the evening will be number 860.
860.
Due to technological limitations and my own lack thereof, we will not have the power point this evening.
860.
Let's sing the first and fourth verse.
There is a habitation, built by the living God, For all of every nation, who seek that grand abode.
Oh Zion, Zion, Zion!
I long thy gates to see, O Zion, Zion, when it shall I dwell in thee.
Within its pearly portals,
Angelic armies sing with glorified immortals the praises of its King.
O Zion, Zion, Zion, high on thy gates to see.
Zion, when shall my thrall hit thee?
It's always hard singing that because my voice wants to do the alto and not the main.
The next song before the prayer will be number 578.
578.
We'll sing the first, second, and fourth, and then we'll
We will glorify the King of Kings.
We will glorify...
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in majesty we will bow before His throne we will worship Him in righteousness we will worship Him alone hallelujah to the King of Kings hallelujah to the Lamb hallelujah to the
the brain.
God our Father, we come to you at this time acknowledging you as the one and true living God.
And Lord, we cannot begin to thank you enough for everything that you do for us each and every day.
We cannot thank you enough for your son Jesus and that sacrifice that he made when he came to earth and lived amongst us as a human and taught us how to live sin free and then paid
that ultimate price when he gave his life so that we have that opportunity if we faithfully follow your word to have our sins washed away and join you one day in heaven.
Lord we are thankful for those amongst our congregation that have had improving health and we just again cannot thank you
enough for that because we know that everything that goes on, your hand is involved in it.
We praise you and thank you for those whose health has improved.
But Lord, there are still many amongst our number that ah continue to struggle with various physical difficulties, spiritual difficulties and emotional difficulties, mental
difficulties.
And we ask that you continue to be with them and their caretakers and their care providers and comfort them as only you can.
And if it be your will, return them to
measure of health that they desire just as soon as possible.
Lord, we're also mindful of those that have lost loved ones recently, and we're especially mindful of the Rutherford family and the Wallace family and their recent losses this past
week, and ask that you wrap your loving, comforting arms around each and every member of that family and their close friends and their loved ones and comfort them as only you can.
And Lord, we ask that you help us all to take the message that
uh messages that were brought to us this morning and the message that's going to be brought to us shortly here from your word and help us to understand it and help us to use
it in our lives to continually to faithfully follow you and more importantly Lord to go out and seek and save the lost as you have directed us to do we pray all this through your
son Jesus name amen
Song before the lesson will be number 122.
122.
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the first and third verse before our lesson.
Since the love of God was shed, priceless blessings on my head, am made in my own.
I will hide it in my
shall rule there alone the love of God within the heart.
and warmth impart.
The soul will glow like Jesus in His tender mercy.
His face, His His faith, His dwelling place.
The love of God glows like a flame.
Through endless years it is the same.
The love of God will never fail nor lose its glory till we see Him face.
to face.
While this love burns true and bright, we are walking in the light he had shown us the road.
We his glory must reflect, let's darken this and neglect, keep some soul from its God.
The love of God.
and warmth and power.
His soul will glow like Jesus in His tender mercy.
If the heart is made His dwelling place, the love of God glows like a flame.
Through endless years, it is the same.
The love of God will bear
fail nor lose its glory till we see him face to face.
Friendship is something that we all hold dear.
It's something that sets the foundation for any relationship we cherish in this life.
Now, what are the foundations of friendship?
Well, first and foremost, you can never have a friendship if you do not communicate.
any relationship, even if it's not friendship, if it's business, there has to be communication.
Even if there's no words, you the ability to smile.
That communicates.
You have your hand gestures.
That communicates.
Without it, there will be no interaction.
But after that communication comes commonality.
Friendships build one of two ways usually.
You either realize that you meet this person and you have all these things in common with them.
You like the same foods, you like the same games, or it builds more slowly.
Instead of it being, man, you have all this that I know, it's someone that you might not like everything they do at first.
In fact, this person might just be an annoyance until you go through things together.
Perhaps it's a co-worker, and you've had to go through these struggles, you've had to go through these hard times facing jobs you didn't want to do, but you did it together.
And the next thing you knew, you were closer to that person than you were your own brother.
You have communication.
you have commonality and after that comes commitment and confidence.
That coworker mentioned earlier, you are now committed to that person.
