In Psalm 133 we read the following. Behold how good and how pleasant
it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. It is like the precious
ointment upon the head that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's
beard, that went down to the skirts of his garments. as the
dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains
of Zion. For there the Lord commanded
the blessing, even life forevermore. Behold how good and how pleasant
it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. And yet how rare a thing this
seems to be. How rarely we see many of the
Brethren dwelling together in unity. How rarely we see the
professing Church of Jesus Christ in our day dwelling together
in unity. Those who profess Christ's name
throughout the world are divided into many, many different churches
denominations, groups and parties all of which claim to be followers
of Christ but all of which differ in practice and in profession
on so many different points. To take this in its widest sense
of course we have The Catholic Church on one hand with its various
views and practices and we have Protestantism on the other hand.
Protestantism is divided into many different groups. Baptists,
Presbyterians, Methodists, Brethren, Independent Evangelicals. Many, many different groups.
and they all differ on so many different points and what's obvious
not just to those in their midst but to the world outside is that
there's no unity. When the world outside looks
upon these churches they say well why are there so many different
churches and how do I know which one is right and why is there
no unity amongst them? And where various ones begin
to question life and the meaning of life and eternal things and
they begin to seek out the truth of the Bible, they're bewildered
at which church or which group to attend in order to discover
the truth of it. So they go along perhaps by invite
from some friend of theirs or some contact they go along to
this place and they hear various things and they read their Bible
and they don't always find everything they see in practice found in
the Bible and perhaps they wonder about this church and they think
well what about the other one and they go across to the other
group and they find these differences And then they begin to wonder
about that so they go to somewhere else. And they even find differences
in the Bibles used. One group uses this translation,
another group uses that translation. And they find various differences
in the translations. And it's all confusion, it's
all division. There's no unity. And what is true amongst the
professing churches, is also true amongst those perhaps scattered
among them or scattered outside of them who come to know the
truth of the gospel. They're so scattered and they're
so divided. Even those that know the truth
so often are divided one from the other. And there are many
reasons for the division. But what is evident from all
of it is that it's a rare thing to come amongst a people and
a gathering and to see amongst them that spirit of unity and
joy in their hearts in the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And to be able to look upon them as David looked when he saw people
gathered in this way and to say, behold, how good and how pleasant
it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. Where is the unity? Where is
the striving for the unity? How can it be found? On what
is it grounded? So much of what we see in religion,
professing religion, is the striving and the influence in the thinking
of man. Men strive to form their groups,
their organizations, their churches. They strive to bring a unity
amongst the people who follow. But is it that unity of which
David speaks in this psalm? And is that people united in
the Gospel of Jesus Christ? And are they of one mind in the
Spirit of God? For unless the Gospel gathered
the people. Unless the gospel has saved the
people Unless God Himself has caused that people to be born
again by His Spirit, and has brought them into the truth,
and has wrought a great change in their hearts, quickened them
to life, they who were once dead. Unless He has taken those who
are dead in trespasses and sins, corrupt by nature, blind to the
truth, opposed to the truth, unless he has taken them and
sounded the alarm of his gospel in their heart, unless he has
sounded the alarm of wrath to come and judgment against their
sins, and brought them into true conviction, unless he's brought
them to their knees to cry out unto him the true and the living
God to have mercy upon them, unless he's opened their eyes
by his Spirit to see their state and to cry out to God to deliver
them from it and unless he's poured out by his Spirit grace
in their heart and brought them into newness of life and caused
their gaze to be set upon his Son the Lord Jesus Christ. unless
He's brought them to believe on Christ and Him crucified,
to look upon the bloodshed for them, to see their sins washed
away by that blood, to see righteousness wrought upon the cross, to see
the righteousness of God made theirs in Christ. Unless He's
brought them to the truth and the sound of the truth and put
faith in their hearts to cry out and to believe upon it, Unless
he's done the work, there will be no unity. For everything stands
in the flesh, in man's wisdom, in man's intellect, in man's
will, in man's strength. And whenever it's in the flesh,
you'll have one arguing for this, another arguing for that, one
going after this way and another going that way. and always at
war, one with another. No unity. Unity begins and ends
with God and His gospel. Unity is in Christ and Christ
alone. And it's in Christ and Christ
alone in His people who have been gathered and separated under
Him, gathered by grace. that they are gathered as a people
united and knit in Christ alone, of whom it can be said, Behold,
how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together
in unity. It is like the precious ointment
upon the head that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard,
that went down to the skirts of his garments, as the dew of
Hermon and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion for
there the Lord commanded the blessing even life forevermore. There's your ground of unity
the Lord's command When the Lord in heaven above commands a blessing,
when he looks upon sinners lost in sin and says of each one,
that one will live, then they live. And when he gathers them
into the gathering of the saints and builds up Zion as one people
in Christ at his command, Then it is like the precious ointment
upon the head that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard.
