Lord Jesus Christ, we seek thy face.
It is written, the light of the glory
of God is in the face of Jesus
Christ.
O thou who didst forfeit for that one
terrible moment the countenance of thy father, in
order that we might never come there, that
we might be received and abide in the
light of the countenance of God.
Do this morning bring us into that very
blessed inheritance through thy cross, the face, the
countenance, the towardness, the unforsakingness of God.
May this indeed be a time within the
veil when we dwell in the light of
the countenance, the face of the Lord.
Lord Jesus Christ, in all that great and
wonderful meaning, we now seek thy face as
we wait on thee.
Show us thy face, for thy name's sake.
Amen.
In this
final hour of this particular ministry, it is
necessary to seek special grace to gather up,
concentrate all that has been said throughout this
week.
And I think, perhaps I should say, I
feel that the leading of the Lord is
to do this with one part of this
letter to the Hebrews before us.
As the letter is drawing to a close,
and we reach that part of it which
is marked as chapter 12, and
it is in verse 25
to 28, it is in those verses, not
all of them, 28.
See that ye refuse not him that speaketh.
Remember, the beginning is, God hath spoken in
his Son.
See that ye refuse not him that speaketh.
But if they escape not, when they refuse
him that warned them on earth, much more
shall not we escape who turn away from
him that warneth from heaven, whose voice then
shook the earth.
But now he hath promised, saying, Yet once
more will I make to tremble not the
earth only, but also the heaven.
And this word, yet once more, signifieth the
removing of those things that are shaken, as
of things that have been made, that those
things which are not shaken may remain.
Wherefore, receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken,
let us have grace whereby we may offer
service well-pleasing to God with reverence and
awe.
A kingdom which cannot be shaken.
The significance then, as we have been trying
to see and show, the significance of this
letter, so called to Hebrews, for the present
time.
But yet once more, that is in this
dispensation which has come in with Christ.
The shaking, firstly, of the earth's side of
things, and then the shaking of the heaven's
side of things.
The other side, I think, had a special
reference to what was just about to happen
in old traditional historic Judaism.
This letter was probably, I cannot be positive
about it, because all the expositors and scholars
are divided about who wrote it and when
it was written, to whom it was written
exactly.
We need not worry about that, but I
am fairly sure that it was related to
what the Holy Spirit knew was about to
take place in the historic Judaism and after
Israel.
The probability is that this letter was written
in the year 69, and you know what
happened in the year 70.
If that is true, it was a very
short distance from the writing of this letter
to the destruction of Jerusalem, which was so
utter, so terrible.
Some of you, pastors especially, will have read
Josephus, and if you have, the section on
the invasion and destruction of Jerusalem is one
of the most terrible things you can read
in history.
It took place in the year 70, and
everything in that Jerusalem was devastated and desolated,
and the Jews scattered, as Peter says, throughout
Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Bithynia, and everywhere else.
The outside was certainly shaken, not only shaken,
but brought down and devastated, and from that
it has not yet recovered.
There is no temple.
There is no integrated Israel on the Elf.
Well, that's the Elf site, and this is
the prophecy, as you know, taken out of
the Old Testament, that this would happen.
And it is interesting, very interesting, significant, and
instructive to go back to the setting of
that prophecy, which we're not going to do,
to see the setting of it in the
history of Israel, just the conditions that were
arising in the time of Haggai.
The prophecy is taken up, brought right over
here, so many, many years later, and applied
the situation which is reached in this letter
to the Hebrews at that crisis time, the
shaking of the Elf, shaking of the Elf,
because it applies particularly the shaking of the
Elf-Jerusalem, the Elf-Israel.
We say that and leave it, but that
is only half of the statement.
Yet once more, will I shake, not only
the Elf, the Elf-site, but the heaven
also.
And in the light of what we have
been saying this week in the morning, and
in the evening, or what the Lord has
been saying, may I say that at any
rate of the evening, in the light of
all this, and of this letter in its
full content, we are surely right in saying
that Christianity, which is the other side, if
you like, the heaven side, is going to
be subjected also to such a shaking.
To such a shaking.
Maybe we will not be far wrong if
we say it has begun.
It is on.
It is proceeding.
It is spreading.
And however you may feel it has not
reached your country yet, well if you are
talking of merely material things, and outward economies,
maybe symptoms of it, but spiritually it is
worldwide.
The shaking of Christianity, the shaking of what
we may call the heaven side of things,
as different from the historic earthly Israel.
But the point is that there is a
universal shaking to take place in the economy
of God.
