In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of encountering God through His Word. He encourages listeners to seek a personal experience with God and not deny themselves the opportunity to have daily encounters with Him. The preacher also highlights the need to focus on heavenly things rather than earthly desires and warns against indulging in sinful behaviors. He emphasizes the power of Jesus' sacrifice and urges believers to share the message of Christ with others. The sermon concludes with a reading from Colossians chapter 3, emphasizing the importance of setting our minds on things above.

We would like to invite all of the men to come and be with us on Saturday mornings. We have about eight, maybe ten regulars, and we have a little breakfast at eight o'clock. And Billy Doby has prepared some delicious breakfasts for us. And when we don't have a full breakfast, we have some donuts or we have Les knows a source where you can get ham biscuits and things like that, and he'll go get them if you'll just come and be there. And it is a delightful time together. It's a good way to get Saturday started. I'd like for us tonight to turn to Colossians chapter 3. You know, to be a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ and to know the power of the blood, what it accomplished in saving our souls, to be convinced in our own hearts what was done for us could not be done by anyone else. The Son of God had to do it. Oh, he did the will of God, and he did such a beautiful job, and it's something that thrills our souls when we think about it. The Apostle Paul was a man that wrote many, many of these letters that we have in the New Testament. This was a man that had a radical change in his life. I mean a radical change. And I think it makes a difference. When you are on course going in one direction and something happens, it causes you to reverse the course that you are on and go in an entirely different direction. That's what happens when you become a new creature in Christ Jesus. Every one of us in this room that is saved by the grace of God, we can say that. Man, I was on the broad road, wide open, going where I did not know, just going, not sure of anything, really. And he touched me, and he changed my life. He set me on a course that leads straight into heaven, straight into where God dwells. That's what he did. But he had to shed his blood. He had to die upon a cross to make that possible. This man's life was radically changed. I think to some measure every one of us in this room that are saved by the grace of God said, yes, and that was a radical change in my life, too. I think differently. I'm motivated differently from what I ever was before. I have new life in Christ. So when I read what the Apostle Paul has to say with all of the other writers of the New Testament, I'm inspired by what he had to say. It means a lot. It encourages us. It confirms that what we believe is real and is true, and it's been a blessing to us in our lives. I'm going to read just a few verses, statements that he made. This is in the Philippian epistle. He says, For me to live is Christ. Here's a man that was deeply devoted to his religion, the religion of the Jews. Here's a man that you could never say that he was lacking in zeal in carrying out what he perceived to be the mind and the will of God. Nothing half-hearted about what he did. God can use people like that. I've known some brothers and sisters in Christ that were heading in the wrong direction, and when God turned them around, let me tell you, they went for Christ just as hard or harder than they did for the world. They were an inspiration to us. They help us. Paul says, For me to live is Christ. To die is gain. He wasn't fearful of dying. In fact, as we read, it says, For I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my labor, yet what I shall choose I want not, for I am in a strait between two things, having a desire to depart, to be with Christ, which is far better. That's far better than what he was experiencing here in this life. He was thrilled that God had given him the opportunity to be an ambassador for Jesus Christ and living in this world that we live today. But to die was gain. It would get better, get better. I think someone reminded us just recently that a funeral for a believer is a time of rejoicing. It's a celebration. Someone that has found Christ and found true life in Christ has been elevated to that place where we long to be, and that is with Christ, our Savior, to behold Him, to look upon Him. To be a Christian is to be a privileged person. Would to God the whole world knew our Savior. This world that we live in today without Christ, they are on a collision course. Eternity looms for them as a place where they will experience. It will be the most dreadful experience they have ever experienced in their life. A shock! Man, what a shock! Please, sometimes I think about that, and some of the people that I know just can't seem to get it. I pray that the Spirit of God would just bring such conviction. But what a shock, I think, if I hear of them leaving this world before they get saved. Man, what a shock it's going to be. It's something to think about. It should motivate us to, with a little more zeal, more love, more grace and mercy in our hearts, go out and tell them about the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the difference. He's the difference. There's power in that blood He shed, and it wasn't shed in vain. Let's read from Colossians 3. I'd like to read the first 17 verses. "'If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth, fornication, uncleanliness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, covetousness which is idolatry. For which things sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience, into which ye also walked sometime when ye lived in them. But now ye also put off all these anger and wrath and malice and blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds. Ye put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him. Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free, but Christ is all and in all. Put on therefore as the elect of God, holy and beloved, vows of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering, forbearing one another and forgiving one another. Any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And above all these things, put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also ye are called in one body, and be ye thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. And let's just offer up again a word of prayer. Our Father in heaven, we are a privileged people. The lines have truly fallen unto us in pleasant places. Thank thee for this privilege of gathering together as a company of your own. We would pray with an open Bible and open hearts, the Spirit of God will be able to instruct us, lead and guide us into truth that will indeed help us to appreciate to a fuller measure the grace and the mercy of God to us. Thank you, Lord. We pray for all others less fortunate. Tonight we think of those millions that are still in the world without the Savior. We think of those that still live in spiritual darkness. O grant, we pray thee, Lord, that the Spirit of God will break through whatever it is that at this very moment stands between his convicting work and their willingness to submit to divine authority and to confess that as poor sinners they need a Savior and they trust our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. In his precious name we ask this. Amen. Well, it seems like Paul is presenting in a strong fashion how important it is for him to recognize that there is a oneness. There is a oneness that we experience in knowing the Lord. We are in Christ. We are in Christ. That is what God reckons us to be. In Christ. It is a blessed position and a place in which we are sheltered from the wrath and the judgment of God. That wrath and judgment will never fall upon us. And we reflect upon this. We started out this day in this room remembering that we are sheltered from the wrath and the judgment of God because of one that loved us so much that he took our place. He felt the awful sting of the wrath and the judgment of God upon his holy soul for the likes of us. Man, we are privileged. We are indeed people that should be praising and thanking God every breathing moment of every day. I am saved by the grace of God. I will never meet God in judgment and wrath. I have been risen with the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. There is no if about it. It's since. That's the way it starts. And once we do that, that change, that radical change that I was talking about, and that wonderful experience of the Apostle Paul in experiencing that change, he really got excited about it. He wanted you and me, he wanted every believer to have his experience. You know, sometimes people say, that man's a Christian or that woman's a Christian, but I can't detect much change in their life, their attitude. They don't seem to have any of that radiant joy you're talking about. They don't seem to get excited about the spiritual things. It's so sad when sometimes we gather together. We've had this to happen. Ruby and I, we talk about it. You know, it was hard to get anything started today when we were together with friends or our family. Just couldn't seem to focus on something that is eternal, something that is a true blessing to our soul. They just wanted to talk about anything and everything that's a part of this world. And you try. You put in a little thought here or something there trying to turn the conversation around and just keep dwelling on nothingness, things that are not really of too much value. We begin to seek those things which are above. You're motivated in that direction now. Before, I've heard people tell me I was really frightened by the thought of ever going to heaven. Well, I think they should have been because they didn't belong there. They wouldn't be happy there. They weren't saved. But once you're saved, you're a child of God, He prepared that place for you. It's a prepared place for a prepared people. The reason an unsaved person feels uncomfortable about their thoughts, he doesn't belong there. He wouldn't like it if he went there. But God is preparing our hearts even now. I'm having that experience. You're having that experience of delighting in heavenly things. It's already started. It's already started. May it grow and mature. You've heard the old saying, that person is so heavenly minded they're no earthly good. We need more of that. It's a joy to be in the presence of someone that they've always got something, a thought, something that generates in your own soul a fresh appreciation for what it means to be a child of God. Christians like that are a joy to be around. They're not worldly minded. You can tell that they have their hearts and souls fixed on things that are above. Christ sits on the right hand of God. He's there. He's not on a cross anymore. He's not