Chapter 11. Well, go ahead and
read it, but I want to go ahead and move into chapter 12 this
morning. We've been in, starting in verse
49, it says, And one of them named Caiaphas, being the high
priest that same year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at all,
nor consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die
for the people, and that the whole nation perisheth not. And
this spake he not of himself, but being high priest that year,
he prophesied that Jesus should die for that nation. And not
for that nation only, but that also he should gather together
in one the children of God that were scattered abroad. Then from
that day forth they took counsel together to put him to death.
Jesus therefore walked no more openly among the Jews, but went
thence unto a country near to the wilderness, into a city called
Ephraim, and there continued with his disciples. And the Jews'
Passover was nigh at hand, and many went out of the country
up to Jerusalem before the Passover to purify themselves. then sought
they for Jesus and spake among themselves as they stood in the
temple what think ye that he will not come to the feast now
both the chief priest and the pharisees had given a commandment
that if any man knew where he were he should show it that they
might take him now i just wanted to make a couple of comments
on these last few verses before we move into verse 12 but I thought
as I'm reading through this and contemplating over these things,
you know, we've been talking about how Jesus the Bible says
that Jesus came into his own and his own received him not
and I think that specifically Has a it has a physical Meaning
and it has a natural or spiritual meaning even his elect received
him not whenever at first we don't receive Christ until he
comes to us but We see here that he came to the Jews. He came
to his people, the one that had been prophesied to them for years
and years and years that he would come as their Messiah. And specifically, we see these
chief priests, these Pharisees, these religious leaders who had
been given the charge or given the place to preserve the word
of God, to teach the word of God, expound the word of God,
to teach the people the things that have been handed down for
all those years and somewhere along the way Of course, from
the very beginning, no one was ever able to keep these things
fully, but somewhere along the way, the religious leaders of
Israel began to take a left turn, and they began to become, add
more laws upon laws to keep their laws, and so a lot of stuff,
all this hierarchy began to grow within these religious leaders. And whenever Jesus came, He didn't come to them. He came
and. When he began his earthly ministry,
he came to John the Baptist. Once speaking in the wilderness,
dressed in camel's hair, eating locusts and and so to speak of
nobody. OK, he came to John the Baptist
to be baptized and then from there he went up from there and
began to gather his disciples. And he made those disciples out
of fishermen, out of tax collectors, publicans. You know, he started
making them out of some of the lowly men or some of the despised
men. Now, the tax collector surely
was a little more educated than the fisherman was, but he began
to Gathered together around himself his disciples and those disciples
were men that were not esteemed among the people and especially
among the religious elite and so Jesus began to gather himself
these people and began to teach them and this really kind of
Fueled a fire underneath the religious leaders who believed
that their number one their authority was being threatened But also
the good thing that they had going if you remember The ties
and the and all the offerings was to be set aside to for the
Levites because the Levites didn't work and and they were to be
taken care of through the tithes and the offerings of the people.
And so if Jesus comes and changes this whole thing, and now there's
no need for them. They're out on their ear and
now they got to get out in the plow with the plow and then the
farm and whatever else and get to work. And so you can see during
this whole thing that Jesus caused turmoil, not just because of
his doctrine. I mean, his doctrine was very
offensive to them whenever he came. However, he only spoke
the truth that was in the Old Testament. And yet they they
had perceived these things wrongly and that just shows nothing's
changed. It's all said there's nothing new under the sun because
even today we have Every bit of this in the word of god and
yet people as clear as it is people misuse it twist it misinterpret
it, you know, and And we'll continue to do so throughout the rest
of time but We see here these religious leaders are the ones
who supposedly was supposed to have been given the insight to
be able to relay these things, convey these things to the people
in so much that when Messiah come, they should have been the
ones pointing the people just like John the Baptist did to
the Messiah. If you remember when the religious
leaders and all the people was coming to John and was asked
him, are you the Christ? Are you that man? And he said
no and He said, you know, nothing can be given or man can have
nothing except be given to him from heaven. What did he do? He pointed them to Christ. Whenever
they came and said, hey, Jesus is baptizing more on the other
side of the river than you are and making more disciples. And
he said, hey, the bride has the bridegroom. This is what I was
here for, to point people to there. That's what those religious
leaders should have been doing, is pointing there. And I believe,
and I know some people disagree with me on this, but whenever
Jesus was speaking, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, he was talking to
the religious leaders. The context of those passages, you see, he
was talking to the religious leaders. We have this thing in
our mind Because we've seen all these pretty pictures of Jesus
painted sitting up on a hill looking over Jerusalem weeping
over this city But the fact is that in that passage Jesus is
specifically directly talking to those religious leaders And
he said Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem and that passage is talking about
how they like a chick should have been warning all these people
of the wrath to come and their sin and pointing them to the
messiah that was to come but they weren't doing that they
were They were manifestly looking to Sinai for everything. They
was looking to Moses for everything. Instead of looking at what all
that was trying to show them is that they are unable and that
the Messiah to come was their hope. And so all these religious
leaders had missed their whole entire calling, had missed their
whole entire place as the religious leaders. And that's why Jesus
said, you know, I would have, if I was the high priest, if
I was the leader, the religious leader of this time, I would
have, like a chick, I would have gathered them all underneath
my wing, which is a sign of protection. I would have protected them And
I would have shown them and I would have told them where the protection
is, where the life, where the hope is. And those religious
leaders did not do that. Matter of fact, they were doing
just the opposite of that. They were turning people away
from Jesus. If you'll remember all through
John, we've seen Jesus has healed many people. And after those
healings, the religious leaders came and was upset that he healed
those. As a matter of fact, if you remember,
I'm trying to remember now, my mind's drawn to blank, whether
it was the man who was healed that was blind or the lame man. the religious leaders came in
and whenever he testified that it was Jesus that had healed
him, they kicked him out of the synagogue, wouldn't let him back
in. See, they were turning people away from the Messiah when they
should have been turning people to the Messiah. And so now, through
all this time, Jesus, not only in the way that he has done things
by the beggarly and meagerly things of the world, gathering
them to himself, and then even his disciples, the few times
that they went out and taught were teaching and talking and
was saying things, casting out demons, casting out devils, all
these things that they were doing, and the religious men are not
able to do those things. And here they are, the elite,
and so the mindset there is, hey, you know, this guy's coming
in and ruining a good thing for us. And so the doctrine on top
of that just brought it to a point where these men, who the Bible
says every man, every woman, every child by nature is at enmity
with God. Well, here they was face to face
with God in the flesh and he couldn't do anything right in
their eyes. And that's how it is with all of us, brethren.
