Heart examination

Book of Nehemiah, please. Chapter 1. Chapter 2, just for the sake of time. Chapter 2. And verse 2, Wherefore the king said unto me, Why is that countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? This is nothing else but sorrow of heart.

And in the context there is that sorrow had filled his heart. It's not the only time we have that in the Bible. Then I was very sore afraid this.

Obviously he was bearing evidence to something that was wrong. And he was afraid the king maybe would be concerned with his responsibility. And now over to chapter 2, again chapter 2 and verse number 12.

And I rose in the night, and I and some men with me, neither told I any man what my God had put in my heart to do with Jerusalem. Neither was there any beast with me, save the beast that I rode upon. Verse 17, Then said I unto them, notice how he brings his brethren in.

It's plural now. Then said I unto them, Ye see the distress that we, plural, are in? How Jerusalem lieth waste, and the gates thereof are burned with fire. Come and let us build up, notice that, not just build, but build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no more a reproach.

So when that wall was decimated, broken down, it was a reproach to them, the people of God. Chapter 3 now. Then Elisha the high priest rose up, and I want to labor this with his brethren.

Now lest I forget to come back to this, whether it is a preacher that's been preaching for I don't care how many years, or someone that's just starting, a local brother, doesn't matter who you are. There is one thing that is absolutely essential. For the welfare of assembly testimony, you have to work with your brethren.

Okay? You can't work. I have lived long enough, witnessed long enough, some of these that wanted to go out as kind of a lone ranger. It doesn't work.

It doesn't work. You've got to work with your brethren. Because there'll come a time when you'll need them.

You'll need their, you want them to have your back. If you're out there on your own, you're not going to have it. So here's a prime example of that.

I've underlined and circled those words in verse 1. Rose up with his brethren, the priest. And they builded the sheep gate, sanctified it, set up the doors of it unto the tower of Medah, and they sanctified it unto the tower of Hananiel. Okay? Further, we can go on and read here.

Now just over a little further, we're going to read what had happened, really what was taking place in the passage. And over to, just picking out, yes, chapter 4 and verse 1. Chapter 4 and verse 1. But it came to pass that when Sanballat heard that we builded the wall, he was wroth and took great indignation and mocked the Jews. And so on.

Okay? Now notice verse 6, something very important. Verse 6 of chapter 4. So we built the wall, and the wall was joined together unto the half thereof, for the people had a mind to work. Okay? A mind to work.

Now just over to chapter 7, we'll read an expression we got twice in this book. Only twice. And verse number 5. Now finally back to chapter 2. Chapter 2 and verse number 12.

Which I want to read again and emphasize, of course, with you. Just for the remaining minutes of this meeting this morning, I would like to work with a traveling, we have them back in our country, I'm sure you have them here, and it's a cardiovascular trailer that has all the equipment needed in for the test of the heart. So we're going to do a little heart examination this morning.

We're going to look at an ECG, a stress test, and a blood test. Which are all found in this prophecy. It's interesting, it's significant.

You have the heart mentioned 654 times in your Old Testament. Seldom does it refer to the organ that pumps the blood through the body. Okay? And you'll read in the New Testament, you've got 98 times.

And you'll have the two mixed together, the mind and the heart. But if you'll notice there is a distinction when they are used like that. Because really when it comes to the heart, it's the thought of what I'm trying to do affectionately.

To be just as plain as I possibly can, which I usually am, if you can't do what you're doing for the Lord affectionately, passionately, with love, He doesn't want it. He doesn't want it. He wants it done with the heart because it will be done joyfully.

There's numerous passages that would support that. However, when we come to the mind, there's a bit of a change. Not only does He want it done affectionately, but He wants it done intelligently.

Brethren, we can be so stupid at times. Doing the right thing in the wrong way is not doing it with the mind. It's absent-mindedness.

So if you and I are going to build, and isn't that what it's about? Let's face it. We don't have to dwell on going through the pandemic and what it cost us. And it did.

It took an onslaught. It took a real bash on the assemblies, on testimonies. And there are brethren and sisters, young and old, that have rose to the moment.

And they say, we're going to rebuild. We are. I'm sorry to say of how many conferences just along... Not in the Maritimes, thank God we've been preserved.

But in many places, there's been a conference for three years. They could have a conference right now. Sure they could.

