If he's in chapter 4, and I want
to read these three verses to you. Paul had just exhorted us
here in verse 3 to labor, to strive, to endeavor, to keep
the unity of the Spirit and the bonds of peace. And now he's
going to give these seven things as an argument for peace. That may sound like a contradiction,
an argument for peace, an argument for unity, but that's what he
does. Seven ones. You and I have heard
so much about these. In verse 4, there is one body
and one spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling. There is one Lord. There is one
faith. There is one baptism. There is
one God who is the Father of all, who is above all and through
all and in you all. Now, all I want to do this evening
is turn you to some passages of Scripture on each one of these ones, and
we'll read it together. Concerning this one body, and
Paul gives us this One body as an argument for us to endeavor
to keep the unity of the Spirit. If you have many bodies, then
there's a reason and a cause for division. But this oneness
that you and I enjoy in Jesus Christ, in His salvation, in
His religion, in His kingdom, is a reason for unity. And He
begins here with saying that we're all in this one body. Now, I want you to turn with
1 Corinthians chapter 12, and I've turned here especially because
this is one of the most familiar Scriptures that teaches the church of the Lord Jesus
Christ that is just one body. These are so important, and you
and I may think that these things aren't important, but brothers
and sisters, heresy slips in. And heresy always causes division
in the church. One of the heresies today that
has slipped in is that there's more than one body. Now, I've
told you this different times, but still, there's a heresy,
and our day has taken root again, that there's two bodies. That
there's a Jewish body of believers, and there is a Gentile body of
believers. Well, if you've got that, then what do you have?
You have division, don't you? You have a cause of disunity.
But there's one body. Just one body. You may be a Jew,
or you may be a Gentile. You may be a woman, or you may
be a man. But if you're in this body, you
have unity. And you should have peace with
everybody else that's in Christ, Because they too are in this
one body. We're an individual church here.
We're a local independent church. But we're not independent of
other churches that are in Christ. I'm not just concerned with this
body of believers. We want unity with the whole
body of Christ, don't we? Because we're one with Him. Wherever
we find Him, wherever we meet Him, we're one with Him. And
that's what Paul is teaching us here in 1 Corinthians chapter
12. Let's begin here in verse 12. 1 Corinthians chapter 12, and look
in verse 12. As the body is one and has many
members, and all the members of that one body, being many,
are yet one body, and so also is Christ, the church of Christ,
the body of Christ. For by one Spirit are we all
baptized into one body. See this? Whether we be Jews
or whether we be Gentiles, whether we be bond or whether we be free,
and have been all made to drink unto one Spirit. For the body
is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say, Because
I am not the hand, I am not of the body, is it not of the body?
Of course it is of the body. If the ear shall say, Because
I am not the eye, I am not of the body. Is it therefore not
of the body? If the whole body were not an
eye, where is the hearing? If the whole is a hearing, where
is the smelling? But now hath God set the members,
every one of them, and the body is as it has pleased Him. And
if they were all one member, where were the body? But now
are they many members, yet but one body. And the eye cannot
say unto the hand, I have no need of thee, nor again the head
to the feet, I have no need of thee. Nay, much more those members
of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary. And those members of the body
which we think to be less honorable, upon these we bestow more abundant
honor. And our uncomely parts have more
abundant comeliness, for our comely parts have no need. But
God hath tempered the body together, having given more abundant honor
to that part that lacketh, that there should be no chisom. divisions in the body, but that
the members should have the same care one for another. And whether
one member suffer, all the members suffer with it. If one member
be honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now you are the body
of Christ and members in particular. And God has said, and remember
in verse 27, You are the body of Christ and members in particular. So how many bodies is there?
There's just one. There's just one. And I assure
you of this, this is the nature of the body. If my hand is hurting,
if I've injured this hand, my head is hurting. And this hand
is hurting. And this leg is hurting. And
this waist is hurting. Why? Because it's a member of
the body. And you and I being members of
Christ's body, whenever we see another member in trouble, we're
trouble with them, aren't we? If we see another member rejoicing,
we rejoice with them. Why? Because that's natural. And it's unnatural for this hand
to suffer and this hand to say, I just don't care. For this foot
to fall and injure itself, and this foot to say, don't affect
me, it does, doesn't it? Why? Because we're one body.
