Sermon

Let The Bible Speak | Allen Bailey

Church of Christ - Bakersfield, Ca

Open publisher episode ↗

Publisher transcript

Transcript

View source ↗
  1. Throughout the years, I have been a great, it's been a great

  2. joy to me to have the opportunity to study with people

  3. who are new to the church, new to God's way, new to God's plan

  4. in this congregation. You have several and we're so

  5. proud of you, all of you, those who've been born and raised in

  6. the Lord's church, those who have come to the Lord Church

  7. right at some point in your life, and those of recent times,

  8. the last year or two who have become New Testament Christians.

  9. All of this is spectacular. It's wonderful.

  10. And I just pray to God that you at the end of life's day, that

  11. you would be as faithful to God today then as you are today.

  12. That is so very important. That is the difference in you

  13. being saved or lost, but not only than those who are newer to

  14. the church. Everybody here, we all need to

  15. do, we talked about last night, be faithful unto death and I'll

  16. give their crown of life. We need to be faithful to the

  17. Lord and being willing to give our life to the Lord if that's

  18. what it took. And it's furthermore, we as

  19. Christian people, we need to have a commitment that we are so

  20. much evangelistic minded. We're going to tell our friends,

  21. we're going to tell our family, we're going to tell our

  22. neighbors. We wouldn't even tell our

  23. enemies about the gospel of the Lord Jesus.

  24. There is so much we need to learn.

  25. What we have on the board tonight is a brief look.

  26. There's many more passages we could include on the board, but

  27. I want to share with you this because it has proven to be

  28. effective in helping to stabilize individuals faith in

  29. the Lord. And it helps us all and me and

  30. you both to know we've got to go back to Scripture.

  31. We've got to go back to Let the Bible Speak.

  32. In October of 1968, the brotherhood that we know began

  33. ATV program called Let the Bible Speak.

  34. It began in Springfield, MO. At the particular time, the

  35. first speaker was Brother Ronnie F Wade, who now has deceased

  36. back in January of 2020. But Rodney did the program for

  37. many, many years and then he retired and another preacher

  38. took his place for a little while and then he passed away

  39. suddenly. So Rodney went back to him for a

  40. second time and then he did it for a while.

  41. Then another preacher took his place and let Rodney retire for

  42. the second time from the TV program.

  43. And then this other preacher had health trouble, so Rodney took

  44. it back up again for his third time.

  45. And then so you had all that together and he was in there

  46. preaching on the television for 30 to 40 years.

  47. Numerous of others have done so recent times.

  48. Perhaps the largest audience of the people would be Brad Hickey

  49. and also would be Kevin Presley. Now, there are several others in

  50. different smaller markets. But these two great men, great

  51. men of God, great preachers, and I'm proud of everything they

  52. accomplished because they're reaching out beyond the borders

  53. of the United States. They're reaching out to other

  54. countries to run their sermons out of many other parts of the

  55. world. Listen, the TV program from 1968

  56. to the current day, obviously 15, whatever, six years or so

  57. ago, but this is wonderful way to reach the gospel.

  58. I don't know how many of you have been converted because of

  59. the TV program, but I know that brother Frankie, he's done a lot

  60. of TV follow-ups. That is people writing in,

  61. asking questions, asking for maybe a CD or DVD, asking for a

  62. home Bible study or Bible correspondence course.

  63. But in Oklahoma City, we have that and we have results

  64. essentially, with rare, rare exceptions.

  65. Every Sunday we get a new introduction to someone's home

  66. and it is so exciting. I just can't hardly wait to be

  67. able to go visit them or to respond to whatever request that

  68. they have. Most times the first request is

  69. a copy of the sermon, maybe a transcript, maybe ACD or

  70. whatever. It's fine.

  71. We just are thrilled to death to have that good fortune.

  72. And we have the same good fortune today, approximately

  73. 2000 miles away from where I live in Oklahoma City, to make

  74. my brothers and my sisters in Christ, some of which have been

  75. in the church essentially all their adult life.

  76. And other than you've been in the church for just a few weeks,

  77. few months, few years, God bless you all, everyone of us,

  78. regardless of who you are, what your background has been, we all

  79. are making a commitment to the Lord the day that we obey the

  80. gospel of baptism. You know, it's very much of A

  81. transition when you're baptized into Christ.

  82. You walk in the water, which is behind this board here.

  83. Yeah. You walk into the water, a dry

  84. center. Guess what?

  85. You walk out a wet Christian. That's an amazing transition.

  86. And just a matter of seconds, you change to being a Sinner, to

  87. being a Christian. You walk in a child of the

  88. devil. You walk out of the child of

  89. God. Let me tell you what the

  90. motivation that that should give within every one of us.

  91. We gain motivation by witnessing your baptism and or even hearing

  92. about it 2000 miles away. Brother Terry, Brother Frankie,

  93. you know, on their own timing, you know, they called and we

  94. communicated by phone several times before the meeting came

  95. about. And it was such a joy to hear

  96. the joy in their heart for your salvation.

