Ending with verse 1 of chapter
1 of the book of Ephesians, I'll read down through verse 7. Down
through verse 7. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus and to the
faithful in Christ Jesus, grace be to you and peace from God
our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with
all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ, according as
he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. having
predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to
himself according to the good pleasure of his will, to the
praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted
in the Beloved, in whom we have redemption through his blood,
the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace. Now it is good this morning to
be able to gather with the Lord's people. This is a privilege that
God has granted unto us. It's a wonderful, wonderful privilege
that we have to have the Word of God, a copy of the Word of
God, to be able to open this book. to be able to read from
it, to be able to receive a message from the Lord. And it is wonderful,
and I certainly am thrilled and enthused about the fact that
God is not silent. God is not silent. He is speaking. God is saying something unto
His people. And I rejoiced this morning as
I was coming in that the Lord had once again, I believe, given
me a message for you. a word from God to your soul. And I rejoiced in that, to be
involved in the purpose and plan of God, to be involved in what
God is doing in our day and in our time. And it makes me quite
hopeful for you, because I believe that God, if He's saying something
to you, that He means for you to hear it. And He will enable
you to hear it, enable you to apply it to your heart, and enable
you to profit from it. And know that we all would become
praisers of our God, blessers of our God. Worship Him as He
ought to be worshipped. Now this morning I want to speak
to you primarily out of verse 3, but in order to open up this
subject to you, I want to begin it this way. And this is the
way that I believe that this has impressed me, and I needed
to be impressed in a certain way. at this time. I needed my
heart to be moved in a certain way and this is the way that
the Lord has moved it this morning. Now one of the things that I
enjoy in life is sitting down and listening to a person talk
who knows what they're talking about. I enjoy that. Beloved, I really do. To listen
to somebody. Now, if I feel that an individual
is experienced in a certain field, not just that he polyparents
what somebody else said, or that he's quoting something maybe
that he read out of a book, or just reading something, you know,
in order to fill up space, but if I feel like that that individual
is talking to me from experience, and he really knows his field,
and if in some degree he is an expert in that field, then I
delight. I thoroughly enjoy listening
to that person talk. I enjoy hearing somebody talk
about something that they know something about. Now this scripture
that we have here for our text this morning is written by a
man who knows what he is talking about. Amen? This man knows what
he's talking about. Now this is not hearsay that
we have here. We have one speaking to us who
has been in the way. We have one here that is a man
that is a man of experience, a man who is an expert in his
field. And this is an old, dead, religious
Pharisee. This man was an old, dead, religious
Pharisee, and Paul was an expert on being a Pharisee. It has been
said of Paul that whatever he did, whether it was in rebellion
or in repentance, he did it with all of his heart. He was absolutely
given to it. He did it with all of his heart.
He never did anything halfway. He had been an old Pharisee steeped
in religion. He was steeped in legalism and
ritualism and in self-righteousness, and he knew religion. He knew
it backwards and forwards. And in the book of Philippians,
you remember, he said that if any other man, in verse four
through six, that if any other man has a reason to boast, he
said, I am more. He said, I'm a Hebrew of the
Hebrews. My daddy and my mama were Hebrews, and they were Judaizers. And he said, I was a Pharisee.
And he said this. He said that he had been circumcised
the eighth day. And he said that he had went
about as far, that he had climbed about as high in religion as
you could possibly go. Nobody else could have climbed.
He says, as touching the law, that he was a Pharisee. And as
touching the law, he was blameless. He was a law-abiding traditionalist,
and he was an expert on being religious, but lost. An expert on it. Now, the second
thing I see about this man is, the man here speaking is a sinner
who has been truly broken at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ
on the road to Damascus. God broke this sinner, brought
him down, humbled him at the feet of Christ. Our brother read
it to us this morning out of Acts chapter 9. And most of you
are familiar with his experience. Now blinded by the light, he
was on his way to Damascus and He had got letters whereby he
had authority from the chief priests to bind those that were
in this way, in the way of Christ, in the way of the gospel, and
to bring them back to Jerusalem. And this old Jerusalem sinner
himself was on his way to Damascus with this authority. And the
light shined about him and struck him off his horse, and he fell
to the ground. And the Lord Jesus spoke to him,
and Paul said, Well, who art thou, Lord? Who art thou, Lord? And Jesus said, I'm Jesus whom
thou persecutest. I'm Jesus whom you're persecuting.
