Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good evening. Good to have you guys back. I'll
have to hear all the stories later from the land down under.
I'm glad everybody could make it tonight. The weather's pretty
bad out there. Let's open tonight's service with hymn number 22,
number 22 from your spiral hymn book. Let's all stand together.
Number 22 from the gospel hymn spiral hymn book. We were ruined by the fall, Adam's
sin defiles us all. By our deeds as by our birth,
we deserve the law's great curse. Helpless, hopeless sinners we,
never can our souls retrieve. But the blessed Son of God Came
as man in flesh and blood He fulfilled the law's demands And
in death stretched out his hands On the cross of Calvary Christ
redeemed and set us free In the time which God had set, the Spirit
came for His elect to regenerate and call from the ruin of the
fall. By his power and by his grace,
we were born for God's own praise. Now your purpose we fulfill,
saved according to your will. Sing this song of joyful praise. ? For the glory of your grace
? Blessed, holy, triumphant God ? Hear our praise through Christ
our Lord Please be seated. Good evening. Glad to see Jill
and Brian back. Can't hardly wait for Greg and
the ladies to get back. It's a bad night. Deborah called
us on the phone. She was about. 20 minutes behind
us and she had turned around and go home. It was really raining
hard. Father, we come before you tonight
father. asking for grace father to deal
with the problems of life father to to watch over each other father
to love each other to realize father that the only good thing
in this whole world father is here in this church in a gospel
church We'd ask Father that you'd watch over Greg and the ladies
that you bring them back safe, Father, because we miss our preacher. We'd ask, Father, that you'd
bless them with a safe journey. We ask in Jesus name. Amen. Sunday night or Sunday morning,
I preached on the call. When we did predestinate, then
we also called. That's the first thing. In our lives that we come face
to face with God always before we didn't care. Now all of a
sudden there's a call and I mentioned the fact. That the new birth
has to come before the call. If we are dead and we are. Then
we can't hear the call. Unless God gives us ears to hear
and eyes to see, we'll never hear the call. And we have to
be careful that we don't take all these things that occur in
time at the expense of all the things that happened in eternity
past. No matter what I tell you about
the call and about the new birth and everything, these things
were already done. before the foundation of the
world and all they're doing now is being fulfilled in time. That's all that's going on right
now. Now the new birth, the being born again, that's the very beginning
of our salvation in time for us, for each individual. So we're
going to look at some instances of the new birth tonight and
we're going to see what the Lord can show us out of them. In Titus
chapter 3 and verse 5, it says, not by works of righteousness,
which we have done, but according to his mercy, he has saved us
by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy
Spirit. We have to be washed and regeneration
is what the Lord is talking about when he says the worship of regeneration
is the cleansing of our mind. and our heart, and our eyes,
and our ears. We're given a heart of flesh
whenever God borns us again. When I say God, I haven't distinguished
between God the Holy Spirit, God the Father, and God the Son,
because they're all one. So God borns us again, and he
makes us willing in the day of his power. He gives us the grace
to hear the call, the grace to come to him, and then he gives
us the faith that follows after. So according to his mercy, he's
washed us with regeneration and he's renewed the Holy Spirit.
Now the first thing you have to remember about the new birth
is this. In John chapter six and verse
28, they said unto the Lord, they said, what must we do? that
we might work the works of God. And Jesus answered and said,
this is the work of God, that you believe on him whom he hath
sent. So the regeneration is absolutely
100% the work of God. And no one has the right to think
they have anything to do with it. God doesn't need our help
with mourning us again. It's not up to us. We have nothing to do with it.
God shows mercy to whom he will show mercy and whom he will,
he hardened. And the ones he shows mercy to
are the ones that are born again. Now in John chapter three and
verse one, there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus,
a ruler of the Jews. The same came to Jesus by night
and said unto him, Teacher, we know that thou art come from
God, we know that thou art a teacher sent from God because no man
can do the miracles that thou doest except God be with him. And that was the attitude of
that day that if someone committed a miracle, it's out of the question
that it could be the Messiah. It's just someone that God has
given the ability to ease their suffering and ease their affliction.
That's what they thought of Christ. And the Lord Jesus Christ answered
and said, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born
again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Before God borns us again,
we're in a natural state. We are enmity against God. We're not subject to the law
of God, neither indeed can be, because they that are in the
flesh cannot please God. There's nothing we can do that'll
make God love us or nothing we can do to buy salvation. There's
nothing we can do spiritually because we're in a natural state.
