Bob. I'd just like to .1 more thing.
In the First Corinthians.
What God's desire is for us, it's the ninth verse of the first chapter. Because if you want to look at it, it's it pushes the same person.
This is the first assembly that has a epistle written to it and the 1St 9 verses are positive and the ninth verse is very positive.
God is faithful.
By whom you recall unto the fellowship of his son.
Jesus Christ our Lord, that's who we're talking about. It's Christ. It's along the way. We're called to that, and we're going to get to the end of the course in this third chapter. Christ and glory. We're present toward that mark, and it's a race that every believer is going to win.
We're going to end up with Christ and glory, but along the way, God wants all this for us.
I just wonder how many of us are Jews in this room?
And and how many of us could boast of being circumcised the 8th day, or being of the stock of Israel, the tribe of Benjamin, the Hebrew, the Hebrews? So one might ask themselves, how does this apply to us?
Is there nothing that you think you might boast in? There might be those that are wealthier than others in this room. It might be those that have a high position. There might be those that are more gifted in the word of God in danger of being prideful for that and perhaps their gospel preachers and, and they feel that they do a great work for the Lord. If there's any number of things, I think that there's a tendency and the danger and that we can take pride in.
Well, those things need to be stripped away as well, don't they?
And even though we're not Jews, we have a prideful heart. And the tendency is as we all want to be accepted and we all want to be recognized for some great things. But the idea is to set aside anything that we are at all because it's all a part of what is in the flesh. And it's all been dealt with on the cross, and Christ becomes the object. And not too long ago, we had actually gone through this chapter and our brother Bruce had brought out that in verses 7 through 9. It's really, it's a process of time.
And I think that's good to recognize because our tendency is, is we might read a portion like this and we might say how in the world this is we're talking about the great Apostle Paul. He saw a vision on the road to Damascus. He was revealed through the Spirit of God and through communication with the Lord the the wonderful mystery of the blessings that are going to be to the church. He's gone up to the 3rd heaven. He had the flesh, didn't he?
It was a process. He had to learn these same things he had. He had to over a period of time, he had to deal with these issues in his life. So that so that at the end.
That that there is nothing he wants to be found.
Standing before the Lord in glory, having Christ as his object, and recognizing that everything that he is.
Is due to that person. There is no righteousness that he could ever boast in, and he wants to strip of that now, and he wants us to strip of that now.
He was not occupied with himself. There was a noticing verse 12 here in 13. He had not arrived, hadn't felt that he did as we read here not as though I had already attained either were already perfect, but I follow after, if that I might apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.
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Rather than I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing.
This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth to those things which are before I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus we've had brought before us Why the apostle Paul?
Set aside all his achievements and everything, and I was thinking, today, there's such a thrust in the world and so often it can creep into our mentality too, to know things, to know a lot about a lot of things.
But setting all of that aside.
One who enjoyed the Lord, who knew perhaps much more of him than maybe any other.
Yet in knowing something of Christ, he not only says in verse 10 that I may know him.
That I may know him as the goal, as the purpose of life. There's where the secret of.
Fulfillment and joy and happiness is to be found that I might know him.
And then there's two other things here in this tenth verse and the power of his resurrection.
And then, and this is striking, the fellowship of what? Of his sufferings.
What a sense these these chapters, this book of Olympians seems to bring before us for our own exercise and for our own good.
The press's privilege that is ours to enjoy Christ as Paul was in the enjoyment of Christ in his life, and we see that as something to exercise our hearts, maybe walk in enjoyment of him.
We sing a little hymn. Jesus, thou art enough.
And I love that other little poem that a dear brother faithfully sent me many years ago.
Hast thou seen him, heard him, known him?
Oh, what is another line of it? What has stripped the seeming beauty from the idols of the earth? Not the sense of right or duty, of the sight of peerless worth. Peerless worth. That will be the sweet, blessed enjoyment of our hearts for all eternity. We cannot begin to realize, beloved brethren, how glorious a hope, how blessed.
Our eternity will be in knowing Jesus as our Savior, how it makes everything pale down here, and oh, may our hearts be touched today.
