In this sermon, the preacher focuses on the importance of walking in the Spirit and not fulfilling the desires of the flesh. He references the book of Jeremiah and emphasizes that the word of the Lord is speaking to the listeners. The preacher highlights the battle between the flesh and the Spirit, using examples from the story of David and Bathsheba. He emphasizes the need for the love of God in one's heart and encourages the listeners to ask the Holy Spirit to fill them with love. The sermon concludes with a mention of the upcoming topic of guidance and the importance of being controlled and guided by the Spirit in every step of life.

And commencing to read at 14, verse 14, Galatians 5, 14, For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Now that's worth pondering over just for a second or two. The whole Ten Commandments is fulfilled in one word, love thy neighbor. And I think when you ponder this you can see that if you really love your neighbor, then the whole Ten Commandments fall into place. You see, if you go up the commandments backwards, the Tenth Commandment is thou shalt not covet anything that is thine own. And you see, if you truly love your neighbor, well you won't be coveting. You'll be glad when he gets a new car. And you'll be glad, and you'll be pleased, and you'll be delighted about everything that goes on in his family and in his home. Because love fulfills that. If you go to the Ninth Commandment, it is thou shalt not bear false witness, thou shalt not steal, is the eighth. And you know, you won't covet and you won't tell him lies, and you won't steal anything that belongs to him, if you really love him. You see how the whole Commandments, the law, is fulfilled in one word, in love. Thou shalt not kill, there will be no notion of killing, if you love. And you know, we have learned as we've gone through this book, that we cannot do this to our neighbor, unless the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost. We must get that bit settled first of all, because if you just try out of an old clown of nature to do this thing, well, you won't do it. Oh no, this is a fulfillment when God filled your heart with love, and we were learning the other evening that the fruit of the Spirit is love. Now I want you to follow this through. Verse 14 says, for all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. But if ye bite and devour one another, and take heed that ye be not consumed one of another. You know, sometimes when you're in conversation with someone, you can almost see them taking a bite out of another believer. Oh yes, it's done, you know. This is what the Bible calls backbiting. And sometimes you can almost hear the growl, when they dare to devour somebody. Not in touch with the Lord at all, you know, there's no love about this thing. And you know, if we start doing this to one another, you know what will happen? We will devour one another. Old Willie Gilmore, who was one of the great preachers among the brethren, and an old man that I had great respect and love for, and when he would come to this town, any time during the convention and all the rest, he'd always come in an hour or so with me, and I was delighted to see him, and he was a great blessing to me in many ways. And he told me that one morning he was going down to the morning meeting, and he met a brother, and he walked alongside him, and this brother started on another brother in the meeting, and he said, you know, for about 10 minutes of the walk, I tell you, he really devoured it. He said, I kept my mouth shut, I was going to worship the Lord, and I neither rebuked him or entered into anything with him, I just walked on, kept my eyes and ears sort of closed. Then he says, when the meeting was over, I was coming back with the brother that he, the old fellow, had been talking about, and we didn't start the trip right till he was talking about the other fellow who was talking about him in the morning, and as he got really going, and nearly devoured him, and said terrible things about him, he says, do you know he's like that? He says, well, he was telling me that you were like that this morning, you were just saying the same thing that you were saying now, and then he says, I opened the book and let them see that they were really devouring one another. Now, you can see this, can't you? You know, when you bite your brother or your sister in this sort of talk, you know what you're doing, you're just like a wolf that enters in among the flock, and you remember that Paul talked about, after my departure shall grievous wolves enter in among you, and remember when you begin to devour a brother or sister, remember you're just doing the devil's work, because your adversary the devil goes about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Now, this is what Paul is saying here, he's saying this, in verse 14 he's saying, you see what can be done, if the spirit has his way in us, and love is filling and flooding our souls, then the whole of the Ten Commandments can be fulfilled in this one word, love. And so you see what can be done, and then he's going on to say, you see what could