In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of obedience and timing in the work of God. He compares the precision of science in modern times to the flexibility of God's timing. The speaker encourages believers to be filled with the Spirit and move in unity as the body of Christ. He also highlights the conflict between the old Adam and the desire to do what is right. Ultimately, the sermon emphasizes the need for obedience and discernment in following God's timing and will.

Nevertheless, Paul has introduced a couple of principles, a couple of laws that are functioning there because of the old Adam, and he describes the conflict that goes on between the two men in himself, where I want to do what's right and I can't, I try and I fail, oh wretched man that I am, and he goes on, I think 27, 28 times, my troubles, I, I, I, we, that which I would, I do not, the things that I hate, that I do, I find the law that says this is right and I want to follow that law, but I, oh woe is me, you know, and Romans 7 doesn't end up in total pessimism, however, it says, thanks be unto God, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Then coming into Romans 8, he starts to talk about the new life in Christ Jesus. I studied the book of Romans, memorized the book one time, I've taken Bible studies on it, and invariably I'd come up to Romans 8 and something would happen, either I had to go somewhere or something would come to pass, but I couldn't seem to get very far in Romans 8, and I think maybe that was in God's intention, but in the last year or two I found myself ministering from Romans 8 a lot, because I believe that God seemed to speak to me, oh a year or two ago, I have brought my people faithfully through Romans 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, and they're still struggling in Romans 7, but will I not bring them into the fullness of liberty of Romans 8? I like to recognize God's sovereignty in all the beautiful works of his hands, without getting controversial about it or without getting doctrinal about it, because I cannot reconcile in my thinking the beautiful doctrines of election and predestination with the doctrines of man's responsibilities. I can't reconcile it in my thinking. That used to bother me, and I tried to reconcile it, and I gave up. I decided I can't reconcile it, but I know they're both right. A month ago a scientist visited us, a Christian friend of ours from New Mexico, and somehow he just felt the need to mention this, and he talked about how coming into the 20th century there was a tremendous advance in science, because until then the laws of Newton he named another scientist, the laws of gravity, and this other scientist seemed to have things pretty well put together for the scientific world, but coming into the 20th century there was this explosion of knowledge that left science, well, what they knew in the past was only partially true. Anyway, he mentioned this, that once science had, he said, been able to analyze the electrons of the atom and determine it as a particle, that you could search out, you could say where it was, you could describe it and all that, and that became more or less established in the scientific world until another scientist came along and proved that the electron was a wave, something in motion, but you couldn't discover that if you're discovering and analyzing the particle, and when he discovered this electron, I might have the wrong words for some of these things, he discovered as a wave, he couldn't relate it at all to the fact it was a particle. Each one in their own category could be analyzed, but there was no way of crossing over from the one to the other. Well, I just thought that's a tremendous illustration of the wisdom of God, because God does tell us, Paul the Apostle tells us, that the invisible things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made. So even in the things that are made, God has revealed his own wisdom and knowledge, so much so that he says all mankind is without excuse, and we do not believe that God created all things out of nothing, because the Bible says we understand by faith that the things that are seen were made out of things that are not seen. So somehow God in his wisdom, there were things in his own heart that he had in mind, things that existed in God, from which he brought forth all things. He didn't make them out of nothing. Therefore, Paul says those invisible things in God from the beginning of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things he has made. And so there is a wonderful truth in the fact that God is a sovereign God, and he's going to do what he's planned, and he'll finish the work in no manner the devil's going to prevent it. It's also true that God wants to use man to work in cooperation with him, and he wants the people who will learn obedience unto him. And when he works in that area, when the time comes for God to do this thing that he sovereignly plans, when the time comes, he requires responsibility from his creature to obey and to walk in obedience. And perhaps the burden of scripture emphasizes that aspect of our responsibility towards God more than he does God's sovereign election. The fact remains God has purpose and plan, and nothing is going to prevent him from doing what he said, to give us great hope and confidence. And yet, there's enough said and plenty said to warn us that if we do not move responsibly before God when he begins to work and when he calls upon us for obedience, that we can fail to enter in to what God has determined. But it doesn't abrogate his plan or purpose. It might delay it. It might delay it for many years, centuries. But it's in God's mind, it's in God's heart, and it will come forth in fullness of time. Like we've been emphasizing, the