And each day that we might purpose in our hearts to plead to Him, and to see the emptiness of everything that would rob us of Christ.
In verse nine it says and be found in him. That's eternity, but in verse 10 it says that I may know him. That's I don't think that is eternity, is it? I think that's today it's a process of growth. It's growing to understand, to know the person, to know his life, to know his obedient walk before his father, to know what it was for him to suffer on Calvary's cross, to know what it was for him to glorify his God and his father.
To provide a way who we were once so far off to be brought nigh to know the power of his resurrection, to know what we are as a new creation, a new creature, to be identified with a, with a, with a risen savior, to be identified with A to have a life that's identified with that one. It's it's what gives us power to go through this world. And the more we know of Christ, the the less of us appears in our lives, the more that we understand.
What the resurrection has done and brought us into the more we have power to walk in an obedient path before God.
And so that gives us also the ability and strength and power to have fellowship with his suffering. We wouldn't want to have fellowship with his suffering if we didn't know him. We wouldn't want to have fellowship with his suffering if we didn't really enter into the power of his resurrection. And so then it may be to be made conformable onto his death. Well, that's how we know that to know him is down here. It's because at the end it may be that we might die.
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And to be made conformable on to His death, if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection among the dead. That is, that we might experience everything that the Lord Jesus himself experienced as a man in this world, that obedient life, that suffering, that going into death and being raised like He was. That is to experience or to attain on the resurrection from among the dead. It's the complete experience. Not all of us are going to go through that, are we? The Lord may come right now.
But there will be those, and there are those that have gone before us that that will go through the fuller experience of what Christ went through than others. As we think of the power of his resurrection. The 1St chapter of Ephesians comes to mind. I wonder if we could read just a few verses there in the in that chapter, maybe starting with the.
The 17th verse.
Or 16th Ceased not to I ceased not to give thanks for you, making mention of in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling, and what is the richest of the glory of His inheritance in the Saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe according.
According to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the death.
And set him at his own right hand in heavenly places, and so on.
Mr. Potter said that's the greatest power that God has ever exercised or ever will exercise, the power of raising Christ from the dead and us associated with it.
The beginning of a new creation.
Man, who is the head of it, resolved it to the highest place. How do you get to know him better?
You're not one of the 12 apostles that accompanied with him when he was down below, heard his words and saw what he did and how he acted in all the circumstances through which he passed. How do we know that? Well, we have the four Gospels, we have the Bible. That's the only way we can find out how he was when he was here. Paul had an advantage over us and that he was caught up to the 3rd heaven. He heard and he saw.
Unspeakable things.
3rd Heaven right where the Lord was. And so he had an advantage that the earthly disciples didn't have, and we don't have those, but we have something the early Christians didn't have. They didn't have this book.
They didn't have this book. We have the most precious possession and anything that you own. Nothing compares with this. If you were given a choice and the enemy came was going to take skip you of everything that you own. What would you keep should be this book because this book tells me what he is what he was like and what he is and.
Do you read it?
Every day, consistently.
You have a set. It's set so you read so much every day and you'll get through the whole book.
It's not just the New Testament, but everything.
We know how we got here. We know how the world was created. This book gives us all these truths.
And how often do we read it? How often do you go out with your pockets full of tracks and go from house to house to tell others about that busted one? We have so many opportunities. You talked about getting bored. You're not going to get bored if you live a Christian life, if you really get out, if you go out, as it says in the first chapter of Philippians, go out with the gospel, you won't get bored when you do that. And when you take the low place and go down, you won't get bored in doing that if you realize that.
That's necessary to get rid of self and then to go up where he is. That's where I'm going to. That's where I'm going to be soon. And and he's my life and he's in the glory. I'm going to be there with him and like him. And then to go on not to give up our numbers. I remember Eric Smith used to tell us that, you know, we're going to be down to the twos and threes. I sat there and shook my head. No, it's not going to get like that. Oh, how wrong I was.
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How wrong I was?
It is that way in many places.
The twos and threes, but he's there, but it's only two or three. If he's in the midst, then then that's the most blessed place you can be on face of the earth. Speaking brother of the reading of the word of God and how much we need it. There are two brothers sitting here right now and I won't mention their names, but one was telling me or telling a few of us about how their peers, they're about the same age.
