...section from the book of 1st Corinthians, 4th
chapter.
Let a man, says Paul, let a man
so account of us as of the ministers
of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of
God.
Moreover, it is required in stewards that a
man be found faithful.
But with me it is a very small
thing that I should be judged of you,
or a man's judgment.
Yea, I judge not mine own self, for
I know nothing by myself, yet am I
not hereby justified.
He that judgeth me is the Lord.
He said, these charges you bring against me,
I don't know any of them that are
true, but he said, I'm not hiding behind
that.
He that judgeth me is the Lord.
Therefore, judge nothing before the time until the
Lord come, who both will bring to light
the hidden things of darkness, and will make
manifest the counsels of the heart.
And then shall every man have praise of
God.
In verse 15 he says, for though ye
have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet have
ye not many fathers.
For in Christ Jesus I have begotten you.
Since you believe, said Paul, through my preaching,
ten thousand people have instructed you, but don't
forget, I preached the gospel that won you.
Therefore I beseech you, be followers of me,
for this cause have I sent unto you
Timotheus, who is my beloved son, and faithful
in the Lord, who shall bring you into
remembrance of my ways, which be in Christ.
As I teach everywhere in every church, now
some are puffed up, as though I would
not come to you.
But I will come to you shortly, if
the Lord will, and then I will know,
not the speech of them which are puffed
up, but the power.
For the kingdom of God is not in
word, but in power.
What will ye?
Shall I come unto you with a rod?
Are ye going to continue so that to
make it necessary that I have to come
severely with a rod?
Or are ye going to accept the truth
and begin to obey it so that I
can come in love and in the spirit
of meekness?
Now, that's what Paul said partly in that
4th chapter of 1 Corinthian epistle.
Paul had authority, there's no getting around that,
he had the authority of the chief apostle.
He was appointed by the Lord for several
things, one of them being to receive and
shape church truth.
The man Paul received the revelation from God
which was behind.
Jesus said, I have many things to say
to you, but you can't receive them yet.
But when the Spirit of God comes, he
will reveal these things and he will take
of mine and will show them unto you.
And that Spirit that came entered Paul when
Ananias prayed for him, and he was filled
with that same Holy Spirit.
And he received that which was behind, and
he was the mold in which God poured
it.
And then he was also appointed by the
Lord to set up a system and polity
for the church, for there was system and
there was polity.
And he was appointed by the Lord to
embody all authority that there was in the
meantime.
And then, perhaps most important of all, to
show by example the Christian way.
He said, I sent to you Timothy, my
beloved son and faithful in the Lord, and
he will bring to your remembrance my ways
which be in Christ.
See, the man of God here was having
his authority undercut by schismatics, men who came
in and taught that Paul was not a
real apostle.
They said the reason Paul isn't a real
apostle is that he never saw the Lord.
The other apostles walked with Jesus while he
walked among men.
But this man Paul is not an apostle,
and we can prove it by the fact
that he never walked.
He came after Jesus had died and risen.
That was their argument.
They overlooked the vision Paul had of Jesus,
of one born out of due time.
And these schismatics and dividers of the church
had to repudiate Paul's authority in order to
establish their own.
And they attacked Paul, and as far as
Paul was personally concerned, he said it didn't
matter.
He said, it's a very small thing with
me that I should be judged by you.
As far as he was concerned, he didn't
care.
He said, I don't even judge my own
self, I'm in the hand of God.
But he knew that if he was going
to have any authority, he was going to
have to establish that authority.
And so he sent Timothy to tell them
about Paul and to straighten them out.
And then finally he warns them this.
He said, now I'm coming in the will
of God one of these times to you.
And it's all right for you while I'm
not there to listen to these schismatics and
these puffed up fellows.
Isn't it strange that there isn't anything new
under the sun?
I remember years ago there used to be
a writer for the Daily News.
What was his name?
He died finally.
But a very wonderful writer up on the
literary level.
And he once went to see the old
Greek play, The Sisterhood.
And he came back after seeing it, and
he reported it in his column.
He said, I went to see the old
Greek play, The Aristophanes.
And he said, I came away deeply discouraged.
And he said, here's what discouraged me.
Not that it wasn't well written, not that
it wasn't well done.
But he said, I came away convinced that
nobody had been able to think of a
new joke in 2400 years.
That everything old Aristophanes wrote into his funny
play is floating all around here.
Now that was a worldly man talking about
a worldly thing.
But the same thing is true in the
spiritual life.
So many of us imagine that we're original.
There's nobody original except Adam.
And if you'll find puffers, uppers, and men
who are puffed up now.
Paul wrote in the 18th verse, now some
are puffed up.
And some are puffed up thinking that I
won't come.
