I love just saying that when
I get up to preach, turn your Bibles. You know, there's a lot
of preachers this morning that get up and preach and they never
open a Bible. I don't know what they say. And I doubt seriously
for God has called them. Because when God calls a man,
the first thing He says to him, preach My Word. So I take great
delight this morning in asking you to open your Bibles. That's
why we provide Bibles. You've left yours at home or
don't happen to have one, we provide you a Bible. In Ephesians
chapter 3, and I want to begin reading again in verse 14. Ephesians
chapter 3 and verse 14. For this cause I bow my knees,
I bow my knees, I bow my heart. I bow unto the Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ. of whom the whole family in heaven
and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches
of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the
inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that
you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend
with all saints what is the breadth, the length, the depth, and the
height. And to know the love of Christ,
which passeth knowledge, that you might be filled with all
the fullness of God. Now unto him that is able to
do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or even think,
according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him be glory in the
church by Jesus Christ throughout all ages, world without end. Amen. Our subject this morning
is found here in verse 17, Christ dwelling in the heart by faith. And you and I have been advancing
through this epistle. One thing that I hope you notice
this morning with me, that we've not only advanced in this epistle,
we've advanced to the point now where it's very difficult to
get a hold of what the Apostle Paul is saying. If you read this
epistle and you thought there was things in it before that
was difficult to understand, well, we've reached the point
this morning where you and I are getting into some things Very,
very difficult to grasp in our minds and in our hearts. Christ dwelling in the heart
by faith. Comprehending what is the breadth,
the length, the depth, and the height. Being filled with all
the fullness of God. What in the world do these things
mean? I'll be honest with you as I
open my Bible from time to time. I look at these things and I'm
almost tempted just to lay my Bible down and to say, I have
no understanding of what this man is saying. And how can I
know? And as I study this epistle,
and I hope as you study it too, and we come upon these passages
like this, I think this is some options that is before us. We have several choices, several
options. The first thing you and I can
do, we can just lay our Bibles aside. We can take them home
and lay them on our shelf, lay them on our dressers or wherever
we keep them, and simply say with the Jews, these are hard
sayings. Who can hear them? We won't even
try. That's the option that you and
I have before us. As your pastor, I don't have
that option. If I quit reading, if I quit
studying, I quit preaching. But I hope you say with me this
morning, none of us has that option. None of us Christians
has the option, just because we come to a difficult portion
of Scriptures, just to lay the Bible down and say it's too difficult. We won't even try. We won't pray
about it. We won't read the Scriptures.
You and I are living in a day of spiritual lethargy, spiritual
laziness, spiritual sleepiness. I tell you, I think it's probably
one of the most dangerous and perhaps the greatest sin of the
church in our day. It takes strength to read these
passages and to study all of them. and to meditate upon it. And it seems like the sin that's
so afflicting the church in this day, we don't have the spiritual
strength to do it. We're sleepy. We're lazy. Have you noticed that in yourself?
That we can be involved in all of these worldly things and the
cares of this life, but as soon as we set down to meditate in
the Scriptures, we become lazy. Or we go off to sleep. The Scripture says this, and
it challenges us this way. Desire the sincere milk of the
Word, that you may grow. Desire this Word. Let the words of Christ dwell
in you, richly in all wisdom. Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet,
and a light unto my pathway. I rejoice at Thy Word, as they
that findeth great spoil." But when we lose that desire, when
we lose this rejoicing, when we lose the inner strength just
to open the Bible up and look at these passages and say, I
know it's a challenge, but I'm going to read it. I'm going to
study it. Have we lost that desire, brothers
and sisters? Have we lost the rejoicing at
God's Word? That's called spiritual lethargy,
sleepiness, laziness. Are we going to do that? That's
the choice in front of us, isn't it? That's an option that we
have. Another option that we have is
this, just to skip over these passages. We don't understand
them. We'll just skip over them. We'll
dwell on things that's easy. We know the passages that's easy
to understand. We've read them for years, haven't
we? Sometimes, when I'll be honest with you, when I get in a jam
and I can't think and I have nothing else to preach on, I'll
run to some of these easy scriptures. And I'll grab one of them. There's
a pastor friend of mine telling me years ago that he got three
different preachers to preach three different nights. And the
only night each preacher could be there is the night that he
was preaching. And he said all three preachers preached from
the same text, the rich man and the lashman. And you know why
they preached from that text? It's easy to understand. It's
sort of self-explanatory. Now you and I can do that. We
can take our Bibles and we can go to these easy passages We say, well, I've read that,
and that's enough. You know, there are passages in Scriptures
that I don't much blame a person for not reading. They're full
of symbols. You read over in the book of Revelations, and
you say, Bruce, I don't understand those things. I don't blame you,
and don't blame anyone, for not dwelling in the book of Revelations. It's just full of symbols. But
these epistles aren't full of symbols. They're not full of these locusts
and horned dragons and all of that. It's plain, plain words. It's just difficult to understand.
