Major Ian Thomas emphasizes the concept of 'The Divine Logic,' illustrating how Jesus, while fully God, lived as a perfect man to demonstrate what humanity should be. He explains that God's demands on man are logical from His perspective, as He empowers us to fulfill them through His presence within us. Thomas argues that true Christianity is not merely about being redeemed but about allowing Christ to live through us, restoring the intended relationship between God and man. He highlights that the essence of the Christian life is to let God be God in us, enabling us to express His character and purpose in our lives. Ultimately, the sermon calls believers to recognize the transformative power of Christ within them, which is essential for living a fulfilling Christian life.

The Divine Logic. Just by way of brief recapitulation, so that I may alert you to some, just a few of the things that we talked about this afternoon, and then we'll proceed from there. We began to look at the Lord Jesus, not in his deity, though that is beyond dispute, in co-equality with the Father and the Holy Spirit. But we looked at the Lord Jesus in his humanity, something which can be to us a source of immense encouragement and help. We discovered that no matter where you find the record in God's Word, in the Gospels of his life and ministry, folk were astonished at what he had to say. So we began to explore some of the astonishing doctrines of the Lord Jesus. We discovered that though he was never ever less than God, he came to this world deliberately for 33 years to behave as though he were never ever more than man. Never ever less than God, he behaved as though he were never ever more than man. As opposed to man, created by him, never ever more than man, who in his amazing conceit, struts across this planet and behaves as though he were never ever less than God. Setting aside the prerogatives that make God, God, he deliberately of his own free volition, for your sake and mine, walked this earth and subjected himself to the limitations that make man, man. The truth about God and the truth about man. And without it any length whatever explaining the proposition, the truth about God because he was the truth about man, as we saw some of us this afternoon, because the truth about man is that he as God created man to be the truth about God. Let us make man in our image and in the likeness of God made he him so that the reasonable minimum that God creator might reasonably expect of man his creature, was that all creation could look at man and know what God was like. He made man that way. And the Lord Jesus, for the first time since Adam fell into sin, was a real man. So that folk were astonished not because he was God, though God he was. Folk were astonished because he was man. Not man as they were, but man as he as God created man to be. The kind of man who in his humanity, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 375 days in the year, gave a valid, unsullied, unblemished expression of what God was like. Because he as God made man for that purpose. Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and in the likeness of God made he him. And when the Father God looked down from heaven, he could say of Jesus Christ, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Perfect man. And we saw in conclusion, that the characteristic of a man whom God can approve, is that that man is a man by whom God. For on the day of Pentecost, Peter made this fantastic discovery. He said, you men of Israel, hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God. A God approved man. By miracles and signs and wonders which God did by him. I see now, what it means to be a God approved man. A man whom God can approve is a man who will let God be God in the man in action. And now, Peter might well have added, I understand what the Lord Jesus meant when he said, The things that I do, you will do in greater works than these, because I am going, going back to be with my Father, so that if you will be as men to me, what I as man was prepared to be to my Father, then I as God will be to you, what my Father as God was prepared to be to me. Because it takes God to be a man. And that's why it takes Christ to be a Christian. Because Christ in the Christian, puts God back into the man. Come in. Are you still up? So late? Oh yes, I imagine the Lord Jesus said, I was waiting for you. Waiting for me? What do you mean waiting for me? You're a stranger to me. Oh yes, Nicodemus, I'm a stranger to you. But you're no stranger to me. I was expecting you, sit down. And I imagine that the conversation continued something like this, said Nicodemus to the Lord Jesus, you're quite extraordinary. Everything you say is extraordinary, and everything you do is as extraordinary as the things you say. You're quite exceptional. In fact, Nicodemus added, I'm convinced, I've come to the conclusion, that there is no possible explanation for anything that you do, anything that you say, or anything that you are, but God! There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. He was the third richest man in Jerusalem, reputedly so. He was the master in Israel, that is the senior theological professor at the local university. A good man. The same came to Jesus by night and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God. For no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. There's no explanation for the things that you do, there's no explanation for the things that you say, there's no explanation for the kind of man you are, said Nicodemus, but God! And I imagine the Lord Jesus in so many words said, you're right, Nicodemus. Absolutely right. I am quite exceptional. Matter of fact, Nicodemus, I am the exception. And you're absolutely right, Nicodemus, there is no possible explanation for what I do say or am, but God. Not, Nicodemus, because I am God. Though God, I am. But because I am man, Nicodemus. Not man as you are, Nicodemus. Not man as your fellow men. But man, Nicodemus, as I as God created man to be. And you're quite right, because I am man, as I as God created man to be, there's no explanation for what I do say or am, but God. Because I as God made man to be functional only by virtue of what God is in the man. And you're quite right, Nicodemus, I am exceptional because, for the very first time since Adam fell into sin and repudiated the relationship to God that lets God be God in a man, my father God can look down from heaven and in my person find a real man who's prepared to let God be God. And you see, Nicodemus, my father who dwells in me, to whom I have offered myself without spot through the eternal spirit and through whom my father has offered himself to me in totality. My father. He does the work. Everything I do, my father does. My hands are at his disposal. Everything I say, my father says. My lips are at his disposal. Everything I am, Nicodemus, my father is. For my