First of all, I want to thank
you for your prayers. Sean comes through the operation
well, and the pathology report shows that they got it all, even
in the lymph nodes. And even though the cancer they
took out of him was a category three, they called it, or something. But we thank the Lord for that. I was asked a question this week.
Somebody has always asked me questions about the Bible. It
was a young Christian. He said he was a young Christian
and he wanted to know, he said, where do you start studying the Bible? Which is
a very, very good question. And to the best of my ability,
what I think, before you start, one gospel and one of Paul's
writings that is very essential to Christian growth and beginning
a Christian growth in Christ. And that's the book of John,
the gospel of John. Nobody lays out the gospel and
the sovereignty of God and the many things that He has done
for the church like the gospel of John. You know, God told Moses
when Moses asked Him the question, What is your name? God said,
I am that I am. Jesus Christ explained that to
us. He said, I am the bread of life. I am the way, the truth, and
the life. No man cometh to the Father except
through me. I mean, you can't get any plainer
than that. He's a good shepherd. The good
shepherd leads and guides and protects his sheep. And that's what Christ does.
Everything pertaining to our life as Christians comes from Jesus Christ, our
Lord. He's our Lord, and as Thomas
said, He's our Lord, He's our God. He's all in all. He is the Triune Godhead in bodily
form. He made the Triune God visible
to His people. The other book that I told him
to study and I gave him some advice on how to study, which
I don't know whether you take it or not, is the book of Ephesians. When God gives Paul the book
of Ephesians, every grace gift that we receive concerning the
salvation of our soul and the growth growing in the grace and
knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ is explained in the book of Ephesians.
First of all, it starts out as God being sovereign in all things,
good or bad. He's sovereign in all things.
He is the foundation. Without Christ, in this book,
you have no Bible. You have no Gospel. He is the
Gospel. And the first chapter of Ephesians
tells us about how sovereign He is. And all things are done
well by Him. All things are to His will and
purpose. And that is one of the greatest
characteristics of our God and our Savior who is Jesus Christ
our Lord. The second chapter tells how
He took He took dead men and women and
built His church, made His church. He that was quickened, we became
alive in Christ Jesus who were dead in trespasses and sins.
He took dead men and women, children, and built a church, the New Testament
church. In the third chapter of Ephesians,
it tells about the fellowship that we have with one another.
Both Jew, Gentile, black, white, green, yellow, it don't make
any difference. We are all one. One. In Jesus Christ. If you've been born of the Spirit
of God. And He determines that. The chapter that I want to speak
on this morning, I want to start on it. We'll have an outline. Maybe if I don't finish it today,
maybe the 18th, if it's God's will, and I'm able to be here,
we'll finish it then. But I want you to look at the
fourth chapter of Ephesians. The first seven verses. It's talking about the duties
of the church in which we will perform. because God gave it
to us and we will perform it. We may kick, we may stumble,
we may kick at the pricks, but I'm going to tell you one thing
right now. When God gives you a vocation and calls you to do
it, you will do it. One way or another, you'll do
it. But listen to what it says, I therefore, the prisoner of
the Lord, beseech you, I beg you, Paul says, As a slave to
God, I beg you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith
ye are called. You could preach on for that
a week and still not cover it. With all lowliness and meekness,
with longsuffering for bearing one another in love, endeavoring
to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Because
there is one body, and notice that there's a one, before each
and every one of these unities and these gifts that's given
each and every Christian. This is something right here
that each and every Christian possess if they're born of the
Spirit of God. They believe this. And you know,
the disciples asked Christ once, said, what is the work of the
Lord? He said, believe that I am He. That's what He said, believe
that I am He. And these right here, the Spirit
of God will reveal that this is the truth in everyone that's
been born by His Spirit. Bar none. If you've been born
of the Spirit of God, you believe this, or you will believe this
as you grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.
There is one body, one Spirit, even as you called in one hope
of your calling, One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and
Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. Seven great verses that explains
our position in Christ Jesus. We believe this. We believe it. But first of all, it talks about
being a prisoner. A slave. In the first verse,
we become a slave to Christ Jesus when we're saved. You know, people
say, well, I made Him my Savior, but He's just not my Lord and
God. You've never been saved by the
grace of God. Let me tell you something. You
don't but God. You do what God says. When you
become His slave, you become His servant. You will do His
will. You might kick against it. I
know, I've been there. When the Lord called me to preach,
I said, He called the dumbest man to preach that ever was.