hanging on a cross. I don't think I'd be comfortable in wearing that symbol that many wear around their necks, a cross, and the Savior hanging on that cross. He's a risen, glorified Savior. I don't object to it. I don't have any problem with it, but I don't want to wear that. I want to have all the evidence of being a new creature in Christ Jesus. And my Savior is a glorified Savior. He's sitting at the right hand of God, exalted to the place that He deserves. That's where I want to go. That's where you want to go. Sitting on the right hand of God, the place of authority, the place where God has prepared for Him because He, by right, has deserved to be right where He is. Setting your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. That's not easy. We live in a world that we're a part of this world in the sense that we have physical bodies, and we still have within the physical body, we have all the potential for enjoying the things of this world. Now, I'm not suggesting that you go around and you live in a fashion that you reject everything that's pleasant. Enjoy the things in this life. But don't let them become first. Don't let them become an obsession. It's sad to see a believer that becomes obsessed with something that is of this world. It has no eternal quality about it. It's going to perish. That's what it's going to do. And yet, I've known believers that they just seem to be obsessed, obsessed with this world and the things of this world. God have mercy. When we get to heaven and we look around and we think about, I've been holding out getting here. Man, if I'd have known it was this wonderful life. That's just pure speculation, brother and sister, but I don't think one of us is going to be disappointed when we get there. I think we're going to say, Hallelujah! Praise the Lord! Here I am, that place that I heard so much about. I read what Paul had to say about it. Here I am. Praise His holy name. I'm a dead man. Dead to the world. I was dead in trespasses and sins, but now I'm alive unto God through faith in that person, our Lord Jesus Christ. I have a life, eternal life, that's based in the person of the Lord Jesus. He's the only one that has that eternal life. Nothing else on the face of this earth, nothing that has ever been offered by one man to another man can give you eternal life but Jesus Christ, the Son of God. When He found us and we found Him, we found the source of eternal life. We don't have to go around feeling sad and morbid about this matter of dying physically. We have life in Him, eternal life. And it just rises above our expectations of experiencing eternal life, the life of God for all eternity. It helps raise us above all the things that sometimes can discourage down here. He is our life. You know, we've been in our Thursday morning Bible study looking at John 17, and I've heard mention of this verse so frequently. Our Lord said, My will is that those that you have given to Me, they may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory. Boy, that's a wonderful thought. That ought to thrill the heart and the soul of every believer. The Lord Jesus wants me to be with Him. He wants me there with Him. He's going to reveal His true glory. Not one of us could look upon His glory in these mortal bodies. I don't think we could take it in. Too much for us. The Apostle Paul was caught up into the third heaven. He heard things, but you didn't hear him say he'd seen anything. I don't think we are yet capable of looking upon the true glory of God. Or we can draw nigh to Him, and we can praise and worship Him for His holy character and all that is a part of Him, but to truly be able to look upon the glory of God, the displayed splendor of God. Man, when you think about that, everything that glitters down here on the face of this earth, it begins to just fade into insignificance. There's nothing here in this world that's comparable. Nothing in this world that's worthy to be compared with the glory of God. It's over and beyond anything in this life. That's what we're going to look upon because we're going to be with Him in glory. It takes some doing, though, on our part. We're not just turned loose, free spirits, and just kind of drifting along, picking up something here and something there. Word of God, and thank God for the Oana Program and what they do in seeking to get boys and girls to learn the Word of God, study the Word of God. It can be a rich experience to read this book, God's Word. And without the help, I think Mark mentioned this just a short while ago, you pile up all the commentaries and you read what this one said and what that one said, but there's nothing like reading the Word of God and you see something that the Spirit of God reveals to you. No commentary can rival that. That's a wonderful experience. Now I see. Now I see. And you know that you've had an encounter with God through His Word, and the Spirit of God revealed that to you. That's just one of the experiences that we can have every day of our lives, and we shouldn't deny ourselves that. There are things that we're to look upon and look upon and frown upon. It says, Therefore, don't let your members which are on the earth, fornication, uncleanliness, inordinate defection, Paul mentions them all, evil, concupiscences, consciousness which is idolatry. He said, after all, that's what the judgment of God is going to do when it falls upon poor sinners. It's because of their unconfessed sin and that no sacrifice was ever made for that sin