humanity is available to him to give a valid expression of himself. For I, you see, Nicodemus, as man, let my father as God be in me the origin of his own image, the source of his own activity, the dynamic of his own demand and the cause of his own effects. So the secret of my life, Nicodemus, is my indwelling father. All I've got to do is be he at. Any questions, Nicodemus? Oh, by the way, Nicodemus, as my father sent me, so send I you. That's why, you see, Nicodemus, though never ever less than God, I had to come into this world to behave as though I were never ever more than man. Because if I'm to send you as my father sent me, I can't send you as God because you're not God. But I can send you as my father sent me as man. And you see, Nicodemus, when you're prepared to allow me to send you as my father sent me, I will then be to you as God what my father is to me as God. You see, the Lord Jesus came to demonstrate a very simple proposition. And I'd like to enunciate that proposition. And there's absolutely nothing complicated about it. But first, you might not completely grasp what I'm saying. Don't be confused about that. I'll repeat. And then I'll illustrate. And you'll see how totally obvious it all is. And that's the thrilling thing about the gospel, isn't it? You know, the thing that thrills me about the truth is that it's true. Forever. And you can return to it again and again and yet again, and it's always true. Here's the proposition. And it derives from some of the considerations that we have already brought before you. Here it is. Every demand that God makes upon a man is, from God's point of view, completely logical. That's the first part. Every demand that God makes upon a man is, from God's point of view, completely logical. Now, let's pause there for a moment and consider what it is that God demands of you and demands of me. Here it is in the Old Testament. Be ye holy. How holy? And God replies, even as I am holy. Here it is in the New Testament. Last verse of the fifth chapter of Matthew's gospel said the Lord Jesus, Be ye perfect. How perfect? Even as your Father in heaven is perfect. That's when you get sort of a little hot around the neck. That's when you're tempted to start arguing. And you say, God, how do you expect me to be as perfect as you are? You're God, I'm not God. You turn to the Lord Jesus and say, How do you expect me to be perfect? How do you expect me to be as perfect as the Father God in heaven? He's God, I'm not God. Well, you're absolutely right. You're not God and you never will be. But as God, you see, He created man to let God be God, all that God is, in a man. And to any man who's prepared to let God be God in the man, everything possible to God will become possible to the man. Every demand that God makes upon a man from God's point of view is completely logical. It's only from man's point of view, fallen man, that it's utterly unreasonable. Because you see, in the divine logic there's a hidden factor. A hidden factor that is absent in human reason. And it is that hidden factor present in the divine logic, absent in human reason, which represents the margin of difference between what is divinely logical and otherwise humanly unreasonable. And that hidden factor, in all its sublime simplicity, is God Himself. God Himself. And this is what the Bible is saying from cover to cover. Here are two categorical statements of fact. One you'll find in the 24th verse of the 5th chapter, the first of Paul's epistles to be set alone. 5, 24. Faithful, faithful is he, God, that calleth you, who God will also, what? Do it. Faithful is he that calleth you, who will also do it. There is absolutely nothing to which God, as God, called you as man, that He, as God, won't do in and through the man. So what would be illogical about any demand that God makes of man, which God Himself, in the man, is prepared to do? Faithful is he that calleth you, who will also do it. There is absolutely nothing to which God called you as a Christian, which He Himself is not prepared to accomplish. This is the argument, of course, that Paul used, you will remember, in the second chapter of his epistle to the Philippians. When he said, work out your own salvation, with fear and trembling, more in my absence than in my presence. To these new converts, the Apostle Paul is saying this, don't lean on me, I'm not your crutch. Work out your own salvation, not work for your salvation, that would be diametrically opposed to everything else the Apostle said. He said, having received as a free gift God's salvation, live it up. Because everything that God ever gave me, as Saul of Tarsus, when I was converted and became Paul the Apostle, God has given you, when you were converted. The same Lord Jesus Christ, who came by His Holy Spirit to invade my humanity, on the grounds of redemption, when in repentance toward God, I put my trust in Him as Redeemer, is the same Jesus Christ, who has come to invade your humanity, in the day that you too, in repentance toward God, put your trust in Him as Redeemer. Everything that God gave me, is everything that God gave you, and what God gave me and you, is Himself. So live it up. More in my absence than in my presence. Because while I'm hanging around, you'll be tending to ape my antics, you'll learn my phraseology, you'll be doing what I'm doing, you'll lean on me, you'll come to me, I'll be your conscience. So more in my absence than in my presence, discover how illimitably wealthy God has made you, by virtue of the fact that on the grounds of redemption, He put back into you what was lost in Adam's gasp. For He goes on to say in the next verse, do you remember? Philippians 2.13 For it is God, God Himself who works in you, both too willing to do of His good pleasure. Not the preacher, not the pastor, not your parents, not your counselor, not some creed, not some methodology, not some technique, not some procedure. It's God who works in you, both too willing to do of His good pleasure. Why don't you let Him loose? Why don't you allow God your Creator, having come to re-inhabit your humanity as creature, why don't you let Him be God? And demonstrate just how big He is. You see, the tragedy is that we're constantly being challenged to be man-sized for God. Mobilize your resources, mobilize your inherent ability, your native skills, your local talent. Be man-sized for God. God isn't interested, for a very good reason. You're too small. All that God is waiting for is the opportunity to be God-sized in a man. That's what He made you for. Every demand that God makes upon a man from God's point of view is completely logical. It's only from man's point of view and his fallen condition that it's utterly unreasonable. Because in the divine logic there is that hidden factor that acts as inhuman reason and that hidden factor is God Himself. Who is there to do in you everything He demands of you. Fantastic. This is the