Turn in your Bibles this morning
to the book of the Revelation, chapter 2. I'd like to read this morning,
beginning with verse 1, and read down here through verse 7. Unto the angel of the church
of Ephesus write, These things saith he that holdeth the seven
stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven
golden candlesticks. I know thy works, and thy labor,
and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are
evil, and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles,
and are not, and hast found them liars. and hast borne, and hast
patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted. Nevertheless I have somewhat
against thee, because thou hast left thy first love. Remember
therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the
first works, or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove
thy candlestick out of its place, except thou repent. But this
thou hast the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. He that hath an
ear, let him hear what I say. To him that overcometh will I
give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the
paradise of God." Spoken to this morning by these words of our
Lord Jesus Christ. that one who walks in the midst
of the seven golden candlesticks, when he spoke these words, nevertheless,
in verse four and five, I have somewhat against thee, because
thou hast left thy first love. Remember, therefore, from whence
thou art fallen, and repent and do the first works, or else I
will come unto thee quickly. Or else, listen old church, what
the Spirit of God would say to you this morning. He says, or
else I will come unto thee quickly and will remove thy candlestick
out of its place, except thou repent. I was thinking about
this candlestick and what our Lord had to say here to the church
at Ephesus about it. I'm certain this morning as I
stand before you and I come before you with soberness of heart,
knowing and realizing the great importance of what we're about
to say today, those things that we have upon our hearts. We believe
this morning that the candlestick is the presence of Almighty God
in His church, and that that presence, as we read in the book
of Ephesians, that the church is built for a habitation of
God through the Spirit, and that God lives in a peculiar way in
His churches. I do know that the Spirit of
God dwells in every believer. If any man have not the Spirit
of Christ, he is none of his, is the testimony of the Word
of God. But yet the Bible says that the
church has been brought together and that it is in unity of the
Spirit for a place. of habitation for God in the
Spirit, and glory is to be brought to God through the church. And
so we're talking now about the local assembly, about that assembly
which God has put together here in this locality, and there are
others in other places we know that God has planted. Now there
is a candlestick that is the presence of God in that church. enabling that church to do the
work that God has called them to do, that God has authorized
them to do, commissioned them to do, and that is to preach
his gospel. Now, beloved, I believe that
whenever the church, when the church is in danger of losing
its candlestick, it is when they become very loose with the gospel
and when they begin to, as it were, to allow the gospel to
seemingly slip out of their hands, those that are in positions of
leadership, they seemingly do not have that intense desire
to know what the gospel is all about. And they lose their sweetheart
love for the Lord Jesus Christ. They lose that. They no longer
want to speak solely of Christ. They no longer want to exalt
Him. They no longer want the congregation
just to sing of Him. They no longer want to hear Him
exalted. They no longer want to hear the
creature debased. They would rather that the creature
be lifted up and that we just give a little more attention
to human merit and human works and human efforts and quit talking
so much about God's ability to save. Talk a little bit more
about our ability to accomplish something. Our ability to go
out into the world and to be an influence on men and women.
