Good evening. Let's begin our
evening service by standing and singing 290. 290, be still my
soul. Still my soul, the Lord is on
thy side. Bear patiently the cross of grief
or pain. Leave to thy God to order and
provide. In every change ye faithful will
remain. Be still, my soul, thy pest,
thy heavenly friend, through thorny ways leads to a joyful
end. Be still, my soul, thy God doth
undertake to guide the future as he has the past. Thy hope, thy confidence let
nothing shake. All now mysterious shall be bright
at last. Be still, my soul, the waves
and winds still know His voice who ruled them while He dwelt
below. Be still, my soul, the hour is
hastening on, when we shall be forever with the Lord. When disappointment, grief, and
fear are gone, sorrow forgot, Love's purest joys restore. Be still, my soul, when change
and tears are past. All safe and blessed, we shall
meet at last. Good evening. All right, brethren,
I'm going to read for our scripture reading. Let's read the text,
which is John 15. John 15. We're reading verses 1 through 8. Our Lord says, I am the true
vine, and my father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth
not fruit, he taketh away. And every branch that beareth
fruit, he purgeth it, he prunes it, that it may bring forth more
fruit. Now ye are clean. through the
word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit
of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye except
ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in me and I in
him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without me ye
can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he
is cast forth as a branch, and is withered, and men gather them
and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. If ye abide
in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will,
and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified,
that ye bear much fruit, so shall ye be my disciples. Let's pray. Our gracious Lord,
we thank you, Father, for your great mercy and grace towards
your people. Lord, we thank you in gathering
us together and giving us the strength to be here the will
and the desire to be here to worship our God, to hear your
word, to be taught and instructed by the word of God. That is our
Savior, our Lord, our all. And Lord, we give you thanks. We praise your name, Lord, because
without you, we can do nothing. Lord, we have nothing to boast
in of ourselves, but we have everything to boast of in you.
We thank you, Lord, for this great grace and mercy which you've
shown to us, who are sinners, who have nothing in our hand
to bring, no righteousness of our own to boast of. But Lord, you've provided everything
for us, and we're so thankful for that. Lord, help us to see
your grace, your work, your righteousness, your faithfulness more and more, and to grow in this grace and
knowledge of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Lord, help us. You know how proud,
how arrogant we can be, how self-confident and self-righteous we are by
nature. But Lord, you know that we're nothing. And yet, Lord, you choose to
be merciful and gracious to us. Lord, we pray that your spirit
would be upon us this evening, that you would be in our midst,
helping us and teaching us, turning our hearts to you, our thoughts
and our minds to you, Lord, bless your people. And Lord, we pray for those who
are sick, who need healing, who are wounded. Lord, we pray that
you would bless them, that you would help them. Lord, we pray
for our brother Scott, whose body is sick and has wounds. Lord, we pray that you would
heal him. that you would help him in the endeavors which he's
doing to try to get better and to be well. And Lord, all those, our brethren
here in the church and those scattered in the other churches,
Lord, we pray for those that are sick, that are suffering, that are
struggling. We pray that you would bless
them. that you would cause your word to go forth and comfort
their hearts, that you would be our peace, our joy, our rejoicing,
our comfort, our all, because Lord, you are all and in all. And we are so thankful for your
great grace and might. Lord, again, we thank you for
gathering us together tonight. Help us, Lord. Bless this word,
we pray in Christ's name, amen. Our second hymn is going to be
201. He is able to deliver the 201. ? Tis the grandest theme through
the ages wrung ? ? Tis the grandest theme for a mortal tongue ? ?
Tis the grandest theme that the world e'er sung ? ? Our God is
able to deliver thee ? ? He is able to deliver thee ? He is
able to deliver thee. Though by sin oppressed, go to
Him for rest. Our God is able to deliver thee. Tis the grandest theme in the
earth or made. Tis the grandest theme for a
mortal strain. Tis the grandest theme till the
world again our God is able to deliver thee. He is able to deliver
thee. He is able to deliver thee. Though by sin oppressed, go to
Him, for rest, our God is able to deliver thee. It's the grandest
theme, let the tidings roll To the guilty heart, to the sinful
soul Look to God in faith, he will make thee whole Our God
is able to deliver thee He is able to deliver thee He is able
to deliver thee. Though by sin oppressed, go to
Him for rest. Our God is able to deliver thee. Thank you. Our text is John 15. John 15. In our backyard, Michelle and
I, you know, we grow a number of plants in our garden. But
we also have a little section where we have flowers. And one of those is a climbing
rose. It's not a rose bush, but it's
a climbing rose in that it's a vine. It's a great, big, strong
vine. And it can put up a vine that
goes 8 feet, 12 feet, even 15 feet long if it's able to. The first couple of years, I
just trained it to go up the trellis, but it ended up providing
a nice display of flowers for my neighbor, rather than us,
because the sun comes a little bit behind our fence, and that's
where it reaches towards. So this last year, I put up a
couple other vines, and one came up, and it went to the left.
