Ephesians chapter 6. Ephesians
chapter 6. I'm just going to read two verses
here, verses 21 and 22. I'm glad everybody made it this
morning. Better late than never. A little
slushy out there, isn't it? All right, let's start here in
Ephesians 6 and verse 21. Paul says, But that ye also may
know my affairs, and how I do, Tychicus, a beloved brother and
faithful minister in the Lord, shall make known to you all things. whom I have sent unto you for
the same purpose, that you might know our affairs, and that he
might comfort your hearts. Now, our subject this morning
is the biography of a servant. Now, many honorable men in the
scriptures have very, very short biographies, and we found that
to be the case here with this man named Tychicus. This man,
very little said about him throughout the scriptures. And right here
we're told, this is his biography, he was a beloved brother and
a faithful minister in the Lord. Now, as we look at this, where
we see Paul's desire for the Ephesians and what he did for
the Ephesians, together with this biography of this man named
Tychicus, we see four qualities, four duties that are necessary
in all God's servants, especially in his ministers. They're love,
faithfulness, communication, and comfort. Love, faithfulness,
communication, and comfort. First, love. He calls him a beloved
brother. Now, what do we mean when we
call one another brother, sister, brethren? What do we mean by
that? You call somebody a brother or a sister, we speak of our
brethren. Well, it means that that person
saved by the same grace of God that we are. They're saved by
God's grace. A brother is one that God the
Father chose before the foundation of the world in Christ. That's
what a brother, all brethren have in common. A brother is
somebody that Christ came and redeemed when he redeemed all
his people from iniquity. That's who a brother is. A brother
is somebody who the Holy Spirit found dead in sins. dead in trespasses,
and regenerated them, and created them anew, and gave them a new
heart and a new spirit, all by God's grace, apart from any works
in them, apart from any merit in them. That's a brother. A
brother is one who is one with God's saints. One with God's
saints. Look back at Ephesians 2 and
verse 19. We're of the same household.
Look here, Ephesians 2 and verse 19. Paul said there, Now therefore
you are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens
with the saints. We are of the same city, heavenly
Jerusalem, and of the household of God. We are of the same house.
In Ephesians 3.15 he says, Of whom the whole family in heaven
and earth is named. That's a brother. We're in the
family of God. That's why we say brother and
sister. And then look down, we're one.
Look at Ephesians 4 and verse 4. There's one body and one spirit,
even as you call in one hope if you call it. One Lord, one
faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all
and through all and in you all. A man was talking to me one time,
and he told me about a friend of his, and he said, now he doesn't
believe that God chose a people before the foundation of the
world, and he doesn't believe that God redeemed his particular
people, and he doesn't believe a man has to be regenerated by
God's grace, that he can come to God by his own will, and that
he has to partially sanctify himself by his own works, the
works of his flesh under the law, and he said, but he's a
dear, faithful brother. Brethren, we don't use the title
of brother lightly. We don't use that lightly. That's
not a title to be used lightly. The title brother belongs to
those who give God all the glory and salvation. That's who a brother
is. It's a title reserved for those
to whom Christ is all. We don't just use that title
flippantly. Now, Tachikos here was a beloved
brother. He was a beloved brother. That
means he was beloved of God, beloved of Christ from eternity. Before he ever even had a being,
he was beloved of God. He was beloved of all the saints
that knew him. And he was especially beloved
of the Apostle Paul. And not only that, he loved his
brethren. This man loved his brethren.
He served his brethren. Now we see here too when we look
at Paul that he was a beloved brother because here's this man
Tychicus. Paul's in prison at this time
and you know Paul could have used this man. He could have
gotten great comfort for himself from this minister of the gospel.
And yet he sends this man to Ephesus to minister to them.
That's what a beloved brother does. A beloved brother looks
over the welfare of God's people looks out for the glory of Christ
rather than for his own comfort. That's what Paul did. So both
of these men are beloved breath brethren. Now how does somebody
become a loving and a lovable brother. How does that happen.
It's the fruit of the Holy Spirit. It's the fruit of the Spirit.