Our need to be more in our communities and all of this. Beloved, we're
in danger of that in our day. We have a tremendous amount of
false religion. We have more churches maybe than
ever before that's been planted in America. But we have more
false religion, more Antichrist than we ever have had in the
history of this nation. And I come before you this morning
to tell you that this church, if we lose Our sweetheart love
for the Lord Jesus Christ, if we lose our thirst to hear him
talked about and preached and lifted up, if we lose the desire
of our hearts to hear the gospel in its purity expounded and declared,
then we're on the verge of losing our candlestick. And it would
be necessary that we remember from whence we're fallen and
repent and do the first works. Go back. to the time when the
Lord Jesus was married, when you were married to Him. Go even
back further than that in the Word of God to when you were
chosen of Him, when He chose you to be His bride, when He
laid hold of you in old eternity and said, I will have you. I
have chosen you for reasons known only to myself. I've sent my
love and affection upon you. And in time, I will have your
heart. I will have your soul, you will
be wedded to me and there will be one spirit between me and
you and I will own you as my own and you will be my child,
my dear child. Go back to that time and think
upon the day of your espousal to the Lord Jesus Christ and
the time when he came into your heart. That time when He came
in, and when He came to live within you, and the joy bells
ring, and the mountains begin to sing, and the trees begin
to clap their hands, and the joy that was in your soul when
the Lord Jesus came in to live in your heart. Go back to that
time. That's what we need, and that
will kindle the fire in our soul that the candlestick be not removed
from us. Beloved, I want this morning,
if I can, to impress this upon your heart. The gospel. Martin
Luther said that the very heart and core of the church, of the
churches, is the justification, the doctrine of justification
by faith. the doctrine of substitution,
the doctrine of justification, how that sinners are justified
before God on the basis of faith. Without question, there is only
one true gospel. Our brother read it this morning
out of Galatians chapter 1. Now, beloved, if we maintain,
if the candlestick stays with us, it won't make any difference
if we meet outside, if we meet in here, if we meet somewhere
else, it won't make any difference if the candlestick stays with
us. It will be because of our being
bound to the truth of the gospel and that we maintain with constancy
our effort to preach that gospel of truth to men and women. God
does not save men and women with a lie. He doesn't bring people
to the truth with a lie. If God saves anybody under Arminian
free will preaching, he does it in spite of that preaching
instead of because of that preaching. I do believe in many, many occasions
that God, when he sends his word out that he does save men and
women, even when they're sitting in those places where Armenian
free will religion is preached. I believe that I know some people
that have been saved in those places, but it's only because
God said, he said, I'll send my word, and he said, my word
will accomplish that wherein to I send it, it will not return
unto me void, it will accomplish what I send it to accomplish.
And when God sends down his rain on the earth and it falls in
the various places on different kinds of soil throughout the
world, it accomplishes God's purpose. And when his word goes
out, God is pleased to save his elect. But brethren, listen to
me. God does not use false Arminian
preaching to bring men and women to the truth. He uses the truth
of the gospel to bring men and women to the truth. What a difference
it makes when somebody has really heard the true gospel, when they've
really heard it. when they really heard it. I'm
not talking about a man or woman, boy or girl, sitting and listening
to somebody preach for years and saying, I heard it. You never
heard it until you've heard it. Until you've heard it in here.
Until you so have heard it that you could not feed on anything
else. Until you could not tolerate
listening to anything else. I talked to a brother this morning.
He called me from down at Butte. Brother Paul, and he said that
he had been attending a few churches down there, having not the money
to make trips up here as often as he would like. But he said
that he'd got into some churches there, and he'd just get sick
about, just as soon as the preacher would start, he'd get sick to
his stomach. And he wanted to get up and walk
out, but he didn't want to make a, just make a big scene, and
so he would just sit, and he would just sit. and tolerate
it. Brother, sister, if you ever
get a taste of the true gospel of redeeming grace, you will
not be able to tolerate another gospel. You will not be able
to do it once you get it straight in your heart what the gospel
is all about, once the Lord has applied it to your heart. Now,
beloved, listen, hear what I'm saying. Every other gospel, there's
only one true gospel, every other gospel is a false gospel, and
those who preach a false gospel are false prophets, and those
who believe a false gospel are yet prophets. Lost there yet
in their sin, and they're under the wrath and curse of God. That's
what the brother read this morning He read it this morning He said
if a man or an angel preach any other gospel than that which
I preach to you Then let him go to hell when Christ comes.
He said it twice let him go to hell when Christ comes, if any
man preaches any other gospel than what I preach." Well, what
does that mean? It means that the man who preaches it is a
false prophet, and it means that everybody that listens to him
and believes what he says, apart from the intervention of God,
will go to hell when Christ comes. And so I say to you this morning,
that it's a serious thing to believe the gospel. It's a serious
thing not to believe the gospel. And the gospel cannot be ignored
or denied, the truth of the gospel. Now, a few weeks ago, I preached
to you a message on the treasury, the treasure, and that was the
gospel. We talked about how the gospel
was the treasure that we have in earthen vessels. Now, there
are four words. I think that which is primary
and essential in the gospel, and that which must be primary
in our preaching of the gospel, is the sin, atoning death, of
our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, the gospel has not been
preached to men until they've been made to hear. And we must
remember this as a church. You must remember this as a church
when this preacher is gone. That men are not, listen, men
have not heard the gospel until they hear how that Christ died
for our sins according to the scriptures. We read in 1 Corinthians
chapter 15 there in verse 3 about the gospel. Paul said, I preach
the gospel unto you as it was delivered unto me, how that Christ
died, how that he was buried, how God raised him from the dead. And so, beloved, it is the gospel,
yes, is made up of facts, but the gospel is not preached until
we preach how that Jesus died, how he died according to the
scriptures. Now that is so very important.