Until we've been given a spiritual life, till we're born from above,
the God of this Bible, the true God, Jesus Christ in the flesh
is not going to be enough for us. Here he spent three and a
half years Preaching and teaching everything that was already told
to them in the Old Testament foreshadowed in all the types
and and and symbols He was coming and presenting himself. There
was no guile found in him He had not broken the law at any
point. And so they had nothing against
him. They couldn't find anything in him They couldn't accuse him
of anything. The only thing they could accuse
him of was declaring himself to be God and but everything
that he did pointed to the fact that he was God. And so they
couldn't even get him on that accusation because they had no,
I mean, even Decademus said, we know that nobody could do
these things unless he be a man from God. And that's what Jesus
was, a man from God, but he was the man who was God. And so we
see that this has become a major issue with these religious leaders
to the point where we've come down now to they're ready to
kill him. And the rage is so bad and their
hypocrisy has come to the highest point that it could ever have
been. They have gone up to Jerusalem
for the Passover, and while they're there purifying, they're consorting
to kill their Messiah. Now that is the height of hypocrisy,
depravity, inability, and enmity towards God. We're gonna go up
so that we can obey the law of God, so that we might be found
righteous in his eyes. We're gonna go purify ourselves
so that we might keep the law in the Passover. But while we're
there, we're going to make our plan to kill the only man we've
ever met that's kept the law and has done miracles and signs
that only God can do. Now, just think about that. Let
that kind of hit you for a minute. You understand and see how depraved
we really are. Without God, that's who we are. And we look to those religious
leaders and say, you know, they're the scallywags of the earth,
you know, they're the bad men. We always look to them. You know,
they're always depicted, when you watch movies about that,
they're always depicted and they always have the scowling face
and they make the most meanest, sternest looking guys take those
positions and everything like that. But guys, these were men
who were like us, okay? They were men. But yet they'd
been elevated to such a state, and I believe part of that's
the people's fault too, but they'd been elevated to such a state
that they believed that they was without reproach. And they
believed that they was the vicars of God on earth. And so it's
no wonder how easy it was for Catholicism to find its way in
because we had 2,000 or 3,000 years of chief priest and high
priest and all that kind of junk among Jews. But yeah, we see
here the depravity of man, where they come down and at this very
place, they're ready to kill Jesus. And so as we come into
chapter 12, we come in with, there is a fuel fire of hatred
and just, I mean, Just a bitter hatred towards the Lord Jesus
Christ by these religious leaders. To the point now where in the
times past they didn't want to stir the people up because the
people were following him and loved him and all this kind of
stuff. To the point now they're ready to kind of throw off restraints.
We're going to get him no matter what. And so as we move into
chapter 12, we're seeing a transition now, because up to chapter 12,
we've basically been seeing this earthly ministry of Christ. As
we enter into chapter 12, we see that his earthly ministry
has now ceased. His earthly ministry has now
ceased, and I say earthly ministry, meaning his preparation for what
he was come to do, which was to die for the people, okay? What Caiaphas has just talked
about, okay? but his earthly ministry up to
that point with his disciples teaching his disciples the signs
the miracles all those things that he uh was doing uh up to
this point and so now his public ministry has come to an end because
from this point forward jesus is now entering in and we see
it right here where he says uh... verse fifty four jesus therefore
walk no more openly among the jews but with this into a country
near the wilderness into a city called the realm and they're
continued with his the cycles he no more walk among the jews
and i think that to me and if we look through the scripture
we'll see from that time forward he mainly he didn't do any more
big open public uh... displays or discourses that all
of it was to his teaching of his disciples. And so now we're
entering into this phase where his death, his betrayal, his
death, all these things are beginning to be lined up, ready to take
place. He's no longer going to interact
with these religious leaders. And so we see a transition into
this place. And so that's kind of where we
find ourselves here in chapter 12. Jesus has removed himself
from the public eye and especially among the religious Jews. And
now we find him at Bethany. Jesus often went to Bethany.
That was a place that he loved to retreat to. He had great friends
in Bethany. And again, we see him coming
and reclining with Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus, who
had it not been for the Lord Jesus would not have been there
this time. Because if you remember, At the
beginning of chapter 11 Lazarus died he was in the grave for
four days buried and stunk and Jesus came after those day four
days and he raised Lazarus from the dead, and Lazarus now is
found here. So let's look at chapter 12,
and I want us to basically look, I wanna read down a few verses,
but we're only gonna deal with the first couple, I think, today.
Maybe we'll move on to a couple if we have time in the next hour
or so. But look at verse one of chapter
12. It says, then Jesus, six days before the Passover, came
to Bethany, where Lazarus was, which had been dead, whom he
raised from the dead. There they made him a supper,
and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the
table with him. Then Mary, or then took Mary
a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly and anointed the
feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair, and the house
was filled with the odor of the ointment. Then said one of the
disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, which should betray him,
why was not this ointment sold for 300 pence and given to the
poor? This he said, not that he cared for the poor, but because
he was a thief and had the bag, and bare what was put therein. Then said Jesus, let her alone.
Against the day of my bearing has she kept this. For the poor
always ye have with you, but me ye have not always. Much people
of the Jews therefore knew that he was there and they came not
for Jesus sake only, but they might see Lazarus also whom he
had raised from the dead. I'm just going to stop right
there. I'd like us to look at a couple of things here in these
first two verses. It says then Jesus six days before
the Passover. Came to Bethany. Where Lazarus
was. which had been dead, whom he
had raised from the dead, and there made him a supper. You know, we've already been
told that Mary and Martha was very diligent in hosting, and
Lazarus, in hosting the Lord Jesus Christ. He'd been there
on occasion before. And if you remember, even at
that time, the same as here, Martha was busy serving. Mary
was sitting at the feet of Jesus, learning, worshiping. And that's
when we heard the little discourse between them. When Martha came
in and complained, Lord, You know, I've been doing all this
work and Mary, she's just been sitting at your feet and Jesus
had to instruct Martha that what she did was good. It was good. So we see that nothing's really
changed. Martha is up serving. Mary is
at the feet of Jesus. And here Lazarus is at the table
with them. Whenever I look at this, I thought
because I tried to get myself in the situation here here Jesus
is coming out of all this turmoil again. Okay, and he finds his
rest in Bethany. He comes to friends. He comes
to loved ones the but we know that he loved him because he
whenever he went to see Lazarus he the Bible said, you know that
he loved him, you know, the reason he wept he loved Lazarus. And
so here Jesus has come among his brethren whom he loves. I got to thinking about that,
how important it is that we have brotherly fellowship. how blessed
it is for us whenever we can come together like we are today
to retreat back together to those who we love and who loves us
and be met with the one who loves us. You know, Jesus in the great
commission, he said, he told the church, and I believe that
the commission that he gave was to the local church, his local
churches as they hold fast to the things that he taught and
gave for them, they are the local church. Jesus said, lo, I am
with you always. Wherever two or three are gathered
in my name, there I am in the midst, gathered with them. We
have that promise that even though Jesus bodily is back to his abode
in heaven, wherever that is, above the firmament, wherever
he is, that he has promised his presence by the Holy Spirit to
be with us. Now that promise isn't given
to everybody. It isn't given to just any organization. The Lions Club can't say, hey,
we have the presence of Jesus with us. The Rotary Club, whenever
they meet together, can't say, hey, we have the Holy Spirit
gathering with us today. They don't have promises like
that. But I would also say there are many so-called churches that
don't have that promise either. because they do not hold to the
things that Jesus had shown fast because he said teaching them
to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you and lo I
am with you always those who are holding to the things whatsoever
I've commanded those who are the ones making disciples, baptizing
them, and then teaching them all things whatsoever I've commanded
you. Those are the ones that Christ
has commanded, that he said, and lo, I'm with you always.