We're one body. And because we have this one
body, there's unity. Unity. Unity is a natural thing
with the children of God, when we realize we're one with everybody
else. We're not seeking cause to be
separated from each other. We're seeking cause to get along,
aren't we? Because we're one body. Just
one body. No such thing, then, as some tell us, that there's
a Jewish body and a Gentile body. One body. What's the second one? One spirit. There is one body
and one spirit. Somebody said, as we read these,
it will try to understand the order of these things. These
are put in some haphazard order. And when we see there's one body,
what comes next? Naturally, the Spirit. How do
we get in this body? By one Spirit. We're all baptized
into one body. There is one Holy Spirit. The Eternal, Sovereign, Holy
Spirit. The Spirit of God, the Spirit
of Christ. Just one. Look over here in Galatians. Just back over there to your
right from where you were. Galatians chapter 4. Look in Galatians chapter 4. Look in verse 4. Galatians chapter
4 and verse 4. Paul gave this as an argument
for our unity. There's one Spirit. You don't
have one Spirit and we have another. I don't know why, but as I'm getting
older, things bother me more. She's gone on out there. I don't
know why, but things used to didn't bother me, just bother
me now. I'm sorry. It's not you, it's me, okay?
Some things just bother me more. Look in verse 4. When the fullness
of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made
under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that
we might receive the adoption of sons. And because you are
sons, sons by new birth, you're born of God, God has sent forth
the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Father, Father. Now, I'm up here. And you're
down there, and there are some children of God down in Mexico,
up in Canada, over in Russia, out in California, but they all
have this one Spirit. God has sent forth the Spirit
of His Son into your hearts. Clarence, He's in your heart.
He's in my heart. Now, you and I can't be in two
places at one time. No angel can be in two places
at one time. Nobody is omnipresent but God. So here we have the second person
of the sacred trinity, and where is he? He's in everybody's heart
who believes. He's in every child of God's
heart. He's there to teach us. He convicts
us. He converts us. He reveals Christ
to us. He conquers us. He seals us. He teaches us. He abides with
us forever. But He's one Spirit. And if you
have the Spirit of Christ, and I have the Spirit of Christ,
then we have unity, don't we? He ain't going to teach you one
thing and teach me something else. That's contrary, is it?
One Spirit. One Spirit. Therefore, we've
got unity. Unity of Spirit. And what's the
next one? The next one He gives, number
three, is this. Before we leave that, I have
a Scripture wrote down here. Let me turn you over. to Acts
chapter 10. I wanted to say this because
it goes right back to this heresy that has come up in our day of
this business of the Jews are one body and the Gentiles are
another body. The Jews are saved one way and
the Gentiles are saved another way. And all of this stuff. That's
heresy, folks. That's heresy. Everybody is saved
the same way. I don't care what nationality
you are, what color you are. We're all saved by faith in Christ,
aren't we? By Christ. And we're this one body, and
we have the same Spirit, and we obtain this Spirit the same
way. By trusting in Christ. When you
believed, you were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise.
Now look here where Peter, the Jew, went down to the Gentiles.