I was in a church building up in Choteau yesterday. I read
some of the things they had on the wall, and they had some things
on the wall about about how that we were all sinners, and that's
true, and they said, well, not only are we all sinners, but
Jesus came to die for sinners, and if you acknowledge that you're
a sinner, and so on and so forth, then you'll be saved. Just believe
and you'll be saved. I thought, well, that sounds
good as far as it goes, but beloved, there are some things that we
must understand according to the scriptures in regards to
the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we cannot preach a true gospel
unless we understand these truths. Number one, there are four words
that I want to give you right now that define how the Christ
died for our sins according to the scriptures. Four words. Now
remember what is at stake here. What is at stake here is, and
I don't care what the landmarkers say, and I don't care what the
primitive Baptists say, I love the primitive Baptist brethren.
There's some of the landmark brethren I love too. But beloved,
regardless of what they say, now they say that when a man
quits preaching, that the church, the local church, is the bride
of Christ, he's in danger of losing the candlestick. And they
say when a man begins to take in alien baptism, when you begin
to take in washings not your own, then you are going to lose
your candlestick. They say that when you begin
to preach that it's all right to have communion with all of
those who know Christ and are in Christ, you're in danger.
In other words, you've got to preach closed communion. And if you preach open communion,
you're going to lose the candlestick. Now that's what they say. And
there's some of them that will go so far as to say that if you
don't preach the premillennial return of Christ or the pre-treb
return of Christ, then you're going to lose the candlestick. I say to you, there's no truth
in any of that. There is no truth in any of that.
The truth is when a man loses his love for Christ, and when
a church loses its zeal and enthusiasm to study and make their life
long work, understanding His mission, His work, and His dedication
to the purpose and will, the eternal purpose and will of God,
then is when they're in danger of losing their candlestick. Now, There are four words that
define the gospel, define how that Christ died according to
the scriptures. You need to hear this. You need
to understand it. And the first word is sovereignty. Sovereignty. Now, beloved, Christ
died by an act of his own sovereign will according to the purpose
of the sovereign Lord God for the people he was sent of God
to save. We read in John 10 and also in
Acts chapter 2 And some of you brethren who have a Bible, you
brethren, get on your toes here, and I'll give you some verses. I'm just not able to get all
of this in this morning, and I need a break once in a while
here speaking to you today. And so I'll just let you read
some verses. Would somebody look up Acts chapter
2 and verse 23? I want that verse read Acts chapter
2 verse 23. Mike, would you read John 10
verses 14 through 18? Larry, would you read Hebrews
chapter 10 verse 5 through 10? This word sovereignty, how important
it is for us to see what the Word of God has to say about
Jesus Christ dying and as an act of his own sovereign will. Jesus Christ died according to
the will of the Father. It was the Father that bruised
him. He went to the cross being predestinated
in the purpose of God to go there and to die. Some people say,
well, he died by accident. He ended up there by accident,
and it just so happened God worked it around to where that his death
would become effectual to the salvation of all sinners. But
there's no truth in that. The Lord Jesus did not die accidentally. The Lord Jesus came into the
world, and the Bible says that he came. He said, lo, in the
volume of the book it is written I've come to do thy will God
and so when he wound up on that cross outside of Jerusalem It
was the will of God that placed him there and that we must preach
Sovereignty in regards to the death of Christ who has Acts
chapter 2 and verse 23, okay Conrad Okay, that verse of scripture
says that him being delivered, you see, by the determinate counsel
of God. you have taken by your wicked
hands and crucified and have slain him. So there where you
see the sovereignty of God and the free will of man, if you
want to call it that, his will is not free, he's bound by sin
or else you wouldn't find him, crucifying heaven's best, the
Lord Jesus Christ. But you see that he was delivered
up there by the determinate counsel of God. All right, now who has
John chapter 10? and verses 14 through 18. Mike,
okay, would you read those? And also, I must pray, that they
shall hear my voice, and there shall be no one to impose my
shame. Therefore doth my Father love
me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No
man taketh it from me, but I lay it down myself. I have the power
to lay it down. I have the power to take it again. This commandment
I receive from my Father. There are many, many things in
that text of Scripture, but one of the outstanding things is
that the Father loves the Son, and the Lord Jesus Christ has
the power to lay down His life, and He has the power to take
it again. Sovereignty. When He died, He
died on a purpose. He said, Other sheep I have,
I must bring them, and I must give them eternal life. And so
the Lord Jesus Christ is sovereign, and His death is no accident.