gospel. This is the gospel. This isn't the gospel plan. This isn't something, you know, optional for those who are particularly fanatically religious. This is the gospel. This is what it means to get converted. This is what it means on the grounds of redemption to enjoy your spiritual regeneration. This is what it means to be raised from the dead, to enjoy that spiritual resurrection that literally puts God as creator back into the man, His creature. That's why what God had in mind when He sent His Son to this world was not on the grounds of His redemptive work upon the cross to get men out of hell into heaven. That's incidental. It's gloriously true. Gloriously true. But the primary purpose of God in sending His Son incarnate for 33 years to live that sinless life so that He could accomplish that redemptive transaction upon the cross and you and I be reconciled to a holy God and have boldness of access through the blood of Jesus. The purpose was not that you and I as men might be got out of hell and into heaven. The supreme purpose of God in Christ was to get God out of heaven and raised into man. That's called being born again. Did you know that? Or did you think that redemption and new birth were one and the same thing? It's tragic just how many true believers imagine that to say I am redeemed is the same thing as saying I am born again. They're not the same thing. They're indivisible the one from the other. You can't be redeemed without inevitably and consequently at that moment being reborn. And you can't be reborn without the premise of redemption. That's true. But they're not one and the same thing. Redemption demanded the death of Christ for you. Regeneration demands the life of Christ in you. How can they be one and the same thing? The death of the Lord Jesus Christ for you. Redemption was designed to put the life of the Lord Jesus in you. Regeneration. So what is the redemptive act? The other is the regenerative purpose. And the regenerative purpose of God on the basis of the redemptive act is to get God in business again in man his creature. He made us that way. And if your Christian life till now since you were converted no matter how sincerely you have tried no matter how nobly you have been motivated in your endeavors to satisfy him if your Christian life quite frankly has been a pathetic flop it's probably because you never discover the difference between being redeemed and being regenerated. It's because you've learned how to become a Christian but you haven't yet learned how to be the Christian that you have become. You know Jesus the way but you don't yet know Jesus the life. You've got a historical Jesus who did something for you then and you've got an eschatological Jesus who is coming back one day. In other words you've got the Jesus that was and the Jesus that will be in the meantime you live in a spiritual vacuum sweating it out for God doing your best for Jesus until at last breathlessly you crawl into heaven on your hands and knees covered with dust and blisters waiting for the Lord to thump you on the back and say well done my good and faithful servant you made it. There are countless tens of thousands of genuinely born again men and women who live their Christian lives like that and some of you are among them. And not the least those of you who are the most dedicated those of you who are Sunday school teachers maybe you're a deacon maybe you're chairman of a building committee God knows what you may be. But you're the folk who dedicatedly, earnestly, sincerely sweat it out for God until you're baffled at your own impotence and sometimes in your heart you like you feel like crying out God there must be something more to the Christian life than this. And there is. Do you know what it is? Christ. Christ himself. Christ. Now here's the illustration and there's another to come I had absolutely no idea when I'm supposed to start but when Harper walked out I'll get the message. Here's the illustration supposing I were to ask you Why does an oil lamp need oil? Please don't make it complicated. Why does an oil lamp need oil? The simplest possible answer you can give would be this It was made that way. It was made that way. Supposing I were to ask you Why does a car need petrol to go? What would be the simplest possible answer to give? It was made that way. Why does a man need God? To behave like a man. For the same reason. He was made that way. Supposing you have an oil lamp without oil What would be the result? Well, you would still have an oil lamp but it wouldn't behave like one. For all the light you would get from it you could have a cabbage on the table. If you have a car and you detach it from petrol and some of you have tried that to your embarrassment because you discover you've still got a car on your hands but what you also discover is that it won't behave like one. What happens if you detach a man from God? Well, you've still got a man on your hands. He just won't behave like one. What's the best thing to do with an oil lamp without oil if you want light? Put oil in it. What's the best thing to do with a car without petrol if you want it to go? Put petrol in it. What's the best thing to do with a man without God if you want him to behave like a man? Because God intended man to behave. Put God in him. Now you know what the gospel is all about. That's why the Lord Jesus said, I'm come that you might have what? Heaven instead of hell? No. He said, I'm come that you might have exactly what dead men need. Life. I've come in the sinlessness of my humanity never ever less than God but for your sake behaving as though I were never ever more than man to accomplish that redemptive transaction that will allow my father God without doing violence to our righteousness to restore to man in the gift of God the Holy Ghost the life that was offered it in Adam when he believed the devil's lie that a man could be man without God. If I said to an oil lamp without oil, produce light. That would be utterly unreasonable. But if I said to an oil lamp full of oil, produce light. That would be completely logical. It was made that way. If I said to a car, go without petrol. That would be utterly unreasonable. But if I filled the tank with petrol and then said, go. That would be completely logical. It was made that way. If I would say to a man without God, be holy like God, be perfect like your father in heaven. That would be utterly, completely. But if God himself comes and that man is prepared to let God be God in the man becomes completely logical. This is the divine logic. This is the only thing that makes the Christian life a working proposition. Otherwise it's a rat race. The moment you detach your Christianity no matter how biblical, no matter how evangelical no matter how fundamental it may be the moment you detach your Christianity from Christ you've reduced it to a formula. An unworkable formula. You've reduced it to a