Regina Conference: 2023
Table of Contents
Luke 22:1-9
Reading
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Lord, thou astronaut after.
Now let us run, and every time by president.
Are comforting.
I shall.
Desire.
I am a president. Save your.
Wild nor fear, nor sin, and.
I want to share.
Our gratitude.
Our hearts.
Are wrong before.
On the train to come down the world of all my grace of.
Earthly.
I.
See you.
And you are busy.
In our hearts to move.
Mercedes.
Benz.
Take up a little part of Luke's Gospel chapter 22.
And perhaps from verse seven we could read from verse one, but I have exercised to take up from verse 7 down to.
Perhaps we could read the 1St?
Meeting here until first 30.
There is an awakening, a work of the Spirit of God is, our brother has said in Brazil. There is a work of God going on in Australia. There's a work of God going on in other parts of the world where Christians are leaving the church systems and are seeking to be gathered to the Lord's name on divine ground.
And we have a generation that has grown up not hearing much truth in connection with what it is, the precious privilege and the normal condition of things for believers to be gathered by the Spirit of God to the precious name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I believe it might be helpful for us to take up this passage together and just allow the Spirit of God to bring it before us.
Luke chapter 22, then perhaps from verse one down to verse 30.
00:05:16
Luke chapter 22, verse one. Now the Feast of Unleavened Bread drew nigh, which is called the Passover.
And the chief priests and scribes sought how they might kill him, for they feared the people.
Then entered Satan into Judas, surname Iscariot being of the number of the 12. And he went his way and communed with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray him unto them. And they were glad and covenanted to give him money, and he promised and sought opportunity to betray him unto them in the absence of the multitude. Then came the Day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover must be killed. And he sent Peter and John saying, Go and prepare us the Passover, that we may eat.
And they said unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare? And he said unto them, Behold, when ye are entered into the city, there shall a man meet you bearing a pitcher of water. Follow him into the house where he entereth in. And he shall say unto the good men of the house. The Master saith unto thee, Where is the guest chamber, where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples? And he shall show you a large upper room furnished. There make ready. And they went, and found as he had said unto them.
And they made ready the Passover. And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the 12 apostles were in. And he said unto them, with desire, I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I say unto you, I will not anymore eat thereof until it be fulfilled in the Kingdom of God. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves. For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the Kingdom of God shall come.
And he took bread, and gave thanks, and break it, and gave unto them, saying, This is My body which is given for you. This do in remembrance of Me. Likewise also the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the New Testament in My blood, which is shed for you. But behold, the hand of him that betrayeth Me is with Me on the table, and truly the Son of Man goeth, as it was determined, the woe unto that man by whom he is betrayed. And he began to inquire among themselves which of them it was that should do this thing.
There was also a strife among them which of them should be accounted the greatest. And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles exercised lordship over them, and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors. But you shall not be so. He that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he that is chief, as he that hath served the weather is great, or he that sitteth that meat, or he that serveth, is not he that sitteth at me, but I am among you, is he that serveth. Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations.
And I appoint unto you a Kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me, that you may eat and drink at my table in my Kingdom, and sit on the Thrones, judging the 12 tribes of Israel.
The church had not yet been formed as we read in chapter 22 of Luke's Gospel. The church was formed on the day of Pentecost and we could read of that in Acts chapter 2.
But this was a transitionary portion, you might say, and the Lord.
Here brought before his disciples.
The fact that he was going to be.
Crucified that he was going to be rejected. We could read it in Luke's gospel. Just turn back to chapter 19. I think it is.
No, it's chapter 18.
In verse 31.
So He reinforced this many, many times in His ministry. At the end He spoke of it as well. Verse 31 of Luke 18. Then he took unto him the 12 Said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem.
And all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished, for he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spit it on, and they shall scourge him.
And put him to death, and the third day he shall rise again. And they understood none of these things, and this saying was hid from them, Neither knew they the things which were spoken.
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And so they were not indwelled with the Spirit of God. They had a hard time understanding the concept that the Messiah was going to be crucified, He would be rejected. They knew that He was harassed. They knew that He was rejected of the nation in some sense. And so on the night of the portrayal of the Lord, He gathered them together in that large upper room and He.
The Spirit of God brings before us morally a moral order in Luke's gospel.
And so Judaism was going to be set aside, not added to, not improved. Judaism was going to be set aside and Christianity as a new entity, a new living Organism, the church was going to be formed in this world. And he was laying down, you might say, the principles of what it would be and how they would.
Leave Judaism in connection with worship and they would come into the presence of the Lord on a different principle, on a different basis and how they would get there to be in his presence. And so this is the how he brings it out in a couple of different passages. But this upper room scene is very significant to the Christian testimony. And I might just say this it's if you've read.
Mr. Willis hid treasures a little book called Hid Treasures, Mark 14, verse 14.
It says.
Wheresoever he shall go in, He shall say to the Goodman of the house. The master says, where is the guest chamber? Well, Mr. Darby's translation is translated, and in the Greek as well, I believe. Where is my guest chamber? Where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples? It's the only place that the Lord called His own. His own place in this scene was that gas chamber and that same word.
Guest chamber is translated in, It's translated different ways, but it's the inn. It's just a place that you and I are in, a temporary dwelling place in the presence of Christ himself.
We're in. We're provided for at his expense as guests were there as guests in his presence.
And his delight is to have us there. So this little passage of Scripture just goes over the principles of how we're brought into his presence.
And what should characterize us as we're there?
Often when we read scriptures, we look at a story and we try to interpret the story.
But every story has a background to it, so to understand this.
A very Jewish setting. We need to understand scriptures from beforehand.
So here it begins by talking about the Feast of Unleavened Bread. We often skip over that. And it's not my desire to go through the seven feasts. We need to lay the foundation first, don't we? What is the Feast of Unleavened Bread? And then the statement go on and say, which is called the Passover.
Is the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
Thou Passover, we need to understand basic principle. Now I'm going to leave that as a question, perhaps with very little comment on it, and then we can follow, perhaps let's turn to Leviticus chapter 23. And there's a reason I point to that, because of the timing. That's what I had more so than the event.
Now I know we're familiar with the feast of with the Passover feast, so the Leviticus chapter 23. I'm just going to point out the time and event in verse 5. Is that in the 14th day of the first month?
And even is the Lord's Passover. Now here's another principle that the day begins a evening, and the morning as a day.
We often think our day is the morning, the evening as a day. The day starts in the evening to go through darkness and then light. So it sets here the 14th day of the month. That's the Passover.
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Verse 6.
On the 15th day.
Of the same month is the feast.
Of unleavened bread.
So when is the unleavened bread being held?
The day after, isn't it? It doesn't take us much to figure that out. If it's on the 14th for the Passover, the next day, on the 15th, is the unleavened bread. Now I'm going to jump one more.
Verse 10.
Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall weep the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheave of firstfruit of the harvest unto the Lord, and he shall wave the sheep before the Lord, and be accepted for you on the Morrow after the Sabbath.
The prize shall waive it. This is known as the fees of the first fruit.
The fees are Passover is the picture of death.
We know that unleavened bread he speaks off, we become holy.
As the leaven is being put to death, the feast of the first fruit is resurrection that you read it the day, the the day, the morning after the Sabbath, that's on the 17th day. All happens within three days. So death and resurrection go together. Now let's go back to the chapter to tie this Jewish setting. It was Jewish setting as our brother Robert mentioned there. The church hasn't been formed yet. Resurrection hasn't happened yet.
In fact, death hasn't happened yet, so they're going back to the old way. And the Jews of old probably didn't even they were mingling in the two fees as if it was one.
Just let me be a little bit technical.
Some of you may remember the Passover is to be held is set between the two evenings. So that's between the 14th day and the 15th day. So I'm going to use today's day to make it easier and I'm going to borrow a phrase from the Catholic system. Some of you may have heard of the phrase Good Friday.
Friday is a good frame of reference. So they have from Thursday at 3:00, that's the 14th day. Friday is the 15th day to 3:00 of that day, so part of that day.
So the Passover fees is actually could be held on the day of the unleavened bread. So we find the Lord in this scene is on the 4th evening of the 14th day, but he didn't die until the next day. He was the true Passover.
That they have to understand. So the two feasts in a sense is the same, but there's two separate feasts. So here very Jewish in nature.
And then they said the Passover must be killed.
I don't know, perhaps someone can correct me on this. I don't know of anywhere that said they went and got a lamb and if you follow the rules on the 10th day, four days before that on the 10th day, a lamb, a lamb without blemish and they would have could kill that between the two evenings. I don't see that mentioned in the Gospels of someone who correct me on that. And so here is between that he's foreshadowing them and this very place that he have with them.
And I'm going to we'll go back to this is that the Lord would say to them with desire. I have desire to after you read that on Lord's Day morning to do what?
To eat this Passover with you. So here in this chapter we have two different feasts. He had the Passover feast with them. That's why the cup came first. That's the Jewish way of doing it. And then after that.
Perhaps we can look at the distinction from verse 19 I'm jumping ahead on is a separate breaking point. That's the remembrance of the Lord that they instituted. He took the bread and then the cup afterwards.
It's important to notice that the significance of the Passover here is that the Passover looked forward to the death of Christ and his work of redemption, the blood that would be shed to cleanse us from our sins, but to be a propitiation of work of redemption for Israel as well. And so the Passover looked forward to the death of Christ, the remembrance of the Lord looked back to that work that was done into the sufferings of Christ.
00:20:20
And his death, we remember him in his death. But the Day of Unleavened bread, when the Passover must be killed, the Passover was first, and it was intimately connected with the unleavened bread, those seven days of unleavened bread. And it speaks to us of a life lived in purity, in moral purity, absence from sin without leaven. You know, it says in First Corinthians chapter 5, know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole love?
Leaven is always a picture of sin. So our lives are to be lived. Seven days oftentimes speaks in Scripture symbolically of a whole lifetime. So in connection with the Passover, the children of Israel, Lord, eat that Passover in the whole lifetime was to be spent live for the glory of God without sin. And so we have that for ourselves as well. Well, He said to them here.
He said, The Lord Jesus said, Where wilt thou that we or they said unto him?
We skipped verse eight, I'm sorry.
He sent Peter and John saying, Go and prepare us the Passover, that we may eat. And they said unto him, Where wilt thou? But we prepared. Now this is very significant.
And why did they ask him where? Why didn't they just say, well, we know where there's a good room and let's go look and see a couple of places and we think we can figure this out. Why did they do this? Why did they ask the question? Well, it says, let's look at the principle of it in Deuteronomy chapter 12.
They knew these passages of Scripture, but it's a spirit of God that led them to ask that question.
We're not going to read this whole chapter, but it's one of the chapters in Scripture that is a real help if you're searching for the divine ground of gathering that there is a divine center. And so Deuteronomy chapter 12.
And verse 13.
Take heed to thyself that thou offer not thy burnt offerings in every place that thou seest.
But in the place which the Lord shall choose, in one of thy tribes, there shalt thou offer thy burnt offerings, and there thou shalt do all that I command thee.
So the choice was the Lord's choice.
And so they asked him this question, Where will thou that we prepare?
And in the Christian context, it's the same principle. You and I need to ask the Lord, where will thou that we prepare? There are some things in Scripture that were never permitted to choose. One is our parents. Our parents were chosen for us.
God will have been things cold.
God in his wisdom chose our parents and then the way of salvation. It's God's choice. There's one way. There's one mediator between God and men, the men. Christ Jesus gave himself a ransom for all. When it comes to the place where I might remember the Lord Jesus in his death on divine ground according to obedience to the Word of God, it's not left up to me. There's no choice here.
And the scriptures forbidden.
Personal choice in the matter and then when it comes to.
Our home assembly, what we might consider we're not to choose our home assembly. It's First Corinthians chapter 12 The Lord places. Let's look at it in First Corinthians chapter 12.
I'm going to read it as it is in the Darby translation or in a note that he makes, First Corinthians chapter 12, verse 18. But now hath God set, you could read it for himself, set for himself the members, every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him. And then in verse 28 God has said, you could read it this way. God has set for himself.
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Some in the church, first apostle, secondary apostles, so on. So God has done some things for himself.
And so he chooses for us, and he places us in our own location, you might say. And then when we go to be with the Lord, it's his choice. We don't choose those things God chooses. So those are five things that God has a right to choose.
And God is perfect in his way of choosing for us.
I was thinking.
In this connection, 1St Corinthians 5 might be relevant here.
As the apostle is speaking here to the Corinthians.
Verse seven First Corinthians 5 Purge out therefore the old eleven, that she may be a new lump, even as ye are unleavened, or even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. So the Lord fulfilled the type of the fossil during his death. But then it says in verse 8, therefore let us keep the beast.
Now that is the feast of unleavened bread that is referred to that, not with all leather. That is, we are not to go on with the old character of life that we had before.
The lusts of the flesh, the activities of the old nature.
Purge out the old leaven, those things that characterize us when we were unsaved.
When we were in the world, they are not to be seen.
In our pathway down here now, self judgment is required because we have the old nature with us at all times. We never have it eradicated going on with the verse, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness.
But with the unleavened bread of sincerity and fruit. So there is a word.
That brings before us our responsibility. It's a wonderful privilege, the greatest privilege on the earth to be gathered the Lord's Table or take of the Lord's Supper.
Remember, we're at the Lord's Table 7 seven days a week.
We're always at the Lord's Table, but we are to purge out those things.
Malice. Wickedness.
They are, they are to be, not to be seen in our in our walking ways, in our pathway which young leavened bread brings before us, as Robert mentioned, I think our whole earthly pathway. Let's get rid of those, that malice and wickedness which comes from the old nature that we all have.
I was thinking of more verses in Deuteronomy 12 and in connection with what you just said there, Brother John, verse 26 of Deuteronomy 12, it says only thy holy things which thou hast, and thy bowels which thou shalt take and go under the place which the Lord shall choose. And so is Brother Robert said that we would not take it 11 our whole lives. But it says in the Old Testament that they were not to eat of the leavened bread for seven days, and so we have seven days in the week. And so that applies to you and I if you look in.
Deuteronomy 12 in connection with my guest chamber.
Has been brought out to see in verse six whether you shall bring your burnt offerings and your sacrifices and your ties and evil offerings. Sorry verse 5, but I'm the place which the Lord your God shall choose, and of all your tribes to put his name there and then in verse.
11 Then there shall be a place which the Lord your God shall choose to cause his name as well there. Verse 12 And you shall rejoice before the Lord your God, ye and your sons, and your daughters, your men, servants, your maidservants, the Levite that was in your gates For as much see us no part nor inheritance. Whiskey, take each to thyself, that thou offer not thy burnt offering in every place that thou see us, but in the place which the Lord shall choose. And when thy tribes and so on. And so you know, he said, go and prepare.
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Well, you and I need instruction.
We might say we'll go where so they did, but he did give instruction and he said that there would be a man bearing a pitcher of water. And so you and I, we have the Spirit of God. We're involved by and when we're, when we come to him and we're saved, we have that blessing. And he gives us his word for instruction. We have the Spirit to guide us and to follow him. I've used this little illustration. I hope that is simple enough, but.
You know, we hear of so many that have a difficulty knowing and understanding the divine center, knowing the place where He chooses to put His name and to dwell there.
And, you know, it's kind of like we've heard many stories about the queen and, and how we might dress before. But, you know, the queen has a place that she sits down to eat, and she too, invites people to sit at that table.
And I know a brother back in Stellerton that has gone to see the Queen before and he was literally told what he was supposed to wear to go into her presence. Well, in this case though, you know, she invites you in to sit with her at her table and you maybe put your best on and, and you go into the hall and they receive you in and you're heading towards that grand table.
And you're almost there and somebody comes and they say, Oh no, no, you're not going to sit at that table.
You're going to sit at this one over here in the corner. Well, how would you feel? I know I would feel terrible if I had anticipated.
Sitting with the Queen at her table. And then I was told to go sit in the corner. The Lord Jesus leads you by the Spirit to Himself, to a place that he has chosen to put his name, and He wants you there. He's shown you that place. And yet there are some that would rather go and sit at the table over in the corner.
I just leave that with you to consider. There is a little verse that I enjoy, you know, in Micah five, it speaks of that one, that ruler that would come out of Bethlehem. And there's a verse in Proverbs 23 that I enjoy.
I think it's 23.
We often say about judging those things, Brother John, that you're mentioning on the Lord's Day, but Proverbs 23 and one, it says when thou sittest to eat with a ruler considered diligently what is before thee. Caleb pointed out to me the other day in the Darby translation that it says when thou sittest eat with the ruler considered diligent, diligently, who is before thee. And so on Wednesday morning we come into a very special place.
To honor that one, to remember that one that gave himself on the cross for you and I shed his precious blood to wash our sins away.
Have we considered?
That we're going to sit with that one and we considered what is really before us.
Would we rather sit somewhere else?
Go and prepare.
That chapter in Deuteronomy chapter 12/6 times, it says the place which the Lord thy God shall choose, right. You know, it's a real comfort to our hearts, ought to be a real comfort to our hearts. It's a comfort to mind encouragement.
He has the right to choose, but His choice is perfect, and His provision for us is that which His His heart would desire to provide for us in His presence. And so it's interesting here that He said unto them in verse 10, It's the instructions that come from the Lord Himself that will guide us if we have a value for His word.
And God has not written His word in a complex way whereby we can hardly understand that. It's written in a very simple way and very clear for the person that wants to walk by faith. And So what we accept as to the things divine, things we accept by faith. And so here He said unto them, the first thing that we need to notice is, are we allowing Him? Do we?
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Afford him the privilege of letting him choose for us.
Do we allow the Lord to choose for us?
It's a solemn thing.
To choose something for myself without his approval and without his consent. It says in I think it's First Corinthians chapter 4. What hast thou that thou hast not received?
Why, we ought to receive everything that we received from the Lord. But it's interesting that it says, he said unto them, Behold, when ye are entered into the city, there shall a man meet you bearing a pitcher of water. Follow him into the house. So the city is a picture of confusion in the word of God. When you go into the city, a city is a place of confusion.
And what we have in the day that we live in is religious confusion.
Babbling, you might say. It's spoken of religious Babylon in Revelation chapter 17 and 18.
Confusion, but the Spirit of God is able to guide and notice that He guides individuals.
And so John, Peter and John were given this responsibility to go and to make preparation, and they were guided by the Word of God, by the word of the Lord Jesus, the Son of God. And He can guide you by His word as well. God deals with individuals, He saves individuals, and he, he brings individuals into the knowledge of the truth. He brings individuals to savor and to love the truth.
He brings individuals into his presence to remember him in his death. And I would re echo the comments that Brother John just made not too long ago. It's the grandest privilege upon the face of the earth.
First Christian redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, to come into the presence of the Lord Jesus the Son of God on a Lord's Day morning and an assembly, reading or prayer meeting, or to come into the presence of the Son of God.
There's no it and to thank him for such a privilege and to be there.
Fully cognizant of the privileges that are his as a priest, it's the grandest privilege. And I say this, we can say by faith that we're gathered by the Spirit of God to the precious name of the Lord Jesus.
And we ought to be thankful for it. You thank God for your salvation. Do you thank the Lord Jesus for dying for you?
It's a good thing, and we try to do it every day, as often as we can. But do you ever thank the Lord Jesus for the privilege of being gathered to the Lord's name?
For the privilege is coming into his very presence, the coming into the presence of the Lord Jesus.
Do you ever thank him for it?
We often say we have faith.
We believe, we trust in God, we say it, we say it in our prayers. And now the question was just raised, did God choose a place or is it up to me? And we find this has been an age-old question. Every member is young people. That was a question raised with many of my peers and we see the same thing over to all kinds.
But yet, right in front of us, even in this chapter, I don't need to go back to the whole Bible, we see that God is very precise with what He has done and will do.
Let's look at it. This is now the fees of unleavened bread. Now I'm going to change the thought a little bit is that according to a time, the time when the fees are of unleavened bread and the Passover.
Well, part of it is because the Lord Jesus is to Passover. The rest is. Our brother mentioned they were looking forward to that true Passover. Incidentally, He came on the 10th day into Jerusalem when he cried from Xanax. To him, He was the perfect Passover.
And then he says that it must be killed. Is it not according to Scripture, that between the 14 and the 15 day the Passover lamb must be killed? And it was. And then we just just not going to go too long on that verse 7. Then came the Day of Unleavened Bread. Is it good timing or accidental?
00:40:05
And then they were asked where. Really, in a sense, you go out. Where? OK, now you told me the place. Now what do I need to do? No, I didn't say that. They found that optical room furnished. I don't know what else they have to do. It was furnished.
Jonathan looking over, I was thinking of you Jonathan, how you lost your house. Well, when you have to go find a place temporary, Can you imagine someone say here's a nice house you can use for now?
Oh, there's no furniture in it. It's all up to you now. No, this is furnished. The Lord knew that. We can't even provide for ourselves. After all this, are we still going to say, oh, no, it's up to me? And I believe that is one of our problems. And I say ours, I point a finger this way, we have a tendency to say, Lord, it's OK, I got this.
And then it failed. What do we do? Do we cry and say, oh man, what a mistake?
No, if you are like me, you will say, oh, I know what went wrong. There's one more thing I can try and one after another. But at the meantime, we believe in God.
Here, rather than trusting that He will provide if He provides for our daily cares, would He not show us the way not to drag and hold on to the mic is from the beginning. I was thinking of Genesis chapter 22.
We know the story. I will turn to it. We know the story Abraham was told. Take your son Isaac to one of the mountains.
We just came back from Idaho conference a few weeks ago. And if somewhere you've been out West, see the mountains, Can you imagine? I see that, Jonathan, meet me at one of those mountains over there.
Boy, I don't know. And I remember one of my children went to sand dune and they said we want to walk to the lake and they said it's just over the Crest. They go to the Crest of 1 Sandy and then, oh, there's another one behind it, but it's one of them. What did God, what did Abraham do? He believed, he trusted, and I won't go too much into it, but he said on the third day, the death and resurrection pictures was brought out, need to be there.
A look afar off and he saw God show him the place. He didn't say give me the GPS location. No God show him the places by faith. And there's so much story we can use in that. God does have a place and they as he said to the woman of the well, it's it's not just someone who want to do things. He said the true worshipper must worship.
In spirit and in truth. Otherwise this head of ours is not going to find what the truth is.
Maybe just a time of religious confusion.
As mentioned, Christendom is is corrupted and defiled with doctrines that are contrary to the word of God. So the the bottom line is the the assembly gathers on divine ground. That is the meaning of the the Lord's table is refers to a divine ground of gathering.
It's not the table that we see Lord today morning that's we partake of the Lord's Supper at the Lord's table. Normally speaking, we come to the Lord's table once in our lives and we are always there 24 hours a day and.
Seven days a week. But the important thing is, is there the divine authority there amongst the testimony of brethren?
Quotation marks, brethren, There are a number of groups who maintain they have the Lord's Table.
They meet.
Basically in the same manner in which we do, holding the same fundamental doctrines, yet they do not have the Lord's table, they don't have the authority of the Lord now.
I believe that we have to be careful here because.
00:45:03
We need to know the origin of a table. How did it? Where was? How did it commence? Was there a setting aside of a divine principle in the origin of that table? If so, I cannot regard that as the Lord's table. Another point, the Spirit of God.
Is not the author of confusion. If he led you to one table and myself to another table, he would be condoning the confusion. There is in prison down.
If he led different brethren to different centers, it would be the Spirit of God would be the author of condoning the division. No, the Spirit of God gathers to Christ who is the divine center. But we need to know that that group that we are meeting with are on divine ground.
That they have not departed from the principles of Scripture in their in their history or their origin and.
And.
I know that the Lord will guide an individual if he is. If any man will to do his will, he shall know of the doctrine. But there is that side that we must have the scriptural basis for our gathering. Is that right today?
Yes, I'm sure that's right.
It's instructive that it was on the principle of faith and obedience that they were to be met by a man. And so you and I will never receive a blessing that we ought to receive and that is intended for us if there's not obedience to the plain teaching of the word of God. Obedience. And then there was faith to move forward. And so he says, when you're entered into the city.
Place of religious confusion that's pointed out, but we need to take a step in faith. We need to move forward. And it says that there shall a man meet you bearing a pitcher of water. And so that man, that unnamed man in Scripture is often a picture of the Spirit of God. And so you have it in Abraham's servant. He's not named there in connection with Genesis chapter 24 going to find a bride for Isaac.
The picture of the Spirit of God and other passages of Scripture, even in the New Testament. So this unnamed man, what is he going to you? He's going to use the word of God. So it's a picture of water. Water is a picture of the word of God, is a symbol that represents the word of God. And really, you know, it's in the picture. He may use a brother, He may use an earthen vessel, you might say.
To bring up something into an apportion of the Scriptures that will be a help in discerning what the mind of the Lord is in this matter. And so it's interesting that it's really a man shall meet you. There was obedience first, and then there was faith, and then they were to follow him into the house where yet earth in.
So that's one of the things that the Lord Jesus said in the last, last instructions actually, that he gave to his disciples in John's Gospel, Follow thou me.
Follow thou me. Just three simple words. Follow thou me. And so we need to follow the instructions of the Word of God and follow in connection with how the Spirit of God leads in this matter if we're going to find ourselves in the upper room.
It's good that you brought out Robert, the unnamed man being a picture of the Spirit of God, because often we feel when we say we want to choose.
We think we're not trusting the Lord, but we're not really waiting for the guidance of the Spirit of God.
00:50:01
The Spirit, when the Lord, after the Lord left this earth, what happened? The Spirit, the third person of the Godhead, came down. And it's more than the fact that He came down into this world. He's been in this world before from the very beginning. What a world was without form and void. He came in the upper over the waters. She's still those problems and difficulties, but this time when He came, He came.
He indwelt into believers.
Very different, isn't it, than to be just upon someone and he's in the midst of the assembly too. So when we think we're deciding where to choose or where to go, just for lack of a better word here, those are not the choice of words. The Spirit, do we realize the Spirit is the one that give us the guidance. It's not how much knowledge. In fact, I tell you, sometimes when there's a difficulty in the assembly, I know I got caught in it before we get letters upon letters.
From both sides of sometimes one side more than the other side, justifying how right they are. And you think, well, the more I read about these problems, the more I'm going to be better at understanding the situation, how wrong that idea is, what we need to be independent upon the Spirit of God. Just one more thought on this there. And you go back to Genesis. How did men, how did men become a living soul?
God breathed into this pile of dirt and he became a living stores. God gave man breath to have life on the day of Pentecost. What happened? The Spirit came and if you look at it, it's a we heard. We heard that big rushing noise. Now, if you look at Mr. Darby's translation, he'll say it was not just a loud noise, it was like a breathing noise. Oh, how interesting to see.
As if now the Spirit of God breathed upon us.
We got a different life, we got a new spiritual life, and it's the Spirit of God that guides us. He's the one that draws us into understanding the Word of God and closer to our Lord Jesus Christ.
God's moral ways don't change from 1 dispensation to the next.