It was purposed by God. On purpose, Jesus died on that
cross. Okay, now who has Hebrews 10,
verse 5 through 10? Larry? Therefore, when he cometh
into the world, to say a sacrifice and offering thou must not, for
the body has not the merit to be eaten. To burn offerings and
sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I,
Lo, I come with the volume of the book which is written of
thee, and do thy will, O God. Above what he said, sacrifice
and offering, and burnt offering, and offering for sin, thou wilt
not, neither hath pleasure therein, which are offered by the law.
Then said he, O I come to do thy will, O God, to take away
the first, that ye may establish the second. By the will of will,
by the which will, we are sanctified through the offering of the body
of Jesus Christ once for all. Okay, so you see there clearly
in that text of scripture that the Lord Jesus had a body prepared
for him. And what do you suppose, why
do you suppose God prepared him a body? It was that in that body
he might come into this world on a mission. and that he might
make an end of sins, and that he might go in that body to that
cursed tree, and there have our sin laid on him, and he die under
the purpose and plan of God. He says all through that verse,
I quoted part of it a while ago. He says, I've come to do thy
will. Thy will, by which will we are sanctified through the
offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. So beloved,
anytime you hear anybody talking about the gospel, look Look for
sovereignty in His message, whether or not He understands that this
was God's predestinated purpose for the Lord Jesus Christ when
He gave Him a body, that He would come into this world and die
on a cross for our sin. Now the next word is substitution. We made a great deal a few weeks
ago about this word substitution. And that word is so very, very
important. Our Lord Jesus Christ died as
the substitute for God's elect. He stood in as our representative. He represented us. Jesus is the
Lord from heaven. Jesus is the second Adam. We
stood by nature in the first Adam, and the Lord Jesus came
to be our substitute. He laid down his life for his
sheep, Not for the goats. Mike read that there in John
chapter 10 and verses 11 through 14. It is utterly folly to imagine
that he would die for people whom he refused even to pray,
is it not? And John 17, 9. Would you look
that up, Alan? John 17, 9 and also verse 20. Those two verses. And Chris,
look up Isaiah 53 verse 8. Verse 8, but is it not folly
to imagine that the Lord Jesus Christ would die to save people
for whom he would not pray? It certainly is. Substitution,
he died for his people, and it's for his people alone, those that
he chose in Christ before the foundation of the world, for
whom the death of Jesus was meant. Substitution. Now then, could
we have those verses, Alan? Now verse 20, did you read that? Okay, all right. And then Isaiah
53 and 8. was taken from prison and from
judgement, and who shall declare his generation? For he was cut
off out of the land of the living, for the transgression of my people
was he stricken. my people, for the transgression
of my people was he stricken." This word substitution, so very,
very important that you remember that. Because the Lord Jesus
Christ, all he was, we are now. Because he has reckoned us to
be what Christ What Christ is, we've been reckoned to be, and
He was reckoned on the cross to be what we were in a state
of nature. With all of our sin, He took
upon Himself our sin. And so it's not enough to say,
well, the Lord Jesus took upon Himself our sin. He died for
our sin. We must, when we preach the gospel,
make it clear, and here's where many of the Armenian free willers,
here's where they lose the game, is that they do not spell out
to God's people what we have been made. They don't preach
both sides of substitution. They say, Jesus took our sin.
But what about me being made righteous in Christ? Me standing
in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus before God. Me being treated
now as if I was as righteous as the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
my hope of glory. That's my hope of seeing Christ.