We can be blamed if we set these pixels aside and don't labor
to understand them because they're difficult. Another option we
have before us is this. We can do this. We can realize that it's God's
will for us to confront these difficult passages and seek,
at least in a measure, to understand them. We can not be discouraged about
it all. We don't have to be fainthearted.
Or think, well, these passages are for the preachers. These
are for our teachers. They're not for the preachers,
brothers and sisters. They're not just for the teachers.
They're not just for the commentators. They're for you and they're for
me. That's an option that we have.
We have this option to say, these Scriptures are written to me.
And I'm going to seek to understand them. It's God's will that I
do so. Now, how do I know these Scriptures
are written to you and me? Well, He tells us here. He tells
us here. Look again in verse 18. Look
what the Apostle says. That you may be able to grasp,
to understand with all saints. See that? What is the depths
and the heights and so on? This is written to every saint.
You remember I told you when we first started this book I
made mention of who this epistle was written to? It was written
to children. You read the sixth chapter and
the first thing he does is speak to the children. There were young
people in that congregation whom the Lord had converted and they
were saints. He speaks to the slaves. Probably
a great majority of these saints in this church were slaves. You
read that in the fifth chapter. And masters and parents. Common
people. Common people. We need to remember that, don't
we? Remember that. Next time you look at this and
say, well, that's a difficult passage. He must have wrote that
for the theologians. No, he wrote that to you, Clarence.
All saints. If you're a saint, this is written
to you. When you read here that Christ may dwell in your heart
by faith, you say, what in the world does that mean? Well, it's
written to you. Read it. I think the secret to have a
heart knowledge of these precious truths is found here again in
verse 16. And we go right back to this.
That He would grant you according to the riches of His glory. the
riches of His knowledge, His grace, His wisdom, His strength,
that you would be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the
inner man. What do we have to have to understand
these passages? You know what we have to have?
The author to teach us. That's it. That's it. Turn in
here, you simple, and pray to this end. Lord, teach me, teach
me. I think the risk that you and
I take by not reading and meditating on these passages outweighs the
difficulty in studying these passages. What's the risk that
we take if we don't read these passages? What's the risk that
we take if we don't truly study them and seek to understand what
they mean? I tell you, we'll be left behind.
We'll miss out on a lot of blessings. And that's so. Did you ever get
behind? When I was in school, I never
will forget this, when I was in grade school, the fifth and
sixth grade, I didn't even have a book assigned to me. Could
you imagine that? We had a teacher, a new teacher,
just got out of college, and he should have never been allowed
in the classroom. Never even issued the first book. And I got so behind in the fifth
and sixth grade, I never did get caught up. My parents, I guess they didn't
have understanding enough to do for me what so many of the
parents did for the other classmates. Pull them out and put them in
another school. I don't want that to happen to me spiritually.
Do you? I don't want to get behind. I want to read these things and
meditate upon these. I want to grow with you. I don't
want to be a spiritual dwarf twenty years from now. With that in mind, how do you
and I approach these Scriptures? How do we approach these difficult
Scriptures? How in the world do we begin
to approach them? Are you with me this morning?
When you read these, do you understand what these Scriptures mean? I
don't either. That's the problem I have. Well,
how can we approach them? How can we approach them without
being discouraged and just give up? Well, let's approach it this
way. First of all, just remember this. Remember these two things. It's
God's will that we do approach them. Because they're written
to all saints. Remember that. It's God's will
that we do it. So don't be discouraged in it.
And secondly, remember what I said in verse 16. The Spirit is able
to teach us. He may do it a little here. He
may do it a little there. But He's able to teach us. Remember
that. Just before you sit down to read,
pray, Lord, teach me. Lord, open my eyes that I may
understand what this means. And thirdly, do this. Approach
it this way. Just begin by slowly reading
these passages. That's the best way we can approach
it. Just by slowly reading these passages. Don't read five or
six verses. That's why we get confused sometimes.