And we remember the story that he was led away and he was blind
when he was led away. And God later restored his physical
sight and gave him spiritual sight also. And he said, Paul
did in his testimony in the scripture, he said, I obtained mercy because
I did all of this in ignorance and in unbelief. And in Paul's
case, where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. And that's
the way it was in my case. Where sin abounded, grace did
much more abound. And Paul said further, it's a
faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. He knew something,
beloved, what it was to be brought out of darkness into light. He
knew what it was to be brought up from the depth of depravity
to the kingdom of light and life. And now thirdly, brother and
sister, this man is God's chosen vessel to speak. Now this is
the way that the Lord has impressed me. First of all, we have this
man who's an expert in religion. an expert on being lost, but
at the same time to be as religious as all get out. And then we have
this man who's a sinner whom God has broken and brought down
and humbled him and revealed Christ to his heart. And then
we have a man here that is God's chosen vessel to speak. Now in Acts chapter 9 verse 15,
the brother read it, where Ananias went to this man, and the Lord
Jesus said, you go, because this man is a chosen vessel unto me
to preach the gospel unto the Gentiles and to preach to kings. This man is a chosen vessel. God had chosen him and commissioned
him, and he was going to suffer great things for the name of
the Lord. And here's the man who ought
to be heard. You talk about a man who has
a right to talk, here is a man who has a right to speak. We're
sitting at the feet of an expert this morning when we read here
out of the book of Ephesians. Now you go to a doctor, my friend,
and when you go in and you have an appointment and he's a respected
physician and you go in and you take a seat and after a while
they call you into a little office and you go back there and then
directly the doctor comes in. Now you respect this doctor.
You believe that he's an expert in his field or you wouldn't
be there. Now what do you do? Well, immediately
you don't begin to tell him anything, you just start listening. And
he tells you, he reveals to you, he makes known to you what he
thinks about your case. He may ask you a few questions,
but you listen intently unto him. Now, we need to quit being
an expert and so opinionated ourselves because our thoughts
are not his thoughts and his ways are not our ways. So we
ought to listen to someone who knows his thoughts and his ways. Is that not right? And here he
is. God brought Paul through all
of the experiences that he had so he could speak to us this
morning, so he could minister unto us, so he could minister
to this man in his position at this time, in this particular
year of his life, so God could say to me, what it is that I
need to hear from him so I would have the comfort and the help
and the sustenance that I so desperately need in my own life
and in my own soul. So he could speak these words. He was a chosen vessel unto the
Lord. He was a missionary to the world. He was a founder of churches.
He was a writer of holy scriptures and he knows the word. He knows the word. He's a chosen
vessel by God to speak the word. And therefore, we ought to listen
to what he has to say. And fourthly, here's the old
warrior, bearing in his body the scars of persecution and
trial. Beloved Paul paid for what he
believed. He dared to preach the gospel
of God's free sovereign grace, and he bore in his body the scars
to prove it. He bore in his body the scars
to prove that he had been faithful to that calling which God had
given him and faithful to declare that message that God had given. He was about to close out his
ministry. His ministry was about over and
to go to be with his Lord, and he wrote to his friends at Ephesus. They were very special to him.
He's the old warrior who's about to fold up the tent, and he writes
to his friends. Here in this passage and also
in Acts chapter 20 you remember that he sent for the elders of
the church at Ephesus and he spoke to them and he said the
Holy Spirit is leading me and he's told me that chains and
Prisons gonna be my lot from here to Jerusalem and that I'm
going to die. You're not gonna see my face
again he loved these people and he was the old warrior and he
begins and to speak here in Ephesians and I can see the great wisdom
that God has given this old warrior. And so to me these four things
kind of prepare my heart and make me to be very interested
in what this man is about to say. What this man is going to
say, what's he going to say? This expert on religion, this
man who's been a broken sinner, this man who has come along the
way as a chosen vessel in the hands of God and has been greatly
used of God in missionary work across the known world in his
day, and this old warrior of the faith with these scars that
he's received through much persecution and trial, what's he going to
say? that's going to be helpful to us here this morning. Well, now in our text he begins
here in verse 3 with a doxology. You see, I'm very interested,
if you will allow me to say this personal word, I'm very interested
in knowing how that a Christian is supposed to conduct themselves
in the world, what kind of a mental attitude we're supposed to have,
what kind of a frame of mind are we supposed to be in, we're
God's servants, we belong to him, we've been called of God,
unto salvation and unto service for our blessed Lord. And it's
certain that we're not getting younger. It's certain that the
day of salvation is drawing nearer and nearer for some of us. Well,
what kind of a mental attitude? I mean, what are we to be about?