The blessing comes down from above. It's poured down. It comes down like ointment.
It pours down upon the head and flows down upon the garments
to the ground. God's commands he pours down
his blessing in the gospel and it pours down from Christ the
head above upon his body upon his people and flows down across
all his people united in him from the greatest to the least
from the head down to the toes it pours down it is not created
by man It is not wrought by man, it is not sent upwards, it comes
down from heaven above. It comes from Christ and Christ
alone. It comes by His gospel. It is
at His command. His command. For there in Zion,
in His church, in His body, in that people alone, the Lord commanded
the blessing. even life forevermore. Oh what
a blessing and oh what a blessing it is to be gathered amongst
that people and to know that you are amongst that people even
if you are not gathered with them physically even if you know
your unity with them as being that which is united with Christ
in heaven above in his truth even if you're one or two here
and there are one or two elsewhere when you know that you are in
him when you know that he has wrought the work when you know
that he has opened your eyes when you know that he has been
the one who's changed you and it wasn't something you sought
it wasn't something you did it wasn't because you wrought it
out you worked it out in the scriptures it wasn't your wisdom
that brought this knowledge to you it was God who opened your
eyes when you know it's his work and his grace there's a joy and
there's a certainty there's a hope there's a joy to know that Christ
has saved you that he has done it that you are not following
cunningly devised fables that you've not embraced something
in your head but there's a reality reality and you know it's real
because God opened your eyes and you know it came from outside
of yourself you've experienced it you've tasted it you've tasted
that the Lord is good you know it you know it and it's that knowledge it's
that common experience, it's that common experience of God's
grace, his life, his command of blessing which unites the
children of God and where there isn't that experience or where
the influence of the flesh is allowed to come in, and to come
in amongst the people of God, and to come in with those who
are yet in the flesh, where the flesh comes in and wars against
the work of the Spirit. That's when you see the division,
the falling out, the disagreements, the separation, the strife, the
anguish, the scattering. Well today we see plenty of the
latter. Today when we look upon the churches, or when we look
upon professing believers, when we look upon those who according
to their profession would be our brethren, our sisters in
the Lord, when we look upon so many, we see so much strife,
so much envy, so much division, so much separation, In the epistle
of Jude, in the epistle of Jude, a short epistle near the end
of the Bible, we read something of this. We read something of
those who come into the church, those who were gathered with
the congregations who do not believe. We read the examples
that Jude gives. of Israel delivered out of Egypt
and of those who were delivered with them, they were gathered
with them, they were in the congregation, yet they did not believe and
they were destroyed. We read of the angels who left
their first estate, angels with other angels, yet they fell and
they are reserved in darkness unto the judgment of the great
day. We read of Sodom and Gomorrah and how this city departed from
the ways of God and was judged. And we read of those, those men,
those men who come into the congregations of the saints, who mix with believers,
who mix in the church, and yet have no experience of the Spirit
of God and of God's grace in their hearts. And they act so
spiritual, and they lead others and they teach them that they
should go this way and that way but their influence only brings
in strife and division and warfare enmity even though they profess
such great things it's a sobering epistle The description
of these people that Jude gives is extremely strong. And yet behind their mask they
are indeed evil. Warranting the condemnation which
Jude gives them. But the trouble with them is
that the mask they wear is so similar to the appearance of
a child of God. And this is why their effect
in the church is so destructive. Because they know so much of
the truth. So much of the scriptures. They
can speak so many great things. Both of the truth, the doctrine
and of the experience of believers. They are so impressive that so
many are easily persuaded of them. And the only way to discern
them is when the truth is constantly preached and maintained and contended
for. And when the grace and the love
of God is evidenced amongst the true saints of God, such that
these who come in no longer wish to be with them. Jude opens with
these words, Jude the servant of Jesus Christ and brother of
James to them that are sanctified by God the Father and preserved
in Jesus Christ and called. Mercy unto you and peace and
love be multiplied. Beloved, when I gave all diligence
to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for
me to write unto you and exhort you that ye should earnestly
contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.