And they're getting a little older in years now. And you know who you are when I mentioned this, but one of them said, you know, brother so and so he just seemed to be so much into the word all the time. And so I'm going to kind of copy him and do it too. And so I started reading the word and I found the difficulty at first to stay interested, didn't understand the lots and but I kept reading the word.
And little by little I became addicted to it and I became excited. I couldn't wait till the next time I could sit down and read the precious Word of God. And, and so it is with us. I would just, I wouldn't think to encourage our hearts, brethren, is if you read it and you find a little difficulty, I'm not getting much out of it. Continue to read it. Read it and read it and read it. And as a dear brother once said, and I think it was quoted earlier in the conference here.
That read the word of God and tell your soul saturated with it is to think in terms of scripture. Read His precious word. It's not a luxury, it's a necessity, brother. It's a blessing to our souls.
To young people, I said it before, say it again. Don't wait till you're my age.
Do it when you're young, when your mind is keen, when you can retain what you've read.
You have all the energy of youth.
Use that energy for Him. You'll never regret it. Never. And I look back at the hours that I spent in my study in that and in the Word of God, I don't. I don't regret that for one moment, and you won't either if you do it.
We can only know a person as we are in their company. Is that right? I know a lot about Prime Minister Harper in Canada.
But I don't really know him. He lives in my city and very prominent, but I've never sat down and spoken to Prime Minister Harper, who is a believer. But we have a wonderful privilege to know the Son of God and to walk with him. He died in order to have our company, not only for this world, but for all eternity. What I was thinking, brethren, that.
So many things that would militate against this. There's the old nature and Satan is opposed to every step that we make in the things of the Lord, every step of progress and and we have the world that is appealing to the old nature as well.
These things we have to keep in the place of death, don't do we not you mentioned check the reading of the Gospels and how important that is. That's what we get really in chapter 2, isn't it? It's his humiliation when he's down here. I like to think of chapter 3 as more Christ as an object in glory to be pursued. And that's what you get in the epistles, didn't you, is exaltation. And it is something that really forms you the more you're occupied with it, it it.
Transforms you if you look at verse in Second Corinthians.
Chapter 3, last verse, it says we all. It's something that is for all God's people, not just certain ones with open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord.
Are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord, so it's Christ in glory, and it is presented here as an object to be pursued.
And I think it is extremely wonderful to meditate on Him in His glory. Those verses you read, Larry, in the end of Ephesians, one you read to a certain point. Do you mind if I go back and read the rest of that because it is so precious?
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Verse 19. I'll read from there forward, What is the exceeding greatness of his power to us word, who believe according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places.
Far above all principality and power and might and dominion in every name that is named.
Not only in this world, but also in that which is to come, and have put all things under his feet, and gave Him to be the head over all things to the Church which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth All in all there is a man in the glory of God.
One of the human race has penetrated the glory of God and he is there the highest position possible.
Brethren.
That's the object before herself.
So that's what he means, isn't it? In verse 12? Not as though I had already attained the Apostle Paul all of his life down here. Even as much as he knew and as knew of Christ, there was still more he could learn about him, wasn't there? Nor either was already perfect. He wasn't there yet.
But I follow after that was his pursuit to know more of Christ down here, wasn't it? I follow after if that that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended in of Christ Jesus. So what a wonderful thing it is. We could we could look at this this man in prison, the most difficult of circumstances and even in prison he can't move anywhere yet his mind and his thoughts are to continue to run the race.
And then not only that, but what is it that his desire was that we would run that race as well. How, how often we would be occupied with our sorrow, our difficult trial, our, our, what we're going through. We'd be so preoccupied with, with how sorrowful we are that that Christ ceases to be an object. But it wasn't that way with the apostle Paul.
He desired more of that object and then not only that.
There he was as an example for us. He desired that we too.
Would follow after that same course, that same path and have him as our object there was.
Diligence and devotedness there wasn't there. And I was thinking that we could turn this for a moment to Second Timothy 2.