And I let it do that. And one went up, and it went
to the right. And I allowed it to do that. so that we could
see the flowers that came from those branches much more easily. And from those vines, from those
vines, it puts up branches about 12 inches long. About a foot long are each of
these branches that come off that vine. And on top of those
branches, it puts up a head or an abundance of little buds.
Sometimes it puts up four or five buds, and other times, on
some, I saw that there were 14 flower buds that all came and
bloomed and put on a nice pretty display for us this last year,
this last spring here. Well, in this passage, the reason
why I say that is because in this passage, our Lord uses a
vine and branches and the fruit, which is born in those branches,
in order to teach his disciples. And he's showing his disciples
that without him, who is the vine, you can do nothing. There's nothing that you can
do apart from the Lord. He even says in verse five, without
me, ye can do nothing. And our Lord is teaching that
through this, through the salvation of his disciples, our God is
glorified. He's glorified in the salvation
of his disciples. Now, in just a hearing of that,
it may sound reasonable to the natural ear that God is glorified
in the salvation of his people. But in reality, in practice,
it's impossible for us to hear that. It's impossible for the
natural man to believe that God is glorified in the salvation
of his people. And it's impossible for him to
walk in that faith, believing that God is glorified in the
salvation of His people. You see, everything that we want
to do naturally, everything that we think glorifies God, and we
think this is what God would have me to do and what I should
be doing, and all the things that we go about to try to glorify
God is actually the opposite of what the Lord is teaching
us and revealing to His disciples here in this passage. and in this Gospel of John, and
in this book, and in the Word made flesh. Man wants to bear
fruit for God, but he does so in a manner that brings glory
to him. He wants to earn that salvation
and that favor of God. But what our Lord is teaching
us is that everything our God does is for our salvation. It's for our good and it glorifies
Him. He's the one that's glorified
in your salvation. Not you, not me. Our glory is
Christ. That God is our God. That He
should reveal Himself to us. But our salvation is unto the
praise, honor, power, and glory to our God. And so this is what
our Lord is teaching us here in this passage tonight. And
so we see all things are by Christ. That's the title of my message,
All Things by Christ. So our Lord says in verse 1 and
2, John 15, 1 and 2, I am the true vine. and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth
not fruit he taketh away, and every branch that beareth fruit
he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Christ is the true vine. The father is the husbandman,
he's the vine dresser, the one who takes care of this vine. And he's the one who looks over
this vine and cares for it. And the disciples of Christ,
these are the branches which come from the vine. And our Lord
is promising us, He's speaking of His promise of life for you. His promise of life revealed
in you, His people. God and not man is glorified
in the grace of this salvation. God is the one who receives all
the glory for the grace which is shown to us in this salvation
which our God has done for us in his Son, Jesus Christ. Now,
these words that we read here, they speak of a vine, and it's
a matter of perspective in how we see that vine. If you're very
high and lifted up and think much of yourself, you have one
perspective. And if you're low and humbled
and brought low, you have another perspective of that vine. Let me explain what I mean. In
nature, we see many types of vines, and not all vines are
very pretty to look at. In fact, growing up alongside
that rose vine, that climbing rose, we've paired with it a
clematis. It's a very popular thing to
put together, a clematis with a rose, because they bloom at
the same time and they grow up together and intertwine. with
one another. And a couple weeks back, I was
actually weeding around the rose. I was just picking out a few
clumps of grass and other weeds that were growing there, and
I had my hand right on that Clematis vine. And I was about to rip
it up, and I realized, whoa, that's the Clematis vine. Well,
why did I do that? Up top, it looks beautiful. It's
got pretty dark flowers. It's deep purple flowers, and
it looks really nice. Well, at the bottom of that vine,
it's dirty. It looks splintered. It looks
like a weed, actually. It looks horrible down at the
ground level there. It looks like something should
be pulled up. It's dry, and it's the color
of dirt, honestly. It doesn't look green. It doesn't
look lovely. It doesn't look like it's alive
at all. Well in scripture our Lord is described in that manner
as a root out of a dry ground. We read in Isaiah 53 verse 2
that he shall grow up before him as a tender plant and as
a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form, no comeliness,
and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire
him. So very much like that ugly looking
vine that was coming out of the ground that was so dry because
the dirt's been so dry here, that vine just looked like rotten
weed, something to be pulled up, something to be disregarded.