It's what happens when a person's born of God, because by nature
we're not loving. Listen to what Paul said in Titus
3.3. If you want to turn there, Titus 3.3, he said, We ourselves,
that is, us who've been born of God, we were sometimes foolish,
Disobedient, deceived, serving different lusts and pleasures,
living in malice. That's not love, to live in malice,
to be malicious toward people and toward God. We were envious. That's not love. to be envious. We were hateful. That's certainly
not love. That's the opposite. And we were
hating one another. We hated God and we hated one
another. That's what every man is in the
flesh by nature until Christ enters in and the Spirit enters
in and makes him a new creature. By God's grace, by God giving
us a new spirit, a new heart, that's how A beloved brother
becomes loving and lovable to his brethren. This is to have
Christ to be made your wisdom. It's to have true wisdom from
above, the love of God put in your heart from above. Look over
at James 3. I'll give you time to turn there.
James chapter 3. Just a few pages to your right.
Just after Hebrew. James chapter 3. Look at verse
17. He says here, the wisdom that
is from above is first pure. That's what God does when He
enters the heart. He purifies the heart. And then it's peaceable. That's loving, isn't it? Peaceable.
To be peaceable. Gentle. And easy to be entreated. You can approach this lovable
brother. Full of mercy. Rejoicing in mercy
towards brethren rather than judging and being harsh with
brethren. without partiality. Or he says, full of mercy and
good fruits, the fruits of the spirit without partiality, not
preferring one over the other, not wanting glory for himself
rather than glory for God and preferring one of the brother
over another brother without hypocrisy. Now, that's a loving
and a lovable brother. That's the fruit of God. That's
when God enters and creates you anew in the heart. Now, brethren,
this is an honorable quality, a lovable and a loving spirit,
a beloved brother. Christ said in John 13, 35, this
is what he said, By this shall all men know that you're my disciples. It's the way you dress, no? It's because you talk in a different
tone than everybody else. No. It's because you just appear
so much more holy than everybody else. No. By this shall all men
know that you're my disciples, he said, that you have love one
to another. Have love one to another. All
right, now that's the first thing. Here's the second thing. It's
faithfulness. A faithful minister in the Lord. That's who Tychicus was. A faithful
minister in the Lord. It means he was faithful in the
work and in the service of the Lord Jesus Christ. The scripture
says it's required in a steward. That's what a preacher is. He's
a steward. He has a stewardship. He's managing the household of
God in the room instead of Christ. He's an ambassador for Christ
as though God did beseech you, as Christ did beseech you by
us. He's a steward. And it's required in a steward
that he be found faithful. Faithful. Now where does faithfulness
come from? Well, faithfulness is not a product
of the flesh either. We're not faithful by nature.
But God is faithful. That's what Scripture said. God
is faithful. And Christ is faithful. And so when God enters in in
spirit, and He puts His spirit in us, when He does that, that's
how He imparts the gift of faith. When He enters in. When He enters
into you, the faithful one, that new man created by His presence
in us, makes us to believe God. We have faith. And when you have
faith, you're faithful. You'll be faithful. That's the
product of having the gift of God's faith. Because it's ordained
of God. Look back at Ephesians 2 and
look at verse 8. I told you this Thursday night,
God didn't just ordain works and say, I hope my children walk
in those works. He ordained for His children
to believe, to repent, to be faithful, to be loving, to be
merciful, to walk in these fruits of the Spirit. He ordained that
and that's why He brings it to pass. Look at Ephesians 2, 8.
For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it's the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. For we're His workmanship. created
in Christ Jesus unto good works, unto faithfulness, unto faith,
repentance, long-suffering, mercifulness, faithfulness. These are good
works that God calls good works. They're totally contrary to what
man thinks good works are. These are the good works He ordains
men to. And He works in us to make us work these works because
He ordained us to walk in these works. which God hath before
ordained that we shall walk in them. And to show you that the
fruit of the Spirit is love and faith, remember what Paul said
to the Galatians over in Galatians 5.22. He said, the fruit of the
Spirit is what? Love. That's how you become a
beloved brother. And he said, and the fruit of
the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness,
and faith. And faith, that's the fruit of
the Spirit. We don't have anything that God gives, that God requires,
we don't have any of that as we're born into this world. We're
like the world was when it fell into chaos in the beginning.
It's without form and void. That's what we are as we're born
into this world. God must come and say, let there
be light. God must come and create us anew. God must come and give life in
us and faith in us and repentance in us and work faithfulness in
us because we don't have it by nature. God has to do it. That's
why, and he does this in his people. When you're born of God,
God does this. If you'll go through and look
at Paul's letters, you'll see at the beginning of Paul's letters,
every epistle, he begins almost every one of them this way. He's
speaking to believers, to the saints, and he calls them the
faithful in Christ Jesus. He says, to the faithful brethren
in Christ. He writes that at the beginning
of every letter. Because that's what believers
are. Because that's what the fruit of the Spirit creates.