Look how they received the Holy Spirit. Look what Peter says
about it. In Acts chapter 10, the Apostle Peter is going down
to preach to Cornelius and his household, the Gentiles. And
he is preaching Christ to them. Preaching Christ through him
forgiveness of sins. In verse 43, Peter is preaching
to him that Christ gave all the prophets witness that through
his name, Whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission
of sins. And whilst Peter yet spake these
words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard. And they
of the circumcision, the Jews, which believed, were astounded
as many which came down with Peter, because on the Gentiles
also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost." Why did they
say also? Because that's the same way Peter
had received Him. That's the same way these fellows
who had come down with Peter received Him. He was poured out
on them. And look in verse 46. For they heard him speak with
tongues, and magnify God. Then answered Peter, Can any
man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, seeing
they have received the Holy Ghost as well as we? When somebody comes up and says,
the Jews receive the Holy Spirit one way, the Gentiles another
way, don't believe what they're telling you. We receive the Holy
Spirit by the hearing of faith. That's the way He comes. And
by no other way. Look what He said in chapter
11. Look in verse 15. This is where Peter went back
up to Jerusalem and some of those Jews contended with him for going
and preaching to the Gentiles. And he rehearsed to them, and
he said in verse 15, as I began to preach, the Holy Ghost fell
on them as on us at the beginning. See that? Just the same as we. Then remembered I the word of
the Lord, how He said, John indeed baptized with water, but you
shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost. For as much then as God
gave them the like gift as He did unto us, who believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ, what was I, that I could withstand God?"
Peter said, I'm one with Him. I've got unity that these fellows.
And he used the Holy Spirit as an argument for that unity. They've got the same Spirit we
have. And Glenn, if you've got the Holy Spirit in your heart
and I've got Him in my heart, we've got unity, ain't we? We don't
agree on everything. We've got different manners of
life. We're from different cultures, but we have unity because He
has the Spirit and I have the Spirit. One Spirit. Just one
Spirit. What's the next one? Thirdly
is one hope. There's one Spirit, one body, one Spirit, and now
one hope. One hope. Just one hope. Every
child of God has one hope. He got that hope from the same
place everybody else got hope. And it's a good hope because
God gave it to you through grace. And that hope is one object. You know what the object of our
hope is. Turn over to 1 John. I hope you're marking these.
If anybody asks you what these ones mean, then you can read
these things to them. Look over to 1 John. One hope. What is that hope? I was reading
a message by Spurgeon the other day, and he's talking about the four connections that our souls
have to Christ. He said we're connected to Christ
in four stages, he said. Without Christ. That's where
we were. Without Christ. In Christ. With Christ. and like Christ. I like that, don't you? And what's
our hope? To be with Christ and to be like
Christ. That's our hope. One hope. Turns
out that's your hope. That's my hope. Look at what
John says. First John chapter 3 and look in verse 1. Behold
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us. that we
should be called the sons of God, therefore the world knows
us not, because it knew Him not. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God. It does not yet appear what we
shall be. But we know that when He shall
appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Every man that hath this hope
in him purifies himself. Even as Christ disappeared. One
hope. And what is it? To be with Christ. And that's your hope. And I tell
you, when you meet somebody, I don't care where he lives. I don't care what denomination
he has. He belongs to. If he can convince you that this
is his hope, you've got unity with that man, haven't you? You
can have peace with that man. One hope. Let me show you one
more Scripture on that. Look over in Romans chapter 8.
This puts to rest that silly notion that the Baptists are
going to be around the throne real close and all the rest is
going to be outside, you know. Now, we'll get over that. I read
him this Scripture. Look at this Scripture. Romans
chapter 8. Look here in verse 15. You've not received the spirit
of bondage again to fear. You've received the Spirit, that
one Spirit, of adoption. And you're crying, Father, Father.
The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we're children
of God. And if children, then heirs,
heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if so be that we
suffer with Him, look at it, that we may be also glorified
separately. Some more glorified than others.
Some closer than others. No. Together, ain't we? Together. Peter came to the Lord one day
and said, Lord, we've left all. We've left off for your name.
What are you going to give us more than you give others? The Lord
said, not a thing. Not a thing. I'm going to give
you a new body. I'm going to bring you home to
my Father's house just like I'm going to do for all my children.
