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What Is a Christian 14 Christian Is a Temple
James K. Boswell
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Sermon Summary
In this sermon, the speaker expresses joy and gratitude for the congregation's singing and participation. They mention the activities of washing, ironing, and making artists tune, indicating the busyness of the community. The speaker also mentions a shuffleboard game and the Canadians winning, although it is unclear what they are referring to. The main message of the sermon is that believers are the temple of the Holy Ghost and should strive to keep their hearts pure and free from sin. The congregation is encouraged to sing a chorus repeatedly to reinforce this message.
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It's fairly true what Mr. Wooley's been saying, we are having a wonderful time tonight and you're singing so wonderfully well. I think it's just marvellous to hear you sing as you sing, especially on a Monday. But after all the washing, ironing, and making Irish tune, and all you've been doing, and some people have been trying to wear me out on that shuffleboard today. Never mind, I think the Canadians still win. Do we win after all? I assure you would, haven't you got rid of me? That's true, we're very happy about that, this is a joy having you, and we shall still bless you and continue to come night after night to encourage others to come along with you. Now let's sing our chorus then, shall we? You haven't sung it for some time. Do you believe it's precious from having not seen Beloved? You don't know it? We just sing it once, then you sing it along with us. All together, we're going to sing now, Lord make my heart thy temple, Cleanse pure and white from all sin. Remember that's the theme for tonight, we are the temple of the Holy Ghost. All together, we're going to sing now. For everyone on the screen, sing with all the emphasis. It's a change of position, he's going to put his choruses onto I think. Now you people are so bright here, you see, you memorise things so quickly, I like the way you do that. So please open your Bibles now, then, 1 Corinthians chapter 6. 1 Corinthians and the 6th chapter, and please remember, they seem as still, what is, or who is, a Christian. We have been finding a Christian is one, remember, who is a child of God, who is a near of God, who is redeemed, who is an influence, and who is a soldier, and tonight the Christian is a temple. And we just see what is said here, 1 Corinthians chapter 6 and verse number 19. Now remember Paul is writing to the saints at Corinth, they are children of God, they have been born again by the Holy Spirit, in a word they are Christians, they are Christ's ones. And yet he writes in the form of a question here in verse number 19, he says, What? Know ye not, don't you know, that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, which ye have of God? And ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's. Now maybe just go back over these two verses, follow them ever so closely. What? Know ye not, that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you, which ye have of God? And ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's. A Christian realizes that he's no longer his own, that he belongs, he belongs to another, he's married to another, he's united to a living Lord. Thank God for that wonderful revelation to your heart and my heart, that tonight we belong to the living God. And so says Paul here, What? Know ye not, that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you? Remember the Lord Jesus in John, chapter 14, says to his own, I love that 14th chapter, don't you? I call it the cozy corner chapter. And there the Lord got His own gathered around Him. Oh, how He loved to do that. And then He unburned His heart and then He said, Let not your heart be troubled, you believe in God, believe also in Me. In my Father's house and many mansions, abiding places, if it were not so, I would have told you to prepare a place for you. And if I go, I think these four little words, I will come again, should be written in gold, don't you? Oh, how they stand out in all the luster and brilliance and glory against the black background of this present day. When apostasy is abounding on every hand, declension we see all around us, the love of many waxing cold, the faith is tarnished, the vision has become dim, and the love is wonderful to know. And in the midst of all the darkness can always be felt to see the glimmer of light, the bright and morning stars just about to appear. And remember, the morning star always appears when the night at its blackest. And the morning star always shines all its brilliance and glory in the blackest point. And my friends, I think we're in the blackest point of the Church's history. I believe the coming of the Lord is imminent, the coming of the Lord is very near. And this Christ said, if I go, I will come