And so we see the importance of the place in Deuteronomy 12 and it doesn't change in this dispensation. And we've talked about this.
Snare of choosing and it's the tenant of Christendom.
Unfortunately, it's the Holy Grail of Christendom. Go to the Church of your choice and it's introducing Levin right then and there because it's giving giving me some credit for making a choice in those 650 denominations that are out there. No, this is sufficient right here to guide us and I'm just going to.
Ask Dave to carry on with the comment he started with a few minutes ago, if you still have it.
Well, I don't want to disrupt from what we've had here. I just I realized the subject that for us here is is the.
The Lord instituting this, this feast, and we need to we need to recognize that. But as we go through this portion by way of application, there are some practical things too for our personal lives. So I'm just looking around the room. I'm looking some of these young children and I think there are some things here for us that would be of a practical nature. So we look here, it says here as we started off in the eighth verse that says he sent Peter and John.
And I think that.
There should be a sense.
For everyone of us, every day that were sent, we all got up this morning, we headed down to that breakfast room. We, we had our breakfast. We, we, we go through our, our, our, our routine. And yet there needs to be, I think, a sense in every one of our souls on a daily basis that when we get up, we're sent.
We're not just left here to choose what we're supposed to do today. No, we're sent.
And I think it's, it's it's a, it was a very reasonable question for the disciples here to ask in the ninth verse that they said, you know, where wilt thou that we prepare? But it's a reasonable question for us too, as believers on a daily basis, to have a sense that we're sent, but also to have a sense where, you know, who am I supposed to visit with with when I, when I get to the get to where the meetings are? Who am I supposed to eat with at lunch? Who am I supposed to try to encourage?
00:55:18
I think those are things that are that are very needful for us on a daily basis. We're all sitting here now.
Were sent funds everyone of us is a sent one today and there should I think there there needs to be that sense in our souls as we go through this day, as we go through every day that we're sent and also a sense of where I think those are needful things practically. I realize that's not the subject here, but as we go through this portion, there are a number of practical things for our everyday life as well.
They acknowledged his lordship in the matter, didn't they? So you and I that know the Lord Jesus is our Savior. We say that He's our Savior. We say we're saved. We say we know the Lord Jesus as our Savior.
But he's also our Lord. He ought to be our Lord. There's a little expression that I heard some time ago.
He's either Lord of all or he's not Lord at all. He's either Lord of all or he's not Lord at all.
You know, Norman Berry, who's an older brother in Montreal and used to have this little expression when he would speak to young people, probably David probably heard him say it, but.
They say, young person, are you saved? You know the Lord Jesus is your savior, You say yes.
He says when you got saved, did you call the Lord Jesus Lord? Did you acknowledge him as your Lord?
You'd say yes, he said. Well, when you got saved, you gave up your right to choose.
You called him Lord, and as Lord He has a right to choose for you everything.
And so many believers will acknowledge the Lord Jesus as Savior.
But not very many will acknowledge Him as Lord. What a privilege it is in this world to acknowledge him as Lord.
I had the similar thought and I was considering what you said Dave, and you know how sometimes we're failures at this and I just read the other day. Maybe it was a gems from Norm Hebert. But it was about how we start our day out and consider him as Lord. And do we get down on our knees and and ask him for all the direction that Dave just pointed out before our day starts, or do we find ourselves running off the business and and then remembering to pray. And I have to admit that sometimes I'm in my car driving down the road before I get before the Lord and ask him for help for the day. And so it was quite an awakening Timmy and when we consider him as Lord of all.
You know, when we consider our salvation and the joy we have in it, and then we consider the moment that like these twelve, he showed us that place. He invited us to his table, we received the invitation, we considered him as Lord, that ruler. And then what happens? Why is it that we lose the the luster of it, let me say, or the grandeur of it? What happens to us even in our Christian lives? Well, we set him aside.
We set them aside. Jonathan quoted in his prayer this morning, Matthew 17. And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no man say Jesus only. And that's the point. That's the Lord and the Lord of all King of kings. We lose sight of it and we start thinking that, well, wouldn't it be a little bit better if we did this in the meeting instead? Or maybe we see a little Gray area in God's Word, and we think, well, we could probably pull that off. That might work.
And now it's all our own doing. It's totally detracted from what we're here to do, which is remember Him in his death or honor Him, give him worship and praise throughout the meetings.
Everything just falls apart in our own hands, and can't we just see that He has given us the most blessed Book of instruction? Can't we just obey it by faith and walk in those things? I know I'll be tested for saying that, but I'm fully prepared to take the testing. Are you? That's what He wants. He wants us to follow Him. These ones, they followed Him. And it's simple. It's so simple. There's nothing more simple in God's Word.
Than how we can meet together and remember him in his death. He has made it so that nobody can mess it up. Why do we mess it up? He says this do in remembrance of me. If you're waiting on it, if you're considering it, if there's no sin in your life that's hindering you, do it.
01:00:17
Part of the problem we have is the influence around us about you. I find that sometimes what I hear during the day, what I've seen affect the way I act. So you might say, well, no, I don't watch anyone. Well, it could even be the radio you listen to. And there ever even being, you know, we say this, I've heard this stupid song and that was stuck in my head. Oh, OK, rhythm. The world. Especially when we think Christendom is saved.
Is not turn with me just a short verse in the book of Jude? Jude I was going to say chapter but we know there is only one chapter Jude verse 11.
I believe this give us a picture to be careful of who we are with, especially among so-called Christians.
Essential woe unto them, for they have gone in the way of Cain. Now let me preface this. There are three points I want to bring out in this one verse. So we just read that the 1St way is the way of Cain. Second one and ran greedily after the era of Balaam.
For reward the third one and perish in the gained saying of Korah. These people all seem to be religious as if it were they want to please God. And often I hear the phrase when people who leave us and go elsewhere they use God rather than Jesus and especially the word that was mentioned Jesus as Lord. We don't hear that. So what is the way of Cain?
Cain simply said. I've got a better way. I can bring my own offering in. Don't need blood. He thought he was smart. That's the way of pain. Do we see that even sometimes in our own lives, that we've got a better way?
Balaam. Well, I won't say too much on that, Balaam He'd do it for money.
Do we see that now? I don't think we should point fingers at other groups, but some.
Do religiously for reward for money. And then the third one, Cora rebellion against God's people or perhaps God chosen life. They think they can do better. This is the religious system and that we need to be careful with.
On the contrary, we need to learn things from those who whom are faithful men opposed that we have confidence in rather than just to listen to Christian radio. In fact, today I want a young people be very careful what what you can get answers from the Internet. You can Google almost any word, any phrase is any thoughts and you will get answers.
But it doesn't mean the right answer, so be very careful with it.
Yes, there's a question of the authority of the Lord being in the midst of his own, and collectively that is important. There's authority, not infallibility, in the assembly gathered to His name according to Scripture. But on the subject of lordship, that's something that we choose for ourselves if we want to go on.
In the context of our former life.
The Lord doesn't force us to be bond men or actually bond men. Is the word use for servants there in Philippians chapter one. It's something that we choose and when we contemplate the cost of our redemption, we look at Romans chapter 12. There we are exhorted.
To.
Yield our bodies a living sacrifice. That is a choice that we have to make. There in Romans chapter 12, you have.
Dedication. You have consecration, you have transformation, you have realization in those verses.
01:05:01
How are we going to use our bodies now?
Which are temples of the Holy Spirit? These members were used.
For the things of this world and for wicked purposes now we have a divine nature which loves to please God and guidance is our brother David referred to.
Is really a matter of communion with the Lord if we are in communion with the Lord?
And we have judged those things in our lives which we know are a hindrance.
May be different in your life than mine, but we judge those things. The Lord will guide us if we just look to Him.
In dependence and keep that will.
Subject to his word. Is that right, President?
The Lord Jesus will never guide us.
Spirit of God will never guide us contrary to it. So in this back to our chapter.
Ten, it says.
There shall a man meet you again, picture of the Spirit of God bearing a picture of water. As been mentioned already. It's a picture of the word of God. The Spirit of God and the word of God always go together, don't they? And so there's, there's a big faction increasing them today who are, are to dwell in on spiritual experiences. But they do that contrary to Scripture. They, they feel as though they're being guided by the Spirit of God through this or that.
But it's totally in violation of any scriptural principle. And yet they claim that they're being led by the Spirit of God and we can do the same thing. I'm not pointing fingers. We can do that in our lives and say, well, I feel the Lord is moving me this way or that. But you just might be going down a road that is in violation of the clear, plain instructions of the Word of God. And so therefore, you are not or I am not led by the Spirit of God in those instances. It's interesting, you know, we're talking about Deuteronomy 12.
And you know, back in Genesis 22 with Abraham and, and, and they're being a place where the Lord was, was directing his servants to be. And in Deuteronomy 12, it's interesting that the Lord never names the place. We know where that place was. It's Jerusalem. But he says, as brother Robert said six times, he says there is a place that you were to go to.
Now what is the Lord doing? He's exercising his people as to where that place is. And what is He giving them? Instructions, principles that that will guide them to that place of his choosing, not our choosing. And that principle applies here too with that question, Lord, where will thou that we prepare? And so it's not a place of art choosing, it's a place of his choosing. But we need to be exercised as to where that place is. And the Lord has already been mentioned, has made it very clear.
As to where that place is, it's nothing complicated, but if we are guided by the Spirit of God, according to the Word of God, we will indefinitely find ourselves at the place where He has placed His name. And there is only one place where the Lord has corporately identified His name with that ground of fellowship as already been mentioned. And, and you know, in John 717, it's been mentioned, if any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrines. That's that's great instruction, what that's telling us.
Is saying that I got to get out of the way if my will is involved with this decision at all, then I'm going to miss the mark. But I have to have a predisposed will and that is a will that is set aside to do his will. And then when when I set aside my own will and I open my my life up in my mind and my heart up to doing the will of God, everything then becomes clear he is then free to guide us by the Spirit of God to do what he will have us to do to be sent to be.
To as our brother Dave Vernon was saying, what are we to do today? Well.
Am I getting in my own way or am I am I predisposed to do his will and and let him guide me? So I think this principle is so important and we can't overstate it, that God leads us according to his word every time and anything less than that we're we're bringing in our own ideas.
01:10:04
Amen.
Placed into the promised rest, she looks the Path 22 in the attendance.
Transparent.
But forehead?
All night? Hardly. No, I can't stay. I'm standing. Progress more than Congress.
We shall be.
Danger.
Lord to me and nobody.
'S done with your heart.
Being like Grass Dance, we're secure.
In my presence.
All of that every time it comes to which I need to be granddaughter.
And I cried.
One drink.
From clear we are people left by the.
Lord King of Snide.
Times David Bowed
Address—David Mearns
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I'd like to open our meeting.
This afternoon with 267.
267.
We trust his protection.
Will lean on his might.
We're sure his direction will guide us.
A right #267.
Ah, fullness.
Whatever you stress.
Or make such a scandal.
Start like it was great.
Me so.
I'll support.
Us and I'll start here.
To the category to survive.
We need to survive and he's brought up to die. From where? The pain on his Wi-Fi.
Will destroy.
Will drive.
We wish you the love of surprise.
All I need to say.
I don't want to touch love. Let's get her into your house.
Could you turn with me please to Ephesians chapter 3?
Ephesians chapter 3.
Paul writes here as a prisoner, as we see.
This 'cause I Paul, prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, he makes a comment in the eighth verse. He says unto me, Who am less than the least of All Saints.
00:05:02
But then he says in the 13th verse, Wherefore I desire that ye faint not at my tribulation for you, which is your glory, for this 'cause I bow my knees under the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the full whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you according to the riches of His glory.
To be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to apprehend with All Saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height.
And to know.
The love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that she might be filled with all the fullness.
Of God.
As I mentioned in my prayer, it was the exercise of the local assembly here that this would be directed to those who are younger.
I'm not younger. It's a long time since I've been younger.
Last time I was here was 53 years ago.
I was 15.
And I'm trying to think. I was at two conferences. I remember that that year, one of them was here and I.
As I was considering this meeting, I was reading this portion and I was thinking.
What kind of an impact would the reading of those verses made to me when I sat here in the conference 53 years ago? And I have to say I would have listened to the brother who would be standing here and I was sitting there at 15, that I would look at those verses and I would listen with mild interest.
If I could put it that way.
My father wisely told me when I first held my daughter in my arms, who incidentally had her third son, her third son just yesterday.
He said to me, David, when you're speaking or when you're visiting with someone, always remember what it was like to be their age. That's a bit of a stretch for me, but we trust that.
This afternoon we can do that.
The Apostle Paul here says.
In the 14th verse for this, 'cause I bow my knees.
The other conference I was at that year.
Some of you probably been there. Was the Wheaton Conference in Chicago. Something that the young guys used to do was play football in the mornings.
I was one that played football and I dislocated my knee and I sat in the front row.
I shouldn't say the front row back a few rows with my foot up on on a chair the duration of the conference, but our brother Eric Smith, he came to our row and he went down the road. He was shaking hands with everybody. He came to me and he looked at me and he said, young man.
Are you the young man that hurt his knee? I said yes. He said, oh brother, you need to take care of your needs. You need to spend much time on your knees. So we have this verse and it says for this cause I bow my knees.
It's my purpose this afternoon to look at the times in David's life that he bowed. A very instructive for me. I trust it'll be a help for every one of us. So let's turn now first to First Samuel, Chapter 20.
First Samuel, chapter 20.
This is an interesting chapter for times sake. We're not going to. We're not going to read the chapter. I'm going to take for granted that.
I'm speaking to people here that read their Bibles. So you're aware of this time in David's life where he and Jonathan, they parted ways? As it says in the last verse, Jonathan said unto David, Go in peace. For as much as we have sworn both of us in the name of the Lord, saying, the Lord be between me and thee, between thy seed and thy seed forever. And he arose and departed. This is a sad statement. And Jonathan went into the city.
00:10:18
You know, Jonathan died on the battlefield. It was a great lament for David. He didn't share in Davide rejection. But here we find in this portion, there's this chapter that takes up shooting of the arrows. That's what the chapter is about.
In the 35th verse it says came to pass in the morning that Jonathan went out into the field at the time appointed. That's an interesting state. There's many, many times in the word where we have the time appointed. It's appointed unto a man once to die after death to judgment. And he said unto his lad, Run, Find out now the arrows which I shoot. And as the lad ran, he shot an arrow beyond him. And when the lad was come to the place of the arrow which Jonathan had shot, Jonathan cried after the lad and said.
Is not the arrow beyond thee? Jonathan cried After the lad makes speed haste, stay not. And Jonathan's lad gathered up the arrows, and came to his master. And the lad knew not anything, only Jonathan and David do the matter. And Jonathan gave his artillery unto the lad, said unto him, Go carry them into the city. As soon as he was gone, David arose out of the place toward the South, fell on his face to the ground.
Here's our subject.
And he bowed himself three times.
And they kissed one another, and wept one another, and David exceeded.
We were we were praying for.
The family of.
Brother John Chalua.
Appreciated you reading that.
Text to us, Brad.
On the 16th of of July I broke bread in that assembly, his home assembly in Rumphi.
The conference that has been spoken of took place this last weekend.
Conferences are different. They're in Malawi than here. They took place in the in the took place. This one took place in the in the meeting room at Karunga. There was 180 people present.
I was, I've talked to several brothers. I talked to the brother that helped take carry John into the into the Medical Center and then subsequently take him into the the hospital.
180 people that are there. All the ladies sleep inside on the gravel, all the men sleep outside. That's the conference accommodations, I think of where you slept. Pray for the brethren there.
Their their circumstances are much different.
What happened was the brother was on the back of a lorry, he's in the front of the lorry actually, which would stand the bed would be about this high and on top of that there would be.
Some racks that would be up about 16 inches and they just packed the people into there and so they're traveling. I've got pictures and videos if you'd like to see them sometime. The brother was on the front corner and the tire started to smoke and he was trying to get the driver's attention. He finally got the driver's attention and then he went to jump out of the lorry. I'm listening to this from a brother that's on the phone with me telling me that was right there. He said his foot caught on the rack.
And because it was up so high when he landed, he landed on his chest, he broke his ribs. The ribs punctured his his lungs. And and that's what took our brother.
Where I'm going with this, just prior to that he had an address.
And he spoke.
On the brevity of life.
This brother, 30 years old, is a 2 year old, a four year old, and now a widow. And he spoke on the brevity of life. You know, as I stand here, we look at the brevity of life, we hear a situation like that and we think, wow, his life was brief. But I stand here at my age and I realize that my life has been brief as well.
And I look at my circumstances different than you young people.
You young people see you all here, different places. You're looking ahead at your life. I'm looking backwards. Life is very brief. It's indeed brief. And here we find that David and Jonathan have this little scenario that takes place with a shooting of the arrows.
00:15:21
Now I would like you to leave your your finger in here.
And I would like you to turn to First Timothy, chapter 6.
First Timothy, chapter 6.
You know what? First of all, I'm going to go to First Timothy chapter one. Let's look at First Timothy chapter one.
And we'll read this.
In.
Without reading the initial verses, we'll go right to He addresses Timothy in the second verse. Timothy, my own son. Then he says this in the sixth verse.
From which?
Some having swerved.
Have turned aside.
If you look at Mr. Darby's note.
He renders that.
Some having missed.
Missed the mark?
Now turn over to Second Timothy.
Two Timothy.
Actually, you know the First Timothy chapter 6. Like I said earlier, First Timothy chapter 6.
And the very last verse of the letter.
There's an exhortation to lay hold on that which is really life in verse 19, and then he says in verse 20, some 21 which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Again, Mr. Darby's note says some having missed the mark.
Now go to the second epistle.
The second chapter.
And the 18th verse.
He speaks of those in the earlier verses and then he in the 18th verse. I'm doing this for times sake. Who concerning the truth have erred.
Again, Mr. Darby's note says.
Missed the mark?
So just back here in First Samuel Chapter 20, we have a scenario where there's some arrows that are shot and you'll agree with me.
That when an arrow is shot.
It goes and it hits the target.
At which point it might miss.
But if it misses, the problem is not when it misses, the problem is when it's let go out of the bow.
You young people are right at that point in your life.
Where you're being let go your life, it's being let go out of the bowl.
Where's it going to hit?
Where is it going to hit serious things, all I'm saying, to think of those scriptures that we've read in Timothy, of those that missed the March. As I said, last time I was here, I was 15. You know, I remember that time and I had a good time with a lot of other 15 year olds, 14 year olds, 1617 year olds.
And I notice that many of those.
That we're here at that time, they're not here.
For the very reason that I have suggested, they have missed the mark.
Many of them are the Lords.
Some are here, some no indication whatsoever that there's any life in Christ.
So where are you at, young person? You're just at that beginning. You're just at that start. Let's turn over now to the Psalms, Psalm 57.
00:20:10
Psalm 57.
We find here David.
Is.
Speaking, he says, Be merciful unto me, O God.
For my soul trusteth in thee. Yeah, in the shadow of thy wings. I'll make my refuge until these calamities be overpassed.
If you notice the heading of the Psalm, it says to the chief musician.
Edel teches Mikdem of David when he fled from Saul into The Cave and I'd like to look at that, but before so let's go on down. David says in the fifth verse it says be thou exalted, O God above the heavens, let thy glory be above the earth. They have prepared enough for my steps and now he says this my soul.
Is bowed down.
They have digged a pit before me into the midst thereof. They are falling themselves. Sila, my soul is bowed down.
Now I'd like to turn because of the connection here, I would like to turn to that portion that's referenced at the heading back in First Samuel 22. If you could turn with me there for a moment, First Samuel 22.
The Psalms start the chapter starts off. David has has fled.
Where a couple chapters from where we started, it says David therefore departed thence and escaped to The Cave Abdullah. It's a very sad chapter. We won't go through it. It's where the priests are slain. And there's this there's this discussion between Saul and a him elected priest. And in the 12Th verse Saul says here now thou son of a high tub. And he answered, here am I my Lord and Saul.
TM Why have you conspired against me, thou and the son of Jesse, and that thou hast given him bread and a sword, and asked inquired of God for him, that he should rise against me to lie in wait, as at this day?
And a Himalek answered the king. And what I want to do for just a few moments is look at this answer of a Himelec to Saul, because what he does.
Is he portrays the character of David at this time when he was in The Cave and was now fleeing. So let's look what it says here in verse 14. A Himalayan answered the king and said, who is so faithful among all thy servants as David, which is the King's son-in-law, goeth at thy bidding and he is honorable in thine house. You know, I love this. There's lots of lists of David's character. I'd like to look just at this one.
There's this, there's this statement that says right off there, right at the outset, who is so faithful? It doesn't say who is so gifted among my servants, but who is so faithful?
Young person as you sit there.
If I was to speak.
With those in your local assembly.
What kind of accommodation would they have of you?
Would they say that you're faithful?
Someone that's respectful, someone that's morally upright, someone that is faithful. This is one of the characters that David had. He was faithful. It says here among all our servants. Yet that servant character, it's not a character that's promoted in this world.
Beautiful character, the servant character, that which we see in the Lord Jesus, that which he has portrayed. I see that in so many of my dear brethren. Love that character. Is that something that portrays you? That servant character? It it, it was one of Davide characters, it says, which is the King's son-in-law.
You know.
David became the King's son-in-law.
After he killed Goliath and.
00:25:05
It's an interesting subject to look at the in laws in scripture.
There are a lot of young people here, and if the Lord leaves us here, there's a very.
High chance that you young sisters are going to become a sister, a sister-in-law.
There is the chance of you young brothers that you are going to be a son-in-law. You are going to have a father-in-law. Just think of that in law relationship, you know, with with David, he was portrayed as being a faithful in law. You know, if we were to go back to Genesis, we would read there about Rebecca and Isaac.
And it says about.
Rebecca that she says.
She says it twice. I'm going to turn to it. Maybe it would be good if we just looked at it back in the book of Genesis.
The Book of Genesis.
And the 20.
6th chapter.
The 26th chapter.
The last two verses they read this way. Esau was 40 years old when he took to wife Judith, the daughter of Beery the Hittite, and Bath the daughter of Elon the Hittite, which were a grief of mind unto Isaac and to Rebecca. Now turn over to the next chapter, the 27th chapter.
And we read this in the 46th verse.
This is 40 years later.
And Rebecca said to Isaac, I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth.
Young person.
Do you want to put your parents through this?
Because of a bad choice that you have made.
Think, think, think of the choice here. Think, think, think of this woman saying these words and at the end of it, after 40 years, she says I'm weary of life because of my daughter in laws.
Young person, be very careful, very very careful as to your choice of a life partner.
This is not unique.
There are those in the sphere of all of our acquaintance that we can look and think of a bad relationship between a son-in-law or a daughter-in-law and their father-in-law and their mother-in-law. You young people, be careful. Be very, very careful. I'm not just talking about an unequal yoke. I'm talking about being with a partner and you're not on the same.
Page spiritually.
So important, the choices that you make, David.
Was a faithful son-in-law. This is not his words. This is the words of somebody else, a Henlek saying, Who is so faithful among thy servants as David, which is the King's son. Law that goeth out, that goeth at thy bidding. He was a man that was obedient. He was obedient. You know. Brother Rob brought before us the concept of the lordship of Christ.
This morning, just saying, you know if the Lord.
It's not Lord of all.
He is not Lord at all, but when it comes to obedience, partial obedience is disobedience.
David was obedient. David went at Saul's bidding. And then it says here and is honorable.
In thine house, you know, beautiful characteristics that we find here at the time when David was in The Cave. And he makes that statement as he writes. And he bowed himself. Oh, that that would that posture would characterize you dear young people. And not just you dear young people all but every one of us. Well, let's go over now to another Psalm, Psalm 38.
Psalm 38.
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David writes here.
The heading says Psalm of David to bring to remembrance. Oh Lord, rebuke me not in my wrath. Now they're chasing me in thy hot displeasure.
The sixth verse, he says. I'm troubled.
I am bowed down greatly.
There's our subject. I go morning all the day long.
The 10th verse my soul panteth, my strength faileth me. As for the light of mine eyes, it is also gone out from me. Now that's a desperate situation to see the light go out of somebody's eyes.
And then he says, if you go on down to the 17th verse, he says, I'm ready to halt. My sorrow is continually before me. It's the picture of someone who's ready to throw the towel in. Maybe there's a young person here this afternoon and that's your plight, that's your position. Maybe you haven't said anything to anybody. Maybe nobody else knows.
Oh, you know, I was looking at a text which I get lots of. I'll read you this one. I was reading it this morning.
Send a text to a brother.
Telling him this is my my text I sent. I spent some time this morning in Luke 24.
Walking to a mass, did not our heart burn within us, while He opened unto us the Scriptures, the things concerning Himself? I said, May it be so with us.
He says this is his text. Well, not in my case anymore. I'm sorry to tell you this says it won't be good news to you, but I finally broke down and left Christian life behind.
Brought up in the assembly, unhappiness got too hard to bear, and while I'm not actively trying to live as much chaos as I can, acknowledging Christ's salvation as all the faith I have and I can give no more, trying to follow in his footsteps has been too hard. I just wish I'd never existed or knew anything, right or wrong, So now I'm pretty much adrift. Even so, I thank you for all the help you've given me, for all that's worth. It's not gone unnoticed. Here's a man. The light has gone out of his eyes.
What about you, young person? What makes you go? What is it that makes you go?
You say yeah, I'm.
I'm Christian, I'm saved, I'm not asking much. I'm asking what is it that makes you go? You know, read about the Lord Jesus. He says the zeal of thine house hath eaten the earth. That's what made the Lord Jesus go. He said I do always those things that please the Father. What about you this afternoon? What is it that makes you go? You know, I so appreciate this posture of David.
It's a posture that kept him. It's a posture that kept him when the times got tough.
It's a posture that kept him when he got really, really low. I think of this brother that I communicated with.
For years, three or four years, and now we come to this point. He throws the towel in.
David says here, the 38th Psalm, I'm troubled. I am bowed down greatly. Maybe there's someone here and that's your portion. Oh, that you would turn to the Lord in this posture. It's a wonderful place to go. Let's go over now to first Samuel. First Samuel, chapter 24.
First Samuel, chapter 24.
It came to pass.
When Saul was returning.
From following the Philistines, it was told him, saying, Behold, David is in the wilderness of an Idi.
David took 3000 chosen men out of Israel and went to seek David and his men upon the rocks of the wild goats. You know the portion, You know what transpired. Saul's trying to get ahold of David. David comes to, to to solve at a time when he's asleep. In the fourth verse it says David arose and cut off the skirt of Saul's robe. Privately came to pass afterwards at David's. David's heart smote him. Notice the fourth verse. The men of David said unto him, Behold the day which the Lord said unto thee, Behold, I will deliver.
Enemy into thine hand. You know. We never read of that with regards to Saul. We read of that with regards to Goliath, but not Saul. And we never read of David calling Saul his enemy. He called him many things, but not his enemy.
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Seventh Verse. The sixth verse. David said unto his men, The Lord forbid that I should do this thing under my master the Lord's anointed, to stretch forth thine hand against him, seeing that he is anointed of the Lord. So David stayed his servants with these words.