You're going to be glorified together. You're going to be
caught up in the earth together. I love that, don't you? We're
going to heaven together. We're going to spend eternity
together. We can get along down here then, can't we? We can have
unity down here. We can forgive and forget and
be gracious. Glorified together. The next one, fourth one. One Lord. One body. One spirit. One hope. One Lord. Look in Luke chapter 2 with me. Luke chapter 2. This is so important. The Lord
Jesus was washing His disciples' feet one day, and He said, You
call Me, Lord, and You say, Well, for so I am. And that's what
we call Him in. There's just one Lord Jesus Christ. And who is He? Well, we can find
Him in the Scriptures. Look in Luke chapter 2 and verse
7. Mary brought forth her firstborn
son, wrapped him in swaddling clothes, laid him in a manger,
because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were
in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping
watch over their flock by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord
came upon them, the glory of the Lord shone round about them,
they were so afraid. And the angel said unto them,
Fear not, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy,
which shall be to all people all over the world at all periods
of time, Jew and Gentile, bond and free, male and female. For
unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior."
Who is He? Christ the Lord. He's the Lord. He's the Lord. There's one Lord. You and I only own one Lord. And who is He? He's the Lord
that came down from heaven and was born of a woman. He's the
only Lord there is. But you know He didn't start
there. And you and I don't believe He started there either. He was
in heaven. Glenn taught us this morning.
I come down from heaven. That's where He was. You remember
when Harry called the scribes and chief priests together and
said, Where is Christ going to be born? And they said, In Bethlehem
of Judea. For the prophet said, Out of
you, Bethlehem, shall come Him that is to rule my people Israel,
whose going forth is of old, from everlasting, from everlasting. There is one Lord. Who is He?
He's that Lord that was born of Mary, but He's that Lord that's
everlasting, the everlasting Lord. And He came! And where is He now? Peter was
preaching on the day of Pentecost, and he said, God has raised Him
from the dead, and declared Him to be Lord and Christ. He's in heaven, and He's Lord.
And Paul said, The Lord shall descend from heaven with a shout.
The Lord. He's our Lord. There's only one
Lord. You don't have one and I've got
another. Jesus is Lord. And He's one Lord. Just one Lord. Now if you believe, if you're
here this evening and you believe, and I doubt there's anybody here.
I hope there's nobody here. But if you're here and you believe
that Jesus Christ was a creature, that sometime around the foundation
of the world He was created, that's not the Lord. That's not
the Lord. We're talking about the only
Lord who is everlasting, who sovereignly reigns over this
universe. We're talking about Him that
is the God-Man, the Second Person of the Sacred Trinity. He's Lord.
We've got unity around Him, Elohim. One Lord. One Lord. And I think it's evident why
Paul gives this fifth one, one faith. There's one Lord and one
faith. And our faith is in that Lord.
Now what does this mean, one faith? And if you read the commentaries
on this, you'll find different opinions. But let me give you
what I think it is. One faith. I want you to take
your Bibles and turn with me to two or three passages. Look
first over in Romans chapter 10. Whatever this is, it has to be
something that would promote unity. This one faith, whatever
it is, it promotes unity among the church, the believers. And
here's what I think it is. I think it's that saving faith,
that justifying faith. It's that faith that lays hold
upon the Lord Jesus Christ from the heart, savingly. It brings the righteousness of
Jesus Christ to the heart. That's what I think this faith
is. Now look in Romans 10, and I'll show you why I say that.
Look in Romans 10, verse 5. Moses describes the righteousness
which is of the law, that the man which doeth those things
shall live by doing them. But the righteousness which is
of faith speaketh on this wise. Say not in your heart, who shall
ascend up into heaven? That is, who is going to go up
and bring Christ down from heaven? Or who shall ascend into the
deep, that is, to bring Christ up again from the dead? But what
saith it? The word is near you, even in
your mouth and in your heart, that is, the word of faith which
we preach. What is that? What is the faith
which we preach? Look in verse 9. This, if you
shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe
in your heart that God hath raised him from the dead, you shall
be saved. For with the heart man believeth
unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made
unto salvation. For the Scripture saith, Whosoever
believeth on him shall not be ashamed." It's saving faith. How are we saved? How are we
justified? Is it by doing something? Is it by works? Or is it by believing
in Christ? It's by believing in Christ.