Those are the two or three. And you know, everyone wants
to get into this dichotomy of what's a church and what's not
a church. Whether it's two or three, the Phillips here, they've
been having a house church in Pineville for how many years? Nine years, 10 years, something
like that? Okay, two or three are gathered in his name, okay?
The Lord Jesus has promised that if they are holy to the things
that he has commanded. They're considered a church.
We're here, just a few fledgling groups. A lot of people, especially
when we first began, thought, ah, you guys are just crazy.
You just, you know, why don't y'all just break up, go to a
church somewhere that's a church? Well, because we believe that
the Bible says that there are doctrines. to be held. There
are ordinances to be held. There are things that Christ
has commanded and we fellowship with those who are of like faith.
We fellowship with those people of like faith. And so we gather
together and meet together because we know that the promise of his
presence among us is there and that he will keep us and that
he will put these things for us to be able to learn and to
grow by and to worship him by. And so whenever we come into
these fellowships together, we have the promise of Jesus Christ
that other people, other places, other organizations, they don't
have that. And some may say, well, whoop-de-doo,
what difference is that? Well, all the difference in the
world, brother. I meet with friends all the time, but I don't get
edified and fed spiritually like I do whenever we come together
here. whenever we meet together, whether it's here, whoever, with
Larry, with Brother Jerry, with the people over in Oklahoma,
whenever we meet together, we're being edified by each other because
we have a common bond, we have a common love for each other,
a common love for God, a common love for the doctrines that are
in the scriptures for God's word. And so we come together there
and here we see the beauty of having a place to come and rest.
And Jesus himself, being in human flesh, the Bible says he often
got tired, he often thirsted, he often hungered. And so there
was, I'm sure, a lot of times whenever Jesus was about his
ministry that just like dealing with these religious leaders.
There was a time that he was, I'm glad to get away. We see
often that Jesus retreated over to the other side of the lake,
up into the mountain, to the garden of Gethsemane. These were
places of solitude for Jesus to get away, sometimes by himself,
sometimes with his disciples. And sometimes we need that. I
know as a pastor, as a preacher, as a father, husband, there are
times that I need to be by myself. so I can clear kids and wife
and work and church and everything out of my head so that I can
speak to Christ, He speak to me, I study His word, I pray
that I can spend time in devotion, spend time in just being there
to listen. I don't know how you guys do
your study and how you do things. Most of my meditation alone,
of course I do a lot of Traveling and so I have a lot of time in
my van by myself And I'm sure because you know a lot of times.
I'll pray and and even sometimes when things are going rough Talk
out loud to God. I'm sure people passing on the
on the roads guys talking to himself or something, but But there are some times that
I just you just talk to the Lord and and you need that retreat. And so the Lord often got away
by himself and he needed that time to himself. But then much time he found that
just between him and his disciples, him and his brethren, was a time
of relief. And that's what we see here today. We see that Jesus has given us
this place of solitude among the sheepfold. Turn with me,
if you would, over to 2 Corinthians, a passage of scripture that I
truly love. And look with me down at verse
14. Well, I'll tell you what. I want to look at those verses,
but let's back up to 13 will be fine. Let's just go back to
13. It says we having the same spirit of faith, according as
it is written, I believe that therefore have I spoken. We also
believe and therefore speak. So one of the things throughout
the New Testament that we learn in different places is that whenever
one is born again. He is given the faith of Christ. It's a particular faith. It's
not natural faith, okay? Every one of us is born with
a natural faith, but that's not the faith that the Bible talks
about, okay? The faith that we find in the
Bible is a foreign faith. It's a supernatural faith. It's
a divine faith. It's not a faith that we can
muster up. It's not a faith that we can
exercise. It's not a faith that comes from us, from Adam. Okay,
it's a faith that only comes in the new birth. We've had a
few discussions on Larry's talk show program on the new birth
and we've extensively talked about that. And this is an over,
the thing that came up to, I think in all three programs that we
did is that faith is something that is given in the new birth.
That is the faith of Christ. Every child of grace is given
a portion of that same faith. We have all kinds of scripture.
We drink from the same rock. We eat of the same bread. We
all partake of the same life. All these things are talking
about that life that we receive being born again, and it has
the characteristics of the divine life. And so that's why we find
brethren who are of like faith. Okay, that's what we mean when
we say of like faith. Now, it says here, we have in
the same spirit of faith, according as written, I believe and therefore
have I spoken. We also believe and therefore
speak. Verse 14, knowing that he which
raises up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus and
shall present us with you for all things are for your sakes,
that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many
rebound to the glory of God for which cause we faint not but
though our outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed
day by day now The Lord Jesus Christ actually
raised Lazarus back up to life. One of these days, for all those
who are in Christ Jesus, whenever we die, there will be a day that
we will physically be resurrected from the grave. But brethren,
there is also a resurrection, so to speak, I guess there is
a bringing of new life to the child of grace that causes us
to have a fellowship between each other there in verse 13.
We have the same spirit of faith. And There are many people who
are in disbelief or in unbelief about these things, whether it
be spiritual or whether it be physical. And so. We see here that God has given
us to know these things. It says for all things are for
your sakes. that the abundant grace might
through the thanksgiving of many rebound to the glory of God. And I got to thinking about that.
I got to thinking about how whenever they gathered here in Bethany
again and Lazarus seen Jesus, the thanksgiving that probably
abounded. I mean, think about it. If you
had died and Christ had brought you back to life and here you
were walking among your loved ones once again, You know, you
would be filled with gratitude. Hey, I'm at the table with my
friend Jesus again. You know, or even Jesus, because
he loved him and wept over the death of Lazarus. He was able
to sit at the table with my friend Lazarus again. Mary had been
given and the thanks abounded in the fact that she came and
she took and we'll talk a little bit more about the oil later,
but she took the oil, the expensive oil, poured it out on his feet
and anointed his feet. Why? Because thanksgiving abounded. You see Martha up serving. Doing
all the things that needed to be done. And in doing so, she
did that service out of Thanksgiving because she loved those brothers. She loved Martha or Mary. She loved Lazarus. She loved
Jesus and whatever other disciples that was there. And so we see
here this company of believers that was gathered together. And
the thing that struck my mind here is, And if you want to turn
back to our passage there in chapter 12 of John, is it said,
and I know this, you're going to have to give me a little leeway
on this, okay? Where I'm not going to be adamant
on these things, but it said there, there they made him a
supper. Okay, Jesus went to Bethany,
went to meet with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. Lazarus being said
to raise from the dead. But the Bible, the Holy Spirit,
for some reason, made mention that they made him a supper. Why is that pertinent to anything?