word is put in the earth and God will not receive it back until it accomplishes the purpose for which he sent that word into the earth. God said through Moses, you shall be unto me a chosen, a holy nation, a chosen generation, a kingdom of priests. God said that to Israel. They didn't enter into it. They failed God. They didn't enter into it. So God established a priesthood separate from the rest of the people. Not to establish a hierarchy on the earth forever, but because his people failed, he chose a certain people to be that priesthood in the Old Testament. But the promise was there. It is in the earth. It comes forth again hundreds of years later. And Peter writing to the saints says, you're a chosen generation, a holy nation, a royal priesthood that you should show forth the praises of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. He brings it forth and God begins to establish a priesthood and a new covenant because of the death and resurrection of Christ, making us all to be kings and priests unto God. But how many are resting on these sovereign declarations of God without being stirred to press into what God has declared? So almost like in the Old Testament, we're discovering that there are many who boast, oh, I'm a priest. The Bible says we're all priests unto God with no thought of partaking of priestly ministry, priestly anointing, priestly cleansing, or wearing priestly garments. Nevertheless, there is a people who are fulfilling God's intention. And he's raising up a holy priesthood in the earth, clothed upon with holy garments, with the holy miter upon their head, with the breastplate of righteousness, with the girdle of true shoes on our feet like the priests in the Old Testament had sandals so we are to have these shoes. God's priests in the New Testament are also warriors. Let's not forget God's warriors are priestly warriors. They overcome through righteousness. They overcome through peace. They overcome through the Word of God. We see them in the book of Revelation. They overcame by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. But what I'm saying is that though this Romans 8 has been in the Bible from the beginning, and there has been a certain emphasis of it throughout church history, and a certain manifestation of it in the church throughout church history, we have not as a body entered into the fullness of Romans 8. I believe God is going to lead a people into the fullness of Romans 8 just as he has led us all through the other seven chapters. A people who are going to walk in the Spirit. Therefore, there is no condemnation to them which are in Christ. Jesus Paul says in Romans 8, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. Free from the law of sin and death. That's our heritage. In the law of the Spirit. And I know I've read that, memorized it, meditated much upon it. And I know, and I'm satisfied in my mind that I've now seen the depths of the working of this law in my life or in the church that I know is there. I know that there's a functioning of that law beyond anything we have seen in this generation, in my life, as far as I know in the history of the church. But there is nevertheless that law that's there. And we know it's there. And we know that God will cause it to be activated in a people who go all the way with him. Science awaits. I mean, they come up with things that they know are there, but they can't discover it, and they can't make it work. When I went to school, they talked about landing on the moon. They had pictures in a paper that I remember cutting out in a science thing that we had to come up with. And pictures of a man walking on the moon, how he could carry several hundred pounds on his back without hurting him because of the weightlessness that's up there and the difficulties they would have there with the heat. When I was going to school, 50 years ago, and here I lived to see a man walk on the moon, I mean on TV. And that was, what, I forget what it was, 20 years ago, more than that, 25 years ago, 1970 wasn't it? Or 69. And here in the space of 30, 40 years, what seemed far out, and I remember one of our teachers saying, you know, how far out it was, but just talking about the possibility of man had the power to get out of this area of gravity we're in. It'd be possible for him to go to the moon, but they had no thought of how they'd bring him back. And here in 30, 40 years, they do it. And we marvel at the acceleration of science. But of course, the old church, it just trudges along, the same pace that's always been going for hundreds of years. Don't expect anything great in the church, you know. Let science do mighty things day after day, year after year, but don't expect new things from God. God's always doing new things. There's things in God yet to be revealed that we know nothing about, that we haven't dreamt about, haven't even conceived of it in our minds, yet hidden in the heart of God to be revealed. For I have not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man the things that God has prepared for them that love him, but unto us God has revealed them by his Spirit. Doesn't say he's manifested them, caused them to come into existence. He's revealed it by his Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God. That's why God gave us his Spirit, you know that? Not just to make you feel good and happy and dance and jump and sing. All that's a reaction to the blessed gospel that God's made real to us. But he gave us his Spirit to lead us into all truth. He gave us his Spirit that his Spirit within would search out the depths of God, to search out the deep things of God. The deep things of God, literally, it's the depths of God. He's put the Spirit of God in your heart and mine to search out those depths in God that he has