How can He take a coal miner and make a gospel preacher out
of him? But you know, God does all things
and He does it well. And he never, remember this,
he never calls you to do something that he don't give you the tools
to do them with, does he Joe? That's right. He gives you the
tools to do them with. I run, I said I can't preach,
I've got a family to take care of. Or I've got to do this, I've
got to do that. And I run from outside job making
over $100,000 a year to the coal mines, where I worked in mud
and water up to my knees trying to get away from the Lord, seven
miles back in the ground. But you know that's where he
put me. He had a ministry there for me that I couldn't believe
after I realized it. I was made chaplain on the whodale. We was averaging getting a man
killed once a week. And it was my job to go report
it to the family and have prayer with them. and tell them what
happened. That was the hardest ministry I ever had. Let me tell
you something. I have connected steel 300 feet in the air. I
worked in the mines. I've done just about any job
you can name. I helped build the tunnels on
77 till a man got killed. See the man killed and fell off
of the bridge. I was working on the bridge.
You know, the one they parachute off of and the man fell through
the net and got killed. The hardest job that I ever tried
to do in my life. But the most rewarding and the
blessing that you receive in teaching and preaching the gospel
is beyond reproach. It is. The first time, well I
still do. When I get to thinking about
talking to people, especially no more than I do, You know,
which is just about everybody I meet. But it's a blessing to be able to
expound the God that lives within us through the Holy Spirit in
His name in preaching His gospel. What a wonderful, wonderful thing
it is. But it's frightening. It's frightening. As I heard Joe say up here one
time, It scares me to think, I've got
to be up there until I get up there. And then God feels. See, I've heard Paul talk about
it, you know. And different ones. But the greatest blessing of
all is the blessing of salvation and experiencing it and being
able to expound on it to somebody else. You know who the greatest
people in the church are? It's not the pastor. It's the
one sitting in the pew. You know, if y'all wasn't sitting
there, somebody might call the law and they'd take me to a pruney
town or somewhere. Because I'd be preaching to empty
seats. The greatest gift of all is being
able to sit and listen to the gospel expounded on about our
Lord Jesus Christ sat there and enjoyed. I didn't realize how
great it was to sit in a pew and listen till God called me
to preach. You know, then you appreciate
it, don't you Joe? But, we're prisoners. And we're prisoners because we
want to be prisoners. When we realize what has taken
place in our life, And we will. I used to say, well, you know,
I can't walk worthy. I cannot walk worthy of the vocation
which He called me for. So I run. I run from it. And you know, it wasn't me that
had to be worthy. He made me worthy through His
grace and mercy. You know, just like I said, the
greatest gift of all. is to believe that He is. And
He is the great I Am. And to really know that, you
must be born of the Spirit of God. And if you believe that,
you're worthy to preach His gospel. Even though our flesh has no
worth to it. It'll go back to the dust in
which it came. but to expound on the triune God and to know
that Jesus Christ is Lord and God of all. And to realize that,
that is the evidence of your salvation. Did you know that?
That's the greatest evidence you can have. That's the evidence
of your salvation is to believe that He is and who He is. So we walk worthy because He
makes us worthy. We're a prisoner. We're made
captive in Christ and bound by His gospel to the truth. You know, that's what bothers
me about preaching. I'm afraid that I'll say something
that's not the truth. And it must be preached in grace
and truth, because Christ was full of grace and truth. That
means He's the only one that's got any. Let God be true in every
man of our. But I must be able to speak the
truth of Jesus Christ and His finished work on Calvary's tree
for the sins that He paid for His people. That is to expand
on the gospel. Something that's worthy is of
great value. So when we're worthy, when we
submit as a prisoner to Jesus Christ and seek after His truth
and His gospel and the great attributes that He had, the character
that He made and He brought out in us through the Holy Spirit
that lives within us, When we realize these things, nothing
is greater. Let me tell you something, the
greatest gift you've got is the gift of salvation. And if it
wasn't for Christ, you wouldn't have it. And I'll just be honest
with you, you wouldn't have it. But to really be worthy is to
qualify to perform the task in which is set before us. And Jesus
Christ gives us the tools to do it. Our vocation, in the Greek the
word vocation and calling is the same word in most places. There's many vocations in the
church. And we're called to feel those
vocations, each and every one. And like I said, the greatest
vocation that we have is sat and listening to our pastor preach
the truth and the unsearchable riches of Jesus Christ our Lord. That's the greatest gift of all. And it says, we're with your
call. What is it we're with, you're
called? We're called by God. Let me tell
you something. The trouble is today, there's
too many people in the pulpit that have been called. They're out to... I heard a young
minister one time, he got out of college, and he says, I will
not take a church unless it pays me at least $100,000 a year. That man's a fool. He thought that because he went
to college and people told him he was a preacher, that he could line his pockets
with gold while he was preaching the gospel. You can't do it.
You can't do it. If Sandy and I depended on what
I've made for pastoring a church, we'd starve to death. But God has provided. I don't
need no church's money. He's always provided for me.