  97. They love you, I love you. They, they know you better than

  98. I do, but I love you in a way because you're my brother or

  99. sister in Christ. So I want you to be so committed

  100. to the Lord. And I promise you this, if

  101. you'll let this title and its meaning that we're going to

  102. share with you 7 points and we can make brief comments on each

  103. of these. But if we can really bear down

  104. and make sure that we individually, men or women,

  105. young or old, been in the church a few weeks, few months, few

  106. years, whatever the case may be, that we're committed to whatever

  107. God wants out of me, I'm going to give it.

  108. I'm going to do the very best I can to do what the Lord wants.

  109. That's the kind of. Commitment the Lord had, and

  110. tell you what, the Lord did you a favor.

  111. He did me a favor. The Lord chose His only begotten

  112. Son. Sent him from heaven.

  113. Jesus was willing to come to die on the cross.

  114. So you and I would have a plan, God's plan of salvation where we

  115. can go to heaven. God wants you to go to heaven.

  116. He designed the plan and you can go.

  117. Jesus wanted to be part of that plan and he he volunteered, yes,

  118. here am I sending me. He's ready to row.

  119. He's ready to go. He was ready to help you go to

  120. heaven. And my dear friends, today what

  121. needs to happen? Every one of us, including me,

  122. we need to have the same dedication to God as God does

  123. to. Us, God wants us to go to

  124. heaven, and now if he gave his only begotten Son.

  125. But listen, I've got four kids. They're adult kids.

  126. And my four adult kids, three of which have their own kids and

  127. another has a fourth, and they have a child on its way and, and

  128. they are very responsible for those young kids and want to be

  129. born here in a few weeks. You know, all that's really,

  130. really important. But tell you what's important

  131. spiritually is that everybody in this building make sure you're

  132. baptized by the baptism of the Great Commission.

  133. You're not baptized according to some man or woman standard.

  134. And I'll be very frank with don't be very pointed with you.

  135. It doesn't matter what you think or what you believe or what I

  136. think or what I believe. What matters.

  137. Is just what Frank had mentioned, book, chapter, verse.

  138. And that's the reason we go right here.

  139. Let the Bible speak, not let island speak.

  140. Not let you speak. Let the Bible speak.

  141. This is where our commitment to the Lord really comes in.

  142. Because if you're caught up, or if I'm caught up and oh, I think

  143. this or I think that, well, listen here, we're listening to

  144. the wrong guy. Us.

  145. We need to go to God's word and listen to the inspired Word of

  146. God. What I love to preach about the

  147. Bible, where it came from, how we received and all that.

  148. That's not what this lesson is. This lesson is going back to

  149. Scripture, but chapter verse, taking a good look at it and see

  150. what we can learn. Now, there's probably twice as

  151. many points that could have been alluded to, but this was

  152. something that I've chosen for tonight's lesson.

  153. And it's it's critical that we follow this and listen, this

  154. congregation and the town of Bakersfield, CA and I looked it

  155. up on the way out here, not quite a half a million people,

  156. but according to the 2023 census report was right at knocking on

  157. the door 500,000 significantly over 400,000 people, half a

  158. million people. I'm going to call her OK, half a

  159. million people. Let me tell you what you're in.

  160. You're so blessed. You're in a congregation right

  161. here that believes in letting the Bible speak.

  162. You're in a congregation unlike any other congregation

  163. throughout this whole metropolitan area who's devoted

  164. to serving the Lord. Put in the Lord first, doing

  165. what Jesus said. Seek ye first the Kingdom of God

  166. and his righteousness and all these things to be added to you.

  167. Matthew. 6 and 33, that's what Jesus said.

  168. My dear friends, today this helps me and you to be more

  169. committed because not about me, it's about God, It's about his

  170. Son Jesus, it's about the Holy Spirit, it's about the angels,

  171. it's about the apostles, about the righteous 1 who've lived

  172. before. It's up to me and you.

  173. God is relying on me and you to talk to people, friends,

  174. neighbors, and everyone else about the gospel and letting the

  175. Bible speak. Well, we're going to take a look

  176. at these seven points and we hope it's encouraging to you and

  177. motivating to you to help make sure we stay on course.

  178. We don't let anybody or anything get in our way.

  179. We don't try to make any unwise decision.

  180. Like why do I have to go to church this Sunday morning

  181. because of XYZ? Wrong.

  182. Listen, Lord's Day morning is the Lord's Day designed for me

  183. and you, as the Bible says, assembly together for the

  184. communion. Assembly together to lay by the

  185. store on the first day of the week.

  186. Christian people gather together because that's the Lord's.

  187. Plan, and that's what the Bible says, and I commend that to you

  188. among many other truths. Point #1.

  189. I have a lesson I preached the last two or three years in Tyler

  190. and it is written. We're not reviewing that

  191. material today, but Matthew 4, verse 4, verse 7, verse 10, if

    Matthew 4:4

  192. you look at the tail end of chapter 3, verse 16 and verse

  193. 17, the very ending of that short chapter of Matthew 3,

    Matthew 3:16

  194. verse 16 and 17, it's the baptism of Jesus.

  195. It's Jesus been baptized and true enough, he was baptized and

  196. then he went out in the desert land and he spent there for 40

  197. days without anything to eat for 40 days.

  198. He fasted before he began his gigantic 3 year ministry.

  199. And when Jesus was coming out of the desert land, which is also

  200. known as the wilderness land, and as he came out of there, of

  201. course the devil is going to find you at your weakest moment.

  202. And perhaps as the Lord gone 40 days without anything to eat,

  203. food may have been on his mind. It would have been on mine, but

  204. it was on his. And they thought that's what the

  205. devil thought. He said, hey, turn these stones

  206. to be made bread. Listen, if Jesus could turn

  207. water to wine, he could turn his stones.

