Address—Robert House
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Welcome to this address this afternoon.
I'd like to start.
By taking a moment.
You just think about what we were doing.
3 1/2 hours ago.
3 1/2 hours ago we sat down in the presence.
Of our Savior, King of Kings, Lord of Lords.
Creator of the universe.
We considered His Majesty and His glory.
And we considered him as the Lamb of God.
And the Spirit of God brought before us.
That same person.
Going to Calvary's cross.
Absolutely amazing that the omnipotent.
Creator allowed himself to be nailed to that cross.
And even more incredible that he was made sin for me and for you if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus.
And on that Friday?
The cross was empty.
Because the one whose name was Jesus, He shall save his people from their sins, was dead.
And placed in a tomb.
With a stone over the door over the entrance sealed.
And on a.
First day of the week.
About 1990 years ago.
The stone rolled back.
To show an empty tomb.
Because Jesus was risen from the dead.
The power of God raised him.
I'd like to just take a minute just to think about that. Recall the feelings the Spirit of God brought before us.
And then I'd like to sing 132.
132.
The person.
Let's pray.
Our gracious God and Father, we are thankful for our Lord Jesus Christ.
And the majesty of his person.
For his wisdom, his power.
And for his humility.
For his love, for his matchless grace.
And now we come to Thee in His name, asking for help. I pray for a portion for myself and for each one in the room today, and for those who will hear this message in the future.
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Ask for blessing.
By thy Holy Spirit, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
My intention this afternoon is to speak about.
Relationships.
But I intend to begin by way of a test.
Now this test is only for people here. We're here on Friday afternoon. Wonder if somebody could tell me.
In the address that our brother Bob gave, what the key verse was?
No volunteers yet.
I heard something.
Listen, I'm looking for the verse.
Maybe I should ask my brother Bob.
Thank you very much. Second Corinthians chapter 5, verse 15.
And the key idea?
In this verse as I picked it up.
Should not henceforth live unto themselves?
That was the negative side, the positive side.
Should henceforth live unto him which died for them.
And rose again.
I intend to take a few minutes.
And go through and try and make a practical application of this verse.
To our relationships.
I don't have nearly enough time to talk about all the possible relationships that we can get into.
But there's a relationship that we have with our God. I intend to talk about that.
There's a relationship that we have inside families.
Husbands to wives.
Children to parents.
And then there's the relationships inside the assembly, and I hope to touch a little bit on some of them.
And then I plan to come back to the relationship again that we have with our God.
So first of all, I'd like to turn to 2nd Corinthians chapter 8, verse nine. Turn over a couple of pages.
For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
That though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor.
That ye, through his poverty, might be rich.
I think the key concept when talking about relationships is this word grace.
It's a beautiful word.
I like the fact that it's related to the concept of charisma.
And charisma is that which attracts. And I want to think about grace this afternoon in a specific way. It's not the only way you can think about grace. Because I know my brother Bill Prost stood here at this spot a few years back, and he talked for 45 minutes on grace. Many different aspects of grace, but I have been personally enjoying.
Two things. Three things about grace.
Grace being an amazing, incredible combination.
Of Holiness.
Humility.
And love.
And we see it so clearly expressed in the Lord Jesus Christ.
For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Why did the creator of the universe?
Come into this world.
To seek and to save that which was lost. People like me and you.
Because he's love. Because God is love.
But why did he come into this world and go to Calvary's cross?
Because if he just wanted friends, he'd come into this world. But no, there was something more than that.
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And that is that he is holy, He is light.
And as a result of that.
Grace had to deal with the question of holiness, God's holiness.
And so when we think about the Lord Jesus Christ.
We have the holiness component that took them to the cross and.
In obedience to his Father was made sin.
And died. And yet at the same time, in that we have the love of God, the love of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's how God commends his love to us.
Because Christ died for us.
And we have in the person of the Christ that absolutely beautiful, incredible, Amazing Grace. Now I'd like to turn over to Titus chapter 2.