You, that you tell them you can trust me and you have confidence and that you know you can trust them.
It's a mutual confidence, a mutual commitment.
These are foundations of friendship vital in any relationship.
and they are vital in our relationship with our Lord.
Our friendship with Him is like these others that we have.
John 15 verses 14 and 15.
John 15, 14 and 15.
Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever, I command you.
Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known
unto you.
John 15 verse 14 says you are my friends.
But he doesn't say it until something very special happens.
That first word in verse 15 is henceforth.
This means that from this time forward I call you not servants, but I call you friends.
Something has changed, something that we need to know if we want to have a similar relationship with our Lord and Savior.
What is it that made it to where they were no longer servants, but they were now friends?
There is a context between
context before John 13-16.
And in that context the apostles are having a fight.
They having a debate over who is the greatest, who is the one that is going to be ruler or be the one that is in command after Christ dies.
He has been telling them, I am going to die and I am going to be raised the third day.
They didn't understand the fact that He was going to be raised, so in their minds He was going to die.
What it looks like is they are thinking, okay who is going to be the next in line?
They have this thought of who is the greatest, but Christ is going to teach them an important lesson.
John 13, starting in verse 1, starts John's commentary on what is about to happen.
Now before the feast of Passover,
when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world unto the Father.
Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end.
And supper being ended, the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hand, and
that he was come from God and went to God, he riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments, and took a towel, and girded himself.
Look back at all these things that Christ knows.
He knew that His hour was come, that He should leave those of this world.
And He knew that He was going to go to the Father.
And there was not only the things He knew, there were the people He loved.
He loved His own which were in the world.
These were the Apostles.
And He had something that was going to be important for them to know before He left.
Verse 3, Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, He had all authority, and that He was come from God and went to God, He was about to go, He rises
from supper and laid aside His garments.
This is the most important thing Christ can show them now.
He is about to leave them on this earth and they are about to have the most important mission twelve men could ever have and that was to help be a part in the establishment of
the church.
And what is it that they need to know before that?
Jesus laid aside His garments and He washes their feet.
He doesn't show them the great power they are going to be able to do.
He doesn't show them the fact that they can move mountains.
He doesn't show them the fact that they can heal diseases.
They already know that.
They see that the Lord and Savior, the God of the universe, washes their feet.
Verse 7, verse 6 rather, then cometh he to Simon Peter, and Peter saith unto him, Lord, dost thou wash my feet?
Verse 7, Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do thou knowest not now, but henceforth thou shalt know hereafter.
Earlier we mentioned John 15, 15 where it says from henceforth I call you no more servants, but friends.
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because all things that the Father has made known to me, I have made known unto you.
John 13 verse 7 is the opposite.
There are things that they don't know now, but they are going to know.
And that is what's going to change to where they become friends.
And the first thing they needed to learn was to serve selflessly.
Verse 8, Peter saith unto him, Lord, shalt thou wash my feet?
Jesus answered him, if I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me.
We're looking at serving selflessly, but before we can serve selflessly, we need to understand what Jesus is saying to us through His Word.
Peter had something he had to understand.
The Lord said, don't know what I'm doing right now.
How can we follow any instruction?
How can we follow any command if we don't know the command itself?
How can a child do what his father wants him to do if he doesn't take the time to listen, doesn't take the time to wait and think, okay, what does this mean?
Peter had to hold his horses.
This was the guy who had
in amazing capacity to put his foot in his own mouth, repeated times, all in the same day.
He was incredibly skilled at it, but he had to learn to wait, to be patient, and see what the command was, to see what the principle was.
And he was going to learn that it was about washing their pride from them, being someone different that was willing to serve.
To serve selflessly, listen to your master, just as Peter would have to learn.
But not only listen, lay aside ambition.
Verse 10, Jesus said unto him, the he that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every wet.
And ye are clean, but not all.
For he knew who should betray him, therefore said he, ye are not all clean.
So after he had washed their feet and had taken his garments and was set down again, he said unto them, know ye what I have done unto you.
And now earlier we mentioned that Jesus was the God of the universe and he is today still.
He, in verse 13, Ye call me Master and Lord.
Ye say, Well, for so I am.
If I then your Lord and Master have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet.