again. He's gone away, but not to stay. He's coming back again. I was going to teach you a new chorus tonight. He's coming as a serpent at dawn. I'm waiting for the resurrection born. He's coming back again. His words so very plain. He's coming as a serpent at the dawn. These are the words I'll teach you the chorus tomorrow night, if the Lord be not come. And of course the part is that the Lord comes, we won't need the chorus. Eh? Wouldn't that be wonderful? Amen? All the joy. So just remember, He is coming, He's on the way. But now in that very same chapter, He says to them, It's expedient for you that I go away. It's profitable for you that I go away. For if I go not away, the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, He will not come. But when I go, I will pray the Father, and He shall send you another Comforter. Not another of another kind, but another just like Himself. Now listen, the Lord gave us three promises without any precept. Now we got a lot of promises in the word of God, but there's a precept or there's a condition. But here are three without any precept or condition at all. What are they? Remember Christ said, I will send the Comforter. Then He said, I will build my church. Then He said, I will come again. The past, the present, and the future. In the past, I will pray the Father, and He shall send you another Comforter. Thank God for the fact Christ has gone up, and the Holy Spirit has come down. And remember, He has to indwell each and every believer tonight. I love that. But then at this present moment, He's building His church. And He said, and I will build my church. Now it's not a building of stolen lime, brick, and mortar. Oh no, this church is a living organism composed of every born again child of God. It's not a dead organization or a denomination. Beloved is a living organism. I never said what label you may have on you. If you are in Christ, you are a member of the living church. The church of the living God. Isn't that a wonderful thing to realize that tonight? And He said, I will build my church. And do you know something? The church is nearing completion. I'm so happy about that. And one day along the living stone shall be added to that vast building. And once that living stone is added, the capsule will be put on, and the Lord shall descend from heaven in the shout, in the voice of the archangel, we shall rise to meet Him. What a moment that's going to be. And then here's the third point, the third promise. I will come again. I will come again. The one that says, I will send the Holy Spirit. The present, I will build my church. You know when you are doing a building, you see buildings going up, you find truckload after truckload of materials being taken to the site. There's a lot of work being done, weighing down underneath the earth as the laying of foundations. A lot of mechanisms brought there, a lot of machinery brought there, a lot of manpower. Once that church, that building is nearing completion, you find a lot of men are waiting for another job, another mechanism being moved to another site. Why? Because, my friend, there's only one or two stones needed now. Only one or two. And, my friend, only those who are doing the finishing touches are required. I want to tell you, on the day of Pentecost, three thousand souls were born again. Acts chapter four, we find again, five thousand souls were born again. Acts chapter eight, great multitude will add to the throng of the regime. That's been going on right down through the ages. And, my friend, we don't see them coming out in the thousands, not in the hundreds today, not even in the scores. We find one here and one there. But, thank God, they are coming. I pray that God is still building them in to that vast building. And we bow before Him tonight as we worship and we adore. I believe the third one is about to be fulfilled. When He said, I will come again. But now, He says, in John chapter fourteen, regarding the Holy Spirit, He said, He shall be with you, and He shall be in you, and that forever. And that forever. He's not coming to spend a weekend, oh no, not coming for a vacation. He's coming to indwell and He'll be in you forever. And now He's saying to the saints at court, He's saying to the saints tonight, here at the park, with all the Bible teaching you've been having, and all the Bible teaching you've had down through the years, He's saying to each one of us tonight, do you know, do you rely, as it comes to you as a revelation from the Spirit Himself, that in you, that your body is a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost, who is in you. Now when this truth dawned upon my spirit life, in a double-decker bus back in Birmingham, England, I knew it theoretically, I knew it doctrinally, I knew it scripturally, and I preached it all over the British Isles. The one day going along that double-decker bus, the truth dawned upon my spirit life, as the Spirit said to me, you're trying to patch up a