Jude writes to these people. He wants to see mercy, peace,
and love multiplied amongst them. He writes to them of their common
salvation, their unity in Christ. They're all alike, children of
wrath even as others, but children of wrath upon whom God's grace
had been set. Those who were lost in sin, who
were awakened by the Spirit of God, who arrested them in their
path and woke them up and pointed them unto the blood of Christ.
Those who came to know in their darkness and blindness that God
loved them. from before the foundation of
this world. That before ever they were born,
God's love was set upon them. That before ever they did a single
deed, God purposed to save them. That salvation is at the command
of God. That salvation is by the grace
of God. That salvation is by Christ alone. They had a common salvation.
But Jude had to exhort them that they should stand in it, that
they should earnestly contend for the faith which was once
delivered unto the saints. Because that faith and that gospel
and that truth which they experienced, that reality that their salvation
had nothing to do with their own will, or their own works,
or their own efforts, or any merit in them. that they were
not saved because God liked them because they did this or they
did that or because they were born in this nation or because
they were of this natural character or because they worked harder
than others or because they were wiser than others or because
they were more devout than others but that their salvation was
at God's command by grace. Because that truth is so greatly
opposed, Jude said stand for it. if you don't earnestly contend
for these things if you don't constantly preach these things
if you're not ever mindful of your experience of these things
if you don't keep in a humble state if you don't walk ever
mindful that you are nothing but one whom God has saved by
grace if you ever rise up in your own wisdom or strength and
begin to think you're something by yourself outside of Christ
then all that's going to happen is that the certain men that
creep in unawares amongst you will bring you into condemnation
they will scatter you they will divide you they will bring in
nothing but trouble preach the truth and those men will separate
themselves. You won't need to examine your
congregation and analyze and try to look into the hearts of
each one amongst you and try to work out which are true and
which are false. You won't need to devise tests
by which your congregation can prove that they are genuine believers. You won't need to devise those
systems of membership and those constitutions for your gatherings
and those confessions of faith and those points upon which everybody
must tick every box in order to maintain the truth and to
root out error. You won't need to resort to the
wisdom and the pragmatic influence of man to maintain unity. No, if you contend for the faith,
if you simply preach the truth the truth will have its effect. The truth will unite you and
it will divide those that oppose it from your midst. Because having described these
that come in, these that creep into the congregations, these
that are so much trouble, these that are spots in their feasts
of charity, these that feed themselves without fear, these that are
clouds without water, carried about of winds, trees whose fruit
wither if without fruit, twice dead plucked up by the roots,
having described these people and the judgment that will ultimately
come upon them. Jude says towards the end of
this letter, Beloved, remember ye the words which were spoken
before of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ, how that they
told you there should be mockers in the last time, who should
walk after their own ungodly lusts. These be they who separate
themselves. Sensual, having not the spirit,
But ye, beloved, building up yourselves in your most holy
faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, keep yourselves in the love of
God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal
life. He describes these, these same
people of whom he's been speaking earlier. These murmurers, complainers,
those that walk after their own lusts, those that speak great
swelling words, have immense persons in admiration because
of advances. These people he describes here
as those that come up in the last times, mockers, those who
separate themselves, sensual, having not the spirit. And the description here could
lead us to think that he's thinking, that he's speaking of those in