and accepted that God would approve of. The children of wrath. We are those children that have obeyed the divine command and we have responded and we have accepted Him. The children of disobedience, those that would not listen, those that would not heed. That's why our hearts go out to the unsaved. Our Lord said, hanging upon that cross, Lord, they don't know what they're doing. They don't know what they're doing. Those people that hated Him, those people that crucified Him, they don't know what they're doing. No person really is truly thinking as a human being created by God and given life, doesn't know what he's doing when he rejects the grace and the mercy of God as revealed in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, because no one that ever lived upon the face of the earth has ever done for you what Jesus Christ did for you and me. No one. Your mother, your father, no matter who it is, no matter how much they loved you, they've never done for you what He did. So we begin to learn that there are things in this life that sometimes I don't want for us to become so confident that we're not going to fall into those things that we say, that's no threat to me. Oh, but it is. It is. Don't boast about, I have done that and I haven't done this. Only by the grace of God you haven't done it. And so often when we see someone that is in that condition of being under the power and control of Satan and he's abusing them and he's using them and he's ruining their lives down here and spoiling them for God, I think we should look and say, but by the grace of God, that'd be me. It could be me. God has so favored me and I'm not walking in that way anymore and I'm not so confident. My confidence is in Him. In Him. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. I don't have any confidence in the flesh. It's flesh. There's not one word of Scripture that makes any provision for improving the flesh. It's sick. It's sinful. It responds to things like we've just read. We know all about that. Some of us live that way. We have a living acquaintance with those experiences. Don't want it anymore. I'd rather die a right man and go with him than to ever go back and live that old way of life. Don't want those things anymore. Have a desire in your heart for something that's better. Something that God has provided. So all these things that Paul mentions just putting off all these things, putting on the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. We're new men, new women. The new man which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him. Wonderful to grow in grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Man, that knowledge we ought to go after. I want to know Him. I want to know Him. And you know the Spirit of God loves to teach us about Him. The Spirit of God just loves to thrill our souls with the person of Jesus Christ. You know Him. Oh, I know Him. He's my Savior. He's the one that loved me and died for me. Want to know something special about Him? Yes, tell me more. And you read the Word of God and He tells you more. He thrills your soul. You grow in grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus. You begin to mature and look upon things in a way that is for the glory of God. Aren't you thankful that you're reminded sometimes when you're reading a passage like this, thoughts are interjected. It's not limited to just one class of people. Suppose it said that the only people that this would apply to are those that are born in the United States of America. It's narrowed down. In Durham, North Carolina. They're the only people that this really applied to. Uh-uh. Oh, no. This applies to Greeks and Jews. You know, the Jew really didn't look upon that. That was something hard for a person that had been trained and schooled and had a heritage in Judaism. For the very thought of him being made one with someone that he considered to be a dog. That was a Gentile. Paul went through that experience. Remember? A man that was so religious, a man that was so devoted to doing the will of God in the framework of what he had learned from his early years. Oh, there's no Greek in this. There are Jews. Circumcision, uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond-free. Christ is all and in all. And Lord Jesus Christ paid it all. God laid on him the iniquity of us all. The whole sin of the world was laid on him. Nobody could ever say, Yes, but he didn't die for me on that cross. Oh, he did. Yes, he did. It's a sad commentary on life. But you won't accept what he's provided for you. Isn't that sad? And most of us that have ever had any encounter with God in praying for a loved one or someone we deeply cared for, we've shed tears. And we said, Oh, word to God, they could have their eyes opened that they could see and understand what you've done for them. Lord, they're in spiritual darkness. They're having a love affair with the world that they're living in. They need your Son. And we pray and we pray that God will deliver them out of that darkness, break the power of Satan over their lives, and let them enter into the joy of God's salvation. Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have a responsibility. Let's stay a little excited about this business of being in Christ. When we're talking to people, let them know that there's something special that we have that they need if they haven't trusted Christ. Oh, there's something special about it. You're in spiritual darkness. You don't see these things. You can't understand these things. But trust Him. Have spread abroad in your heart the love of God. Receive that assurance of all of your sins forgiven. Man, your soul will wake up and you'll be offering some praise and thanksgiving to God. And you'll want to share it with others. Forbearing one another, forgiving one another, quarrels, differences in life. The Lord Jesus Christ forgave them all. Sometimes baffles when people tell me, I can't forgive that. Oh, you can't? Oh, you can't? Or you won't? He forgave you of all of your sins. The Lord Jesus Christ didn't say, I can forgive you of everything, but not that. Not that. Oh, no. We're to forgive the same way He forgave. He forgave me of all of my sins. He made payment for all of my sins. And it cost Him. Beloved, it costs the Son of God something to pay the penalty for your sin and my sin. And we're forgiven. We're forgiven. We're not perfect, but we're forgiven. And we are those that are willing to forgive each other. I forgive you, brother. I forgive you, sister. How can you do that? He forgave me all of my sins. And I have to forgive. And that love of God that is spread abroad in our hearts, greatest of all gifts, we have it, the fruit of the Spirit, which is love and joy and peace. We've got it in our souls. Let it be released by the power of the Spirit of God. Let it be evident in our lives every day we live. Let's live in your life for the glory of God. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. You know, that's the experience we have at the Lord's Supper every Sunday morning. Before I come to the Lord's Supper, I tell you, I try to get right with God. It takes preparation. If you're going to really come and remember the Lord, check yourself out. Any known sins, sins of commission, sins of omission, get it right with Him. Say, Lord, I'm so vulnerable. There may be something I'm overlooking, but I'm confessing. I want to remember the Lord Jesus. I don't want anything to get in the way. I want the Spirit of God to have perfect freedom in my life. I don't want Him to worship and praise to Him this morning. That's what we do when we come here. This is wonderful. I'm saddened sometimes when believers, somebody in your own family, they can't get it. They can't understand it. They seem to be so limited as to their understanding of what it means to Him to have us come and remember Him. And oh, what we derive from coming here. It's a wonderful experience to be a true worshiper of God. We worship Him by the power of the Spirit of God according to the truth revealed in the Word. Oh, let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly and always in teaching and admonishing one another, psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord whatsoever you do in word or deed. Brother, that kind of makes us check up on what we're talking about, doesn't it? We'll be a little more careful about what I say. And I want my words to be something that injure, do harm. I want my words to speak of the truth that God has revealed in my own heart and soul in word or deed. And an evil mind is a terrible thing. I don't have to ask you this because I know we've all had it happen. Have you ever had an evil thought at some time when you wanted to put it to death? If you could pronounce death upon it at that very moment, if you could take a knife and cut it out of your mind, if you could do something and you just cry out to God, Oh, God, how did that thought ever get into my mind? I hate it! I reject it. I want the mind of Christ, that one that thought purely, that one that never had an evil thought in mind or heart. I don't want that. Sin in word or deed. Do all in the name of the Lord Jesus. Isn't it wonderful to call yourself a Christian? I'm a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. Who is He? He is the Son of God. God's only begotten Son. Came into the world. Loves poor sinners. He loved me. Loved you. Died for your sins upon the cross. Oh, with some enthusiasm. Humbly and grateful for the privilege of sharing that with someone else and telling them, You need the Lord Jesus. Trust Him. Trust Him. He loves you. I'll tell you one thing He does. He likes to hear us worship and praise His Heavenly Father. He loves to hear the child of God. I'm a worshiper of the true and the living God who has loved me and given to me salvation at such great price. Oh, what it costs the Father to give of His Son. He and He alone knowing the true cost that was involved in providing salvation for a lost humanity. We're children of God. We can just get excited about it if we want to and tell somebody else about it and say it's the best thing that will ever happen to you. You just get saved. Let the Spirit of God reign and rule and fill you and go out and be a witness for the Lord Jesus in this world today. The world needs Him. This world needs Him. Untold millions, they need our Lord Jesus Christ. Let's tell them about Him. Our Heavenly Father, we thank Thee again tonight for the time together. And we would pray that our hearts will be thrilled and inspired as we've read the Word, as we've thought about Paul, so many others that have gone before. This legacy they've left to us of what it means to live for Jesus Christ, the Son of God. To be a witness and an ambassador for Him in this world. Use all of these things to re-inspire us. And, Lord, keep our hearts ever turned toward Thee. Lead and guide us by Your Spirit in the truth You revealed, we ask in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.