for his people. Depths that we know nothing about, heights that we know nothing about, lengths and breadths that we know nothing about, that only revealed by his Spirit. He puts his Spirit within us, that's why we're restless. That's why we can't rest in present achievements, present attainments, present gifts, present blessings, because God's Spirit is there. And if we give way for the Spirit of the Lord to dominate our lives, there'll be more and more of a sense of restlessness concerning our present conditions, because the Spirit is searching out the heart of God, and God's heart is in a state of restlessness until he finds the home that he has for himself. Totally satisfied with the Lord Jesus, but still longing for his other younger brethren to come into the same kind of rest that the Son has entered into. God found total rest in his Son, but there's other sons that he hasn't found rest in yet. Therefore, he says, for Zion's sake I will not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest. Isaiah said that, and I read that one time. I know Isaiah said it, but he was writing only as the Spirit of God was moving through him. The Spirit of God saying, for Zion's sake I will not hold my peace, for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest until the righteousness thereof goes forth as brightness, and the salvation thereof is a lamp that burneth. God says, I won't rest until the righteousness of my Son goes forth and my people has brightness. The salvation thereof is a burning lamp. The Gospel is more than a word. It is a word. It's a word from the heart of God, but it's a fire. It's a burning light which we are supposed to be. You're a light, the light of the world. You say, Jesus is the light of the world. He says, well, as long as I'm with you, I'm the light of the world. He says, he's made us to be lights in this world of darkness. When we sense how dark we are in this dark world, God help us to come to that restlessness that God has in His own heart. He can't rest until His righteousness shines forth in His people. So therefore, I have hope that even if I'm, you know, seemingly dead and insensitive to what's going on, I sense that God says I'm in a state of unrest and I'll remain this way until my people begin to shine forth with the light and the glory of my presence. And to help them out in the task, God needs help. Well, God needs help in the sense He needs fellowship. And that's why He doesn't send angels to minister. He does send them as ministering servants to work along with His people. But He sends you and I to do the ministering, to do the preaching, to do the evangelizing, to show mercy, to show compassion, because God's intention was to have this light all over the earth. Not just a few disciples who would go forth and evangelize, but wherever they went to light this fire and go on their way that the fire might continue to burn. Too often it's extinguished. Too often it goes out. Too often it doesn't shine forth with that brilliance that God intended. And so God will not rest until it goes forth as a brilliant light. To help them in this task, He sets up watchmen on the walls of Jerusalem. I know Ezekiel talks about watchmen who are designated by God to go and warn the sinner of the error of his way. In Isaiah, Isaiah talks of a different type of watchmen because watchmen have different tasks. And the watchmen that Isaiah talks about are those that God says, I have set on thy walls, O Jerusalem, watchmen who shall not hold their peace day or night. Ye that make mention of the Lord, keep not silent and give God no rest. Until He establishes, until He makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth, God makes us watchmen who will cry unto God. God, I'm not going to let you have any rest until you do what you said. Until you establish, until you make Jerusalem a praise in the earth. So God declares it Himself. That's the burden of His heart. He says, I'm giving people who are going to share my burden. And actually, if we only recognize it, the true prophet is really that one whom God has chosen and gifted and disciplined and tried and tested to work in harmony with God and to share God's secrets as well as the burden of His heart. It's wonderful when the prophet comes out and bears one of God's secrets. We think, what a marvelous prophet. But the true prophet will not be satisfied with that. Nor will God be satisfied until He draws him unto His heart where He shares the very feeling and burden of God's own heart. That's why so often we read in the Scriptures about the burden of the Lord. The burden of the Lord that this prophet had upon him. The burden of the Lord. The burden? Because the message God lays upon His prophet becomes a burden that they have to carry. And people like to hear the prophetic word, but they don't want to listen to it. Jeremiah went forth of this prophetic word. God said to Jeremiah, finally you know. Or was it Ezekiel? Perhaps it was Ezekiel. You know, He says, you're like one who can sing well. And you can play an instrument. You sing well. My people like to listen to it because who doesn't enjoy singing? But He says, you're like that to my people. They like listening to the prophecy, but they hear my words and do it not. And so God raised up prophets who not only have a message, but have the burden of the Lord upon their heart. And to know that the burden of the Lord is for His people. To raise up on the earth a true testimony, a true witness in the earth. People are going to walk in the glory and the light of the Holy Spirit that not just comes to you to cause you to talk in tongues or to interpret or to give a word of wisdom or a word of knowledge or to prophesy. And He does all that. And God's intention being that that ministration of truth would