I've spoken to some about it. Do you know why there's no conference? Because it takes exercise and energy. And believe me, it took exercise and energy to rebuild these walls.

So first of all, sorrow had filled his heart. Does it really bother you? That there wasn't the Sunday night gospel meeting for quite a while? Does it really bother you? Well, we carry on, but we get everything done by noon hour. And there's really nothing in the afternoon except for you to go for your own pursuits and your own pleasures.

Does that bother you? Does that make you sorrowful? Isn't it Malachi, it says, Wherefore do ye close the doors for naught? Brethren, we've done it. Some have given up and they're sitting on their hands and say, Well, you know, it's the end times, it's a difficult day, all these things are against us. And even visiting in public and taking children, picking them up and that sort of thing.

Even back home, my wife and I had to go to the RCMP office and get a clearance sheet. Because you know as well as I do, that if I help maybe a young girl, I'll just use an example, that has fallen down and I pick her up. And she says that he touched me in the wrong spot.

That hits the courts. I'm the one that's on the block. And they will believe her.

So we need to, I know we have to go through this. And there's people that oppose doing that. Well, if you've got to do it to satisfy the local authorities, brethren in God's name, do it! And get at it.

And put your heart into it. I don't want to be partial, but I want to speak plainly this morning. It was thrilling.

Brother Plant will support me in this. To see younger and older brethren over there on Western Avenue, beating the streets, visiting people. I went with them.

They said, do you mind coming to this house? It's kind of a rough one. Well, I've been through some rough ones in my day. Honestly, I have.

I could go there just now. But you know, there's risk in rescue. There's risk in all this.

If we thought of all the things that could happen when we're trying to do a work for the Lord, we would quit and give up. If we thought of all the opposition, whenever you're doing a work for God as this man Nehemiah was doing, there was opposition. There was a sand ballot.

There's men that stood with him in the first chapter and fell in the last chapter. I don't need to remind you that I'm in the last chapter. Not the young fellow that used to come springing into this conference how many years ago or the conferences in Iowa.

And I'm not trying to stroke a long beard. Excuse me, I shaved mine, so I'm pretty close. They said don't have that, but I'll be careful here.

But I just want to say this, brethren and sisters. Years makes a difference. And the man that stood with him, Elisha, boy, he's a good man.

Look at the influence that he had. So he leads the way in the first chapter, but he leaves the way in the last chapter. To me, that's very disappointing, very disheartening.

When I have those my age, my peers, those that sat in the same minister meetings I sat in and listened to Willie Norman Crawford and some of those excellent teachers of the word of God, many others that could be named, and they've tossed it hook, line, and sinker out of the ship. What's done it? What did it to this man, Elisha Bibb, in the first chapter? Why does he leave it? Well, it was the family, okay? It was the family. Too many brethren have let their children, pardon the expression, wind them up and give them a whiff of chloroform, took their teeth out, but now they're gumming their way along.

Nobody listens to what they say. They've been so weak. There's times when you've got to take a stand, even if it's against your own son and your own daughter.

We have an overseer down our way, well-known to Scott and I, broke his heart when both boys left the assembly. He called him into his office, and he said to him, I'm sorry for the path you're taking, but it's not going to change Mom and I. We're staying where we have been all these years, and we're not going. Now, not everybody's done that, don't kid me.

How about you today? I stand in the good, along with many others here today, I stand in the good of solid teaching of the word of God that we've been hearing from both of our brethren this morning, and I support and add amen to exactly what we've heard. I stand in the good of that. And I never had the example of overseers and teachers from the word of God, where would I be today? Do I have this conference that's going on here today? Because there's men, out of a former generation that I knew, and older ones here today, and they've stood.

Okay? They had lots of reason to turn them away. There's times when testing came, as it did in this past. I mean, even when it came to this man, I mean, his grandson, Jonathan, Marysanne Belitz, chapter 13, verse 28, and it took away all the family influence.

All it took, in another case, was Adaliah's daughter, Jezebel Nahab, to marry Jehoram, King Jehoshaphat's son, idolatry like an avalanche. Flooded Judah. You try and stand in front of that flood.

So what's it come back to? Well, what about an ECG test? Okay? I have to go to that medical doctor once a year with my license, and the hard part is heading in the license, because if you don't pass that test, you're not getting that license back. I don't care how many hours you've got, how many aircraft you've flown, how safe and careful you've been, you're not getting the license back. And I look over at that.