Read it like this, that Christ may dwell in your heart. And then go back and read it
again, that Christ may dwell in your heart. Well, we may not
understand that fully, but what does that do to you just to read
that? That Christ may dwell in your
heart." Isn't that wonderful just to read it? It encourages
you to go ahead and dig deeper, doesn't it? Because it's so appealing. The Son of God, the Lord of glory,
the King of nations, the Governor may dwell in my heart. Oh, how appealing that is to
the soul. Just to read it slowly. You know, we see this happen
all the time. It happened to me. It's happened
to some of you. When you're young, you meet somebody, a young man
meets a young woman, and they begin to spend some time together,
and they begin to care one for another. They begin to love one
another and like one another. And just an occasional visit
isn't enough, is it? Having a date isn't enough. Going
out to dinner isn't enough. They want to take the next step.
They want to be married. Why? They want to dwell together. They enjoy one another's company
so much, they say, let's just move in. Let's just get married
and move in and dwell together. You're the first person I want
to see when I wake up. You're the last person I want
to see when I go to bed every night. I want to dwell with you. Why do they do that? They enjoy
one another. They love one another. They like
one another. Most friends that you and I have,
they're friends. They're really friends. But you
and I would never want them to move in with us, would we? We wouldn't be friends long,
would we? But how many of you have had,
or maybe you do have, a precious relative? I mean, you have a
dad, or you've had a dad, or you've had a mom, or you have
a mom, and that person is so dear to you and so precious to
you, you would take them in in a moment and keep them and let
them dwell with you in your house. Because that's how dear they
are to you. You'd have done that with your dad, wouldn't you?
In a New York minute. And you wouldn't have cared at
all, would you, Clarence? I told my dad that. I told your mother
that, didn't I? We love you. Man, you can move
in with us. We'd love to dwell with you.
Every day. How much more? This heavenly
friend. How much more? this holy Friend,
this kind Friend, this pleasant Friend. How much more desirable,
how much more enjoyable would it be for Him to move in? Not just in our house, but in
the heart. Can you imagine that? Christ
in the heart. If He came to dwell in your house,
when you left, you'd leave Him in the house. But when He's in
the heart, wherever you go, He's with you. There abiding in your
heart. Ain't that wonderful? Just think
about it that way. We may not be able to get at
the depths of what it means for Christ to dwell in the heart,
but we know this, it has to be something glorious. It has to
be absolutely wonderful. for Jesus Christ to dwell in
the heart. And this word dwell, it means
to abide, to reside, and to take up permanent residence. Now, you and I know the doctrine.
We know the doctrine of the indwelling of the Spirit of Christ. Christ
dwells in the heart. We know the Scripture teaches
that, don't we? We know the doctrine, and we need to be settled upon
that. Every true believer has the Spirit of Christ in his heart. There's no such thing as being
a believer and not being born again. There's no such thing
as being a believer and not having the Spirit of Christ. If any
man have not the Spirit of Christ, he's none of His. As soon as
a man looks to Christ, Christ comes into the heart by His Spirit. We know that. We're settled on
that. But that's not what this is talking
about. It's more than just the doctrine
that we believe and understand of the indwelling of the Spirit.
It must be more than that. Paul had already dealt with that
in the first chapter in verse 13. When you believed, you were
sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise. So he must be talking
something more than just the doctrine of the indwelling of
the Holy Spirit. And he must be talking something
more than just the assurance of having the Spirit of Christ
within you. What does the Spirit of Christ do within us? One of
the things He gives us assurance does. The Spirit wears witness
with your spirit that you are children of God. But He means
more than just the doctrine of this indwelling of the Holy Spirit,
and He means more than just having the assurance. We don't exclude
those two things, but this is more. It must be more. And what is it? Verse 17 speaks
of the fellowship. The communion. Not just the assurance
that we need as children of God. that He's dwelling there. But it's the communion, it's
the fellowship that we have with Him as He dwells there. I want you to turn over to a
couple of passages of Scripture. I want to read you a couple of
songs. Turn over with me to John chapter
14. Brother Glenn has been studying these passages in the
last few months. But look here in John chapter
14, and I want you to hold verse 16. You and I have these songs
in our songbook, and if you've got opportunity, and you have
some old songbooks around your house, especially by these men
like John Newton, Isaac Watts, and Joseph Hart, You read some
of the songs that those men wrote, and they explain to us in their
songs something about what it means for Christ to dwell in
the heart. You look under the headings of
their songs as assurance, or joy, or peace, or rejoicing,
or something like that. And they talk about this, that
Christ abiding in the heart, and something about what it means.
Let me read you a couple of passages. John Mason said this, God is
my exceeding joy, was the name of this song. And he says this,
where Christ doth dwell, sure heaven is. Now that tells a lot
doesn't it? Where Christ doth dwell, sure
heaven is. That's why Newton wrote that
song. A prison with palaces through,
if Jesus would dwell with me there? Is he honest in making
a statement like that? What had he experienced about
Christ dwelling in him that would make him say, Lord, I could be
in a prison, but if you would dwell with me there, it would
be a palace. That's what we're getting at.