They made him a supper. I mean, is it just John logging
down the facts? Well, as we've seen in John,
John isn't like some of the other apostles that wrote the gospels,
Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Their account was more of a strict,
historical account from beginning to end. John's kind of moves
around a little bit. Sometimes he talks about things
before and after they happen in some of the other Gospels.
Sometimes he doesn't talk about some of the things that were
in the other Gospels, and it's only found in John. Sometimes
he talks about things that's only found in John. Sometimes
he doesn't talk about things that's in the other Gospels.
And so we see John had a little bit different way of writing
than Matthew, Mark and Luke did. John, to me, at least again,
to me, it seemed like John wrote more from a heart of love. And
we know that that was the disciple that Jesus loved and John loved
him. Matter of fact, he was the one
who was there at the cross with Jesus. John loved Jesus. And it seems to me that John,
as he writes these details, he writes them from a vantage point
of love, but he puts in things that shows the things that he
loved about the Lord Jesus, small things, intricate things that
were going on where Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and again, it's
all by the same author, the Holy Spirit, but I believe the Holy
Spirit also through that writer displayed how they were, different
things about them. That's the beauty of how the
Holy Spirit has put these things down for us. Just like with Paul,
we can see the earnestness of Paul. We can see the brilliant
mind that God had given him. We can see the reasoning and
the ability to think in Paul and how his writings come out,
even though it's the same writer that wrote that who wrote Jude.
the same author behind Titus, the instructional letter, the
same writer behind the Song of Solomon, the Psalms. This same writer has written
in many ways through many different men. And so I think John here
is putting in some intricate little details to show just how
simple and common Jesus's time and minute, although we see the
miracles, the raising from the dead, we just see him. He raised
from the dead, but he also reclined at table with friends. He didn't
restrict himself from the fellowship with the brethren. And brethren,
I know a lot of preachers. Matter of fact, I know one preacher
specifically that I heard in one of his sermons, he was talking
about being a preacher, being called to preach and his relationship
with his people. And he specifically said, He
said, I make a distance between me and the people of my church.
He said, I don't run around with them. I don't do things with
them. I don't, you know, it's strictly a pastor lay person
relationship. That way I don't get caught up
in drama. I don't get swayed to one side
where I might be biased to one or the other or anything like
that. And he makes this distance between his people And I thought,
man, how horrible that is. How can you be a pastor if you
don't have a love for your sheep? And he may say he has a love
for his sheep, but I've heard him preach enough now. He has
a love for preaching and not necessarily for the sheep. But
how can you have that love for your sheep unless you're intimate
with your sheep? You know them. Jesus said, I
know my sheep, my sheep know me. There's this relationship,
this fellowship among them. And this is what Jesus, and I
think this is why John put this in here, because here we just
seen the high priest consorting among themselves, raising themselves
above everyone else, not thinking about anything else. This whole
entire panoply of messianic history has all culminated to the place
where Messiah has come, but the religious man is separating themselves
from that. And they don't want nothing to
do with that. Give me my self-righteousness. Give me my self-worth. Give me
my ability to do this or to do that to the very point that they
reject the son of God. And they don't care about any
of the people that they were put in place to watch over. And
so what I see here is the, I say dichotomy, is the parallels that
we see today in modern churches. We see pastors and preachers. who care for the sheep, to give
them what they need, to tell them what they need to hear,
to be straight with them, to not be compromising, but also
to be a part of them, to love them, to be a part of their lives.
And vice versa, the people also have fellowship with the pastor. there is a love and a bond there
is a there is a genuine and all this saying and of course then
we see in the false churches again how many times do you think
joel olstein goes out to dinner with people in this church except
for ones on his staff probably not very often you know we don't
hardly see a lot of interaction kind of Attitudes, you know,
I've been to matter of fact back when I was in the Southern Baptist
there was a lot of times that we'd go down to Oklahoma City
to the State Convention whenever the state convention would be
there and they would fly in all the famous Southern Baptist preachers
from the country to preach this thing and And a lot of those
preachers, not all of them, but I've seen several of them, they
would get up and preach, then they'd go down, and you wouldn't
see them no more. They wouldn't be back eating
with you after the services were over. They wouldn't be out in
the foyer shaking your hand and talking to you. Some do, but
there were some that didn't. There seems to be this disconnection
between the shepherd and the sheep. in self-righteous religion. But
whenever it comes to true religion, when it comes to Christ only
for righteousness, we see that it mimics the true shepherd. Jesus loved his people, and he
fellowshiped with his people. He dined with his people. He
was involved with his people. And they were involved with him.
They weren't put off by him and thought, oh, I can't approach
under the man of God. You know, they weren't like that
with him. They felt that they could come
and serve him and talk to him and eat with him. and how shameful
it is today in churches where men who are called to pastor
and to preach the Word of God puts this harsh division between
them and the people to think that they are something above
the rest of the people and everybody else is down here. Oh, you guys
all go fellowship. I'm going to seclude myself to
my study where I must make sure that I'm prepared for every opportunity
that the Lord gives me it instructs you. See? You say, come on now, how many
people are really like that? More than you think. More than
you think. Not only that gentleman that
I talked about, but there's several men that I've met that they don't
do a lot of fellowshipping with their people. They spend hours
and hours and hours and hours on end in their study with their
books and their Bible. but yet they don't know nothing
about their people. Their people don't have a love for them. For
some reason, they don't have a love for them. They admire
their preaching, but they don't have a love for them. And they
don't have a love for their people. They admire their attendance
and maybe their money, depending on what church you're going to,
but they don't admire the fellowship. and I thought it was just beautiful
here to see and I pray that that is what's fostered here in our
fellowship. I pray that that's what what
what we experience here is that that there is a bond. And that
we are a company where there isn't hierarchy. There isn't
spiritual elites and spiritual. Uh. malcontents. There are ones that are not fully
there that we, well, we put them over here and then all of us
will get here. You know, my prayer is that all
of us would be like it said in that passage in Corinthians,
that we all together would manifest the savor of His knowledge in
every place. And He ended that and said, and
who is sufficient for these things? None of us is worthy. I'm not
worthy to stand up here. I'm not sufficient to teach you
anything. I'm not sufficient to do anything.
So why would I place myself of hierarchy and be, be, uh, be
mad or be jealous or be anything because somebody else might take
your attention and talk to you and fellowship with you. Why
should I be afraid of that? We should have a love for each
other that passes all understanding that reaches out to each other.