But when I come, he said, and I'll
do it shortly.
I'll make a test.
And I'll not test the words of these
men, but I'll test their power.
For the kingdom of God is not in
word, but in power.
Now here's what I want particularly to emphasize.
The kingdom of God doesn't lie in words.
I am among the few who are trying
to tell the Church that in this day.
I was encouraged Thursday.
I, as you know, spoke and Brother McAfee
sang and we kind of took Wheaton over
Thursday.
And after the last talk, Dr. Redmond came
over and said, Well, God bless you A
.W. Keep telling them.
There are a few that see it, but
not very many yet.
But re-see or see over again, see
again what they saw back there.
That the kingdom of God is not in
words, but in power.
See the words are the form of truth.
They're the outward image of truth only.
And they can never be the inward essence.
And words are incidental.
They're incidental.
If I were to say, now everybody here
that can speak Swedish, bring your New Testament
next Sunday.
And everybody that speaks German, bring yours.
Norwegian, yours.
And so we'd have a half a dozen
different languages.
And I would say, now read that fourth
of Revelation.
It would be quite a revelation to us.
To hear that the words were only incidental,
it was the meaning that mattered.
Somewhere in the middle of this all, there's
a meaning, a spiritual meaning.
And the six different people embodied that meaning
in six different set of words.
And those words were not alike, or only
occasionally alike.
We ought to remember that, we ought to
know it.
The kingdom of God is not in words.
They're only incidental, and they never can be
fundamental.
When fundamentalism ceased to emphasize fundamental meanings, and
began to emphasize fundamental words, and we shifted
from meanings to words, and from power to
words, we began to go downhill.
Now there's an essence of truth.
And it may follow the form of words,
as the colonel in an English walnut follows
the confirmation and figuration of the shell.
But the shell is not the colonel, and
the colonel is not the shell.
And so while the truth follows the form
of words, it sometimes deserts it.
The great error is in holding the form
to be essence, and putting the kingdom of
God in words.
So that if you've got the words right,
you've got the whole thing.
And if you can get a better set
of words, you have more truth, not necessarily
to all.
Now, words deceive even good, honest Christian people.
They deceive because we feel that if we
mumble words, there's certain safety in mumbling words.
And that there's a power to frighten off
Satan if you mumble certain words.
Now my brethren, if a man is just
as plainly ordinary as I am, and not
afraid of words, would you ask me please
why the devil should be afraid of words?
The devil who is the very essence was
of ancient created wisdom back there, and had
the perfection of beauty and the fullness of
wisdom, and whose power lies in his shrewdness
and in his intellectual brilliance, can you tell
me how that devil should suddenly become so
foolish as to be afraid of a word,
or afraid of a motion, or afraid of
a symbol?
To keep the devil away, I put a
chain around my neck.
Or to keep the devil away, I make
a motion with my fingers in front of
my face.
I wonder what a man without any arms
would do, an amputee, if the devil came
after him and he couldn't make the sign
of the cross.
I hadn't thought of that until now, but
it's worth considering anyhow.
But the devil isn't afraid of words, and
he isn't afraid of symbols, and you can
surround yourself with symbols, religious symbols, Protestant or
Catholic or Jewish, and you haven't helped yourself
in the slightest.
Because the devil isn't afraid of a symbol,
he knows better.
You ever see the little child that's afraid
of a false face?
Put a false face on, and the little
child runs and yells.
But if the child did that when it's
sixteen, you'd be shamed of.
We, as soon as we grow up, we
know that false faces don't mean anything, and
words don't mean anything as words.
And we imagine if we say certain words,
they have power to bring good.
If we say certain other words, they have
power to fend off the devil.
And there's safety in mumbling words, and if
we fail to mumble the words, we're in
for it.
And if we're remembered to mumble the words,
we're all right.
That's just paganism under another form.
And Paul told them plainly, for these were
pagans recently, but only lately converted, and he
said, you Greeks, you're Greek, and the Greeks
love oratory, and they love fine language, and
they produce a lot of fine literature.
He said, you Greeks, you love fine words.
But he said, I don't come to you
with fine words.
I come to you in this second chapter.
I determined not to know anything among you,
save Jesus Christ and him crucified.
And my speech and my preaching was not
with enticing words of man's wisdom, but instead
a demonstration of spirit and of power, that
your faith should stand in the wisdom of,
not stand in the wisdom of men, but
in the power of God.
So we ought to throw this off.
You may feel a little bit mentally naked
when you throw all this off.
You know, it's one thing that we do
when you strip superstition away from a man.
He feels terribly naked for a moment.
But until we strip off our superstition, the
Lord can't put on us a cloak of
truth.
Now, the kingdom lies in power.