Suffered them not to rise against Saul, But Saul rose up out of The Cave and went on his way. And David also arose afterwards and went out of The Cave and cried after Saul, saying, My Lord the king. And when Saul looked behind him, David stooped with his face to the earth, and he bowed himself. He bowed himself.
Blessed posture.
You know, there was the opportunity for David to end it all right here with Saul.
There was an opportunity, but the state of Seoul was such that he didn't do it.
And I just, you know, there was every bit of the enemy here that was encouraging David to end Saul's life right here. But David was ready to wait God's time. And, you know, young people.
You and I are bombarded every day with the enemy of our souls in so many different ways.
And I'm just going to, I'm just going to try vividly show you how the enemy works in our lives. And when I was in the Winnipeg area, I asked this question to those there. I'm going to ask it now.
I'm going to ask for a show of hands.
Has anybody ever gone fishing and caught a fish?
A lot of fishermen caught a fish. I have two. So just to make the point, all of you who have put up your hand and caught a fish.
You are master deceivers.
Master deceivers. You take that line, you take that hook, you put that bait on it. You're trying to camouflage it in such a way that you do the best job possible to deceive that fish. You drop it in the water.
You know that's exactly the way the enemy works. Exactly the way.
If if it's a big fish.
Comes along and it looks and it's probably suspicious so it swims away.
But it's in its mind.
Again, just exactly the way the enemy works. So.
He comes back again and he takes another look at that, that bait.
Still looks suspicious so it goes away again.
Comes back a third time, he grabs it right away and you've caught the fish.
If it's a small fish, he grabs it right off the bat. But you know that's exactly the way the enemy of our souls works. If you look at a tackle box, it's filled with things called lures.
The whole concept is deception. If you look at a family fisherman's box, they've got hundreds of them because they try to figure out just exactly what the trout are feeding on. And they, they keep trying another bait. They keep trying whether they're feeding on the bottom or they're feeding on the top, they try and they finally figured out what the what the fish is feeding on and they start to catch fish. You know, the enemy of our souls has had lots and lots.
Of experience. He knows what our He knows what our weaknesses are. He knows what our failures are.
But this is the way he works, you know. Remember David sitting with Bathsheba? He saw Bathsheba, he went away, but it was in his mind. He couldn't get her out of his mind. It's like that big fish that looks and swims away.
You know, every one of us are tempted.
And if there's a good state of soul and there's an opportunity.
It's not a problem.
It's not a problem.
If there is a bad state of soul, but there's no there's no opportunity, it's still not a problem even though with a bad state of soul.
But if there's a bad state of soul.
And there's an opportunity.
My experience is that is a bad day. That is a bad day for every one of us here. With David, there was an opportunity, but there was a good state of soul. You look at the scenario with with Joseph, he had an opportunity, but there was a good state of soul. Oh young people, be aware of the way the enemy works. It's by deception.
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And he holds out that which looks so good. He has a huge buffet for us to feed at.
I'm so thankful here. David bowed himself. There was the opportunity, but there was a good state of soul. Let's go over to Psalm 145. Psalm 145.
Psalm 145. We read the heading here. It's David's Psalm of Praise.
In verse 14.
The Lord upholds us all that fall.
Raiseth up all those that be bowed down. There's our subject. I so appreciate David slipping this in. In a number of these psalms. The the posture of being bowed, the eyes of all that wait upon thee. Thou give us them their meat in due season. Now openest thine hand, and satisfy us the desire of every living thing. You know, dear young person, the Lord has your good and blessing.
Fully.
To give you but it's it's on his terms.
And oh, if you take up those characteristics that we saw of David, that we read of and we we see this, this posture that David has, it's a pathway of blessing for us. It says here that openness, thine hand that satisfies the desire of every living thing. The Lord is righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works. The Lord is nigh and to all them that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth.
He will fulfill the desire of them that fear him. He also will hear their cry and will save them. Oh young person, I trust that this would be the story of your life.
I'm not going to pretend there's not trials. Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward. But a pathway with the Lord with this posture is a wonderful, wonderful pathway.
I had an experience just a month ago.
I flew into Malawi.
I was planning to be there for a heavy 2 weeks and then going to Mozambique, we arrived there.
Broke bread at A at a the assembly of Mizuzu I was traveling with with brother Harold. We we got into our car, we needed gas. We we started to drive. Every gas station has a long lineup of cars. Every gas station.
On doing some homework, there's no gas in Malawi, none whatsoever.
All these cars that were lined up, nobody even sitting in them, they just parked there and they went home, just sold it. And when the gas does come, incidentally, it's still not there.
They would be able to at least be in line.
I've got this trip that's planned already lined up all day meetings with the brethren for two weeks already couriered money to them to to have money for a fellowship lunch and and here we can't move.
And we're on the side of the road with all these cars. We're wondering what to do. We're praying and a knock comes on our window.
And a lady is there and we roll down the window and she says, are you looking for some gas? Well, yes, we were looking for some gas. And she said, well, I, I have 100 liters at my house and you're welcome to have it.
You know who else but the Lord would provide such a thing? She goes home.
She gets her son and with Jerry cans on her son's motorcycle, they bring it to our rig. We filled it up, We filled the back end with the Jerry cans and we had enough gas for the rest of the time. The whole rest of the time there was no traffic on the road.
There was diesel, so there was cars, but just think of how time and time and time again in my life, this has been my experience and this is what David is portraying here to the one.
That has this posture of bowing before the Lord would the God that it would be. So with each young person that's here, we're just looking at the time. I want to turn now to the 35 TH Psalm. If you could go there for a moment, the 35th Psalm.
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Psalm of David, plead my cause, O Lord.
And I want to move on down to the.
14th verse Read the the rest of the verses at, at your, at your, at your leisure. You can see that David's joy was in the Lord. If you look at the ninth verse. My soul shall be joyful in the Lord. It shall rejoice in his salvation. And here's our subject in the 14th verse. I behaved myself as though he had been my friend or brother. I bowed down heavily.
As one that mourneth for his mother.
You know a young person.
Sometimes it's difficult for us to see the mind of God in our lives, and I want to encourage you to recognize that circumstances in our life can sometimes be a fog to stop us from seeing that which is real. You know, the people of God, they went across the wilderness. I appreciated those verses that were read in the 78th Psalm.
You know, for them to get direction, they had to have their gaze lifted up. That's that's how they could see the cloud. That's how they could see the pillar of fire. It moved, they moved. But for them to move, they had to have their gaze upward. And it's not different, young person with you and me. For us to get direction in our life, our gaze has to be upward.
And if there are going to be circumstances that come in.
And the enemy is trying to disrupt us from being able to see what his mind is. And as I said, those circumstances can be a fog. Let's turn over to 2nd Corinthians for a moment. Second Corinthians, the 4th chapter.
Two Corinthians, chapter 4.
The 16th verse. For which 'cause we faint not, but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day for our light affliction, which is but for a moment work for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things which are seen.
But at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal.
But the things which are not seen are eternal. The enemy wants to have us focus on the things that are seen, not on the things that are unseen. I was impressed by a statement that I didn't read in Mr. Darby's writings, but I read it in Hamilton Smith's, and he was quoting Mr. Darby. He makes this comment, he says, for the believer.
Things unseen.
Are more real than things seem.
Because things seem bring with them a deception.
You know that's so striking because the enemy tries.
To fog our vision with circumstances and we can't see what's real in David's life about himself.
His vision was somewhere else. I want to look at one last one and it's in First Kings.
Turn with me to 1St Kings.
First Kings.
First Kings chapter one.
You can read the whole chapter at your leisure.
I'm not going to do that.
Solomon has just started sitting on the throne in the 46th verse of First Kings chapter one.
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Moreover, the King's servants came to bless our Lord King David, saying, God, make the name of Solomon better than thy name, and make his throne greater than thy throne. And here's our subject. And the king bowed himself upon the bed.
And also thus said the king, blessed be the Lord God.
Of Israel.
You know young people. David had a good finish.
David had some wrinkles in his life.
David is called a man after God's own heart.
David continually had this posture.
And David had a good finish.
Recently I went through.
First and second Chronicles and I was impressed by so many people that had a good start but a bad finish.
In my own life, peers of mine, I've seen so many that had a good start and a bad finish.
You young people, you sit there, you're in that position where you've got a good start. You're here at a conference, you've got a Bible on your lap. It's a good start. The Lord wants you to have a good finish.
It's only going to be by taking up with this posture that David had. That is such a lovely posture. You know, I'm so thankful to see see you here. The brethren here obviously have a desire especially for you to have an address for you. Our desire is that you would not just have a good start, but you would have a good finish.
And then you take up this posture.
And realize appreciated the thoughts that we had this morning that the concept of not simply the Passover, but the the the Feast of unleavened bread and how there should be that that that condition of our souls always being in the presence of God. I'll tell this one one story.
I was visiting my wife's family out West.
One of my brother-in-law's kept some sheep.
And.
He wanted to go see some Scottish games. There were some sheep trials. I thought, well that'd be interesting. We went and if you, any of you have ever seen some sheepdog trials, it's a, it's an area of the size of a football field fenced in and they let 5 sheep in one end and a shepherd with his dog comes in the other end and there's this enclosure in the middle with an open gate. It's about 10 by 10. And the object is to get the five sheep into the enclosure.
Without touching the sheep, if the dog touched a sheep or the shepherd does, they're disqualified. So it's pretty fascinating to watch. They can do it in maybe 5-4 minutes. Very fascinating. After you've seen five or six and there's there's 40 to go. I was done. So I thought I'm going to go go elsewhere to see what else there is. I was interested because from Scottish descent there's a Scottish tartan and I wondered if there was going to be a Scottish.
In there. So I went looking and while I was searching came across.
Another competition, and it was a bagpipe competition, and over the loudspeaker all these bagpipe players had signed up. And when your name was called, you would come to this location and in front of the judges you would play your piece. And I got to the judges just as a young man was getting there with his bagpipe, and he was.
He was a young man, he was pretty sure of himself.
He was cocky and the judge asked him and said So what are you going to play for us? So the young man thought he had chosen a piece that was obscure and he told the judge the name of the piece.
And he said to him, so have you ever heard of that piece? And the judge said, yeah, I composed it.
You know, I've been to other competitions.
As someone that's played the violin, I've been to competitions and seen you can argue with the judge, you know, whether the piece should be played faster or slower or, or what kind of emphasis there should be, you know, from a piece that's that's been composed, you know, in the 1700s, you can you can make those arguments. There was none of that here, None of that here.
00:55:02
But, young person, there needs to be a sense in our souls when we get up in the morning, of whose presence we are in, not just on Lord's Day morning.
Not just in the prayer meeting, but to realize in whose presence we are in and to have this posture that David had that we've taken up this afternoon. May the Lord bless His word. I'd like to sing. Have I an object? If we could sing that this afternoon. Somebody have the number for that.
Thank you. Somebody start that too 46 in the appendix.
Luke 22:11-20
Reading
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A small lifeless waves.
Our Holy Land.
Of God.
Everything was in my favorites.
As those strange.
In my life.
Verse 11 to verse 30. Luke chapter 22.
Luke 22. Luke chapter 22, verse 11.
And you shall say unto the Goodman of the house, the Master saith unto thee, Where is the guest chamber, where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples? And he shall show you a large upper room furnished. There make ready. And they went and found as He had said unto them, and they made ready the Passover. When the hour was come, he sat down, and the 12 apostles with him.
And he said unto them with desire, I've desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I say unto you, I will not anymore eat thereof until it be fulfilled in the Kingdom of God. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this and divide it among yourselves. For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the Kingdom of God shall come. And he took bread, and gave thanks, and break it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you. This do in remembrance of me.
Likewise also the cup after supper saying this cup is the New Testament in my blood which is shed for you.
Behold, the hand of him that betrayeth me is with me on the table, and truly the Son of Man goeth as it was determined. But woe unto that man by whom he is betrayed. And he began to inquire among themselves which of them it was that should do this thing. And there was also a strife among them which of them should be accounted the greatest. And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors. But you shall not be so.
But he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger. And he that is chief is he that doth serve. For whether is greater he that sitteth at meat, or he that serveth? Is not he that sitteth that meat? But I am among you, is he that serveth year they which have continued with Me and my temptations. And I appoint unto you a Kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me, that you may eat and drink at My table in My Kingdom, and sit on the Thrones, on Thrones judging.
00:05:25
The 12 tribes of Israel.
You'll notice in this passage of scripture that there are two questions that are raised.
One in verse 9 says, Where wilt thou that we prepare, and then where we begin? Here in verse 11 you shall say unto the good men of the house, the Master saith unto thee.
Where is the guest chamber where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples? And so both questions are necessary. Where wilt thou that we prepare? It was the will of God.
And it's the purpose of God to have his people in his presence. And that's why division among the people of God is of such a serious nature. God calls the in principle we find in first Kings chapter 12 Chapter 13 Jeroboam, the son of Nibat that made Israel the sin. Why was it? It was because Jeroboam set up and idolatrous system.
And it was in competition with the divine center and it allowed for man to have a choice.
One altar was in Dan, the north of the country, one was in Bethel. And so it was an imitation set up and it perpetuated the division among the people of God and prevented the majority of the people of God from coming into the presence of the Lord at the divine center. And so it was a wicked thing in the sight of the Lord. And so all through the.
Kings and the Chronicles, you hear this.
Statement made by the Spirit of God Jeroboam the son of Nebat made Israel the sin. So here you have where is the guest chamber where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples and so it was they were being introduced to another place. It was verse 12. He shall show you a large upper room furnished.
They were responsible and you are responsible. I am responsible to be in the place of the Lord's appointment, the Lord's choice, and he gives this.
Question. Where is the guest chamber? And you and I need to ask that question when we first are young and we first are searching for the truth of God as to where we should be gathered to the Lord's name. And so he says.
He gives this question they were to ask. The master saith unto thee.
Where is the guest chamber? I want to ask you. Have you ever asked the Lord that question?
You know we read in our family Bible reading.
At home years ago in Deuteronomy chapter 12, we were reading through Deuteronomy and we came to Deuteronomy chapter 12 and one of my children said Dad.
Where is this place?
That it says, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God in the place which he shall choose. Where is this place?
I said to that one, I said, I can't tell you where it is. You have to ask the Lord where it is and He has to show you. I cannot show you, but the Word of God will lead you and the Spirit of God will lead you as we have had this morning will lead you to that place. If you ask, He will show you. And so God is as good as His Word. He shall show you a large upper room.
Burden, I want to make another comment if you'll allow.
It was an upper room.
It's a place characteristic of separation from the street level of this world.
And so to get into an upper room, you have to climb stairs. You have to climb and step one step after another step. And so it speaks of separation in our lives.
00:10:07
From that which is inconsistent with the life of Christ, with the testimony that would be give him honor. How do we separate ourselves? What do we separate ourselves from? Some people are afraid of that word, but.
Really. God uses it, and he uses it throughout his word coming apart. He's separate, saith the Lord. And I will receive you, he says in Second Corinthians chapter six. Well, we need to exercise separation in connection with our moral issues, you know, it says.
A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. So we read that in First Corinthians chapter 5 this morning.
In second, in Galatians, the second time that phrase is used, a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.
It's in Galatians. It has to do with more, with doctrinal level. Both are necessary. We need to be separate from moral evil, but we also need to be separate from doctrinal evil. And then two, we need to be.
Exercise separation ecclesiastically of put it this way, not everything that names the name of Christ, not every group that names the name of Christ.
Is going on in all of the truth of God.
Not everyone that says.
Lord, Lord is a real believer. It speaks of profession. And so ecclesiastically we need to be exercised of being separate from that which dishonors Christ. And so we also need to have practical separation, practical things of life to say, to walk in a principled way and not to be found in the bars of this world, in the movie theaters of this world and you name it.
There's all kinds of lures and Satan has the most just have to try it once and you're hooked. And so there's to be found in that large upper room requires the climbing individually into those steps, those stairs, if I could put it that way into the upper room to be above the street level of this world morally.
And spiritually.
To be found in the presence of the Lord. That's the picture that he's giving to us here.
We mentioned Abraham alone this morning. Perhaps that would enhance.
The what was said in regard to separation turn with me to Genesis chapter 22.
Read just a few verses here. Beginning of verse three. Genesis chapter 22. Beginning at verse three. And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his *** and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and clave the word for burnt offering, and rose up, and went into the place which God had told him.
Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said unto his young man, Abay ye here with the *** and I, and the lad will go Yonder and worship, and come again to you. We see the energy of faith here, that when Abraham was told to to take his son Isaac to be an offering.
There he rose up early.
We need that energy too, don't we, from the Lord? You know, when there's something that we like to do, it's easy to rise up early to do it. There are things that we dread and we don't do that. So here we see that he rose up early. He was obedient to the Lord's word and to His ways without questioning. And yes, he needed help. He took the *** out of it and two young men to help things the *** in Scriptures speaks of.
And clean things is an unclean animal.
Young man, I see many young men here. Scripture said you're strong, you have physical energy. But here I believe it's a picture of worldly strength. So there were two things that Abraham sort of needed those that unclean beast, and the young man had the strength. But when they get to the place, he said he has to lift up his eyes first.
00:15:14
We can just have our eyes down, looking down on the earth.
Being filled with earthly things, we have to look up. He looked up and that's when the Lord showed him the plays afar. The Lord told him. Now he showed him the plays of far off and that is set on the third day. I believe three days speaks of the number three speaks of manifestation. Things got manifest on the third day. The third day too should remind us of death and the resurrection.
So to understand a word of God, we have to have death and resurrection before us as well, don't we? He lifted it up and then it said, then there's something difficult in a sense to do now. He said to his young man, this worldly energy as if it were you, stay back here.
Separation, the unclean beast, you know, that has to stay back here too, and that he and his son has to separate from that to go on where the place that was appointed for them. And I trust that could be a good example for us to leave the unclean things. There are many things in the world that defiled our thoughts, our communion with the Lord. We have to leave those.
And the energy that we depend on, if it's not from the Lord, we need to leave that behind you.
Would it be a picture of this and?
What you're Speaking of with Mephibosheth in Second Samuel Chapter 9, just in consideration of.
What's been said and how he will guide us to that place? I was thinking of David here.
In verse 3, two Samuel 9, and verse three. And the king said, Is there not yet any of the House of Saul, that I may show the kindness of God unto him?
I feel like the Lord Jesus says that about you and I. And he goes on, and Ziba answers them. And he said unto the King, Jonathan hath yet a son which is lame on his feet.
And the King said unto him, Where is he?
Where is he? I feel like, well I believe the Lord Jesus says that where are you today? Where is he? And so he gets an answer. He says, so I was said unto the King, Behold, he is in the House of Maker, the son of Emile, and I wonder if that was really the place.
Where the king would have Mephibosheth to be. And so he says. Then King David sent and fetched him out of the House of Maker, the son of Emil from loaded bar. Now here's the action on our part. Verse six. Now in Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul was come unto David. And so he expects that return unto him, doesn't he? He fetched us out of it. He expects us to go to him.
And when he does, he fell on his face and did reverence and so on, he says.
Number of places here that he would eat at the King's table. But verse 13 So Mephibosheth dwelt in Jerusalem, for he did eat continually at the King's table and was lame on both of his feet. I'm sure we could address that as well. But what a beautiful picture of what He expects us to do in reverence to him, in honor to him as we remember him in his death, that we would eat at the King's table continually. You might consider your lame feet on your own, but.
Really is how he'd have us to be, isn't it?
He shows us the way to get there.
Yes, this chapter really brings before us the reconciliation of man to God, and the work begins with God. Nothing in connection with our salvation begins with us. We were dead in trespasses and sins. There are two lines of truth that go throughout the scriptures, and I would encourage you. I know there's young here if you don't have your own copy of the synopsis of the books of the Bible.
If I was deserted on an island.
Somewhere a shipwreck, I would want to have my Bible and the synopsis of the books of the Bible. I mean, I could make a couple of other choices as well, but I would love to have those volumes and the Word of God. But in Mr. Darby's just at the beginning is his comments on Genesis. He says, you know, there are two lines of truth that go throughout the whole of the Scriptures, and that is the responsibility of man and the sovereignty of God.
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Now you and I cannot understand and grasp the interface between those two things.
But the fact is, what we've read here in Second Samuel Chapter 9 shows us that nothing happens in our lives apart from the sovereignty of God. And so God in His grace quickened us, gave us divine life. And then when He gave us divine light, He gave us faith to believe. And we believe. When we heard His word, we believed because we had given us the faith. It all started with Him. Yes, we're responsible to believe the gospel of the grace of God.
And it's the same thing in connection with being gathered to the Lord's name.
Why am I gathered to the Lord's name? I'm responsible to be there, to be in the place of His choice. But why am I here, really? It's the sovereignty of God.
Except for the sovereignty of God. Except for the action of Christ Himself.
The work of the Spirit of God.
I wouldn't be gathered to the Lord's name. It's a sovereignty of God. And so here what we have is this fact that it's.
They were to follow. They would never find the place themselves.
Was impossible, and so they were to follow the leading of the Spirit of God.
And the master perhaps here the.
Exercised oversight in the upper room. They were to ask where is the guest chamber and so it was a work of God to save the soul. It's a work of God to gather us to his precious name. And so this is being brought out here. I might just point out to in Luke's Gospel chapter 10. We have another in mentioned there.
And it says in verse 34 of Luke 10, he went up to him and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast and brought him to, it should say, to Beacon, and took care of him. So here we have in Luke chapter 10, the Lord Jesus himself, the Good Samaritan bringing 1 into the end, bring him to the end. And so it's a work of God.
To save a soul. But it's a work of God to bring us into his presence. How thankful we should be.
We should not take it lightly in any sense of the word, to find ourselves on a Lord's Day morning in the presence of the Lord. In His sovereign grace and goodness. We could be somewhere else, but we find ourselves in His presence.
I think it's important to this line of truth to remember that we are gathering to a person. Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach without the camp.
Is separation certainly from the world, but also from all the ecclesiastical confusion there is imprisoned them, but it's to a person.
And our hearts are to be attracted to that person either.
I think there's that, that side of responsibility here. The truth is presented to us of a divine ground of gathering.
We are responsible what we do with that truth.
I've often used that verse in Galatians chapter 2. If I build again the things that once I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor. So there's the danger of drifting away from that divine ground. That's what Satan would like to have, and it's happening, drifting back to the systems of men or or the denomination.
This is, this is a danger, certainly a danger in Brazil, the danger in Canada too. And so we have Second Timothy, chapter 2.
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Often referred to that is an individual separation. Chapter 2.
Verse 19 The Lord knoweth them that are his, but here's our responsibility, let everyone that name it the name of Christ.
Depart from iniquity. We're in a great house. There are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and of earth, and some to honor and some to dishonor. If therefore, if a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, and so on. So the purging there is an individual responsibility.
Purging from the vessels to dishonor from what is dishonouring.
Doctrinally or could be morally in relation to the Lord Jesus. Let us remember that we're gathered to a person, the person of the Lord Jesus in our midst. Is that right? You love it? Yes.
And so we have that in our chapter, the end of verse eight, Peter and John were told.
And go to prepare the Passover. I'd like to emphasis on this last little phrase that we might eat. What were they to eat?
It was the Passover.
If we turn back to Exodus chapter 12, we'll read just briefly.
What they were to eat.
Exodus chapter 12, verse 8.
Speaking of the lamb, they shall eat the flesh, and that night rose with fire, and unleavened bread and bitter herbs.
That's Christ.
He is the lamb.
The unleavened bread. He's the lamb. He's the unleavened bread. Bitter herbs. That speaks to Christ as well they were to be.
On the Lord Jesus.
I bring this up is.
When we gather.
What is the purpose?
The purpose should be to feed on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Occupied with him.
And dear young people.
If that's not the focus.
Then we missed the whole thing.
If it's not to be known in Christ, then we've missed the whole picture. We've.
Missed the whole reason that God would have us to be around his Son.
Thank you for that. I think that's a very, very important statement that what is the purpose. You know, sometimes we use the phrase we're going to meeting tomorrow.
Some would say they go to church.
Are you going to meeting on Lord's Day?
And while you there as the word of God request as the Lord Jesus requested us. This dude is simple 2 letter word DO do what happened when you do.
In remembrance of Maine, we're there to remember the Lord.
This portion we have before us is the foundation of this. It doesn't give us the I don't believe this gives us the authority on how we're to break bread. We learned that in First Corinthians Chapter 11 because in this portion it is for his own. It was the Passover that he had first. But then when they were at the First Corinthians Chapter 11, the apostle Paul said that he received that of the Lord, which in turn is that he gave it to us.
That's the authority that we are to be there. This do in remembrance of me. So now that raised another question too. So we come to remember the Lord, how do we remember Him?
Do we come with the thought that this is all about me? He saved me from my sins. I believe that's good. He did this for me, it's good. But do we also think about him, the price that our blessed Savior have to pay to bring you and I unto God for wait a minute now do we even think about how God things of his own Son?
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That's the remembrance, isn't it, His death. So we were able to look back to the cross and also as far as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you do show the Lord's death.
Here we come. Then we can look forward to when you come to take his home to be with himself. Now, let me backtrack a little bit. The word gather was mentioned numerous times and I think many of us assume that word we use that I believe there's some translation, or perhaps I should say paraphrase, use the phrase that come together. I believe there's a big distinction between gathered and come because this afternoon I came here.
It is me who decided to be here. I came, but to be gathered, we have no strength. Someone picked you up, you were gathered and put in the right place. That's the Lord, that's the Spirit of God who gathered us and we must be there. As you will find, the gospel doesn't give us authority, but it builds a foundation as the Lord Jesus after the woman of the well, he said, here's something you're going to learn, He's going to change.
Is no longer Jerusalem or this mountain you're going to worship. Remember, we emphasize many times that there was a place for Israel vote. Jerusalem is the place, there's no question about that. That's the center. But now he said to her, a true worshiper must worship in spirit and in truth. And our brother already mentioned, we are gathered not to something, but someone to the Lord himself, and he noticed through the place.
There was a guest chamber.
It's not like I have made a beautiful building for you to be gathered in Noah's temporary because it's not about things of this world. We have gathered to a person. We use the phrase we gather to the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
I trust this is in line with what you're speaking, but it reminds me much of the two on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24 and a couple of pages over. And surely those ones were there in that day. And we think about him being on the cross. He quite well witnessed it. And yet it says, but we trusted that it was him. And so they went away. They got discouraged and they went in a different direction. And so to be in the way of Emmaus is not what the Lord would have for us, but.
You know by the Spirit that one in whom we say we gather around as the person of Christ.
He comes along with them. You'd have to read it all in Luke 24 from verses 13 down to the end, but.
He says to them.
Verse 25 Then he said unto them, O fools and slow of heart, to believe all that the prophets have spoken, not, not Christ, to have suffered these things.
And to enter into his glory, and beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them, and all the Scriptures, the things concerning.