Titus, chapter 2.
Starting in verse 11.
For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men.
Teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world.
That's the holiness component.
Looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ.
Who gave himself for us. You can see the love so clearly.
And then why? That He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. So you see there grace combining the love and the holiness. And whenever I think about the Lord Jesus, and so often on Lord's Day morning, the Spirit of God brings before us when we sit down in His presence.
Philippians 2.
You can't help but think of that humility that the Lord Jesus demonstrated.
How could he?
The Almighty.
All powerful.
God allow his creature to spit in his face, to pluck the hairs off his face, to crucify him.
That's humility.
Well.
We've had the verse brought before us. The love of Christ constrains us on Friday.
That we should not henceforth live unto ourselves, but to Him.
That died for us and rose again. Now let's turn to Psalm 119.
Psalm One 119, verse 9.
Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking heed thereto, according to thy word?
There are some instructions from the Old Testament and that's what I want to do.
Look at the word of God. Apply it to my own life in connection with relationships.
Now, just to show you that it's not just.
An Old Testament idea. Let's turn to First Timothy, chapter 4.
First Timothy chapter 4, verses 15 and 16.
Meditate upon these things, Give thyself holy to them, that thy profiting may appear to all take heed unto thyself.
And under the doctrine.
Continuing them. For in doing this thou shalt both save thyself and them that hear thee.
Notice that. Take heed.
Unto thyself. So what I want to do for myself this afternoon, and what I want you to do for yourselves.
Is measure your personal behavior in the relationships that you're in, in the role that you have in those relationships against the Word of God.
And wherever I see a difference in my own life between what I'm doing and what the Word of God calls me to.
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I trusted by the grace of God I'll be able to change it and that would be the challenge for you as well.
It's much easier for me to go to this book.
And read a verse and say that applies to my buddy that has the marriage problems.
Always that verse ever fit him.
It's much harder for me to look at myself and say, you know, Robert, there might be a little room for improvement in your own life.
So.
That's what I'd like to do.
You could probably guess what chapter I'm going to. Ephesians chapter 5.
There are a lot of other chapters and portions as well that have to do with relationships. When you think about it, we're made in the image of God.
And God is triune Father.
Son, Holy Spirit.
Always has been, always will be, and there's always been a relationship.
Between them.
And when God?
Chose to make man. He made man in his own image.
Male and female.
Created he then. That's fascinating.
He designed male and female for relationships.
And he designed them to have children.
More relationships.
So this is something that's important. It's about the word is what? The Word of God has so much information in it regarding relationships and how do we live appropriately in them. So turn to Ephesians chapter 5.
We'll start with verse 17.
Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.
Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit.
Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.
Singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord. Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Submitting yourselves 1 to another in the fear of God.
I read all that good and powerful verses, but the part I wanted to pay attention to is the last phrase, submitting yourselves 1 to another in the fear of God.
Does anybody in this room think that they're omitted from that?
I don't think there's any room for anybody saying no. I'm the boss here. Everybody else has to do what I want.
Think about.
Philippians.
Chapter 2. We've already mentioned it.
Let nothing be done through strife or Vainglory. Verse 3.
But in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves. This is a beautiful concept.
All through this room I'm seeing hundreds of jewels.
Pearls.
Diamonds.
Some fitted in sockets of gold, all for a different purpose.
All of you.
Jewels of the Lord.
Valued.
But you know what? I'm one of those jewels too, valued by the Lord and loved.
Precious in his sight.
But when I look at all you.
What am I to see?
Gems and jewels that are more valuable than I am. All of you better than me.
Look at this. Look, not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.
Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but was?
Made himself of no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men.
And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
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He submitted himself.
To the priests, the chief priests, the high priests.
He submitted himself.
To pilot.
To the Scourger.
To the soldiers who let him out.
And crucified him.
And in obedience to his Father.
Holland, that cross.
He asked if there was another way and there was number other way. And so he did it in love and obedience to God his Father.