That's my hope of walking the streets of glory is that God
now treats me just like the Lord Jesus ought to have been treated
at all times. Okay, and then there's another
word and that word is satisfaction Satisfaction being both God and
man in one glorious person our Savior the Lord Jesus was able
by his one great sacrifice to satisfy the justice of God's
holy law and justice Romans 3 Verse 24 through 26. Who can find that? The first one to find it. How
about you there, Jonathan? Could you find that? Romans 3
verses 24 through 26. being justified freely by his
grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom
God hath set forth to be appropriation through bathing his blood to
declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are
past. Through the forbearance of God,
to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness, that he might
be just, and the justifier of him which believeth. All right,
there's several things in that verse. First of all, we're justified
freely by His grace, and that word freely there means without
cause. We're justified without cause
by His grace. There was no reason, as God looked
upon me, that He should justify me, give me a standing before
Him, just as if I'd never committed a sin. No reason to be found
in me for that. freely freely and then went on
to say that he was the propitiation or the satisfaction that word
is satisfaction Meaning that the Lord Jesus Christ is that
one who worked out? Satisfaction between me and God
I've been sat God has been satisfied completely and entirely on my
behalf by the Lord Jesus and Now, you know, we always have
in the back of our mind, we need to please God. We need to please
God. Well, there's nothing wrong with
having that in our hearts. We want to please God. We would
want that God would be always pleased with us. But beloved,
do you know that the satisfaction, God being satisfied for all of
the infractions of the holy law, God being satisfied for all the
sins that I've committed in my life, regardless of whatever
they are, somebody had to satisfy God. I had offended Him. And
do you know who that one was that satisfied Him? Well, that
verse that Jonathan read spells it out. We've been satisfied
through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus. God's been satisfied
through that redemptive work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He
satisfied God. He went to the cross. He died.
The death of sin, the soul that sinneth, it must die. The Lord
Jesus went and died on the cross. He died. The Bible says the wages
of sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal
life through Jesus Christ. And so the satisfaction was worked
out. I have never satisfied God. Jesus satisfied God. Now brother, sister, if you listen
to a man preach and he does not preach that God is satisfied
on the behalf of his elect, his gospel is not pure. He's a false
prophet. If he tells you that you must
satisfy God on your own, left to yourself, you must satisfy
God. Then my friend, you know that
that man's not preaching the message. He's not preaching the
whole message. He has no good news for ruined
men and women. He has no good news for you that
are in a state of sin and rebellion against God. No good news! But
for a man to preach to me and tell me that God is satisfied.
Now brother, sister, I know something about what that means. And I
rejoice in that, that God's satisfied. And it's wonderful, isn't it?
I mean, that'll make the joy bells ring in your soul. God's
satisfied. And we know that the reason is
because Jesus answered to God for the infractions of the law
and our sin and every sin we committed. Okay, there's one
more word. And I'm going to ask Isaiah 53, verses 10 through
11. Stephen, would you want to look
that up? I think that'd pretty well get us around with all the... Well, no, we have Benjamin back
there yet. Maybe we'll find another verse here for him in a minute.
But this fourth word is success. Now here is where we really,
now we're preaching the gospel and we're telling you that God
was sovereign and that Jesus was delivered by the determined
counsel of God. And then we told you that he
was a substitute, that God treated him like us and treats us like
him, like he should have been treated. And then we told you
God was satisfied. And now we're telling you that
the Lord Jesus Christ was a success. And that's where you lose an
awful lot of people. Well, did you find Isaiah 53
verse 10 and 11, Stephen? Alright, would you read that?