In the sovereign ordering of God, a universal
shaking.
What for?
So it says, in order that there shall
be nothing left but what God himself has
established.
Notice the little phrase, as of things which
have been made.
Who made them?
Homemade.
Things made.
Things which God made, has made and established,
are these things.
And the only things which will ultimately remain.
And the shaking is for that.
Now this letter is a comprehensive comparison and
contrast or discrimination between the passing and the
permanent.
Between the temporal and the spiritual.
Between the earthly and the heavenly.
That's the letter to the Hebrews.
That is what we've been emphasizing all the
way through.
The not any longer.
A comprehensive not.
Ye are not come, and the but, but
ye are come.
Two great comprehensive orders, economies, sovereignties, whatever you
may call them.
This whole letter has to do, on the
one side, with the things which are transient
and not abiding.
And on the other side, the things which
are permanent and which remain.
That.
That, the things which cannot be shaken.
Here's your that again.
That, the things which cannot be shaken, shall
remain.
This is the comparison and contrast or discrimination
that is made by this letter as a
whole.
And here, as a kind of parenthesis, let
me put this.
You see, it is important for us to
remember that this letter was written to a
people who, for a long period, had held
the position of a people whom God had
taken out of the world to himself, showing
that it is possible for such a people
to miss the way.
It is possible for such a people to
make their position an earthly one.
Just an earthly one.
Or make that position earthbound.
And that is the force of this letter.
Not to Israel only, but to Christians.
This is the on-high calling letter, isn't
it?
This is the heavenly side.
This is the new Israel which God has
taken out of the world to himself and
for himself.
But through and through this letter runs this
reminder that a people who were like that
for so long, taken out for God, to
God, did in the end miss the object,
miss the way, did not arrive.
Chapter 3 is all on that.
They did not enter in.
They perished in the wilderness.
Oh, this terrible battle between what ought to
be said and what time allows to be
said.
Oh, dismiss your chapters again and see chapter
3.
I must put it in.
Enemy or no enemy.
Dismiss chapter 3.
There you have the people who failed to
enter in, who perished in the wilderness.
You see, they could not enter in, is
the word, because of unbelief.
That's chapter 3.
But chapter 4 opens, and you're not far
into chapter 4.
Before you have this, the word of God
is quick and powerful and sharper than any
two-edged sword, piercing to the dividing asunder
of soul and spirit.
I'm not going out on that.
But the point is that in the wilderness
where they perished, it was because they did
not discriminate between soul and spirit, in effect.
They didn't understand the doctrine, of course, but
they lived in their souls.
That is the self-life, the self-direction
of everything.
How this affects us, what we are going
to get out of this, what this means
in our interest.
The self-life is the soul-life.
The spirit is not that.
The spirit is unto God, is the God
-life.
But this cleavage was not made in the
wilderness.
And although they had come out by such
a mighty work of God, and become God's
people, and were separated under him, because they
persisted in what we now call, in New
Testament terms, soul-life.
Soul-life as the people of God.
And there was no discrimination, no clear cut
between, as of a two-edged sword.
See, cutting both ways, up and down.
No clear cut between the self-life and
the life of the spirit.
They perished in the wilderness.
And you tell me that that is not
a possibility for Christians?
That's the point of the letter, you see.
Dismiss chapter three and four as simply mechanical
divisions, and pass right on and say, why
did they perish in the wilderness?
Why did they not enter in?
Why?
Well, here we are.
There's not this clean cut between self and
the Lord, between soul and spirit.
A large matter about which you've heard too
much.
I think there's too much talk about that
just now.
It's become a very fascinating subject.
You never capture people more quickly mentally than
when you begin to talk about soul and
spirit.
It's a very interesting mental subject, isn't it?
Most fascinating.
I'm coming to the place where I want
to talk about the things and not the
names.
The meaning and not the language or the
terminology.
However, that's by the way.
Now you see what I'm saying is, this
letter was addressed to a people who for
a long time had held the position of
a people separated unto God, but who eventually
missed the way.
And lost the inheritance.
Lost the meaning of their separation.
Because, well we come back again, the earthbound.
The earthbound.
Judaism.
Earthbound.
And God said, I'll shake that.
I'll shake that earthboundness.
And I'll shake it so devastatingly that there
will be no temple and no Jerusalem and
no headquarters for the nation at all.
The whole thing will be smashed.
I'll shake that earth side.
And he did.
And has done.
And it's gone on all these centuries.
But he doesn't stop there.
Letter goes over to the other side.