He's going to do the ECG right in his office. That doesn't really terrify me as bad as another thing he's got called scales. I stepped on them one time, and he said, well, Murray, I have to tell you, you keep this going, you're going to be 470 pounds in 10 years.

I wanted to hit him. That was a terrible thing to say. Okay? Another thing I don't like too well is I know he's going to do it.

I can't speak for my brothers here today, but it's the eye test. Well, you can go over these things in our life. The eye test.

I'm a little colorblind. I have to kind of bluff my way along. Hopefully, he passes.

They sent me once for a reexamination of that, but we make our way. But the point is this. Where does it start? With the heart.

If you don't pass that ECG test, you're out. Now, we've got examples of that, the Word of God. You take for a man like Samson.

Look at the potential in Samson's life. Look at what he could have been. The tragedy in any of our lives is not what we are, but what we could have been.

Okay? What does Delilah say to him? How canst thou say thou lovest me when thy heart is not with me? How canst thou say thou lovest me when thy heart's not with me? Whatever she missed, she picked up. This man's heart's not with me. Now, brethren, I don't know where your heart is today, but he does.

Okay? What kind of a heart am I giving him? I did not take time to read about Ananias and Sapphira, although I'm going to refer to them. But it's interesting. Just in our own daily reading at home, it says that Peter says, Why hast thou lied? Has Satan filled thine heart? Satan filled thine heart.

He's still in the same business. But what would you find in this man? God had put something into his heart. God had put something into his heart.

I don't know if it was just recently in a meeting somewhere, maybe it was at the former conference down east, that we preach it, and it is so. God's assembly is no place for a lazy person. In fact, this book, this wonderful book, this Bible, does not in any way, shape, or form condone laziness.

With men that I travel with and work with, the best time of the day is our devotion time. When Mr. Plank comes into our room and we sit down, and we are maybe reading the proverb of the day, we pray together, read it together. Good practice.

We were just commenting yesterday about the slothful, and the lazy, and the sluggard, and what he won't do with that. In other words, it condemns it. But by and large, God's people are not that way.

They aren't. And we're thrilled at that. Now, I was, just let me go through that.

That's E.C.G., that's Samson. Well, what about the stress test? Well, it's interesting here. It says they rose up to build.

They passed the stress test. In other words, they realized, we can do it. And brethren and sisters, we can do it.

Whether it is at Cedar Falls, Western Avenue, Stout, Hampton, name them. We can do it. You say, yeah, but you don't know how weak we are.

Brethren, there's lots of weakness amongst us. I have to share the responsibility of that weakness. But we can do it.

Pass the stress test. I've already talked about the blood test. That's the hardest one to test.

That's a man like Eli, Elijah, David. When it came to the family, unfortunately, they failed. Now, some of my family, some from Canada here, do know a sister by the name of Esther Hannah.

She was just buried after fighting courageously cancer for a number of years. I was not at that funeral. I was at another funeral, Mrs. Ruth Elliot, and Pugwash at the same time.

So I was not at Esther's funeral. But I had a sister, one of my nice cousins, write me, and she said, Murray, you would have enjoyed your second cousin, Dr. Alan Kimber, speaking at Esther's funeral. And she just gave me the outline.

He took up the Hs, okay? She was a Hannah, okay? Fred Hannah was her husband. Fred got saved at meetings that Paul Kimber and I had. I'm not going to tell you how many years ago.

You'll think I'm an old man. Anyhow, her heritage, she was a sister. Sisters, listen, great heritage.

We can't get along without you. That's the truth. I mean that with all my heart.

And I'm supported by every brother in this auditorium this morning. Her heritage, she was a sister. Her heart, a sinner saved by grace.

Her hospital, she was a nurse. She was a servant. Her home, a sucker of many.

Her home was open. Always went to Esther and Fred's home. Her hall, at the hall, her hall, a saint.

Her health, a sufferer. She suffered. Her hope, a sojourner.

She dragged herself to meetings. I mean, I don't want to embarrass my brother Kent. I've enjoyed his hospitality so many times.

I admire somebody like that dragging themselves. I know he's going to tell you he's feeling good, but listen, you're not fighting what he's fighting. And I'm not either.

So her health, a sufferer. Her hope, a sojourner. Her honor, a soldier.