the world, those who have no time at all for religion, those
who mock the very idea that there is a God, that there is heaven,
that there is judgment to come, that there is salvation to be
found through Jesus Christ, these in the world who mock and of
course these words can be applied to them. But really Jude here
is speaking of those who are in the congregations. Those who
have crept in amongst the people of God. Those who appear spiritual. They speak great swelling words,
have immense persons in admiration. they have a lot to say regarding
the things of God they sound very spiritual and yet ultimately they don't
have the spirit and ultimately therefore what they are influenced
by is their own flesh therefore they are sensual and ultimately
it is they who separate themselves Jew does not say cast them out. But they will be seen, they will
be evidence when the gospel, when the faith is earnestly contended
for, they will be evidenced as those who separate themselves. At one time they come into the
midst of the congregation. But then they will murmur. They
will complain. They will find fault. They will
say, but you're not right on this. And what about that? And they will seem to take the
spiritual high ground. And they will say, but we should
be separate. Come out from among them and
be ye separate, says the word of God. And they'll find this,
that, and the other upon which we should divide and having divided
from that which is obviously wrong they will then come along
and say but we should divide because of this also we should
leave that and we should follow this and they're constantly exhorting
those that hear them to separate to separate from this to separate
from that And they sound so right, so beguiling,
so spiritual. And yet the reality is they would
separate believer from believer. They would separate from those
whom God has said his love upon. They would separate from those
whom Christ has purchased with his own blood. And though it
is no doubt right, and they take that which is right and add in
error to it in order to beguile, though it is right for the believer
to be separate from the world, and though it is right for us
to separate and divide from error and unite in the truth, it is
not right to divide from those who love Christ. It is not right
to endlessly divide and divide until there's nothing left. These
separated themselves. They brought schism into the
body, they brought division. And of all the sins which we
see described in the New Testament, division and schism in the body
is one of those great troubles which Paul the Apostle preaches
against. It came in at the church in Corinth. He said this, I heard that there'd
be divisions among you and I partly believe it. He writes to them
that there should be no schism in the body, no division. He
finds a people who were disunited, Though they were a people who
had common experience of the gospel. Though at one time this
congregation had heard the gospel and there was a number there
who were saved. It had reached the point where
the congregation had grown and the divisions came in. And some
would say, I am of Paul. I received Paul when he came
here and preached. I believe and follow him, but
I'm not sure of Apollos, who we have here now. And I'm not
sure of Cephas. I know Paul is true because he
was an apostle, but these aren't. But someone else says, well,
I don't know Paul. I never met him. I wasn't here
when he came. But I love Apollos' preaching.
And another one says, well, I love Cephas' preaching. I don't get
on with Apollos there's something about the way Apollos speaks
I'm not sure about and though in their hearts they might have
desired all of them to be following the truth ultimately there's
a division there's a following of man and then there's an emphasis
upon this thing and upon that thing and to one one might be
taken up with this particular doctrine One might say that what
we must hear about is particular atonement and rightly so but
that's all they speak about. One might say that we should
be looking for the coming of the Lord Jesus and they shut
their ears to the teaching of anything else in the gospel and
simply wait. One might say something else
and they're all following truths. Yet they're all divided. And
others in the midst say this is wrong that you follow after
man and they take the spiritual high ground and say I'm of Christ.
I don't follow man at all. I think it's very dangerous to
follow men. Very dangerous to follow preachers.