I'm going to shake this other thing too.
This Christianity.
It came in from heaven.
The Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.
But what have men done with Christianity?
Brought it down to earth.
Made it earthbound.
Made it something.
The Lord foreseeing that prophesies, I'll shake that
also.
I'll shake that also.
And Christianity as a merely earthly system will
go into the melting pot.
It will go into the fire.
And only that which is really truly heavenly
of the Spirit of God will survive and
come out.
You see the force of this letter.
Hence, and here dear friends, another week is
required.
If you go through this letter, you will
find that it is divided along two lines.
The line of precaution.
Of warning.
And the line of resolution.
Now a little Bible study for you.
Not here.
You go through and mark the nine times
in which the word lest occurs.
Lest.
Let us, first, let us fear lest a
promise being left us of entering in.
Any one of you should seem to come
short.
Lest.
Nine times that word lest is used through
the letter.
Trace it and see its context.
Lest for this reason.
Lest for that reason.
Perhaps I'll touch on just an illustrative piece
in each section.
Then ten times.
Ten times.
Nine times lest.
Precaution.
Warning.
Ten times you have let us.
Let us.
Ten times.
And connected with that phrase.
Let us.
It's an admonition to resolution.
Be resolved.
Know you can't take anything for granted about
this.
You're not going to get there by drift.
And that is the first lest.
You see.
Lest by any means you drift past.
That's the real language.
You drift.
And the picture behind is a picture which
is a very simple one but very very
clear in its implication.
I used to be a yachtsman in Scotland.
And we would go out on our day
sail.
But the most anxious moment.
The most anxious should I say moment.
The most tense moment was when we came
back to pick up our moorings.
If the tide was flowing strongly.
The current.
The wind.
There were our moorings.
You've got to take off your power.
Take down your sails.
Get your head towards the mooring.
And then everybody.
One with a boat hook up in the
bow.
Someone lying down flat on the desk with
outstretched hand to get hold of that mooring.
And to grab it.
And hold it.
Because the tide or the current flowing would
even pull you into the sea.
You didn't hold tight.
But the tenseness.
The peril was you would miss it.
And drift past it.
And there are the rocks over there.
Drift past.
Miss and drift.
Carried by the tide or the current or
the wind.
It was a tense moment.
We got it and held on.
We were able to pull the boat up
on the mooring to make fast.
The tension was gone.
We reached home.
It's all right now.
Everything's all right.
Now that is the picture here which is
actually used.
Lest we drift past.
Drift.
Less.
Caution.
Warning.
All this is presented.
And oh what an all it is.
This fullness and finality in Christ brought in
with verses 1 and 2.
And all that is in this letter.
The great inheritance.
A tremendous all.
And the first warning is you could drift.
You could drift.
You'd be carried past and carried away by
the current.
By the present breeze.
Now Paul puts it in other words.
In another way.
Carried about by every wind of doctrine.
The slight and cunning craftiness of men.
Same thing.
Well that's an illustration of the Lests.
And I say there are nine of them.
That's why I say we want another week.
But there.
Less.
And over alongside of that is the exhortation.
Let us.
Hold fast.
Let us hold fast.
Let us lay hold.
Let us go on.
And I'm just going to put another fragment
in because I think it's illuminating.
You may have a point of application.
Lests.
Because of the deceitfulness of sin.
We are subverted.
The deceitfulness of sin.
Have you ever thought about that?
What is the deceitfulness of sin?
If the word sin is a comprehensive word.
Now don't you narrow it down to one
of its meanings.
Sin has many aspects.
It works in many ways.
You can call this sin and that sin
and something else and a thousand things sin
yes.
But they're only aspects of the one thing.
What is the meaning of the word sin
in the bible?
Missing the mark.
You may miss it because of this or
that or many things.
But in the end it amounts to this.
You've missed the mark.
Sin comprehensively is missing the mark.
The deceitfulness of sin to subvert you from
the mark.
What Paul calls the prize of the mark
of the on high calling.
Missing the mark.
The deceitfulness to subvert.
How what do you mean by that deceitfulness?
Well for me at the moment for this
purpose this morning it is policy in the
place of principle.
There is nothing more subverting more spiritually injurious
than policy being politic.
Oh how I have seen tragedies in the
life of godly men servants of the lord
on this thing.
No man brought face to face more than
one.
I have one or two in mind face
to face with god's full purpose.
Full purpose.
But they had a position in the christian
world and this full purpose requires a lot
of things of adjustment as to position.
Adjustment as to position as to relationships.