procedure. A pattern of behavior to which you seek to conform in the hope that others will equate your conformity to that pattern with a relationship to Jesus Christ. Conformity to any pattern, no matter how noble no matter how sincerely conceived conformity to a pattern never, ever establishes a relationship to Jesus Christ. It simply establishes a relationship between you and the pattern. The church, it represents the past to impose it or the council or the parent. Relationship never derives from conformity to a pattern. The pattern must derive if it is to be legitimate from a relationship to Jesus Christ. And there is no substitute for that relationship. Because it is the Lord Jesus himself as God in you that makes the Christian life a working proposition because he is that life. I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life. The truth about the way, how to become a Christian and the truth about the life, how to be the Christian that you have become. Because it's only his life in you that gives you the power to be what his death for you has given you the right to become. That's the gospel. And unless you are reckoning with the life of the Lord Jesus in you which you no more deserve than his death for you as you are reckoning with his death for you you may have become a Christian but you'll never begin to be the Christian you've become. I don't mean you won't try. You will, but you'll fail. Because the old Adamic nature has no more capacity to live the Christian life after you're redeemed than before. What will happen to a man who in the energy of the flesh no matter how well-meaningly, no matter with what sincerity your dedication tries to live the Christian life before redemption? What will happen? He'll fail to live the Christian life. What will happen to the boy, girl, man or woman who being redeemed, already cleansed and reconciled to God still now tries to live the Christian life in the energy of the flesh? What will happen? Just what happened to the Galatians? He'll fail to live the Christian life. What's the only difference? Simply this. That the man who tries in the energy of the flesh to live the Christian life before redemption will fail to live the Christian life on the way to hell and the person who being redeemed and already reconciled to God tries to live the Christian life in the energy of the flesh will fail to live the Christian life on the way to heaven. Which are you trying? Which are you trying? There's only one person capable of living the Christian life. Christ. It's only the oil in the lamp that produces life. It's only the petrol in the car that enables it to go. It's only Christ, in the Christian, putting God into the man that makes the Christian life a working proposition. Deny that fact. Ignore it. And you're doomed to frustration. And everybody else who comes under your influence. By and large, unfortunately, you see, we either try to live the Christian life without Christ or we try to live the Christian life for Christ. Equally stupid. What would be the difference between an oil lamp trying to produce life without oil and an oil lamp trying to produce life for oil? What would be the difference? No difference at all. It would be equally stupid either way. The only reason why you put oil back into the oil lamp is that that's what it takes to be an oil lamp. Behaving like an oil lamp. You're right, Nicodemus. There's only one possible explanation for my life. What I do and say and am. God. Not because I am God. Though God I am. But because I'm man. Man as I as God created man to be. A man created by God. To be inhabited by God. To let God be God. Is that so much verbiage to you? I know that for many it isn't. Because I'm covering very elementary territory. And there must be many, many folks here tonight who say yes I understand exactly what you're saying and I know it's true in my experience. I know that apart from the Lord Jesus the whole Christian life is an utter impossibility. I tried it. But I thank God with all my heart for the day the moment of truth when I discovered that he gave himself for me only to give himself to me and now all that he is I have got. And life since then has been the hilarious adventure that God always intended it to be. But it may well be that we have younger Christians or those who have been older Christians for a long time but never discovered. How does it all work? Is it just playing on words? No it's the most glorious reality that you could ever know experientially on earth as man on the way to heaven. This is fulfillment. When I say that it takes Christ to be a Christian because Christ in the Christian puts God back into the man what does that mean? Maybe that's what you're asking. Well let's just do a little bit of research before we conclude tonight so that we can clear the decks in this all too brief period of time for further exploration tomorrow. Get back into the fifth chapter of the first of Paul's epistles to the Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians and chapter 5 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 two verses that summarize the whole issue first here they are and you ought to have these heavily underlined in your Bible they're marvellously meaningful 1 Thessalonians 5 verse 9 God has not appointed us to wrath judgment but he has appointed us to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. In other words God is unwilling that any should perish. He has absolutely no pleasure in the death of the sinner that dies. God has not appointed us to judgment he has appointed us to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ something that he's going to accomplish then just in case there should be any ambiguity in our minds or fuzziness as to what salvation involves he goes on to define it in the next verse God has not appointed us to judgment but he has appointed us to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us listen who died for us there whether we wake or whether we sleep and in the context you understand what he means by that whether we're physically alive or physically dead whether we're still in the body or already out of it whether we're still on earth in time or already in heaven in eternity whether it's now or then here or there he died for us that whether we wake or sleep we should live together with him that's salvation living together with him 24 hours a day not just 11 o'clock on Sunday morning and midweek prayer meeting half past seven Wednesday night or house to house visitation or that pious moment when you're witnessing to somebody no no that's only a procedure the Christian life is a flowing river it's living together with him out of your innermost being flowing rivers of living water this spake he of the Holy Ghost whom they that believe on him should receive by whose presence you and I are credited with the resurrection life of Jesus Christ so that 24 hours a day our humanity