Himself And they drew nigh unto the village, whether they went, and He made as though He would have gone further. But they constrained him, saying, Abide with us for His toward evening, and the day as far as spent. And He went into tarry with them. And it came to pass, as He sat at meet with them, He took bread, and blessed it, and break it, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him, and he vanished out of their sight. And so it was he that was, that one Himself it was Christ.
That they were drawn to and so they said one to another. Did not our heart burn within us while he talked with us, by the way, while he opened us the Scriptures? And I can only think of what Stephen said. And, you know, when we have an opportunity to be in his presence like this on Lord's Day morning to remember him, do we ask ourselves, did not our hearts burn within us?
And if they didn't, surely we've missed it.
I've often said the remembrance of the Lord.
Is a request, not a command, But it's like a picture of the Lord in death. I have a picture of my mother in my home in Ottawa. When I look at that picture, I remember my mother when she was with me. He's with the Lord many years now. When we partake of the emblems on Lord's Day morning, it's a picture of the Lord.
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In death not so much occupied with His glory, now at the right hand of God, which is a wonderful truth.
But occupation with his death, Mr. Darby said. I never remember the Lord, but I think of a dead Christ. That's important.
We don't want to be legal about it, but let us contemplate.
The magnitude of that work of redemption and.
Call in wandering thoughts that we might have.
Meditate upon the sacrifice of the Lord.
What it meant for he the Holy One who knew no sin to be made sin for us. You know, Satan is very active on Lord's Day morning and our thoughts can be 100 miles away. We have to.
Gird up our loins.
Brother mentioned the bitter herbs there, probably another thought along that line.
You know, it was our sins that caused the Lord that suffering, those filthy sins that I had committed.
That caused the Lord that agony of those hours of darkness. How serious it is if I am going on with anything.
That is, contrary to God's mind, anything sinful habit.
Or whatever it is and I come to break bread.
That is serious. It's Hippocratic. It's a hypocrite because I'm saying that I'm remembering the Lord in his death and his sufferings for the very sin that I'm going on with.
How serious that would be. So we have in First Corinthians Chapter 11.
Much teaching along that line because the Corinthians were a careless group of believers they were going on with. There was division among them, there was immorality among them, there was confusion in their meetings, disorder. But the Lord was still in the midst, and the apostle gave them an admonition.
That.
If I we better turn to it first, so I get the words First Corinthians Chapter 11 familiar to us. It says, let a man examine himself for 28 Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup, for he that Egypt and drinketh unworthily in an unworthy manner, that perhaps we could say unjust sin.
In the life eateth and drinketh judgment, damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep.
God had had acted in a governmental way in the assembly in Corinth because of their carelessness.
Yet, being at the Lord's Table, some of them were taken away by the article of death.
They must have been believers, because no unbeliever is spoken of as in sleep, only a believer is spoken of in that way, the body being asleep, while some of them they were taken away. So the apostle says, if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged, but when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world. Is that right, brethren?
I just, I appreciate that.
Brother John, just to make a comment with regards to that further down.
In the 15th verse.
Because sometimes we're very occupied with with ourselves and our state.
At the remembrance which is is needful and we can look at this whole subject from our standpoint as well, but it's it's good for us to see it from the Lord's viewpoint too. So here in the 15th verse we read he said unto them with desire, I have desire to eat this Passover with you before I supper. So it was the Lord's desire to be to have them around himself. It's it's wonderful for us to to think about going into the presence of the Lord. That's wonderful, but just think of it from the Lord's standpoint.
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If we go back to Mark's Gospel for a moment in the fourth verse of the 4th chapter.
We see the.
We see the Lord.
Selecting his disciples.
We have the disciples. There's four different lists of them, but this one here in in Mark's Gospel, I'm sorry, the third chapter.
Mark's Gospel, chapter 3.
And verse 14.
Here Dean, 12.
Now here we find first and foremost why.
That they should be with him.
Afterwards we read and that he might send them forth to preach and that power heal sicknesses cast out devils and so on. But first and foremost is he ordained the 12 That they should be with him. He wanted their company and in the same way he he wants our company and I I think you think of Lord's day morning we're going to have if the Lord leaves us here, this this privilege of coming into the presence of the Lord. But he his desire is is he wants our company.
He wants us to be with us. And you know, that's such a humbling thought to consider. You brought before us, Brother John, that that concept in in in in Corinthians of eating unworthily. And it's needful for us to to.
To have a clean vessel, you know we were speaking about.
Separation and thought to say this, but maybe let's look at it in we really get the full concept of it in the book of numbers. Go back to the book of Numbers.
Numbers the 5th chapter.
The whole thought of Numbers five is separation from evil time and time again. So here you have the Lord speak unto Moses, saying, Command the children of Israel, that they put out of the camp. Every leper, everyone that has an issue, whosoever is defiled by the dead, both male and female, shall ye put out the fourth verse. The children of Israel did so, and put them out without the camp. As the Lord spake unto Moses, so did the children of Israel. And so you have this whole chapter that takes off the thought of separation from evil.
Putting it away, but how different the next chapter. The next chapter is the law of the Nazarite. And so we read in the Lord, spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, whether either man or woman shall separate themselves, avow the vow of the Nazarite to separate themselves unto the Lord.
It's a completely different concept. Look at the fifth verse.
Down towards the end.
He separated himself unto the Lord. The sixth verse, all the days shall he separate himself unto the Lord, the eighth verse, all the days of his separation, He is holy unto the Lord, the 12Th verse, he shall consecrate unto the Lord, the 14th verse, and so on. There's many, many times. So you have this, this 5th chapter, which is separation from evil. But now we have the law of the Nazarite, it's separation unto the Lord.
So we have a place in the Old Testament. We have a person in the New Testament. I appreciate brother Dave, you're bringing out that the gathering power is not on ourselves. It's a serious thing to gather people together in every way, shape or form. We we have it here now we've the Saints here have have invited the Saints and they they gathered. That's that's the concept of whether it's last night, the young people, they gathered together and they played, they played capture the flag. Regardless, it's a serious thing to gather people together. But.
That which we're speaking about in Matthew 18 is where two or three.
Are gathered the the force is completely out of ourselves and it's it's it's a beautiful thing to realize that it's the Lord's desire and that's what we have with desire. I have desire to eat this Passover with you before some his desire was those that he had he had ordained to himself that that they would be with him. Oh, he wanted to eat the Passover with him. He wanted their company and he wants our company too. He wants it not only tomorrow morning, but he wants our company.
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All through our lives this week, now we want to, we want to surround the occasion with fear. We want to leave that impression, but it should be with self judgment. I think of that verse. Let him drink and forget his poverty and remember his misery no more.
It is not only does it give us.
Encouragement, but it brings joy to the heart of God, the heart of the Lord, because He remembers also the sufferings that he passed through there at the cross for our redemption.
It's also mentioned in connection with this.
This His desire for our company in verse 28, I think is our chapter. Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations to the blessed Lord, went through all kinds of trials, and suffered the reproach of men who came unto His own. His own received Him not so in the time of His rejection. We have the privilege of being companions of His.
During the time of his rejection, and that's during the time that we're living. But it's interesting, you know, as we speak of these things, there are two things that are normal to Christianity.
It is normal Christianity to remember the Lord Jesus in his death.
And it is normal Christianity to be baptized. Perhaps I have the order backwards, but let's just look at Acts Chapter 9.
It's Paul, as you know, was a model Christian and how a Christian is saved, how a Sinner is saved and how a Sinner is gathered and so on. And so it says.
In Chapter 9, let's read verse 18. Immediately there fell from his eyes, as it had been scales, and he received sight forthwith, and arose and was baptized.
That doesn't say whether Paul said, OK, I'm saved now I need to be baptized.
But the one that had been used of God to speak to him were not told everything that Ananias said to us.
And I spoke to him. We have very little recorded of what was said, but he says brother Saul.
Inverse a little bit earlier, verse 17. And then he was filled with the Holy Ghost. So he was engulfed with the Spirit of God, sealed with the Spirit as he understood.
The facts of salvation and said Christ died for me immediately. He was sealed with the Spirit. He speaks of this in Ephesians chapter one. He goes over that doctrine, but it was normal to be baptized.
The scripture doesn't see a believer. Someone that really knows the Lord Jesus as Savior is not being baptized.
And so, you know, there may be someone here that's not baptized and they went, well, you know, it's kind of got to be kind of a ritual. And the brethren are going to read a bunch of scriptures and there's going to be a public thing. And boy, I can't take that. But, you know, in the Scriptures, these things were done privately. I'm not saying that we don't want to have a public baptism and so on. We have them in different places, but.
You know, in a very quiet way, the Ethiopian eunuch in the wilderness.
Was baptized by Philip, just the two of them. There was some water. He was baptized in the name of the Father, the son of the Holy Ghost. The Philippian jailer was saved at midnight, his whole household, he says. I don't want any heathens in my household. I want everyone to be on Christian ground, identified with Christ. The whole household was baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. But for a believer, it's normal.
And then it says a little later on in Chapter 9 of Acts that.
He says, it says in verse 26, when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he is saved to join himself to the disciples. But they were all afraid of him and believe not that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, brought him unto the to the apostles, and declared unto him unto them, how he had seen the Lord in the way, and they had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of the of Jesus. And he was with them coming in and going out at Jerusalem.
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So it's evident that that Paul was received into fellowship. I believe that Damascus, many went to Jerusalem. We read of it in Galatians. I think it's chapter 2 went up for 14 days.
And.
So we tried to join the brethren and he said, I'm a Christian too, but he wasn't received on individual testimony. They said, no, you're not we, we know you. We heard about you. You're not coming in here. And but Barnabas, you know, had acted, you might say, as his letter of commendation. And Barbara said, no, I, I heard him preach. I, I can verify that he truly is a believer.
And so those two things I believe we need to recognize are necessary.
Baptism and remembrance of the Lord.
Now we might say, well.
That's you know what, maybe I'm not ready for that. Well, you know, it doesn't give us any ages of those that were to be gathered to the Lord's name, those that were to be remembering the Lord in his death, but they were to be responsible, it says in our chapter here.
That they were to make ready, so they were to exercise self judgment I believe is the thought and it says in verse 13 they went.
On that lovely.
You'll never be happier in your soul.
Than to obey the truth of what you hear and read in the word of God.
To simply obey it and to walk in submission to the will and the Word of God.
You'll never be at peace without it, and you'll never have the joy of the Lord as you He would desire you to have.
If you just go.
To the point that has been brought out regarding the loose desire to be with us, there's a distinction in our chapter here between verses 15 and 18. That's the Passover supper. And then versus 20 or 19 and 20 says the Lord stop the House of her supper didn't bring us to God. It provided shelter. The blood on the door actually kept God out. That sheltered those that were in the house when they got the angels.
But that was the Lord's consensus, and the Lord's Supper brings us ancient communion of himself. First Corinthians, chapter 10.
Says in verse 16, the cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? Is it not the communion of the body of Christ? And so it introduces the new thing that brings us into fellowship with himself, fellowship with his suffering. You know, when the Lord was on the cross, you look for something to take pity. I found none but you and I provide him to a place where we can have communion with himself, and we consider His suffering his work.
Person, and we can worship that person that we've been brought in to fellowship with.
Some might wonder, well, we have the Lord's Supper spoken of in Scripture, in Mark Matthews Gospel, Marks Gospel.
Gospel. Why do we have to have it in First Corinthians?
First Corinthians Chapter 11. Why is it there?
Well, we might say that in the Gospels it's historically is given to us.
In the historical record and from a Jewish perspective, it's a seed plot. The Lord you, the Lord Jesus always gave the seed law himself of Paul's doctrine of church doctrine. He gave the seed plot of it. But because the disciples were not indwelled with the Spirit of God, he didn't unfold the whole of the revelation of Christian doctrine himself, and so the remembrance of the Lord Jesus.
In his death is part of what we call Paul's doctrine. Paul's doctrine has four main parts to it. One is the remembrance of the Lord. Peter doesn't speak of it. John doesn't speak of it. It's not a part of that ministry. It's church doctrine, and it's what the apostle had revealed to him. Let's read it in first Corinthians 11.
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Verse 23, it says I have received of the Lord. That's the revelation that he received from the Lord, the risen Christ on five. And so he reveals this from a Christian perspective. He gives the teaching of the emblems in chapter 10. Why? What they are, what they mean and so on. But he says this do in remembrance of me at the end of verse 24. And then he says he reveals to us as well in verse 26.
As often as you eat this bread, ye eat this bread.
Let's us collectively and drink this cup. Ye collectively do show the Lord's death or announced the Lord's death till he come. So it was revealed to the apostle Paul that this would take place until the coming of the Lord.
We have the confidence that we're going to be able to remember the Lord Jesus and his death until he comes. Another part of Paul's doctrine is the coming of the Lord, he says.
That I would not have you to be ignorant. And so he he had that revelation from the Lord, and then all those things that we have that are in Christ.
And he speaks of really in the mystery.
Christ's in the church.
It's all Paul's doctrine. Those four parts of those are the four major parts of what God, what the Spirit of God brings out in Paul's ministry, the coming of the Lord Jesus for his Saints, how it will take place, the sequence of events and the breaking of bread, what we can do while we're here, and the assembly, how the assembly is to be ordered, and so on. And then all of those blessings that we have, heavenly blessings.
That we're heavenly citizens and that we're blessed in Christ and to the great mystery of Christ and the Church, the relationship that we have with Christ.
Just a.
A note in reference to him I have received of the Lord First Corinthians and Romans, and 2nd Corinthians were written before the Matthew, Mark and Luke and John.
We didn't have that reference because we kind of received it directly from the Lord.
So the First Corinthians is written, we might say, from a Christian perspective. And so that's why on a Lords Day morning, a brother will stand up and he will sometimes read First Corinthians Chapter 11, verse 23 down to the end. And he doesn't read it in Matthew, his Gospel. He doesn't read it in Luke's Gospel. Sometimes he might. But really if we read it intelligently, he reads that Christian portion.
And it gives us the doctrinal significance of what took place.
On that night in a Jewish setting, but from a Christian perspective.
Or how thankful we can be for the accuracy of Scripture and to tell us that the basis of our fellowship with Christ is the blood that was shed.
And so when we take that cup, let's read it in, as we're talking of this doctrinally, First Corinthians chapter 10.
He he says in verse 16, chapter 10 and verse 16, the cup of blessing which we bless, it doesn't represent the judgment that Christ bore on the cross. That's not what it's Speaking of. The cup, when it's a cup of wine on the table, that represents a cup of blessing, the blood that was shed to bring us into blessing, the greatest blessing that God could possibly bestow upon man.
That we could be brought into a relationship, reconciled to God, made sons of God, heirs of God, joint heirs of Christ. Could you be better blessed? You couldn't be better blessed. It's a cup of blessing. The cup of judgment was born on the cross. It's a different cup.
And so the Lord Jesus.
Bore the judgment for our sins, not waiting. Then in verse 17 it says we being many are one bread or one loaf.
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One body, for we are all partakers of that one bread or that one loaf. And so when on the Lord's Day morning, you take part and the loaf comes by and you take a little piece of that loaf, you're publicly confessing that you are a member of the body of Christ.
And in fellowship with the Lord, as it were, you're responding to his request that you would eat and remember him in this way. And so it's a public thing, but it's a public profession that you belong to Christ.
I would say, Robert, that the truth of the one body.
Of Christ developed in First Corinthians 10 is the one loaf on the table. When I look at that one loaf, I see there represented every member of the body of Christ, wherever he is.
He's in that loaf.
Not those that have passed into the presence of the Lord, They are not in that vote. But every living member of the body of Christ is in that loaf. When it is broken, then the symbol changes. Then it is the remembrance of the death of Christ, of His precious body being broken, given in death. So the aspect in First Corinthians 10.
Is is the collective side, I thought, the communion of the blood of Christ the way I have understood it.
Where it speaks, there communion of the body, the blood of Christ. I thought it thought of it as.
Recognizing God's thoughts as to the value, the preciousness, the efficacy of that blood that was shed. God's thoughts having common thoughts with God.
As to the value of that precious blood, the 11Th chapter is individual. It's the Lord's Supper, not the Lord's Table, it's the Lord's Supper. We partake of the Lord's Supper at the Lord's Table. But but as I said, the Lord's Table is, is the divine ground of gathering, and we are looked upon as always being at the Lord's table. Is that right, Robin? Well, in First Corinthians 11/20.
25 It speaks of ye. That's plural, isn't it, John?
Ye this do ye collectively.
As OFT as ye collectively drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as ye collectively drink, eat this bread and drink this cup, ye collectively do show the Lord's death till he comes. So it's a wonderful thing the Lord gathers two or three or more or fewer. You know, it's the lowest number is the two or the three.
Used to be in the England two or three thousand. Then perhaps when Dave Mearns and I were younger it was 2 or 300.
Now in some places it's 20 or 30.
Many places you'll go, it's two or three. Sometimes it's two.
Nevertheless of the Lord, though Amen.
This point of.
In remembrance.
There is opposition to this remembrance of.
A greater significance than we can grasp. And that opposition comes from the God of this world, Small G. There's nothing he wants more than to erase this event from the minds of man. And so it is.
It's important and it's precious that we seek to announce his death, that.
On that regular basis, Acts 20 and seven, the first day of the week, the disciples came together to break bread. And we have a seed of it all the way back in Genesis. And I'd like to look at that Genesis chapter 50 and verse 25.
And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence. So Joseph died, being 110 years old, and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.
01:05:17
Joshua 24, verse 32.
And the bones of Joseph, which the children Israel brought up out of Egypt buried, And Shechem, and a parcel of ground which Jacob bought of the sons of Hammer, the father of Shechem, for 100 pieces of silver, And it became the inheritance of the children of Joseph.
The coffin of Joseph, 40 years. They carried that coffin through the wilderness.
Let's not, let's not count this as an unnecessary impediment in the Christian path. It's a.
It's a final part of the Christian path and.
Sadly, some just become.
From the side you can discourage and give up this precious privilege of remembering him also in Christendom that that.
Practice of taking communion viewed as.
We gotta we gotta move it off to the side because there's more important things that are need to be done. And but the of this principle to to carry that coffin all the way through and bring it into the land of Shechem Joseph who who died that was was given of God to provide life.
It's not a means of grace, um.
As it has been interpreted in denominationalism, we're not better before God because we remember the war. It's.
As Robert brought out this the body of Christ, if we remember the Lord intelligently, I think what you were referring to is that we remember the Lord as members of the body of Christ.
Yes, that that is the thought I think and I didn't mean to cut you off there on that thought, but in First Corinthians 10, it's the collective aspect there.
Is very appropriate timing in a sense too that we read. We heard various comment of this passage tomorrow morning.
We have the real practical practice as if it were.
What these words affect our hearts, our thoughts as we are gathered tomorrow morning?
And with the express purpose of remembering him in his death force he just.
Trust that the Spirit would move our hearts. It's not a praise and prayer meeting as some people will call. It's not a a Thanksgiving meeting is the remembrance, although praise and prayers often flow out from it. So we have to remember this dude in remembrance of me. And one more thought to that too is it's not those brothers who often take part is not about knowledge.
It's about your priesthood, your responsibility as serving priests. So all brothers are able to offer Thanksgiving, and the sisters have an equal part in that meeting, don't they? We ask. The silent part.
Their holy priests, the Sisters, our holy priests, as well as the Brothers.
And there they certainly have a contribution to the remembrance in in their by their.
Silent participation.
I was wondering in in our chapter here I just asked him the question that the Lord did not partake of the.
Of the Passover Cup, although he did partake of the Passover.
With the disciples.
But it mentions in the 18th verse, I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine.
Until the Kingdom of God shall come.
Verse 17 He took the cup and gave thanks and said, take this and divide it among yourselves. That was the Passover cup, was it not? And the Lord did not partake of that cup.
01:10:07
He didn't partake of that cup because it speaks of the establishment of the Kingdom and earthly joy when the Lord will have his rightful place and he was rejected when when this Passover was celebrated as Anyone have a thought on that?
He was the perfect Passover lamb. He fulfilled the Passover requirement in every way. So we find in the Passover scene, they had to choose a land on the 10th day of the month, and they had to keep it until the 14th day between the evenings. So he entered Jerusalem on the 10th day of that month. We perhaps followed the phrase from the Catholic again, the Palm Sunday, that's the 10th day of the month. On Thursday, that's the 14th day of the month. This is the passage we're at that they had as if it were the last Passover.
Now the Passover lamp can be killed between the evening. So from Thursday evening, that's three o'clock Thursday afternoon to 3:00 on the 15th, which is Friday.
Is is the time set aside when it can kill the lamb? So the Lord had the Passover with the disciple. He Himself, being the perfect Passover lamb, was offered up. He yielded up his ghost at 3:00 the next day.
And then we find that he fulfilled the others. I failed to mention. We mentioned about the Passover, the unleavened bread, the feast of the first fruit, which is on the 17th day of the month, a few days later, that's resurrection. And then the remembrance that we have in Corinthians, really before the seven feasts is 50 days afterwards, the feast of Pentecost when the Holy Ghost descended and everything changed from there on. Then we all.
Become, or I should say that we the believers then become intelligent one because we're indwelled by the Spirit of God.
We sing 245.
#146 what I have in mind.
We bless our Savior's name.
Ourselves.
I do make.
Enough.
Gospel 1
Gospel—David So
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
Well, good evening. I do know the clock shows a little bit before 7:00, but I thought we're all sitting down. It'd be good opportunity to use the time. Perhaps. Would he even squeeze by singing an extra hymn? So I see children here. So I like to start with a children's hymn first.
Hymn #46 in the back of the hymn sheet.
And 90 Short children's hymn Glad Hiding, Let's Sing 46 Galati Idi.
OT.
S you have to come to the right savings.
Let's look to the Lord for help. Blessed God and our.
Well, I like to sing one more hymn.
Hymn #26 Perhaps that's a long one. Perhaps we were saying the 1St, the 3rd, and the last verse.
There is light.
Say unto him who was now children to the dream.
We are here.
To grow up and like me to make it. They can't speak for God.
Oh my God, I'll be mad River from the Drake.
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah can't play.
Better in the life of life and I'm not alone I have a crush on the stage I find there is light that the smoke and for being then doubt not thy welcome since God.
Declare there remaineth no more to be done.
That ones in the end of the world he appeared and completed.
The work he begun, verse 5.
But take with.
And as follows.
Your grandson never can't sight.
00:05:29
Romans chapter one. Let's read just one verse there.
Perhaps 2 verses Romans chapter one, verse 16.
Oh, perhaps we'll start you into verse 15. So as much as in me is I am ready to preach the Gospel to you that are at Rome also.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation.
To everyone that believeth, to the Jew 1St, and also to the Greek, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith as it is written.
That just shall live by faith.
What a wonderful privilege to preach the gospel of God's grace, I know.
Sometimes it's difficult to tell others and we shy from telling soul, but it is a wonderful message that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
The other day.
Few days ago I took a couple of my grandkids to the museum in Toronto.
And they have this exhibit with dinosaurs. And I understand that a lot of young children, our other grandchildren here love dinosaurs. In fact, the little one that when you owe, he opened up the picture. And I understand you've probably heard it at your meeting here that partway through meeting, he opened up the picture. He went roar.
Not appropriate at meeting time, but that's what the little ones sometimes do.
We see things.
There are different thoughts when we see dinosaur. But you know, one of the thoughts that I liked is I heard it when I was much younger. Or perhaps I'll go backward with a background or to that story when we were in Idaho a few weeks ago. There are perhaps the western states, there are gas stations with a picture of a dinosaur and they have a name, Sinclair.
I'm sure you've seen that, right? You folks violate, you probably have the Sinclair gas station. Well, the thought that when I went out and saw that, the thought came and I remember that and perhaps Brother John Kenwood, correct me on that. I heard it from Brother Charles Hayhoe in his gospel. I used to really enjoy his gospel and he mentioned it one time. He said he walked up to the gas station.
And he said to the boy there who was ready to pump the gas, he said.
Young men who put the sin in Sinclair.
I go what a question. Who put the sin in Sinclair? I'm sure Mr. Sinclair did not look at his name from that standpoint. David's. Finally. You probably remember that story too, right? I don't remember the rest. I'm a terrible listener. I only remember bits and pieces.
That stuck with me. Who put this in?
So there are dinosaurs. The scripture actually speaks of that. It's not my thought to speak on that tonight. We have dinosaurs today. Crocodiles really is a form of dinosaur. I have a piece of rock here, the stone, which is not a rock, and you kids are welcome to look at it. There are fossils. Well, they're really tiny. It's not this exotic.
Rock fossil that are worth millions of dollars. These are just the.
Cheap stuff we pick up on the beach. Well, we do know that there were creatures from way, way back, that a form is evidence of that. But do we know that everything we see tells a gospel story?
00:10:07
Everything we see if we pay attention. How many young people knew that, Mrs. Sinclair?
Have sinned in him.
Wait a minute now what about you? I.
Think I know most of you. I don't know of any Sinclair in this room.
I see John Kent, I see John Kemp. I see many Browns and clerks.
Many name no Sinclair's.
But.
Do you think?
Sin as I am.
Was put into your name.
Wait a minute, let's rephrase that.
It was put in you.
Do we know that?
Tells us in the book of Romans we go further, for all have sinned.
Now let me think now the word or ALL?
Who would be excluded in this room tonight if we use that reference all?
I don't think anyone is excluded. So the word of God set for all have sinned. Not only that and come short of the glory of God.
Oh, you're a reminder of seeing everywhere. Dinosaurs. They die. Why did they die? They're gone extinct. Or at least most of them.
What about you?
I think Brother David quoted out that it is appointed unto men.
Oh, that's you and I. It is appointed until man wants to die, but after this the judgment.
This is serious matter, isn't it? That's why this is the gospel meeting, a meeting of good tidings. Oh, wait a minute. I just said it was serious. How can there be good tidying? It was serious. Well, it also depending on how you take the gospel message. If you reject the gospel message, the serious is this. The wages of sin is death.
But the good news is the gift of God is eternal life through.
Jesus Christ our Lord.
As you share.
Perhaps a few stories in regard to dinosaur. I don't really know that much about dinosaur. In fact, the only name I can actually see is Pterodactyl. Short of that, I can't pronounce the rest of the type of dinosaurs. I see many moms here smiling because they teach the kids all that and they have to say those names, right? Many of you go. I know all those names.
Well, I don't, but they're gone.
We don't need to worry about that. But there is evidence of those dinosaurs that were once roamed this Earth. They're gone.
But what evidence will we look?
We have the word of God that tells us many things and then.
We want to go back to my early statement. We see things, but we don't think of it as gospel message.
So let me change the question, how many here can read write Chinese?
Come on, Not even one.
One you can. Oh, OK, then I can tell you almost anything. You wouldn't know if it's right or wrong. So you have to trust me by faith, I'm telling you a real story.
I'm looking out that way and I saw a door. Anyone see that with me?
You see the door? Well it would be nice if I projector, but it wouldn't matter if the Chinese character is interesting. It's a door a draw 2 lines like 2 doorposts and then there's a symbol of the sun as the sun and the moon. Two Suns attach to the doorpost. You may go hmm.