There must be a change. And that change is the new birth. Now there are blessings connected. with the new birth, different
spoken, different kinds at different times, like the washing of regeneration. It gives us a new attitude. It makes us a new creation in
Christ Jesus. Whenever we are able to see the
kingdom of God, we've been blessed with spiritual life. So there
always comes a blessing with regeneration. The Lord said in
John chapter 10, I believe in verse 18. No, John chapter one in verse
10. He was in the world, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ. He
was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world
knew him not. He came unto his own, and his
own received him not. But to as many as received him,
to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even them which
believe on his name, which were born not of blood, nor of the
will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God. God is the one who borns us again. Now the blessing we receive is
this. We're given power to believe. We're given faith to believe
in the Lord Jesus Christ. There always comes a blessing.
We come to the Lord knowing almost nothing. knowing almost nothing. And over a period of time, the
Holy Spirit will open our hearts and our minds to what we're supposed
to know about the Lord Jesus Christ. But the first thing we're
going to learn about the new birth is that God is in charge
of it. He's the one that is in, that
borns us again, brings us out of the deadness of sin. It tells
us in Ephesians chapter two and verse one, you hath he quickened
who were dead in trespasses and sins. Now to be dead in trespasses
and sin means just exactly what it says. We're not sick. We don't
need medicine by the table called the gospel. We wouldn't have
the strength to reach for it if it was there. We are dead
in trespasses and sins and the Lord has to deliver us out of
this. It tells us in Ephesians chapter
two and verse four that God who is rich in mercy for his great
love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sin has
raised us up together with Christ and caused us to sit together
in heavenly places in Christ. The blessing there is that we've
been raised from the dead. We've been born again. We've
been brought to spiritual life. We've been brought to a knowledge
of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. But there's another lesson
there that we need to listen to. We miss it if we're not careful.
He's caused us to sit together with Christ in heavenly places.
Why is Christ sitting down? Because he's finished the work
that he came to do. If we're sitting down with him,
that means there's nothing left for us to do. And that's exactly
what it says, that we're sitting in heavenly places in Christ. Ephesians chapter two and verse
eight, it tells us you have the, and I'm sorry, I'm having a bad
time tonight. I don't mind telling you that.
It's been a bad week and other things have happened. But it
says, by grace are you saved through faith. And that not of
yourselves, it is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should
boast. For we are his workmanship created
in Christ Jesus under good works, which was before ordained that
we should walk in them. We're saved by grace that's free.
Faith is free. God does the saving, God does
the calling, God does the graciousness, God does the faithfulness, God
does everything. And the works that were before
ordained that we should walk in them, they're the works that
Christ did. We're not able to do anything
in this life that would please God. Not as long as we're in
the flesh, we're not gonna please God. But the Lord Jesus Christ
pleased God, and because we were in him, then we did. We were
crucified with Christ. We were resurrected from the
dead with Christ. So the good works that were foreordained
that we should walk in them were the very things that Christ did
for us. Now in Ephesians chapter two
and verse 12, it tells us what we were before God called us. It said that we were without
Christ. We were aliens from the commonwealth
of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, having
no hope and without God in the world. But ye who were sometimes
afar off are now made nigh by the blood of Jesus Christ. We're
made nigh by the new birth. We're brought in, we're past
all these things. So what are we now? Verse 19
says that we're no longer strangers and foreigners. that were fellow
citizens with the Saints. And that were of the household
of God. You want to know who your fellow
citizen with? Look around you. The children
of God. Those are the ones that are called
in a fellowship with one another. Those are the ones who are not
strangers and foreigners. Those are the ones that are brought
together by the new birth by the work of God. Turn, if you
will, to James chapter 5 and verse 1. James, or I'm sorry, 1 John,
1 John chapter 5 and verse 1. Whosoever believeth that Jesus
is the Christ is born of God. And everyone that loveth him
that beget loveth him also that is begotten of him. Now it's
not been that long ago when Greg was preaching that he said any
word that ends in E-T-H means it's an ongoing thing, remember?
It's not a one-time incident, it's something that occurs and
it keeps on occurring day after day, year after year, forever
and ever. Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born
of God. It means whosoever keeps on believing,
whosoever believes to the end that Jesus is the Christ, they're
the ones that are born of God. Now, to believe that Jesus is
the Christ, to believe the promises of God, They're easy on a pretty
day, they really are. When the birds are chirping and
the sun's shining and you can smell coffee coming out of the
kitchen, the lawnmower starts the first time you pull the crank.