Faithfulness. Faithfulness. Now, Tachikos was
faithful because Christ qualified him. That's what we're talking
about here. God qualified him. He had to be qualified to be
a minister of the gospel just like a believer's got to be qualified
to believe. He had to be qualified to believe first. You got to
be qualified. And then he appointed him. to
be a minister, and then he sent him to be a minister. And the
same was true of Paul. Turn over to 1 Timothy 1. 1 Timothy
1. A man doesn't become a preacher
because he decides one day, you know, that looks like there'd
be a good occupation. He doesn't choose to be a preacher
like a man chooses to be an engineer or a doctor or a lawyer or something
like that. And he doesn't just go to a school
and become one. You don't become a preacher because
you went to a seminary. That don't qualify you. That
don't appoint you and that don't send you. Man can't do this.
Christ has to do it. Some of the men Christ has used
have been very educated. Some of the men Christ has used
haven't had any education at all. He don't need those things.
He works in his people to teach them to preach the gospel. He
equips them for his people just like what his people need. Every
congregation he sends them to, he puts the preacher with that
congregation. Now look here, 1 Timothy 1.12. This is what Paul said. This
is how he became a preacher. I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord,
who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful. He made
him faithful. And he says, putting me into
the ministry, who was before a blasphemer and a persecutor,
an injurious man. But I obtained mercy, because
I did it ignorantly in unbelief. Let me say something about that.
Paul had not heard the truth of the gospel. And when he was
sinning against God, he was doing it ignorantly. Now, you sitting
here that have heard the gospel and still don't believe on Christ,
you can't plead ignorance anymore. You've heard the gospel. You
can't say what Paul did. I did it ignorantly. If you go
on being a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious to God's people
and to God's glory, you can't plead ignorance. You've heard
the gospel. But Paul hadn't heard it at this
time. But now look what he says. But the grace of our Lord was
exceeding abundant with what? With faith and love which is
in Christ Jesus. He gave him faith and love and
constrained him by his faithfulness and his love for him. And that's
what made Paul to believe and to be faithful and to love. So,
before sending his ministers, Christ is going to work this
in his people. And he's going to do it so that he proves to
their brethren that they're faithful. This man, Tychicus. Paul obviously
recognized some gifts of God in this man. And so Paul asked
him to go with him on a trip one time. He went with him from
Macedonia to Asia. That wasn't a short trip. You
know, back in those days, it took some time to travel. These
men spent some time together and talked to one another. And
then as as men, as men began to desert Paul and men that appeared
faithful once began to go back and walk no more with him. Tachikos
stayed with him because they were of one mind in the gospel.
And he was proven to be faithful to Christ. And so Paul sent him
to several churches, not just to Ephesus, he sent him to Colossae.
He sent him to different places because he was a faithful minister
in Christ and it was proven that he was faithful. Now what does
it mean? What does that mean to be a faithful
minister in Christ? What is that? First of all, it
means he's faithful to the Lord, Jesus Christ, his Lord and his
Master. A man's got to know God. He's
got to be saved by Christ and be brought to submit to Christ
and to follow Christ and believe on Christ, cast all his care
into Christ's hand before he can ever preach Christ. He's
got to experience the power of God before he knows anything
about that power and can speak about that power. He's got to
experience God keeping him out of the pit of corruption and
bringing him out of the pit of corruption when he turned into
rebellion, so he can tell you how God is able to do that. And
he's faithful to Christ, first of all, by his own faith, his
own heart is toward Christ. And then to be a faithful minister
in Christ is to be determined to know nothing among you but
Jesus Christ and Him crucified. You know, some men can get up,
and I've heard men who preached, and who preached Christ very
well. I mean, preached Christ, said
some things that I thought, I gotta write that down, that's good.
And then you listen to them again, and they don't preach Christ.
And you listen to them again, they don't preach Christ. And
it may go six, seven, eight times before they ever preach Christ
again. They preach morality, they preach, you know, all kind
of other things, but they don't preach Christ. To preach Christ
is to open up your message preaching God's Word. It's to open up your
message getting to Christ straightway and preaching Christ from beginning
to the end. It's not preaching about Christ. It's preaching
Christ. Preaching that He's the Son of God. Preaching that He
came and was made of a woman and made under the law. And He
redeemed His people from the curse of the law being made a
curse for us. That He accomplished it. That He fulfilled that which
God sent Him to do. It's to preach Christ in His
glory where He is and what He's doing now. Saving and calling
out His people, reigning and ruling in the midst of His people.