How are we to think? What's going on? What is to be
going on inside of us? And I certainly want to listen.
I want to listen to what this man says. And I want to hear
his word to my heart this morning. So he begins here in verse 3
with an auxology, with a hymn of praise unto God. With a hymn of praise unto God. Bless God. Praise God. Glory be to God. Blessed be the
God. And I think what we should do
here is look at this verse like this. Blessed be the God. Blessed be God. And the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ. Now my thoughts As
I looked at these verses, were these somewhat. Bless God, praise
God, praise our God, all adoration and glory be given unto our God. And I thought about what poor
creatures we are. what poor creatures we are who
have not the understanding who have not the will or the vocabulary
to praise God as he ought to be praised. Notice I said we
have not the understanding and we have not the will and we have
not the vocabulary to praise God as he ought to be praised.
Now I'm not thinking about people jumping up like popcorn popping
in a bowl I'm not talking about that running around the room.
No, no, I'm not talking about that. I'm not talking about raising
our hands openly and outwardly and making all kinds of physical
signs because you could do all of that and still not bless and
praise God. I'm talking about genuine heart,
felt, sincere praise that goes up out of our hearts and reaches
unto the glory land, unto God who sitteth upon the throne.
Now if you would be turning to Psalm 135, we're going to look
at a couple of verses there. But this can be done inwardly
or outwardly, and it is to be a heart condition, it's to be
a heart Expression. Now, beloved, we murmur and complain
quite well, do we not? We murmur and complain quite
well. Might I say that we have the
vocabulary for griping. We have it down pat, do we not?
The vocabulary, and not only the vocabulary, but we have the
will. to gripe, and to complain, and to murmur. We're all well
equipped for that. We have the understanding, the
will to murmur. But oh, for the understanding,
the will, the vocabulary to bless God, to praise God as he ought
to be. For the understanding, the will,
and the vocabulary. Now look at verses one through
three of Psalm 135. Praise ye the Lord. Praise ye
the name of the Lord. Praise him, O ye servants of
the Lord. Ye that stand in the house of
the Lord, in the courts of the house of our God, praise the
Lord, for the Lord is good. Sing praises unto his name, for
it is pleasant. Look over to verse 19. Bless
the Lord, O house of Israel. Bless the Lord, O house of Aaron. Bless the Lord, O house of Levi. Ye that fear the Lord, bless
the Lord. Blessed be the Lord out of Zion,
which dwelleth at Jerusalem. Praise ye the Lord. Now, beloved, think of our houses.
Think of our houses. Bless the Lord, O house of Gerrimans. Bless the Lord, O house of Gebkes. Bless the Lord, O house of Hodges. Bless the Lord. Let every house
be turned into little churches where the name of our God is
blessed. and where the name of our God
is praised. Now, beloved, I'm not taking
into account this morning anything about your physical condition.
I'm not taking into account anything about your bank account, how
much money you have or how much money you don't have. I'm not
taking anything into account of what kind of oppressing set
of circumstances you may be in this morning. I'm just telling
you, if you're alive, if you've got breath, We ought to be praising the Lord. That's the thing we need uppermost
to be thinking about is our need to praise and bless the Lord. Well, Paul knows what he's talking
about. He's no one gallus evangelist
that's coming through town. As the expression used to be,
he didn't come in town on the back of a pickup truck. He used
to talk about some of these evangelists, and when they were only a one-cylinder
or two-cylinder evangelist, they'd say, well, he came in town on
the back of a pickup truck. He didn't really amount to a
whole lot. But we're not talking about a one-gallus preacher here. We're talking about Paul the
Apostle, and he knows what he's talking about. This is that old
Pharisee. This is that sinner saved by
grace, the chosen vessel of God, the old warrior about to lay
it down. And he says, he says, bless God. He said, praise God. Well, why, Paul? Why should we
bless God? Why should we praise Him? Well,
first reason is because He is God. He is God. Blessed be the
God. Blessed is the only God of heaven
and earth, the sovereign, majestic God that sits upon the circle
of the earth, that inhabits eternity, this sovereign of the universe. Now, beloved, I wish that I could
forget just for a little while about God's gifts and praise
Him not for just what He gives, but because He is the giver. Because He is the giver. This
God is the giver of all things. He's worthy to be praised because
He is God. He's infinite holiness, infinite
wisdom, infinite love. Do you admire wisdom? So, oh
yes, I admire wisdom. Then you ought to admire God
because He is infinite wisdom. Do you admire purity? Do you
admire perfect purity, my friend? Well, the glory and whiteness
of perfect holiness belongs to this one, to our God. He sits
upon the throne of glory and he's absolutely holy. And you know what we need to
do is quit looking at ourselves and other people and begin to
praise God who is worthy. You say, I don't see very many
people around who is holy in our day and time. Look up to
our God. He's perfect in holiness and