That's easy. But what about the darkest day
in a person's life? What about a time when you feel
abandoned by everyone? There was a man in the land of
Uz that was named Job. He was a perfect and an upright
man. He had ten children. Can you believe that? Seven boys
and three girls. It was a day just like we're
talking about. The birds are singing, the sun's
shining, Job is happy, the Lord is in his heavens, everything
is good. And one of his servants comes
running up to him and he said, have stolen all of your stock. The oxen were plowing and the
asses were feeding beside of them. And the civilian came in
and stole all of them and killed all of your servants except me.
Now, Joe being, I'm sure, an average man, he probably figured,
well, that's all right. I can buy more cows. I can buy
more mules. I hate that about the servants.
But I'll overcome this. There's worse things that have
happened. The man's not even done talking, and another servant
runs up. And he says, fire has fallen
from God out of heaven and burned up all of your sheep and killed
all of your servants but me. And I'm the only one left to
tell you what happened. Well, Joe being a perfect and
an upright man, and he probably thought, well, apparently it's
not God's will that I raise any sheep because they're all gone.
We will deal with whatever comes up in our life to the best of
our ability. But another servant runs up,
and he said, the Chaldeans made out into three bands and stole
all of your camels, and they killed all of the servants but
me. Job has just lost everything
he owns. They're gone, they're not coming
back. You're not going to recover from this. I'm sure that job
does what every one of us here would do. Well. It could be worse. I've still
got my children. I still got my wife. I've still
got my health. That's usually what we do. We
try to look on the bright side. But while he's still standing
there talking, here come another servant. And he said, your children
were in their elder brother's house drinking wine and eating. His kids were apparently really
close, really close. I mean, a close-knit family.
They're all there, seven boys and three girls and whoever they're
married to. They're all in the house. And
an evil wind came out of the wilderness, knocked that house
down flat and killed all of them. In a day like that, are you going
to be able? to hang on to the promises of
God. You're gonna be able to believe
that Jesus is in the Christ. Scripture says that Job rent
his mantle, shaved his head, fell down on the ground and worshiped
and said, naked came I forth from my mother's womb and naked
shall I return thither. The Lord gave and the Lord taketh
away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
In all these things Job sinned not with his lips nor charged
God foolishly. How many of us would have the
grace to stand there in the face of all that tragedy and say,
I come into this world with nothing and I'll go out of this world
with nothing. The Lord gave me everything I
loved and enjoyed for all that time and now the Lord taken it
away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. So his children are
gone. But this is not all. Because
Satan had the authority from God to take his help. Satan struck
Job with boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his
head. That has got to be terrible. He scraped up a pile of ashes. You'd sit on these ashes and
throw them all over yourself and scrape yourself off with
a piece of broken pottery. That's the only relief you're
going to get. There he sits on the pile of acid. His health
is gone, but he got his wife left, doesn't he? But she comes
out and looks at him and said, Job, why don't you curse God
and die? So she's out of the picture too.
So what's he got left? He's got three friends. They
come down there and I'll tell you how bad Job was. The three
friends showed up. And when they saw Job, they all
four sat down on the ground and never spoke a word for seven
days. Now that had to be a tragedy. And then they started in on Job. And they told him, Job, you're
a hypocrite. You've got sin in your life somewhere
that you haven't confessed. You've done something wrong to
offend God. That's why you're being treated
like this. And Job told them, no, God doesn't need a reason. He does what he wants to because
he is God. And it just went from bad to
worse. I mean, right there at the last, they were just about
to come to blows. Did Job lose sight of the promises
of God? No, he did not. He's lost everything
he owned, he's lost his children, he's lost his health, he's lost
his wife, and he's lost his friends. And in chapter 19, verse said,
oh, that my words were written, that they were printed in a book,
that they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock
forever, for I know that my Redeemer liveth. and then stand in the
latter days upon the earth. And though after my skin worms
destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God. And I'll
see him with these eyes and not the eyes of another, though my
understanding be consumed out of my body. God gave Job the
faith and the love to hang on to the promises and the fact
that the Messiah is coming right in a situation like that. We
can't even imagine how he felt and what was going on with Job.