penetrate the hearts of His people, imparting to them the Spirit that that Spirit in them would begin to search out the heart of God. The Spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God. His intention to search out God. That's why He gave us His Spirit. We might come to know Him in a far greater reality than we have ever known. So they came to Jeremiah and said, oh, you're a prophet. What's the burden of the Lord? Jeremiah turned and said, you're the burden and God's tired of carrying you. I don't have a word for you. I came to that. I don't have a word for you. You've disobeyed the Lord. You've become a burden unto God. Jesus says, take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am meek and lowly in heart and ye shall find rest unto your souls. But there's a new law that God established in the church when the Holy Spirit came to abide in this temple. A law of life. That law has been hampered, been hindered. Once in a while we see a release of it. We're amazed at the simplicity of God's working because He's working according to a law of life. The law of life functions very beautifully. It functions because it's a living reality in God's people. It just works because the law is functioning. But when it isn't functioning, oh, what drudgery. What carnality. And we fail to realize that God's purpose is that that law should continue to be the law that dominates God's people. God said through Jeremiah, my people have committed two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and they've hewn for themselves broken cisterns that hold no water. Two evils. They forsook the fountain. When the fountain is flowing, I mean, God just sweeps away and people are just swept along in the flow of the river. But when we forsake that, God give us grace when we realize the river isn't flowing to seek God and that He might show us the way back to the river. Instead of doing that, when the fountain ceases to flow, Jeremiah says, we build for ourselves cisterns, broken cisterns that don't hold water. Two evils. Which is worse? One thing to forsake the fountain, but instead of coming back to the fountain, build a cistern. The stream is just about dried up. Build a cistern and let's divert some of that water into the cistern here. Keep it pure. Because if we don't do that, there's going to come in all kinds of heresies and false doctrines. We'll dig this little denominational pool here and we'll get some fresh charismatic water in there. Give it new life. New life. You see the sign all over America and Canada these days. New life church. And so what they do in getting the charismatic blessing into the pool again? God says it won't last there in the pool. It might be fresh. There's a ministration of the Spirit there and you pour it into the pool. It might be fresh a day or two, a week or two, a month or two. It won't last. It won't stay fresh. Except we come back to the fountain and let the fountain determine its own course. It has its own law. When the river is flowing, I mean, especially when the waters are high. Especially in springtime. There's a springtime in God's purposes as well as there is in the natural. God causes the winter and God causes the frost and God causes the snow. He sends forth His Word to cause all those things, but in the time of spring He sends forth His Word and melts them and causes the waters to flow. And so God says He sends the rain from heaven and the snow. We need the snow too. Piles up there in our mountains, especially there in Canada. I stood one time at 2,000 feet of solid ice up in the Columbia Basin there, which feeds the Columbia River, which flows through Canada up and down and around and down into the States and out near Portland. They don't know perhaps that it comes from a mass of ice way up there north of where we live. Because the snow, God ordains that. For what purpose? For the season of melting. A lot of frozen people in the church. Do you feel like one of them? Don't worry about it. Springtime comes and you melt. You melt and you flow and you flow in the river of God. God's got a lot of frozen Christians around. He loves them. They wonder why we're so dead. Well, you're frozen. You can't help it. He causes His wind to blow and the waters flow. There are treasures in the snow. Do you not know? Treasures in the snow, and God knows that. At time of spring it flows and the rivers flow and determine their own boundaries because it's regulated by its own law. This spring we had highways washed out near us up there because the river became so torrential it just formed a new channel for itself. Cut off highways. It just went on a rampage. We don't like that. We want to keep things under control so we don't worry if the fountain dries up. We'll dig a well. If there's no water in it, we'll divert some water into the cistern. If it was a well spring, it'd be different. But dig a hole and call that the church and pour charismatic water into it. Hope to keep it fresh and you know very well that water, no matter how fresh it is, it's going to get stale if it isn't flowing. And I'm not criticizing God's people. I'm just trusting that somehow God's people will know that though they call themselves charismatic and Pentecostal, we're far from what God intended in Pentecost. You see, I talk in tongues. What about the winds of God that were there in the day of Pentecost? What about the fire of God that came down and rested upon them on the day of Pentecost? What about the fact that they were all of one accord in one place in the day of Pentecost? Well, yeah, but they talked in tongues and I talk in tongues, so you got it. God baptizes afresh as a body with the baptism of the Holy Ghost and of fire. I know He's going to do that. I know He's going to do it. You say, well, that's terrifying. That's