And none can stay His hand of saying to Him, what doest thou?
It's to preach Christ and Him crucified. To shut sinners up
to Him. So that they don't have... You
know, that's the problem with most preaching you hear. is they
sort of leave it ambiguous and they leave it open. It's like
Pontius Pilate who said a lot of good things about Christ,
but then he turned him over to the will of the people. And that's
what most preaching is. It leaves it open. What I'm trying
to do is back you into a corner. I'm trying to paint you into
a corner to where you can't move without facing Christ. I'm trying
to put thorns about you on every side and corral you into where
you've got to go in this straight gate. We had cattle when I was
growing up. And sometimes, you know, they're
out there roaming around, they got that big old field, and they
can go in any direction they want to in that field. And it'd
be time to go to the cell barn. And the only way you could get
them into that trailer to take them to that cell barn was you
had to make them go in a way to where the way got narrower,
more narrow, and more narrow, and more narrow, until the only
thing they could do was step in that trail. Well, that's what
I'm trying to do with you every time I preach. Shut you up to
Christ so that you've got to step into Him. No other choice.
A faithful minister in Christ preaches the gospel according
to God's Word. When I preach to you, I try to
read the Scriptures to you, and then I try to go line by line,
and say something about each phrase about about what each
word means. Try to make sure when you get
finished, you understand that passage of Scripture. And you
see God's glory in it, you see Christ magnified in it, and you're
shut up in your sin to Christ after you get through hearing
it. That's what I want to do. I'm not going to read a passage
and then just take off and leave the context and everything and
just preach to you now for 45 minutes on what's on my mind. That's not faithful preaching.
is to take the Word of God and go line by line. What does God
say? That's what I want to know. What
does God say? And then compare it with Scripture to Scripture
and show this is what He says throughout His Word. That's preaching. And a faithful minister is faithful
to the souls to whom he ministers. God's made him willing to forfeit
comforts that he could have. because he's more desirous in
his heart for God's glory and for the good of God's people.
That's what a faithful minister is. You know, we come into this
world and we got all our wants and all our aspirations and all
our ambitions and our worldly desires and all that. Before
God puts a man in the ministry, what he's going to do is he's
going to take those away from him so that he's content with
what God gives him, content with what he has, And God's glory
is so magnified to him and Christ's honor is so important to him
that he would rather see God glorified and Christ honored
than he have what he otherwise could have if he just went on
with a worldly occupation. I thank God. This is what I thank
God for. He gave me a faithful pastor.
And not only that, he gave me a heart not to take it for granted.
Whatever you do, Don't take it for granted. I wish there was
some way I could put it in the hearts of everybody here to understand
it's a rare, rare thing when God sends somebody that will
preach His Word in simplicity and in truth to you. Most preachers,
when you listen to them, I guess they're trying to impress people
with their oratory, and they speak in such a way that you
can't even understand what they said. And I guess that's supposed
to be impressive and make folks think, well, we got a great preacher. He preaches so loftily, I can't
even understand what he means. Well, that's not good preaching.
I want you to understand what I'm saying. I want to be as clear
as I can. I want you to know, without Christ,
you're dead in your sins. You can't do one thing. I want
you to know Christ is the way, the only way. Christ is the truth
and the only truth. Christ is life and the only life. And if you don't have Christ,
you don't have life. You got to have a perfect righteousness
to come into God's presence. That's what I want you to know.
I want you to be clear on that. I want you to believe here every
day that you come in here in your flesh, feeling as low as
a worm. and in the inner man being renewed
and walking with God. That's what I want to see. And
I can't do it. He has to do it. But I'm responsible
just to preach it as clear as I can. And that's what I want
to do. Here's the third thing, we'll have to hurry. We see the
importance of communication between brethren. Verse 21, he says,
but that you also may know my affairs how I do, I'm sending
you Tychicus and he'll make known to you all things whom I've sent
unto you for the same purpose that you might know our affairs.
Now in the verse before this, Paul had just said that he was
in prison, and that's where he was. Now you know after he said
that, that the brethren in Ephesus are going to want to know about
his situation. They're going to want to know
about his condition. They're going to want to know
They're going to want to know if he's healthy, what his health
is. They're going to want to know if he's, how he got freedom
to preach the gospel because he said he did. They're going
to want to know how that gospel is, how's it going forth in Rome? How's it, how's it, how's God,
what's God doing there? He's going to want to know what
the wheel workers are doing. How are they affecting the work?