And yet he knew that his Redeemer lived. He's looking forward to
it. He knows there's going to be a resurrection and he hangs
on to that for his dear life. But everyone does not have the
faith to keep on believing that Jesus is the Christ. Judas Iscariot
believed that Jesus was the Christ, he definitely did. He, of necessity,
had to commit miracles just like the rest of the disciples or
he'd been questioned about it. He was the treasurer, he kept
charge of the money. But he was also a thief, and
he sold our Lord for 30 pieces of silver. He believed here that
Jesus was the Christ, but he didn't believe it here. Simon
Magus, Simon the Magician. It says when Peter went down
to preach that Simon heard him. And scripture says Simon himself
believed also and was baptized. And he followed Peter and the
rest of them around watching them and wondering about these
things. And when he saw that the Holy Ghost was given by the
laying on of hands, he offered Peter money to have this gift.
And Peter said, I perceive that you're still in the bonds of
iniquity. You're still in sin. Thy money
perish with thee because you thought that the gift of God
could be bought with money. Simon, the magician, believed
that Jesus was the Christ here, but he didn't believe it here.
One more, Demas. Paul said, Demas hath forsaken
me, having loved this present world. I don't know who Demas
was, and it's not important. But he believed the preaching
of Paul. He believed that Jesus was the Christ. But he's like
the seed that fell into the thorns, and the cares of the world grew
up and choked him out. He never, ever had a heart work. He just had a head knowledge,
and that's it. That's it. To keep on believing
that Jesus is the Christ takes a work of God. It takes the new
birth. It takes the call. It takes sanctification. It takes glorification. It takes
the power of God to keep us believing because we got a peanut brain
and we'll forget it the first time something bad happens to
us. If it were not for the love and mercy of God, none of us
would be able to keep on believing that Jesus is the Christ. But
the children of God don't have any problem. I don't care what
comes on the children of God, they'll turn to the Lord and
they'll cling to the cross if you want to use that terminology.
He is our only hope. and our only help is the Lord
Jesus Christ. Don't never doubt that God doesn't
love us with an intense perfect love and he will try us and he
will give us the grace to come through these trials. He'll give
us the faith to keep on believing that Jesus is the Christ and
they're born of God in order to do that, and everyone that
loveth him that begat, loveth him also that is begotten of
him. If you love God, then you're
gonna love his sons. It's typical, not typically,
but usually it speaks about the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the
only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. But
in this particular verse, he's talking about us. We're the begotten. If I love God, then I'm gonna
love you. It's not an option. It's not
an option whether to love your Christian or brothers and sisters
or not. It's something that every child of God will do. Now, I've made all the excuses. I'm well aware of the fact that
the Apostle Paul and John Mark had a falling out, but they made
up. They made up. Scripture is very
explicit about these things, about me and my brothers and
sisters in Christ. It says in Proverbs that a man
that's friendly or a man that has friends must be friendly.
If you want to have friends, you've got to be friendly. You've
got to walk over to them, not wait on them to walk over to
you. This is something that every child of God needs to come in
that door and say, I'm here with brothers and sisters that are
nearer and dearer to me than my own blood family. Don't pick and choose, love them
all. That's the only thing that we
have to do is to love our brothers and sisters. Why? Because we
are fellow citizens with the Saints, we're all in the same
condition. We're all called by God. We're
all born again by God. No one is ever going to be any
closer than the people in this room. We're closer than blood
relations. Because we're in Christ. We are
in Christ. Scripture also says if you don't
love your brother that you can see how you're going to love
God that you can't see. It is a necessity that we learn
to love others. Now this would be more important
to some people than it is to others, no doubt. I can remember
Deanna telling me years and years ago when we went to church, she
said, there's no love in this church. Me, being the Calvinist
that I was, I said, hey, we got the truth. We don't need love.
But it doesn't work that way. You can have the truth and love
if God will bring you to a gospel church, and this is one of them. This is one of them, this church
is exceptionally loving. If you've never went anywhere
else, you grew up in this church, you don't know it. I know preachers
that would walk in that door, come all the way across there,
walk down the aisle and sit on that front row and never speak
to anyone, never shake their hand, never tell them good morning,
and just sit there like a boiled owl and wait for the service
to be over. I'm not gonna tell you who they are because some
of you knew them. That's not right. Even if such a thing as changing
a flat tire do good unto all men, especially those of the
household of faith. Like I said, scripture is very
explicit about how to handle problems in the church. So we
will continue to love each other. I'd rather aggravate Brian than
to eat a five-piece chicken dinner. I really would. And Burt. I just
say things to him and they say things back. That's how people
get along. But if I ever offended Brian,
I'm talking about a deep offense. The Lord Jesus Christ said, if
a brother offends you, go to him by yourself. Brian would
come to me and say, listen, what you said to me last week really
offended me. And if I said, Brian, I'm sorry,
I didn't know I offended you. I really apologize. I won't be
doing that no more. I'm really sorry for whatever
it was I said. Then we both gained a brother.