in glory. Listen, He's got that glory and
whiteness about His throne. Look up to Him and praise Him. Now, do you love someone who
loves? Do you love somebody who, do
you really like to be around people who are loving people,
who show forth that unselfish love, that pure love, just because,
just because they love? Well, God loves because He loves,
not because someone deserves it or someone buys it. then you
ought to praise God, my friend, and bless Him because He is perfect
in love. His love is unpurchasable. And God is a God of love, a sovereign
love. He's a God. He's God-blessed
forever. So he's God. Worship him as God. Praise him because he is the
God that he is. And second, because Paul tells
us that he's the father of our Lord Jesus Christ. So you see
what I'm doing is that I'm established here, that I'm told by this authority,
by this man who's an expert, I ought to bless God. First I
ought to do it because God is God and he needs to be blessed
and he ought to be blessed And it certainly isn't selfish on
his part that he wants to be blessed, because he's the only
one that's worthy in all the universe to be blessed. God is
the only one worthy. And now, then he tells me this,
that he's the father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And how wonderful
that is. Now, I would not try ever to
divide the Holy Trinity. The Lord Jesus Christ came into
this world. He came into this world. He was
sent into this world. The Lord Jesus Christ is God's
Son. It tells us here, blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. If you have your
Bible, turn with me this morning to the book of Isaiah, Isaiah
chapter 9 and I want us to look here at verse 6 and you'll see
what this verse here is really talking about Now it says in
verse 6 for unto us Isaiah 9 6 for unto us a child is born unto
A child is born. Now this is talking about the
Messiah. This is talking about the Lord Jesus Christ. This is
talking about the Son of God, the only beloved and begotten
Son of our God. And he says, for a child is born.
Jesus was born just like any other child is born into the
world. And then he goes on to say, and
I want you to get this unto us, a son is given. Unto us a son
is given. A child is born, but a son is
given. Well, we read in the latter part
of this verse, the everlasting father is going to be one of
the names that will be given here unto the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe that Jesus is God.
I believe it with all my heart. That the Jehovah God of the Old
Testament is the Jesus of the New Testament. I believe it with
all my heart. I believe it. Now then, what
I'm going to say is this, that the Everlasting Father, He's
not called that because I'm His Son through faith. He is called
the Everlasting Father because of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ
is the Eternal Son. God and it says a son is given
God has given his son his only begotten son and so God blessed
be God who is the father of our Lord Jesus Christ now the Lord
Jesus came not into the world just in order that we would so
God could love the world No, no, no, no. Jesus did not come
into this world and die on the cross to create love in the heart
of God. He came because God did love. In 1 John 4 and 10 it says here
in His love, not that we love God, but that God loved us and
gave His Son to be a satisfaction for our sin. He came into this
world not to create love and mercy in the heart of the Father,
but to enable the Father to exercise love and mercy and still be the
just God that He is. That's why He came. That's why
the Father gave Him. The Redeemer's death is not the
cause of God's love and God's grace and God's mercy. It is
the result of God's love, mercy, and grace. That's why He came.
He's the father of our Lord Jesus, and he spared him not, but delivered
him up for us all, that we might freely receive all that God has
to give to poor, helpless sinners. Bless God, then, first of all,
brethren, because he is God, and then bless him, because he's
the father, he's the giver, he's the sender of our Lord Jesus
Christ. You know, in John chapter 10,
verse 29, it says, my father gave them me. My father gave
them me, Jesus said. He said, I give unto them eternal
life, they'll never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out
of my hand. And my father, which gave them me. The father gave
Christ to his people. He gave him. All right, and then
in John 5 and 24 says, Verily, verily, truly, truly, I say to
you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent
me. The Lord Jesus Christ was sent.
Into this world who sent him? Well, the father sent him Into
this world Now as you see i'm to be taken up with all of this
i'm to be captivated by all of this I'm to allow this to permeate
my soul and i'm to be i'm to be i'm to absorb all of this
truth about our lord jesus christ now then thirdly he says bless
god because He has blessed He has blessed us. Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us. So we bless Him because He's
God, we bless Him because He's given us His Son, and we bless
Him because He hath blessed us. He did it. He's the giver, the
Bible says, of every good and perfect gift. He's the source
of every mercy. He's the fountain of every comfort. We sometimes say things we don't
really mean to say. When we're blessed sometimes,
we say, well, that was a good break. Or we see somebody, you
know, and something seems to happen and everything seems to
go their way, and we say, well, that person sure got a good break.