Humble yourselves.
Well.
Let's turn to Hebrews chapter 4.
And verse 16.
We have an incredible example in the person of the Lord Jesus.
And how are we ever going to even start?
To be conformed to his image.
The task is huge. Verse 16. Hebrews 416.
Let us therefore come boldly under the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
The throne of grace. It's a lovely place.
Think of it. That's where God the Father sits, and beside him, our Lord Jesus Christ.
And we get to go there and ask.
To obtain mercy from our God help in our relationships.
And grace to help in time of need.
That's to give me the ability.
To be the father I'm supposed to be.
The husband I'm supposed to be, the son that I'm supposed to be.
We all have that same resource.
So prayer is fundamental and important to our being able to do relationships. Let's turn back to Ephesians chapter 5.
Verse 22.
Wives, submit yourselves onto your own husbands is on to the Lord.
Verse 33. The last part.
The wife see that she reverence her husband.
That's going to take Grace.
You know the hard thing about this? I am not a woman, I am not a wife, so I can only imagine what this must be like.
It doesn't say.
When your husband has earned the respect.
When he's lived up to my image of what a husband should be.
When is as good as my father used to be, and he wasn't very good, he's got to be at least better than my father. Then I'll submit to him.
Then I'll give them the reverence, the respect, whatever. Until then, he needs to go get help.
No, no.
Your instructions wives to submit with one qualification.
As on to the Lord.
That's important because the holiness part fits into that.
If your husband is asking you to do something, that's unholy.
I believe the instruction of that verse is that you and your responsibility to God, you don't have to do it.
But that's The only exception that I see.
I'm not saying it's easy. I'm saying that's why you have access to the throne of grace, why we have Jesus as an example.
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Now let's go to.
Verse 25.
Husbands, love your wives.
How is it that a husband can wake up Christmas morning?
Roll over in his bed.
Look at his wife and say.
I don't love you anymore.
Get out of bed, pack his bags and leave.
It happens. It's tragic.
How is it that a wife looks her husband in the face and says I hate you?
Well.
It takes grace.
On all sides.
Takes grace to love because.
I'm not told to love my wife because she's beautiful.
And only as long as she's beautiful.
I'm not told to love my wife so long as she's good and obedient and submissive.
I'm not told to love my wife as long as there's no other woman that you know what, she's actually a little cooler, so I'm going to have a fling with her.
No, I'm told to love my wife.
I don't see any exceptions to that.
Not easy always. Some days it's easy.
Sometimes it might not be.
That's why we have the throne of grace to go and pray and get help find grace.
For times of need.
Love.
Got at least three meanings in three different words in Greek translated into English.
Agape filios Eros.
Agape is the love of God that loves in spite of the object.
And loves with no response.
It's a beautiful love because there was nothing in me when Christ loved me, gave himself for me.
But he did because of that divine love. It's a beautiful thing, grace of God.
Some days we need that kind of love when we don't feel like loving.
Our wives, you do it anyway. It's a choice.
And we'll come to that a little farther down what it is. And I'm picking this order because First Thessalonians 523, we had that earlier.
Agape Filios Brotherly Love family love Sometimes your family is nice to be with. Just so much fun to travel with them.
Other times you've got problems in the family. Not so much fun.
Maybe there's sickness, maybe there's misbehavior.
Not so easy.
That's where you need grace. Go to the throne of grace. Seek mercy and grace to help.
But the last one, Eros, is that relationship, the physical relationship, the love.
Natural attraction. Sexual type.
And I want to make this point.
That's a perfectly good love.
So long as remember it takes grace and grace has the holiness component in it.
I hope you've been listening this conference.
For the word ***********.
My fellow brothers, there's no room in my relationship, in a relationship that's not grace for anything that you learned in a pornographic magazine or movie or anything else that this world presents because it's under the word lust.
The flesh is never satisfied.
Ever. Cannot be. Lust is never happy, it always wants more.