If I do that my large door of
opportunity for the lord will be closed.
If I do that I will lose my
influence for the lord.
If I take that way maybe I shall
be involved in well so much that you
know will mean loss for the lord.
Someone responsible for an organization.
Somehow or other it's got to get support.
Now now if I take
such and such a lie as is being
indicated I'll lose my clientele.
I'll lose my financial support.
That's policy.
Politics.
Alongside of what god has indicated.
And the issue is will I trust the
lord to look after what is of him.
I'm no longer interested in anything that is
not of the lord but if it is
can I trust the lord to look after
that while I obey him.
Go his indicated way or shall I hold
on to my my place of opportunity open
doors and influences for the lord.
And take this other course.
Do you see what I mean?
The deceitfulness of missing the mark.
And I've seen more than one tragedy that
after years it's so manifest to everybody that
man has missed the way.
That man was meant for something more.
Something other.
The lord meant something for that man but
policy came in and he argued for his
policy that it was in the interest of
the lord that this and this letter says
you can be subverted by the deceitfulness of
sin policy instead of principle.
Does that fit in anywhere?
Well it's necessary you see to pinpoint all
this teaching but there it is.
So here we come back.
Hebrews the letter to the Hebrews is a
statement of what is abiding and permanent as
over against what is passing and transient.
And does not that matter?
Surely it does supremely.
The shakable and the unshakable.
The new testament is comprised of 26 books.
If you'd like to have 27 you can
but say 26 books.
And most of them most of them were
written to combat some form of a
universality of effort to destroy what had come
in with Jesus Christ.
You'd like me to repeat this?
It's a big mouthful I know.
Most of the new testament was written to
combat some form of a universal effort to
destroy what had come in with Jesus Christ.
Got it now?
That's the statement.
Very comprehensive.
You've got to break it up apply it
to each book of the new testament.
See oh oh what then Matthew and Mark
and Luke and John and Acts and on.
This is written to combat something.
And when you take that as the key
my word aren't we in a a combat
in Matthew.
Isn't the Lord Jesus in a combat in
Matthew and Mark and Luke and John.
It's an atmosphere of competitiveness of conflict of
antagonism.
Right?
Is that true?
And so you go on with the letters.
Here is some form in each one some
form of this universality of effort to destroy
what had come in with Jesus Christ.
It's a comprehensive the new testament is a
comprehensive countering of a many-sided attempt to
subvert the church and pervert the meaning of
God's son.
In that statement you've got your new testament
and its real meaning.
Do try to get hold of it in
that way.
Now the chief point of attack in this
comprehensive or universal effort.
The chief point of the attack has always
been and still is the measure of Jesus
Christ.
The measure of Christ.
We must in the first place keep him
out altogether.
Give him no foothold.
That's the battle of the ages and of
the nations.
Soon as you bring Jesus Christ into a
vicinity trouble arises.
Conflict begins.
You must keep him out.
Oh look how it was with Paul as
he went from city to city.
He was hardly there.
Hardly there.
Hardly said anything.
I don't know how much he had said
in Philippi.
What he had said he said to just
a little handful we don't know exactly how
many by the riverside outside the city.
He went into the city not preaching as
far as we know.
Not raising issues as far as we know.
The devil knew.
The devil had possession of that damsel.
That priesthood.
A priest.
Woman of the temple.
And how subtle.
These men are the servants of the most
high God who show unto us the way
of salvation.
By the devil preaching the gospel.
It looks as though the very devil himself
is glorifying the Lord Jesus.
Something very subtle here is the issue sure.
But the point is from the unseen world
where the real intelligence of the significance of
Christ is recognized.
Is possessed.
There is this combative coming in wherever that
which is representative of Christ or that which
is Christ in effect arrives.
Trouble arises at one.
Keep him out.
And if he's got in drive him out.
Do everything.
Drive out what is of Jesus Christ if
he's got anywhere at all.
But then that is not all to drive
him out.
To subvert those who are his embodiment there.
To subvert.
To deceive.
To turn aside.
To bring in false teaching.
False Christian ideologies.
That which is other in its essence.
Not essentially Christ.
Something put on to Christ.
Christ plus.
Put on.
There are many things which are being imposed
upon Christianity.
All good meaning but they are not the
essence of Christ.
That is the point of attack in some
way either to prevent.
To force out.
Or to limit in some way or other
the measure of Christ.
And you know dear friends or you ought
to know that it is the measure of
Christ which is the governing thing.
Not only that Christ has got in.
No.
But the measure of Christ.