Are you being opposed? They're going to want to know
if there's any possibility he'll be released from prison. These
are things they'll want to know. And so Paul, knowing this, wants
them to know his condition. That's that's you want to fellowship
with one another. A faithful minister wants the
people. I want you to know my state and
I want to know your state because then we can pray for one another
if we know how each other are doing. And then Paul also communicated
and this is how scripture speaks of communication. He communicated
by giving them a gift. He introduced them and sent this
man, this faithful minister of the gospel to them. And he couldn't
have communicated to them a better gift than to send them a faithful
minister. That's what he did. And he did so for their advantage
alone. You know, sometimes men give something, but they're doing
it because, and the world does this, if you get something in
politics, it's because they're going to call in something on
you later down the road. Paul's not doing that. He's just
sending them a minister for their good. He didn't say, send back
something to me from him. He just did it for their good.
And in this we see the importance of communicating, fellowshipping
with one another and giving to provide whatever the other needs.
We ought to do that for other churches and for our brethren.
And I'm thankful because God's given you a heart to do that.
You have faithfully communicated to me, to your other brethren,
both in fellowship and in giving, and you've done that to other
churches. And I don't have a problem commending you for that. I know
it's by God's grace. Paul commended his brethren. He said this to them. He said,
I commend you for communicating with me in my affliction. Now,
when you see this communication like this, this giving, don't
you see what God did for us? This is what God did. He communicated
with his people. He fellowshiped with us in our
suffering. He gave to us, the scripture says, God so loved
the world that he gave his only begotten son, that we might,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting
life. John said, and this was manifested, the love of God toward
us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world
that we might live through Him. Do you see a picture of that
in what Paul did? I can see Paul in his heart, sending Tychicus
to them. And as Tychicus is riding away
on the horizon, he's thinking, this is what God did for me.
He sent His Son to me to save me from my sins. And we see what
Christ did for us. Hereby perceive we the love of
God, because He laid down His life for us, and we ought to
lay down our lives for our brethren. Do you see that in Tychicus?
Tychicus is being sent. Christ was sent. And Tychicus,
to be sent, he's going to have to, to some degree, lay down
his life. But not in any degree toward what Christ did. Christ
was sent. And He came and laid down His
life. He laid down His glory and was
lived in poverty. He laid down His power and depended
upon the Father when He walked this earth. He laid down the
honor that was due to Him. He was despised and rejected
of men. And at last, He laid down His
body. He laid down His soul being made
sin for His people in order to put away the sin of His people
and make us righteousness in Him. That's what He did. That's communicating with His
brethren. That's why the scripture says this. The scripture says,
to do good and to communicate, forget not. For with such sacrifices
God is well pleased. Is God well pleased with Christ's
sacrifice? That's what Christ did. God's
well pleased with him. And the only way, sinner, God's
going to be well pleased with you is if you come to God in
Christ Jesus. Because God's done the communicating.
He's done the giving. He's done the providing. He's
done the supplying. And now He's going to have you
to bow and thank Him and praise Him and glory in Him for making
the supply. Alright, lastly. We see the charge
that Christ gives to every servant. This is the charge He gives to
you when you're talking to your brethren. This is the charge
He gives to me as a preacher of the Gospel and to all His
preachers. This was Paul's number one reason for sinning in Tychicus,
verse 22. That he might comfort your hearts. That he might comfort your hearts. Instead of seeking his own comfort,
Paul constantly sought the comfort of his brethren. Look over at
Isaiah 40. You know Paul could have used
some comfort. There he was in prison, in chains,
rejected of men, despised of men, beaten by men. And he could
have used some comfort. But did he write them letters
and say, Oh, y'all come to me and comfort me? No, he wrote
a letter. And from the beginning of the
end of that letter, he's comforting them, telling them what great
things God's done in Christ Jesus for his people. And then he sent
a preacher to him and said, Now you go comfort them. You go,
you go reiterate to them, go repeat to them everything I've
said to you. Do we not need the gospel repeated
to us? We need it repeated over and
over and over. Over and over and over. Paul
wrote this letter to him, and then he sent a yugo, and you
read this letter to him, and then now you just preach it to
him. You comfort him. Not just telling him about my
situation, with the gospel comfort him. Where'd Paul get that heart?