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And to my lady sisters.
What you learned in Harlequin Romance is about what a husband is supposed to be to be.
That feeds your kind of female lust.
It doesn't belong in a holy relationship either, and that's where grace comes in. You need to have holiness and love and humility altogether in all aspects of a husband and wife relationship. And now moving on to verse 26, there's an incredible lesson in what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for us.
That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water.
By the word.
That's what he's doing for us as his church, as his bride.
And that's what I need to do for my wife.
Figure out what her potential is, figure out what she's capable of, understand what my Lord wants for her, and help create the environment and the circumstances for her to be that woman that God intends her to be.
And.
Wives, God brought Eve to Adam.
There be a help meet?
And you need to actively think about how do you help your husband be the man that God wants him to be, to build them up, to strengthen them?
These are the things. Doesn't depend on what the husband does, doesn't depend on what the wife does.
Obedience to the Word of God.
It doesn't guarantee your husband won't look at you some morning and say I don't love you anymore. He's perfectly capable of doing that.
It doesn't mean your wife won't look at you and say I hate you.
But it is the path of blessing. It is the path that God laid out in His Word for a good.
Relationship and it can be done one sidedly.
And it would take the grace of God and trips to the throne of grace to make that happen.
You know the scripture it talks about even and unbelieving husband.
Being won by the wife.
So there's hope and there's grace, and God is able when we think things are impossible, He's able to change the situation. He's the one that can change King's hearts. He can change your wife's heart, can change your heart.
Your husband's heart.
Well, trying to move on to the children.
Let's go to Chapter 6.
Verses one and two.
Children, obey your parents and the Lord, for this is right.
The only condition on that is in the Lord.
Your parents tell you to do something. Do it.
You know, that's actually the path of happiness.
The path of unhappiness.
Children is to live to yourself.
To live unto yourself.
First Corinthians and 2nd Corinthians chapter 5 verse 15. In the middle, we're told not to live to ourselves. I'm speaking to you as if you're Christians and if you're not, you need to have a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ and accept them as your Savior.
Because without that you don't have access to the throne of grace. So I'm going to speak to you as if you're Christians. Obey your parents. That is what is the path of happiness. And then verse 2, honor thy father and thy mother, which is the first commandment with promise.
That it might be well with thee, that thou mayst live long on the earth.
I dishonored my father once.
An afternoon was a very long afternoon for me.
I wasn't looking forward to him coming home from work.
I smashed something that he valued and I did it intentionally and I'm not proud of it.
Wasn't a happy afternoon.
If I had simply obeyed, my life would have been better. My father's life would have been better.
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And so, children, even if your father is unreasonable, even if your mother is unreasonable, doing things that you don't think makes any sense, that they don't understand your circumstances, the path of happiness and blessing.
Is obeying and honoring your father and mother. You can turn to the book of Malachi, the 1St chapter and you'll see there how God was dishonored as a father by Israel. They shortchanged him when he wanted something. They did the worst possible job they could and still do it. How do you respond to your parents?
You know what they want.
Are you doing the minimum just to get out of getting in trouble, or are you responding with a willing heart? It takes grace to be able to do that. And you as a child can go. The Lord Jesus received the little children, took him up in His arms, and He blessed them. And He wants you in love and in holiness to obey and honor your parents.
Well.
I'd like to turn over to Malachi the 4th chapter just for a minute.
Malachi Chapter 4.
And verse 6.
He shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.
You know what Ephesians chapter 6 verse four says?
It says fathers.
Provoke not your children to wrath.
You know.
One of the things that's essential in our relationship is that we think about them and we plan for them.
What is the nature of your children, fathers?
Don't do things on purpose to bother them. If they need predictability, try to be predictable.
If they're interested in something you have no interest in and love to them, seek grace to be able to be interested in what they're working on and think about the path of their life. How to try and help them is no guarantee that they're going to obey you. There's no guarantee that they're going to make your life pleasant. But there it is. Think about it, just like you think about your wife and.