I didn't see the beauty of that vine. Well, the vine also grows
along the ground. And if you allow it to grow along
the ground, you have to get low to see that vine. And you have
to look under the leaves and inspect what's going on with
that vine to see what it's producing, if anything. Oftentimes, if you've
ever grown a cucumber and it's not been staked up, you might
not realize that there's fruit just laying there and going to
waste on that ground because it's hidden. And unless you stoop
down and take that time to look into it and to lift up the leaves
and to inspect it, you'll never see all the fruit that's there. It'll go unnoticed to the natural
eye. Well, the same is so of our Lord.
In verse 3 of Isaiah 53, verse 3, we're told that Christ is
despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted
with grief, and we hid, as it were, our faces from him. He
was despised, and we esteemed him not. You know, another characteristic
of a vine is that it has, often it has no strength of itself. It doesn't lift itself up on
its own. It needs the support of another. And that's the only way that
it can be raised up, is to be supported by something else.
Turn over to Isaiah 42. Look at Isaiah 42. This is how our Lord describes
His Son. Verse 1, Behold My servant whom
I uphold. Our God has raised up His Son. His Son is the Vine and He is
the One who holds up His Son. He says, mine elect, I've chosen
him in whom my soul delighteth. I have put my spirit upon him.
He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. Look down to
verse six. I, the Lord, have called thee
in righteousness and will hold thine hand and will keep thee
and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of
the Gentiles, Now at this point, our eyes are turned to the perspective
of the lowly. This is what the children of
God are brought, to see in themselves, to know themselves. He says in
verse seven, to open the eyes, to open the blind eyes, to bring
out the prisoners from the prison, and then that sit in darkness
out of the prison house. I am the Lord, that is my name,
and my glory will I not give to another. Christ truly is glorious. He's a beautiful vine. He's wonderful
and glorious to the one who is blind, to the one who can't see
until Christ gives him sight. He's glorious to the one who
sat in prison, shut up, left for dead, counted as nothing,
counted as a criminal, a sinner, one worthy of that prison, one
worthy of that death. Christ is beautiful to the one
to whom he comes and opens that prison door and brings them out
of that prison and into the light and gives them life again. in himself. He's beautiful to
that one. And so, to many, Christ may not
seem but a filthy thing to those who are self-righteous and self-reliant
in themselves, but to that one who can do nothing, and has no
power, has no strength, and has nothing of themselves to recommend
themselves to God, to them, Christ is beautiful. And Christ is lovely. And Christ is precious. And Christ
gives them life. And they know it. And they're
thankful and they rest in Him. So the one who makes the difference
in all of this, the one who makes the difference between the one
who is high and lifted up and the one who is brought low and
made nothing in themselves is the Father. He's the husbandman.
He's the one. It's God that makes the difference
in you and another. It's God that made the difference
in making you low. You may have been high and lifted
up and self-righteous in yourselves. All of us are by nature. And
that is where we're found, but it's the grace of God that brings
you low and makes you to see your need and to see that that
need can only be met in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so the father
is the husbandman. He's the vine dresser who tends
diligently to his garden. And it's by his grace that we
are rooted in Christ and bring forth fruits, precious fruits,
spiritual fruits, which he receives, fruit unto God, because it's
rooted and comes from the vine, the Lord Jesus Christ. And so by the will of God, we
are rooted in Christ. By the will of God, and only
by the will of God, do we know Christ, are we found of Christ,
do we see Christ and behold his beauty and glory and rejoice
in him. It says that our father purges
or prunes these branches that they may bring forth more fruit. About a week ago, that climbing
rose in our yard completed most of its blooms. There's a couple
more on there, but most of them are already done. They've died,
the petals have all fallen off, and it's over. And Michelle was
looking for something to do out in the yard. She enjoys being
out in the hot sun, much like you, brother. She likes to be
out there, and she was looking for a few chores to do. And I
said, well, you know, the rose is ready to be deadheaded. And
what that means is after the rose has bloomed and the petals
have fallen off, you go out there and you prune. those branches. That's where the roses are. They're
on the branches and you go up there with a nice sharp garden
shear and you just snip snip and clip off this one there and
you chop off that one there and you reach in a little further
and you get a few more off here and there and you get as many
as you can. And the reason why you do that,
well it was because this rose will bloom a second time this
year. It'll bloom closer to fall again,
as will the Clematis as well, and so it'll bloom again. If
you leave the heads on there, it'll bloom again. It'll put
forth other roses, but if you cut off the dead rose heads,
it will actually produce a greater abundance of roses because the
plant will put more energy into the hole of the body. It'll strengthen
the body of the plant by getting rid of the rose heads, the fruit
that was on there. And that's what the Lord is doing.