And now verse 15, for I have given you an example that ye should do as I have done unto you.
They had this discussion, they had this fight over who was the greatest and instead of doing that they were to be like the Lord who came down to die on a cross and serve, do His
will.
They were to lay aside their ambition and they were to take up their cross.
Christ would not only take up this towel, He would die nailed to two boards of wood that put together for you and for me.
That is the kind of service that our Lord did for us, the kind of service He did for them.
And they are going to change from this point and it's going to be seen in their actions.
Before they were asking who is the greatest, who is the greatest?
And now...
When Christ is going to say, of you will betray me.
Well, if you have this attitude of who is the greatest, how are you going to react to someone saying, you're going to betray me?
No, I'm not.
I'm not going to do that.
In fact, I'm going to be the next leader.
That's not what they do.
They say, Lord, is it I?
They have a completely different mindset after this because the Lord has taught them with example.
If we are going to be friends of God, we must learn to serve selflessly.
But we must also learn to love with a new love.
This service that is seen in John 13 verse 15 that we are to do for others as Christ has done to us, it has a motive.
Moving forward, verily, verily, I say unto you, the servant is not greater than his Lord, neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him.
If ye know these things, happier ye if ye do them.
Verse 18 and following shows that there is one that is going to betray them, and this is Judas, the fake friend, the one who is going to suffer for all eternity because he did not
serve his master.
He did not have the same humility.
Verse 31.
Therefore when he, Judas, was gone out, Jesus said, Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.
Verse 32 continues to describe how each will glorify the other.
In verse 33, little children, yet a little while I am with you.
Ye shall seek me, as I said unto the Jews.
And as I said unto the Jews, whether I go ye cannot come.
So now I say unto you, imagine a father who is about to leave.
He's going to be gone a long time.
It's going to be at least several weeks.
And he has his sons and he is telling them, listen, before I go, I don't know if I'm going to see you again.
I need to tell you this.
That is like what Christ is doing here.
He's saying, listen, I'm about to leave and you need to hold on.
If you're going to get anything out of what I'm saying unto you, hold on to this.
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I give unto you, that ye love one another, as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
Jesus, what's new about this?
We know we're supposed to love each other.
The greatest commandment is, the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, and mind, and the second is like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
This is a commandment as old as Moses.
What is new is the kind of love this is.
They already knew that they were to love each other enough to do as they should do to others.
But the new thing was that they now know they are to love each other as Christ loved them.
The Lord that gave his life for us, that's
love we are to have with each other.
Brethren, if we don't have this kind of selfless service, this kind of love for each other, we do not have friendship with Christ.
We do not have the friendship with each other we are to have, because we are to love each other as Christ loved us.
Verse 35, by this all men shall know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
Remember those foundations of friendship we talked about earlier.
We talked about communication.
We talked about commonality, commitment, and confidence.
With the idea of commonality, this love is something that we have in common with Christ.
Ye love one another as I have loved you.
Verse 35, by this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
Love is the Christian's ID card, and without it, there is no way to enter into heaven.
There is no way to live this life, and other people know the way they are supposed to go, because this love is the light.
This love shows his way.
We are to serve selflessly, love with this new love, and we see that it has this commitment behind it, this communication behind it, but there's also commitment.
Looking at this verse again, says, A new commandment I give unto you.
This love, we have it in common with Christ, and it is not an option.
It is something that is imperative.
And moving forward, John 14 verse 6.
After Jesus has shown this kind of love to them, He will say, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
No man cometh unto the Father but by me.
If we do not follow His example, there is no way to go to the Father.
And the example in this context is this love.
And now, love is going to be throughout all of this.
and he is going to tell them in John 14-15, if ye love me, keep my commandments.
But now connect that with this idea.
We have if you love me, keep my commandments.
And earlier we looked at the idea that a new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another.
If you love me, keep my commandments.
A new commandment I give you, that you love one another.
We have a circle here.
Christ is showing them
that the thing that is their lives are to revolve around is this love.
This love is the sign of what they are going to do.
This love is the reason of what they are going to do.
It is to make their very being.
You're my friends if you do whatsoever I command you.
What Christ commanded them is love.
We are to serve selflessly.
We are to love with this new love that is.
is in common with Jesus, is committed to Jesus, and it has confidence in Jesus.