I just pick up my Bible and I read it and I hear Christ. You have
to be careful of preaching. The trouble with preaching is
it exalts the preacher. And they turn from the preacher
and take the spiritual high ground of following Christ alone. And
this sounds very spiritual and very beguiling. Yet it's not
of God. Because when God sends the preacher,
Christ preaches through that preacher. if you follow Christ
you receive the preacher whom Christ sends to you to preach
his gospel and to turn your back on those whom Christ sends is
to turn your back on Christ himself whatever you may say. You're
following Christ alone when you say I only follow Christ I will
rather pick up the scriptures than hear a man is to follow
yourself as the preacher and to follow your own wisdom and
intellect upon the word of God rather than receive the preaching
that comes through the one whom God has sent that you should
hear. These attitudes sound so spiritual
And I'm emphasizing it strongly to try to get across how these
things come across in practice for this is exactly how it comes
across. Those who will speak spiritually
will take a truth and magnify it to the point that it becomes
an error. It is true that salvation is by God alone. It is true that
it has nothing to do with man. Yet it is also true that God
is pleased by the foolishness of preaching to save them that
believe. It is also true that God calls
and sends preachers to preach to his people that they should
believe and that they should be built up in the faith. And
to receive and follow those preachers is not to follow man. And Paul
makes this clear in this epistle. Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified
for you? Or were you baptized in the name
of Paul? I thank God I baptized none of
you but Crispus and Gaius, lest any should say that I had baptized
in mine own name. This is not me. I came not with
my own words, I came with the gospel. For Christ sent me not
to baptize, but to preach the gospel. when you follow me you're
not following me you're hearing the gospel not with wisdom of
words not with my wisdom not with my intellect i didn't come
with my wisdom lest the cross of christ should be made of none
effect for the preaching of the cross is to them that perish
foolishness they say that's man's words that's preaching that's
listening to a man and they say it's foolishness you can't go
that way you need to follow christ alone But it is not. But unto us which are saved it
is the power of God, the preaching of the cross, by those whom God
sends. We receive them, we hear them,
not to hear a man, not to follow a man, but to hear Christ and
to follow him. For it is written, I will destroy
the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding
of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the
scribe? Where is the disputer of this
world? Have not God made foolish the
wisdom of this world? For after that, in the wisdom
of God, the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the
foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. by preaching. And yet here at Corinth they
had divided following one man and following another they'd
followed the man. When they should have received
the gospel the message he brought and followed Christ that he made
known. The unity is in the cross in
the message and in the one who speaks it by his spirit. Later
in the same epistle Paul says be ye followers of me. even as I also am of Christ. Now that's a remarkable statement
to say to follow me in the light of the fact that many would say
don't follow man don't follow a preacher you're following man
that's not sovereign grace that's not God alone that's man yet
Paul says it's not follow me because I follow Christ and follow
me as I follow Christ when I don't follow him throw it aside if
I say something you can't find in the scriptures that is not
in accord with the gospel reject it when I speak out of my flesh
throw it to one side do but hear me as one whom Christ has sent
and hear the Spirit of God speaking through me and follow me as I
follow Christ what I say which is true, follow it, follow it,
don't be divided. Paul often exhorts for unity,
unity, unity in the Spirit, unity in the truth. He does not endlessly
teach the people to divide. He says stand for truth divide
from error but he does not tell them to keep casting out this
man or don't go after that man because he knows that in all
of us there's the flesh and in every man there are errors and
in every man there are failings and we are to look for that in
each believer which is of Christ and we are to look past the faults
and the failings and the errors of our brethren who are full
of errors as we are ourselves look past them for that evidence
of the root of the spirit within them of the root of the truth
Look for those who are of Christ. Look for unity. Speak the truth
in love. Seek peace. There should be no
schism in the body. Don't seek to divide the tares
from the wheat yourself. It's God's work. He will do it. He will separate. He will send
the fires. He will send the trials which
will sort out. He will bring the things to pass
that divide those who are of Him from those who are of the
devil. It's not your work. Your work
is to stand for the truth. not your work, it's God's work. He will preach his gospel in
your midst and that is what unites and that's what separates from
error. These who separated themselves
of which Jude speaks were like the Pharisees, very spiritual,
very pious, very zealous for spiritual things, very very knowledgeable. more knowledgeable than many
of those who might have been gathered in these congregations,
able to deceive, able to impress, able to impress the simple with
their great swelling words and yet ultimately carnal by nature,
speaking of the flesh, bringing the flesh into spiritual things.