be done, you could devour one another, you know, and that brings him to where we're getting to tonight, what should be done. So after he has pointed out what love can do, and pointed out what flesh can do, then in verse 16 he says, this I say then, walk in the spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. But that's what we're taking up this evening, and we want to do it as carefully as we possibly can. I believe that we're dealing with something that can become a mighty blessing in your own life. Walk in the spirit and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. Now there are one or two translations covering this very verse, and I would like you to hear one or two of them. One of the translations says, this is what I have to say, let your steps be guided by the spirit, and then you will never gratify the cravings of your earthly nature. He says, I mean, I mean this, lead the life of the spirit, then you will never satisfy the passions of the flesh. Then there's another one, here is my advice, live your whole life by the spirit's power, and you will not satisfy the desires of your lower nature. But there's an old translation that comes from Dr. Rarey, who was Adonis for many years, as he was with Shepherd there for many years, and he just translated like this, this I say, walk by the spirit, and your old flesh won't have a chance. And I think that's a great translation. So we're going to look at this, walking by the spirit this evening, and I want you to notice there are four things that we want to sort of bring before the meeting just now. First of all this is the phrase that has to be pondered, walk by the spirit, what do we mean, what are we getting about, let's get down to it. It's a phrase to be pondered. And then when we talk about walk, you know that's the principle, and it's the principle to be employed, and we're not talking about physical walk, it's taking a metaphorical thing. And then there is not only a phrase to be pondered, and the principle to be employed, there's a promise to be enjoyed, there is a promise here, walk by the spirit, and ye shall not fulfill. That is God's word, and that's an inspired word from Paul. And then there's a power here to be broken, the lust of the flesh, and so you can see the four things. Now when we look at this first one this evening, let's look at this phrase, walk by the spirit. Now when we begin to think about walking by the spirit's power, and I mean taking step by step, and every step is ordered and controlled and energized by the spirit's power, you know it becomes walking by faith. You remember Paul said to the Corinthians, we walk by faith, not by sight. Now I want to bring that in because of this, you know as I go around the meetings, and I listen to young believers, and old believers, and all kinds of believers, I hear a lot of people talking about by faith so much. You know what the great Hebrew chapter 11, it's by faith, by faith, by faith, the whole way down. You remember when we were expounding this, that I said that this chapter began with an exposition of faith. Faith is the evidence of things, not faith. And then all the great exponents of faith are there, and then all the great exploits of faith are there, and then all the great experiences of faith are there, and then the excellency of faith is there, because Moses seems to get onto the top run, and by faith he endured of seeing him who is invisible, and that must be excellent to walk all the time like that. But you see I hear young people talking about by faith. Just yesterday, a young person said to me, you know if I could only get the guts by faith, I could do the thing that God wants me to do. And I pulled him up and said, now what do you mean by that? He says, you know if I could only get faith working some way, that I could get the guts, or the grace, or the strength. And you know the way he talked to me, I could see it's a thing that I discovered a long time ago in a lot of believers. You see they talk about by faith, by faith, by faith, by faith, until they almost have faith as an invisible idol. And it's faith that they can up with. Please if we're going to talk about by faith, let's talk about by faith in God. I don't think you need to talk about by faith. If you look up this mighty chapter, this is what Paul's getting out of, it's faith in God you know all the time. And I want to get you the hold of this. I was talking to a girl today, I don't think anybody will ever know, so I can go on with this. She came from afar, and her uncle brought her in the car, and she was nearly out of her mind, and they've been having a lot of trouble with her, and going to take her to a mental home and all. And he says before we take her, will you have a talk with her? And so she came to talk with me, and I got to talk to her in a way that maybe nobody ever had. And when I got her confidence, and knew that she was at ease, and we were talking things over reasonably well, I said you know dear, there's something away in the back of her mind that is not bothering you. She said yes there is. I said it's some sort of sin isn't it? She says yes it is. I says