And I see this here. I see Martha who is serving. I see Lazarus who is there who
has experienced the grace of God. I see Mary who is in worship
and devotion to the Savior. And all of this comes right after
it says, and they made him a supper. They made him a supper. I pray
that every time that we meet together here as the Lord's people,
that we make him a supper. I pray that Jesus reclines at
table with us. I pray that each and every one
of us is doing our part in the supper, whether it be the actual
cooking, whether it be the listening, whether it be the showing forth
the grace of God, whether it be in the worship, whether it
be whatever the case might be, that as we come together, You
notice here in this situation, Martha didn't get upset at Mary
like she did the last time. Now each one had their own thing,
and it brings me back to what Paul said, as each member, as
every joint supplied. Every member of this body of
Christ here in Joplin has been given a gift of God, has been
blessed of God, has been anointed with the Holy Spirit anointing
from the new birth that has this faith of Christ in there and
has the fruits of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, longsuffering,
gentleness, goodness, meekness, all those things. And we have
that. And those gifts are given to us as well as other gifts
for the edification of the body. And we come together and we work
jointly. It isn't the pastor working for
the congregation. It isn't the congregation supporting
the pastor. It isn't this guy here because
he's got some degree or this guy here because he's been here
for 95 years. OK, it isn't that. every member,
every joint supply. And what a beautiful picture
we see here. Beautiful picture we see here.
We see a genuine love. We see genuine service, genuine
gratitude. And a showing forth of grace. I believe that whenever a church
of Jesus Christ is given by God to function that way, it shows
for the grace and glory of Jesus Christ. It is a blessed company. It is. It is a great thing. And so we see that that this
coming together before the Passover, Jesus took this time away with
his with his brethren to enjoy great fellowship. Brethren, I
don't know how I can express more the fact how important it
is to have fellowship. Having not had fellowship for
some time, and being able to come into here and to have fellowship,
it's just a joy, even though it may not be a whole lot of
fellowship. It's fellowship. We strive for that, we yearn
for that. I remember Brother Jerry was
saying in one of our programs the last couple of days, couple
of weeks, is that we are given a hunger and love for each other. This is part of feeding, being
fed spiritually. We're fed spiritually primarily
by the finished work of Jesus Christ. What he has done, Jesus
said, my flesh, is bread indeed. I mean, it's this is what I'm
giving you to feed off of, not real flesh. You know, he's saying
my body, which is broken for you, my blood that is shed for
you. This is what you will spiritually be nourished off of. And then
the brethren, whenever we are gathered together, then that
too, because whenever we come together, what are we going to
do? I believe that if we're given
the new birth, when we come together, there might be talk about a few
things, but primarily when we get together, you know what we
want to talk about? The one thing we would love to talk about,
and that is the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We
like to talk about these things. We like to speak often to one
another about the things of Jesus Christ. And I see this beautiful
picture here that no more was there division among this household
of who was doing what. But this time when Jesus came
this time, there was a mutual love and affection. There was
service, there was worship, there was gratitude. And I believe
that that is a beautiful picture of what I pray that we have here. Verse two, look again at verse
two. It says, there they made him a supper and Mary and Martha
served, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table. They're here six days before
the Passover. This is the last Passover that
Jesus will celebrate with his people. If you go through the
passages of scripture, you'll see that from the time Jesus
entered his earthly ministry until the ending of his earthly
public ministry here, he observed three other Passovers. And then
this would be his fourth one. Of course, we know the culmination
of that Passover ended with the Lord's Supper being instituted
and given to the local church to continue in remembrance of
him on what was about to transpire in his death and his burial and
resurrection. And so we see here that this
Passover, we're coming into the celebration of Passover. And
let's look at a few verses that kind of deal with this because
this was the last Passover. OK, the one when Jesus, when
Jesus ate of this Passover, we go from Jesus eating the Passover
to being sent to the cross where there he became our Passover. From that day, there is no more
Passovers. There are no more. The Jews continue
to celebrate Passover. There are Jews today that still
celebrate Passover. Matter of fact, there are those
who claim to be Christians who are these torah observers who
continue to follow some of these rituals and stuff like this and
observe passover but passover ended with jesus that this was
the last passover jesus whenever he ate this passover as we'll
see coming up in our exposition of john later but when jesus
ate that passover and he instituted the lord's supper He told those
disciples, he said, I'm not gonna drink no more of the vine until
I celebrate it with you in the kingdom. And that was the last
Passover. There was no more Passovers to
keep. There was no more Passovers to
celebrate because the reason for Passover had come. The reason for Passover, if you
remember, the Passover was a celebration that the Jews were told to keep,
a festival, a feast that they were told to keep for a certain
amount of days during a certain time of year that reminded them
of whenever they were enslaved in Egypt, whenever all of Israel
was enslaved in Egypt and God delivered them out of Egypt and
brought them into from there eventually into the promised
land. But how God delivered them from the hand of Pharaoh, how
God delivered them and specifically how on the last the last night
there in Egypt, whenever God sent the death angel to come
into all of Egypt and to kill all the firstborn of Egypt. God told Israel, Sacrifice a
lamb, kill that lamb, and I want you to put the lamb's blood on
the top of your door, on both sides of your door, and whenever
the death angel comes and it sees that blood on your door
post, it won't come in, nothing will happen. But if that blood's
not there, The firstborn will die. Okay, and so which side
note by the way that was only told to and given to those in
Goshen the children of Israel that the telling of the Passover
lamb. was only given, it wasn't told
to the Egyptians. The Egyptians weren't told to
go do that. Only Israel was told to do that. But anyway, so the
Passover was that night whenever God sent an angel to kill all
the firstborn of Egypt, wherever that blood was, the angel passed
over that house and nothing happened. And so thus we have the Passover. And they were to remember how
by that, Pharaoh turned loose of God's people. The people was
then freed. That's what they were celebrating. And so with the celebration of
Passover. Jesus now came and he ceased
all those types and foreshadows that told about everything that
was to come. And so Jesus was now the fulfillment
of the Passover. Now look with me in one Corinthians
and let's look at chapter five if you would. A little bit about
this Passover that we were six that were six days away from.