I haven't got time to write, Alan. He corresponds with me, but he missed an H. He said, wasn't that long enough? Oh, he missed an H. It was a good one to miss. What would be the next H, sister? Herself.

Herself. Do you know why he couldn't find herself? Because a few years ago, when she got saved out there in Cape Britain, Wycagama, she looked after herself in the waters of baptism, where she bowed to the fact that she died with Christ and had risen to walk in the news of life. She got rid of herself.

When it comes to our hearts, brothers and sisters, is it not true? My heart is either filled with his self or himself. When it's filled with himself, there's no task that is too great. There's nothing that you can ask me that's too difficult.

That was the way that this dear sister lived. Realizing that truth in the waters of baptism. While I'm on that note, let me just take a second to say, and I'll stop at mid-sentence if I have to.

Baptism. I believe it to be one of the most solemn occasions in the life of a believer. Why? Because there's two deaths being witnessed.

No. Somebody sent me a clip here a while ago of them clapping at a baptism. Another sister came back home to our home assembly, and she told somebody else, she didn't tell me because it would set me on fire, so I know where it happened.

She said, I went to a baptism. They were baptizing eight-year-olds. If you've been baptized today, God bless you.

Baptizing eight-year-olds. There was not a sister there with a head covering on, but plenty in slacks or pants, whatever you want to call them. Be careful.

Go to the UK, don't you say pants. Say slacks, okay? For men, trousers. Just leave that.

There's not a brother there with a... I know, I know. You'll look at me and say, yeah, you've got to be a white shirt and all this. No, no.

You know why I have a white shirt? I'm telling you, I'm colorblind. I can't make them match. It's very easy.

I've got a white... Everything goes with a white, all right? The other boy is good for them. But there wasn't a brother there with a jacket on or a tie. She said to me, it just smacked of irreverence.

In fact, she says, this is her words to another sister, it bordered on rebellion. Who says we've got to dress like that? Who said? Brethren and sisters, there is not a function. We've been hearing that, the warnings of Nadab and Abihu.

Okay? There's not a function in which the dignity of the Divine One we represent shouldn't be taken note of. That does not mean that I've got to go to the children's meetings. I went there the other night.

It's a wonder they weren't taking pictures of just my sweater. Okay? I don't think anybody was horrified. One time I took a man, he's gone now, one of the biggest businessmen in Sussex, got to go to a gospel meeting, and I went dressed as he did.

The young fellow turned around, he tapped his mother, he punched her, he says, Mr. McCandless doesn't have his suit on. Well, that happens, okay? Brethren, I understand these things, okay? I'm very human. I hope you understand that.

But the importance of it. But that's why this was successful. So we just learn from the importance of what God has for us as his people, and to remind ourselves of the importance of hard work, and hard work and the influence that we're having on a coming generation.

So were they successful? Oh, my, were they successful. You can't tell me that a work that would take months could be done in 52 years, 52 days, if the divine hand was not with them. What's he say? Hand of God was with us.

He said the people had a mind to work. They had a heart to work. If we could leave this conference, with the ministry you've heard already even last night in the prayer meeting, with a renewed mind and a refreshed heart, to pour and put these things into the assembly of God for his honor and for his glory.

Now, very quickly, I don't want to dwell too long on Ananias and Sapphira. But the devil had filled their heart. And he hasn't changed his mind.

He's still there to fill your heart. You know what I want? I noticed just in my reading, just a few weeks or something, it just impressed itself on my mind. Why does it say young men? Young men carried them to their grave.

Well, the Word of God doesn't make a mistake in that. There was a man over in the U.K. by the name of Peter Manuel, a very notorious murderer. He had one request.

He says, I want young men to carry me to my grave. People say, why young men? You know why? He wanted it to remain in the memories of those men for as long as possible, what he had done and how wrong it was, and the price he paid. Isn't that the same when it comes to Ananias and Sapphira, young men? There was something there that had to remind them that, hey, this is God's house.

You cannot do what you like. And so we have to be reminded of that constantly, young men that did it. I'll maybe have to discuss it with my good friend William Skates after, but I believe it was young men.

I don't say it was your brethren that carried them, neither Abed Abihu, but I wouldn't be surprised in the context if we can see it as young men that had that terrible task. So, brethren and sisters, just let me conclude by saying, I know I live in the good of what you live in the good of, but first, us younger ones, okay? Let's give it all that we can, passionately and intelligently, that it be our intelligent service as God provides.