becomes as available to him as God on earth in us as men as for 24 hours in every day his humanity was available to his father as God on earth in him that is the Christian life living together with him that's why you can't take any off hours that's why there's not a moment of time in any day when you are not subject to that disposition that lets Jesus Christ as God be God in the man that's what the Lord Jesus meant when he said whosoever there be among you that forsake it not all that he hath he cannot be my disciple how much have you got left over which you have disposition the moment you've forsaken all that you've got nothing because you're going to live together with him therefore you make no one-sided unilateral decisions you live together with him for you will be indwelt by the Lord Jesus by the same Holy Spirit by whom he was indwelt by the Father for a very good reason that's exactly what it takes to be a man God now Paul's concern of course was that those who claimed redemption through the blood of Jesus and said they were converted would grasp this fact and would make themselves as redeemed sinners cleansed in the blood of Jesus once more available to the Lord Jesus for him to be as God in them what he was prepared as man to let the Father as God be in him he called it sanctification that's why in the 23rd verse of the same chapter he says the very God of peace sanctify you holy now don't be afraid of that word sanctification don't give it a pious musty connotation sanctification simply means that you're set apart for that intelligent purpose for which intelligently made that's sanctification it simply means that if God made man for a certain purpose you claiming redemption that is to say reconciliation to God so that you're once more at peace with God your maker your cheapest delight will be in the totality of your being to be available to him as God for the purpose which he he created you as man that's sanctification that's why you can't obviously know what it means to be sanctified until you understand the intelligent purpose which God made God made you nor can you obviously enjoy sanctification unless you know the intelligent way in which God having made you for that purpose intends to accomplish that purpose anything can be sanctified this watch is sanctified when I look at it and tell the time I've noticed one of you already sanctifying your watches you've been putting it to the intelligent use for which it was intelligently created tell you the time when I put my glasses on my nose and look through them I sanctify them that was the object of the exercise that's why they were made sometimes the exercise is a little deceptive to those who watch because they don't know that there's nothing in the top because I just don't happen to need what's in the top you see, because I only need the bottom half so they're only half sanctified I could of course stir my porridge with them it would be a very useful exercise but it wouldn't really be what was in the mind of the maker your humanity can be used to a thousand and one different uses none of which may be in themselves wrong but it doesn't mean you're sanctified because your humanity simply being used for harmless devices but no longer available to God will be a dead loss to Him just as if you were drunk or a drug addict so don't kid yourself when I put my shoes on my feet and walk down the road with my shoes on I sanctify them that's why they were made to put on my feet I could walk down the road with them on my head but you'd think I was a little peculiar you'd be right now Paul says this you folks in Thessalonica have claimed to be redeemed you've claimed to get back to God you've deliberately personally and intelligently opted out of a fallen unregenerate society and you've deliberately by your choice said I'm going to get back to God my maker he says fine if you intend to get back to God your maker remember He as God your maker will anticipate that He now as God will be able to use your humanity for the purpose which He made you and remember what He made you for to tell the truth about God not to tell lies about God He created man in His own emission in His own likeness so that by everything you do say and are you give a valid expression of God's character His mind His will His purpose becomes incarnate in terms of your flesh and blood and I'll tell you says Paul what it's going to involve he says it's going to involve your spirit your whole spirit verse 23 and conjunction your soul and conjunction your body and there's a conjunction of course between each because each is a separate entity not to be divided from but never to be confused with the others he said it's going to involve your whole spirit it's going to involve your soul and it's going to involve your body and when your spirit soul and body are all once more available to God your creator for the purpose which He as God made you His creature then you'll be thankful once more you'll be functional and notice the order of importance spirit soul and body because the most important part of you is that which is least recognized and by most folk not even exist within their knowledge the human spirit the next important part of you is the soul and the least but not unimportant part of you is your body very few people know they've got a human spirit there are some who have a vague idea they've got a soul though they couldn't define it everybody of course knows they've got a body because they gaze at it with admiration every morning in the mirror it's what gets hungry and needs to be fed it's what gets thirsty and needs to be watered it's the bit of you that gets tired and gets corns and toothache and you decorate it and dress it up and put hats on it and shoes on it roofs over it and wheels under it your body millions billions of man hours and dollars invested in servicing the body the least though not unimportant part of you is fearfully and wonderfully made a marvellous piece of engineering and there is nothing intrinsically sinful whatever about the human body or the soul or the spirit it was fearfully and wonderfully made by a master architect God himself there may be something very sinful about the way you use that body but there's nothing sinful in the body itself except in so far as it's abused misused and prostituted by a sin principle of satanic origin that has usurped God's place in human experience now the body you have in common with all forms of created life vegetable, animal and man and each individual species within the animal or vegetable kingdom or man has got its own peculiar shape whereby we can distinguish the one from the other you know the difference between a cabbage a cat and a king they have different bodies and you distinguish between each other because you have different bodies within the same species you're in the human group but you know each other by the different shapes of your body but there