That's Ephesians isn't it?
The ultimate thing is the measure of Christ.
The measure of Christ.
If you were to use that word measure
you're always transported to Ezekiel aren't you?
The end of Ezekiel what is it?
It's the temple.
Now I'm not putting any interpretation on that.
Whether that is going to be literal.
And all the old testament sacrifices restored.
You can have your own interpretation about that.
I'm not touching that.
But what I have there is that when
that temple does come into view.
It's a heavenly temple.
And the heavenly messenger has his measuring line.
And taking the prophet round.
Round about.
He took me round.
He took me in.
Round.
About.
In.
And out.
How detailed.
How meticulously detailed that is.
Every point.
Every fragment.
Every iota is given a measurement.
It's according to this measure.
This heavenly measuring read or line.
It's measured by that.
It places only by reason of it having
that measure.
And now whether you like the interpretation or
not I believe that stands right at the
heart of the letter to the Ephesians and
the new testament.
And to this letter to the Hebrews.
Spiritually we have come to a new Jerusalem.
We have come to the dwelling of the
most high God.
We are come to Zion.
We have come to that which Ezekiel spiritually
saw.
A spiritual temple.
We have come now to that which in
every detail is measured according to Christ.
Is this how much of Christ is here?
According to the measure of the stature of
the fullness of Christ.
That's the beginning of Hebrews isn't it?
As well as Ephesians.
See?
And so the chief point of the attack
is always to take something of Christ away.
Divert from Christ.
Put something in the place of the very
essence, the essential Christ.
Anyhow, anyhow, anyhow, anything.
So long as the end of it is
less of Christ.
Not so much of Christ.
Not more of Christ.
It has to do then with the Lordship
of Christ in everything.
Lordship of Christ is to open, singing, crown
him, crown him Lord of all.
Lovely idea.
Beautiful thought.
Wonderful thing.
Do you see what it means?
Not only the thing as a whole, this
wonderful temple, house, sanctuary, but to the last
detail in the whole heavenly order.
The last detail of Christ.
In your life, in mine.
He is the decision.
He is the controlling principle.
This is the kingdom.
Oh our Christian phraseology does need redeeming and
revising.
We talk about the kingdom, the kingdom.
We are out in the work of the
kingdom for the spread of the kingdom.
I say these words, kingdom, church and all
the others need redeeming.
They need revision.
What is the kingdom?
Well in the original language it's quite clear,
but we've missed it by some other mentality.
The kingdom of God is the sovereign rule
of God.
The sovereign rule of God.
That's the meaning of it.
And that here is brought down to a
detail.
It's not just some comprehensive conception of a
king.
No, it's where I go today.
What I do today.
What the Lord would have about me today.
That's the kingdom of God.
A kingdom which cannot be shaken is of
that kind.
Where it's all Christ.
Hence the necessity for making known the ground
upon which security rests.
Cannot be shaken.
The ground on which security rests.
Security is of course a very new thing
today.
A very lively concern isn't it in this
world.
Security, security.
Well your metropolitan insurance.
An immense organization in this one word is
security.
See what I mean.
In every realm this word security is governing.
There is nothing secure, eternally secure, but what
is established by God and that is concerning
his Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.
And that is the positive side to the
New Testament always.
And so I'm going to conclude by reminding
you of the nine and the ten.
Why nine precautions?
Why nine times?
Beware less.
How precautionary the Lord is even with his
best servants.
His most used servants.
If they are really under his sovereign government
what precautions he takes.
Do you remember?
Had he ever a greater servant than the
Apostle Paul?
Was there ever a servant more used, God,
than he?
Stranger to say in the annals of eternity
that man stands very high in preciousness for
the Lord.
Lest, lest by reason of the greatness of
the revelation I should be exalted.
A bad measure, thorn in the flesh, a
messenger of satan.
I have bespoke the Lord three times that
he would take this away if he said.
Not no, the Lord is always positive, my
grace is sufficient.
But the precaution of the Lord to keep
a most used and valuable servant from deviating
from the awful snare of pride.
Even in holy things, the things of God
and heaven, for spiritual pride is the worst
kind of pride.
And pride, pride, the devastation of pride works.
Lest I should be God's precaution.
Lest, lest.
And here you have these nine lests.
Look at them friends.
Go through.
Not just as a bible study, interesting.
But note the peril that is associated with
each lest.
Take it at heart.
And so this book has this running right
through from beginning to end.
Lest, lest, lest.
Be on your guard.
Watch.
Is this of that kind that abides forever?