If a branch is growing away that isn't good for the plant, he'll
turn that branch, he'll prune that branch, and he'll reshape
it. There were some other vines that came up last year, and I
snipped them off to help ensure that they stayed in my view and
didn't go up over the fence. And by removing those deadheads,
it produces more fruit and makes a more beautiful show of fruit
in the time of its season. And so there's a a former showing,
and then there's a latter showing. And in that latter season of
the plant, it'll put forth more fruit, more flowers again. And so that's why we deadhead,
and that's why the Lord purges the branches. That's why you
are purged. That's why He deals with you
in such a way so that it's for our good. It's for our good. It's according to his delight,
and his purpose, and he knows exactly what he's doing. He knows
exactly how to bring forth fruit from us, and he knows exactly
how to strengthen the body. He knows exactly what he's doing. Now, to such who are saved by
the grace of our God, our Lord says in verse three, now ye are
clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. You know,
when I read these words, now you are clean, through the word
which I've spoken to you. There's a great calm in that
word. There's a great comfort in this
word which our Lord is saying to us. He's telling us that He
has given us life. When He speaks that word to you,
now are ye clean. He's telling you He is your life. He has given you eternal life
in Himself. And He's saying that My Father
is sovereign over all things. And He sent Me to put away your
sin. And I've given you life. You are clean even now. And so it's a comfort. It's a
comfort, because we don't come, and we will not come, except
the Father is pleased to bring us to Himself, except the Father
wills it. And so when Christ says, now
are ye clean, through the word which I have spoken unto you,
that word comes as a comfort to us. that gospel word which
is revealed in Jesus Christ. Our God is revealing to us our
righteousness. That He's not looking to us for
our righteousness. He's not looking to us to keep
His word in order to obtain a righteousness for ourselves, but He's declaring,
I have made you righteous. I have cleansed you. You are
clean, every wit, whole and perfect. the Lord and so he saved us from
our sins he's obtained for us the promise of eternal life this
is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you and Christ
speaks it to our hearts now this word reveals Christ in you the
hope of glory Christ is that word which dwells in our hearts
by faith and he says in verse 4 look at John 15 verse 4 He says, abide in me, and I in
you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide
in the vine, no more can ye except ye abide in me. So this word
is the word of promise in the Lord Jesus Christ, which is given
unto you. We are in Christ, and it's a
promise, what he's saying. These are not a law of commandment. Christ isn't saying, if you do
this, and if you're able to do this, then you'll abide in me.