Or we say, well, they sure was lucky. They sure was lucky. Well, Paul said, he hath blessed
us. That's what Paul said. He has
blessed us. All that we shall ever enjoy
in our pilgrimage in this world, God hath decreed and purpose
to give us. Do you believe that? God hath
decreed and purpose to give us. I want you to turn back to a
very favorite passage of scripture. Turn with me to Romans, chapter
eight. And I want us to look, beginning
with that old familiar verse, verse 28. Now there's been a
lot said by preachers on this, on these verses that were about,
a great deal has been written and said by preachers about these
verses. And in verse 28 it says, And
we know that all things work together for good to them that
love God, to them who are called according to His purpose. But what I would like to say
is that if we really Believed these verses we would quit having
so many of these mountains and valley Experiences where we're
hot and cold and where we're up and then down in and then
out we would have a more peaceful and level Living experience if
we really believed these verses now beloved I'm preaching to
myself Of course you wouldn't know anything about what I'm
talking about when I'm talking about up and down and in and
out and so on and so forth. You wouldn't know anything about
that. But I know something about that and so I'm preaching to
myself. Now we feel something goes wrong
or we feel that something goes terribly, terribly wrong. But in God's plan, do you hear
me now? Do you hear me? As one old brother
would say, I'm about to jump a creek here. In God's plan,
let me point this out, nothing ever goes wrong. Can you take
that? Can you buy that? Can you jump
that creek? It's kind of wide. But in God's
plan, nothing ever goes wrong. Nothing. Well, in the world,
Jesus said, you'll have tribulation, but be of good cheer. He says,
I've overcome the world. And in him, we have too. In him,
we have too. He said, I've overcome it. I've
already got the victory over it. And you have too if you're
in him. Our feet are planted on the rock
of ages, and we shall not be moved, not by success, not by
poverty or failure, not by elation or depression. We shall not be
moved. For whatever happens, big, little,
great, or small, it is for my good after all. It is for my good after all. Now, beloved, if we had a test
given on our Calvinism, that is, our theological Calvinism,
we'd all make a hundred, wouldn't we? We'd all make a hundred. But on experiential Calvinism,
I think we'd probably all flunk. We'd all flunk. And we know,
Paul said, that all things work together for good to them that
love God. Listen to what else he says.
Those that are called according to his purpose, for whom he did
foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image
of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren
moreover whom he did predestinate them he also called whom he called
them he also justified and whom he justified them he also glorified
past tense every bit of it past tense already glorified in the
mind of God he hath blessed us not that he will not that he
plans to not that he if he can get around to it you know Satan's
often said to me God's busy, you know. There's an awful lot
of people that's trying to get his ear. God is very busy. And he ain't got time to fool
with you and your little situation. He ain't got time to fool with,
well, devil, let me tell you something, he already has blessed
me. He's already blessed me. And
all these things are settled. They're already settled. Somebody
said, well, you know, I just wish the Lord would bless me.
Well, he has. He has. He hath blessed us. Now, follow with me. Are we gonna
ride this out? Are we gonna, will this do to
ride the river with? I mean, when this thing gets
sticky, I mean, when you hear on the radio, when you hear on
the radio that one of these upstart nations out here in the world,
have got the ability to deliver a nuclear bomb to the heart of
the United States of America, what are you going to do? And
not only do they have the ability, they've got the will to do it,
and they've been crossed, and they're going to do it. Now what
are you going to do? What are you going to do? Will
this do to ride out the storm? Will it do to ride out the storm?
Can we build on this? Can we trust in this? Can we
hope in this? Can we? Can we really? Well,
beloved, I believe we can. Now all the demons in hell cannot
take this away. Can't take it away. Look here,
if you will, beginning with verse 37. Let me quickly read through
verse 39. Nay, in all these things we're more than what? We're more
than conquerors through him that loved us. For I'm persuaded that
neither death nor life, angels, principalities, powers, things
present today nor things to come tomorrow, height nor depth nor
any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the
love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. I'm persuaded,
Paul said, so all the demons in hell cannot take these away. Well, what is he blessed us with?