well we don't need to name it or anything like that you know, that's your bother isn't it? She says yes it's something I committed about 30 years ago. You see it's an old story isn't it? Well I have seen this a thousand times, and she's committed this sin, and it haunts her. Yea the devil haunts her with it, and she's tormented of the devil. Yea when our lord was here he went about healing all who were oppressed of the devil, and here it is, and there it is, and at last he drops it out. And I thought I knew what it was anyway, but it doesn't matter. And you know, you know god will never forgive me. I said you're a believer, yes, and you believe that Jesus died for you, yes, and you believe that he was wounded for your transgressions. Yes I do, actually you don't you know. I says dear your trouble is not what you're trying to tell me, or what you even think it is, your trouble is that you don't believe God's word. That's your trouble, and all the tablets they gave you down at the doctor's will no help you. You see she's trying to make herself believe that she believes that he was wounded for her transgressions, but what she's actually believing that he was wounded for all her transgressions, but this one. No that one wasn't dealt with. I says look dear, if he dealt with all your transgressions, but this one on the cross, you're damned, you can go home, you're finished. He's not coming back to die again you know. And I began to loosen her up, and weaken her up, until her shackles fell off. Let's talk about faith in God would you. Don't be talking about faith up on the fireboard or something like that. We need to talk about faith in God, and faith in God's word. You see real faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. And when I brought her to the place where she could see if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. She was coming to the place where she believed what God was saying to her. Now let's go a little bit further with it. Let's talk about faith in God, and faith in God's word, and faith in God's Son, and now we're at faith in God's Spirit. Let's get that bit in, where the Holy Ghost is going to control our every step. That's what you call walking by the Spirit. That's where we need to get to. And I want to get down to this thing, I want to get down to walking by the Spirit. You see how this all works out, don't you? You see when we talk about walking by the Spirit, it becomes walking by faith in the Spirit. And you know when your every step is being controlled, and when I say your every step, we'll come to this walking in a moment, when I say every step I mean every step in the home, everything that's happening in the home, and everything that's happening in the business, and everything that's happening in the state, and everything that's happening in the church. That your every step, your every movement, is being controlled by the Spirit of God, and your faith is in the Spirit of God. This is what we're talking about. You know, you begin to walk in newness of life, don't you? And you begin to walk in love, and it's only then you begin to walk worthy, and it's then that you walk circumspectly. You know, I've got a little grandson, and he's just a year old the other day, and he's a great little character, and he's just beginning to walk, and I watch him, and he doesn't know that I'm learning, and I can see him, you know, he's not just the best at it yet, he staggers about a little bit, but he has to find the balance. You can almost see his toes squeezing out till he gets the balance, and he stands, and he's all pleased with himself, and then he gets the power to lift this leg and put it out, you know. I have some more babies I've got, and he can get the other one a bit, and then he doesn't go too far, he just rocks about a bit, you know. You're learning to walk. And when we're going to walk by the power of the Spirit, you know, it's like a tightwire rope, because all the time you have to be depending on the Spirit's power, and all the time you have to be loving your brethren, and all the time you have to be walking circumspectly, you have to be taking great care, and there are so many things you do at once, and you're on a tightwire rope, and you'll fall off now and again. Yes. Now, I want you to get the hold of this, you see. We're talking now about this metaphor of the truth, you see. You see, you're not, we're not speaking physically now, you know that. We're speaking metaphorically. Paul is taking a very ordinary thing, just our ordinary walk, and metaphorically he's speaking about an extraordinary thing, that every step is being controlled, and guided, and governed, and energized, and strengthened. By the Spirit of God. And you know, you need to go very slow about this to keep it going all the time. It's walking by the Spirit, but we'll see. You know, I find this out, and this is how you know a thing or two, I find out that if you're walking by the Spirit, if your life is being controlled, and you're being energized, and moved, you sort of get along to the prayer meeting. Now, there's some of you going to find out you're not walking in the