Why? Well, my interpretation to that is when I see a door, I'm reminded that it's very bright at the door.
00:15:07
A gate? A door? Why was this so bright?
I think scripture said because of seeing Adam and Eve were chased out of the garden, what was put there to stop them from going back in? Do you remember the story?
Cherubim were flaming swords. Well, maybe the Chinese weren't very good with writing pictures, but as sure describe it, it was so bright as if there were two Suns or the brightness of two Suns at the door. So can you look at the door and you will say that, yeah, that was the wages of sin.
Can we not use that as a gospel message?
Because of man's disobedience to God's Word, we were kicked out of that garden, and that door is a reminder that we can't go back in. Terrible, isn't it? The Word of God tells us So what else?
Well, let me think now I'm going to use Chinese characters again.
How many have you seen a tower?
What's the tower is usually this tall structures right and they said you have I'm glad you have.
Some people say, well, the Chinese symbols are just pictures. So if you were to draw a tower, what would you draw?
A flat line. Now you probably go like this and say that's a tall tower.
What the Chinese letter is interesting, it's made-up of a number of symbols, is that one of the symbol was grass and dirt.
We'll come back to that in a minute. And then they said people one mouth.
That got me puzzled for a while. People had one mouth. Oh, people had one language.
OK, people have one language, grass and straw. I mean grass and dirt. Well, we have to go to the book of Exodus to find how Pharaoh said to them, don't give them any straws to make breaks. People were making breaks while they had one language tower. Is it not a testimony to the word of God?
That.
Men try to find a way to God, their own way. This afternoon we have the way of Cain.
This is similar, isn't it? It's God. It's OK. I want to go to heaven. I'll build a tower tall enough that we can just go in our own strength.
Symbols throughout.
You had lunch this afternoon. At least I hope you did. Some of you were too busy playing. Maybe you didn't have lunch, but I saw some bread on the table. Did you see that? You probably had some too, right?
Well, do we think of gospels story when we see bread?
What can you think of bread? Did someone say he's the bread of life?
We have one here who gives life. He sustains life.
Water you drink.
There are so many things that we don't even need to tell the story. Now let's go back to Romans chapter one.
Verse 19 because.
I'm sorry, I just lost a thought and it came back to me. I will hold your finger there. It was stunning to say about the dinosaurs. So people.
With knowledge, the smart people would take evidence and they come up with stories.
Well, there's something called carbon dating, they'll say. This rock is probably so many millions years old.
You heard that right, they can garbage this. Now I don't know much about physics or chemistry, but I do know there are no carbon in rock.
Zhinga carbon in wood, in trees, but they can still figure it out. Carbon dating. So a lot of stories are made-up. So I want to tell you a story and then we'll come back to that. There. I told someone that a few weeks ago some of us were a Keratin conference. You know, Keratin conference is interesting. It is right beside a man made lake.
00:20:18
Beautiful lake. And the reason one of the brothers discovered that years ago this would be, I'm thinking, wow, we've been going for 45 years, so this got to be 50-60. Seventy years ago, I don't know.
And a brother who worked for Natural Resources will call in because the cottages were complaining that that lake.
The fish in that lake is very few and far in between. So he came in to investigate.
And they do the scientific thing with natural catching. I don't understand all that. And because their conclusion to that is highly inefficient, that lake.
When this brother was done for, what I heard the story was to report at the very end was is that Cottagers need to learn how to fish.
But they did have a story. Now I'll tell you another one that was similar to me because brother David asked. Anyone caught a fish before? I didn't put my hand up because I sorta did, but I didn't. I'm not a Fisher. I was with a brother who fished. So he gave me his fishing rod. I went Lake Ontario. We couldn't see land. He said he dropped his line up 190 feet down in the water and we caught.
A salmon about this big now I gotta be careful. I used to what we because I really didn't do anything.
I pulled it up.
That was my right, yes, I suppose I can say I did. He told me. He told me that was my rod that he set up. So while he was bathing my rebating my rod, he gave me his and I go. Your rod feels funny. He said he caught the fish too. Another fish. We caught 2 Salmon this big, this big and my mind started to go as some of you know I like numbers and back then there was a four salmon limit. So I go, we caught two in 30 seconds.
We're going home in about 10 more minutes.
Well, I learned something. That whole leg had only two fish.
That was my theory because we spent the rest of the afternoon and we're caught nothing.
We had fancy computers. We have depth Finder, we have fish Finder. We see this and that. I learned there were no other fish in that lake. Isn't it interesting how we can come up with theories based on our own understanding? So now let's go back to Romans chapter one.
Verse Verse 19. Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has showed unto them, For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made.
Even his eternal power.
And God and Godhead. So with that they are without excuse, because that when they knew God, they glorify him not as God, neither we're thankful, but became vain in their own imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became.
Fools. Thus the natural heart of man that we think we think we're so smart.
That we leave God out. We think we are the master of this world. You know, some of us are getting older. I think Robert says something to to Dave said, yeah, we are. Well, I know what you mean. I'm there too, right? I'm thinking Montreal 1967. I know for some of you that was a long time ago.
1967 they had a thing called World Expo in Montreal.
And they had a theme. That theme for that Expo was.
Man in his world.
We as men declare that this is my world.
We don't want God. We can take care of everything. Can you imagine if you own a house and you left it empty for a while? Perhaps you've gone away and someone moved in without your permission.
And later on they say that's our house, not yours. Is that what we're doing? That God has put us here? We now see this is our world. We first of all, we don't believe there is a God. Science show that there is no God. That's the ignorance of man, that they would change everything.
00:25:23
For their convenience. What are your conditions tonight, friend? Is that what you're thinking?
That you are your own master of your own doing. Let's go back to Genesis chapter one.
I'm going to approach the gospel from a slightly different side of things. We often tell you how terrible of a condition you're in, but tonight I want to tell you how much God loves you and that what he has done so that he can redeem you back to Himself.
I want to look at a creation because I think a brother on this end this afternoon. The pattern of things always the same that God used similar pattern for the things of old and it's very true. So we're seeing creation Genesis chapter one in the beginning, God. I think that's a very important statement. God created the heaven and the earth.
Period.
Stops there.
And then he said, And the earth was without form and void. It was empty.
You know, you say no, I've seen pictures from space. They take a picture of the Earth. It's beautiful. I see oceans. I see continents. Well, you can almost see people, I guess, depending on how good your eyes are. But he said the Earth originally was without form and void. As Mr. Darby will put it, the Earth was waste.
And empty.
What happened? We're not told. And a darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. So can you picture the conditions? Perhaps even this rock was there at that time when there was void, empty.
Nothing, or at least nothing was good and the whole earth was covered with water. You know, it's interesting. We often think about the earth was flooded. Well, it was flooded twice if we read it carefully. It was flooded in the very beginning, and then it was flooded again and Noah's time and then.
God in the form.
Of the other person, the spirit came. It's interesting, the spirit work on earth in a very early time, and the Spirit of God moved upon the phase of the water. And then God said, let there be light and there was light, and God saw that it was good. And God divided the light from the darkness.
Not my thought to go through the creation story but I was thinking.
This.
Seems so parallel to your life and my life.
What will we like?
Darkness.
We know that.
You were in darkness at one time. We learned that in the book of Ephesians. Alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel without God, without hope in this world. That was your condition and my condition. Oh, not only that. You were empty, without form and void.
Hopeless.
What would you be?
And then the Spirit came.
And then there was light. It's interesting that light comes first. And then when we go to the next chapter, we find that God took this pile of dust, dirt, and he breathed into his nostril. He became a living soul.
Isn't it interesting from darkness to the spirit through the light than there is life and this world was remade or this earth was remade because of that? Now just looking at time here, I know it's a shorter meeting so please bear with me. Let's go to Acts chapter one.
00:30:21
You might say we don't normally turn to the book of Acts early portion for gospel.
Acts, chapter 2. My mistake. I alluded to that in some of the comments earlier. Acts chapter 2. And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place, and suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind.
Wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.
And they appear unto them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them.
This is a strange gospel message.
Today, a Pentecost signifies that the believers those who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Became part of the church, the Spirit of God Indwell in the church and in the believer.
But there was an action of this rushing mighty sound.
Now we won't have time to go into it. Some of you who have a Darby translation look and see what he said about this sound. It's like it's like a breathing noise.
The spirit as if it were breathed on the believer and.
Well, not that they weren't a living soul. Now they have a new life, a life that is Christ like.
They become different.
So that would explain why John chapter 3 when the Lord Nicodemus. Let's turn to John's Gospel chapter 3.
I know we know these portions, but I want to read it carefully with you. John chapter 3 verse 3 Jesus answer in southern to him, verily, verily I say unto you, except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.
Verse 5 Verily I say unto you, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. I know some would use the phrase that born again means you are saved. I don't believe scripture teach us that.
You need to have the light.
To see what the Kingdom of God is. We were ones in darkness. We don't see anything. What do you see in the dark?
You know, a few weeks ago, on our way home from Idaho, we stopped in, I can't remember where now. We had two grandchildren with us. We visited a cave.
When you go underground in caves.
And when they turn the lights out, you know what darkness is. I don't know how many of you have gone through some of these cave tours. You go in there, you turn the lights out just to show you how dark it is. Literally, you can put your fingers in front of your nose as you can see because it's total darkness. And then the tour guide was funny. She said, well, now that the lights is on, look.
Do I might over the ground? Oh, of course. The lady started to scream. But it was OK prior to that because they didn't know.
So when we're in darkness, you don't know how terrible things are around you.
In fact, I'll tell you another story on this. We, some of you have known that in Toronto we used to meet at a place called the Old Mill. That's why you see the address Old Mill. It's just a fancy hotel.
Convention Center, really nicely done up. The word they use is luxurious. The lights are dimmer, colors are nice and one day I always thought that was the light setting. One day they were doing maintenance.
I didn't know they can turn the light up a lot brighter and when the light was turned up nice and bright I see cobwebs all along the place. So it's good to dim the light sometimes, but when you're in darkness you don't see anything.
00:35:07
How can a man be born again? He needs to see God through the Spirit of God. Give us that life that we're able to see.
And then through the Word and the Spirit were able to enter the Kingdom of God. Now we're going to be careful. Not saved. You know, let me change the example. I'm trying to think this is a Canadian conference. We have many Canadians here. You know, if you were to go to the US, you might say I got a port passport.
I have the right to enter into the United States. You do until you get to the border.
That you'll find out whether you can or can't to go in. That there are requirements still.
So the fact that you can see and now you know, through the Word and the Spirit you can enter into the Kingdom of God.
Then comes the other part. That's the gospel message.
We're still in John chapter 3. Let's just skip down to verse 14. It used an Old Testament example. There it tells us. And as Moses, remember the man Moses, the meekest man on earth.
As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, Even so.
Must the Son of Man be lifted up?
We use that gospel story often we sang that him there is life in a look at the crucify 1 Lok Lok and live that remind you of that story that they have to look at that serpent that was raised and by believing and taking that step of faith of looking.
They were saved from the from the wrath of God. So it reminded them that as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, Even so in this case, not the brass serpent, but the Son of man. And I see young people here just as a sideline. It's good to look up the Son of man. The Son of God will see differences in there, don't we? So the Son of man, the picture of the one who.
And reject it. The one who's going to come back and judge this world. He was lifted up just like the serpent of Oh, so that they can be saved. And then we can go on to the next verse.
Well known verse verse 16 for God.
So love the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever.
Believeth in him.
What happened?
Should not perish, but have everlasting life. I'm going to read that from the new translation. I think it's even more accurate there. That whosoever believe in him but have life eternal. Oh, it's precious. Because everlasting is something that will go on and on and on. Would you like to have this life that you have to go on and on, a life of sin?
Shame, that's not really everlasting life, but life eternal, a life that is like our Lord Jesus Christ, the life that is eternal. So believing that God has done the work, the work is done, what do you have to do?
Sometimes saying there is nothing to do, there is nothing to buy because the price has been paid.
It is the work of God, so if anyone hears things that I can do.
Whatever you think that statement would be, it would not earn you salvation. The work is complete. God wants us to believe. Believe just like you said here, because He has sent the Holy Spirit into this world already to pave that way. He wants you to be with Himself. The life eternal is even more. As I want to encourage one another, let's turn to Ephesians chapter one.
I know we are addressing most here in this room who are his, but it's nice to know this or I won't expound on this, but read it as an encouragement. Verse 2. Grace be to you and peace from our God and Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who had blessed us.
00:40:17
With all spiritual blessings.
In heavenly places, in Christ, or in the heavenlies, according as He has chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. You can read the rest of the chapter. God loves you. God wants you. He wants you to be His. He wants you to spend eternity.
Have a life.
That is like our Lord Jesus Christ. It's not because of what you can do, it's not because of what you're worthy of, but that it is God's love, God's grace towards you. That's why He's willing that none should perish, but all may come to the repentance.
Let's just sing.
A hymn in closing.
Hymn #27 Perhaps we'll just sing the 1St 3 verses of hymn #27.
My God, I have.
Is involved in saving your soul.
God the Father who loves you for God so loved the world, God the Son who's willing to be a willing victim to die for you and a spirit of God is helping along the way. Let's give thanks. Blessed God and our Father we.
Love
Children—Steve Hall
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
Loves me, my Bible tells me so.
You believe that it's my dream of Wi-Fi.
And the wakes will make me one way to hold me in heaven.
She wants me, yes. She's not as long as he.
Can see that loves me.
God, I forgot me so.
Very good. Who? Who else has a song?
Anybody.
#10.
Let's sing #10.
Say.
Wow.
I.
Breathed with me, proud to die as proud as I was.
All right. Do we have another one?
Somebody has to have a favorite.
#8.
OK, we'll do #8.
We can grind the sun.
00:10:06
And my death in Christ.
Our eyes shall we hear the sacred, all of us, during smoke beyond the sky.
Yes, we'll grab the right Scars name.
Hey, do I have snow?
All righty. We're going to take a break from singing for a little bit, and if we end early, we'll sing tomorrow, OK?
So I know it's not.
Totally common, but does anybody have a memory verse that they want to say this morning before we get into the lesson?
You got one.
We love.
With brown vapor bags.
You got to like a Sunday school lesson with a brown paper bag.
I always thought those were the best.
I'm going to take a big risk here and I'm going to do something that I've never heard of done.
In a Sunday school lesson at a conference. Is that all right with you guys? So I want to play a game.
You guys like games?
You love games. Good. I'm.
This is going to be a special game, so a lot of us traveled a long ways to get up here.
To Regina. And so I was thinking about a game that I know my kids played a lot.
When we would go on long trips.
And the way that this game works is someone me thinks of a word.
And I'm going to use it in little sentences.
And I want you to just raise your hand. If you think you know what that word is. I have a bunch of different sentences that I'm going to use this word in. I'm not going to actually say the word. It's going to be a blank. And I don't want you to yell it out. OK, If you know what it is, I don't want you to yell it out. You just raise your hand and then I'm going to come and you can whisper it in my ear.
00:15:24
And if you get it right, you get something out of the bag, OK.
And we're going to do I have AI have a bunch of these little sentences. And then when we get done with all those little sentences, we're going to open the word of God and we're going to look at what the word of God says about them. Does that sound fair? You guys got got this down. So if you know the word, just raise your hand, OK?
All right.
The first one is blank. Is a decision.
And we'll let some of those that are just a little bit older play as well. So blank is a decision.
I'm going to guess that.
Even the folks in the back row probably are going to struggle with this one. You got an idea? OK, come here.
No good. Good guess, good guess. Anybody else want to take a guess?
And there's no.
Come on, no.
No.
You want to take a guess.
Who whispered in my air?
No.
OK, well, we'll go on to #2.
This one's a lot. Well, I think I'm going to, I'm going to skip #2 and #3 We'll come back to those. I got to make this hard to begin with.
Blank is first mentioned in the Word of God in Genesis chapter 22.
A little bit a little bit easier. No, you can't look it up.
Well, I mean, there's a lot of words in Genesis chapter 22, so.
You don't count. I think you got it now. Yeah. So we have one person maybe in the room that has it. Adults can raise your hand, too. I got enough candy. You're going to take a guess.
You don't need the candy.
All right, we got one, one person that knows. All right, we're going to go on.
This one should be a little bit easier.
In Revelation.
In the.
First part of revelation the Lord speaks to some of the churches in the church in ephesus was.
Rebuked because they were missing this.
Or they left it.
Is you got a guess.
No really good. Good guess. Really good guess. Anybody else?
You got a guess.
You don't know it yet, OK.
Good. All right.
All right, maybe this will be a little bit easier.
Without. Without this, even if I had enough faith to remove a mountain, I would be nothing.
OK.
All right, we got to take her in the front row.
You get.
Anybody else?
Should have memorized that first a little better.
Go ahead. Come on.
No close.
00:20:01
No, you gotta. You gotta whisper it in my ear.
Nope.
Anybody else?
No, not quite. Get another guess.
She said tell me a word.
Still don't have it? OK, that's fine.
All right.
#2 blank is kind.
Very good.
There are chocolate bars in the bottom.
Oh, we got OK.
All right, very good.
Just a SEC here. We'll get to the go ahead.
Good job.
Sure, there's there's chocolate bars in the bottom.
Good job. Go ahead. I got lots of candy.
Good job.
We've got to take her back here.
All right.
Good job.
All right.
Just a second here. The next one, number three is it's a fruit of the Spirit.
I think you were supposed to raise your hand first. Did you get what your sister said? OK.
I think the cat got out of got out of the bag.
Yep, all right.
So if anybody didn't hear.
Let's see here. It never fails.
You already know it.
You already got one too, didn't you? Or you didn't, OK.
Yep, that's another word for it that works.
Get it?
Nope.
Didn't understand what you said.
No, Umm.
The next 1 #8 says we have known Blank because he laid down his life for us.
Does that ring any bells?
Yeah, you get it.
Next one.
Says blank, not the world.
You're right.
Get it?
Not yet. Yeah, go ahead. OK, this one you all should get for God. So blank the world.
What is it?
God so love.
It's love. You're getting candy. Did you hear that? You know what it is?
Go ahead.
Now you can have one anyway.
All right, did anybody in the front not get a piece of candy you can come up afterward?
You know what it is?
For God.
So what is it?
Yep, you got it. Very good. There's a couple more.
God is love, right? OK.
We'll deal with the rest of the candy afterward.
00:25:04
He first loved us.
We love him because he first loved us. That was the verse, I think, on the Sunday school and there's No Fear in love. So I'm going to turn to some verses and let's read about this. So the first one.
Love is a decision.
Let's turn to Romans chapter 5.
Romans chapter 5 and verse 8 says.
But God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Children, I wanted to talk about love this morning.
A little bit, and sometimes we have an idea in our minds of what something is, but it's not really supported by the Word of God.
In this verse here God commendeth his love commendeth is a really big kind of difficult.
Word, and I would like you to think of it this way. God decided to love us. God commended His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Love, especially God's love, is a decision.
But I want to, I want to help you children understand love and, and I hope that the questions that I was asking you, the game that we just played got you to think about this subject love a little bit.
And I've been thinking about this subject, love, because I've been to a lot of weddings and I'm still going to go to several more this year. One of them happens to be the wedding of my nephew, who's in the room.
So.
That means I get a pick on him a little bit.
Love is a decision.
I want us to change our thinking because I think most people, if you ask them what love is, they would say that love is an emotion.
And I don't believe that Scripture tells us that. I believe that scripture shows us that love is a decision.
And it makes a big difference, children, when love is a decision instead of an emotion.
The reason that that matters is because we are called on to love others.
When emotions just don't work.
And so the first thing I'd like you to remember, children, out of my talk this morning is love is a decision. It's not an emotion. There's motions associated with love, but love is a decision, OK?
The next one we had, and I'm going to go in the order that I wrote them down, we're going to turn to 1St Corinthians 13. And I suggest you hold your finger there because if you know your Bibles very well, First Corinthians chapter 13 is often referred to as the love chapter, and we're going to have a lot of verses.
From First Corinthians chapter 13.
First Corinthians chapter 13 and verse four says charity or that's the old English version of love. Love suffereth long and is kind.
Love envieth not, love vaunteth not itself.
It is not puffed up.
These are descriptions of what love is.
And I think it's really helpful. And we're going to come back to this chapter a number of different times, but love.
Is kind.
And children, that's one of the things about love that I want you guys to remember if possible.
As love is kind.
00:30:03
Love is kind.
The Lord Jesus in his kindness towards us.
Came and became a man, and that was something that.
You might say he couldn't undo. He became a man forever.
So that he could go to Calvary's cross, so that he could display his love toward us in a way that we could understand.
Love is kind. We're going to go over to Galatians Chapter 5.
For the next one, hold your place in First Corinthians.
Does anybody know this first by heart? Anybody willing to quote it?
The fruit of the Spirit is.
OK, I'll read it. The fruit of the Spirit. This is what the Spirit of God acting in our lives produces in our lives. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.
Against such there is no law.
With the fruits of the Spirit.
Yeah, that's good.
Good, so the fruit of the Spirit. It's what the Lord creates in our lives and children.
One of the things about love and we have it in the Sunday school verse that was, that was the memory verse for some. We love him because he first loved us. If we're going to love others, we need to enjoy the love of God ourselves. And so the fruit of the Spirit creates in US love towards others.
Let's continue on. I don't want to delay too much. Let's turn back to Genesis chapter 22. This is the first time.
Love is mentioned in the word of God.
We know the story. Your children probably know it pretty well.
Abraham was tempted by God and God did tempt Abraham in verse one and he said to Abraham, Abraham and Abraham said, Behold here am I. And he said God said, take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou love us.
And get thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there is a burnt offering. On what of the mountains that I will tell thee of.
The first time we get a word in Scripture, it's defined for us and in this case.
I believe that we find out that love is also associated with sacrifice.
Abraham was asked to take his son and to offer him as a burnt offering.
God was using that as a picture to us so that we could understand His love.
If you remember, and we won't take the time to read the rest of the story, but Abraham was stopped.
He took the knife in his hand and God stopped him, and he provided a ram that was caught in a thicket by his horns.
But in part of that, when Abraham and Isaac were walking up the mountain to go to the place.
Isaac said.
And I'm going to paraphrase here, Dad, there's wood for the fire and fire.
There, But where's the lamb?
And Abraham said God is going to provide a lamb.
And so we can Fast forward to the cross. The Lord Jesus came as the Lamb of God. John said, behold the Lamb of God. He came as the Lamb of God to wash away your sins and mine. He had to die. He had to be that perfect sacrifice. And children, if you don't know him as your Savior, I know you've heard the gospel many times.
00:35:09
Don't neglect that.
That's the greatest display of love. I believe that that's the next one.
Umm.
That's one further down. We'll turn to that first John chapter 3 and verse 16. This is one of the John 3 sixteens.
Beautiful verse.
The other love chapter is First John.
3:00 and 4:00.
One John 316 says Hereby perceive we the love of God because he laid down his life for us. I'm going to read that in the new translation because I think it's a little better. Hereby have we known love.
Because he laid down his life for us, we would not know anything about love.
If God had not sent his beloved Son into this world to die for our sins.
We would not know anything about love. We understand.
A little bit about love because.
The Lord Jesus laid down his life for us.
Let's go on.
A few more. In Revelation chapter 2, verse four, we have a verse.
There Revelation chapter 2.
This is speaking to.
Ephesus. Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.
The church in Ephesus loved the Lord, but they had left their first love or their.
Energy of love.
They had gone, grown cold in their hearts.
And you know what? Sometimes we can grow cold in our hearts.
We can have.
A situation where we are so used to talking about love.
So used to talking about the Lord's love that we don't.
Enjoy it and we lose the freshness of it. I think that's what this means.
They had lost their first love. They had lost their love for the Lord Jesus and.
Again in first John.
The memory verse was first John 419 We love him because he first loved us Now if we find ourselves that we're.
We're not enjoying the Lord's love, it's because we have lost sight of what He's done for us.
We've grown cold in our hearts and we need to be reminded of that yesterday we were talking about.
Umm, a loaf and a cup.
And in about an hour we'll have the opportunity to sit around a table up here in the front and there's going to be a loaf and a cup.
And we're going to remember the Lord Jesus in his death for us.
And the reason for that is so that our love doesn't grow cold.
We need to be reminded of the Lord's love.
For us, there's a couple more verses that I wanted to touch in on in First Corinthians chapter 13. We'll go there as we're leaving first John four. We all know the verse God is love.
We perceive the love of God that He sent his Son.
So we understand a lot about love because of what the Lord Jesus has done.
And I'm going to go back to First Corinthians chapter 13. I don't want to go too long here.
00:40:02
I'm just going to read verse 4 through 8.
And then I want to read you a poem as we finish up.
Says Love suffereth long. Love is kind. Love envies not. Love want us not itself is not puffed up. Love does not behave itself unseemly.
Love doesn't seek his own.
Love is not easily provoked.
Love thinketh no evil.
Love rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth. Love bears all things.
Love believes all things. Love hopes all things.
Love endures all things.
Love never fails.
Verse 13 now abideth faith, hope and love these three, but the greatest is love. I want to read.
A poem in closing.
That I came across a long time ago.
And it really struck me.
I hope it is something that you enjoy. He would not sit still long enough to have his portrait done.
His heart was set to move his life at twice the speed of love.
An artist who who tried to freeze his style on canvas or in stone.
Found that real life isn't still life, even when life's alone.
A traveling artist known as Paul.
Painted truth with words. That truth, he saw, was burning love.
That comforts and disturbs.
Each year he grew until he knew the portrait couldn't wait.
And without a sound, the man sat down, and he began to paint.
Love is patient.
Love is kind, never jealous, free of pride.
Love will not be confined. Love will abide.
Love is hopeful. Love is not blind. Love is faithful. Every time.
Love is someone.
And when you open your eyes, you'll find that love is alive.
Now Love's going to stand the test of time and time, and stand when time is spent.
Just look at the portrait painted.
It's the son the father sent.
He is patient, he is kind.
Never jealous, free of pride.
He will not be confined.
He will abide.
Love is hopeful. Love's not blind.
Love is faithful every time.
Love is someone and if you look in his eyes.
You'll find that love is alive.
That portrait is First Corinthians chapter 13, and it's a portrait of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Their children.
Love came as a man.
Came here for the purpose of demonstrating to us.
What love is about?
He decided to love you and me when we were not lovable, when we were sinners, sinners when we were His enemies, when we were lost and undone.
And he gave his life for you and for me.
And he suffered.
More than we'll ever understand, so that we could understand a little bit about love. Let's pray.
00:45:05
Our great.
Heaven on Earth
Address—Robert Boulard
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I thought maybe we would sing #328.
To begin 328 and maybe if we get a little bit sleepy we'll sing another one halfway through, I'm not sure.
But if anybody is nodding and so on, we may just stand up and sing another hymn 328. Perhaps somebody could start it for us.
Let's ask the Lord's blessing on our meeting this afternoon.
I'd like to just read a couple of verses of scripture.