Everything I own belongs to Him. My truck, my car, my home, my
wife, everything that I have was given to me by Almighty God. And He'll give it and He'll take
it if we don't use it to be worthy of the vocation which He called
for. There's one thing I learned early
in life when the Lord saved me, and He saved me late in life.
I was 32 when He struck me down on the road to Pinnacle Mines. And you know, He saved my soul.
Beat it all the next Sunday I was in the pulpit. Because we had
a pastor 97 years old, had dementia, and he forgot where the church
was at. We had deacons that would not go up front and even talk
or try to teach. And so the lots fell on me. My
mother said, I can still see your bridge of legs shaking when
you stood there and tried to expound on the gospel. But we will do what God tells
us to do, and from that I run. I run to the mines trying to
get away from it. Jonah, he ran. He got on a ship,
but he come back. He didn't come back the way he
went either. And then, the Gospel, I'm going
to tell you something. You can know all truths. All
truths. And if it's not expounded on, in loneliness and meekness with
long-suffering for bearing one another in love that you're blowing
in the wind. That's what you're doing. I don't
care how much truth you know. If you do not love people in lowliness and meekness with
long-suffering. This right here was the hardest
thing there was for me to learn. Because I was bull-headed, I
was self-sufficient in my own earthly way, fleshly way, but
we must be lowly and meek. We must be humble. If we're not
humble, God can't use us. And He will not sanction a person,
I don't care how good a speaker he is, how much the Bible he knows, if it's not
done in lowness and meekness, with long-suffering, with humility,
it is of no value whatsoever. And then it says, for bearing
one another in love. Love. I know we don't love like
we should. But I'm going to tell you something.
We've been born of the Spirit of God. The love of God lives
within us through the Holy Spirit. Even though our flesh, there's
no goodness in our flesh. There's no righteousness in our
flesh. We still have the greatest Spirit that there is living in
our body. And it teaches us all things.
That's what it teaches. It teaches us all things. I'm
not going to get into that because it's later on in the sermon. But we must be humble. We must
love one another. And to love one another, we must
make sacrifices for one another. That's what love is. Look at
the sacrifice Christ made for us because He loved us. He died
for us on Calvary's tree. He paid our sin debt in full,
past, present, future. Because He loved us and chose
us before the foundation of the world. What a love that is! There's
no greater love that any man can do than to give his life
for a friend or a brother. He gave His life for us that
we might have life. eternal life in Christ Jesus. We're endeavored to keep the unity of the Spirit
in the bounds of peace. You know, in order to keep the
unity, we have to swallow pride. We must have to grieve a lot
of times with someone that we don't agree with. We must walk away. The hardest thing for me in loneliness
and meekness and to really endeavor to keep the unity was to walk
away. But God taught me how to walk
away. It took forever. And He liked to beat me to death
doing it. Because when my ministry was in the hardest hearts of
men that I ever experienced. That's a coal miner. They got
the filthiest mouth. Their mind is never on heaven
and heavenly things. Even though, oh yeah, I'm a Christian. I've had them show me baptismal
certificates they carry in their wallet. You know? This entitles
me to heaven. They didn't even know what the
gospel was. They didn't know that the gospel
had to be administered by the Holy Spirit. See, God declared
it, Jesus Christ paid for it, and the Holy Spirit administers
to the hearts of man. They didn't even know who the
Holy Spirit was. They talked me into going to Bradshaw one
time. If you know where Bradshaw is.
Some boys had a singing group in the shop where I work. They begged me, oh you've got
to come down. These people don't know what preaching is. So I
agreed to go for two nights. And it was an apostolic church.
They had the E&C. the big crosses, they had the
robes. I was supposed to be in there
two nights. I ended up being there two weeks.
And the first two I baptized was the preacher and his wife.
I'd like to go back down and see if any of them are still
Christians. Whether I saved them or God saved them, you know.
He had asked Henry one time, he said, Henry, do you believe
in eternal security? He said, He said it depends on
who saves you. I never will forget that. He
said it depends on who saves you. But we must endeavor to keep
the unity in the church. Don't be a gospel. The one that's
the weakest That's the one you care and become the meekest towards. The child in Christ. That He
might grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. You're
not allowing to know if you don't have a humble spirit toward Him.