man, make a man holy, make a man righteous, cultured, refined. I finished with that man 2,000 years ago. There's not a good thing about you, and I put you on a cross. Now I see you no more as a child of Adam. I see you now as my son. And He, by His Spirit, now dwells in your body. And your body is a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost, who is in you. When that truth dawned upon me, and I shuddered out of glory in the middle of that bus, I couldn't hold it back. It was a revelation in my own spirit that the Spirit of God literally lived in me, that He was a living reality and living in me, that my body was a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost. Let me ask you, has this truth dawned upon you, my friend, tonight? Has it gripped you? Has it come to you as a revelation? Oh, I pray, during these days of conference, each one of us will realize for his or herself this glorious, transforming, revolutionizing truth, what? That Christ, by His Spirit, literally lives in me. Mr. Hill, a man to whom I am greatly indebted, he and I were administering a conference at Hackensack in New Jersey, along with John Smart, some years ago. Mr. Hill wanted to speak first. And I was so glad, because I never heard him preach. He listened to me preaching plenty in and around Long Island, different parts of New York. But I never heard that dear synagogue minister, and I wanted to listen to him. But you know, I was so taken up with his beautiful oratory, his wonderful language, his choice of the English language, his choice of those beautiful, rare words, not a word out of place. Every word, his diction, enunciation, absolutely correct. And I was so taken with his beautiful English, I forgot about what he was talking. And, my friend, I was so taken up with this, until near the end of his message, he said these words. He's been in the group all these years. I've taught it in every college in the world. I know it theoretically. I know it scripturally. I know it doctrinally. But not until three weeks ago, did it dawn upon my spirit life, that Christ, by His Spirit, literally lived in me. There was a man getting very near to the end of his journey, and the truth of this wonderful revelation became a reality in his own heart. I changed my message, spoke in Galatians 2, chapter 20. It's no longer I, but Christ lives in me. I finished up with the filling of the Holy Spirit. John Smart scrapped his message, and he spoke on a doctrinal aspect of the filling of the Holy Spirit. Oh, my friend, may I ask you lovingly, has the truth dawned upon your spirit life? Oh, you may have been a Christian for many years, and you've never known the power or the joy or the realization of this glorious fact, that the Holy Spirit indwells you. That your body, my body, is a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost who is in us. This will revolutionize your whole life and ministry. May I pause here one moment? Those of the Christians Paul is writing to, I call on and write down here tonight at the heart of the psalms, the speaker and hearer alike, and say tonight, do we know, has the truth dawned upon my spirit life, that my body, yes, this earthly tabernacle, is a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost who is in me? Remember he said, he shall be with you and he shall be in you. He was with them to Pentecost, at Pentecost he entered into them, and from that moment the last child born in the God family, the Holy Spirit has taken up his abode in the regenerated spirit of man. I wonder, has the truth gripped us tonight sufficiently to cause a joy bell to be set a-ringing in our hearts, to bring an inner realization of the indwelling presence of the Lord Jesus Christ? I may know the love of God so should have drawn my heart by the Holy Spirit, removing all the debris, all the muck, all the hindered moths, the revelation of Jesus Christ in us and through us. All he longs about, everything else, to make Christ a living reality in your life and in mine. A young boy, a very fine young fellow, when he was only eighteen months old back in Britain, his father died, leaving him with his mother all alone in the world. The mother worked very hard to give this boy the best education as possible to give him. He graduated from high school, from varsity, with honors in every subject. He became one of Britain's leading surgeons, a very brilliant doctor. He had got into a high social circle, a social status far beyond his own, and he despised his own mother. He told a young lady who became his wife that he was brought up by a nurse whom he called Faithful Mary, all the time referring to his mother. As we were married and settled in the lovely home, he said to his wife one day, Darling, I feel indebted to Faithful Mary. She went through a lot for me. I would like her to come here and live with us in our home. There is the attic room. We can give her the attic. The maids are here and they can attend to her. The young wife