God's judgment. God, send your righteous judgments upon us. Send your righteous judgments to burn up all the debris, all the chaff, all the tears, all that is not of you, all that is carnal. That the righteousness of God might go forth as brightness and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth. The law of life is in the Spirit. But if we do not give the Spirit of God His full sway in our midst, that law is not able to function. And I know that God is preparing a people who are going to be willing in the day of His power. When in every gathering in His name, they look for the presence of the Holy Spirit to lead and direct as truly as they did when Jesus walked this earth. And when Jesus came into the room, though they might have been whispering beforehand and coming up with a lot of ideas and wondering who was going to be the greatest in this wonderful kingdom Jesus was establishing, Jesus would come into the room and there was a hush. Let's hear what the Master has to say. And sure enough, He'd say, what were you talking about? Nobody said anything. There was a hush when Jesus came around. They knew that He, the discernest of hearts, was standing there before them. They knew He was their Lord and Master. And Jesus never intended when He went away that our assemblies would be so free that we could just do anything we wanted in His name and get away with it. He desired that every gathering in His name should be unto Him, that we would seek earnestly for the Lord Jesus to speak in our midst as truly as they did when Jesus walked through the door and sat down. That when Jesus went away, He promised that it would be better for Him to go away. Because when He went away, He would be able to send the same Spirit of truth that was in Him to abide not just with His people, but to walk in them. Not just as disciples in Jerusalem, but when the gospel spread throughout the earth, that same Spirit would dwell in every believer throughout the earth. So that there would be a temple over all the earth, and that His temple would be filled with His glory. We thank the Lord for every mighty visitation of the presence of God. But I'm encouraged to know and to believe that God keeps the best till the last. That the latter glory of this house is going to be greater than the former. And the former started out in great glory. We look back to Pentecost as something we all missed and wishing we had been there. I don't any longer, because I know God has something for the latter-day church that's far more glorious than He had for the early-day church. For the simple reason it's harvest time, and I know that harvest time is more glorious than the time of the sowing of the seed. Each one important, very important, but the purpose of the sowing of the seed is that there might be a harvest time. And the harvest is the thing that God's waiting for, therefore it ought to be that which we are cherishing and longing for. The harvest of the fruit of the Spirit in our lives and in the corporate body of Christ. God's waiting for that. Be also patient, says James, if God's waiting for it, you be patient too. For the coming of the Lord draws nigh. Be patient therefore. Let God work patience in your heart and lives. You say, no time for patience, time for action. I know that's what the church says. Because if you and I be patient, that we move under the cloud according to His timing. Because it's just as important to walk in the timing of God as it is to do the will of God. Timing is very important. Especially when we come into this matter of walking and moving in the Spirit. Timing is very important. So those who walk in obedience to the Father, they're going to be up and about their Father's business, true enough. But they're going to know God's timing. And it'll be very important to them. And when others come suggesting a wonderful way to reach the crowds. Go on down to the feast, that's where the crowds are. You should be there, you're a miracle worker. Jesus said, you go down to the feast, my time hasn't come yet. A day or two later, His time came and He went down. His mother said at the wedding in Cana of Galilee, knowing that He was about to go forth in this tremendous ministry, no doubt, they have no wine. He says, woman, what have I to do with you? My time has not yet come. Jesus' mother said to the rest, whatever He says, you do it. I don't know if it was a minute later, ten minutes later. He says, fill the water pots with wine. Why didn't He do it when His mother suggested it? Because He was moving according to a divine law. A divine law and He must not deviate from that. I remember when they sent this man to the moon on their return trip. They said, any second now, they'll press the button to get them in the right orbit or bring them back to earth or they'll go off in orbit about the sun. How critical science has become in modern times. Everything has to be exact. But with God, any time is good enough. If you feel like doing something for God, do it. God brings His people to a place where they're under such discipline of the Spirit and so filled with the Spirit that they'll know how to move in the Spirit. And then we can see a work of God performed in the hearts of man and in the earth and in nations so quickly, you couldn't imagine how quickly it could happen. And God has everything coordinated in the body of Christ that they'll move as one man. With one mind. Doesn't Paul speak about the body of Christ growing up into the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ unto a perfect man? Not unto a perfect man, but unto a perfect man under the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Too high a vision, you say? I know. We can never attain to it. I know. I'm not talking about what you and I are going to do about