is something that distinguishes the animal kingdom from the vegetable kingdom and this comes as a big surprise to lots of true believers it's the fact that you've got a soul and every form of animal life is distinguished from the vegetable kingdom by the possession of a soul or heart as it's often described in the bible which is a behaviour mechanism and that behaviour mechanism is threefold in character mind with which you think on occasions emotions with which you react and a will that operates under the influence of your mind and your emotions to motivate the physical members of the body into action that's how you function that's how every form of animal life functions in varying degrees of sophistication it's how a dog functions if you doubt this may I suggest an experiment find a wasps nest get a stick and poke it then hang around for a bit and you'll discover that those wasps have a very highly developed emotional capacity you will discover also that with their very highly developed emotional capacity they have a very highly developed intellectual capacity to know who did it not only that but they will match their highly developed emotional capacity and intellectual capacity with a volitional capacity to wreak vengeance upon the culprit but you by then would be retreating in a hurry with three smarting reminders on the back of the neck that your experiment had been highly successful it's how you watch your dog behave who recognises you by your smell and shape and sound when you come home it waits for you it's been looking for you all day it's been confused lonely and because it recognises you with its mental recognition there's an emotional response it's glad to see you and so it springs and barks and jumps and wags its tail isn't that right how do you know it recognises you how do you know it's glad to see you by the way the body behaves that's why you look at the body when you see a dog I do if I'm visiting a home that I haven't visited before and there's a dog between me and the door I don't look at the door I look at the dog I want to know which end of its anatomy is going to get into action its tail or its teeth because that'll tell me what's going on in its mind and its emotions and its will which ultimately will precipitate the physical member of its body into action if it's one of those fluffy little things that comes and curls with one ear up and one ear down and you know a half grin and rubs itself up and down your leg you're encouraged but if I see a dog with its teeth bared and its ears down its tail between its legs and you know looking at me in a menacing kind of way I get the message it communicates through the body but the body is simply that communication that tells me what it's doing with its mind its emotion and its will now God has marvelously protected the animal thing for its preservation and its reproduction in a fantastic kind of a way for into each form of animal life apart from man God has built in a computerized behavior program we call it for convenience sake instinct and between that instinctive thrust and the animal soul there is a rigid interlock that it cannot break so it only has a limited area of freedom of action but it is kept within certain prescribed boundaries of behavior by God who made it it governs migratory paths of birds and fish and beasts it governs feeding habits it governs mating seasons it governs building skills did you ever see a spider go to school to learn how to spin instinctively with a rigid interlock because of the rigid interlock between the instinctive thrust and the animal soul it operates under the law of compulsion in other words there is no ultimate option its very existence and perpetuation of the species is dependent upon its absolute obedience to prescribed laws that have been built into it and this of course can be demonstrated in a thousand one different ways and as I travel around the world as it's my privilege to do nothing nothing fascinates me more than watch this process going up to the salmon hatcheries on the Columbia river of Oregon near Portland on the northwest pacific coast of the United States I was told how when those fish get a certain size they'll be placed in the water and they swim downstream through the great dam that has been created to generate electricity for a vast tract of country they'll come to the open ocean go up to the Alaskan coast and there they'll swim around in that open ocean for three and a half to four years and then they will return to the mouth of the Columbian river where they remain for three to six months double in size and then fight their way back against the stream until at last they come to the dam where the engineers have produced knowing the habits of the salmon a fish ladder 167 steps and you can lean over the iron rails and watch them one after another fight their way up step by step until almost exhausted they reach the top where there's a funnel shaped device with plate glass on either side and folk looking through counting them as they go up to the upper reaches beyond the dam to come finally not approximately but exactly to the place where the little fish they were placed in the water some four years before and there they spawn and die how do they get back signpost on the sea bottom navigational aid no instinct if you've been swimming around in the arctic ocean or the alaskan ocean for three and a half to four years would you find your way back to the columbia river a clump of trees in los altos northern california in the bay area which i have visited and where i'll be back in about three weeks time there is a certain species of butterfly you'll find it there every single summer without fail but they never ever reproduce in that area they reproduce an incredible distance away there they lay their eggs the eggs become a caterpillar the caterpillar becomes a chrysalis and the chrysalis finally becomes another butterfly and that new butterfly will then fly all the way back to that clump of trees in los altos well tell me this if you were a butterfly then an egg then a caterpillar then a chrysalis then another butterfly do you think you'd find your way back to los altos you can't even find your way around town and some of you how do they do it instinct you can watch off the coast of san diego the whales come down from the arctic regions to a bay off the mexican coast there every year they reproduce and then swim all those thousands of miles back fascinating things some of you i'm sure in this country have seen the beautiful film produced by the moody institute of science called the city of the bees and many of you probably keep them yourselves and know far more about it than i do but it's one of the most fascinating illustrations of the principles but there's only one bee that lays eggs that's the queen bee and it's sex is determined by the food it's given as an egg it's the same kind of egg as any other bee but