Look in Romans chapter 4. Just right back over to your
left just a little bit. Look in Romans chapter 4. Look here in verse 1. What shall we say? That Abraham
our father is pertaining to the flesh as found. For if Abraham
were justified by works, he hath wore of the glory, but not before
God. For what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and it
was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that works is the
reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that
worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly,
his faith is counted for righteousness. Even as David describes the blessedness
of the man to whom God imputeth righteousness without works,
saying, Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven and whose
sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord will not impute sin. Look in verse 20. Abraham received
the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith
which he had, yet being uncircumcised. size. Abraham believed God. How are we justified? Martin Luther said this was the
church stands or falls right here on this doctrine. And I
believe it's so. Bunyan wrote messages on justification
by faith. Spurgeon preached several messages
on the righteousness of God which is by faith. One of the best
ways to confront a person, especially a religious person, is just this
way. You ask them if they believe
that God is absolutely holy. And all of them will probably
say, I believe that. And then say, are you sinful? Most people
will be ashamed to say, no, I'm not. Have you sinned? Then you're a sinner. Then say,
well, how can you, being a sinner, be just with God who is holy? And see what their answer. And
if it's any other way but this faith, then you can't have unity
with Him. Let me read you one more Scripture.
Turn over to this. I've got to read you this before
we go on. We'll go on quickly. Look in Galatians chapter 2.
Look in Galatians chapter 2, verse 16. Galatians 2, verse 16. This is
the faith, I think, that the Apostle Paul was speaking about.
The one faith that brings unity. You know, when you read the faith
in the Scriptures, the whole body of truth, this Bible, when
I hold this Bible up, I can say, here's the faith. It's a body
of truth. Ain't that right, Larry? Jews
said, earnestly contend for the faith. Here's the faith, this
body of truth. But you know, as we read this,
we don't always agree on this, do we? There's things that you've
got more light on than I have. So it can't be meaning this,
but when it comes to the faith that's saving and justifying,
that brings the righteousness of Christ, boy, we're in agreement
there, aren't we? And look here at what Paul said
in Galatians chapter 2, and this is what the book of Galatians
is written about. The whole book is about justifying
faith. Verse 16 of chapter 2, knowing,
knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but
by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we, we Jews, we apostles,
have believed in Jesus Christ that we might, or in order to
be, justified by the faith of Christ and not by the works of
the law, for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified
in his sight." What was the Reformation all about? When Luther came out
from Catholicism, what was that all about? They were saying you've
got to be justified by these ceremonies. There's more to it
than just faith. And Luther says, no, the just
shall live by faith. We believe Christ to be justified.
We believe Christ to be made righteous. And he says, I can't
stand to be around you fellows anymore. I'm out of here. And
he left them. And he wrote his book on Galatians. Justification by faith. Justification
by faith alone. And that's what brings unity
in. That's unity. And those who do not believe
that, we don't have any unity with them. We don't have unity
with Catholicism. We don't have unity with anybody
that believes that a man is justified by what he does or what he can
do. It's faith in Christ. He's did
it all. And we come to Him by faith.
We believe Him. We rest Him. We put our confidence
in Him and in Him alone. That's unity. Unity. One faith. When they had that great conference
in Acts chapter 15, Peter said, we believe. Here's the apostolic
creed that some people say. We believe. Here's what we apostles
believe. Here's the faith. Here's the
faith. And here's what gives us unity.
We believe that we shall be saved. by the grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ, just as the Gentiles. And what does that do? That brings
these old dead-dog Gentiles and those old Jews together, and
they meet and love each other and have this unity because of
this faith. Sixthly is this, one baptism. One baptism. Now, I've read on
this for days and studied on this, and I thought, how in the
world, how in the world can baptism be an argument for
unity? If anything, it divides us, doesn't
it? It's really not baptism that
divides Christians. It's the mode of baptism. Did
you ever notice that? It's the mode of baptism. Am I to be immersed? Am I to
be sprinkled? Am I to be baptized face down? I didn't know until the other
night I was watching the documentary. And some historians, religious
historians, say that they used to baptize face down. I didn't
know that, did you? What if that's the way we have
to be baptized? If some insisted today that you
had to be baptized on your back, and others insisted you had to
be baptized face down, that's caused division. When we get
into modes of baptism, we're going to have some division.