That's what Paul is saying. That's what it means for Christ
to settle down in the heart. Abide in there, in the soul.
Mason said, where Christ doeth dwell, sure heaven is. And saying,
there must be. Since, Lord, Thy presence makes
my heaven. Whom should I sing of but Thee? Thy presence makes my heaven."
Ain't that amazing? Thy presence. Your dwelling in
my heart. It makes this heaven to me. Do
you understand anything about that? We may not explain it,
but maybe we've experienced something of it. Thy presence makes my
heaven. I sometimes think that heaven
would be hell without Christ. And I think hell would be heaven
with Him. That's how we value His presence in it. His dwelling
within our heart. I have another book. Before I
read that passage, I have another song. Let me read three or four
verses here. I don't know who this fellow
is that wrote this song, but it's page 58 in our song. But
let me just read three or four verses before I read my text.
Jesus, the very thought of Thee, with sweetness fills my breast,
but sweeter far thy face to see, and in thy presence rest. Nor
voice can sing, nor heart can frame, nor can the memory find
a sweeter sound than thy blessed name, O Savior of mankind. O hope of every contrite heart! O joy of all the meek! To those
who fall, how kind thou art! How good to those who seek. But what of those who find? Now
listen to this. He said, how good you are to
those who seek. And then he says, but what of
those who find? Ah, this nor tongue nor pen can
show the love of Jesus what it is. None but his loved ones know. Have we experienced that? None
but His loved ones know. That's what Paul is saying. That
you may be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner
man, that Christ may dwell, settle down, abide in your heart by
faith. Look here at my passage. Look
here in John chapter 14. And look in verse 16. I will
pray the Father, And He will give you another Comforter, that
He may abide with you forever, dwell in you. Even the Spirit
of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him
not, neither knoweth Him, but you know Him. For He dwelleth
with you, and soon He shall dwell in you. I will not leave you
comfortless. I will not leave you orphans.
I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world
sees Me no more, but you see Me. Because I live, you shall
live also. At that day you shall know that
I am in My Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you. He that hath My commandments,
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me. And he that loves
Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love Him and will
manifest Myself unto Him." See that? I will abide in Him and
manifest Myself unto Him. In verse 22, Judas said unto
Him, not Iscariot, the other Judas, Lord, how is it that You
will manifest Yourself unto us and not unto the world? Jesus
answered and said unto him, If a man love Me, he will keep My
words, and My Father will love him, and we will come unto Him
and make our abode with Him." Now that's wonderful, isn't it? That's what Paul is talking about.
That Christ may come into your heart in a way of fellowship,
in a way of communion, to manifest Himself, to make Hisself known
to you, that He lives there, He abides there with you in His
heart. Look in chapter 6 of John right
quickly. Look in John chapter 6 and look in verse 54. Look in verse 54. Whoso eateth, and let's read
this like this. Whosoever is eating my flesh,
and whosoever is drinking my blood, hath eternal life, And
I will raise him up at the last day, for my flesh is meat indeed,
and my blood is drink indeed. He that is eating my flesh and
is drinking my blood dwelleth in me, and I in him." See that? It's something that's taken place.
It's more than just having that one-time assurance that He saved
us. It's more than just knowing the
doctrine of the indwelling of Christ, the Spirit of Christ.
It's this fellowship. It's this communion. It's Christ
abiding, dwelling in the heart. Isaac Watts had this to say about
it. Lord, what a heaven of saving grace shines through the beauties
of Thy face. and lights our passions to a
flame. Lord, how we love Thy charming
name. When I can say, My God is mine,
when I can feel Thy glories shine, I tread the world beneath my
feet, all that the world calls good and great, while such a
scene of sacred joys our raptured eyes and souls employed, here
we would sit and gaze away a long and everlasting day." Ain't that
wonderful? These men experienced what Paul
said by Christ dwelling in your heart. I can't explain it, but
these men experienced it. Now, there are people, I realize
while I was looking at this and studying it, there are people
that downplay these songs. I know people that read songs
like that and they say, no, those guys didn't experience that.