Indestructible and unshakable is it, Christ.
Be utterly committed.
And that's where the other side, let us,
let us.
And the let us ten times, if you
sum it all up, amounts to this.
Be unreservedly and utterly committed.
Committed, I think that means something more than
becoming a Christian.
Many, many who are still children of God,
just genuinely born again, but they're not utterly
committed.
Not utterly committed.
There are some other interests.
They've got one foot or even a toe
in the world.
Still something where there are alternatives to utterness.
But the, the exaltation here ten times mentioned,
let us, let us.
Because, because, because of this peril, let us.
The great let us of chapter 6, 1,
isn't it?
Let us go on.
Don't drift.
Don't leave yourself to the mercy of the
present current.
The tide, the wind.
There's nothing that will keep us safer than
being positive.
I like that translation of the phrase.
You know that our English is fervent in
spirit, serving the Lord.
And I think it's Moffat who has translated
it, and I like it.
Maintain the spiritual glow.
Always a safeguard.
There's nothing more safeguarding than being positive.
Remember David on the housetop?
Tragedy, catastrophe, calamity of David's life, which left
its scar on him, was being on the
housetop when he ought to have been in
the battle, or reclining when he ought to
have been going.
This road dilly-dallyed in the wilderness of
40 years instead of getting on with it.
Going.
Let us go on to full growth.
Not laying again the foundations, but let us
go on.
Go on.
So often weariness, tiredness, discouragement, despondency, perplexity,
disappointment make us sad.
Make us sad.
Take the initiative out of us.
We're inclined to sink down.
And then again and again in our spiritual
history we have to gird up the loins
of our minds.
And no, this won't do.
This won't do.
This is a colder sex.
If I get down here there's no way
through.
The only way is to come out of
it and go on.
Be aware of your colder sex.
Your backwaters.
You're no thoroughfare.
Keep on the high road.
Remain thoroughfare.
In this sense if you like, in this
sense you can be marching to Zion, whether
the doctrine is right or not.
Have the spirit of it.
And you'll sing again in that hymn, I
walk the golden streets.
And we carried on that tune after.
And the bible says there are no streets
in the New Jerusalem.
There's only one.
A street of gold.
All of God is in the New Jerusalem.
The heavenly Jerusalem.
Only one.
Only one thing.
A golden street.
You're not going to choose your locality there.
You're going to be put onto the Lord's
highway.
You see the figurative meaning.
It's just that.
All of God.
A golden street and only one.
We'll have to learn how to live together,
shan't we?
But the point, the integrating, uniting thing is
let us go on to full growth.
If we're all of that mind, we'll not
be caught by these subverting things.
These alternatives.
These classics.
These impositions.
We'll not be caught.
No.
Is this going to mean really and truly
an increase of Christ?
A greater fullness of Christ?
Or is it some interesting thing?
Some fascinating thing?
Something that's going to be for the moment,
for the time being, and then presently it's
going to fade out and I'm going to
be left high and dry?
That's what happens with so many of these
things.
They're just for a time.
You can see history strewn with a rank
of things which at one time seemed to
be the thing.
The ultimate thing.
The only thing that is the thing is
the increase of Jesus Christ.
The test of everything.
Increase of Jesus Christ and the universal challenge.
Contact test is on that.
I've said enough.
I close there, praying as I trust you
will do, that will not be a subject
of a conference.
A man's pain, morning by morning, the Lord
will make the challenge of it.
For yet, yet again I will shake not
the earth only, but the heaven.
The shaking has begun.
It has begun.
Christianity has entered the great shaking.
What is going to remain?
Not the things of the maze.
Not the earthbound things of Christianity.
But that kingdom, that sovereign rule which cannot
be shaken.
It's Zion's citizens as the mountains are round
about Jerusalem.
It cannot be shaken.
That's the Old Testament idea.
But here it is.
It's what is really and truly spiritual and
heavenly that is in us and that we
are in.
It is that, to use our first word
these mornings, that to which we are coming.
Lord help us.
Lord with the indelible pen of the spirit
of the living God, O write the terms
of the new covenant on our hearts, the
fleshly tablets of our hearts, indelibly so, that
it may not pass with a week, with
a ministry, gathering people, however all this may
be blessed and joyous, but that the Lord's
own intention revealed to us may abide in
our hearts, continually check us up, arbitrary between
the two courses, the option, the alternative.
It always comes back to this.
Does this mean more of Christ?
Lord so help us.
We ask with thanksgiving in the name of
the Lord Jesus.
Amen.