What about sprinkling? What about sprinkling? Reckon
we could have fellowship with anybody that sprinkled? You and
I are discerning. I mean, we're just dead for sure
that you must be emerged. in the name of the Father, Son,
and the Holy Ghost. I don't know how to explain that scripture
where Paul baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Gil said,
not at the exclusion of God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. I don't know. I don't know. But
I'm just saying that for this reason. When you talk about the
mode of baptism, there's much reason for disunity. So how in the world are we supposed
to understand one baptism and that promotes unity? I think
the only reason that it does, and the only way that it can,
is what is baptism? What is it? What does it teach?
What is taught by water baptism? And I want you to turn to this
Scripture. Just two more Scriptures and I'll close. I want you to
look over in Romans chapter 6. What is baptism? How does it
promote unity? Romans chapter 6. Let me say this like this. You remember in 1 Corinthians
10, Paul made the statement concerning the Jews that they were baptized
into Moses in the Red Sea. And you wonder, how could they
have been baptized into Moses? And I think he's given there
the meaning of baptism. What did it mean for those Jews
to be baptized into Moses? And the only way that I can think
of would be this. Moses was their deliverer. He
was their commander. He was their Savior under God. And they identified with him.
When Moses took his rod and put it out over the Red Sea, and
that sea parted, Moses went across on dry land, and they followed
him. They said, there goes our prophet,
there goes our Savior, there goes our Deliverer, and they
followed him. They identified with Moses as
he went across that Red Sea. What has baptism been in the
light of that? It's identification with somebody. Who does baptism identify us
with? Christ. Christ the Lord. Now look what Paul says in Romans
chapter 6. Look here in Romans chapter 6
and look in verse 3. Know ye not that so many of us
as were baptized unto Christ were baptized unto His death?
Now notice this. Therefore, we are buried with
Him. With Him. See how we identify
with Him? If you are baptized in the name
of the Lord Jesus Christ, God the Father, God the Son, whatever
mode it is, but if you are baptized, that identifies you with Him.
Christ was crucified on the cross. Are you identified with Him?
Christ was buried. Are you buried? Yes. With Him. Read on. We are buried with Him
by our baptism into death. That like as Christ was raised
up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also
should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together
In the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness
of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man is crucified
with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth
we should not serve sin, for he that is dead, dead with Christ,
is freed from sin." Now, if we be dead with Christ, see that? With Christ. We believe that
we shall also live with Christ. Knowing that Christ being raised
from the dead doth no more. Death hath no more dominion over
him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once. But in that
he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves
to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God through our Lord Jesus
Christ." See what baptism does? It identifies us with Christ
and the vital work of Christ upon the cross. We're crucified
with Him. We suffered with Him. We died
there with Him. We were buried and we rose again
with Him. And we walk in newness of life.
We're alive unto God just as He did. Ain't baptism a beautiful
picture of identity with Him? That's what it means. If you can get beyond the mode
of baptism, and if you can't, if we can't, we can't have fellowship,
we can't have unity with any of our Presbyterian brothers.
We just have to push the old top lady aside and say, you know,
you ain't been baptized the way I was baptized. He was sprinkled,
you know. Thomas Watson was sprinkled.
Many of our old forefathers were sprinkled. Calvin was sprinkled. But in their sprinkling, they
identified with Christ. That was their baptism. So it's
not the mold, but the teaching of water baptism. Now if you
can explain that any better than that, you're welcome to come
up here and do it. That's the best I can do. That's the best
I can do. And brothers and sisters, I want
to go as far as I can. I don't want to twist any Scriptures.