it. I'm talking about the Creator of this new creation, the Church, which is the fullness of Him that filleth everything. The Church of the living God. The fullness, the completeness of the Christ who's enthroned in glory. The fullness of Him, the very completeness of Him. Nothing lacking in the Church that was in Jesus. No virtue, no attribute, no fruit, no characteristic that pertains to Jesus. It's lacking in His body because we grow up into Him. Because we grow up into Him, we partake of His very life. He's put that life within us. It's a law within us. It's the law of the Spirit. Our cry is, O Lord, how long before somehow You will activate this law and cause it to work? God can do it very simply and very quickly. All He needs to get is a willing people. And the reason this law functions so beautifully in Jesus was because His ear was so tuned to the voice of the Heavenly Father that He recognized the voice of the Father from all distinct, from all other voices. He said, I do always those things that please Him. I can do nothing of myself. Jesus took that position that He might be a pattern for you and I. He wasn't God the Son coming down to walk amongst men as God the Son, acting like the second person of the Trinity, doing whatever He wanted to do. He was the Son of God. In other words, He was the manifestation of the Father Himself walking in human form, declaring the Father, revealing the Father, speaking forth the words of the Father, manifesting the Father. That's what He came to do. Manifesting the Father as a human being, as a Son. As an example of that body of sons He's going to have. All He did was without sin. That's why He died on the cross, to make us without sin. You say, I've received Him as my Savior and I know I still have sin. Fine, but His full intention is not that you'd always have some sin. His full intention is to so purge, cleanse, purify us that we'll be as clean as Jesus is. Holy as God is holy, the Bible says, be ye holy as God is holy. See, I can't come to that. He's not asking you to come to it. He's talking about walking in obedience and hearing that creative word, be ye holy, for I am holy. When God says, be light, there was light, wasn't there? Yeah, but you say, I've got a rebellious heart. That's why God wants to take away that rebellious heart. When He speaks to you, He says, be clean, you're clean. Be holy, you're holy. The functioning of that law that is placed within us, but we're not seeing it functioning the way God intended and the way it will happen. Because He still has to bring forth that obedience in His people that we know only in part. And as I say that, I almost have to apologize and say that partial obedience is really disobedience. For I'm reminded of what Saul said to Samuel. I've obeyed the word of the Lord. I've destroyed the Amalekites, and I've got the king in chains, and here he is. What then is that bleeding of the oxen, bleeding of the sheep and the lowing of the oxen that I hear? Oh, well, of course, I brought that for the Lord. I'm telling you, when God brings a sinner to Himself, He wants you and I to know that our pathway from then on is carrying a cross. Like A. W. Tozer said one time, when the people in Jerusalem saw that poor fellow carrying a cross on his road through Jerusalem, he wasn't out looking for a new way of life. He wasn't out looking for a new direction. He was carrying his cross outside the camp to be crucified upon it. We profess to be carrying our cross, but we're looking for a new direction. We're looking for God to do something that we can fit into. We'll obey you, Lord, as long as... I want this first, of course. I want to do this. I've got an education yet. You know, I've got plans. But apart from that, Lord, I'll do your will. And the message of the gospel is, if you're going to be my disciple, you take up your cross and follow me. And that means follow Him without the camp. And that means to die upon it as Jesus died upon it. I can't say I've known that in fullness. The part I know is nothing compared, no doubt, to the full measure of being crucified with Christ that God intended. But I know it's according to the functioning of this same law of life that as we commit ourselves to die with Him on Calvary, we will rise to walk in the law of a new life. It's the clear declaration of His Word. The law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh. God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. We can't excuse ourselves. Oh, I'm a sinner. I'm born in sin. I'm painted with sin. God says, I condemned it when Jesus died on the cross. I condemned your sin with Him. He died. Your sin died with Him. See, I wish it was true. It's true, but somehow our inability to believe it in fullness causes us to think it's not true. God's going to send forth a wave of His Spirit through His people that will cause them to believe His Word and to take away the unbelief. God says, I'm going to do something very sovereign for my holy name's sake, He said to Israel. And He says, I want you to know it's not for your sakes at all. It's for my holy name's sake because you profaned my name amongst the heathen. I'm going to do a great work because you profaned my name and you're not getting any glory out of it. And it's not for your sakes I'm doing it. I'm going to bring you back. I'm going to cleanse you. I'm going to put a new spirit within you. I'm going to cause you to walk in my laws and in my statutes. And I'll put a new spirit within you. I'm going to cause it to happen. We've got to walk in obedience to come to that. But God's going to cause it to happen in a rebellious people. And He says, it's not for your sake. It's for my name's sake. That gives us great courage, you know. I know God's got to do this for His holy name's sake because His