To open up, there are, let's return to Deuteronomy Chapter 11, and we're just going to read maybe three or four verses there. There are two places on the face of the earth that God intended to be happy.
Places, and he actually uses a little term here that I often think of.
As the days of heaven upon earth two places and so this is the first place.
That we become accustomed to when we're born into this world. Verse 18. Deuteronomy 11. Verse 18. Therefore shall ye.
Lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand that they may be frontlets between your eyes. And you shall teach them your children, Speaking of them when thou citizenine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou lie us down, when thou risest up, and thou shalt write them upon the doorpost of thine house, upon thy gates.
That your days may be multiplied in the days of your children.
In the land which the Lord swear unto your fathers to give them as the days of heaven upon the earth. Well, we know that the world is stained with sin, and it's filled with corruption and wickedness. But God intended that the Christian home. This was a godly Israelite home. But the principle applies that the godly Christian home was to be a little safe haven from the world, and it was to be so enjoyable for the.
Family that it would be just like a little picture of heaven on earth, and there would just be rejoicing as the word of God had power with the parents and they would cause the delight of the word of God. The delight of Scripture would be passed on to their children and they would have a delight in it. And then they would be together, the father and the mother and the and the children in the presence of the Lord just enjoying.
And delighting in the Word of God, and in the company of God himself. But then the other.
If you just flip over a page, it's a page in my Bible. He intended that there would be another place.
That would be a very happy place, characterized by joy in his presence.
00:05:03
And he says.
In Deuteronomy chapter 12.
That.
Let's just.
Read just using these little verses introductory.
Let's read verse 11, Deuteronomy 12, verse 11. There shall be a place which God to cause his name to dwell there thither shall you bring all the other command you.
Your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithe, your heave offerings of your hand, and all your choice vows which you vow unto the Lord, you shall rejoice before the Lord your God.
And your sons, he and your sons, and your daughters, and your men servants, and your maidservants, and the Levite that is within your gates, for as much as he hath no part nor inheritance with you. Well, isn't that nice to read that word? Rejoice.
One of the things, one of the memories is most.
Remarkable to me as a young person, as a young child, was the pleasure and the joy of going to the assembly meetings. Now, as you know, I wasn't brought up among those gathered to the Lord's name, but there was a little meeting room that I went to in a place called Rockaway Valley.
And other places as well. And it was an imitation. It wasn't really the real thing, but it was a pleasure to go and to read the Word of God there and to be with those brethren.
But there was a price to pay. And the point is, let's turn to.
Chapter 23 of Proverbs where it doesn't read one verse there there's a price to pay to make it a happy place and to rejoice in the presence of the Lord. It's going to cost something. Everything you do costs something, costs time, costs money. Maybe it costs your effort and it may cause you to.
Sacrifice and look like you're losing out on something in this world that the world values. But God is no man's debtor, so it says in Proverbs chapter 23 verse 23 by the truth.
And sell it not?
Also wisdom and instruction and understanding or intelligence. So by the truth make a transaction, and if you make a personal transaction with the Lord.
I can't make it for you.
You make a transaction with the Lord, it's going to cost you something to lay aside your own agenda, your own purposes, your own desires. And as we had before us yesterday, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do and own the Lordship of Christ? And you know it says a couple of times in Scripture. As for God, his way is perfect.
Now you can't improve on that, can you? Perfect perfection.
But those of us that are a little bit older didn't always follow that advice, and so we've made a lot of mistakes and we've had to retrace our steps every now and then, and we have these embarrassing moments and regrets in our lives because we didn't.
Follow that advice. We didn't buy the truth. We didn't pay the price that was required to walk in all of it. And you know, in the French translation it says 911 point, don't sell. A little bit of it is really the sense.
By the truth and keep all of it.
There was a man. I'm not here to tell you stories or entertain you, but I just feel.
Is necessary to point.
To emphasize the price that sometimes has to be paid.
To walk with God.
There was a man in the Rockaway Valley area. He lived in a place. This was in the early 1900s. His name was Mr. Croft. I can't remember what his.
First name was, but he was an old man in the mid 60s when I knew him. And he sat beside an old wood stove in the house that Yolande Croft once lived in. And he had a little rocking chair and he sat there by the wood stove. And he would, he loved children. And we would go to see him and he would speak with us and visit with us a little bit. And I asked Yolan one day why?
What? What's so special about Grandpa Croft? And she said, well, you know.
00:10:06
He was a young man, he had a young family and his wife died, went to be with the Lord.
And he was distraught, but he remarried, remarried a young sister in the Lord, and he lived in a place called Lac de Plage. I don't know if you remember where Lac de Plage is. I've only driven by it, but it means in English, Lake of the Beaches. And it's a beautiful lake of beaches. And that's where he lived.
But there was a little assembly meeting hall in Rockaway Valley.
I suppose in those days might be an hour away and probably impossible, impossible to come there very frequently. And so this young bride that he had said to him, she said, you know, if we stay here in Lac de Plais, it's a beautiful place, but if we stay here we're going to raise a bunch of heathens and they'll be lost to this world.
We need to move, we need to get back to Rockway. And anyone here who knows like what Rockaway Valley is like, it's not like Lac de Plage.
It it's pretty rocky and it's a pretty hard place to earn a living, but this man picked up his family and moved to Rockaway Valley.
And he eked out a living, bought an old building, tore it down, built himself a house, banged out the nails and so on. And he was a mainstay in that area.
A godly brother raised godly children with the help of a wife, a godly sister, and some of those children are in fellowship at the Lords Table today. Some of those relatives are in fellowship at the Lords Table today.
But it cost them that home, that beautiful home in Lac de Plage, so that he could live next to the meeting room, not perhaps right next to it, but very, very close within walking distance of that meeting room. He paid the price and he bought the truth in his day. And young people, every one of us, those that are older.
We're all going to have to pay a price and God will test us on the principle of faith as to how much we value.
What it is to be in His presence. I want to ask you a question before we get into our subject here. Did you come to the meeting this morning?
Or did you come to be in the presence of the Lord?
I was a young man, perhaps, maybe a little older than a young man, but I was working in Michigan and.
Came home from the office working, you know, with the car companies. It's like a giant chess game, and you're against a whole bunch of competitors, and you feel like you're playing Monopoly all day and getting beat up. And I came home one day and it was a Wednesday night, I think. And I said I had a brother. Bob Collard was there for supper.
I said, Brother Bob, I'm so tired. I don't know. I'm so weary. I don't know if I come go to meeting tonight. He looked me in the eye. He said what You're telling me you're too tired to come into the presence of the Lord tonight?
I said, well, maybe I'm not too tired to come into the presence of the Lord tonight. So I went to the meeting that night. Isn't it nice to remember that we come into the presence of the Lord? Don't get into the habit of saying, well, I wonder if I'm going to go to a meeting or if I maybe I'll go to a meeting tonight. Maybe I won't make the call, make the decision, pay the price as it were.
To decide.
To be in the presence of the Lord as often as you can. It'll be like heaven upon earth.
You will look back and you will have memories of those occasions and little.
Capsules, little Nuggets of scripture, little Nuggets, little gems that the Spirit of God has given you.
That are with you for a lifetime. Perhaps I would say for eternity. Isn't that the truth for eternity a little nugget a little portion of Christ and if you miss a meeting that you could possibly be that meeting and this is a I'm just quoting chapter Brown many years ago used to say this. If you miss a meeting where you could easily have been at meeting and you didn't go to be in the presence of the Lord.
You missed something that the Spirit of God had for you that night or that occasion.
You miss something and you may never get it again and so it's vital for us.
As I say, to have a Christian home, to have a home where there's the Word of God has power and it is reverenced and there is fruit for God in the home, it's going to be like heaven on earth. And then in the assembly it's the same thing. There's if the Word of God has power and there is a bowing to the authority of the Word of God and a love for it.
00:15:24
And a sense that we're coming into the presence of the Lord. There's going to be fruit for him.
And it'll be as if it's heaven upon earth. And I just rejoice to see these young ones here racing around with their little cars.
And little boys and girls, and I have to think about that verse every time it says heaven upon earth. And those little ones, they remember, they'll get a little bit older, but they'll remember these friends that they played with and the happy time that they had. Well, let's turn to Matthew's Gospel, chapter 18. I want to take up this chapter.
There, we're going to take up six points really in connection with this chapter. It has to do, you know, the church is only mentioned in the Gospel of Matthew. It's not mentioned in the other Gospels. And so the Lord Jesus, as we said yesterday, gives a seed plot of Christianity in the Gospels himself, and then he left it for the apostles to develop the truth.
Because the apostles were not indwelled the disciples, they were not indwelled with the Spirit of God, so they really were hobbled.
In a marvelous to be indwelled with the Spirit of God, to have the spiritual capacity.
To understand the things of God and to enjoy them, the capacity to enjoy them and the capacity to be able to communicate about them, that's marvelous. You have more than the apostles did before.
Before the cross you have, you're indwelled with the Spirit of God. Well, let's read. I'm going to just for the sake of time, instead of reading the whole chapter, would you permit me to just read a little bit? We'll comment on that little part and then we'll go to the next part. So it says here in chapter 18 of Matthew verse one. At the same time came the disciples unto Jesus saying, who is the greatest?
In the Kingdom of heaven, Jesus called a little child unto him.
And set him in the midst of them.
And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted.
And become as little children.
Ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the Kingdom of heaven. And whoso shall receive one such little child in My name, receiveth Me. But whoso shall offend one of these little ones, which?
Believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
Well, what we find here in this chapter is the principles of really our conduct and how our conduct should be governed while we come to be in the presence of the Lord, and it should be a part of our Christian life throughout.
And so the first thing, isn't it remarkable? The very first thing on the list is humility.
You know, some of you may have remembered Brother Manford Gertz in in Germany. I used to do business in Germany. So I'll visit them and remember Well his little expression. Every now and then the subject of humility came up and he would say, he would get right up into your face. He'd say, oh, did you read my book Humility and how I obtained it?
You know humility and how I obtained it.
Well, you know the Lord Jesus.
The Son of God, who had every right as God in this world, they decide his rights.
That you might come into blessing and that he might demonstrate in his own life.
How you ought to conduct yourself. And so he humbled himself.
And became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
You know, his life was characterized by humility.
Let's read in Matthew Chapter 11.
00:20:01
We read these verses and sometimes they're applied in the gospel, but really they had to do verse 282930.
You know, the Jews were struggling under the burden of Judaism and laws and everything. They had something like 613 laws that they had to keep. They couldn't even remember 10.
But they struggled and struggled, and so they had a law and it was unyielding.
But the Lord Jesus said, Come unto me, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden. They labored under the burden of the law. He says, I will give you rest.
So Christianity isn't a set of rules, That's just a person, the person of Christ.
In his arrest, he says take my yoke upon you.
And learn of me.
That's a true disciple. You know what disciple is? A learner.
You learn something about the Lord every day. You know I'm going to be 67 on my next birthday.
And you know, I'm still reading in the morning and I get up in the morning, I'm looking for some treasure, and every now and then I find a little bit of treasure.
And I underline it and I highlight it in my Bible and I savor it and.
I'm still learning and then I've got such a poor memory that a year later, maybe even a few months later, I have to re enjoy it. I have to relearn it.
As your memory fails as you grow older, you're going to find that you need to read the same thing over and over again.
But the Lord Jesus, blessed Savior.
He was meek and lowly. He wouldn't take offense and He wouldn't give offense. That's really what it means. And you shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
Well, the Lord desires to walk with you, but that walk with the Lord is one that's in humility.
God resisteth the proud. God resisteth the proud. You know what it means to resist.
You put if if Daisy got up here and I'd push against him, I'd push and push. That's what it means, means God resists the proud. You see a proud man in politics and so on.
God is resisting him, and God resists the pride of men, and He judges those that are proud. But here we have these little children and He took a little child, placed him in His presence. You know the Lord taught in different ways. He taught. This is an object lesson. He took an object. Brother had a stone here last night.
He used an object, a little child. What can a child do? Can't defend himself.
Believes everything you tell them.
Is very dependent, can't really acquire food on his own, perhaps might beg on the street and so on, but he's helpless. And you and I come into this world helpless and in the things of God, you and I need to come into the presence of the Lord in humility, because we know nothing.
I like to read, you know, lying down and dead. I like to read lying on the sofa, lying in my chair. I'm comfortable.
And every now and then I just have to put my book down, sometimes put my Bible down and say, Lord, I don't know anything.
I don't know anything. I didn't know this.
I don't know anything.
You ever tell the Lord that I don't know anything? Maybe you ask him some questions and he'll answer your questions, ask him questions about Scripture. And you know what happens is the next reading meeting you go to maybe two readings meetings later or whatever, the Lord will answer your question. Oftentimes you'll answer it with a word, but this is the very first principle that the Spirit of God brings before us and the words of the Lord Jesus himself. What ought to characterize Christianity?
In the assembly and in the Christian testimony was to be humility.
Not pride.
Oh my. Is that what characterizes my life? That What characterizes your life? Humility.
You know, we live in a world that says I have rights. Well, we said yesterday, and I think of it oftentimes. You know, Mr. Barry used to say that if you took the Lord Jesus as your Lord, you gave up your right to choose. You don't have any rights. The Lord Jesus has rights, but his rights were trampled in this world. But if your true follower, the Lord Jesus.
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Why you'll walk with Him in humility? Well, I just want to encourage you to walk in humility with the Lord Jesus.
And as a little child in humility.
To take a simple place and not seek prominence among the people of God at all, not seek prominence in your family, not seek prominence in the world, but to just walk with God humbly.
And it's an easy yoke.
I'll tell you one more little story. I don't want to tell too many but want you to remember this.
When I was a young man, I came to work in Hammer Bay and I worked for my father-in-law a little bit with him and we were building a picnic shelter at the CNIB campgrounds in Hammer Bay, Gordon Bay.
And there was a hot July day, I don't know if maybe 30 degrees, 35°. And here we were trying to help put this thing up and there was a tight time schedule.
And we had a beam like a 6 by 8 beam that went down the center of this picnic shelter. It was like 30 feet long, something like that. And we had to carry it. We didn't have anything that we could take. So the both of us had to pick this thing up, one at one end, one at the other. And it was just weighed a ton fur. I don't know how I picked it up, but I was walking to carrying this thing.
And it seemed to be getting lighter. I thought, well, maybe I'm getting used to carrying this, you know, and.
And finally I look back and here was my father, my future father-in-law, one hand under one hand under one hand. He was walking towards me and he was pretty well carrying the whole thing by himself. He was a very strong man.
And you may feel weak in the things of God, you may feel like you can't do it and you don't have the strength to do this. But there is one that is strong enough. And in the things of God, He's going to allow trials in your life, testings of your faith, and He's going to allow difficult situations. And yet you're in the yoke with Him. And it's not an unequal yoke.
If you're cleansed with the precious blood of Christ, why, You're a child of God, and here the Son of God who redeemed you with his own precious blood, is all right alongside, and he's carrying the heavy end of the load. You're not.
You may sing him seem like you're carrying the heavy load, but you're not. Well, that's the first thing that really characterizes Christianity, ought to characterize Christianity and characterize the assembly. This humility, not a seeking of my own will and a pressing forward of my own agenda, but really humility and childlike humility. Well, let's look at the second one here, verse 7. Woe unto the world because of offenses because.
For it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh. Wherefore if thy hand or thy foot offend thee, cut them off.
Cast them from thee, for it is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee.
It is better for you to enter into life with one eye rather than having two eyes to be cast into Hellfire or really eternal fire.
Take heed that thou that ye despise not one of these little ones, for I say unto you that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven. For the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost.
Well, this second portion really has to do with self judgment. And you know when it speaks of a knife and it was spoken of yesterday in Proverbs chapter 23, put a knife to thy throat, it speaks of self judgment.
The 9th and Christianity ought to be characterized by unsparing self judgment.
Not allowing anything in my life that would be hindrance to others. And you may say, well, I have a right to do that. I have a right. And I'm a, I'm a believer. I have equal rights with every well, you know, the assembly is not a democracy.
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You're a guest.
In the guest chamber.
You're a guest of the Lord Jesus.
He delights to have you there as a guest.
Oh, he loves everyone equally.
But it's his rights that have to do with the assemblies, His glory that has to do with the assembly. Not your glory, not your rights, not how you like things done or would like things done. No, it's how the Word of God presents it in connection with the truth. Well, you know, what happens here is if I assert my own rights, I assert my own opinions and I.
Carelessly run roughshod over the consciences of others.
Then what it says here is I might offend a little one.
He says despise verse 10 Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones.
For I say unto you, that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father, which is in heaven.
Well, you know, there's an angelic work going on in heaven and before the Father.
This is what the word of God tells us. The Lord Jesus tells us that there's angels in heaven and they're looking after Isaac.
And Joanna?
And some others here. I don't know your names, but there's an Angel looking after you after your interests in the face of the Father.
You know what's interesting? If you turn to John's Gospel, we're not going to turn to it. We don't have time. But Mary Magdalene was too. She saw two angels. She was talking to two angels. They talked to her, and she just kind of turned her back on the two angels. She wasn't interested in angels.
She wanted to see the Lord. She wasn't interested in angels, but there are angels, there are ministering servants.
And they're interested, Santa, the father, to look after these little ones.
And if I allow something in my life that turns aside, offends a little one, it's a serious offense. You know, I just looked it up in the dictionary a few weeks ago. Offend, It means this.
In the scriptural sense, to snare or entrap, to turn aside, to hinder or to violate a little one.
I'm going to read that list again.
To snare, to present a snare, a trap to a little one, to entrap them, to turn aside, to hinder or to violate.
Oh, it's a serious thing.
To come into the presence of God and turn aside a little one that has faith in Christ or perhaps is just exercised about coming into the presence of the Lord.
And so the Lord says here that he's using these little figures to cut off, to cut off thy hand. If I'm taken up with some hobby that I think, oh, this is, it's a hobby and I'm, I have a right to do this and well, maybe not.
If it's going to be hindrance to your brethren, if it's going to be hindrance to a little one, maybe not, says thy foot. Oh, I go to this place. That's fine. I have a right to go to the movies or to go to a ball game or whatever. No, he says. No, you don't have a right.
You might be hindering a little one. There's going to be a little one looking. I want to tell you a little story in when we lived in Massillon, OH, I had a neighbor across the road from me, Kitty Corner, and they were believers. And so my family would go up during the summer and I'd go up to Hammer Bay and I would work three days a week in Massillon and then I'd drive up for the weekend.
So one day this brother, Jeff Sprout, he invited me over to his house, his wife Nancy, and cooked a nice salmon.
Filet and oh, she was a gorgeous cook anyway.
After the supper was over.
Push back the plates and everything, he says. We'd like to know where you go to church.
She says. We've been watching you and we've been watching the young people that come to your house. They're not like the other young people that do burnouts on the street and all that kind of stuff. I mean, there's something different about those kids, he said. Where do you go to church?
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I said well.
It's not really a church. It's we're Christians gathered by the Spirit of God to the Lord's name.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, where is it?
I said, well, it's in Cuyahoga Falls. Well, what's the name of it? I said it doesn't have. There's no name on the building.
What street? I said, well, he says, well how do you get there? So I said, well I go up right at 8:00 and I get off at.
Portage Trail, he said, Oh yeah, Portage Trail. And I said I go up, up by the fire station. Yeah, yeah, he says. And you turn right and yeah, I said I turn right and then I go down to.
Bailey And then I oh, yeah, yeah, I said. And then you turn left on Myrtle. Yeah, I said, yeah, I'll turn left on Myrtle.
And he says, And what building is it on Myrtle Ave.
I said, well, there's a brown brick building down at the bottom just before you turn at the park. He said, yeah. He says, yeah, it's a brown brick building, got a big parking lot. And he says, yeah, and there's no name on the building. That's the building, huh?
Well, you see, he worked in masculine.
In Cuyahoga Falls, and he lived in Massillon and he knew the building.
Was two 8.2 miles away and he knew where it was.
You're being watched.
And your life is having a testimony. People are watching you walk out of the meeting, out of your house, or driving to the meeting and they're watching and you're having a testimony. You're having an effect upon their lives. Well, let's be careful to exercise self judgment and to be sure that we never, never turn aside a little one from following the Lord.
It's a serious, serious offense and so we ought to exercise self judgment. Be careful.
As to our conduct in our Christian testimony and in the assembly, let's make it a happy, happy occasion to be in the assembly and not be seeking our own rights. Well, let's turn a little to the next little story. Here verse 12 it says, how think ye if a man having 100 sheep, and one of them be gone astray?
Does he not leave the 90 and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?
And if so B that he finds it, verily I say unto you, He rejoiceth more of that sheep than of the 90 and nine which went not astray. Even so, it is not the will of your Father, which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish.
Well, this is the third little story, the little third principle that should really characterize the Christian testimony and characterize the assembly.
And that is to have a shepherd in care. The assembly should be filled with shepherds.
Some of you know I have a twin brother.
In 1974 we came out to Winnipeg. We had an uncle that had.
Bought a field, basically 100 acres and erected a little bit of a shack and there was some Timothy on the field. And so he was bailing that up and I needed a couple of young boys to help him heave these bales onto a wagon and he was selling the hay and so on. And so we came out to the Winnipeg area. His name was Bert Hoole. I don't know if you remember him or not.
Grew up in a Christian home.
That's another story. But he didn't go on for the Lord. But my brother. My brother and I went out for the summer and then I came back east to go to school, lived at my father's house and my brother Norm decided he would stay there and stay with Uncle Bert. He would go to school there in the Winnipeg area.
And it really didn't go very well. He wasn't at the meetings.
And he was sliding.
And there was a brother in the little assembly in Pine Grove who flew.
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To anything, his name was John Hagel.
And he made specific.
Trip rented a car and went right to the place where my brother Norm.
Was they had a little chat with him, encouraged him to go home, says well I don't have the money to go home, Said how much would it cost to go home?
Norm told him how much it would cost. He pulled out his wallet. He said here you go home. You need to be at home.
And so a couple of days later, Norm showed up and he was at home again, began to go to the meetings again, and not too long after it took his place at the Lord's table and so on. Oh, we need to be shepherds, brethren. Every one of us needs to be a shepherd.
And every little sheep makes a difference. You know, this is one percent, 101 Percent. So what's 1 sheep? I got 99 more. No, that's not how the Lord sees things. Everyone was purchased with his own precious blood. What a price was paid.
There is no higher price that could be paid for your soul to set you at liberty in the presence of God, to make you a Son of God. There was no higher price paid. And how dare we look with indifference upon those that drift off, and maybe have a habit and maybe have some.
Propensity to seek company that they shouldn't seek and so on. Everyone of us should be interested in seeing all of the flock of God go on together for the glory of God. Well, you know, you'll notice here in chapter 18, it says in verse 11 That the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost. There are some that don't know they're lost and they're young. They're children.
And then I think it's in Luke's gospel chapter 19, verse 10, it says the Son of Man has come to seek and to save.
That which is lost.
Well, there it's Speaking of adults. So a child doesn't have a will set against God, generally speaking.
But an adult does. And so the Lord comes to seek that adult. And there may be some adults here that aren't saved. God says He's come to seek and to save that which was lost. But the little ones, they're wonderful to have a shepherd in care for these little ones and to guide them. And it's a pleasure. It's a joy. You know, we had a little.
Grandchild in our home.
There's disappointments, you know, as parents, you'll find this out. All of us who are parents have disappointments, sorrows.
Our oldest daughter married. I don't know if he's a believer or not. He says he's not. He was brought up in a Christian home, too.
She has two little girls that came to the house in July along with some other family members. We had a nice time and the little girl, Emma, her oldest girl, went to the little Sunday school class that my wife had and.
She said Grandma, I don't know how to, I don't know how to do it.
I don't know how to do it. What do you mean you don't know how to do it? She said. I don't know how to have my sins read. I don't know how to do it. I don't know how to have my sins forgiven. Grandma, tell me how.
Grandma told her how.
Grandma told her how to have her sins forgiven.
Everyone of us should be shepherds for these little ones and don't take the time for these little ones and tell them what they need. And that's really what the Spirit of God is bringing out before us here. So let's have a shepherd in care. And then it says in verse 4, verse 15, it says, moreover, if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between me and him alone.
If he shall hear thee, thou has gained thy brother.
But if you will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it to the Church or to the assembly. But if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and republican.
Verily, verily, verily, I say unto you, whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven.
Let's just stop at verse 17, verse 1516. Seventeen really might say the fifth thing that really should be characteristic of.
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The upper room, The Christian meeting place, The Christian testimony.
Is that it's a place where personal disputes can be resolved. And let's face it, there are sometimes difficulties among brethren, among Christians, and God has made it so that we can resolve our disputes difficulties.
We all have strange ideas, isn't that right?
We all have wrong ideas.
We all have what we think is right and good.
And sometimes we step on one another's toes, sometimes we cause an offense. And it says, If thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone.
Oh.
You mean I shouldn't just broadcast this so and so stepped on my foot?
At about 12:38 yesterday, it still hurts.
In fact, he made a mark on my shoe.
No, it says go and tell them yourself. Why does it say this to go and tell them alone?
Because he may not know.
You may have stepped on his foot, but you were too busy. You didn't know, You didn't remember.
Or, you know, we sometimes say things to one another and we're thinking that this is pretty clean, this is straightforward and but whoever you set it to takes it a different way and maybe feels insulted.
Go and tell them right away.
You shoot them an e-mail? No, that's not what it says.
You send somebody over to tell them no. You send them a letter? No.
Talk to him. Go see him now. Maybe you can't. He's left the country or he's left the city or whatever. Give him a call. I think there's liberty to say that. But the Lord says the Lord Jesus says go tell him, you know the Lord Jesus, you offended him.
You offended God. You sinned against Him.
He came and told you. Maybe he sent an evangelist, maybe he sent a verse of Scripture. But he told you. He told you himself. You offended me. You sinned against me.
And you said, yeah, I did. I did see it. I'm sorry. I confess I sinned.
You know, Brother Gordon Hale, he didn't speak at my wedding. I wish he had, but he used to say for a happy Christian marriage, it was necessary to have a threefold cord. So one cord was the husband, 100% for his wife, one cord is a wife, 100% for her husband. And the third chord was.
Both of them 100% for the Lord.
But he also used to tell us, you know, there's going to be times when you have a little bit of a difference.
Be sure that you have these four phrases in your vocabulary.
Your wife comes to you and says, I feel really hurt. You say, oh, I'm sorry.
Please forgive me.
I love you.
I think it may have been more than that, but isn't that nice? I'm sorry, please forgive me, I was wrong.
I love you.
You know, there are some people that will not say they're wrong. I'm not, I'm wrong. It was my mistake. I'm sorry. They will not say it. Can't say it. It's not in their vocabulary, but make sure it's in yours.
Make sure it's in yours and if you want to have a home that is like heaven upon earth, make sure you have those little expressions. Memorize and you use them.
I had to say it last week. Actually, I think I had to say it just before I came here, maybe after I came here.
There was something missing in the bin and I talked to my wife and finally I had I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm wrong.