You're stunting His growth. I can't explain it no more. We're
stunting His growth. I've seen it. I've seen young
Christians say, well, if that's the way it is to be an adult
Christian, I don't want to be one. I've heard them make that
statement. And I've seen... Sandy said,
she said, I've never been thrown out of a church until I married
you. She said, I've turned around and got thrown out of a church
now. I said, that's what happens when you preach the gospel. Long suffering means to bear
patiently the faults and infirmities of others. Not quick to anger. Don't be offended by misunderstanding. That's Satan's delight. He can
take and he'll use church members to turn your words around something
that is plumb out of context. and destroy your witness to one
of your brothers and sisters in Christ. He delights in that. He does. In Galatians 6 it tells us we're
our brother's keeper. 6th chapter and the first five
verses. Listen to it. Like I said, we will probably
not get through this, but if the Lord's will, we'll finish
it some other time. Brethren, if a man be overtaken
in a fault, you which are spiritually restored, such as one in the
spirit of meekness, considering thyself least, thou also be tempted. bear you one another's burdens,
and so fulfill the law of Christ." Not the law of Moses, the law
of Christ. Christ's law is the law of love. But let every man prove his own
work, and then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone and
not in another. For every man should bear his
own burden. If we don't think of enough of
our brethren, to help him bear his burdens or help him grow
in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're
not a friend. There's something wrong somewhere. But we're to love one another
in meekness, in lowness of mind, for bearing one another in oneness. You know, I pointed out one spirit,
one body, that's oneness. That's oneness. We have that
within us, that oneness that's given to us by Christ through
the new birth. He paid that debt for us that
we can become one. in unity, in long-suffering,
in forbearing one another. That's why fellowship is so important. That's why we must assemble ourselves
with the brethren. That's what it's for. For growth,
the Christian growth. The more we grow in Christ, the
sweeter our salvation gets. It gets so sweet, you know, Sometimes I just can't stand,
I have to get up and walk around the house and think about what
God's really done for me. I've got up in the middle of
the night to be working on a sermon and I just couldn't get it. Get up and walk around the house
two or three times and hit me. I'd come back and finish it.
It's the only one in the world I'd be in. There's nothing that pleases
God and pleases you as a born again Christian than to grow
in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we
can see our brother growing, our brothers and sisters growing.
We can see them walking away when there's trouble stirred
in the church. And there will be trouble stirred
up in the church. Satan, he delights in that. That's one of his specialties. My dad said, if you want to know
where Satan's at, look at the front row. That's not to say
anything about you, Joe. But anyhow, he said, look at
the front row. He said, those, you know, have
been meetings, you know, and the front rows would be full
of preachers, you know. And he said, look at the front
row. You can find Satan somewhere there. And I guess he was right,
you know. But we are to forbear one another
in love and keep unity in the Spirit in the bonds of peace.
If you want to read about love, go to the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians. It tells you how to love. What
love costs you. And it does cost you. That's like the... What was the man that walked
away from the guy that had been robbed and in a ditch? He walked
on the other side of the road and said he'd pray for him. Let
me tell you something, you better do more than pray for him. If
you love him, you'll do more than pray for him. You'll pick
him up, you'll bound his wounds, you'll take him and you will
pay his debt to society to be healed. That's what love is. The oneness in unity even is
to surrender my rights and opinions to protect and preserve that,
that's oneness. Accepting truth. except in truth. You do not compromise. I don't care who it is, where
it's at, you can do it in a meek way, but you do not compromise
the Scriptures. That's blaspheme. That's what
it is. Blaspheme against the Holy Ghost. We cannot compromise the truth
because Jesus Christ is all truth and He's all grace. Everything
that we have or everything that we ever will have was paid for
him on Calvary's tree. I'm going to cut it off there.
The next time, if God wills, the next time I speak, we'll
speak on those seven unities that we all profess. Every one of us profess these
and study them. We're a member of that one body.
We're a member of that one spirit. We're a member of the one hope. We all have the same hope. And
let me tell you something, the hope that's given to you when
you're saved, it will come to pass because God said it would. He cannot lie. He cannot lie. It will come to pass. It doesn't
might about it. I get in my truck, I turn the
key, I expected to start. But I had to buy a battery here
a while back and it didn't. It started for four years. That's worldly hope. Godly hope. It must come to pass
because He said it. There's no ifs, ands, and buts
about it. God cannot lie. He spoke worlds
into existence that you know good and well He's able to take
care of us. He's the great I Am and you know
He can take care of us. Even the winds obey His command. The waters obey His command. Everything that He ever touched
and created must obey His command because He is God. And He's Jesus
Christ our Lord. A deacon told me one time when
I was a young Christian, he said, when you get to heaven, how many
are you going to see? You know, I hadn't thought about that.
He said, you're going to see one. He said, He's three in one,
just like you have a body, soul, and spirit. He's going to be
sitting on that throne and He's going to be God the Father, God
the Son, and God the Holy Spirit all bound in one. Because He is Almighty God. Our
Father, we thank You for the time You've given us. We thank
You for the love that You showed us in saving us. We thank You
for our salvation. We ask that as Joe stands before
us, speak through him, that he might become and teach the riches
of Jesus Christ our Lord. Heavenly Father, bless Walter,
wherever he's speaking at today. Father, keep us safe and bring
us back at the appointed time. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.