Its essence is in power.
The gospel is not the statement that Christ
died for our sins according to the scriptures.
The gospel is the statement that Christ died
for our sins according to the scriptures, plus
the Holy Ghost in that statement, to give
it meaning and power.
And just the statement itself never will do
it.
Have you wondered at times, as I have,
why those churches, some of them, who drill
their young people from their childhood in the
catechism and teach them the doctrine so that
they're positively instructed in the words of the
truth, yet somehow strangely fail to get them
through to the new birth?
Have you noticed that?
We're not referring by name to any denomination.
And I have nothing against the catechism.
I think it's a fine thing for young
people.
But have you noticed that there are whole
generations of so-called Christians who are drilled
in the catechism and who know the doctrine
and can recite the gospel as well as
the law, and still never manage to break
through to the new birth?
They never come through to that shining wonder
of inward renewal.
The reason is, they are not taught, or
they are taught, that the word lies or
the power lies in the words.
And if you get the words, you're all
right.
Whereas Paul says the kingdom of God doesn't
lie in words at all.
The kingdom of God lies in the power
that involves those words.
And you can't have the power without the
words, but you can have the words without
the power, and a lot of people do.
So that the power of the Spirit operating
through the word, that's the gospel.
It's the statement of the fact that Christ
died for our sins according to the scriptures,
that he rose again, that he was seen
of many, that he's at the right hand
of God and will forgive those who believe
on him.
That's the gospel in its shell.
That's the shell of the gospel.
But the power must lie in there, or
there'll be no life in it.
So Paul appealed away from man-given authority,
and he appealed away from talk however eloquent,
and he appealed away from even his own
position, and appealed direct to the power of
the risen Lord manifest through the Spirit.
And he said, I want you to know,
and I sent Timothy to try to straighten
you out and remind you that it's the
power of God that talks, not a man's
mouth.
The appeal, I say, was to the power
of the risen Christ.
My brethren, if this church and the people
who compose it are not living in a
constant miracle, they're not Christians at all, because
the Christian life is a miracle.
It is what the Ark of Noah was
in the day of the flood.
It is completely separated from that flood and
yet floating upon it, completely separated from it.
It was what Jesus was when he walked
among men, right in the middle of them
and yet separate from sinners and higher than
the highest heaven.
There operates within the true body of Christ
a continual energizing of the Spirit that makes
a continual miracle.
A Christian is not somebody who is believed
only.
A Christian is somebody who is believed in
power, and the working of the power is
a moral power.
It has power to expose sin to the
sinner's heart.
Nobody will ever be truly saved until he
knows he's a sinner.
Nobody will ever know he's a sinner, truly
know he's a sinner, by simply threatening him
or warning him or telling him.
You can go to a man and say,
You're a sinner.
You swear and lie and you're wrong, you're
evil.
He'll grin and shake his head and say,
I know, I know, I shouldn't do those
things, but I guess we're all human.
You haven't convinced him.
You can read Plutarch and Aristotle and Herbert
Spencer and all the rest of the books
of ethics and show him he's dead wrong,
and he still will never know what it
is to be a lost sinner.
You can threaten him that if he doesn't
look out, if he doesn't straighten out his
ways, the atom bomb will get him, or
Khrushchev will be over, and you still haven't
convinced him.
You haven't told him anything he didn't know.
But when the Holy Ghost has come, says
Jesus, he will convict the world of sin
and of righteousness and of judgment.
And when Peter preached at Pentecost, the scripture
says, being pricked in their hearts, they cried
out and said, What shall we do to
be saved?
And that word pricked, they say, Weymouth says,
is a word stronger and deeper than the
word pierced, where they pierced the heart of
Jesus with a spear.
The words of Peter in the Holy Ghost,
the new baptized prophet and apostle, the words
of Peter penetrated like a dummy spear, so
deep, deeper than the spear had gone into
the heart of Jesus on the cross, and
forthwith came water and blood.
So, my brethren, the Holy Spirit isn't something
that we can argue about, or somebody that
we can say, Well, you believe your way,
and I'll believe my way.
The Holy Spirit is an absolute necessity in
the Church, an ungrieved Holy Spirit, because there
is a power in the Spirit to expose
sin and revolutionize and convert and create holy
men and women, and nothing else can do
it.
Words won't do it.
Instructions won't do it.
Line upon line, precept upon precept won't do
it.
It takes the power to do it.
Then it's a persuasive power to convince and
persuade and break down resistance.
And it's a worship power to create reverence
and excite ecstasy.
If we were to put statues all around
this place and have candles burning here, and
have beautiful Italian-made glass-colored windows, pictures
of shepherds and altars and all that, and
I were to come in here in a
long black robe, you would have a sense
of, well, I think you'd probably, you being
you, you'd probably have difficulty restraining your mirth.