He's speaking words of promise to you. He's saying, if I abide
in you and you in me, meaning if the promise of God, the power
of my salvation has come upon you, you shall abide in me and
you will bear fruit. It's of me. It's of your Lord. And so for us to do something
It's by the power of our God. And so our God declares to us
what he has done for us. These are joyful words of promise. He tells us actually in verse
11, look down there in John 15, 11. He said, these things have
I spoken unto you that my joy might remain in you and that
your joy might be full. If this was something that we
had to do, we wouldn't be very joyful about it. But when we
hear it as it is, the promise of Christ of what he's done for
us, it's a great joy. Abide in me and I in you, as
the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in
the vine, no more can ye except ye abide in me. How is Christ
described to us in the scriptures? We read of Him in Colossians
1.27, where we read Christ in you, the hope of glory. We're told in Matthew 1.23, His
name shall be called Emmanuel, which by interpretation is God
with us. He says in John 14.23, if a man
love me, he will keep my word. That's a promise. He will keep
my words. And my Father will love Him. And we will come unto Him and
make our abode with Him. We're told in Hebrews 13, 5,
I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. In Ephesians 3, 16, Paul writes
that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. That ye might
be filled with all the fullness of God, Ephesians 3.19. We're
told that ye are the temple of God. The Spirit of God dwelleth
in you, 1 Corinthians 3.16. And he that is joined unto the
Lord is one Spirit, 1 Corinthians 6.17. That's the promise of our
Savior, to dwell with you, to dwell in you, to be your God
and for you to be His people. We're connected to the vine. We're attached to the vine. Separated
from that vine, we have no life in us. We can bear no fruit in
us. You take that branch off that
climbing rose, and it will not produce any flowers. It must
be attached to the vine. And that's what our God has done
for us, and that's the promise of His Word. in His salvation. We didn't save ourselves at the
first. We don't keep ourselves saved. Our God has done all the
salvation. He's done all that is necessary
for us. Why should we be troubled? Christ
tells you, even now ye are clean. Now ye are clean through the
word which I have spoken unto you. Now because we are Christ's
and He dwells in us, We'll know what he means when he says, without
me, in verse five, ye can do nothing. Let's read that verse
five. I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in
me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without
me, ye can do nothing. The fact that we have life of
Christ obtains for us all the promises of God in Him, all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. This is the
promise of your God for you. He's given you life in Christ. It means that our God is and
has done everything for our salvation. Everything for our good, where
all things are working together for our good according to that
purpose of our God. So that even when we're brought
low, even when we are taken down from on high, and things don't
go our way, and things are trouble to us, and things don't make
sense, and we don't have answers to why things are the way that
they are, just know that your God is bringing you low to behold
the beauties of His Son, Jesus Christ, to behold Him who is
everything to us. The natural man doesn't hear,
without me you can do nothing, because the natural man is confident
in himself that he can do whatever he needs to do. But our God is
showing us, no, without me you can do nothing. And there's another
promise in that, in that Christ dwells with us so that really
truly you don't do anything without Christ, because Christ is ever
with you. And He's the one bringing you
through it. Everything you go through, every wall you hit,
every door that closes, every window that shuts, your God is
with you. And He's doing it all for your
good. And He brings us low in ourselves to behold the glory
of our God in His Son, who's able to take that which is nothing,
that which is blind, that which is weak and has no strength in
itself, and he is able to accomplish his will and purpose, to feed
his sheep with that gospel word, to hear that word which declares
to you, now are ye clean. through the word which I have
spoken unto you, that word which Christ declares, saying, look
unto me, trust me, believe me, walk by faith in me. I am the
vine. You are the branch. And all the
fruit which you bear is through the vine. It's from me. And you'll
produce that fruit which I'm pleased to bring forth in you."
And so We see what we could be. We see what we could be if left
to ourselves. We see Judas. We see Simon Magus. We see Demas. We read of Ananias
and Sapphira. We could be something like them
in ourselves, but God chose to bring you low in yourself. God chose to reveal his son in
you. God chose to bring you low to
behold the beauty of Christ rather than look down upon Christ and
think, boy, what a weak vine is he. Why doesn't He use me
more for greater things? Why doesn't He do this with me?
How come God doesn't see this with me? Because God is God. He's able to do what He will
do, and He glorifies Himself through weak things, through
the things which are cast off, through the things which are
despised, through the things that are nothing to bring to
naught things that are. Our God is pleased to use the
weak and the foolish things, the beggarly things, because
it all speaks to His glory, praise, and honor. And so the fact that
we're delivered from the condemnation that is upon those other names,
which are not the names we want to be associated with in scripture,
we're thankful for what our God has done for us in delivering
us. You know, when Judas was with the 12, Christ said, ye
are clean, but not all. But now, he says, ye are clean. Ye are all clean through the
word which I have spoken to you. I have redeemed you. I have interceded
for you on your behalf. I have delivered your soul from
death. And it's by his grace in bringing
us low, taking us low in ourselves, it's by his grace that causes
our heart to hear what Christ is making His disciples to know,
that without Me, ye can do nothing. Without Christ, you can bear
no fruit. Without Him, we cannot believe. Without Him, we have no repentance. Without Him, we won't hear His
Word. Without Him, we won't be healed. Without Him, we can't worship
our God. Without Him, we're not kept from
temptation. Without Him, we're nothing in
ourselves. We can do nothing, and we are
nothing without our God. We can't even love our God without
Him. Truly, our God shows us that
it's not of Him that willeth. It's not of Him that runneth.