Christ is telling them what they have to do.
He is about to leave this world and they are going to be without Him, but He is not going to leave them alone.
They are going to have the Comforter.
Now, please remember, this discussion, though there are many things we can take from it and apply in our lives, is specific to the Apostles.
and Jesus.
We do not receive the comforter today in the same way they did.
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Instead, we have the words of the Comforter, which was the Holy Spirit.
We can read those words, we can find comfort in them, and we also find the way we are to live in them.
We know the way, the truth, and the life because we have His life recorded in this Word.
And we are guided into all truth, not because the Lord is miraculously putting thoughts in our minds or words in our minds, but because His Word is right here where we can read it.
Now, with that in mind,
John 15 verse 25, but this cometh to pass that the word might be fulfilled that is written in their law.
They hated me without a cause.
But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me.
And ye shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning." Christ is going to send this Comforter.
Chapter 16 verse 7, nevertheless I tell you the truth, it is expedient for you that I go away.
I need to go away, for if I do not go away the Comforter will not come unto you.
I depart, will send Him unto you.
And when He was come, He will reprove the world of sin, of righteousness, and judgment." And it continues in verses 13 and 14.
They are going to have this Spirit, and we have the comfort of that in God's Word itself.
But not only do we have that, we have the Father Himself.
Verse 15, all things that the Father hath are mine.
Therefore said he that he shall take of mine and shall show it unto you.
In a little while and ye shall not see me, and again a little while ye shall see me because I go to the Father.
All things that the Father hath are Christ's.
Now we are Christ's and we also belong to the Father he shall take of mine.
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We also belong to this Father, and He wants to hear our prayers, and He wants to know what is on our minds.
John 16 verse 23, in that day ye shall ask me nothing.
Lerily I say unto you, whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.
Hitherto ye have asked nothing in my name.
Ask and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full.
These things have I spoken unto you in Proverbs, but the time cometh when I shall no more speak unto you in Proverbs, but shall show you plainly of the Father." They have this
comfort of the Spirit.
That's part of their confidence in Christ.
And they also have a Father that will listen to them.
They are no longer going to ask the Son
for anything.
They had not asked the Son for anything.
Now they are going to ask the Father.
So they have the Spirit, they have the Father, and then they have the Son.
If ye shall ask anything in my name, all parts of the Godhead are on their side.
Or rather, they are on the side of all parts of the Godhead because they are the friends of Christ.
serve selflessly, being willing to wash feet, being willing to die for brethren, love with this new love, this love that is willing to show that kind of service, the motive behind
the Christian life.
and enjoy the blessings of being a servant of the Lord.
Enjoy the fact that you have the Spirit's Word in front of you.
You have the Son mediating for you in heaven and you have the Father waiting to hear your every prayer.
The Lord is fighting for you.
The Lord wants to be with you.
As He was with His apostles, no, not everything is parallel, but He is with you.
He wants the best for you just as He wanted the best for them.
Now...
Are you a friend of God?
Are you a friend of the Lord in heaven?
Are you His servant?
Because if you have not obeyed His word, there is no way to be His friend.
Acts chapter 2 shows those who became servants of God first in the New Testament.
Christ told them that this spirit was going to come, and He did.
In Acts chapter 2, cloven an tongues like as a fire came down.
and they were speaking in tongues and they were then going to preach the first gospel sermon.
Acts chapter 2 verse 22, what was it that even on the day of Pentecost when the church was being established what is it that they had to do to submit to Jesus to become his servants
to become saved to ultimately become his friends?
Acts 2 verse 22, ye men of Israel, hear these words.
The first thing they had to do was hear something and that was going to be the gospel of Christ.
They were going to see proof of what He did in the miracles, wonders, and signs.
They were going to know what He did.
1 Corinthians 15, 1 through 8 shows the gospel.
It's the death, the burial, the resurrection, and the witnesses of Christ as is preached here.
Verse 23, by wicked hands he was crucified and slain.
Verse 24, whom God raised up and loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should beholden of it.
And verse 32 shows this Jesus, hath God raised up whereof we all are witnesses.
They must hear something and that is the gospel.
They must hear the proof behind it.
And now they must also repent of their sins.
And before they can do that, they must believe the message that they are hearing.