I was wrong. Please forgive me. I'm sorry. I love you.
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Oh, how much would be smoothed out by that? So go and tell them yourself. But you know, there are some things the Spirit of God tells us in this little passage, some things that are never going to be fixed down here. You may try to fix them. You may want them to be fixed.
But there may be some things that you can never fix, some relationships that can never be restored.
As much as liveth in your life, live peaceably with all men, as much as liveth with lieth in you. But it may be that somebody does not want to be restored.
Oh, we should have a soft and tender heart to want to be restored. But he says you may just have to go on and say, well, I can't walk in fellowship with that man. I just kind of have to consider that even though he's a believer, we don't have much in common. He's a heathen. I mean, I have to treat him like a heathen in a sense that I don't have fellowship with him. He's still a believer, but I don't have fellowship with him while we're running out of time, but.
The fifth thing is this that in verse 1819 and 20 that this place Christianity.
And the Christian testimony, those gathered, the Lords name, it's a place where there are binding decisions made. There's authority of the Lord in that place. Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. Whatsoever shall but loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth, as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.
Where two or three are gathered together.
In my name or unto my name, there am I in the midst of them.
Now, we don't have time to elaborate on this little passage too much, but there is authority in the assembly. God has raised up those that are an oversight in the assembly. The assembly is not a democracy.
God has organized the assembly. It doesn't look organized. It doesn't look like there's a high priest and all this sort of thing. But God is organized and he has raised up for himself those that are in oversight that are shepherds among the people of God. And if you're eating the Epistle to the Hebrews, he says they watch for your souls as they that must give account.
They're responsible to the Lord for how the assembly goes on under their watch.
And God will hold them responsible for how the assembly went on under their watch.
You look it up in Hebrews.
But I'm just going to point out in verse 20, it says where two or three where. That's the divine place. You know, there's a little booklet, I don't know if I had it out there yesterday, but it's called the place of his appointment by FC Blount. FC Blount was a very godly man. He was an evangelist, I think. I can't remember what city was from, but chapter Brown said he was the best taught and most.
Accurate. Most wonderful evangelist that he knew of.
That he spoke on this verse of Scripture. There's a little bit of an address on it and it's well worth reading. So that the where is the divine place. The two or three is a divine testimony are gathered is divine separation together is divine oneness in my name or unto my name is divine authority. We're gathered under the authority of the Lord.
There am I.
The Divine Presence, and then in the midst of them, He's the divine center.
Oh, what a blessed place it is to be found in the presence of the Lord, with the Lord in the midst.
It's the happiest place I know of upon the face of the earth.
To be in the presence of the Lord.
And when I come into the assembly meeting, I see all your faces and so on. I see the faces of my brethren. I'm not. That's not what I'm looking for. I come and I sit and I say, I am now in the presence of the Lord. And now why am I there?
I was gathered by the Spirit of God. I was brought in by the Spirit of God and brought into the assembly.
Is the sovereignty of God the love of God?
Let's look at the next one. Here it says.
Really. This is the last one, verse 21. I don't have time to read the whole thing but.
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Peter came to him and said, Lord, how OFT shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him till seven times.
Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee until seven times, but until 70 * 7 four 190 times.
That means I'm to have unlimited forgiveness in my heart for anyone who sins against me.
Did you sin today?
Yeah, there's forgiveness.
Did you send 490 times last week? Yeah.
Probably.
Oh, you have a savior that loves you so much. He goes on with you and your failure. And you may forget to say I'm sorry, I love you, please forgive me.
But he goes on with you in his love and his favor.
But you know if we have an unforgiving spirit.
He'll take it up with us. If we have a hard heart towards any of our brethren, He'll take it up with us. And that's what he's Speaking of in this parable. We don't have time to read it, but it's the 7th similitude of the Kingdom. We have 6 similitudes of the Kingdom in chapter 13 of Matthew and now this is the 7th one. It's very remarkable that it's the last little story that he tells in this chapter, but it's the purpose of the Spirit of God to bring it before us that we need to have a forgiving spirit.
Towards one another Now, he says there's a man that had owed 1010 thousand talents. Somebody said they made the calculation. I'm not a mathematician, but they said that's like $50 billion.
He says, oh, I'll pay all, give me some time, I'll pay it.
Well, you can't pay $50 billion. You may think you can, but the Sinner can't do anything. You can't do anything. You've been forgiven. We're all $50 billion debtors and we've all been forgiven. Those who received Christ as Savior, Every single one of us.
Now somebody may do something and sin against you and cause you grief, insult you, whatever it is, and 100 pence and you might calculate that to be maybe $10,000.
Well, it says man came and he throttled him by the throat. Read it in Mr. Darby's translation. It throttled him. Painting now.
Cast them into prison.
Things don't always run real smooth.
In personal relationships, isn't that right? So we kind of get dealing with one another in a hard way, while the Lord will deal with this because he's a father, and a father will deal with us in a governmental way. And that's what he's Speaking of. He delivers to the tormentors, and that is that we're going to have a tormented conscience. We're going to have a tormented feeling every time we remember about that one.
Person that one brother, that one sister. We're going to, we're just going to grit our teeth and we're just going to remember. And we just have an unforgiving spirit. I have it out for this brother or this sister.
Verse 35 S Likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if from your hearts.
Ye from your hearts forgive not everyone his brother their trespasses. So this is to have a forgiving spirit is one of the features of Christianity to have forgiving forgiveness in our hearts towards our brethren and to the words those in the world too. I would say so these six things are in verse chapter 18.
Principles that should characterize Christianity characterize the assembly itself is humility from verses one down to verse 6, then verse 7 down to.
Perhaps verse 10 really the second thing is self judgment, unsparing self judgment and then really we have the shepherding care. The third thing from verse 12 down to verse 14 and then in verse 15. The fourth thing is a is a place where personal disputes can be resolved in a godly way for the glory of the Lord. And the fifth thing is that verse 18/19/20 that the assembly.
Place where there are binding decisions. The name of the Lord were gathered unto the name of the Lord under His authority.
Not the authority of the brethren. And then the sixth thing, the last one, is that the assembly should be characterized by those that are, have a forgiving spirit. They know how much they've been forgiven.
01:00:09
They practice forgiveness.
And if you think somebody has wronged you, go alone. Tell them yourself.
And well, we'll trust the Lord that these little passage of Scripture, these little comments, might be helped to us to go on.
And that might be for our children, for ourselves. The assembly might be a little picture of heaven upon earth.
And that our homes might be pictures, little pictures, to our children, to our young ones.
To us, those that are older, of heaven upon earth.
We commend ourselves.
God?s Work in Making Us the Complement of Christ
Open—Jonathan Boulard
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Oh, Jesus, gracious Savior.
I want my father's father.
We have life aside in the birds. I made our qualification.
I'd be able to do within the heart of the world.
Stranger.
Wisdom.
Grass strip club.
Oh Lord, I do one day instead.
Let's see here.
Why swallow may try and take.
Yes to this, grandparents that wall.
I understand.
Our kids and turn.
And trust. And I've been.
Now trend and dirt, all gravy and trigger for the day in the long run.
May all make fun of the day. It's like I'm translating our substance.
You don't learn the Lord.
You're going to play some grass grass spirit game.
130.
Chair, very few words here.
Let's look at Ephesians chapter one.
Ephesians chapter one, the last part of.
We can read verse 22. Let's put all things under his feet and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is His body.
Just this last phrase, the fullness of him that filleth All in all.
Often the.
Older will seek to speak to those of us who are younger to.
Encourage us on in the pathway of faith.
What is particularly before my soul this evening is this afternoon is as one that is younger to speak to those that are a little bit older to seek to encourage them in the pathway if they.
Was speaking with Josh Koster and some of it was in jest, but he was mentioning just how difficult it was turning 40 and just the realization sinking in of decreasing ability, decreasing strength, decreasing mental faculties.
00:10:15
And.
Justice, realizing that you're looking back at life more and more than looking forward at life. And so these comments.
Are in the vein with the desire of comfort and justice to reflect on those.
That are in that position and obviously further along as well. It's striking Amy and I haven't been able to to be among the Lord's people traveling about freely for a few years and being here now and you look around and there's a few more Gray hairs on different ones. A few more canes have been sprouted, a few more limps and you realize the passage of time.
So just just this phrase, the fullness of him that filleth All in all. And so I'll try to develop this a little bit further, but just the realization that in each one of our lives we're being formed as the companions of Christ. And there is that which is being done in our lives day by day.
Often, without our even realizing it, we're being formed as suited companions of Christ.
This, this verse is almost incomprehensible, the fullness of him that filleth All in all.
The Creator, the sustainer of all things. And yet he has his compliment.
In his church, in his body.
It's astonishing. And that is that takes place as a result of that work which He is doing in our souls, that which He is forming of Himself, that we will be suited companions for all eternity with Him, the fullness of Him that filleth All in all the passage of time in our lives.
Is not, is not inconsequential. The years that pass as the Lord forms in US more of Himself. It's not inconsequential. It's not something to minimize. It's something to look back at and rejoice in and to thank the Lord for. Let's just look at a few verses in Deuteronomy chapter 8.
Deuteronomy chapter 8.
Verse 2.
Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God LED thee these 40 years in the wilderness.
To humble thee.
And to prove thee to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldst keep his commandments or know. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna.
Which thou knewest not.
Neither did thy fathers know that he might make thee know, that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord.
Death man Live.
You can stop there.
The children of Israel as Moses is giving them his closing words.
He's instructing them that they're not to forget those 40 years that they've wandered in the wilderness. We read that history as they went through, and it just seemed like one train wreck after another, one disaster after another.
They weren't to forget it. They were to remember it.
But it's conspicuous in Scripture. You read through the book of Joshua.
And the the conquest of the land, the spiritual power, the energy that was there, yes, there was failure, but.
The state of soul among the people of God after those 40 years in the wilderness.
The wilderness, it had its intended effect. There was real blessing, there was real profit. And so they weren't too.
Just try to forget those 40 years. They weren't to try to forget those failures, that weakness that had been present. They were to remember it. They remember. They were to remember the Lord's mercies through it.
They were to take it with them and profit from it.
And so to just.
Speaking as one that's younger, although.
Talking to young people now and feeling is one that maybe is a little bit older, but just to speak to those that are older, just what a treasure you have.
To look back at the Lord's ways with you in your life.
Is to reflect on his faithfulness.
And I'll just make a few comments on on Jacob. I'm not going to refer to any scripture in particular. I will allude to certain instances in this life.
But I have been much encouraged by the life of Jacob and that it seems like he failed very nearly every test that he had in his life.
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Perhaps up until he comes into Egypt, it seems like every single test that he took, he failed.
And yet when he comes into the land of Egypt and he finally realizes that he is a Prince with God.
His name had been changed for years, but he never, never seemed to take it to heart. Israel, a Prince with God? Jacob a supplant or a deceiver.
So here Israel.
Coming down into Egypt, he had failed just about every test that he had been put through.
But it's evident that there is that profit in his soul.
He had learned the lesson, though he had failed the test. And so he comes into the presence of Pharaoh, and he finally begins to act like he is a Prince with God, and he walks into the presence of Pharaoh and he blesses Pharaoh.
The most powerful man.
Most likely on the face of the earth, he walks into his presence and he blesses him.
And that's the dignity.
Of my dear older brother, and that you have the Lord has worked in your life.
I can't. I can't throw stones and say you've.
You failed any more than the failure that I see in my life.
But the Lord has worked with you.
And he's working to change each one of us to be suited companions for himself.
He's working to change you.
Into a Prince with God and.
When you realize that dignity of the position that is yours and those of us that are younger, we can realize it as well.
And you realize, like it says in first John chapter 3, I believe it is, behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God.
When we walk in the dignity of that, there is tremendous power and there can be tremendous blessings. So you look at Jacob there in the land of Egypt. That was last, I think it was 13 years of his life.
Phenomenal power, phenomenal discernment. His eyes were dim at the end of his life, but his discernment was undimmed.
And he went out in a blaze of glory, He finally.
Finally walked in the dignity that had been his all his life long, but he finally.
Finally receive that blessing from the Lord. He finally walked as a Prince with God. And so that's.
That's all I had on my heart.
The fullness of him that filleth. All in all, that's the portion, That's the position that each one of us will have for all eternity.
To be the compliment, the fulfillment of that which is eternal and infinite.
But that he's worked in our lives, that we can be his compliment in that way, that we're not to forget that those 40 years in the wilderness.
It's not wasted time even if we failed the test.
We can still take those lessons.
And.
Jacob or Israel right at the end of his life.
I think it was a call meant Dave Burns. He's made more than once and I've enjoyed it and perhaps heard it from others as well. But the God that shepherded me all my life long and to this day.
So, Jacob.
Could look back and see that which the Lord had worked in spite of Jacob's failure all his life.
And so.
The desire for myself and for my older brother, and that you would be able to look back and see that which the Lord has done and rejoice in it, Not to look back at the years and regret that which is lost or passed, or regret the lost abilities or energies.
Which is treasuring her soul that which the Lord has worked and walk in the dignity of that position that is yours and be a help and a blessing to those of us that are younger.
One Score and Four Score
Open—Brad Erlandson
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
One aspect of what I've had on my heart.
Is one score and four score.
The age group of the range of 20.
One score. The age group of the range of 84 score and.
Let's look at.
A portion in Jeremiah 32.
Portion that has to do with a transaction.
We've had some reminders on transactions, and here's one about the right of redemption.
And.
We've had some remarks about.
A good start and a good finish, one score and four scores and we have in this portion.
Jeremiah instructed to make a purchase and that it was his right to make that purchase. And I look around this room and.
Yes, we don't have any rights, but you have a right of redemption and what we the truths of divine inspiration that we hold in our hands and that we've been schooled in and that we need to make an effort in. And so there needs to be that transaction. Buy it and don't sell it. And the opportunity is there in one score.
To avail yourselves in that period of strength in your life and take it and use it, redeem it. Let's let's read a little bit here in the 32nd of Jeremiah. Read a couple of verses at the beginning and then the portion in respect to the the purchase.
Jeremiah 32 verse one the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord.
In the 10th year of Zedekiah king of Judah, which was the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar, for then the king of Babylon's army besieged Jerusalem, and Jeremiah the prophet was shut up in the court of the prison which was in the king of Judas house.
So Nebuchadnezzar is besieged. Jerusalem now down.
Verse six And Jeremiah said, The word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Behold, enemy of the son of Shalom, thine uncle shall come unto thee, saying, By thee my field that is in anatok for the right of redemption is thine to buy it. So Hannah Meal, my uncle's son, came to me in the court of the prison according to the word of the Lord, and said unto me By my field I pray thee that is in amethought.
Which is in the country of Benjamin. For the right of inheritance is thine, and the redemption is thine by it for thyself. Then I knew that it was the word of the Lord. And I bought the field of Hannah, Hannah meal, my uncle son that was in Anatol, and weighed him the money, even 17 shekels of silver. And I subscribed the evidence and sealed it and took witnesses and weighed him the money and the balances. So I took the evidence of the purchase, both that which was sealed according to the law and.
And that which was open. And I gave the evidence of the purchase under Baroque, the son of Neriah, the son of Messiah, in the sight of Hannah Meal, my uncle's son, and in the presence of the witnesses that subscribe the book of the purchase before all the Jews that sat in the court of the prison.
And I charged barrack before them, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, take these evidences, this evidence of the purchase, both which is sealed and this evidence which is open.
But the men in earthen vessel, that they may continue many days, For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel. Houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land.
So the setting here is.
Jerusalem is about to be.
Overcome and.
Jeremiah is instructed to make this purchase and just a couple of thoughts here on one score and four scores. I so enjoy this setting because of the intergenerational aspect that we can enjoy here from the young to the old that's been set aside in Christendom to a large degree. And we don't have this this company together and.
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One score I want to encourage you to cultivate relationships in the fourscore. Perhaps its grandparents, perhaps its other going to tell a little story about.
I was a little more, I was, I was beyond one score, but I had, I had an opportunity to go and have lunch with my Grandma Schmidt from time to time. I worked in the same town.
And it was a good lunch and I'd go over there occasionally I'd sit down at the table and then we just visit.
And there be times. One time I specifically remember she related it was the day that her husband had passed away. It was a day in January, and she wasn't even 50 years old when she was widowed. She was left with an 11 year old son, the youngest of six boys. And what I remember specifically about Grandma relating that memory was that there wasn't a twinge of bitterness in what she was telling.
And I value that, the difficulties of the pathway. But there wasn't bitterness. Another another memory is this very room of intergenerational fellowship.
76 or 77 came here for the meetings. There was some difficulties at home.
My dad specifically said to say to greet a particular brother.
I found him and I greeted him.
He leaned over and he kissed me.
Albert Hayjo.
And.
Those are happy memories. There was a lot of difficulties at the time surrounding that greeting and he sent his message and so I value that the.
On Wednesday, I was driving and I was thinking about this portion. I was thinking about coming here and thinking about who I would see.
And I was thinking about who I wouldn't see.
And tears were running.
I'm sorry, it's not who I would see. It was who I wouldn't see.
I value who I see, but there's many that I don't see and I'm going back a long ways and those, those are happy memories and happy relationships and there's been.
There, there, there there is a.
A purchase, a right of redemption, and it may have been laid hold on at one point, but there needs to be it needs to be maintained. The the right of redemption. Is it to take your place at the Lord's table? Yeah, that's part of it. But that's not that's not the completion of it. There's there's a going on. There's grow in grace, the last words of Peter grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
And so we all need to end the enemy of our souls. He wants to. He wants to take that away.
And he wants to make make your life barren for him, and he's going to make every effort to do that. But here Jeremiah's given these instructions and it just doesn't seem logical. And the world is going to look at your pathway and your steps, your efforts and.
What are you thinking? Well.
Jeremiah is told to buy this field. It's about to be taken out of their hands, out of their possession. It's been out of their possession for 2500 years. And yet he follows these instructions and he makes this purchase and he has 17 shekels of silver and he buys it. And the, the we, we, we can look forward to this transaction and this effort and what we're, what we are acquiring because it's going to.
It's going to reap a rich reward in a soon coming day.
And verse 15 Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land. He was, He was buying it, and He was taking that step in obedience because there was going to be possession again in this land. It was all going to be handed back to them. They forfeited it because of disobedience and because of infidelity.
They they were, they lost it, but it was going to be brought back to them again.
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I remember having a conversation with.
A family member, the earlier generation gathered at a young age, gave it up and I was, I was talking about things that I enjoyed in the aspect of a coming millennial age and how everything is going to be so settled and he said.
Oh, you're a dispensationalist. The Millennium is just a figure. Well.
Yeah, I am a dispensationalist, but the Millennium is more than a figure. It's a reality. And it's going to be.
Houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land. And this is one of the transactions. One part of the transaction that we can make and we should make is things that were recovered in the 1800s, one of them being dispensational clarity and knowing, having our orientation in terms of where we are and what's happening and it's.
It's not difficult. And so we can, we can know that and we can know where the church is going and we can know that God is going to take up his counsels and his desires and his purpose with Israel once again. So just one other.
Couple other things in connection with this transaction and this purchase. Yes, it's going to cost you something. The Lord's Day. There's, there's transactions that happen all the time. There's a transaction to be here on the Lord's Day, and it's been largely given up in Christendom at large.
It's selfishness. That's what it all boils down to, is to please myself and do what I want.
Instead of using it for the Lord. And I don't mean to be so presumptuous as to say that I've always made the right call on what to do with the Lord state. But fortunately in our home assembly, there's been an evening meeting that has been maintained along the years, through the years, and that has been a help to me to keep the Lord's Day in its proper perspective. I remember a conversation with someone from from another assembly.
And he talked about.
Going golfing. Lord, say afternoon. And I did a little bit of research, went back to some of the older lists of gatherings or something, and there used to be an evening meeting in that assembly. There wasn't any more. So that afternoon and that evening was open. And when there's a void, it gets filled with something else. So the Lord's Day is a transaction. Getting here was a transaction. Hosting us was a transaction. I take a deep breath.
I think about the tab for hosting this other side of that kitchen wall is a transaction, a big transaction to feed us as well as we've been fed.
On behalf of your guests, thank you very much for your kindness in that transaction.
Moses made a transaction. Let's turn to.
Hebrews, Chapter 11.
Before we turn to Hebrew. Yeah, Hebrews Chapter 11.
Verse 23. Hebrews 11 and 23. By faith Moses.
When he was born was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child, and they were not afraid of the King's commandment. By faith, Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.
Esteeming the reproach of Christ Greater riches than the treasures in Egypt.
For he had respect unto the recompense of the reward.
We'll just go that far. He had respect under the recompense of the reward. Jeremiah had respect onto the return of those lands. Moses had respect unto the recompense of the reward.
The world can't understand this choice that Moses has made, choosing rather to suffer affliction than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. I read once that Moses was in line to sit on Pharaoh's throne. There wasn't the son to be the heir, He was the son of Pharaoh's daughter. That was that was where he was headed.
He gave it all up to suffer affliction with the people of God. What he did was, and this is the tenant of the Christian path.
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He he sacrificed the present for the future. That's the tenet of the Christian path, sacrificing the present for the future. And it's the best investment you and I will ever make is to sacrifice the present for the future, not please myself, but to look ahead to what we have in glory and.
To the one score you're going to you're going to reap a rich reward If you look around this room and you look for a godly a godly help me to go on with you. That is it's going to be a rich reward right here in time and to have this this setting and to enjoy it with your household.
There's nothing. It's, it's heaven on earth. And you, you won't be disappointed.
And umm, so that's, that's Moses steps chose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. The reproach of Christ. Yes, there will be reproach, greater riches than the treasures in Egypt.
First Corinthians, chapter 3.
Verse 21.
Therefore let no man glory in men, for all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come, all are yours and your Christ, and Christ is God's. This is what we possess near once it's all, it's all in our possession and.
All of these things that he speaks of.
Life or death or things present or things to come. The enemy of our souls would, would, he'd he'd bring that lure past you that you're missing something by walking in the path of faith. But all things are yours. That is the reality of the Christian path. Life or death. Death is our servant that brings us into the.
Presence of the Lord absent from the body.
Present with the Lord and these are all these are all transactions and we come out ahead. All things are yours and your Christ and Christ is God's and.
Trying to trying to put my hand on that thought.
Once more and it's it's escaped me. Pardon me.
Back-to-back to Ezra, Chapter 9.
Chapter 8.
Here there's a journey back to Jerusalem on the part of 12 of the chief of the priests, verse 24, Ezra chapter 8 and verse 24. Then I separated 12 of the chief of the priests.
Umm Cherubaya Hashelbia, and ten of their brethren, and weighed unto them the silver and the gold, and the vessels, even the offering of the House of our God, which the King and his counselors, and his Lords, and all Israel their present had offered.
Down to.
Verse 29 Watch ye and keep them until you weigh them before the chief of the priests, and the Levites, and chief of the Fathers of Israel at Jerusalem, in the chambers of the House of the Lord.
So took the priests and the Levites the weight of the silver, and the gold, and the vessels, to bring them to Jerusalem under the House of our God.
Verse 31 Then we departed from the river of Ahava on the 12Th day of the first month, to go under Jerusalem.
And the hand of our God was upon us, and He delivered us from the hand of the enemy, and of such as lay in wait by the way. And we came to Jerusalem, and bowed there three days. Now on the 4th day was the silver and the gold, and the vessels weighed in the House of our God by the hand of Mermaid the son of Uriah the priest. And with him was Eliezer the son of Phineas, and with them was Josephad the son of Joshua, and Noah Daya the son of Binua Levites.
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By number and by weight of everyone and all the weight that was written at that time.
Also the children of those that have been carried away, which were come out of the captivity, offered burnt offerings onto the God of Israel. 12 bullocks for all Israel 90 and six rounds 70 and seven lambs. 12 He goats for a sin offering. All this was a burnt offering unto the Lord. And they delivered the King's Commission on to the King's lieutenants and to the governors on this side of the river, and they further the people and the House of God.
So we have.
We have wealth in our possession. It's been weighed out to us and.
Here they took it. They brought it back to Jerusalem. There was the enemy, such as lay in wait, by the way, but they were, they were preserved. And yes, there's going to be, there's going to be dangers, but they're preserved. You and I are going to be preserved with these precious, precious possessions in our hands to bring them back. And may it be that there is that.
Good start at one score and that good finish at 4 score that all is delivered. Just this.
This four score stage.
I want to.
Ought to acknowledge.
The stage of life where there isn't much that you haven't seen and you're still here and.
That's that's commendable and I appreciate, I'm sure I speak on behalf of everyone in this room that there is that going on in spite of the disappointments of the pathway and what a privilege to have your hand in furthering the people.
And the House of God, that's what's going to count for eternity, and that's what's going to.
Is God going to be a debtor to us? No, no, he keeps he keeps good books and every effort that you've made for him is going to bring a recompense and dear one score. I I would encourage you to to go on in these things to make them your own.
It's not genetic, young people, it has to be laid hold on yourself. And so I would encourage you to do that. There's a.
There's a wealth of truth in this precious book, in the ministry that's available to us, and may it be our desire to further the people and the House of God.
Barzillai and Chimham: Older and Younger
Open—Josh Costron
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Second Samuel, chapter 19.
And we'll read from verse 31.
And Brazilia?
The Gileadite came down from Rogelum.
And went over Jordan with the king.
To conduct him over Jordan.
Now Brasilia was a very aged man.
Even 4 score years old.
And he had provided the king of sustenance.
While he lay at Mahanium, for he was a very great man. And the king said unto Barzilay, Come thou over with me, and I will feed thee with me in Jerusalem, in Barzilia. I said unto the king, How long have I to live?
That I should go up.
With the King and to Jerusalem. I am this day Foursquare years old.
And can I discern between good and evil? Can I serve and taste what I eat or what I drink? Can I hear any more of the voice of singing men and singing women? Wherefore then should thy servant be at a burden unto my Lord the King?
Thy servant will go a little way over Jordan with the king. And why should the king recompense it? Me.
With such a reward.
Let thy servant, I pray thee, turn back again, that I may die in my own city, and be buried by the grave of my father and my mother.
But behold thy servant Jim Ham, let him go over with my Lord the King, and do to him what shall seem good unto thee.
And the king answered, Chim Ham shall go over with me, and I will do to him that which shall seem good unto thee, and whatsoever thou shalt require me, that will I do for thee. And all the people went over Jordan. And when the king was come over, the king kissed Barzilia and blessed him, and he returned unto his own place. And then the king went on to Gilgal, and Chim Ham went on with him. And all the people of Judah conducted the king, and also half.
The people of Israel.
Well, I sure appreciate.
What my brothers have just shared.
And I just was thinking as they were speaking.
About the wonderful legacy that our dear older brethren.
Have left.
And continue to leave.
With us that are that are younger. I speak not as one who I think is young anymore as John and Jonathan and I were jesting a little, but certainly younger than many here and one who has.
I trust, perhaps in part at least, appreciated much of what my older brethren have passed along. You know, I was thinking of Barzillai. He's an old man, and he was eight years old.