And see a verse and I believe that someone correct me if I'm wrong here. I don't have my new translation open to it, but it's verse 15. But I believe the word is do thy diligence there to show thyself approved unto God, a Workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. I remember some years ago when we had the the joy of having our our dear brother Gordon Hay Holt with us and we were he's quite elderly at the time and quite tired after traveling.
And we were discussing something, I don't remember what it was, but he didn't feel like he really quite understood the question or the had an answer. And what really spoke so loudly to some of us sitting there was the fact that as tired as he was, there was that diligence. There was that diligence in the things of the Lord to learn and to know what the Lord was saying.
In connection with this question, but how we there needs to be diligence with us as there was with the apostle Paul that he might know him and here we find it. I believe it is. Does someone have a new translation Agreed that.
That verse it says, Strive diligently to present thyself approved to God.
A Workman that needeth not, that has not to be ashamed. Strife stride diligently. Thank you.
There's a good verse in Proverbs goes right along with that. It's been helpful to me. Proverbs chapter 13, verse four. The soul of the slugger desirous and hath nothing.
And there's possibly a lot of hungry souls here.
But the soul of the diligent shall be made fast in Proverbs 13-4.
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This vert, this word apprehended means to be laid hold of.
So he says that I may lay hold of that for which also I am laid hold of by Christ Jesus. In other words, brethren, God has laid hold of us. He has arrested us. He has a purpose in mind for us. What is that purpose He has in mind for you and me? Is that we?
Might lay hold of what he has in mind for us Christ in glory. And then he says in verse 13, I count not myself to have laid hold on it, but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth under those things which are before I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
One thing I do you know, we live in a world where we get so many things in our lives. We get cluttered. Our lives are cluttered with so many things.
And that distracts we need to have.
Purpose of heart, like you say Larry, we need to remember one thing is important and so there was one thing before the apostles soul is to reach forward to that goal, remember.
Chapter Brown talking about these verses and I really enjoyed what he had to say about verse 14. He says it's the word pictures being painted of a runner.
Who is getting close to the goal and he's putting every ounce of strength in just one thing. He's not thinking about anybody around, just one thinking one thing. Every ounce of strength is going and getting to that goal. Brethren, if we would understand the supreme value of that prize, we would run that way too.
Years ago. Or I still do, I don't know.
I have a client who held the long jump record built a special room.
Six hours a day he exercised.
To win that record didn't stop there. He was always trying to beat that record. He had one goal in mind.
Just to continue on.
To win that gold medal.
I also had the privilege of being in the presence of AC Brown, seeing the room where he did most of his work.
In reading in a closet. Very small.
A little chair on the back of the door and that's where he meditated. Read the word of God, that this person who won the gold medal.
My own shame I don't spend 6 hours a day.
So to summarize a little bit, because we're drawing to a close here, he has called the Saints to rejoice.
And he has spoken of the source of the Saints joy, and that is to lay aside everything to do with fleshly pursuits, things that were ambitions that we might have in this world. In his case it was to be the top dog in the Jews religion. But for us it could be in any number of things like he, like you were saying.
With the man that wanted the gold medal, it still lay aside all those ambitions and to pursue after Christ in glory. That is the secret of Christian joy. Dear young people, do you hear what I say? As long as you think that there's going to be real happiness and pursuit after ambitions on earth, you're going to find out that it's not the case. The real joy, real, true Christian joy is pursuing after Christ in glory.
Gives his own experience as an example for us because there was number one that was more deeply involved in the course that he was going on before God reached him and the power of that new object in his life changed everything. And so we have here really at the end of the chapter 3 states.
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It is to be thus minded with the apostle Paul, which he adds as being really perfect, that is, Christian maturity. Then he speaks of a second state, and that is to be otherwise minded. Then in the few verses further in verse 19, he speaks of those who are earthly minded. So we have the thus minded, the otherwise minded, and the earthly minded, and in relation to how he is laid out the Christian path of pursuing Christ in glory, every one of us are in one or the other of these three states.