Oh they could see every error and cast out every heretic, Oh
they said of all these others don't stand by me I'm holier
than thou. Oh they stand firmly for this
and for that but ultimately they separated themselves not just
from the world but from the people of God. Ultimately when the truth
was maintained they would not unite with those that truly loved
it. They say they cannot fellowship
with these anymore. They can't fellowship with them. And they go their own way. They weren't spiritual. They
were sensual of the flesh. They separated thinking they
were spiritual. They served God they thought.
And yet they served themselves. Paul speaks of separation in
various places. But he says of himself in Galatians
that God separated him unto the gospel. It wasn't his work. He didn't do it. God took him,
he who was so spiritual as a Pharisee, he who was so zealous that his
zeal caused him to persecute the church and to slay those
who were true. He was so zealous that the separating
of Paul came not at his hand, but at God's. God took him. God
stopped him. And God sent him to the church
to be united with them and to unite them in the truth. It's God's work. It's all God's
work. It begins with God. It ends with
God. Men try to do this work, they
try to do what God does. They try to keep the churches
united. They unite around forms, around
systems, around denominations and parties and creeds and confessions. They unite around teachers and
preachers. But they always stop short of
the true uniting around the gospel and Christ alone. Because whenever
they strive to keep the unity, it's in man's strength and man's
wisdom. And however right the words they
dream up for the confessions, and however right their motives
and desires are to keep out the error and keep in the truth,
ultimately it becomes of the flesh. And true believers are
kept outside, and tares are kept inside. It's the spirit's work. It's God's work. He commands
the blessing. How good and how pleasant it
is for brethren to dwell together in unity. How good. The unity
is in the Spirit, as Ephesians says, endeavouring to keep the
unity of the Spirit in peace. There's no unity where there
is not the Spirit of God in the hearts of that people. We must
be born again. It must be real. And there's
no unity where the work of the Spirit in the midst of the people
is set aside and where the wisdom of man and the intellect of man
takes the fore. where the intellect of man in
the scriptures and in teaching and expounded on them is brought
to the fore, where preachers are raised up who are trained
in college and not trained at the feet of Jesus Christ. When
man's wisdom comes in, the spirit is set aside, but unity is in
the spirit. The ground of unity is in the
truth of the gospel, the gospel alone. And it's when that gospel
is preached demanded and not compromised and contended for
earnestly that error is kept aside. And you'll not find that
gospel encapsulated in confessions of man. We have the scriptures
God kept and compiled the scriptures, his perfect confession of faith
for his people. And God continues to send to
this day those preachers whom he sends, who preach by the spirit
of God, to open up the scriptures unto his people, to take that
bread of heaven and to break it and to feed them. And by so
feeding, they are rooted and grounded in the truth and no
other way. unity is in the gospel by the
spirit with the body of Christ his people alone now wherever
the body of Christ is gathered there will be tares gathered
amongst the wheat but it's not for us to cast them out God will
do that and ultimately when you stress and when you preach this
grace of this gospel they separate themselves they leave they go
They will not gather, they will not join. There's always something
they find to contend with, always something they find that is not
right in that place where the gospel's preached. You may say
to them, but isn't the gospel there? Oh yes, he preaches a
good word, but I don't agree with this and I don't agree with
that. They find some reason to keep aside. When the reality
is, they war against the gospel. the gospel that wondrous gospel
by which God saves that wondrous gospel by which he's taken a
people from out of this world of darkness and brought them
into that into the light that wondrous gospel by which he builds
his church as a pool of light in the world of darkness united
in Christ, that wondrous gospel upon which, through which God
has set his love upon a people who once hated him, that wondrous
gospel that brings life. As Jude says, keep yourselves
in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ
unto eternal life. Here's the Gospel, here's the
answer to all division and strife and enmity in the church, here's
what brings the unity. The love of God, the mercy of
our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. Mercy, grace, the love
of God, the love of Christ for his own. This is what builds
the church, this is what keeps it. This is what roots his people
in love, one for another and for Christ. This gospel, this
love brings peace, reconciliation. Reconciliation. It brought peace
and reconciliation between God and a people who once hated him.