but of God who showeth mercy." It's God who showeth mercy. And
so our God makes us to know that in the hidden man, in the new
man of his creation. He makes us to hear his word
and to know, Lord truly, I am nothing in myself, and I can
do nothing apart from you. And like I said, it sounds easy
to hear, but it's impossible to hear it by faith and to walk
by faith trusting that our God knows exactly what He's doing
and is doing exactly as He pleases and displaying His glories even
in weak things like us. But He is. He is. The Father is glorified in this
very thing. And so we read and can identify
why Paul would say things like, who is sufficient for these things? Who's sufficient for this truth,
this glorious truth? We have this treasure in earthen
vessels. We're weak, poor, fragile, easily
broken vessels. And God hath given to us the
ministry of reconciliation. In this group here, He's given
to us the ministry of reconciliation to preach the glories of God
and the salvation of sinners who have nothing of themselves
to recommend them to God, but has reconciled us through the
blood of His Son Jesus Christ and says to sinners, look to
Him, look to Him, all who trust Him. and come to me through Christ,
my Son, whom I've sent. They are righteous, and they
have eternal life. And I give unto them the promise
of eternal life, to dwell with them, to reveal myself to them,
to show them that apart from Christ, they can do nothing. And I'll make them content in
Him, in my Son, I'll keep them, I'll protect them. They'll be
connected, rooted to the vine, and they shall bear fruit in
their season. God does that for his people.
So that we see by his power, we hold forth the word of truth. Ephesians 2.16, or Philippians
2.16, we hold forth the word of truth, which abides in us. through the preaching of the
cross. And we believe because it's the
power of God unto us, and it's not foolishness, but we trust
and believe that Christ is the salvation of Christ. Without
Christ, I can do nothing, but I can do all things through Christ,
which strengtheneth me. Without him, I can do nothing,
but I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me.
He tells us, or we read in Ephesians chapter 6 if you want to turn
there, Ephesians 6 and verse 18 Paul was just finishing up
the armor. of the people of God, the armor
of Christ, which we have upon us. And he tells the brethren
to always be praying in the spirit for all things, for the saints,
to be praying for one another. And he asks in verse 19, he says,
and for me, remember me, brethren, that utterance, utterance of
that word of power may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth
boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am
an ambassador in bonds, that therein I may speak boldly as
I ought to speak." And what we see there in that is that we
are weak. Every one of us is an ambassador
in bonds. an ambassador in a chain. We
all have something in this flesh which to the common man appears
to inhibit us and hold us back and doesn't allow us to break
out and be what we would be. We're all ambassadors in bonds
in that we have weaknesses and we have things which work against
us as far as this world is concerned. but by the grace of God, by the
power of His Spirit, even in that bond, we may declare boldly
the glory of our God in the face of Jesus Christ and what He has
done for sinners, that other sinners who are low and have
nothing might hear and have hope in the Lord Jesus Christ. To
know, well, if God can have mercy on that man, maybe He'll have
mercy on me, too. and be gracious to me." Turn over to Colossians 1. Colossians
1. Our Lord is showing us that we
have no power of ourselves to hold forth that word. We really
are nothing. And when you think about it,
the fact that He chooses such weak things and such beggarly
things and such powerless things in themselves to hold forth that
word It's to show us that it's all the power of our God. And
so in Colossians 1, verse 26, Paul's describing this word of
life, calling it even the mystery, which hath been hidden from ages
and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints,
to whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory
of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope
of glory. whom we preach, warning every
man, and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present
every man perfect in Christ Jesus." That's the wisdom, brethren.