  208. To bread. But guess what?

  209. And as a kid, I just said, man, why didn't he do that?

  210. That would have been so cool. But guess what, it wasn't man

  211. cool because he would have done it had it been.

  212. He said no Sir, he said it is written.

  213. Number one, it is written. Man should not live by bread

  214. alone, but by every word proceeding out of the mouth of

  215. God. Don't go by physical food, you

  216. go by spiritual food. That's what's important.

  217. Jesus did two things three different times.

  218. Matthew 4, Matthew 7, Matthew 4, verse 4, seven and 10.

    Matthew 4:4

  219. He did three things. He did three things, two things,

  220. three times. It is written.

  221. It is written. It is written.

  222. He quoted it right, quote UN quote.

  223. It is written another thing He did three times.

  224. He went to God for help. I want you to know in your

  225. spiritual journey, you can have hiccups, you can fall flat on

  226. your face. I have too.

  227. And I'm not through falling. I'm not through making mistake.

  228. I want to pray to God every day. And as baptized believers, you

  229. can know what is written and you can stand against the devil just

  230. like Jesus did. Jesus told the devil in verse 7

  231. when when the devil took Jesus up on the pinnacle of the temple

  232. and there he just set him down and then he essentially modern

  233. day binocular, he did jump. Jump.

  234. The anchor should give you charts concerning you less than

  235. anytime you dash your foot on. In other words, you know, just

  236. slap your toe, jump, we're all here.

  237. Watch, let's see him, then jump. And I thought, boy, if jeez,

  238. we're going thought it'd be so neat.

  239. Guess what? No, it wouldn't have been.

  240. So that was me thinking like a a mortal person, Jesus the

  241. spiritual leader. And Jesus said it's rich and

  242. again, thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

  243. Now if I was the devil, I just kind of think I would have left

  244. the scene of action there, but I'm still going and move on.

  245. Did the devil do that? No, he didn't do that.

  246. He come bouncing right back and he showed Jesus the riches, the

  247. glory, the honor, the fame and all the things of the world.

  248. You know what Satan said? He said every bit of this I the

  249. devil will give you Jesus If you know everything the devil offers

  250. you carries a condition if you have fallen down to.

  251. Worship me. I don't think Jesus had to think

  252. twice about that. He said, I tell you right now

  253. it's written again, thou shalt worship the Lord of thy God and

  254. him only shall thy serve. Now Christian friends, listen,

  255. young and old, men and women, new converts or people, been in

  256. the church basically your whole adult life.

  257. I want you to understand what is important in your spiritual life

  258. is it is written. You want to know what's written.

  259. You want to make sure you plot your life.

  260. You want to make sure that you obey those things.

  261. Big things happen when you obey the Lord.

  262. Terrible things happen when we choose to disobey the Lord.

  263. So I want us today, in order to get our spiritual life really in

  264. shape, to learn what is written. And you're going to learn that

  265. by reading, by studying your Bible, by focusing in and

  266. comprehending these words and listening to a variety of your

  267. brethren where they're teaching lessons, by going to revival

  268. meetings and making sure that anybody that says anything.

  269. We mentioned this briefly last night.

  270. Is giving you book, chapter, verse in the Bible.

  271. I'm not interested in people's ideas and thoughts souls if it's

  272. not biblically based. I want biblically based

  273. situations. It's so important point #2 have

  274. you not read? And Matthew the 19th chapter,

  275. the Pharisees, they came to Jesus and they said is it lawful

  276. for a man to put away his wife for every 'cause?

  277. Thus in verse three of Matthew 19 and Jesus, Philip says he

  278. immediately popped the next, but he said, have ye not read

  279. Matthew 19 verse four? Have you not read the he which

  280. made you at the beginning, made you male and female?

  281. And here comes the conversation back and forth.

  282. And Jesus said from the beginning, it was not so He went

  283. all the way back to the patriarchal dispensation of

  284. time, back to Genesis, early Genesis chapter 123, and moving

  285. forward. He's known from the beginning

  286. God did not allow that. You know what they did?

  287. The devil and his followers and these wicked old Pharisees here,

  288. they said wait a minute, wait a minute, Moses, your man Moses

  289. allowed you and allowed us to divorce for every 'cause you

  290. know what Jesus said? Yep, He sure did because of your

  291. hard hearts, because of your hard hearts, He allowed that.

  292. But from the beginning God did not allow that.

  293. Jesus allowed it. He has the manipulations, He

  294. allowed it. However, Jesus said in verse 9,

  295. whosoever shall put away his wife for every for any cause

  296. other than for fornication and married another commits

  297. adultery. Jesus tightened it up mighty

  298. tight. One call for Scripture divorce

  299. for man or woman, a Christian man or woman to divorce her

  300. spouses for doctrine. And when these Pharisees

  301. questioned Jesus about can we do it forever because Jesus

  302. essentially gave them no and patriotic law and no under my

  303. law. It's a powerful message.

  304. The key point we're making right here is how did Jesus approach

  305. it is have you not read, my dear friend, that is a good

  306. phraseology to utilize when talking to people, whoever

  307. you're able to talk with about spiritual things.