In verse 37, now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do?
Verse 36 shows that they were told they crucified the master.
They crucified the Lord.
And then they respond to that not with, what is this?
They responded with, okay, what is it we have to do?
They believed the message.
They heard the gospel.
They believed the gospel.
And they believed it enough to say, okay, what is it we have to do?
It moved them to action.
And they would have to confess Christ as Lord.
That's what they did here when they didn't say, this wasn't Jesus.
They accepted the fact it was.
And in that, they confessed with their mouth that Christ was Lord.
unto salvation.
Then there is repentance and belief.
Acts 2, 38, repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Here, believe, repent, confess, be baptized, and as the rest of Acts 2 shows, remain faithful.
God wants you to be His friend.
Christ wants you to be His friend, to learn His humility, to learn His charity, His love, and to enjoy those blessings.
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his word shows how to become one and that is before you today.
If you are a Christian and you need the blessings of forgiveness to come before the church to confess sin as 1st John 1 9 shows that opportunity is before you now.
If you have any need of the cleansing blood of Christ at this moment please take advantage of it as we stand and as we sing.
164.
464.
God sent his son, they called him Jesus.
He came to love, heal and forgive.
He lived and died to find my pardon.
An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives.
Because He lives, I can face tomorrow.
Because He lives, all fear is gone.
Because I know he holds the future And life is worth the living just because he lives And then one day I'll cross that river
I'll fight like Spine, no war with pain.
And in as death gives way to victory, I'll see the light of glory and I'll know he reigns.
Because he lives, I can face tomorrow.
Because he lives, all fear is gone.
Because I know how.
oh And life is worth the living just because he lives.
Is there anyone here today that did not have the opportunity to protect the Lord's Supper this morning?
If so, raise your hand.
Let us pray for the emblems.
Dear Lord, our Almighty God and Father in heaven, we come to thee in prayer at this time, thanking you so very much for the sacrifice that you provided with your Son on the cross.
Or God, had He not sacrificed Himself and given up all in a sinless state, we could have no chance for salvation.
May we now partake of this bread, which is representative of the Lord's body that was hung on that cross, and a memorial most pleasing unto Thee.
May we take to heart the sacrifice that this bread represents as we partake of it.
And so we pray to Thee in Jesus' name, amen.
Pray for the fruit of the vine.
Likewise, Lord God, we come to Thee in prayer thanking You for the fruit of the vine, which represents in and of itself the blood that Christ shed on the cross, the same blood
that we come in contact through through the act of baptism that washes away our sins as clean and as white as snow.
Lord God, we know that we could have no such a better sacrifice than the lamb that was given to us.
May we partake of this in a manner that is pleasing unto thee.
In Jesus' amen.
separate and apart from the Lord's Supper.
It is now a convenient time for us to pray for the offerings that we are to lay by and store of each and every week.
So let us pray for what we can give to our Lord back.
Lord God, we come to Thee in prayer again, thanking You so very much for the many blessings that You have bestowed upon us each and every day.
We know that there is no monetary value that we could ever give back to this church or any congregation.
We could give up everything that we hold dear to us, every physical possession, all the way down to our clothing, and it would not even begin to rival the amount of blessings
that You have poured down upon us.
From every moment we get to live with our family and loved ones, every lesson we get to learn from the covers of your book that you gave to us, the love letter written by your
hand, all the way to the sacrifice of your son that died on the cross, we are so very thankful and we pray that we can give back to you a small portion of what we should lay in
store willfully and happily to forward towards your kingdom for the betterment of it.
And so we pray to thee in Jesus' name, amen.
If you'd like to stand for the closing song before the prayer, it'd be 147.
We'll sing just the first verse.
147.
I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus of Nazarene, and wonder how he could love me, a sinner condemned unclean.
How marvelous, how wonderful,
How marvelous, how wonderful is my Savior's love for me.
Heavenly Father, we're indeed privileged to have been able to assemble this day to hear some wonderful messages from your Word.
and to fellowship one with another.
We thank you, Father, for the multitude of blessings that we don't even realize.
But as we prepare to depart, Father, we ask that you look down upon each of us with mercy, bless each of us with our needs, and continue to watch over us and bring us all back at
the next appointed hour.
We ask all these blessings in your son's name, amen.
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