it's given royal jelly and they produce six or seven so that they can fight it out so that the final victor is real tough you know a robust sort of buxom lady with muscles like elephants kneecaps because that's the queen bee that's going to keep the hive populated the only bee that lays eggs and they trim the population to the economic situation if there's no real material for the factory in the winter time they reduce down to as many as nine thousand by putting the queen bee on hard rations and she goes on strike and won't lay eggs but in the spring when the scout bees come back and tell the good news that the sun is shining the sky is blue and there's lots of raw material they begin to pump food into the old lady and she really goes to town does she lay eggs five, ten, fifteen twenty, thirty, forty fifty, sixty, seventy eighty thousand amazing and yet the egg will die if the temperature after a certain period varies by more than three degrees in Dessie, Ethiopia eight thousand five hundred feet above the equator I came down the morning and the water was frozen in the tap by ten in the morning it was eighty, ninety degrees in the shade suppose you knew there were bees there were bees up there and you had to keep the eggs without varying temperature by more than three degrees how would you go about it they do it very simply they have two squads of bees one on one side of the entrance the other on the other side of the entrance one face in the other face out and they flap their wings one blows air in one sucks air out that's air conditioning and in our conceit we imagine we thought of that bees have been doing it for thousands of years and when the temperature rises they really flap as fast as they can flap and they can't flap any flappier what are they going to do then bees go out and bring in water and by the latent heat of evaporation they undergird the air conditioning until finally towards the evening the temperature begins to drop and they slow down until none are flapping and the temperature is still dropping do you know what they do then put on the central heating message goes around the bee, hide to every inhabitant so they all eat a little honey and the sugar content increases their blood temperature and the central heating's up outside zero to a hundred zero to a hundred that's how you would draw the graph but inside never varying by more than three degrees and they don't even have a thermometer how do they do it very simple instinct and when the scout bees come back and dance magnificently to tell the worker bees exactly how far to fly how much to lay off the wind how much fuel to take to give them just enough energy to get there and back and the workers go out instinctively having begun with one species of plant they'll never go to another because your existence and mine depends upon cross pollination that's why they have to stick to the same species and once they've begun with one they stick to it instinct tells them they must who thought of all that gods the nurse bees that feed the eggs and those that are responsible for producing the honeycomb to a mathematical specification maximum cubic capacity to hold as much as possible maximum tensile strength because the load will be greater than its own mass and minimum material is used because wax is very expensive to the bees and that mathematical specification is part of every single generation that bees are ever born a German mathematician worked it out by pure science maximum cubic capacity maximum tensile strength minimum material is used and it came out exactly the shape of a honeycomb with the tiniest variation of degree and he thought that this proved the superiority of the German mathematical mind over the bees until an Englishman checked his mathematics and the bee was right this has since been said into a computer and the computer has come out 100% on the side of the bee who thought of that gods how often have you seen a bee with a textbook under its arm to learn how to build honeycombs it's only human beings have to go to school and college bees aren't that dumb they know exactly what to do they've got a computerized program instinctively built in magnificent say if god can produce fish and bees and insects and birds that with mathematical precision will do exactly what they're told don't you think god could have produced a man governed by instinct who by everything he did said or was would have given to all creation a completely valid mathematically accurate expression of god's character of course why didn't he because god is love and the only thing that satisfies love is to be loved the only thing that satisfies friendship is to be befriended and you cannot compel love and you cannot compel friendship love and friendship must stem from a pre-volition the exercise of an option that gives me the right to say yes or no and you see when a bee behaves that way that bee is functionally satisfying to god because god has created made that bee his creature that way to do that job but that bee being functionally satisfying is not morally satisfying by what it is doing that bee is not saying anything to god that bee isn't saying god I love you or god I hate you or god I couldn't care less the bee isn't looking into god's face and saying god you're my creator and you created me to be a bee and I want to be the kind of bee that you want me to be see is that what a bee says no because a bee isn't god conscious it is governed by a rigid interlock between an instinctive thrust built into it by god the creator and it's own bee souls it operates under the law of compulsion functionally satisfying yes but never morally satisfying god created you and me to be morally satisfying and that's why god made us differently and he gave to us a human spirit that he didn't give to any other form of created life that unique capacity that allows god as creator by the holy spirit god the holy spirit to live within the human spirit of man his creature that god the holy spirit from within the human spirit might have access to the human soul and play within the human soul that role that instinct plays in that of the animal teaching the mind controlling the emotions directing the will and governing behaviour for whoever controls mind whoever controls emotion controls will and whoever directs will governs behaviour given a man who makes his mind utterly available for god the holy spirit given a man who makes his emotions utterly available to god by the holy spirit you've got a man who under the influence of a god taught mind god controls emotions will have a god directed will and let god direct your will and god will govern your behaviour then all creation can look at you and know what god is like you're right Nicodemus I'm quite exceptional I'm the exception there is only one possible explanation for what I do and saying am god because though never less than god I've come into this world to behave