  308. And they said, well, why do you do this?

  309. Why do you commune every first day of the week?

  310. Why do you sing without instruments, music?

  311. Why, Why? Why did you shoot something out

  312. you said? Have you not read?

  313. Ephesians 519, Colossians 316. Hebrews 212.

  314. In the midst of the church. Well, I seen some praises unto

  315. thee. Have you not read of how Jesus

  316. the Lord suffered? Have you never read these

  317. things? And you don't want to sound

  318. egotistical here, but you want to get people to understand.

  319. You've got to go back to what the Bible speaks or what the

  320. Bible says. You got to read the Bible.

  321. Now I do know this. People have different reading

  322. habits. Some people like to read just a

  323. few verses a day. That's OK, That's perfectly

  324. fine. Some people like to read a

  325. chapter a day. Now when I'm training young

  326. preachers, I've trained a number of young preachers.

  327. And when I trained young. Preachers, they've got to read

  328. the New Testament through every month.

  329. Every month that they're with me.

  330. I I'm making a commitment to that.

  331. And if you're not committed to that, you're not coming to study

  332. with me because we're going to learn this book right here.

  333. We can learn it. We can learn it good.

  334. We're going to know what to do to be saved.

  335. We're going to learn how to stay saved.

  336. We're going to learn the establishment of the church.

  337. We can learn all kind of things. And the only way you're going to

  338. know that is to know what is being the scriptures know what

  339. is for us to read. Have we not read?

  340. Well, I've never had anybody not to agree to do that.

  341. It's like that's number one every month that you read the

  342. New Testament through and I've had people with me for weeks and

  343. for months and for some have been for years.

  344. They've been great. And then every morning we will

  345. set forth a time to get together whatever book they've read, we

  346. talk about questions they've had.

  347. We talk about events of those particular reading those

  348. chapters, that particular. Book of the New Testament and we

  349. just have a really good intense study for about an hour.

  350. Talk about what they read yesterday and then today they

  351. take off on another book. And tomorrow we're going to do

  352. the same thing again because we're going to learn the

  353. Scriptures. My friend, I beg of you, let the

  354. Bible be the number one book you read in your life.

  355. Let it be your number one. Because if you don't read the

  356. Bible, did you know you're going to be easily misled?

  357. Oh, that'd be that'd be just so sad.

  358. But you are and I would be. If I did not know my Bible, I'd

  359. be easily misled. The Word of God teaches that

  360. over and over again. And you know, today whenever

  361. situations turn up and people are not reading and studying the

  362. Bible, but yet they're complaining because they don't

  363. feel like they're growing like they should without the reason

  364. people don't grow. And the reason people don't grow

  365. is because. They don't know what the Bible

  366. says. You don't know what the Bible

  367. says. We make mistakes.

  368. It's just like someone who's new to the church.

  369. They made for an example. When you throw a wild example

  370. out here, they made some say do not show up, not because they're

  371. sick, but they just had something else on their mind to

  372. go do it. But once they read the Bible and

  373. they began to realize what this is really, really important.

  374. I need to read and study the Scripture.

  375. This needs to be all what I do. You know what, the more you know

  376. about God's Word, the better off you'll be spiritually.

  377. So therefore, have you not read, You're going to find this all

  378. through Scripture one way or another.

  379. It is written, you send all this in.

  380. These are just two of the points of the seven points, and it is

  381. so critical that we read and we study the Bible.

  382. We'll plot for life and guess what?

  383. You will no longer be a baby in Christ like First Corinthian

  384. talks about when people are first baptized there.

  385. Like a baby. In Christ, but then they go to

  386. what the word of God called full grown or mature.

  387. It is so great to see people from beginning to you see, and

  388. the Lord doesn't expect you to grow overnight.

  389. He does expect you to work toward developing yourself into

  390. a good, solid Christian. It is so precious.

  391. The Lord is so good, so kind, so thoughtful.

  392. I do want you to love the Lord, not the Lord loves you.

  393. And if you do that, Satan doesn't stand a chance.

  394. Well, I'll assure you. Have you not read and the

  395. question that you can utilize within your?

  396. Vocabulary. Just like I've tried to utilize

  397. it in mind when talking to people and they ask you a Bible

  398. question, I said to you. A lot of times I'll say, well,

  399. have you ever read about this situation or that one, or maybe

  400. a parable or a miracle or just a direct message or intent from

  401. Scripture sermon, whatever the case may be, when people find

  402. out it's in the Bible, they've not read it.

  403. I, I just give you many, many examples of that, but that's not

  404. what's important. What's important is that you

  405. point in people to Scripture. Number one, you make sure that

  406. you've read it and you know what it says?

  407. You know where it says that? And now?

  408. You are teaching other people #3 what said the Scriptures down

  409. the the passage of Romans and Galatians.

  410. Both of these say the same thing.

  411. I'm not going to discuss all the details because it goes quite in

  412. depth and that's not the tenor of today's lesson.

  413. But Romans 4 and verse 3, Paul said what said the Scriptures in

  414. Galatians 4 and 32, the Church of Galatia, just like this one

  415. was the Church of Rome. He said what sets of scriptures?

  416. I love this, I love this when people come to me and why do you

  417. do this and why do you do that? I go, but what sets of

  418. scriptures? What do you mean?

  419. I go, what does the Bible say? Let us go.

  420. What if written, have you not read?

  421. Mention the passage too. You know what sense of

  422. scripture? This is important, and this is

  423. how to stabilize your Christianity.