But if you'd been brought up to it,
you wouldn't.
You'd think that's reverence.
No, brethren.
Reverence is not created by beautiful windows, although
I like to see them, nor by symbols.
Reverence is the astonished awe that comes to
the human heart when God is seen.
And that the Holy Ghost can do through
the Word and that nobody else can do.
I can imitate holy tomes all I will.
We can try to be just as religious
and ecclesiastical as we can, and still when
it's all over, the feeling will get psychological
or aesthetic at best.
But when the Holy Ghost came upon the
early church, they durst not join themselves to
them.
And in 1 Corinthians, the sinners fell on
their faces and said, God's in this place
of the truth.
So there's a power to bring reverence, to
excite ecstasy, to bring worship.
It lies in the Word when it's given
in power.
And in the Holy Ghost, the power of
the Holy Spirit is a magnetic power.
It draws to Christ, and it will exalt
him above all else and above all others.
And in this church, we must demand more
than correct doctrine, though we dare not have
less than correct doctrine.
More than right living, though we dare not
have less than right living.
More than a friendly atmosphere, though we dare
not have less than a friendly atmosphere.
We must demand that the Word of God
be preached in power, and that we hear
it in power.
For in 1 Thessalonians, you'll remember, Paul wrote
and said to them there, that the gospel
came not unto you.
I know, O brethren, he said, that you're
the elect of God, and here's how I
know it.
Our gospel came not unto you in word
only, but also in power, and in the
Holy Ghost, and in much assurance.
That is, not only Paul had the power,
but the gospel could run in power, because
it was heard by them in power.
So when the Spirit of God, through the
Word, preaches in power, and it's heard in
power, then the objectives of God are wrought
out, and holy men are made holy, and
sin is forgiven, and the work of redemption
is done.
Briefly now, the way to attain it, prayer
and faith and surrender, the old-fashioned ways,
and I know none other.
Prayer and faith and surrender.
Pray, and as you pray, surrender, and as
you surrender, believe.
And that's for all of us.
You, as God's people, have every right in
the scriptures, every scriptural right to demand that
you hear the Word in power, and if
you do not hear the Word in power,
you have a right to rise up and
ask why.
If you're hearing nothing but teaching, nothing but
instruction, if there's no evidence of God in
it, then the preacher can't say, I appeal
to God to say whether this is true
or not.
If this can't be, then you have a
right to demand that somebody come that can.
On the other hand, any man who stands
here to preach has a right to expect
that you believe in power, and that we're
so close to God and so surrendered and
so full of faith and so prayerful that
the Word of God can work in power.
Shall we not believe God for that kind
of church here?
For the kingdom of God is not in
words.
The kingdom of God is in power, and
you can take the little lance manual and
read it and sign your name under the
bottom of every page.
It won't mean one lonely thing to you.
But if the Word of God is in
power, it means everything to you.
So let us trust God for correct doctrine.
We dare not have less, but we must
have more.
Right living, we dare not have less, but
we must have more.
Let's be a friendly church, but beware lest
it be simply a friendly church.
It's amazing how socio-religious or religio-social
atmospheres can permeate a church so that it's
hard to tell which is a holy ghost
and which is simply nice social contact.
I believe that both ought to be there,
and I believe they can both be there.
I believe that when the early church met
and broke bread, they fulfilled both their spiritual
communion and their social fellowship.
So there's no reason why they can't be
fused.
There isn't any reason why the warm cordiality
of social fellowship can't be made incandescent with
the indwelling holy ghost, so that when we
meet and shake hands and sing and pray
and talk together, we're doing both these things.
We're having social fellowship plus the mighty union
and communion of the holy ghost.
Let's be very careful that it's both, not
one only.
To try to destroy or prevent social contact
and social fellowship is to grieve the Spirit,
for the Spirit made us for each other.
And he meant that there should be social
fellowship and friendliness together.
He meant that we should break bread, not
only formally in a church, but be times
when we meet.
He meant that we should know each other
by our first names and have our social
fellowships.
He meant it.
And the churches that try to destroy that
succeed only in getting a lopsided and fanatical
type of church.
But be very careful, my friends, lest that
we don't mistake the one for the other.
So let's have a friendly church, and let's
have a morally right church, and let's have
a church where correct doctrine is taught.
But let's also have a church of which
any man can come here and say, when
he goes away, I know the entrance I
had unto you, that I could preach unto
you, not in word only, but also in
power and in the Holy Ghost and in
much assurance, because you are a kind of
people that could take it.
I say this is most important, that the
kingdom of God lies not in words but
in power.