immediately agreed to his desire for Faithful Mary to come and stay with them in their home. He wrote to his mother and said that he and his wife would like her to come and stay with them in their home, that she should make their home her own. For she was not to be known as his mother, just to be known as Faithful Mary. Now, when I got that letter, I just threw it up and put it in the waste paper basket. But you know what a mother's love is, don't you? A mother would do any privation, do any injustice, to suffer any hardship, just to be near the object of her heart's affection, providing it's a boy. And as it happened, she wrote back to his office and told him she told him if he was willing to come, even in such circumstances, just be known as Faithful Mary. They went for her in the lovely car, driving along this lovely little English lane, up the main highway, up a long private drive, up that lovely home standing back at the little plantation. The butler met them at the door, seated in the reception hall. Now the time entered the drawing room, and then to the dining room. Now for a nice meal, she thought she got to the attic. Everything thoughtlessly clean, little as what is a driven snow. The maids are there to care for her, and to look after her. But it's still the attic. A cloud overshadowed that home, and heaven has entered into it, and they couldn't understand why. To one day the young wife, when on her way toward the attic door, the old lady held dear herself to the heart of the young girl, and she loved to talk to Faithful Mary. She had such a heart so full of understanding, and so wise in her decisions. As she was just about to talk to her, she overheard her husband address his mother as mother. She threw herself down, as the team began to cry. She stopped her young heart up. He asked her, what's the matter darling, what's gone wrong? She said, Harold, Harold, why have you deceived me? Why didn't you tell me she was your mother? Had I known, I'd have given the best room in my home. Why didn't you tell me? He confessed his sin to her, and together they went their way across the attic. The young girl with a flush of teardrop on her face, bent over, and she kissed the dear old lady, and addressed her as mother, for the very first time. The mother was brought up, given the right of way in the home. The clutter was removed. Happiness was restored. Why? The mother's got a rightful place. Now may I pause. You may be in your own heart saying tonight, what a brute of a son. Friend, I partially agree with you. But are we aware tonight, that we've got someone enduring us, who's more sensitive than a mother? That one is the Holy Spirit. Now let me ask you lovingly, which part of your life are you giving Him? If you're born again, He's indwelling you. But have you grieved Him into the attic of your life? You wonder why there's no real joy, no inner serenity, no inner tranquility. You wonder why there's no real desire for Bible study, no real desire for a private devotion and prayer. You wonder why your testimony is not convincing and vital. You wonder why there's no fruit in your service. Is it because you've grieved the Spirit into the attic of your life? O child of God, will you from your very heart tonight, pray and pray with me always, always in serenity. Have thine own way, Lord. Have thine own way. Hold, O Lord, my being in absolute sway. Hail, O my Spirit, to all to see. Christ, O me, always living in me. Now it says, Paul, do I know, do you know, that your body is a temple of the Holy Ghost, who is in you and you're not your own? For you have been bought for the price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. Please don't go away and say, that's Catholic teaching, that's New Testament teaching. I may be allowed to use the names of some of the great theologians of the day gone by. You can take the books of John Nelson Darby, of Kelley, of Lincoln, of Sage McIntosh, of Stoney, of Dennett, Denny and Dennett, or more recent days, C.A. Coates. And all those men taught the truth of our deliverance from the power of indwelling sin by yielding to the indwelling Spirit. And the quicker we as God's beloved people get back to realizing the truth, there is deliverance for us as we yield to the indwelling Spirit, who indwells us, but do I know, as a living reality, as a divine revelation, in my own heart, that my body is a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost, who is in me. May I go further? Remember Romans chapter 12, verse number 2. The Apostle Paul writing to a saint at Rome, he says, I, this teacher, notice the beautiful language he uses here, he's not conscripting, no commanding, not even demanding, in a beautiful language he says, I beseech, and the word beseech means wooing to win, wooing to win. I beseech you. Some people tell me Paul was a bachelor. If Paul was a bachelor, he knew an awful lot about women. And what he should hear is of a young man getting down before a young