But if I tell him, Brian, you need to man up, son. You need
to learn how to take a little bit of kidding yourself. That's
what you need to do. Then he's to go get two more,
or three more. And they're supposed to come
talk to me about it. And I'll listen to them. And
they say, yeah, I was there when you said it. I stood right there
and heard you say it to Brian, and you really said it. And Brian
was really offended. And I listen to all of you, and
I say, well, you boys need to get over it now. We're all grown
men. We can't just be little nitpicking
stuff. Then you tell it to the church. Now, I've never been involved
in bringing anybody before the church, but I know people that
have, and I heard that it's a heartbreaking thing. I knew two men in Texas. that were in business together.
Not a big business, but a business nevertheless. And one of them
wanted out. And the other kept all the equipment.
So they brought it before the church. And the church did a
very poor job about straightening it out. And the bitterness is
still there. I don't want to get involved
in anything like that. But if it got to that point,
and Brian told Greg, he said, Greg, I want you to bring R.G.
before the church, and I want him to judge this matter. And
we all sat here and they all said, well, I've known Brian
forever, he's not easily offended, you must have really said something
bad. And in the long run is this, if I still refuse to make amends,
then I'm to be to you as a heathen, and a sinner. It's that important
that you offend a brother that it would go to those lengths
to straighten it out. But I don't think anyone here
would take offense at each other because we know each other and
the Lord blesses all of us with a good sense of humor or whatever,
but I'm going to tell you right now, doctrine will cause an offense
so quick that you would not believe it. I mean, the one we've had
lately is a flat earth. It will cause so much trouble.
And it almost never gets straightened out. Nevertheless, there are
rules laid out for keeping order in the church because it's not
right. For two people, one over here
and one over there, to sit there and look at each other and say,
well, everybody else might like him, but I can't hardly stand
to be around him. It's not right to walk in that door and not
greet other people. It's not right not to try to
go around and make everyone feel comfortable in the house of the
Lord. We're here to worship God. We're all in this together, every
one of us. And it is not an option to love
one another. It's not. That's supposed to
all be taken out of us whenever God calls us when he warned us
again and called it. We're supposed to be above those
things. If you offended me years ago, God has forgotten about
it. Maybe I have it and I'm in the
wrong. We need to not let these things bother us. I need to look
at everybody in this church and think about how fortunate I am
that you love me and how fortunate I am that I have you to love
because you're all I got left in the world. This is it. This is me and Deanna's family
right here. That's it. And we need to be aware of the
fact that if you don't love your brother, you don't love God. That's just what it amounts to
and that's scriptural. Verse two, by this we know that
we love the children of God when we love God and keep his commandments. That's one of the benefits you
have. If I really love God, And I keep his commandments to love
the Lord Jesus Christ with all my heart and all my soul and
all my mind and my neighbor as myself. Then it's taken for granted
that I love my brothers. If you love God, all of these
things come together and there's unity in the church and there's
peace in our heart. I don't think anybody can have
peace when they got a few going on. So it's very, very important
that we, I guess you might say, nip these things in the bud whenever
trouble does start. Verse three, for this is the
love of God that we keep his commandments and his commandments
are not grievous. Whenever God warns us again,
and we hear the command, come unto me, all ye that labor and
are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. What's grievous about
that? When it says, if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord
Jesus and believe in thine heart that God has raised him from
the dead, you shall be saved. Our heart has already been prepared
to believe him. Our mouth has already been prepared
to confess him. What's grievous about that? The
commands of the Lord, if they are gospel commands, and they
are, they're not grievous. It only gets grievous when you
get off into the law. It only gets grievous when you
start adding things to it. Don't go doing this on Sunday.
Don't be doing that. Don't wear these kind of clothes.
Don't say that. Don't drink this. Don't eat that.
Don't do these. Then it gets grievous. But the
commands of God are not grievous because he gives us the will
and the grace to keep them. So their commands are not grievous. By this we know that we love
the children of God when we love God and do His commandments. For this is the love of God and
we keep His commandments. The commandments are not grievous.