name has been blasphemed amongst all nations. If the Jews blasphemed the name of Jehovah God in the Old Testament as Paul said they did and as Isaiah said they did, how much more is the name of our Lord Jesus Christ been blasphemed amongst the nations because of those who say we're Christian and are unlike Christ? Blasphemed amongst the nations. God says, you profaned my holy name amongst the nations. I'm going to for my own name's sake because I'm jealous for my name. I'm going to raise up a people, cleanse them, deliver them from their sin, put a new heart, a new mind, new spirit within. Cause them to walk in my ways. Cause them to do it. That's what the law is all about. Why do you sin? Why do you really sin? Well, you know you were born in it. So you struggle to fight against it. You were born in it. But there's a higher law than the law of sin and death. You say that's a tremendous law of sin and death. No man can resist that law. Christ did. And he says if we learn to walk in the spirit, we're free from the old law of sin and death. In Romans 5, God through the apostle Paul, God declares five times that the effect of the new covenant is much more effectual than the working of the old law of sin and death. Much more effectual. It's through the offense of one many died, much more the grace of God has abounded. One that sinned brought death. So one that lived righteously poured out the free gift unto many. Verse 16. Verse 17. By the one man's offense, death reigned. Death reigned. Death was king. Death was Lord. You say it's still true. Well, that's a sign of our own belief, you see. It's still true. I'm going to die someday. God put within us a long life that though this mortality crumbles, we live on. There's a law of life. And someday at the last trump, at the resurrection, even our bodies will be changed. In the meantime, he's given us new life in the spirit, saving our souls and quickening our mortal bodies by his spirit, but not yet giving us that immortality. That's on God's agenda. But he leaves us in our mortality while he deals with our spirit and soul whereby he can humble us, keep us weak, keep us dependent upon him. If I was to enter tonight into immortality, nobody could hurt me. Suffering would all his feasts. You say that would be good, wouldn't it? Not if the work of test and trial has not fulfilled its purpose in my life. This is the time in our mortality where God is able to refine us because of our mortality. Always bearing about in our body, Paul said, the dying of the Lord Jesus, that his life also might be manifest in our mortal flesh. This is the time of suffering. When I enter immortality, I was reading this little article. I used to carry it with me. This man says, don't desire to go to heaven too soon or don't desire to enter into immortality too quickly. This is your time to suffer with him. Once you cross over and enter into immortality, the time of suffering is over and therefore the time of the work of suffering in you and I is finished. Let God finish that work of test and trial in us now while we dwell in mortal flesh. Words along that line. Isn't that true? God wants to finish the work of test and trial in us and so he leaves us walking in the weakness of mortality that will always be dependent upon him. For the very air we breathe, the very food we eat, the very life we live, we're totally dependent upon him. It doesn't deny that God has started a new law, caused it to function within his church. But notice this. Through one man's offense, death reigns. Death set up a kingdom to one man. Much more, they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ. If one man's sin started the beginning of the kingdom of sin and death that has held a stranglehold over all humanity for these 6,000 years, one man's sin. How much more shall one man's righteousness, that perfect man's righteousness, begin a kingdom of life? How much greater is the one than the other? I mean, we can't escape the logic of this and the only reason we doubt it is because we don't see it. God bring us to a place of such faith in God that we believe where we cannot see. With that kind of faith, faith has real substance even though we don't see it. God said to Abram one day, Henceforth, your name shall no longer be Abram, but Abraham, for I have made thee a father of many nations. Abram went out and bore the reproach of it all his life. He was an old man and he had no children. Hi, Abram. Pardon me. God changed my name last night. No longer Abram, it's Abraham. Father of many nations. Oh, a big joke. Big joke. He had to bear the reproach of the name. God's called a name upon us. He calls us Christians. Christ ones, anointed ones, we bear the reproach of it because we know we're so far like Him, but God hastens the day when it'll be something that the nations will recognize these are Christ ones. These are men to be feared because they trust in the living God. God's yet going to do that in the meantime. Yeah, we're Christians, but are you like Jesus? Well, not really, you know, but yeah, a big joke. Is he any different than our Muhammad? Or, you know, some of these men who created great religions? That's the stigma that is applied to the Christian church, and for good reason. God's not concerned too much because He's just awaiting that time, and He'll stand for His word and cause His word to infiltrate His people, bringing faith and substance, and bringing faith into hope, and hope into love, and the people of the nations are going to see the love of Christ revealed in mortal people in the earth as truly as it was revealed in our Lord Jesus, so that they too will lay down their lives for those in need, if need be, because they're Christian. Call to be disciples of Him. Call to take up their cross and follow Him. Paul says, Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. Sin has reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life. Sin reigns unto death. We see it. We still believe it. It's reigning unto death. It's evident. God says where sin abounded, grace does much more abound. I know we hear people say, you can't help but recognize what an awful day to bring up a family, establish a home. What a terrible day. I know. But wasn't it a terrible day when the Egyptians were in bondage and they were beaten and tormented and made slaves of Pharaoh and yet their families multiplied. Somehow they had confidence that God was going to come and that God did come. And he says, I've seen, I've heard, I've seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt. I've heard their groanings and I've come down to deliver them. The same God sees the groaning of His people and let us groan in the Spirit. Paul says, we groan too. Creation's groaning. We groan as we wait for the adoption, even the redemption of the body. It's a suffering world we're in, but our suffering is different. We groan for the manifestation of the Spirit of God coming forth, taking control in the midst of His temple as watchmen on the wall crying out day and night. Giving God no rest until He established, until He made Jerusalem a praise in the earth. Where sin abounds, grace does much more abound. I don't care what Satan, what time he'll have yet to bring forth all his diabolical works and to bring it to conclusion. But he's going to bring it to conclusion because the mystery of iniquity has got to come to fullness. I would have thought it had come to fullness 30, 40, 50 years ago, but it still goes on. It's still coming to a still greater fullness. It's going to come to complete fullness. What about the mystery of Christ? I mean, how can we be so ignorant to give all the glory to Adam and to the law of sin and death and to the laws of Satan and fail to realize that our King rose from the dead and He's King of all kings and Lord of all lords and God's given the world over to sinful man and the devil and go to take us off to heaven. He's going to make us a conquering people right here in the earth if we follow the Lamb with us soever He goeth. A breeding lamb. And we'll overcome by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of our testimony if we love not our lives even unto the death. That's the kind of a witness God's going to have on the earth. He's going to have a true witness of Jesus in the earth. Before the Holy Spirit takes us on to be with Him. The Holy Spirit came to make in the earth a true witness of the Lord Jesus during the absence of Jesus. We haven't seen the fullness of that witness yet but we're going to see it. We saw a great foretaste of it in the early church. We're going to see the fullness of the witness, the testimony of Jesus in the congregation of the saints. As they gather in His name they'll be the body of Christ as truly as a man stood there in a body, a pure body, a holy body prepared by the Holy Ghost and born of the Virgin Mary and preached the gospel. We're going to see this man, this corporate man coming into that same unity that was between the Father and the Son prevailing in His many brethren not by the work of man, not by conclaves and conferences and conventions and seminars, but by the working of His Holy Spirit in His people. Not only because of the preaching of the Word, but because of the working of that Word in their hearts and lives. And I know that this Word is going to work in the hearts of God's people. Any Word that comes forth on the anointing will continue to work in the hearts of God's people to bring into being that which God intended when He sent the Word forth. And if sin has reigned unto death, be assured, grace is going to reign through righteousness unto eternal life. Oh, how we honor the kingdom of death. Grace is going to superimpose itself on the kingdom of sin and death through His people who are walking in realms of life by Christ Jesus. It's a greater law. The law of life working on God's people is greater than the law of sin and death. Otherwise, are you saying that when Adam and Eve partook of the fruit and disobeyed God, that there's more power in that than there was in the last Adam when he hung on the cross and cried, Father, it is finished? Which is more powerful? Which is more powerful? The disobedience of Adam or the obedience of one? The obedience of Christ. Oh, we ought to be ashamed at the way we doubt God's holy Word because we don't see it working. Let's continue to bear the name Christian until God comes forth and says, These are my anointed ones. These are my people. These are my people moving in the same spirit in which I moved when I walked this earth. Heavenly Father, seal this Word in the hearts of Your people. Spoken perhaps, Lord feebly, but O God, I know You've spoken and let it be a Word that will linger long in the lives of Your people and work in them steadily that there might be a performance of that which You have declared. Let us say with the precious Virgin Mary, Be it unto me according to Thy Word. Let us say it, Lord, unto You. Do in us that which You have said according to Your Word, though it be a reproach unto us and though it means that our soul also might be pierced through with many sorrows because of the reproach. Cause, Lord, that Your Word will begin to take root and bear fruit in the lives of Your people in a new dimension that we've never known in this time of harvest. Let not the harvest fail, Lord, but let there be the early and the latter rain to bring it to fruition that You might come into Your garden rejoicing over the fruit that You are discovering. Fruit unto Your honor and glory. Fruit for Your own pleasure. In Jesus' name we ask You, Amen.