  424. It stabilizes every young or older person in the faith.

  425. I love it because the devil is a man on the run.

  426. He's running away. So it's like he did Jesus here.

  427. You know, verse 11 which we didn't talk about, but verse 11

  428. of Matthew 4, the devil leadeth him and the angels came and

  429. ministered unto Jesus. It is so great to see the devil

  430. whipped soundly because Jesus quoted what was written in the

  431. Scripture. My dear friends, today, if we're

  432. not careful and we allow things to get in our way, it can really

  433. create a lot of problems for it spiritually.

  434. Please don't let Satan have one inch of your spiritual life.

  435. Don't let him get one point with you.

  436. No, you say no. No, I'm not interested in what

  437. you have to say. You know, I have a priest this

  438. one summer, a long, long time, but things the devil wants to

  439. do, there's many things the devil loves to, to really dig

  440. down and and do whatever he can. Because see, the battle is

  441. between God and the devil. And the devil figured, well, I'm

  442. not going to win over God, but I may win over God's children.

  443. That's me and you. And he could try to get us out

  444. of the way. I just want you to know this,

  445. and this is disappointed as I need to be, but if we do not

  446. know the Scriptures, if we don't know what's written, if we don't

  447. know what's read, we do not know what the scriptures reveal.

  448. My dear friend, the likelihood is we're going to make some

  449. really serious blunders, and I want to show you what the Bible

  450. says about it, and I'm going to invite you to turn Hebrew the

  451. 5th chapter. I don't have this passage on the

  452. board, but Hebrew five can tell us the last.

  453. Three. Verses of Hebrew five will be

  454. verses 1213 and 14. And I want to look at the logic

  455. that the great inspired writer of Hebrews reveals about knowing

  456. God's will and God's Word. Hebrew the 5th chapter maybe

  457. please begin reading the verse 12.

  458. And we're going to read 1213 and 14.

  459. Hebrew chapter 5, begin in verse 12.

  460. I'll give you a moment, no hurry, we're good Hebrew.

  461. The 5th chapter beginning in verse 12.

  462. And I want you to look at this, and I want you to imagine you're

  463. the person Paul's writing to verse 12.

  464. For when, what? For when?

  465. For the time you ought to be teachers.

  466. You have neither one teacher. Again, which be the first

  467. principle of the articles of God and you're becoming such a have

  468. need of milk and not a strong meat.

  469. Look at verse 13 for everyone that gives us milk is unskillful

  470. in the word of righteous. Why?

  471. Because he's the babe. He's the babe.

  472. That's what the Bible says. That's what your version says.

  473. Whatever your version is, he's showing he's the babe.

  474. Verse 13, look here. But strong meat belongs to them

  475. that are full age, that's mature.

  476. They're growing in the faith or mature.

  477. There are full age. Even those who by reason get a

  478. hold of this, this is powerful. This is going to help us do the

  479. right thing, make the right choice.

  480. Look at the very last two verses here or the last two lines here.

  481. He said who by reason of use. They have the senses exercise to

  482. discern both good and evil. Don't you want to know what's

  483. good? Don't you want to know what's

  484. evil? Don't you know which is which,

  485. good or evil, right or wrong? Well, yes, you know and you need

  486. to know and you want to know. Well, you're going to learn what

  487. the Bible says by what's written, what you read, and you

  488. can learn the inspired scriptures given by God.

  489. And now we know how to discern both good and evil.

  490. Well, that's motivating to me to know that the more I know about

  491. Scripture, the better it would be that I know right from wrong.

  492. And guess what? The more you know about

  493. Scripture and the more you know about what's written, the more

  494. you know about Let the Bible speak, the stronger you can

  495. become spiritually. Don't ever let anything get in

  496. your way. This is what it's all about.

  497. Or there's much more I can say, but I'm going to.

  498. Continue #4 give attendance to reading First Timothy 4 and

  499. verse 13. Here's the chance that the

  500. apostle Paul is writing a young preacher Timothy, and we can

  501. spend a little bit of time right here.

  502. And both first Timothy and Second Timothy.

  503. If you notice First Timothy 413, we'll also notice Second Timothy

  504. 2 and verse 15. But in first Timothy 4, you know

  505. a very popular verse is in verse 12.

  506. And I'll go ahead and turn there with you because the several

  507. eternity and that's great. And I want us to take a good

  508. look at this because beginning in verse 12, he's given you

  509. several things that will help you live in a very faithful

  510. Christian life. And in first Timothy the 4th

  511. chapter, here's what the Bible says.

  512. Let no man verse 12, let no man despise our youth, but be thou

  513. an example the believers in Word and that's simply your matter of

  514. life and conversation and charity and spirit and faith and

  515. impurity. He said I want you to be an

  516. example. Get hold of this.

  517. I want you to be an example of the believers.

  518. Now listen, this is the two way St. me and you.

  519. We're baptized believers. We need to be example of the

  520. believers two ways. Number one, to other believers,

  521. we need to be a good example, letting our lights so shine

  522. before others for everybody to follow.

  523. Furthermore, we are an example of the believers #2 to non

  524. Christians, to non baptized believers.

  525. Wow. So when you look at first

  526. Timothy 4 and 13, then he says, I need you to do this right

  527. here, Timothy. Oh, here's what I want you to

  528. do. I want you to give attendance to

  529. reading, to exhortation, to doctrine.