To be thus minded would be to have laid aside other ambitions and pursuits that we might have in life, and to pursue Christ as our goal, as that one singular object. But he understands that not everybody is at that place in their Christian experience. So he allows for growth by Speaking of those who might be otherwise minded. They may have still a few other irons in the fire that they are pursuing. And he says to them in verse 16.
Nevertheless, whereunto we have already attained, let us walk in the same rule. And So what he's saying is to what you have attained to walk in that what you have understood. Walk up to the light that you do have and God will give it to you and he'll show you even more. And then he speaks in a sad way of those who could be earthly minded, and he speaks in a parenthesis there, verse 18 and 19 of the earthly minded, because really he's Speaking of those who are.
Mere professors who did not have life at all. And that's a reference to verse two, no doubt. And but he is bringing before us really the end of a path of one who pursues the earth with earthly mindedness. And it does have application as far as the principle is concerned that a Christian could be taken up with the earth too, even though he's really Speaking of those who are mere professors. So what a what a summary that he has brought out here in these three mines.
Trusted everyone of us would be thus minded with the Apostle Paul.
And then he speaks about it in the end of the chapter, when we will be with and like Christ, who is the goal and the prize. That's that day, what we're looking forward to when Christ will come and he, he will change our vile body that should really be our bodies of humiliation and make them like his glorious body.
But a days before us, give us the thought on the verse 20, our conversations in heaven. That's not a good translation there the citizenship, isn't it?
It's closer to that. Closer to that, Yeah. The Greek word is polito, Oma. That sounds like politics, doesn't it? And our politics, our associations of life, everything is in heaven, not down here. To get occupied with things here. You're not in the you don't have the Christian object.
Our place is there, our Commonwealth, our associations of life, our politics. Who are you going to vote for? I always say I already voted. Would you vote for? Well, my man's in. I'm waiting for him to come out.
Just one blessed Lord.
But now we've gotten to the point I have two pamphlets, both printed at Moody Bible Institute. One goes back when I was really young and then the other one much later, and they're just diametrically opposed, the one to the other. The first one was very sound, that the Christian is not to get involved in politics. And the second one, if you don't, you're not a good Christian.
That's where we are today.
Second Timothy.
That person was driving diligently. We also got verse 5 where it says no man is crowned except they strive lawfully.
At the end of that verse 16 or 15 where it says.
Not be ashamed. The new translation puts it this way, it says.
Cutting in a straight line, the word of truth. Cutting in a straight line, the word of truth. With those shortcuts and no deviation, they're pressing towards the mark. And as to these thoughtfully as well as those that were.
Just like to mention that the flesh is not satisfied with one object, and the Lord Jesus only had one object and that was to satisfy His Father, to please his Father perfectly in all things. And so we find him repeating the statement in John's Gospel. I believe it's four times. I do always those things that please my Father. You only have one object, but the flesh isn't satisfied with that. And Satan is the author of multiple choice and he would desire to distract our hearts.
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That we might not have one object. And so the apostle Paul says here in verse eight that I have suffered the loss of all things. All, not most, but all things. And he only had one thing left. It was Christ in that prison cell. And the heart is going to be satisfied. You and I are going to be satisfied when we have Christ. And that's all we're going to have in the glory. And the flesh doesn't want it. And so we need to keep that, the flesh in the place of death.
And have that one object. The Lord spoke to that young man in Mark's Gospel chapter 10, and he says one thing thou lackest. There was just one thing that he wouldn't give up. And the riches of this world had attracted his heart. And so may the Lord just give us grace to sell it all, to give it all, and just to have Christ. I'll just give you an illustration, Our brother David Hurlbut and Cindy his wife.
And their two children, their hosts, burned to the ground. They lost everything. They didn't have anything, only the clothes that was on their backs and the car that they were driving. That's all they had. And did it change their joy in the Lord? I believe in a sense that it increased their appreciation of Christ. And so, you know, if we would go on just with that one object before us and seek grace to lay aside every weight and the sin that the Soeizer beside us and have Christ before us.
When we leave this scene, that's all we're going to have is Christ.
And Satan appears to saw.
Good life ain't nothing I'm experiencing.
With my father is great, so calm down.
No Fear reaching others now, preaching where it's Christ on our side.