Yet pleased the Lord to bruise him, he hath put him to grief. But thou shalt make his soul
an offering for sin. Ye shall see his deed. Ye shall
prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in
his hand. Ye shall see of the travail of
his soul, and shall be satisfied by his knowledge. Ye shall, my
righteous servant, justify my inquiry. Ye shall bear with him
into his grief. Yes. Well, that's a tremendous
verse because it tells us that the Lord Jesus Christ is going
to see the travail of his soul. It tells us that the Lord Jesus
is successful. I think it is Isaiah. Benjamin,
would you look up Isaiah? Do you have an Old Testament
there? Look up Isaiah, I think it's 42 verse 4 and see what
that verse of scripture says and and if that's not the one
I think it's it could be Isaiah 44, but I think it's 42. Look
that up. But the Lord Jesus shall not
fail. He shall not fail. And so we
see that when the Lord Jesus went to the cross and when he
died for our sins, the true gospel, if we're going to be faithful
to it, we've got to preach that his redemption is a redemption
that redeems. And that we're not preaching
that men and women need to redeem themselves. But we're preaching
that redemption has been accomplished. It has been accomplished. All
the redemption that ever will be accomplished has already been
accomplished when Jesus went to the cross. And you and I,
as sinners, as sinners, need to look to that redemptive work. And when Jesus died, He succeeded
in delivering and saving everybody whom the Father gave Him in that
love covenant before the foundation of the world. He did sure enough
save them, and they will be saved. Every one of the elect will be
delivered out of their sin, will be saved by the redemptive work
of Jesus Christ. And if you have anybody preach
to you and they're in doubt, as to whether or not God's truly
going to save a people, whether God is able to save all that
he purposed to save, then you know that that fella don't know
the gospel. He don't know it. Redemption is not something we're
working on. It's not something we're trying
to accomplish. Redemption has been accomplished
and it was accomplished by our substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen? Success! Success! I'm talking about. Benjamin,
was that the right verse? What does it say? Yes. He will not fail nor be
discouraged. He won't. And the Lord Jesus,
we're not talking about Christ being a failure. He's not going
to be one. And anybody that ever gets up
and wants you to have wet eyes for a Jesus who's sitting up
in heaven wringing his hands because sinners won't let him
do what he wants to do or because sinners none will ever be saved,
listen to me, Jesus is not going to fail. He's not going to be
discouraged. Now, if you're a sinner here
this morning, lost, undone, without Jesus Christ, I believe what
I would do if I was you. I would begin to seek after such
a Savior, a sovereign Savior, a Savior that saves by substitution,
that He was willing to take a sinner's place and die in His place. in order that you might be accepted
of God, be righteous as he is. That's not blasphemy. Somebody
said one time, you're blaspheming God when you preach that. I'm
not doing any such thing. I am as righteous before God
as Jesus Christ himself. Oh, there is no truth to the
gospel. There's no truth to it. We are
standing in His righteousness. He was made to be sin for us
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. And then we talked about satisfaction
and then success. And if I was you this morning,
that's the kind of Savior that I'd be looking for. I'd be a
seeking Him. I'd be a praying. I'd be a cryin'
to God. I'd be a cryin' to God. Well,
the time got away from me. I really have some other things
I'd like to say, but let me just say this in closing that this
morning, the thing that we need to be
conscious of is this treasure that we talked about a few weeks
ago, and that we're all fallible people. We make mistakes. We say too much at one time and
don't say enough at other times. We're hot sometimes and we're
cold sometimes, and sometimes we're indifferent. Sometimes
things are just not right, our systems aren't right, and we're
such fallible people. But brother, sister, listen to
me. We must maintain our zeal for the gospel. If you lose that,
the candlestick will be gone. And there are church buildings
sitting in America this morning where there used to be a thriving
ministry of the gospel, and now the buildings, the weeds are
growing up through the floor, or they've been turned into museums,
or people have went in and converted them and made apartment buildings
out of them. There's, listen, Ichabod's been written over the
doors of so many, many, many churches. The glory hath departed. What's the glory of a church?
It's Christ our Lord. It's the message of the gospel.
It's His gospel. That's the glory of the church.
And we don't want to lose the candlestick. We don't want to
lose it. And I believe this morning that
each one of us need to weekly as we come to this place or wherever
the church meets, come come with a heart warm toward Christ. Oh,
that I could learn more of Him every day and know more. Listen,
it's your lifelong business to know Jesus Christ. Paul said,
Oh, that I might know Him. And he'd already had experiences
where he'd been caught up and where he'd had all kinds of experiences
to where the Lord had to send him a thorn in the flesh to keep
him humble. Yet, oh, that I might know Him,
that I might know Him. at your lifelong assignment to
know the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, that we knew Him better,
that we knew Him better. My, my. Father, in the name of
Jesus, bless the effort here this morning for Thy glory, for
Thy praise, and may the Lord Jesus Christ be made known to
some poor sinner's heart here today May they never forget what
they heard on December the 8th, 1996. We vowed to be more earnest
as we come here this morning. We stood over a grave where we
had planted the body of one of the members of this church about
a year ago. And we vowed this morning that
we would be more in earnest than ever before preaching the gospel
of the grace of God. Father, give us a burden, give
us a help and strength never before to be able to be a faithful
witness of the gospel. Do thou be with us that the candlestick
might remain and that the joy of the Lord be here and all of
us would have a renewed sweetheart love in our hearts for Jesus
Christ. We pray in his name. Amen.