Where'd he get that charge from? Right here. Here's what Christ
tells his preachers and his people. Isaiah 40, verse 1. Comfort ye,
comfort ye, my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably
to Jerusalem. Well, how am I going to go all
the way over there? No, Jerusalem's sitting right here. Jerusalem's
sitting right here. It's God's people. Comfort ye,
comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to
Jerusalem, and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished,
that her iniquity is pardoned, for she is received of the Lord's
hand, double for all her sins. Christ said, you go and you tell
them the warfare is accomplished. How's the warfare accomplished?
I didn't even do any fighting. Because God said, you stand still. The battle's not yours, it's
mine. And he sent Christ and Christ won the victory. He says,
you go tell them their iniquities pardoned. It's because he won
that victory. He came to make it so that God
can pardon his people and still be just to do it. That is the
gospel. He sent Christ to dial that cross
so that God could be just and the justifier of his people.
His laws upheld and God did the justifying. Don't let us walk
around and say, oh, I'm just, my faith justified me. That's
turning away from what the scriptures speak. That's taking the doctrine
of justification by faith and corrupting it. The doctrine of
justification by faith is God gives you faith to see God justified
you. And when you're brought to believe
on Him, That free justification is yours freely through faith,
apart from your works. It's because He did it. He did
it. He says, you go tell them their iniquities pardoned. He
says, you go tell them they've received of the Lord's hand.
It's the Lord's hand whom they've received. Everything we have,
brethren, we receive from the Lord's hand. Doesn't that sound
personal? If you received something anonymously,
that's not very personal. If it was just that Christ came
and did this for everybody and now it's just there for the taking,
if somebody take it, that's not personal. But to know He came
and we received from His hand personally, from His hand to
us, because He came and died for His people. He came and redeemed
His people. He came and regenerated His people.
He came and drew His people. He came and embraced His people.
He came and gathered His people with His hand so that... Just like that. Personal. One-on-one. He come and give
it to me personally. Isn't that how it happened to
you? That's personal. And what did we receive? We received
double for all our sins. Double for all our sins. Righteousness
and holiness. Forgiveness and pardon. He put down our old man and created
in us a new man. Double for all our sins. And
Tychicus could comfort them concerning why Paul was in prison, too.
Look over to Philippians 1, verse 12. We'll end here. Philippians
1, 12. You know, they're sitting there
thinking, well, if God has all this power, then what's His servant
doing in prison? Why is His servant in prison?
If God is so sovereign, then why do such bad things happen?
Well, here's why. Philippians 1, 12. Paul wrote
this to the Philippians to comfort them. And here's what Tychicus
would go and tell the Ephesians. I would, you should understand
brethren, that the things which happen unto me have fallen out
rather unto the furtherance of the gospel. That's why everything
happens in this world. Good, bad, and ugly. That's why
it happens. Because it's going to fall out for the furtherance
of the gospel. Look at this. So that my bonds
in Christ are manifest in all the palace. and in all other
places. And many of the brethren in the
Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to
speak the word without fear." Look at verse 19. Paul says,
and I know that this shall turn to my salvation. Not only is
it for the good of God's people, Paul said it's for my good too.
I know it's going to turn to my salvation through your prayer,
and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to
my earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed. But that with all boldness, as
always, so now also, Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether
it be by life or by death. Do you see here, Paul and Tychicus,
both of these men were beloved brothers. They were loving, loving,
lovable brethren. They were faithful ministers
of Christ. They communicated to God's people
and they comforted God's people. This is what God makes his people
by his grace. This is what he does by his grace.
This is what he does. And their memories are preserved
in the scriptures forever for us. They are. You know, men are
trying their best to preserve their memories. I watched this
documentary recently on Cornelius Vanderbilt and John Rockefeller
and Andrew Carnegie and J.P. Morgan and Henry Ford. And we all know them right now
because it wasn't too long ago that they did what they did.
But go back 200, 300, 400 years. Name men that did what they did
back then for me. Can you? Off the tip of your
tongue? Go back a thousand years and tell me some men that did
something like that. Go back two thousand years and tell me
men that did something like that. Their memories just perish with
them. But here's two men that's memories
been preserved by God in his scriptures for generation after
generation after generation. Why? They love their brethren
and they serve Christ faithfully. Oh, that's something to be remembered
for. They loved their brethren and served Christ faithfully.
Amen. Let's stand together, brethren. Father, we thank You for Your
Word. We pray that You'll bless it now. Make us to be like these
two brethren we've just seen in Scripture. We pray it in Christ's
name and for Christ's honor. Amen.