We're not telling men, obey the law, get yourself right with
God by the law. We're not turning men to the
flesh. We're preaching Christ. We're holding forth the word
of life, declaring the Lord Jesus Christ as salvation. Whereunto
Paul says, I also labor, striving according to his working, which
worketh in me mightily. When I was thinking about Paul
says, which worketh in me mightily, I thought, Paul can say that,
but I can't say that. When you think about all the
things that Paul did, being an apostle, writing much of the
New Testament and being used by the Lord to plant so many
churches and to declare the gospel so plainly in these epistles
so that the truth of the gospel remains with us to this day. Had Paul not written those things,
we might not see, at least in the sense of men, we wouldn't
see the clarity, the simplicity of Christ declared in the gospel
that he is all salvation. But Paul was used by God mightily
to explain these things, to show forth Christ so plainly to us. But then I thought about that
verse a little more, and I thought, you know, that's arrogant. to say that that's not true of
me because the reality is that if the Lord uses any one of us
to be a help to any of God's people, to any of His sheep,
that's a testimony that God is working mightily in you, overcoming
all the darkness, all the evil, all the unbelief that's in this
sinner here, to be used by the Lord to hold up the Word of Life,
to feed the sheep of God, to comfort your hearts, turning
you to the Lord Jesus Christ, and not yourselves, to behold
Him. God's working mightily in that
because He's overcoming the flesh and all that is dark and wicked
and evil and contrary to the truth that's in us. So as He
uses you to bless His people, to love your brethren, He's working
mightily in you because He's overcoming all that is evil that's
in you. and He's working mightily displaying
His glory and His power in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so, if God will use us, He's gonna make us to see that I'm
nothing and that without Christ I can do nothing. He's gonna
bring us low so that we know that the glory is His, the praise,
the honor, the power is all of His. He said in verse seven,
if ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what
ye will, and it shall be done unto you. So that we pray more
and more, not for the carnal things, not for riches, not for
worldly things, but more and more as he grows us in the grace
and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Lord, thy
will be done on earth, even as it is in heaven. He tells us
in Romans 8, 26, likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities. For we know not what we should
pray for as we all, but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for
us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And so our God is
conforming us more to the image of His Son, to be lowly in ourselves,
to be despised by the world, to be nothing in their estimation,
but he loves us, and he keeps us, and we're thankful for that,
and we're made thankful for that. And he says in verse eight, herein
is my father glorified, that ye bear much fruit, so shall
ye be my disciples. And so he promises that we shall
bear fruit, we shall bear fruit, and he tells us what that fruit
looks like. Galatians 5 22 and 23 when he
says the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, against
such there is no law. And so rejoice, because you that
hope in Christ, and believe Him, and hunger and thirst for Him,
and love your brethren, and want to love your brethren, and be
kind to them, that glory is all the Father's. Bearing that in
you, causing you to walk by faith, not to be so powerful in ourselves
that we forget Him and think of ourselves more highly than
we are, but He keeps us low and humble, ever looking to Him and
crying out to Him. And He receives all the glory,
the praise and the honoring. And we're made fine with that. We're made happy with that and
glad in Him. So I pray He blessed that word
to your hearts. Amen. All right, brethren, let's close
in prayer. Our gracious Lord, we thank you, Father, for your
grace, that you should use sinners like us, and you should
turn us from our strength and our wisdom and the things which
man glories in, and that you should bring us low in ourselves
to see our need of Christ, to know that without Him we can
do nothing. and to make us glad in him, to
rejoice, to be settled and comforted by our Lord. Father, we thank
you for your mercy to us, for saving us, doing this in spite
of us. And Lord, we pray that you would
indeed be pleased to be glorified among us, that you would use
us to hold forth the word of life. and that we would indeed be faithful
in this ministry of reconciliation which you've committed unto us
to declare Christ. Lord, keep us ever faithful in
feeding your sheep. It's in Christ's name we pray
and give thanks. Amen. Closing hymn is 386, All for
Jesus, 386. I don't think we've sang this
one as a group. ? All for Jesus, all for Jesus
? ? All my being's ransomed powers ? ? All my thoughts and words
and doings ? ? All my days and all my hours ? All for Jesus, all for Jesus,
all my days and all my hours. All for Jesus, all for Jesus,
all my days and all my hours. Let my hands perform His bidding. Let my feet earn in His ways. ? Let my eyes see Jesus only
? Let my lips sing forth his praise ? All for Jesus, all for
Jesus ? Let my lips sing forth his praise All for Jesus, all
for Jesus. Let my lips speak forth his praise. Since my eyes were fixed on Jesus,
I've no sign of all besides. So enchain my spirit's vision,
looking at the crucified. All for Jesus, all for Jesus,
looking at the crucified. All for Jesus, all for Jesus,
looking at the crucified. Oh, what wonder, how amazing,
Jesus, glorious King of kings. Danes to call me his beloved. Let me rest beneath his wings. All for Jesus, all for Jesus. Thank you.