He confessed here in this chapter to David just how much he was feeling the circumstances of age. Strength was leaving him, his body was breaking down. He felt as though he didn't have much left to give.
Says of Brazilian that he was a was a man.
That had substance.
He was a wealthy man.
And what he used his material wealth for was to support the king.
And his people.
He willingly laid it down.
For the service of God, you might say, and for the benefit of his younger brethren.
You know, men of wealth and scripture often speak to us.
In type of those who have spiritual riches that they can pass along to those who are younger.
And we are so indebted to our dear older brethren for your faithfulness.
Example of faith.
And, you know, for sharing something of the spiritual wealth that you've acquired.
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And I just would encourage you to dispense that wealth to those of us.
Who are poor?
And who are beggars?
To provide us with those years of wisdom and knowledge that you have acquired through your efforts and toil as you poured yourself over the Word of God and and mind out many, many gems and principles and instruction.
I would encourage you to share that with those of us who are younger because.
We hope to gain by that and pass that along too.
That's how the truth should be passed along from generation to generation, in the same purity in which it was originally received.
To faithful men.
And I'd like to see this in Barzilia a little bit, how this man old felt as though his age was getting the best of him, but yet he still was doing something that was productive.
And yet he points over to Chim Hem and he says take Chim Ham with you. I don't have the strength to go. I want to be buried.
In my land, where my mother and my father are. But take Chim Ham, you know, Chim Ham, I believe, speaks of this, and I think his name means something like longing with great desire.
You know, I think of this, this, can I say this legacy that our dear older brethren are leaving us and have left us. And if there's one thing that that we get from that, at least if I can speak personally, is a spark, a desire, an encouragement, a new motivation to carry on for the Lord.
And for his things, and to build up those around us, and to pass along the truth and carry on in it faithfully.
And so it's in a way Barzilia leaves this along as well, if I can apply it practically.
That he points him on to Chim Ham, this man who speaks of these things, a man who in type would, I think, point to us of longing with great desire for the things of God.
I am so indebted to my older brother and there's many who I could single out which I will not do, but those who have just fortified me in my faith. The Lord has used them various capacities in ways to just spur me on. Older sisters who have been a great help to me just by way of their own example in the assembly carrying on.
You know, some of us brothers were back there.
And we were talking in between meetings.
And a brother had made the comment of about a widowed sister who well into her latter years was just such a great example of faith. And she would just give little words of encouragement here and there. And and it was such a help, such an encouragement. You know, these, these little gems that our older brethren just kind of lay at our feet and these seeds that they plant.
You have no idea what it does, you know.
That it just might be that which.
Lights the fire.
Within a young person or a middle-aged person to carry on.
And so I think that while.
Might think if you're older that you have not much to give. I would say that you have much to give because you have much that we don't have.
And we need you.
Turn to.
Exodus.
Chapter 24.
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And I won't make much comment, I just want to notice a couple snippets.
Verse 13 And Moses rose up in his minister Joshua.
And Moses went up into the mount of God.
And over to chapter 33, I think it is.
Verse 11 And the Lord spake unto Moses, face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.
And he turned again into the camp, but his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed, not out of the Tabernacle.
I'd like to speak to my younger brother now.
And I would like to encourage you to draw.
Close to your older brethren.
And keep step with them.
I think a comment was made by a brother at a conference recently and I could be misquoting it and I didn't listen to the meeting. I just heard a snippet, something to the effect that if we're just, I think he was speaking from the perspective of an older brother, and I appreciated this comment. He says if we're just slowing down and you can pass us, just pass us.
But I would like to say too that we need to draw near and keep step with you.
I think of Joshua, this younger man who.
Kept step with his older brother Moses.
You know, kept company with him.
The things he must have learned.
If you're a young person, I would encourage you to.
Spend time with the older ones in your assembly.
You know, there's moments, many moments at conferences like these, and I look back fondly when I was a young person.
Where there were a number of older brothers poring over the scriptures over the table after lunch, talking about some spiritual truth, and I remember just pulling up a chair and listening.
Kind of a family on the wall kind of thing.
And that was invaluable.
To hear what they had to say.
You will never regret getting to know your older brethren better, and I just want to encourage you that you would make that effort.
Keep step with them, hear what they have to say. They have wisdom, they have gems of truth that they can share with you that you may not get anywhere else, frankly.
And talk to them and spend time with them.
And you'll be the better for it, I promise you that.
So just a couple words of encouragement, both for the younger and for my dear older brethren.
All right, and let's see.
Sin can never come. Whose life our longest spirit leans from earth, where yes we will and can we call our home, our fathers house on high, the rest of God, our rest to come, our place of liberty.
Perhaps we can start singing from verse 3.
On to victory.
312.
Encouraged my life, blessed work with joy and follow me 312.
Lead on, almighty Lord.
We all live.
For me.
And God bless, all my life I celebrate.
Where God is reaching all of the beginning.
Technician period stop by.
Rise.
And turn off the screen.
00:20:06
I'm not crying for no more, no more.
Gospel 2
Gospel—John Kemp
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We're going to open our meeting by #15.
Make me hard, fear.
Where the forest and how may hear.
Their prayers.
We see.
Yeah, there is room.
Rest.
Not being.
Yes, there is room.
All things are ready to come.
Yes, yes.
Everything has done.
Yes, there is room.
Lord is now out of place. Yeah.
Shall we look to the Lord one that is one of my favorite here, if I can find it here #9.
Come every soul.
By sin oppress there.
Mercy with the Lord, some brother would start.
Again duration I crossed staying it's raining.
00:05:32
He will save you. He will save you.
Now.
You can't see such, it's not true.
The way that later went to rest.
He brought him now.
She will save you. He will save you. He will save your power.
And so, dear friends, at the outset of our gospel meeting.
We want to ask that question in all earnestness. Have you trusted in Christ as your Savior? We're not talking about religion tonight. We're not talking about joining a church or anything of that sort, but we are asking the question directly.
Have you been sheltered?
From coming judgment by the precious blood of Christ.
Is that your hope?
Is that your refuge, or are you trying to make yourself better for God? That's impossible.
Years ago in England there was an awful mind disaster. It was called the Bar Mind disaster. I cannot remember the year when it occurred.
But many of those brave men underground were entombed and lives were lost.
A feverish rescue effort was put forth.
To save those men from being buried in the bowels of the earth and all according to the record.
All were out except six men, six men still down in the bottom of the mind and in a place where which was almost impossible to reach, but they resumed their efforts.
Tons of debris blocked the entrance.
To the chamber where these men were.
But they worked day and night.
00:10:01
They got rid of all that debris and there was a fire door and they forced it open and there the picture on the newspaper.
Six men, side by side.
Passed into eternity. But what was so significant there, my friend?
One of them or more had taken a piece of chalk.
And had written on the rock wall these words.
We are all trusting in Christ, so we know.
Those six men whose bodies who were recovered.
We're with the Lord in the glory.
If that happened to you tonight, where would you be? Where would your eternal soul be?
Because tonight.
Is still the day of God's grace.
And we want you to know.
That God is deeply interested in the salvation of your soul.
To lose your health is much, to lose your wealth is more, to lose your soul is such a loss as no man can restore.
That soul of yours.
Is invaluable, but where will it spend eternity?
Dear friend, this may be the last gospel meeting that we will ever have in Regina. It's the last meeting of the conference, but it may be the last opportunity that God will reach out with his arms outstretched and give the invitation from his heart of love.
Be reconciled to God.
Some people think that God needs to be reconciled to us.
But that's a misconception.
God never needed to be reconciled to us from apost eternity. His heart was full of love and grace.
And.
Even before the Lord Jesus came into the world.
God's heart was reaching out to the lost name, and the Syrian is an example, and others the heart of God.
Was full of grace and love and mercy and pardon.
And forgiveness. Man is the one that needs to be reconciled. You and I are enemies by wicked works. We are the ones that need reconciliation. We need to have our minds changed because man has some hard thoughts about God.
And he thinks that God is his enemy.
That's a falsehood. God is not your enemy. He hates sin. Oh yes, God's thoughts about sin have not changed.
But he loves the Sinner. And tonight?
If I can express it, which is hard for me to do, the arms of the Lord are wide open.
And his invitation is for whosoever, because you're not fit for the realms of glory the way you are. If you're unsaved in this room, there is judgment before you. You are condemned already.
You see what this says here?
It says you.
HH I wonder what this means.
Well, you know that I've been to India many times and I've been to Bombay, one of the largest cities in India, with its terrible slums.
And sometimes this is put on the outside of the door.
And the person who lives in that apartment is not very happy.
Because he knows that he has to vacate, he has to get out of that apartment because this means unfit for human habitation. Unfit.
00:15:11
It's in such a condition of deterioration that the government says.
We're going to empty these apartments.
That can be a difficulty in the midst of the monsoon. Some of you boys and girls might not know what a monsoon is, but if you were ever in one, you would never forget. Every afternoon, usually July, August, June, July, August, there is a torrent of rain. The streets are filled to overflowing, having to collect all your belongings and get out.
The monsoon is quite a challenge, but you know, dear friends, this is written on your body. Unfit.
For human habitation condemned already.
You have a body and a soul and a spirit, but your body.
Is really going to go back to corruption if the Lord doesn't come? So that body which we have is not the body that is fit for heavenly habitation. Oh no.
This body that I have, it may go into death.
At my age, you never know.
And.
I know I have that assurance that not a new body, but this body is going to be fit for heavenly habitation.
I'm going to have a body of glory.
When? Maybe tonight. I hope so. I cannot say for sure, but I hope the Lord will come tonight. We're on the threshold of His coming. We want you to be fit. Change this age. Change this U to F.
Fit for heavenly habitation? Yes, we're going to have bodies of glory.
But of course, if you do not accept the Lord as your Savior.
That body sooner or later, maybe sooner than you think.
Is going to go into the grave.
And it will go into corruption.
The Lord Jesus had a perfect human body, but it could never see corruption.
Because there wasn't one stain of sin.
No old nature in the blessed Lord.
Perfect. Holy. Spotless.
The Lamb of God.
Your friends, tonight we're going to read some scriptures.
In John's Gospel and make a few comments, but we want you to know at the outset.
That man is no longer under probation. What do you mean you might ask? Well, the probation was over at the cross. That is where man displayed what he truly was.
An enemy of God, They hated the Lord without a cause that is the most severe.
Denunciation the most severe.
Statement the Lord made because He was.
Perfect goodness God manifests in the flesh.
And yet man rejected him.
Cast him out, gave him a malefactor's death.
Nailed him to the cross of Calvary. God turned that awful act of man's hatred.
Into eternal blessing for you, if you will bow the knees to the Lord Jesus.
And trust Him as your savior. Today, John, today, tonight, John chapter 4.
When therefore the Lord knew how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John?
Though Jesus himself baptized not but his disciples, he left Judea.
Departed again into Galilee, and He must needs go through Samaria. There cometh then cometh He to a city of Samaria, which is called Saikar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's well was there, Jesus, therefore being wearied with his journey.
00:20:24
Sat thus on the wealth, and it was about the 6th hour.
There cometh a woman of Samaria.
To draw water, Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.
Now the Lord was.
In Judea at the beginning of his public ministry, but.
He was being rejected in Judea, so he was on his way to the northern part of the country Galilee, where most of his disciples came from.
And.
On the way to the northern part of the country Galilee.
He could have bypassed Samaria. In fact, a Jewish legalist wouldn't go through Samaria. It was a defiled place. It was unclean. They would bypass it through Perea and go up the valley of the Jordan across to the Sea of Galilee.
The Lord must needs go through Samaria.
In the councils of Apost Eternity, it was determined that the Lord Jesus should meet this woman.
It was number after thought with God. The Lord sat on that well. I have done the same. And that woman of Samaria, she came down with that empty water pot on her head. She saw a man sitting on the well, and she recognized this is a Jew. I can tell by the blue ribbon around his garment.
He should not be at this well. This is our well.
And it's deep. Anyway, she came and you know the story. The Lord said, give me a drink. He won her confidence. Here was the Son of God in manhood, taking manhood into union with himself. He was weary, he was tired, he was hungry, and yet he had an appointment with this poor.
Samaritan woman.
He had stores of marvelous grace for her. What kind of a woman was she? Well, I don't think your mother would like to walk down the street with this woman of Samaria. Her reputation was not very good, and she was coming at a time when most women don't come to draw water.
At the 6th hour which is high noon and.
If you're in these tropical countries like I have often been.
It's really hot at noon hour, the brethren tell you. Don't go out, Mr. Kemp, at this time of day. But the woman was found with her water pot empty, and there she met the Lord of Glory, sitting at that well.
He knew all about her past, and the Lord knows all about your past, dear friend.
And remember that he has a deep interest in you, just as he had in the woman of Samaria. Her reputation was pretty bad. She was not a woman that.
That would be found in the company of religious people.
She was an unclean woman. I don't mean outwardly, she was unclean inwardly, but the Lord knew all about that. And he came not to judge the world, not to condemn the world, but to save the world. And, and this woman was going to be one of the trophies of his marvelous grace as I am and as many of you are.
Dear friend tonight.
Yet there is room. Let me tell a story. We sang that hymn.
00:25:05
God's house is filling fast, yet there is room. Some guests will be the last, yet there is room that was written by George West Fraser.
I love that to him writer he would compare favorably with Mr. JG Deck, the greatest of Brethren hymn writers. George West Fraser was born in 1840 in Ireland. He was brought up in a fairly good home, a religious home.
And around 1859.
1860 If you know anything about history, there was a great revival movement in Ireland. Thousands were gathered into halls. Mr. McIntosh and many others preached the gospel to thousands of people at that time.
And George West Fraser was invited to come.
Doctor Guines is speaking tonight.
George, come with me to the meeting, but I'm not really interested in in that sort of thing. George, come. You don't have to stay if you don't want to.
All right, he was persuaded. And when he came there was no room. The place was packed. Standing room only.
George said his brother said, well, we can't get in obviously. But look, there's this the water pipe there. We're young men up the water pipe. They shimmied until they got up to the the 1St floor and there was a window open and there George Frazier sat with his with his brother.
His feet dangling over the windowsill, looking down on the the large crowd.
And those words that Doctor Guines spoke as he I suppose he spoke on Luke Chapter 14 yet there is room were burned into his soul.
He heard the gospel. He was convicted there on the windowsill.
And he went home.
And.
But he didn't go home with a peaceful conscience.
Here is the message that we that he heard through the window. At the window the Savior calls to him. I go as guilty, lost, undone life and forgiveness. From him flow God's well beloved son. That was a message that George heard.
When he went home and for a couple of weeks he was in agony of souls.
He was convicted.
I'm a Sinner. What can I do? I know that I'm not ready for the presence of a holy God.
He was ready to give up and go back to the world. A verse came to his memory.
That he had heard, I don't know, maybe in Sunday school. A faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation.
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners and George Frazier.
Bowed the knee. Peace fluttered his soul.
He was gathered with the brethren. Some of the most precious hymns that we sing on Lord's Day morning were written by George West Fraser. 2:45 On that same night. Lord Jesus went all around thee, joined to cast his darkest shadow and many others. Look in your index, you will see.
George Frazier didn't live long. He married.
He lived in Cheltenham. He was a neighbor of Mr. Macintosh. They were close friends. They both died in the same year, 1896. They were both buried in the same cemetery. You can see it if you go to Sheltingham. I have not, but they're both with the Lord.
00:30:00
George Frazier wrote that hymn. God's house is filling fast, yet there is room. And we want to tell you, dear friends, tonight before the meeting closes, that.
The heart of God is wide open. There's room in his heart, in his home for you. There was no room for him in the inn. He was born in a Manger. And the angels looked down from the glory, thousands of them.
And they said, glory to God in the highest on earth.
Peace, goodwill toward man. For the first time the angels looked down and they saw their Creator. They had never seen him before. The Lord Jesus took manhood, as Mr. Kelly says. He took manhood into union with Himself.
A perfect man in every sense of the word apart from sin.
And you know, when the Lord entered this world, he entered into an environment.
That was opposed to his holy nature, everything.
That, he saw, was opposed to God, He was rejected by his people, He was scorned, he was despised, He came onto his own, and his own received Him not. The Word was made flesh, and it dwelt among us God's well beloved Son in manhood.
Here at the Well of Sikar, speaking to a poor.
A poor woman that was, you might say, isolated her sin isolated her really. The Lord was lonely. A lonely man too. We sometimes sing love in my lonely life of sorrow here below. Because the Lord didn't have anyone that really understood him as he walked this earth.
They misunderstood him. They even said that he had a demon.
So the Lord was a lonely man and we don't hear of.
Outside of the Sisters of Bethany, we don't hear of anyone inviting the Lord into their homes. Well, I shouldn't say that.
Because I was thinking of.
I was thinking of Simon the Pharisee in Luke Chapter 7. Yes, he did invite the Lord into his home.
But I mean overnight, I don't think we we, we read about that. The Lord probably spent many nights on the Mount of Olives alone and.
He did go into the House of the Pharisees. He never went into the House of a Sadducee. A Sadducee was a modernist. He didn't. A Sadducee didn't believe the Old Testament to be the entire word of God. They.
Chose certain books that they would accept some of the writings of Moses, but the Lord never.
Consorted with a Sadducee, he did with the Pharisees, because although they were blind as Simon in Luke Chapter 7, he was blind and there was that poor woman, a prostitute, weeping at his feet and Simon looking on. I don't think this is a prophet, or he would not allow.
This woman to touch him like this.
But that was the Lord's heart.
She wiped his feet with her tears and poured on myrrh, which was very expensive. It was probably in an alabaster box that came from Egypt, very expensive. But that woman, her heart was touched. She knew her, her sinful condition. She knew she wasn't worthy for the presence of that person.
The Son of God who is lying at the table and partaking of the meal that Simon the Pharisee had prepared.
And Simon was thinking in his heart, well, this can't be a prophet, you know, Simon thought, I'm a 50 pence debtor. This woman is a 500 pence debtor. I We don't have company with this sort of a person. But that was not the case with the Lord. He came in his.
00:35:08
Matchless grace. All the moral degradation he overcame.
He came to give life forgiveness. Thy faith has saved thee, he said to that woman in Luke 7. Go in peace. Not her tears, not her kisses, not the alabaster box that was broken. Her faith saved her. Dear friend, is your faith tonight in the person and work of Christ?
Or are you? Is your faith in something that you have done?
Your religion or your good works? The Lord spoke in our chapter here.
Of the gift of God, eternal life. He spoke of the living water. God is not asking something from you.
He's too rich to sell and you're too poor to buy. If God put any price on salvation comparable to its value, you couldn't pay, you're a bankrupt Sinner. We all were like that, but the Lord said to this woman.
If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith unto thee, give me to drink, Thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water. Isn't that wonderful living water?
That well in Sychar is 78 feet deep. I sat beside it. You drop a penny there, it takes a long time for it to splash.
This poor woman of Samaria, she had tried all the wells of this world, all the pleasures of sin she had indulged in, and the well was deep. You know there's nothing in this world, dear friend, that can satisfy that heart of yours. It was created for eternity and only the Lord Jesus.
Eternal life that He offers you the gift of God.
The Living Water is being presented to you, flowing down from the heart of God tonight.
Are you going to refuse that message? Are you going to turn your back upon such love?
I often tell this story. I guess it's a little threadbare.
854.
There was an awful plague of cholera in London.
Nobody. The doctors there, they didn't know. Where does this disease come from? We haven't met it before.
Does it come from the vapors on the water? We don't know, but the people are dying like flies all over.
All over London. What can be done? Well, we just let it run its course and then it will be over.
But Doctor John Snow, he said, no, I'm going to go to the bottom of this. So he took a big map of London.
He put it on the wall.
And he got out to the.
The address records.
And he began to go around to the homes where a person had died, knocked at the door.
Where did you get your water at such and such a well?
That street down there in the center of London, where did you get your water?
The same, the same St. the same pump. And on he went. He put a then he put a mark wherever he had visited. So he knew that all those people where there had been death in the homes, they all got their water from the same well there in the center of Soho, I think it was. It had a big long handle.
And that's where the people got their water.
Doctor John Snow said Cap that well, don't let anyone.
Again, draw water from it and lo and behold, the cholera epidemic subsided and there was no longer that awful death toll because the water that was coming through that well was coming from the Thames River, which was polluted with slaughterhouses and open sewers.
No wonder cholera is spread that way in India through polluted water and hundreds can die with that awful disease. Well, dear friends.
00:40:12
The wells of this world are polluted. There's pleasure in sin, but it's only for a season. These wells polluted with filth, with selfishness, with sin, and people are drinking at these wells. They're trying to find satisfaction in this world, and they're disappointed. Why don't they listen to Solomon in the book of Ecclesiastes?
He had everything that heart could wish. Gold was just like the gravel on the street. It was so abundant.
Solomon had everything that you could.
Accumulate to make a person happy riches.
Honor wives to no end and.
He wrote the final verdict. All is vanity and vexation of spirit. Dear friend, tonight we want you to know that the Lord Jesus is pleading with you tonight to close in with His offer of mercy.
Because you do not know.
Tomorrow's sun may never rise upon thy long deluded sight.
I live in Ottawa.
And justice. A few months ago, a couple of blocks from my home, a man was taking a stroll on Sunday afternoon with his wife. He was crossing the street that I know very well. I pass it nearly every day.
A young man fleeing from the police roared down the street.
Hit that man immediately, ushered into eternity.
What a just a young man, 45, with a family living in the area where I live. Probably I had met him on the street. Gone into eternity. Dear friends, you have no lease on life.
Lust dost thou art, and unto dust Returnus was not spoken of your soul. And so tonight, like this poor woman of Samaria, she became an evangelist.
And.
She went into the city where she was well known, especially by the men, and she proclaimed the gospel. Come see a man that told me all things that ever I did I forgot to tell you. The Lord touched the conscience of that woman, he said to her, after speaking to her about the living water.
She said I would like to have this living water, but.
Sir, you have nothing to draw with. From whence have you this living water? The Lord spoke to her about her sin. Go call thy husband and come hit her. Oh, that was touching the black spot in her life. I have no husband. And the Lord said you've, you've said right, you have no husband. You've had five, and the man you are living with now is not your husband.
In that sense, thou truly and so.
She was a convicted Sinner, but she found the stores of grace.
In the heart of that man at Psycho's well were far greater than all her sin She became an evangelist, and she went out with the message to the city of.
Samaria or Sikar and she spoke to the people.
Come see a man which told me all things that ever I did. She realized this is the Messiah. I have found him. Her heart was full, nothing official. It was overflowing. And that's the way we should be when we preach the gospel from an overflowing heart.
Dear friends, the meeting is coming to an end soon.
But remember.
God is offering you that living water.
Many of those Samaritans, when they heard the Lord, the Lord stayed a couple of days in the city of Samaria and many more believed because of His own word they said. Now we know not because we have heard thy word, we have heard them ourselves and know that this is Christ. Have you heard the Lord speaking to your soul personally tonight? He's speaking to you individually or not. Lost in the crowd, dear friend.
00:45:11
This may be your last opportunity.
In June this year, my dear wife and I were taking a trip down through southern Ontario and.
We decided to go to Niagara Falls.
And.
Eleanor always loves to view the Horseshoe Falls there.
In the American Falls, a magnificent spectacle, one of the seven wonders of the world. And by God's grace, we gave out many tracks in Niagara Falls. There were multitudes of people there, 162 feet high. Let me tell you a story. This is for the boys. Robert Woodward was about 10 years of age.
He and.
An older man and his sister got into a boat on the Niagara River which flows down to the falls. It was a beautiful day. They were having a lovely ride on the boat, but something went wrong and the motor stopped with their sheared. A pin or what I don't know.
But they were at the mercy of that strong current. Niagara River going down to the falls has a strong current.
They couldn't roll the boat, in fact, a wave came and capsized the vessel and they were thrown into the water. Miraculously, Believe it or not, a man put his hand over the railing and he caught the thumb of the sister of little Robert and pulled her to safety. The man went over the falls and was never seen again.
What about Robert? He had a life jacket on.
He went over the falls. You know those falls, There's sharp rocks down at the bottom. Yeah, many, quite a few have gone over in barrels. But boy, they, they don't, they don't want to do it again. And little Robert went over the falls, right down into the gorge there.
And they're the maid of the mist that tourists both that is moving around. I haven't gone on it. Taking people right to the edge of the the falls. They saw something bobbing up and down in the water and someone crying for help. And sure enough, it was Robert. So they threw him a life preserver.
And they pull them into the boat.
Of course he was shot. He had to recover from shock, but he was fine. Do you know that's the only person who has gone over the falls with only a life preserver and survived. No one else has.
The story was splashed on newspapers and magazines all over the world. Boy goes over the falls and lives.
That's not the end of my story. One year later, Robert Woodward heard the gospel like you are hearing it tonight.
And he felt the Lord saved me once so that he could save me twice. His little heart, I suppose he was about 11 years of age. It was touched with the wondrous message of God's love. And he bowed the knee there, a little boy, and he accepted the Lord and trusted his precious blood.
And he was saved. There was number notice in the newspaper about that anywhere.
They weren't interested in that at all.
But I understand that he has gone back to Niagara Falls and preached the gospel at that very point.
Dear friends.
Life is real and earnest, but tonight?
Will you be like this woman and find out who it is? Not only what the Lord was offering living water to that poor degraded soul, but offering to you tonight?
Living water, eternal life.
Forgiveness of all your sins.
You know when the Lord was on the way there to the cross of Calvary and the time is gone. Forgive me on the as he was going up to the summit.
00:50:10
He was so weak with that heavy cross upon his back. He'd been up several nights in pilots and Herod's Judgment Hall, and he was exhausted. He was a perfect man in the Garden of Gethsemane.
An Angel was sent to strengthen him. The agony was so great as he contemplated the cross. So they said he's going to die. Simon, come over here.
Black men from Africa, probably you take the cross, Simon, Some people think, oh, the people were having compassion on the Lord because he was he was feeling so much the burden of the cross. That's not the point. They wanted if I can use the I hesitate to use it, but I don't know of a better word. They wanted the pleasure of putting.
On the cross nailing him there, the Son of God, the creator of the universe, they thought he was going to die, so they put that cross. Simon brought that cross up. The Lord was put upon it and the rest of the story, you know, his precious blood was.
Poured forth from His ribbon side, which has power to cleanse you from every stain of sin, to give you a flawless title to eternal glory, a passport to heaven. Will you trust the Lord this evening? Will you receive Him as your Savior? Will you trust in the finished work of Calvary? Or are you going to go out in your sins as you came in here? One thing I do know.
You will go out different than the way you came in because you've heard the gospel.
Of all props feebly presented, you have heard the message of salvation.
So you are more responsible. May God bless His word and special thanks to our beloved brethren in Regina who has given us such a wonderful week, a weekend of happy fellowship, and we do appreciate it very much. If we have time, maybe we could sing just a few stanzas here. Number 13.
#13.
Some some brother would start it.
Shall we close in prayer?