  530. Listen, you look at that and it's very, very clear what he

  531. has in mind and what he expects out of Timothy.

  532. And then Please note here he lets him know I want you to give

  533. attendance to it now my. Question to you is, are you

  534. doing that? Am I doing that?

  535. The more you read and study the Bible, you're getting so

  536. equipped. You're going to be able to work

  537. over the devil. He will lose every battle with

  538. you. If you know the Scripture, what

  539. enough to say, no, Sir, that's not what we're going to do.

  540. It is so wonderful. You know what the most beautiful

  541. thing is? Not only are you working to help

  542. save yourself, you're working to help save others.

  543. Now here's the situation. There's more I can say there,

  544. but I want us to now go to a passage of Scripture that's been

  545. thumped on a little bit unjustly, and I want to share.

  546. Some thoughts with you on Second Timothy 215.

  547. Now, Second Timothy 215 is not near as complicated as some

  548. people seem to. Think it is and they try to make

  549. it. There's none, none of that.

  550. So I want to read it. I want to explain it and if you

  551. have any question about this after services you feel free to

  552. ask. I'm more than happy to talk with

  553. you about it. The word of God said study

  554. second to 2:15. The Bible said study to show

  555. thyself approved unto God, a Workman that needeth not to be

  556. ashamed of rightly divided the word truth.

  557. It's amazing how people say say study.

  558. It don't mean study. It doesn't mean keep your nose

  559. in the books. It doesn't mean you got to read

  560. and study all the time. Who said it does?

  561. There's probably been a time in the history of our life that

  562. people use the word study to say you need to keep your nose in

  563. your books. Let me tell you what this verse

  564. teaches. Keeping your nose in your book,

  565. but it's not in the word to study.

  566. All right, look that verse again.

  567. Study to show yourself approved unto God this word Study.

  568. Matter of fact, if you're using a modern version, you very

  569. likely said be diligent, be enthusiastic, be aggressive, be

  570. diligent to make your calling and you're like, sure, see, you

  571. need to be so on fire for the Lord.

  572. You're not letting nothing get in your way of serving the Lord.

  573. You be diligent. You study to show yourself what

  574. approved unto God. What's more important than that?

  575. Nothing is more important than you've been approved before God.

  576. So you're the other thing you're studying to make yourself

  577. approved unto God as a Workman. Listen that needeth not to be

  578. ashamed. No, no, don't be ashamed.

  579. Be thankful. Read your scriptures.

  580. It's OK if people see you should read.

  581. There are people, sometimes it's the strangest thing, they say,

  582. Oh, we should not offer thanks in the restaurant because people

  583. will see us praying and, and the Bible says don't pray to be seen

  584. a man. Wrong.

  585. What are people thinking? It's great to be an example for

  586. now, if you're doing it for the absolute sole purpose of getting

  587. people to wow they must be religious, then you've got a

  588. problem within yourself. The fact of the matter.

  589. Is we can show you time to people in the scriptures.

  590. They pray where whoever was there can witness it.

  591. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to give yourself holy

  592. to Jesus in the scripture. Give yourself hold of them like

  593. we read in First Timothy. Now we're studying, we're being

  594. diligent, we're being eager to make our self approved unto God.

  595. A word that needs not to be ashamed.

  596. Now look here, rightly dividing the word of truth.

  597. That sounds like I need to keep my book, my nose in the book,

  598. rightly dividing the word of truth.

  599. There's your study that you're not thinking of studying,

  600. getting your nose in the book rightly divided the word truth.

  601. Now I've got a whole lesson I did without one phrase.

  602. Let me tell you what rightly divided the word truth is

  603. focusing in. It's just like you remember here

  604. in Matthew 19 when the Pharisee that Jesus about it didn't often

  605. put away. Why fear?

  606. Because. You know what Jesus did, but all

  607. the way back to the beginning, the patriarchal law in Genesis 1

  608. forward and then he showed them what God said.

  609. And then they discuss the law of Moses and then now today we're

  610. under the law of Christ. So it's very important to

  611. rightly divide the word of truth.

  612. So in other words, if I ask you a biblical question for today,

  613. you can't go back to Genesis or Genesis 3 says this.

  614. No, no. Or you can go to where the books

  615. of the law of Moses and read chapter verse.

  616. No I want Matthew to revelation. You rightly divide the word of

  617. truth by knowing and you're recognizing well, this question

  618. was asked under the Mosaic Law, and Mosaic law taught this.

  619. But today we need to know what the New Testament teach you,

  620. that it is the law of Christ that we need to follow His will.

  621. That's how you rightly divide the word of truth.

  622. That's not where it all ends. I'll assure you.

  623. When you get into the law of Christ, then you got to talk

  624. about, well, I need, I need to address that which is during the

  625. day, the spiritual gifts and the days that are not spiritual

  626. gifts, when spiritual gifts have already taken away and been done

  627. away with, then how do we go from there?

  628. The Bible. Tells us how matter of fact

  629. there'll be. One night this week I'm I'm not

  630. absolutely positive and we will be dealing more with that.

  631. There's there's several topics that I, I want to give and I'm

  632. working on that quite a bit today and I won't have more

  633. sermons than I've got days to give, but it's OK, I'm going to

  634. work at it. I do want you today.