Now this is something about the Passover and now Jesus has come
and is our Passover. It says, verse seven of chapter
five, it says, purge out therefore the old leaven that ye may be
a new lump as ye are unleavened. For even Christ, our Passover,
is sacrificed for us. Therefore, let us keep the feast,
not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and
wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Okay, so we're not to keep the
old tithe. We're not to get out all the
rudiments of the Passover. They say now we're to celebrate
the Passover in sincerity, in truth. There's another verse in the
Bible that's kind of parallel to this. Those who worship God
must worship him in spirit and in truth. OK, in spirit and in
truth. That means that there whenever
we worship him in spirit number one, we need to be spiritually
enabled. To even worship. But whenever we worship him in
spirit, we're going to worship him sincere. We're going to worship
him in sincerity. It's not going to be worshiping
him in rote because of. a law that was given to us. Now,
I'll say this. There are a lot of legalists
today and religionists today. Why do they come? Whenever we
gather together for the worship of God, they come out of habit. They come out of legalism. They come out of to look good. There's a reason that they come,
so they're not coming sincere. But brethren, the children of
grace, whenever we gather together like we are today, we come because
we're sincerely coming to worship God. And we're worshiping him
in truth. And so whenever we come here
today. The celebration quote unquote of the Passover is not
in cooking a lamb, eating bitter herbs, and unleavened bread,
and drinking wine. No, the celebration of Passover
today, for us, is together, together, with one heart, with one mind,
with one love, and we worship Jesus Christ in truth. And so
we are still experiencing the celebration of Passover, as it
says here though, not in keeping in leaven of malice and wickedness,
but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. We're
coming here with something that cannot be spotted, that can't
be leavened. How many in here knows what leaven
is? Well know what leaven is, right? Leaven is what they put
in bread to make it rise, okay? In the Passover, they weren't
allowed to put leaven in the bread. Matter of fact, they weren't
supposed to have leaven anywhere in the house. So in the days
in preparation to the Passover, they cleaned out the whole house,
making sure that there was no leaven in the house. That leaven
represents sin. And whenever we come to worship
God, the only way that you can worship God sincere and in truth
is if there is no sin. Now, how many of us in here have
no sin? Raise your hand. Every one of
us have sin. So how is it that we can worship
in spirit and in truth, or as it says here, in sincerity and
truth? How can we be unleavened before
God? We see here in John, we have
Lazarus, we have Mary, we have Martha, all three of them have
their issues, they're sinners, but yet they're coming in perfect
fellowship and worship with Jesus Christ. How do we do that? Well, it's because there was
one who was made like us, who was not leavened. who died for
us and sacrificed for us, and all that unleavenedness of him
was imputed to us. So when we stand before God,
we stand unleavened. We stand pure. We stand clean
with no sin before God if we are in Christ Jesus. And the
only ones who can truly worship in spirit and in truth are the
ones that have that standing with God. Look with me if you
would over to Colossians chapter 2. Colossians chapter 2 again, we're
seeing where Jesus was the end of the Passover this last Passover
that we're reading about Here in John this Passover was the
last Passover So all these guys that are around here saying we
need to keep the Passover that they're not understanding what
the scripture is teaching here and And whenever they look at us
and say, you guys are not the true children of God, you guys
are not a church because you don't keep the Passover. Look
at what Colossians chapter two says, verse 16. Let no man therefore
judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of an holy day
or of the new moon or of the Sabbath days, which are a shadow
of things to come. But the body is of Christ. let no man beguile you of your
reward in a voluntary humility and worshiping of angels, intruding
into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by
his fleshly mind, and not holding the head, from which all the
body, by joints and bands, have a nourishment minister and knit
together increaseth with the increase of God. Wherefore, if
ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why,
as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances,
touch not, taste not, handle not, which all are to perish
with the using after the commandments and the doctrines of men? which
things have indeed a show of wisdom and will worship and humility
and neglecting of the body, not in any honor to the satisfying
of the flesh. So here, brethren, we see that
this new worship, this new fellowship of the brethren, this worship
when we come together to Christ is not something that we do by
traditions. It's not something that we do
by rudiments, as it says here, the rudiments of the world. OK. It's not in what we eat or what
we drink. It's not in what we wear. It's
not in how we sing. It's not in how we you know what
time we gather, how long we gather, when we gather. OK. That's why here we, at least
I preach and teach and encourage those to look into the biblical
freedom that is in Christ Jesus under grace, that there is not
this legal Sabbatarianism. We don't have things that we
have to continue to do to worship God correctly. We worship God
correctly when we are born again and from the inside out worship,
not from the outside in worship. And too many today worship God
from the outside in. they worship God from the outside
in. I mean, even among those who are not quote unquote liturgical,
if you'll allow me that big word, who are not liturgical, even
among the Southern Baptists, there was the debate. Do we have
hymns or do we have contemporary music? you know do we have piano
or do we have a band do we have you know there was all this and
there was a lot of people and i heard it especially whenever
i was teaching youth and things like that among the youth crowd
and then those who were old who always hung around the youth
because they never could grow up and mature they always wanted
to be a part of the youth group, you know? And there was a few
that was like that who was, you know, 24, 25, who was still coming
down with the youth instead of being up with the adults. But
there was always this talk, oh man, I just, hymns just don't do it for me.
I can't get into worship if I'm listening to hymns. I have to
listen to, you know, contemporary music. You know, or talking about
the preacher, man, man, if a preacher is up there in a suit and tie,
I just can't get into into worship if he's in a suit and tie or
vice versa. Now, I just can't I can't worship
if the guy's up there in jeans and a slouchy shirt. Or we'll hear. I just can't worship when everybody's
in together. Now, if we're off as youth, we
can worship together, but it's hard for me to worship with other
people. were being dictated from the
outside. Whether or not we can worship
when the Bible says the worship comes from the inside. It's it. Worship is coming from a heart
that has been given life to love God and to love his people and
to love this word. And when we love this word, we
love these people. We love God. We worship from
inside. It wells up in us. We want to
be together. We want to hear preaching and
teaching of God's Word. We want to talk about God's Word. We want to thank the Lord for
all that He's done for us. That's something that comes from
inside, and it only can be done that way for one who's been born
of God. And so all these people in the
Old Testament And coming into where the New Testament is that
continued on in these things, they were trying to perform a
worship that was rooted in the traditions of men. It wasn't
something coming from the inside. It was something they were trying
to perform outside to be acceptable and receivable to God. And Jesus has broken that down. That's why it was such a beautiful
picture. Whenever Jesus died on the cross,
the Bible said that during that hour, whenever he died, that
the veil of the temple was torn in two. that veil that separated
the Holy of Holies and that outer court, what separated that big
giant veil was a giant thick curtain. And nobody could go
into that Holy of Holies except the high priest. And that's inside
the Holy of Holies is where God came down and met with the people. But the people didn't get to
meet with God. Nobody got to meet with God. The only one who
was able to go in during this time when God would come down
is the high priest. And he first had to purify himself
with all these rituals and had to have on just the right clothes
and do just the right things. And he went in and even at that,
everybody was a little bit doubtful that they were still worthy to
go in. So they tied a rope to his feet.
so that whenever he went in, if he didn't do something just
right in preparation, and God killed him when he got in there,
they was able to pull him out because they couldn't go in there.
Now, you see how crazy all these rituals and rudiments are? And
I don't mean crazy in the fact that God established them for
a purpose, but now how we see, we go through all these motions
of things that are not necessary anymore. God tore that veil in
two so that we don't have to have a high priest of man to
go in and worship for us. We can worship God now. The veil has been opened up to
us, and the Bible says that he has made us priests unto God. We can now approach his throne
and worship him, and we do that internally. And so it says, let
no man judge you in these things. If you don't keep those men's
traditions, a lot of people look at what
we do, and they say, that ain't church. How can you not even
worship? You guys are just getting around
talking about your pet things that you like to talk about,
you know? Well, you're right. We are getting
around talking about the things that we like to talk about. And
yeah, we do come in and all we do is sit around and visit with
each other. And yeah, you know, we sing the hymns, the spiritual
songs, We do the Psalms. We talk about them and sing them
once in a while. We don't do them as much as we
do the other ones. But is there any other prescription?