Spirit at all. Oh, you're Baptist, all right, I know. And you're very good members, and all that sort of thing. And you're nice to know. But you're never at the prayer meeting. Never. You go to the prayer meeting. Would you like to tell me the Holy Ghost is ordering your life, and you never go to the prayer meeting? I wouldn't believe you did. You couldn't get that over in me, you know, I wouldn't believe that for a moment. If I'll tell you this, you know, he'll take you to the house of prayer. And I'll tell you this, he'll take you to the banqueting house. There's this food prepared now. Where are you from, truth be told? Macon, Maumee, is that what you're at? Oh, I'm afraid you should be coming for your food. I'll tell you this, you'll find out that we're going to learn a lot of things about what walking in the Spirit really means, you know. It's not just a nice phrase to coddle on with. Oh no, there's a lot of things. You know, let's do this little bit. He says, we're back at verse 16, which I say then, walk. Have your whole life ordered and controlled by the power of the Spirit. And ye shall not fulfill. You know, Paul was very sure of this. This is an inspired saying. This is God's promise, ye shall not fulfill. This is the promise of victory. And it's the promise of victory over the works of the flesh. Now, I'm going to say a few things and I'm sure I shall disturb somebody, but then I can't help that, you see. Now, let's go down to verse 19 for a moment. Now, the works, I want you to get the works, because the S is there. The works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness. Now, I think you know these words all right, don't you? You know what adultery is, and I think you know what fornication is. Some little fellow in the meeting asked me some weeks ago, what's fornication about? I said, it's sexual sin of an unusual nature, and don't ask me all about it. Because there's a whole lot of sexual sins that are terrible things, and if I told you about them now, I'd scare the life out of this meeting. There are things that are being practiced in sex, that some of you dear old saints never knew about, you would hardly believe. And you can bless God for your ignorance. Just go home and thank God you're ignorant. The commander of the police brings down a statement one morning, he said, look, have a look at that, that fellow's confessed that there. I said, I don't believe a word of it, he's making a fool of me. Where were you brought up, I said? I said, that fellow's telling you the truth, that's what they're practicing in this town. My God, they're not doing that, are they not? Oh, I would frighten you, you know. I would frighten you. These are works of the flesh. You see, Mr. Mason, who is the Secretary of State of this province of ours, he's the Queen's representative, I saw him on the TV last night, hammering the table, and he's going to bring in a bill for abortion, so that they can have abortion in this country of ours without anybody saying anything about it. My dear friends, this is iniquity of the deepest dark. This is uncleanness and lasciviousness, all right. Let me turn you over to the book of Jeremiah for a moment, too. And we're at Jeremiah, and we're at the first chapter. Now, the other week in Lisbon, I preached on this here. I want you to get the hold of this very carefully now. Jeremiah chapter 1. And just to save time, down at verse 4. Then the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Now the Lord is speaking to you. This is what he said to him. Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee. Now, I know I've got to be blunt about the thing, but I have to be, I'm going to be God's servant, and I'm going to help the young ones. Let me turn you over to the book of Jeremiah for a moment, too. And we're at Jeremiah, and we're at the first chapter. Now, the other week in Lisbon, I preached on this here. I want you to get the hold of this very carefully now. Jeremiah chapter 1. And just to save time, down at verse 4. Then the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Now the Lord is speaking to you. This is what he said to him. Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee. Now, I know I've got to be blunt about the thing, but I have to be, I'm going to be God's servant, and I'm going to help the young ones. You know, before Jeremiah was conceived at all, before God formed him in the belly. Now, I want to know who's forming the baby. You know the answer? So that this tiny little seed in this mother's womb, this tiny little seed is being formed by God. Before I formed thee, this baby is being formed, and everything about it. I want to say this, if you put your hand to it to destroy it, you're a murderer. Oh, you know, they talk about so many things. Some fellow from Queens, a professor, says, You know, there's a whole lot of problems here, you know. Oh yes, there is. A whole lot of problems. Women with big families. It's a very good job they didn't destroy number 17 in our family, because I wouldn't be here tonight. I happen to be number 17. It's a very good job they didn't destroy number 16 in John Wesley's family, for