I don't want to teach an untruth. I want to go as far as I can
to have unity with the church of Jesus Christ. I do. I don't
want to find a reason for discord. I want to know if there's a reason
the Scripture gives me for unity with God's children. And I think
if we look at baptism in that sense, it will. One more. Just
one more. Seven is this. One God. There
is one God. Now notice what the Apostle Paul
has done here in a sort of a sneaky way. He says our unity is in
the person and work of the triune God. Ain't that what he's saying?
He begins with the Holy Spirit. He goes to the Lord of glory.
And now here he is at the Father. There's one God, the Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ. Brother Larry asked me to come
up to his house the other day. Jehovah's Witness is going to come over.
And Larry wanted me to come up and join him with a conversation
with him. And me and Larry both noticed
this about halfway through the conversation or so, this one
lady just closed her Bible. And we both noticed she just
wasn't interested anymore. She wouldn't talk. Wouldn't go
to the Scriptures. And we asked her, when they got
ready to leave, we asked her, I told her, I said, I saw you
just turned everybody off. You closed your Bible and just
turned us off. What happened to you? And you know what she
said? I think this is what she said. When you mentioned the
Trinity, when you mentioned the Trinity, our fellowship, brothers and
sisters, is in a triune God. The Spirit, the Eternal Sovereign
Spirit, is the third person of the Sacred Trinity. The Lord,
the Son of God, is the second person. And now here's the Father. He's the first person of the
Sacred Trinity. And this Trinity and their work
on our behalf and in us is a cause for unity. But if you don't believe
the Trinity, no, you might as well close your Bible. If you
think you're going to have unity with the Church of God, you're
not. You're not. Because our Savior is a triune
God. And it takes a triune God to save us. One to choose us,
one to redeem us, one to call us and regenerate us. But the
same God in three glorious eternal persons. God our Father. Look on Matthew
chapter 23. Matthew chapter 23. I guess we finally got, we haven't
been saying much about doctrine up until now in the fourth chapter.
We've been talking a lot about unity, but we haven't been saying
much about doctrine. But you really just, boy, it's
come here now, hasn't it? Without even looking
for it. I mean, you're just preaching suddenly. Boy, there it is. There
it is. And you may think at first, boy,
you're getting too broad here. But boy, as you go on, you realize,
my goodness, it's gnarling down now. Unity. Who has unity? Just one group
of people in this whole world. Those who have plurality of gods,
those on Mars Hill, they had an altar prayer, but God didn't.
There's no unity in that. They think there is, but there's
not. Plurality of gods leads to division. That's just natural.
One God brings unity. Look here in Matthew chapter
23, in verse 9. Look in verse 8. Don't you be
called Rabbi. That's what these Pharisees and
scribes want. But don't you be called Rabbi.
For one is your Master, even Christ, and all you are brethren. And call no man your father upon
this earth, for one is your Father, which is in heaven. One is your
Father. Just one is your Father, which
is in heaven. Neither be called Master, for
one is your Master, even Christ the Father. Just one God, one
Father. Your Father is my Father, here
in Christ. Same Father. Bastards. They've got reason
to fuss and fight and cuss each other. You and I ain't bastards,
are we? We have a Father. A heavenly
Father. One heavenly Father. And there's
unity. That's an argument for unity.
And Paul said here, He's above all. He's our Father and He's
our God and He's above all. He's above all physically. For
He's in heaven. That's His throne. He's high
above us physically. He's above all of us spiritually. All life is in Him. He breathed
into Adam the breath of life, spiritual life. He sustains this
life. He's above all in power. He's
the Almighty. He's the Sovereign above all.
And He said that He's through all. Through all. Everything
we do, we do it through His grace. through His strength. We've never
done a thing that was good and was right and was accepted, but
He did it through us. Spurgeon used to quote that little
poem, every virtue we possess, every victory won and every thought
of holiness is His and His alone. He works through us. You're the
light of the world. You're the light of the world.
Why? How can you be the light of the world? God's shining through
you. Through you. And he said, God is in you all.
The Father is in you all. You are the temple of the living
God. For He hath said, I will dwell
in them, and I will walk in them, and I will be their God. They
shall be my sons and my daughters. Seven ones. An argument for unity. in the church of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Let us pray.