Mothers, just as you should think about your husband, you need to think about the path your children are on.
And guide them.
According to the tenor of the way, direct them to grow and mature, to be intelligent Christian adults who can act on the principles of the Word of God, not just. This is the way The brethren have always done it, not just.
This is the way Dad says to do it.
But help them learn to search the scriptures and by the grace of God.
Understand what God wants them to do and how He wants them to live according to this word.
Now why does the devil work so hard to destroy families?
To get the father to be absent at work too much.
Or off playing his sports. Or stuck on the Internet or whatever. Or the mother to get involved with alcohol so she's not there to love and care for her children.
Or the children themselves, to make the home miserable by bad language, by abuse of their parents, whatever it might be. Why does the devil work so hard to do that? Because he wants to ruin the picture that we need to understand all the other relationships that we have in our life.
So when you turn over to.
Timothy.
First Timothy, chapter 5.
Verse one, rebuke not an elder, but entreat him as a father. You know what, if you don't understand the father son relationship, how are you going to function in the assembly?
No matter what it is, you're going to need the grace of God. Remember the holiness and the love, both of them. They're part of what Jesus was and the humility. Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God that He may exalt you in due time. Look at the next verse. The elder woman is mothers.
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See how important the family relationship is. It helps you understand how to function in the assembly.
And then the younger sisters, the younger men as brethren.
Parents, mothers especially, don't let your children be mean to their siblings.
Teach them to be respectful. You know, mothers have that role of respecting their fathers and it's a role model for their children to respect their fathers and they need them to know that. So then the assembly, they can show that same respect to their brothers and sisters in Christ and get along properly in the assembly.
Always there's going to be problems because we live. Somebody mentioned this morning the spiritual warfare that we're in. The devil is always attacking, always trying to cause trouble and disrupt. And where do we go? Back to the throne of grace to obtain mercy and find grace, to help the holiness and the love. And now I want to go back one more thing. Why does the devil try to destroy the family?
Because ultimately, it's a relationship.
Between.
Child and father that God has with us.
Think about Hebrews 12.
God portrays himself as a loving father.
Who cares about his real children to discipline and train them?
It takes grace to learn those lessons. Remember the holiness of God. Remember the love of God and the humility of Christ.
And you know, the husband and wife relationship is so important. Why?
Because that's the relationship between Christ and his bride, between me and my Savior.
I need to see it functioning at a human level.
In order to understand how it works between me and my God.
First, John teaches us that if you say you love God and you hate your brother, it's not real.
And the Lord Jesus, what is the one commandment we have as Christians?
That you love one another.
As I have loved you.
What does love require of Maine? Remembering the holiness of God.
And humility, that's what grace is, and it's going to help us in all of our relationships and in the last relationship with God.
The Holy Spirit, we have to remember He's inside each and everyone of us.
We need to listen to him. Sometimes the Apostle Paul listens and sometimes he didn't.
But God was gracious to him, and Paul humbled himself.
And was used for blessing even in his chained circumstances of being in prison.
And so we have to listen to the Spirit of God as He would teach us things from the Word of God, and as He would communicate to our heart and conscience about our state of soul. So going back to those two verses, wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking heed there to according to thy word, and that same thing.
Listening to the word of God, measuring myself against it. And then the key thing is I need to change.
And it's the grace of God that's going to allow me to change. It's me. And I have a responsibility to act according to the word of God.
In each of my relationships, remember the humility of the Lord Jesus Christ that took him to Calvary's cross and the holiness that had him bear our sins on that tree, and the love to His Father and to you and me.
And that's what's going to help us in our relationships, husband and wife.
Wife to husband, parents to children, and then those same relationships in the assembly and our relationship to God, to have that same kind of loving affection between children and father as with God and ourselves, between husband and wife as with ourselves and the Lord, and continuous obedience and listening to the Spirit of God.
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Let's pray.