lady, he's thinking, my friend, to woo her that he might win her. He's proposing to her and these particular days, I'm talking about the younger generation, I find they don't need too much coaxing these days, or too much wooing. But the word is, it says, I beseech you. I beseech you. Isn't this lovely? I was in St. Catherine some time ago conducting a wedding there. The bride's father got up to the reception and he said these words, 45 years ago today, I got down on my knees to propose to my bride and he said it's taken me all that time to get back on my feet. After 45 years. That's the word Paul's using here, I beseech you therefore, brethren. Isn't that lovely? Seeking to woo them that he might win them. Oh, if I could only have something of the love of that great man. I've got that love. But oh, it may have its way in my life if it reached your heart tonight. I know it's reaching your heart. But oh, if we only respond to that love tonight and hear the Lord saying through the chosen vessel, I beseech you, my child. I beseech you, my blood-bought possession. I beseech you, the darling of my own heart. I beseech you, brethren. And that means sisters too. That means brethren with a small b. It's the only brethren I know. And friend, I want you to get this deep down in your heart tonight. I beseech you therefore, brethren. Who are they? Sinners paid by grace. Claimed by a precious blood. Those who recognise they are no longer their own. They've been bought with a price. And he says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your gift, your hand over your body, a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable, your intelligent, your logical service. Why is this? We have been pardoned. You've got peace. You've got power. You've got wonderful provision. And the provision I've made for you is all in my beloved Son. Now, I have bought you to present you. And he says, I want you now to present your body to me. Now, you may be a Christian for many years. You have never yet come to this place in your life. But you have presented your body, a living sacrifice. Now, listen. This is just as definite and just as deliberate as the moment you receive Christ for salvation is that moment when you present your body to Him in wholehearted surrender. Boy, Nicholson known to so many, Ross MacIntyre's wife, Joan, and others one night, the purpose of the night, ran into the caverns, quietly bowed her heart and surrendered her whole will to Jesus Christ. I didn't know about it. And a long afterward, when Boy called me one day, he said, Jim, I want to tell you something. He said, that night when you gave that message, on complete commitment and surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ, I never done it. But I did it that night. Others in that same auditorium fought this, or fought it. They fought it. They thought I was teaching second blessing or something. And some who fought it, my friend, have gone back into the world. One couple I know only too well. They have invited people home. I often find it happening after a meeting, you know. People invite people home, have a sing-song, to try and get away from the conviction of the Spirit of God. From a hilarious time, trying to quieten what the Spirit of God has been doing in their heart. Christians I'm talking about now. Most people did that. And after they'd gone home, the young wife turned to the young man and said, what are you going to do about that message tonight? Oh, he said, I thought you were talking about that. He said, yes, I know. Well, he said, I am not surrendering. I am not giving my life. What happened, he lost his job. He lost his first baby. Boyd Nicholson, when he gave his life, the Lord had nothing. Commercial artist. Working in the basement. But God took that man up, my friend, offered him a job he'd never known before. A salary he'd never known before. The people here couldn't confirm that. And Boyd's wife, my friend, would not yield her life to that night. She said quietly, Boyd, I know what you've done tonight. You've surrendered your life to Christ, haven't you? He said, yes, I have, Niecy. I have. Whatever it costs, I am going all the way with Him. She said, I haven't. It wasn't until that same week, Niecy went down to the studio downstairs through her arms on Boyd and said, Boyd, I too have surrendered. And Boyd Nicholson's one of the funnest men we got in the assembly today. Others that night surrendered their lives to Christ. I didn't know that until I was just there recently speaking at the watchman's service. And John and his wife were there at that service that night. Oh, friend, listen. I wonder what you're going to do with your life as a Christian. Some of you are getting on in years, not quite so young as you used to be. Now I'm getting there myself. But may I pause. The Eden of your careers, the Bible says, there shall be light. And that light can shine brighter and brighter unto that perfect day. Oh, friend, may God give