And they even downplay these Scriptures. They try to explain
some of them away. But I have only one question
to ask people that downplay these songs as if these men were being
dishonest with us. And they downplay these Scriptures
and explain them away. I've got only one question to
ask those people. How would it feel? What would
be your heart attitude if you could live in the knowledge and
the reality of the Son of God actually dwelling in your heart? Wouldn't you rejoice? Would that
have some profound effect upon you? Couldn't you say here with
this man, here we could sit and gaze for one long eternal day? There have been people that have
experienced this. There have been people who desired
this. You remember. When those two disciples were
on the road to a Mass, one of our favorite places, Luke chapter
24, the Lord Jesus had raised from the dead. They were so sad.
And the Lord came along and He was walking with them, but they
didn't know it. Aren't we that way sometimes? If you're a Christian,
if you're a believer, Christ dwells in your heart. But you
may not even know it. You may not be aware of it. That's
not what Paul's talking about. He wants you to live in the reality
of it. And here the Lord Jesus, the
resurrected Christ, was walking with these two disciples. And
He said, why are you so sad? They said, well, we thought Jesus
of Nazareth was the Savior. Now they've killed Him and He's
gone. We're all confused about it. We don't understand. And
finally He said, you poor fools. And slow of heart to believe
all that the prophets have said. And beginning at Moses, and all
the prophets, He expounded to them in all those Scriptures
the same concern in Himself. All the way from Jerusalem to
Emmaus. And when He got there, where
they lived, He made it as though He was going on. He just kept
on walking. And you know what the Scripture
says? Now here's the desire. Here's this thing that I'm talking
about. They got a hold of Him. They said, wait a minute, wait
a minute. The Scripture says they forced Him. They constrained
Him. And here's what they said to
Him. Come and abide with us. You know what that word means?
It means to dwell with us. Come and stay with us. We've
got a house right here. We want you to live with us.
And the Scripture says He went in and they cooked a meal. And
while He was sitting there eating with them at the table, breaking
bread and giving thanks, their eyes were opened and they knew
Him. They knew Him. Wouldn't it be amazing? Wouldn't
it be amazing if we could experience that? I've never known anybody, not
even those two dear disciples, that lived in that experience. I don't know of anybody that's
ever done it. I doubt if the Apostle Paul did. But wouldn't
it be wonderful to let that be our aim? Wouldn't it be wonderful to pray
to that end? To study to that end? What is
my goal in this life as a Christian? I want Christ dwelling in me.
I want to say what these songwriters have said about the joy and the
bliss and the glory of it all. No, I never know any man to stay
there. But I tell you, he'd be an aim
to shoot at, wouldn't he? be a target to set in your eyesight. How much you and I gain by believing,
how much more we could gain by having a stronger faith, and
how much we lose by our doubts and our unbelief. Paul said that
Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. You see why he says
you're going to need the Spirit to strengthen you? If you're
going to enter into the experience of Christ dwelling in your heart,
it's going to be determined a lot by your faith. Your faith in
Him. Your faith in His Word. And it's
going to take the Spirit to strengthen you to enjoy this and live in
this virality. Peter was out walking on the
water. The Lord said, Come to Me, Peter. And here's a man,
just like us, that got out and was walking on the water. And he began to look around and
took his eyes off of the object of faith. Faith is not in faithism. Faith
is in a person. Faith is in this Word. And Peter
started looking around, and what happened to him? Down he started
to sink. And the Lord wretched out and
got him and pulled him back up and said, Oh, you of little faith. Why did you doubt? Why did you
doubt? What could Peter have done? What
could he have done if he had kept his eyes on the Master and
hadn't begun to look around? Why, he could have skipped on
those waves. He could have run. He could have
turned flips. He could have made it to the
Savior and hugged Him. I'm not concerned about walking
on water, and you're not either. But I am concerned about this.
Christ dwelling in my heart by faith. I don't want any signs. I don't
want to speak in tongues. I've got one tongue and it's
got me in enough trouble. I don't need another. But I want
faith that is strong enough and effectual
enough, set upon the Savior, upon the promises of His Word
that will bring Christ to my heart and dwell there. That's
what I want. A couple of more psalms in closing.
Newton made this statement. Though sometimes unperceived
by sense, by faith." Listen to this now. Though sometimes unperceived
by sense, faith sees him always near. A guide, a glory, a defense. Then what? have you to fear. It's faith that sees it. It's
faith that embraces it. Listen to this one verse of Psalm.
This is found over in page 66 of our book. Just one verse. O restless spirits, our restless
spirits, yearn for Thee, wherever Our changeful lot is cast. Glad when thy gracious smile
we see. Blessed when our faith can hold
thee fast. How is Christ held in the heart?
By faith. Faith holds him fast. Faith constrains
him to stay in the heart and manifest himself. that Christ
may dwell in your hearts by faith. Let's pray.