What is he blessed us with? Well, back in Ephesians chapter
1 again, we see that he's blessed us, well, this is what it says,
with A-double-L, all spiritual blessings. He's blessed us with
all spiritual blessings. Now, brother, sister, please
don't get upset with me. Don't get upset with me. But
we are such earthbound creatures. that we wouldn't know hardly
of spiritual blessings if we met it in the road, if we met
it in the street. We wouldn't hardly know it. Now
listen to what I say. To be carnally minded is death. To be spiritually minded is life
and peace. They that are spiritual mind
the things of the spirit, and they that are carnal the things
of the flesh. Now listen to what I'm going
to say. We think too much of this body. We think too much
of it. And that's one of our problems.
We think too much of it. All we seem to think and talk
about in this world is something better, something bigger. We're
interested in our own body. Oh, I must get my arthritis in
check. And I suppose if I had it, I'd
probably be saying it too. And somebody says, well, my eyesight
is bad. I've got to some way or another
get my eyesight taken care of. I was talking to an old gentleman
out in Fairfield yesterday, kind of a friend of mine, telling
me about his son-in-law in Kokomo, Indiana. 51 years old and he
has diabetes and he's lost his eyesight and he's been traveling
all around the country and been going to Mayo Clinic and and
he sued one doctor over it and oh he just just going you know
and of course I can understand how valuable it is to be able
to see but I want you to know some things I want you to listen
to what I'm getting ready to say here and then another fellow
says oh if I can just get my hearing back My hearing, you
know, I'm having trouble. If I can get healed and if I
can get my reward, I want healing and prosperity in this world.
And you know, there's a lot of preachers. You listen to them
on television and that's all it's about. Driving a bigger
car, having a nicer home, a bigger home and being healed and getting
your reward and prospering. That's all it's about. Well,
I'm going to tell you something, beloved, that's all flesh. That's
all flesh. And it doesn't make any difference
how much of this you have. You're going to wind up in the
same place. You're going to wind up in a
hole in the ground. Dead. Graveyard dead is where
you're going to wind up. Don't make any difference how
much of this stuff you've got. You say, well, I think we ought
to eat right. I think we ought to eat right.
Well, it's OK if you eat right. It's OK. Somebody said, I just
got to run up that hill. I got to be able to run up that
hill. Well, as far as I'm concerned, walk up the hill. Walk up the
hill if you can't run up it. I was down in West Virginia and
Sarah showed me a hill. And it was paved all the way
up, and people lived on both sides of the road all the way
up to the top of that hill. And she said, Dad, my ambition
is to be able to run up that hill. I said, give it up right
now. Forget it right now. That hill
is too steep for you to be trying to run up. And somebody says,
well, we need better eyesight. We need better eyesight physically.
Well, I think you ought to be born again so you can see the
things of God. The Kingdom of God. Be born again
so you can see. Because if you die without seeing
the things of God, you're going to hell. And it don't make any
difference how good your eyes are. It doesn't make any difference.
And then about the ears, we don't really need to hear all that's
going on in this world. We'd be better off if we didn't.
Wouldn't we? A whole lot of things in this
world I don't need to hear. I tell you, I think I've heard
maybe now more than I ought to. I need to hear Him who speaks
from heaven. I need to be able to hear Him.
Hear that voice of the Lord, my soul. I'll tell you, that's
what soothes me. I'll tell you what, there isn't
nothing that gives a man more satisfaction and peace than to
hear from God. Hear from God in the Word. Hear from the Lord.
God's saying something. It'll soothe your soul. Now, somebody said, well, I'd
like to live to be a hundred preacher. I don't need to live
to be a hundred. You don't either. I want to tell you that's too
much of this for anybody. A hundred years of it? A hundred
years of this? Well, see, you may not have been
led like I've been. You might not have went through
the bramble bushes and been in all of the thickets that I've
been in. You ever been in a thicket? Well,
you couldn't hardly get out of it. You just cutting yourself
and the briars was sticking and hanging on and you couldn't get
out. Well, brother, this world is a wilderness. This world is
a dry and desert place. And this world can make you feel
like that a hundred years is just too much of it. Just too
much of it. Well, we need to live forever
with the Lord, don't we? Forever with the Lord, that's
what we need. Forget about the hundred years. How about living
forever with the Lord? How about that? Well, praise
God, that's what we want to do. Live forever with the Lord. I
need spiritual blessing, and that's what Paul's talking about.
I need something that whenever this thing is going down, and
it's going to go down. We need some spiritual help.
I want you to turn quickly, and I'm going to try to close. Last
week, you wouldn't believe it, but I had about four minutes
left on an hour tape. I did. That was something. I thought I'd probably run out.