us grace to come. Do you know when Paul says in Romans 12, 1, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God you present your body to God. He's not talking about God the Father. He's not talking about God the Son. He's talking about God the Holy Ghost. And friend, there is no jealousy in the Godhead. Please get that. There's no jealousy in the Godhead. There is no jealousy in the Godhead. They are co-equal. And they are co-eternal in perfection and in power. And what I am saying to you, that you present your body of living sacrifice wholly acceptable unto God. The Holy Spirit indwells us tonight, but He wants our bodies. He wants to make real to us, says to Corinthians 4, verse number 11, that the life of Jesus might be made manifest in my mortal flesh. Paul says in Corinthians 1, verse 20, whether by life or by death, Christ might be magnified where? In my body. And dear child of God, this is only possible in the measure in which I am willing to hand my whole life over to His control. There's only one life well pleasing to Him. It's the life of His beloved Son. And we can only be well pleasing in the measure in which the life of Christ revealed in us. May we come to that place when from our very heart we're going to pray tonight with all sincerity. Have Thine own way, Lord. Have Thine own way. Hold all my being absolute sway. Fill with Thy Spirit to all to see Christ only always living in me. Above and very away, away yonder in Northern Ireland, listen to George Duncan give a message like I'm giving tonight. And only the night before that they surrender their life to Jesus Christ. I think of a book on the bookshelf called Living the Christian Life written by George B. Duncan. I just get it. It's only 50 cents. I've read it. Some chapters I've re-read. And there's one chapter there on the tongue. It's worth the whole book. That was my message for tonight at the temple. May I just bring it to a close because I haven't got time to go into my classic. I'll do that tomorrow morning. T. E. M. P. L. E. Your body, my body is the temple of the Holy Ghost within us. And we're going to take up the various members of our body. And we're going to just depend upon the Holy Spirit to make it real in each of us that we may recognize all the important facts. Know ye not, you're not your own for you're bought. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit. There are those on this campus who are coming to me and saying, Jim, we haven't heard that ministry for 40 years. Young people, I go around the country and they come and say, Uncle Jim, we've never heard that. So many of us knew it, doc, finally, theoretically, theologically, all to know the power of the fact of the indwelling Christ. I'm no longer my own. I belong to him. And we come tonight and we look up and from our hearts we say, take my love, O Lord, I pour at thy feet its treasures and restore. Take myself and I will be ever only all for thee. Let us take the first letter, T, if we may, and the word is tongue. Tongue. And when we recognize our bodies are the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, our tongue now belongs to him. Now then, very important, said back in the book of Numbers, by your tongue you are justified, by your tongue you will be condemned. And thank God for all who tonight with their tongue have confessed Jesus Christ as Lord. Because the Bible says, every knee will bow to him, every eye will see him, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, the glory of God the Father. Romans 10 and 9 said, but if thou should confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in thine heart God raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, but with the mouth confesseth me unto salvation. O my beloved, tonight with your mouth you're going to be justified, with your mouth you'll be condemned. Remember, my friend, the importance of that little, all-important, vital member of the tongue. I want to clarify many just with one little expression, and I'll go on from here tomorrow morning with the letter E, down through the acrostic. But here's the word tongue. In Psalm number 24 we'll read these words in the form of a question and an answer. Who shall ascend to the holy hill of God? He'll have clean hands and a pure heart, not lift up his soul into vanity, nor sworn deceitfully. I want to see that last one. We'll deal with the others during the course of our talk tomorrow morning. Nor sworn deceitfully. Let me ask you very lovingly before I touch this, because there may be someone in this very fine crowd tonight, and you've never yet with your mouth openly confessed Jesus Christ as your Lord. I wonder, will you be wise or not, and will you turn to your neighbor and say, I know the Lord Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I have received him into my heart. If you've never done it, will you do it right now? Just turn and say, I own him as my Lord and Savior, and I receive him into my heart. I am