For whosoever is born of God overcometh the world. And there
again you've got the ETH. It's a continuous thing. We don't
just overcome the world one time and then coast the rest of our
life. We overcome the world every day. We overcome the world in
our hearts and our mind, our bodies and our action. We overcome
the world because we love God. Who is he that overcometh the
world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the son of God. And there again, you got to ETH.
You have to continue to believe that Jesus is the son of God. When the Lord calls his children,
He gives you the means and the grace and the strength and the
will to do whatever he has for you to do and for me. If he called
you to preach like he did, Greg, then you'll preach the rest of
your life. If he calls you to be a loving wife, you'll love
your husband and you'll love Christ. Same way with a husband. If God calls you to love your
wife and be ready to lay your life down for her, you will do
that. God's not going to give us a
task before us and not give us the grace to do it. When it says
that we need to cast aside every weight, God gives us the grace
to do that. To quit worrying about everyday
cares of the world. To quit worrying about whether
whether people like me or not. To quit watching so much of Fox
News. Cast aside the cares of the world. And the sin which does so easily
beset us. Anybody that don't think sin
crouches at the door, gonna jump on you every chance you get,
don't know much about sin. because we are ever ready to
sin. And the only thing that stops
us from just falling into it head first is the grace of God.
So you cast aside every weight and the sin will just so easily
beset you. And you run the race that is
set before us. You look down the rest of your
life. Some of us are closer to the
end of the race than others are. But you wonder, You wonder what's
the world gonna be like whenever the race is over? Is it gonna
be where I can even come to church and worship God? You don't worry
about things like that. You run the race that is set
before you with patience, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher
of our faith. That's all we have to do. That's
all we have to do is to seek the Lord with any problem that
comes up. Now I know that's hard to do. Because we have a tendency to
think that the Lord helps them that help themselves. And that's
not the way it works. The Lord helps them that cannot
help themselves. That's how it works. If we believe
that Jesus is the Christ, it's not just a head knowledge that
we believe, yeah, he's the Messiah. To believe that Jesus is the
Christ in the gospel way, in the born-again way, It's to believe
that he is the creator of heaven and earth and all that in them
is. He is the mighty God. That he
was born of a virgin. I don't care what science tells
you, he is the God-man and he was born of a virgin. To believe
that everything he did pleased God. To believe that even when
he pleased God, we were right there in union with him and we
pleased God too. To believe that he died and rose
again and that he's ascended into heaven and that he sat down
at the right hand of God and he ever liveth to make intercession
for us. He's doing it right now. That's
what it means to believe that Jesus is the Christ, that he's
fulfilled the tiniest little requirement to be the Messiah. It doesn't mean anything else. It means a total 100% belief
that he is the one, the way, the truth, and the life, and
no man cometh to the Father but by him. So when we read these
things, we wonder if we're able to do them. Am I really able to love everyone
here without discrimination? All of you are not as easy to
love as I am. But I try, I really do. I try
not to be a respecter of persons. I try to be what I would consider
a born again child of God. Everybody love everybody equally. It's a difficult thing for this
many people to come together. And not have differences in Poland
out. But if. If we. Pray for grace to deal with one
another. All these little things will
work themselves out. I didn't mean to leave the impression
that there was anybody having trouble here, because if there
is, I wouldn't want to know it. I'm just telling you the importance
of love toward each other, the importance of love for a Christian
church in Lexington, for one in West Virginia. We should love
every other child of God because we love God. They're his children,
they're our brothers and sisters. Father, we Ask, Father, that
you would give us the grace, Father, to be conformed to the
image of Christ, Father, to love others as much or more than we
love ourselves, to go about encouraging people, comforting them, Father,
in the faith. We'd ask, Father, that you'd
forgive us of our failings and our shortcomings, Father. Open
our eyes to the things you'd have us to change, Father, that
you'd draw us into a closer fellowship with every Christian, Father,
that you'd bring Greg back safely, Father, that we might be able
to hear him bring the gospel. We'd ask for a safe trip home
for everyone here tonight, Father, in this weather. We ask these
things in Jesus' name, amen. Let's sing Amazing Grace, 236 in the hardback temno. Amazing grace, how sweet the
sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found. Was blind, but now I see. Was grace that taught my heart
to fear And grace my fears relieved How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed Through many dangers, toils and snares,
I have already come. Tis grace hath brought me safe
thus far, and grace will lead me home. When we've been there ten thousand
years Bright shining as the sun We've no less days to sing God's
praise Than when we first begun