  635. To. Learn.

  636. That second Timothy 215 teaches to be eager and be diligent to

  637. study. The Bible says you the King

  638. James will use the word study other verses use the word to be

  639. diligent to make your call and let you sure.

  640. Why? Because it makes you approve of

  641. God. At the end, it teaches you and

  642. me that we need to rightly divide the word of truth. 2nd

  643. 10:00 to 2:15 is a wonderful passage, but people when they

  644. realize the word study meant to be diligent, they just dismiss.

  645. At least, it seemed like the attitude by which they

  646. antagonize Second Timothy 215 people just didn't.

  647. Want to pay attention to that passage?

  648. That's bad. That's wrong.

  649. I want you to appreciate this passage.

  650. It teaches you how to be approved of God.

  651. It teaches you how the right to divide the word of truth.

  652. It teaches you the enthusiasm by which we need to study.

  653. This is the great verse, and we need to do that.

  654. And what we need to learn is give attendance to reading.

  655. My dear friend, do you understand if we put all this

  656. together? How motivated we are going to be

  657. to study this word or just look at #5 using the Word of God

  658. effectively? This is one of the most popular

  659. passages of Scripture in the New Testament, at least in many

  660. circles. Jesus wept might be the number

  661. one because that way everybody can memorize.

  662. It 2 words Jesus wept. John 1135 But no, that's not

  663. what I want to talk about. I want to talk about Second

  664. Timothy. Paul is teaching his training.

  665. Timothy, did you know Second Timothy is the last book we have

  666. in the record of of the apostle Paul wrote, it is said by

  667. historians. Now he could look out the little

  668. jail cell and he could see where his head was going to be removed

  669. from his body. He could see where his life was

  670. going to be taken from him. But before he died, buddy, he

  671. started writing a letter. He wrote Second Timothy.

  672. Oh, it's such a powerful. And when you know, when you know

  673. when you start reading Second Timothy.

  674. This is his very last letter. Paul wrote fourteen of the 27

  675. books of the New Testament, but this one is his last one that we

  676. have in the record. And what he teaches here in 2nd

  677. 10 to 316, he let it be made known.

  678. And listen here he let it be made known.

  679. All scripture is given by the inspiration of God.

  680. All scripture. And I'll give you another verse

  681. here in a minute. You go ahead and be turning

  682. second Peter Chapter one I. Want you to get a hold of this?

  683. We can come back here in a minute.

  684. Go ahead and turn over to second Peter, but here he teaches here.

  685. All scripture is given by the inspiration of God.

  686. This scripture is given by God. That's why we're to be committed

  687. to following Him. And it's profitable.

  688. It's beneficial for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for

  689. instruction and righteousness. What's the benefit?

  690. That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnishing

  691. all good works. Wow.

  692. This is really good. Now if you're in second Timothy

  693. 3, put your marker there. I want to show you the passage

  694. that I want you to read in second Peter chapter one.

  695. It's the very last a couple of verses of second Peter.

  696. One the word of God said verse 20, knowing that first of all

  697. the prophet knowing the 1st that no props the scriptures of

  698. private interpretation, no scripture came from man.

  699. It came by the inspiration, the Holy Spirit, which I would like

  700. to speak on one night this week too.

  701. Verse 21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of

  702. man, it did come by the will of man, but holy man of God spank

  703. as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

  704. I want you to know the Holy Spirit inspire the scriptures by

  705. God. Even Jesus when he got ready to

  706. depart and to go to heaven, he told the apostles, I've got to

  707. leave you. They was all what I call beside

  708. themselves. They were not happy with what

  709. was getting ready to happen that Jesus was going to leave them.

  710. But one thing, Jesus let it be made known.

  711. He said don't worry about it, no sweat.

  712. When I get to heaven, I will send to you the Holy Spirit from

  713. the Father. He, the Holy Spirit.

  714. He's going to testify with me. He's going to tell you

  715. everything thing that I've said to you.

  716. He's going to remind you of everything I've said so you

  717. don't have to worry about you remembering it because God is

  718. going to give you the Holy Spirit and He's going to guide

  719. you to everything you need to write.

  720. See God, Christ, the Holy Spirit work together for God's plan.

  721. Now when you look here, here's what we find.

  722. We find the second in the 316 the Bible said teaching us to

  723. use the word of God effectively, that this Scripture is given for

  724. doctrine, reproof, correction and doctrine and instruction.

  725. Here is what is right. You know, somehow or another,

  726. and this should not be the way it is.

  727. Doctrine is almost like a dirty word to some people and doctrine

  728. just simply means teaching. But when you say, well, we're

  729. going to talk, we here's our doctrine.

  730. People say I don't really want your doctrine.

  731. Would you say here's I'm we're going to teach what Jesus

  732. taught. Oh really?

  733. What did he teach? People are much more interested.

  734. Don't hate the word doctrine, appreciate it.

  735. Even the Bible from God in 2nd 3/16 he said doctrine.

  736. Basically they can teach you what's right.

  737. Oh reproof right here. Now he's going to teach us.

  738. What is wrong? Wow, isn't it important for me

  739. and you to know what's right and what's wrong?