as though I ever never more than man and I as god created man to be inhabited by god so that god by the holy spirit could inhabit the human soul teach the mind control the emotions direct the will and govern behaviour that's why you see Nicodemus I have offered myself to god without spot through the eternal spirit and that's why my father himself has given to me the holy spirit without measure and you see Nicodemus I allow my father as god by the holy spirit to teach my mind control my emotions direct my will and govern my behaviour and the words that I speak unto I speak not of myself my father that dwells in me he does the work I let him I let him because you see when I made man this way Nicodemus I created man with a moral option that could say yes or no not a rigid interlock between the instinctive thrust and the animal soul but a moral interlock between the holy spirit and the human soul a moral interlock that involves Nicodemus love for god reciprocating god's love for man dependence on god is not a moral for god and obedience to god as an expression of dependence on god so love for dependence on and obedience to god Nicodemus is the moral interlock that lets god as god be god in a man in action you're right Nicodemus since Adam fell into sin my father god looking down from heaven for the first time in my person has a man who is prepared to let god be god in the man make sense that's why he is has seen me has seen him that sent me and you see Nicodemus I came as man was the way I made him that man as man is might one day become man again as man was intended to be one last thing then we're through could you imagine what would happen in a bee swarm of 80,000 bees if suddenly a terrible disaster were to happen a calamity were to take place so that in one split second the rigid interlock between the instinctive thrust and the bees soul in every single one of the 80,000 in the swarm what a snap so that not one single bee of those 80,000 is now governed by instinct each has become ego bee centric and every single bee now is master of its own destiny to do as it pleases utterly ego centric so that all those responsible for air conditioning stop flapping they can flap for themselves standing here flapping all day they can do their own flapping and the nurse bees responsible for feeding the eggs suddenly stop feeding the eggs and they say little suckers they can go and get their own food here am I working my fingers to the bone just to feed their big stomach they can go and get their own food and the worker bees start marching up and down under red flags and say food for the workers not heard by none we are our own masters no more bosses down with the boss say what would happen to that bee swarm exactly what has already happened to human society it would perish in violence and anarchy that's why for this poor world there is no hope none no hope look in any direction you like anarchy and violence every time I get on a plane I am searched every time millions of people get on a plane today they are searched in our sophisticated intellectual age in a dirty permissive society that tolerates every kind of evil no boy, girl, man or woman anywhere in the world today can get on a commercial airliner without being searched why because we are living in an age of anarchical violence and this whole society is on the very threshold of destruction and you are part of it there would be only one possible solution to the dilemma of that bee swarm the restoration of the instinctive thrust by the renewal of the interlock between it and the animal soul and there is only one possible solution to the human dilemma the restoration of the moral interlock between the holy spirit restored to the human spirit on the grounds of redemption and the human soul so that once more God can be God again in a man that's what the gospel is all about that's why Jesus said you must be born again not just to get to heaven out of hell but to get God out of heaven into man now we'll pray we're grateful again Lord Jesus because as our creator God you came to this world to demonstrate for thirty three years true, genuine humanity man as you as God intended man to be forgive us for being the tragic distortions that we are look in mercy upon a poor chaotic anarchical perishing world grant that each one of us claiming cleansing through the blood you shed upon the cross and becoming though we never ever deserved it the recipients again of your resurrection last the holy spirit restored to our human spirit and spiritual regeneration may be willing once more as those reconcile to God to bring so that our hands may once more become his hands feet to walk within lips to speak within eyes to see within hearts to love so that these words may cease to be just so much language but the rich experience of our hearts to me to be alive to live is Christ I've been raised from the dead even while still in the body because the moral interlock between me and Jesus Christ has been restored that gives him now once more the right to be God in the man with all the blessing that that involves thank you dear lord in your own precious name amen may be that you've never been born again you're still dead you're still part of a perishing world you've never been redeemed I trust that before these days are ours you'll turn to Christ and humbly thank him for dying for you so that to cleanse them his blood they might be restored to you in the gift of God the Holy Spirit that life that was lost in Adam you don't have to wait for any invitation you don't have to wait for an after meeting or personal instruction even before I finish this sentence just where you're sitting you could know Christ as your savior all he's waiting for you is your response in faith that he might respond in faithfulness before you sleep tonight by your own bedside you could say Lord Jesus at last things are beginning to make sense the world in which I live as I look around it doesn't make sense it's chaos it's frightening it's dirty but this makes sense and I want to be clean I want to get back to where I belong thanks and before you sleep know that Christ is your redeemer and the king is back in his kingdom tomorrow afternoon and Monday night we shall pursue our exploration and discover if this is all gloriously true as indeed it is how fantastically wealthy you've become by virtue of the fact that the creator God is actually resident at this very moment in you as creature man the moment you know that what can frighten you so long as you're available to him in your availability to Christ you let all God loose in the world and he'll take the consequence and it'll be magnificent beyond your wildest dreams or expectations and the repercussions will be felt to the uttermost ends of the earth that's what makes it so exciting to preach Christ because the truth is always true and God delights to vindicate it in the lives of those who'll trust him