A people who were once ungodly. A people who are once sinners.
A people full of hatred for God and his people. A people like
you and me. Those who are undeserving. Those
who are evil by nature. those who are fleshly, those
who deserve to be cast out and rejected, those who deserve to
have no part or lot with the people of God, those who have
no place in his church. Those upon whom the Pharisees
would look and despise them as sinners and say unto God I thank
thee Lord that I'm not as this one a sinner. Those upon whom
they'd cry out stand not by me I'm holier than thou. Those whom
men cast out of their churches, men cast outside of the camp
as Christ was cast outside of the camp of the Jews. and taken
outside the city to Golgotha, the place of the skull. and nailed
to the cross, and lifted up as the one who claimed to be the
Son of God, upon whom the religious cried out, we will not have him,
we will not serve him, away with him, crucify him, crucify him. The religious cast him out, and
they cast out every child of God that follows. Yet Christ
receiveth sinners. Christ loves sinners, Christ
loves his own, Christ stands with grace and love for his own. And all those cast out by the
religious, by those who have the great swelling words, the
popularity of men in the churches, those who are separate, those
who are so spiritual, yet of whom God describes as being so
sensual, these cast them out. but Christ receives them. Is
that you? Were you one of these cast out
by the world, cast out by the world's religion, cast out by
these who appear so spiritual? Do you know you're nothing? So
poor, so weak, so lacking in knowledge. you come across these
that can discuss the scriptures and can debate about this and
that that can discuss eschatology, theology all these points and
they can bewilder you and you haven't an answer for them and
they seem so right and you seem so bewildered and yet you know
in your heart that you are nothing and you know nothing You can
do nothing, you can think nothing, yet you know that Christ loves
you. You know that his grace and his
mercy has been set upon you. You know that Christ's blood
has washed you. And you know that He has received
you. Yes, Christ receiveth sinners. Have you been received by Him?
Has He led you to Him? Has He sent His gospel to your
ears? Has He commanded the blessing that gathered you in? Has He
drawn you unto Himself? As one who knows and feels to
be nothing, feels to be an undeserving recipient of grace, has He gathered
you with His people of nothings? As that people that hopeless,
helpless people, blind, dark, weak, helpless nothings whom
he gathered, whom he unites in his gospel, whom he loved, whom
he took and washed with his blood, whom he set upon a high place,
he picked them up as beggars off a dunghill and clothed them
again as princes. Are you one of them? One of them? One who has nothing to place
yourself above anyone else. One who has no reason to divide
from any of these others so saved. Because you know it's by grace.
You know it's by Christ. You know He did all the work.
And is Christ divided? No. Then how can His people be? How can a people so saved be
divided? a people purchased by His blood,
sanctified, set apart for Him, set apart to be holy, separated
under God, whom He took, whom He separated, whom He chose. If you're His, then you know
it, and you know that He's done the work, and you love Him, and
you love His people, and you love to be gathered with them.
And when you see a people so gathered, a people so saved,
a people who love Christ because he first loved them, a people
melted by his grace, melted by his mercy, melted by his compassion,
wondering that he could love them who were so evil, so corrupt,
so unthankful. so raging against his truth,
so melted by his love, when you see a people like that, a broken
people, a contrite people, a people who have known his grace, when
you see them gathered and united under this gospel, you will cry
out with David, behold, behold, how good and how pleasant it
is for brethren to dwell together in unity.