going to tell you the joy there will be flooding in your heart tonight. All the ring in your heart tonight. There really will teeth. Dr. DeGangi and I were in Peterborough, Ontario. Dr. DeGangi a Presbyterian minister for many years. He's now Secretary of the Medical Mission Board, working out of Toronto. In fact, we were together for a convention for the deepening of spiritual life. Very godly brother, man I have great regard for. This morning at the Bible reading, he used the expression from Psalm 24. He spoke of Psalm 23 one morning. This is Psalm 24. He came to the expression, Who shall stand on the holy hill with clean hands, pure heart, never lift up his soul to vanity, nor swarm deceitfully? He said that word swear means to take an oath. And as a Presbyterian minister, many people came, Godfather, Godmother. The father and mother brought their children to me. I gave that child a name. I baptized that child by sprinkling it. Yet deep down in my own heart I knew that child was not becoming an inheritor of the kingdom of God. I was swearing deceitfully as a minister. I said, sprinkling will not make a little baby an inheritor of the kingdom of God. He said, I knew that many people standing before me, those Godfather, that Godmother, who with their vow were confessing that they were going to bring up that child in the nocturnal admonition of God, bring that child up for God, under the principles of the Holy Scripture. Yet I knew with you within me, those people would not keep that vow. He said they were swearing deceitfully. He said, now this convention is being held here in this Baptist church. The Baptist pastor is sitting here. Others are here today. I myself have been baptized by immersion now as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. For he said there are many who come and they go down these waters and they confess in their very act they've died to sin. They've died to the world. They've died to self and they're rising to walk in heroes of life and they're sworn deceitfully because they've still got the same irritability. They're still irritable. They're still impatient. They still lose their temper. They're still jealous. Give them their malice. Backbiting, but critical. He said, beloved, they're swearing deceitfully. We have professed and put off the old manly deeds and arrived to walk in heroes of life and if we're not walking in heroes of life having put on Christ the balm of love and walking in the energy of the Spirit of God then by more than that you say we are swearing deceitfully is not by attitude and by demeanor. Let me say, as a pastor we often have to stand before people who are being married. We ask the man, are you? Will you have this woman to be thy lawful wedded wife? Says, I will. Will you have this man to be thy lawful wedded husband? Woman says, I will. Whom God shall let know then through the thunder and all the time in their powerful saying, what if it doesn't work? I know a good lawyer swearing deceitfully. I bring this message to a close so I wish I were just starting. Friend, your body, my body is a dwelling place of the Holy Ghost who is in us. He wants your tongue. He wants my tongue. Will you present that tongue to him tonight? Will you? Oh, how vital, how important is that little member for he wants his tongue to speak forth his praises, to magnify his master's grace. Now that tongue, my friend, will be used to the glory of God in announcing the glad tidings, telling forth the story of redeeming love, the word of comfort. Oh, may your word be, as it says, remember in the book of Proverbs, health-giving. May your voice, my voice, bring health and healing and comfort and cheer and encouragement, salvation for his own dear name's sake. Let us remember in silence and in that moment let us just have a quiet word of the Lord for ourselves. Now that we've had that word, we're going to sing very quietly and thoughtfully that verse I've been quoting so often tonight. Have thine own way, Lord. Have thine own way. Hold o'er my being absolute sway. Maybe the Spirit of God put his finger upon some particular area of your life that you've been holding back. That's been grieving the Holy Spirit. He's not been having complete sway in your life. But tonight you're going to confess that particular thing, area, and you're going to allow the Spirit of God to come in and take over. The verse is I close. Know ye not your body's the temple of the Holy Ghost who is in you which ye have of God and you're not your own for ye are bought for the price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit. James, let us sing thoughtfully and prayerfully. Have thine own way, Lord. Have thine own way. Hold o'er my being absolute sway. Fill with thy spirit till all shall see Christ living in me. Once more very thoughtfully and prayerfully. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
What Is a Christian 14 Christian Is a Temple
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