Turn back with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. I want to talk just
a little bit about these spiritual blessings that Paul said we've
been blessed with. What are they? First of all,
he says in verse 30, but of him are you in Christ Jesus, and
that plays a very significant part in what we're talking about
this morning. Who of God, of Him are you in
Christ Jesus? Who of God is made unto us wisdom,
righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption? Wisdom, understanding,
the ability to see the things of God, and the ability to see
the purpose and the plan of God for our lives, the ability to
see the glory of God in the face, of our Lord Jesus Christ. He
gives us the wisdom to tell the difference between what's right
and what's wrong. And if any man wills to do my
will, he'll know the doctrine, whether it's of God or whether
it's of man. And next, He's been made into
us righteousness, holiness, perfection, completeness in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now, you think just a little
bit. Now, I'm telling you, God hath blessed us with these things.
Now, you listen to what I'm saying, because there's some of you here
that desperately need this. And then we've been sanctified.
That means we've been set apart by God in Christ. set apart by
God and made us, He's made us His own. He's separated us from
the defiled things of the world and He's taken what is ordinary
and common, us, and He's made it godly and intends to make
us just like His Son. And then redemption, He has found
a ransom. He has bought and paid for me. He has bought and paid for all
of his people. They're bought and paid for. He has blessed us. What are you
worried about? He has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings. I don't need one thing that the
law can supply. I don't need one thing that religion
can afford. I do not need one thing that
I myself can supply. I don't need one thing that the
Pope can supply. I don't need one thing that the
angels can supply as far as my eternal salvation is concerned. All spiritual blessings in the
Lord Jesus Christ. So this is what this expert has
to tell us this morning. He's telling us that we're complete
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Why don't we believe that he
hath blessed us? Why don't we believe it? Why
are we so troubled about our salvation? Oh, I wish I'd troubled
about it. If we've been blessed with everything
we need, then our salvation is secure. Is Christ in heaven?
Is Christ in heaven? Then I'll be in heaven. If he's
given me everything I need to get there, then I must be there. And if God put me in Him, and
if God never looks at me again after He put me in Him, and all
He ever sees, oh my friend, can you see this? That God never
looks upon me again. He looks upon Christ, and it's
what He's given. He's blessed me with all spiritual
blessings in Him. God turned everything over to
Him. and then put us in Him and everything God demands of a sinner,
He give us in His Son, the Lord Jesus. And so He's not going
to be in heaven and His body be on earth. The head in heaven
and the body just strung out everywhere. Some of them in hell
and some of them here, some of them there. No! No! The body of Christ will all
be gathered on that celestial shore, the body of Christ, everybody
that God saves going home to glory. Now then I want you to
turn with me on over to 1 Corinthians 3 and look at verses 21 through
23 where Paul says this to us, therefore let no man glory in
man or in men for all things are yours. Whether Paul or Apollos,
Cephas, Peter or the world or life, We've been given life that
we might live, and death, we're gonna have to die in order to
enter into eternal glory. Flesh and blood can't inherit
the kingdom of God. So the world, life, death, things
present, things to come, all are yours. God's already done
it all for his people. It's all yours. And ye are Christ,
and Christ is God's. What a wonderful, glorious thought.
Well, where are these blessings? Well, we're told there in Ephesians,
if you wanna back up there to Ephesians chapter one again,
and we're about ready to wind this up. He said he's blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. So these blessings are in heavenly
places. They're not in this world. This
is a temporary world, isn't it? Things that are seen, are temporary. Don't ever forget it. They're
temporary. And you know there's absolutely
no guarantees about nothing. Some of you people are young
and you're wonderful people, wonderful young people here.
Blessed, blessed young people. But you're young and you must
understand there is no guarantees of tomorrow. None whatsoever. you look at some of the old people
among those folks from Kosovo and their lives were wrecked,
destroyed. Old people. They ain't gonna
have no time to go back and build this thing again. This world
is, as far as they're concerned, this world is over. And I want
you to be aware this morning that these blessings that He
hath blessed us with they're in the heavenlies where our Savior
is. They're in Him. They're in Him. And they're not
in this world. And not in this body. Because
health will fail. It's gonna fail. You say, well,
I just, could you give me just a little break, preacher? I mean,
give me a break. My friend, health is gonna fail.
It's gonna fail. I've been, you know, I observe
this. I watch this. God has blessed me with wonderful
health. I've had just a very few problems
in my life, and I've been blessed of God. But I'm aware that health,
regardless of how good it is, that it'll fail. It's going to
fail. And so you say, I'm blessed.