  740. You know how we do that? By learning what the Bible says.

  741. Are we going to learn that by what's written about, what we've

  742. read, about what the Scripture said, the fact we've been

  743. focusing time and attention, now we're using the Word of God

  744. effectively. That's how it's all fit

  745. together. Listen, Satan is on the move

  746. away from you if you're committed to following the Word

  747. of God. We're not going to learn what's

  748. right and what's wrong. We're going to learn correction.

  749. You know what correction is, is how to get right.

  750. Wow. You know what people love?

  751. They love to know how to get right.

  752. Well, their heart is really right, and they're trying to

  753. improve that. They love to get right with the

  754. Lord. My dear friend, I want you to

  755. get right with the Lord. If you're not and if you are,

  756. God bless you. You're our brother and our

  757. sister. You're the son or daughter of

  758. God Almighty. Wow.

  759. The devil lost his battle with you because you obeyed the

  760. gospel and baptism and you've made a commitment to the Lord.

  761. I'm going to serve you to the day I die.

  762. Your commitment to the Lord is is such a powerful commitment.

  763. It is so wonderful. And then it says for instruction

  764. and raunchiness. And that is how to stay right.

  765. My Christian friends today, here's what we want to do.

  766. We want to show you what's right according to Scripture.

  767. We want what show you what's wrong according to scripture.

  768. We want to show how to get right according to Scripture.

  769. We want to show you how to say right according to scripture.

  770. And that's because that's what 2nd 10 to 316 says.

  771. I'm not making that up. I'm just giving you a bigger

  772. piece of 2nd 10 to 316. What it's taken.

  773. You can read verse 17 goes together beautifully.

  774. Let's go to point number six and first Peter.

  775. Now Peter is the same man who's in Jesus's inner circle, Peter,

  776. James and John. You remember the transfiguration

  777. and other events in the life of our Lord?

  778. What Peter first Peter 2 verse six, he said it is contained.

  779. I love this, believe me, I use this.

  780. It's contained. In the scriptures, but if.

  781. Somebody wants to change the way of worship, singing, praying,

  782. teaching, communion, contribution, and they want to

  783. change. I go no, no, no, no.

  784. I'm not interested in what you want.

  785. I'm interested in what the Scriptures teach.

  786. I'm interested in what's contained in Scripture.

  787. Now, can you show me in the scripture what you're promoted?

  788. People say, well, not exactly. Oh well, if you can't exactly,

  789. that means no. And I'm not interested in what

  790. you think. I want to know what the

  791. scripture says. Listen, you robbed that out and

  792. people will either come to you and obey the gospel and do the

  793. right thing or they going to leave and do their own thing.

  794. Please don't be the one that's going to do your own thing.

  795. You be the one that said, Lord, you tell me what to do and I'm

  796. going to do it by the Scripture. You can do that.

  797. It's contained in scripture. See friends, I'll tell you what

  798. this is for new converts and people been in church based in

  799. all your adult life and that is we need to learn what the Bible

  800. says and we need to make sure we're plot to our life.

  801. In conclusion here, Revelation one, verse three.

  802. Blessed is he that readeth. Number one and they that keeps

  803. the words of the prophecy of the book.

  804. He said blessed word blessing means happy.

  805. Blessed are happy. It's he that readeth it and keep

  806. those things that are written therein.

  807. Listen, we want to do today. We want to read and he said.

  808. I want you to keep the things. That are written in this book.

  809. Well, I love doing Bible markings and and teaching to do

  810. personal work and and training a different one that I've done

  811. this all over the country. And it's a very important role

  812. because it's teaching the congregation how to accomplish a

  813. very important principle of reaching the lost.

  814. And this is where it is. It's following this teaching

  815. right here that we're teaching people to read and to keep the

  816. things they read. That's your commitment level.

  817. You want to follow that? Well, there's so much more I can

  818. say, but it's already 8:30 or so, 837.

  819. I could go by my time and then it's bedtime, so I won't.

  820. It's two hours later. But I want you today to do the

  821. right thing. I want you to be so committed

  822. that Satan know I don't stand a chance with him or her.

  823. No, no, because they're going to go by the Bible.

  824. They're going to stay with the word of God.

  825. No, I don't have a chance. I'll tell you what, Whip Satan

  826. and whip sin. Give yourself completely to the

  827. Lord and don't let anybody or anything get in your way and

  828. salvation would be yours. May the Lord bless you in every

  829. way. To anyone in our assembly

  830. tonight who's not ready to meet your Maker, would you please get

  831. right tonight? We I always will be going home

  832. in a little while, but we're not in a hurry.

  833. We want to see you obey the gospel.

  834. If you've not obeyed the gospel, and if you have obeyed the

  835. gospel and you've got sin in your life, you have yielded to

  836. temptation. You know the song you should

  837. sing. Yield not to temptation for

  838. yielding the sin. Listen, if you have things come

  839. in your life, that's a myth, get rid of it.

  840. Repent of the realms, confession, thoughts and our

  841. prayer, the baptized belief with thy share privilege.

  842. We want you to be saved. Please come and stand and want

  843. to see. We thank you for listening to

  844. our podcast put on by the Church of Christ at 2215 Plans Rd. in

  845. Bakersfield. If you would like any additional

  846. information or you would like to receive a free Bible

  847. correspondence course by mail, please e-mail us at

  848. [email protected]. Our service times are Sundays at

  849. 10:30 AM and 5:00 PM and Wednesdays at 7:30 PM.

  850. Please make plans to join us. We would love for you to be our

  851. honored guest.