Has the Bible told us that there's something else that we need to
be doing other than this? All we are to be doing is to
keep the law of Christ. Whatever Christ has taught us,
if we're performing that, but yet we don't have Structure,
does that make us any less of a church? Does that make our
fellowship not genuine? And does that make our worship
null and void? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. See, worship is not dictated
by anybody outside of yourself. I wrote a little thing. I think
there's still copies out there in the magazine rack thing. The worship of God alone. And
in that article that I wrote, I made mention, I said, anytime
that there is something that we have to have externally to
bring us to worship, then we have an idol. It's an idol. Because
the children of God worship in their spirit. It's been given
to them to worship. It's been placed within them
a love. It's been shed abroad in their
heart. They don't have to work it up. They don't have to wait
to Sunday, meet, go to meeting to worship. They worship all
week long. They worship all the time. And
whenever they come in the fellowship, guess what? Their worship becomes
united with those that is given to God as a sweet savor for him. So six days before this Passover,
which was a Jewish custom and festival that they had to keep.
Jesus came to Bethany. To Mary and Martha and to Lazarus
and reclined with them. And I believe again showing a
transition. Not only Jesus showed the transition
of how religious leaders should be. OK, how true under shepherds
ought to be. But he also showed a transition
on, when two or three are gathered in my name, we can have breaking
of bread, we can have a fellowship meal, we can have reclining at
table, we can have talk, worship together with Mary, Martha, and
Lazarus. We don't have to have Caiaphas.
We don't have to have the regal robes. We don't have to have
the big synagogues. We don't have to have the moons
and the washings and all these things. We don't have to have
those things. We come together in the very simplicity that we
see right here. You know, it's not until we get
into Acts that we begin to see that they met from house to house.
But brethren, here is a beautiful picture of Jesus meeting with
his brethren. in a very small format, in a very, very informal
way. And what happened as the result
of this gathering together? Worship was poured forth unto
Christ. Worship was poured forth. See,
we don't have to be confined to the structures of religion
to worship. We've been freed of those things.
Matter of fact, brethren, we should be able to worship so
freely and more now that those restraints have come off. Listen,
whenever you're worrying about, did I have the right tie today?
Did I have the right suit piece? Did my shoes match my belt? Whenever
I got up behind the pulpit, did I have my three points in a poem
ready to go? Do all those structures, I can't
worship under those constraints. And a lot of times I wasn't able
to worship under those restraints. It was just wrote. I was getting
up there and I was just. It was wrote. It was tradition. It was follow the way. But there's something about the
intimacy. That I see here in these first two verses that just
compel me about love and and Christ love and especially the
love between him and his people. And turn with me, if you would,
to probably one of the most neglected books of the Bible, the Song
of Solomon. Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes,
Song of Solomon. You get to Isaiah, take a left
turn and go back. The Song of Solomon. A lot of times there's a lot
of, let me just speak from experience in the past. The only studies
in Song of Solomon that I ever heard of growing up and being
a part of the Southern Baptist people, was only used for couples to
get away for marriage counseling, marriage seminars to make our
marriage better. Now, I admit, you go through
the Song of Solomon, there's a lot of blushing points in the
Song of Solomon that are intended for a husband and wife only.
And there is a great picture of a love between a husband and
her wife here. But brethren, this song of Solomon,
it isn't necessarily speaking of just a man and his bride.
It's speaking of Jesus and the bride. It's speaking of Christ
and his people. And as we go through and read
some of the poetic love language that's in Song of Solomon, it's
amazing to see how Jesus loves his people. Look, if you would,
in the first chapter of Song of Solomon, and look with me
at verse seven. It says, tell me, O thou whom
my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou makest thy flock to
rest at noon. For why should I be as one that
turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions? See, there's
a desire here for fellowship. There's a desire here for feeding
together. O thou whom I so love, where
thou feedest, where thou make, tell me, where thou makest thy
flock to rest at noon. Where are you taking them to
eat? Where are they going to be? I want to be there with them. Look at verse 13. A bundle of
myrrh is my well beloved unto me. He shall lie all night betwixt
my breasts. What does that meaning there?
What's that talking about? Does anybody know what myrrh
is? Anybody got a clue what myrrh
is? That was one of the things they
brought to Jesus when he was born, frankincense and myrrh. Myrrh
was an ointment that they'd use, or a healing oil that they would
use. And they would make you feel better, basically. And so,
whenever it speaks of myrrh, it speaks of something that brings
comfort. It brings something that brings
wellness. And he says, a bundle of myrrh
is my well-beloved unto me. He shall lie all night betwixt
my breath. He comes to comfort us. He comes
to love us. It's almost as if whenever Christ
meets with us, brethren, whenever we come and the Spirit meets
with us, it's as if Christ is laying his head upon our breasts
and we are reclining with him and talking with him. I think
of that night on the Lord's Supper, whenever they were reclined at
the table and those men were there with Jesus and their heads
were up there. You remember that John laid his
head upon the breast of Jesus. and just sitting there and listening.
And maybe not even a lot of stuff may even be said. Just being
there with Jesus. Just being there with Him. There's
a lot of times we can come, and not all of us are vocal. Not
all of us have a lot of input to give. Some of us are more
listeners than we are talkers. But just being there among the
brethren being there with the presence of Christ among us. While you're there, look over
at the 5th chapter. And down at verse 2. It says, I sleep, but my heart
waketh. It is the voice of my beloved
that knocketh, saying, open to me, my sister, my love, my dove,
my undefiled, for my head is filled with dew and my locks
with the drops of the night. There is a desire for intimacy,
a desire for fellowship there. that that verse is actually echoed
back in Revelation. If you want to turn there, you
can revelation 320 when Jesus says, behold, I stand at the
door, knock, and if any man hear my voice and open the door, I
will come into him and will sit with him and he with me. Now,
we all know that that scripture in Revelation is talking about
Jesus speaking to the church. He's not speaking to individuals
saying knock knock on the door of my heart. You know, if you'll
just let me into your heart, I'll come in. You know, we see
how many of y'all have seen and maybe even had in your house
or had relatives had in your house. I know we had this picture,
but the old famous picture of Jesus outside the door knocking. This passage is speaking of Jesus
coming in and his fellowship with his brethren. Where two
or more are gathered in my name, there I will be. And so we see
this intimacy there. There's this communion there
between God's people and Christ. And so we see some wonderful
things that characterize, I believe, every every preacher or excuse
me, every believer and every gospel church. I see number one,
there's communion with Christ. Whenever a true church gathers
together, whenever people who are born of God gathers together,
there is communion with Christ. We see this in our passage here
in John. We see this with Lazarus, let
me get back to my passage here. We see this in Lazarus. It says. There they made him a supper
and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the
table with him. There was communion with Christ.