Boy, I've got these biceps. I'm just strong. I'm able to
do anything I want to do. And so on and so forth. Listen
to me. And you say, well, I'm mighty handsome. Or I'm very
attractive. I'm beautiful. Well, I'm telling
you, my friend, all it is, just a matter of time. That's all
it is. Matter of time. It's a matter
of time. The blessings are not there.
God hath blessed us. And it's not in a bank. Say,
oh well, I mean, you know, do you have to add that? It's not
in a bank! I don't know what you got, how much you got. Don't
need to know, don't want to know. But I'm just telling you, the
banks can fail. They did, didn't they? Didn't
they back in 1929? You think they can't fail again?
My friend, it is almost certain they'll fail again. Almost certain. It's gonna happen. going to happen. And I know of people that if
it does happen, it's over for them. They'll probably, like
some did in 29, jump out of the Empire State Building or jump
out of some other window or jump off a bridge someplace. They'll
do it. Why? Because all the blessings they
got is in a bank. That's where it is. They don't
have anything in their soul. They don't know God. They don't
know anything about God. And I'm going to tell you, I'm
going to listen to this old preacher. He's an expert and he said, these
are in heavenly places. That's where they are. They're
in heavenly places, not in a building because it's going to decay and
it's going to crumble. It's coming down around you.
Say, I've got a pretty good house preacher, you may have, but the
day will come, it'll come down. It'll come down. Every building
which our Heavenly Father has not built will come down. And he's talking about if he
built a spiritual building, it'll stand. All these others will
be destroyed by fire in the last days. Now everything lasting,
everything worthwhile, everything is eternal, that is eternal,
is in the heavenlies. It's in the heavenlies. I want
to share with you a couple of verses here, and we're just about
done. Turn with me to the book of Hebrews, chapter 6. Hebrews,
chapter 6. And I want to read two verses
here. Verse 19 and verse 20. Listen
to what it says. Paul's been talking about hope.
And he says, which hope, in verse 19, we have as an anchor of the
soul. both sure and steadfast, and
which entereth into that within the veil." Within the veil. Not
the veil of this world, but that veil yonder. Where the forerunner
is for us entered. I like that because it speaks
of this being in Christ. the forerunner that's our forerunner
that's the one our elder brother who is Jesus Christ he is for
us entered already within the veil and that's where all of
these spiritual blessings are they're in Christ even Jesus
made an high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek So the
Lord Jesus Christ has entered in, he's our forerunner, and
all these blessings are within the veil. They're there, and
I'd like to go into that, but I don't have time to do that.
I want to read this poem, and we'll close. In Christ, and beloved,
this is what you got to see, and may God reveal it to your
heart. May God reveal it to your heart. In Christ, the Father's
sovereign love was freely to me given. In Christ, the Father's
righteous grace secures my home in heaven. In Christ, I have
all my soul desires. He is my supreme delight. In Christ, I have all that God
requires to turn my darkness into His light. In Christ, the
source of all my bliss, my Savior, Brother, Friend. My wisdom, righteousness
on Him and only on Him do I depend. May the Lord bless these truths
to your heart. And that you'll listen to this
old preacher, Paul. And I tell you what, I got a
lot of good out of this. I got a lot of good out of it. I hope
nobody would in any way, shape, or form feel bad about it. You know that I spent this time,
some of you may be excited, some of you may not be. Some of you
might got bored, just bored stiff, listening to what I had to say
this morning, but it helped this old preacher. It helped this
old preacher at my time. in life. It strengthened me. It helped me to see exactly what
my attitude ought to be, what I ought to be about, day by day.
I ought to be permeated with these thoughts. Father, in the
name of Jesus, open hearts. May they receive the Word and
be blessed by the Word and encouraged by the Word. And may you, our
Father, deliver some poor soul here that's ignorant and blind
needs that the scales would fall off their eyes like it fell off
old Saul of Tarsus eyes and they'd receive their spiritual sight
and may we get just carried away with the idea that we better
be looking for something beyond this world and that our thoughts
and intentions of our hearts ought to be centered on heavenly
things where Christ is seated at the right hand of God where
treasures are safe where thieves cannot break through and steal
and rust cannot corrode. May we set our affection on things
above. May this be a time, great change
for this church, that we'll all become more spiritual minded.
and seek after and long for, regardless of how much of this
world we have, that we'll seek after and desire with all of
our hearts the true riches. I pray it in Jesus' name, for
his sake, amen. God bless you.