John Wesley was number 16. God knows who they have destroyed, and yet our Queen's representative, he thinks he's the whole chief. He's got to bring this corruption into our country. Yes. I'll tell you that this is, this is the works of the flesh. We need to stand up against it, you know. Let's go back to this where we were. We're at chapter 6. We're at Galatians 6. And I don't want to deal with all this, but I just want to get you just to see the thing. Verse 19, Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft. And you know, this is in all kinds of forms. You know, the young girls, some of them in our meeting, you know, they couldn't lift the paper and have it open unless they were at the horoscope and see what their star was, and what is under their star this day. You know, some years ago, it must be 10 years ago, she's here now, but she's, she's a far bigger woman now than she was. Don't look around for anything. She said to me, she was just a young woman, she said, Pastor, oh Pastor, you want to see my horoscope today? I said, what was it? She says, anybody born on this day is going to marry a man with black hair and tons of money, and be happy ever after. I said, you see that feeling that's in your breast just now? There's a word for that. She says, what is it? I says, dark. It's as if you would only sit down and have a bit of sense. Look, if you would sit down and have a bit of sense, there must be a million people in this world was born on this day, some of them are Chinese, bless them, some of them are colored negros, some of them are this and that. There must be, there must be a million, maybe two million. Are they all going to get black haired men with money? It's a funny world, isn't it? Now, she told me the other day, she says, since you really tackled me, I never looked at one of those silly old things since. Well, thank God for that. She's far better looking without it. My dear, you'll get a man without that keeper. Oh no, let's get away from all that sort of thing. Let's get away from that. But you see, this goes on. Verse 20, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, sedition, pharisees, envies, murders, drunkenness. Oh, I think we need to stop there, you know. When you think that some people out of some of the assembly meetings come now to argue about social drinking. That's social drinking, my foot. It's drink, isn't it? It's setting strong drink before your neighbor, isn't it? And cursed is he that setteth strong drink before his neighbor. And when Nadab and Abishu went drunk into the temple of the Lord, the Lord blotted them out like that. Oh, don't let's cod with this shit. This belongs to the flesh, in case some of the elders of your assembly didn't tell you. This is flesh. You don't tell me that the Spirit of God will lead you into a public bar to drink spirits that will take your senses away. You're not trying to tell me that. My God, some of us in this place would be glad to get rid of it. Don't let's cod about with that. You see this, don't you? You know the Spirit will direct your life but not into the house of the devil which is witchcraft, and not into the den of bloodshed which is murder, and not into the public house which is drunkenness. You see, this is what I want to get over to you. You know, if we can have faith in the Spirit of God who indwells us, and by faith we walk controlled by the Spirit's power continually, then the promise is yours, ye shall not fulfill. This is the way of victory. This is the way that you'll glorify God. This is walking really in newness of life. But there's a little bit more there, isn't there? This I say then, walk in the Spirit and ye shall not fulfill. Let's get this lost of the flesh. You know, there's a battle goes on a way down deep in here. This is what we were talking about in Romans 7. There's something in there that was. David knew about this battle, and he was wounded in the battle, wasn't he? In the case of Bathsheba, wasn't Achan wounded in the battle? Oh, it wasn't the woman he was after, it was silver and gold. And there's a lot of God's people get wounded about this silver and gold. The prodigal, it's the far country that gets him. Demas, it's the world. Yes, it's all the lust of the flesh. The old flesh wants these things. Oh friend, can we get the hold of this or can this get the hold of us this night? Let's go over it again. You know, love is fulfilling the whole 10 commandments. You'll not covet anything, you'll not tell lies, you'll not steal from your neighbor, you won't touch them. Friend, you'll need the love of God in your heart. And only by the Spirit of God can you have the love of God shed abroad in your heart. And by faith, you can ask the Holy Ghost to constantly be filling you with love. Then there'll be, there'll be no biting or devouring. And to control, to energize, yet to guide your every step. Now that's where we're putting the full stop this evening. Because that's where I want to go on next week, because we're going to talk about guidance. Just what it exactly means. You see, we have to cut it short sometimes just to get the truth right for the next to come.