And I believe for the child of grace when we come together in
a true church that is given to love God to love the brethren
to love the Word of God. There will be communion with
Christ. We also see that there will be worship. We see this
here where Mary is found breaking the pound of ointment of spikenard. We see that there is worship
among his people. There's a lot of times whenever
I leave here, although most of the time I do a lot of the talking
here during the service, whenever I go home, just from being with
you, the comments, the time around the table, the talking, just
the being together, a lot of times, even whenever I'm preaching,
I'll get up here and I'm not ready for anything. To be honest,
a lot of times whenever I come and stand, my mind is in a thousand
directions almost. It may have been a long week
at work, it may have been a hectic day at home, whatever the case
might be, I come here and my heart, my mind is not ready to
preach. And as I begin to speak and stuff,
things that I hadn't even prepared, things I hadn't even thought
about, the Lord brings to remembrance the things of God and I begin
to speak. And I sure don't mean this in a boastful way, or any
kind of way bringing glory to me, but I am blessed a lot of
times by the ministry that God does in me and through me, in
spite of me, knowing going into that, I'm not prepared for this,
but he brings me into worship. See, we used to have a saying
in the Southern Baptist, we have music leaders. but at some point in time, they
were changed to be called worship leaders. So now we had to have
all these leaders to lead us into worship. We gotta have someone
up there to lead us into worship. Brethren, there's only one person
that can lead us into worship, and that's the Holy Spirit sent
by God to lead us into worship. And that's why I'm trying to
convey is there's many times here I've come scattered and
even this morning, somewhat scattered. Of course, everyone says, amen,
we understand, we acknowledge that. Come scattered, but yet
the Holy Spirit leads us into worship. And whenever I go home,
I'm thankful that there was things that was being able to be conveyed
that had the Lord not come, I probably wouldn't have done that, said
that. I wouldn't have mentioned that. And I'm not talking about
being flippant in a mystic way of, you know, never study, never
prepare, never read your Bible and just come up here and just
whatever comes out of your mouth, that's, you know. I do think
that a pastor ought to, you know, go over his thoughts and think
on things and what the Lord would want him to say and everything.
But brethren, there's a lot of times that worship just don't
come by rote. or by preparation. The Spirit
leads us and we see that by Mary. Mary just out of nowhere, what
happens? She spontaneously comes in to
Jesus' feet and brings us, I don't know if Lazarus knew about this
or Martha knew about this, but Mary, she come and she didn't
care who was watching. She didn't care who was involved.
She didn't care what was going on around her. She was worshiping
the Lord. And I think that's kind of how
it is. Whenever we truly come in spirit in the truth, we don't
care what others think. We don't care what's going on.
All we know is Lord, please meet with me. Speak to us today. Speak to me today. Open up my
understanding. Open up my heart. Crush my flesh
that is so opposed to these things. And let me see you. Let me love
you, let me desire you, let me worship you. Brethren, we have,
and this may be a topic for us at some point down the line in
our discussion. We so forget and don't talk much
about, don't even think about much the beautiful ministry of
the Holy Spirit. the ministry of the Holy Spirit
in what he does for us and in us so that we might know Christ. Not just know of him, but know
him. Convene with him and and and
commune with him. And so we see that Lazarus communed
with him. Mary worshipped him. And. Martha
served him. There was a service to Christ
and to his people. Martha was about serving Christ
and his people. A healthy, true church has people
that love each other and they want to serve each other. They're
not fixed upon themselves. They're thinking of others more
highly than themselves. And so they're serving others.
and they're serving Christ in doing so. And so we see, brethren,
here a work of harmonious, non-exalting love of fellowship among the
brethren when Jesus is at the center of it. Because did you
notice that in this passage here, Jesus was the center of it all?
Although Martha was serving, Lazarus was communing, and Mary
was worshiping, Jesus was the centerpiece of the whole entire
thing. The disciples were looking on, and I'm sure participating
in some aspect, but who was the center of it all? Jesus Christ. Why should we keep Jesus Christ
at the center of everything that we do? Why do we preach Christ
and Him crucified? Why does our discussions revolve
around Christ and not our free will and our abilities? Why is
all of everything that we do to sing about Jesus, to pray
about Jesus, to preach about Jesus, to declare about Jesus,
to press Jesus, to push Jesus, to talk about Jesus? Why is he
the centerpiece of everything that we are and everything that
we do? Well, whenever Jesus is at the center of everything that
we do, we will be people who serve and commune and worship. A couple of verses before we
leave. Philippians 2. Starting in verse 1, it says,
If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of
love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any vows and mercies,
fulfill ye my joy that ye be like-minded Yes. I believe that that verse
was intended for Baptist churches. Although you have gone through
history and the many splinters that they've created, it doesn't
seem like that. But Paul here by the Holy Spirit. Says. That if there be any consolation
in Christ. If there be any comfort of love,
if there be any fellowship of the spirit and any bows and mercies. Be like minded. I'm not see, I don't think Paul
is telling them. that you need to be a consolation
in Christ, that there needs to be a comfort of love. These aren't
things that we try to do. These are things that we are. If you're born again, these are
in you. And if these be in you, then
you should be like minded. Having the same love, being of
one accord, of one mind, Let nothing be done through vain
or through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let
each esteem others better than themselves. 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. See, that was the mind of Christ
is to be that way. And he's saying that if you're
born from above, if you have any consolation in Christ, any
comfort of love, any fellowship of the spirit and have any bowels
and mercies, then this mind is going to be in you also. That
you're going to be like minded, just like Jesus was. You're going
to be in the same mind. The same course, the same action. That's why I say, you know, I
mentioned this to the brothers on the did the other day, and
I actually wrote a little article about this on my Facebook a while
back. I don't worry. I don't worry
about assurance, and I don't worry about preservation, perseverance. I don't worry about obedience. Now, let me qualify that. I believe we all ought to be
obedient. Okay, I think that we should do all that we can
to be obedient as much as that we know. But I'm not worried
about whether or not I'm obeying enough, serving enough, doing
enough. I'm not worried about all the
good works that I'm supposed to do. Because there's been a
promise that has been given to me. That he who began a good
work in you will carry it out. We'll complete it. We'll finish
it. He's doing it now. He will finish
it. That it is he who works in me
both the will and to do his good pleasure that he has put his
spirit in me to cause us to walk in his statutes. That there is
a promise that every work that God has ordained from the foundation
of the world for me to walk in, I'm going to walk in that. And
so Paul here to the Philippians is reminding them of this fact
of look amongst yourselves and see, listen, the Lord is going
to be doing these things among you. This is the mind that should
be there. How do we do examine ourselves?
Let's look at these things. Are these evident in our lives? And then down in verse 14, it
says, do all things. Do all things. Do all things. This is a knife in my heart just
as much as anybody else. I'm sure do all things without
murmurings and disputings. That you may be blameless and
harmless, the sons of God without rebuke in the midst of a crooked
and perverse nation among whom you shine as lights in the world,
holding forth the word of life that I may rejoice in the day
of Christ that I have not run in vain. neither labored in vain. Yea, and if I be offered upon
the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice
with you all for the same cause. Also do ye joy and rejoice with
me. You see, there's a oneness there.
There's a unity there. There's a fellowship there among
the brethren. Whether it be you, whether it
be the pastor, whether it be the smallest, the oldest, the
wisest, the not so wisest, it doesn't matter. We've been given
of one faith. We've been brought together to
commune with Christ, to worship Christ, and to serve Christ. And we just pray that by His
grace that He's enabling us to make supper. I pray that we've made supper
for them today. Let's stand and have one prayer
and we'll be dismissed.