Trust in God, Pt. 4

Ron Weinland

August 11, 2018

Today we’re finally going to continue with the series that was being covered before I once again began to experience heart problems and became hospitalized for nine days in early July. Part 3 was given on the Sabbath of June 30th and this will be Part 4 of the series entitled Trust in God.

I’ll mention some of those things later on but it was that Sabbath that I talked about how good I was feeling and how good things were going, and they were until that week.

Since it’s been so long we’ll have a quick review so that we can get back into that particular series. It’s been quite a while. And that will help us a lot too, and it’s good to review some things.

I think of the one we’re going through that we haven’t gotten back to yet—it’s been interrupted a couple of times—about thankfulness, gratitude. I think that’s amazing how God works with various kinds of sermons that are given and in that one there it’s being spread out over a long period of time, but it keeps bringing us back to that thought, that thinking, and the importance of thankfulness and gratitude. I’m looking forward to getting back to that and finishing that series as well. But this one comes first. We need to finish this series first. And this, to me, is good, just going back and reviewing some of these things and what we’ve been covering I think will be helpful as well here, as I just mentioned a few of the things that we went through.

We began to address this series because of some conflicting matters that had come up in different regions of the Church and the reason for this was stated as a matter of how important it is for us to become more properly equipped and to be more spiritually on guard (I guess is the way to say that), against those things that have the potential to be destructive spiritually to us. There are things that have happened a long time ago in God’s Church that haven’t happened to the scattered body, that haven’t happened to the remnant, and some of those things have begun to happen again.

So there are beings out there who know how to strike at the Church, and they try everything imaginable. They’ve tried everything through time during the Philadelphia era of God’s Church and on into the Laodicea era of God’s Church, and nothing will be left unturned as they continue to become more stirred up as we get closer and closer. They know their time is short. We have to be on guard. We have to be very much on guard and not to let down in any fashion or form.

And to be candid, there are times (and I still see it), that there are those who have let down, there are those who are not as dedicated, as zealous as they really should be, as they need to be. You can’t be in God’s Church and do it halfway. You can’t be in God’s Church and take it lightly. You can’t be in God’s Church and not throw yourself into a relationship with God, with Christ, and with one another. There is no standing back. There is no, as I’ve talked about, being out in the courtyard. We can’t live life like that. We can’t go through the motions of having kind of one foot in and mixing to a certain degree.

It’s a fight. You have to be dedicated to a fight to the end and the primary fight is self. You have to fight against self. That’s the primary battle and if anyone ever lets up in that then one can become spiritually weak and you can be hit by different things by beings out there that want to distract you.

I’ve talked about drama a lot, and they like drama. Oh, they love modern drama today and how it’s hit the airwaves and everything imaginable over the internet and things that stir up and magnify drama. They love it. It’s a powerful tool that they have, that they use, and we have to fight against those things. And if people let down they don’t know; they get to a point where they don’t realize how weak they are or how weak they’re becoming. One can deceive themselves into thinking that by being in the courtyard they’re with the program, and that is not the case. That’s incredible deception.

Let’s turn over to Psalm 62 and review what was said at one point. This series has all been in the context of learning to more fully place our trust in God and how He works in our lives. Place our trust in God and how He works in our lives. If we grasp that we wouldn’t want our lives anywhere else but to be in God’s hands and to trust Him, to understand that when we are called He is the one who has called us. He has a plan and a purpose for us, that’s why He calls us. He has made it possible for us to go from point A to point B with every favor, with every help, with every strength in life that we need, but we have to throw ourselves into that. We have to work. We have to apply ourselves. The way has been made possible, but whether we want to walk in that way and stay in that way is our choice. Therein is oftentimes the battle.

Psalm 62:5—My soul, in other words, that which I must live, David said, My soul, waits or stands still only upon God, for my expectation, as in “hope,” “one’s focus,” is from Him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; He is my defense/fortress, “strong place,” if you will, a place of strength. We need to look to God in that manner. God is our strength. He is the one who strengthens us. Oftentimes pray that. We need to pray in that vein, that He be our stronghold, that He be our fortress, that He is the one we look to to build a hedge around us to protect us, to strengthen us, to protect us from those things that are out there that want to pull us away. On and on it goes.

He says, I shall not be moved/be shaken. You know, that’s up to each person, the kind of mindset one needs to have. It’s something you have to determine, “I am not going to be shaken! Nothing is going to move me.” You know, Paul talks about, what is it that can cause us to be moved, to be turned away from God, from Christ? What is it out there that can turn us in any fashion or form? And basically God lets us know there is nothing that can. If you look to God, if you go through the process of repenting when God shows your sins to you and you repent of those things, God forgives us and He will give us the help and strength to keep moving forward. But it’s something we have to want! It’s something we have to be determined in responding to and having this kind of a mindset, “I will not be shaken! I am not going to be moved! I don’t care what comes in the next few months; nothing is going to turn me away from this way of life!” Do we have that kind of conviction, that kind of mind? I don’t care what it is! Life, death... Death... Who gives a flip! If your life is in God’s hands where else do you want it? What do you want to hold on to? God! Not always life; God.

Because sometimes things we want, and we want to hold on to, things that we try to save, whether in our own lives or other people’s lives, things that we think we can accomplish, that we can do on our own ability and our own power are the very things that can take us away.

In God is my salvation and my glory. Do we think like that? That’s something we have to ask ourselves. “In God is my salvation.” He’s the one who saves us. He’s the one who’s given us everything we have in life, physical and spiritual. Thankful for that? Grateful for that? The more we are the more we’ll enjoy our physical life let alone our spiritual. The rock of my strength, and my refuge is in God. It’s in God.

Trust in Him at all times... And the reality is we don’t as human beings, not even in God’s Church! We don’t trust in God all the time in all things. Things in this world, things about selfish human nature pull us away from that. We think we probably do. We may think we do, but we don’t. Either in this sermon or the next part that we go through we’ll discuss one area especially that makes that quite visible, quite clear that we don’t really place our trust in God. In this one here that I’m talking about is one where He commands us to do it. I’ll just tell you what it is – anointing.

People have become very slack in God’s Church, of letting themselves go through whatever suffering they’re going through without asking God’s intervention. That’s whether or not do you trust in God? Because He says to do that first above everything else. It doesn’t mean He’s going to. He may let us go through certain things. He may let us experience different things even with health or whatever it might be. Our life is in His hands. But there are certain areas we are to look to Him, and it tests us if we really trust in Him and what He tells us. In this one here He just tells us this is what you’re supposed to do. It’s even a command. When you’re sick you are to call on the elders, the ministry, to be anointed. It’s not an option. That one there alone screams volumes to me in God’s Church of people who have let down, immensely down, in the last several years; just in that one area alone, of whether they really are trusting in God.

Put yourself to the test because that’s a big one there. You can think, “Well, I do...” No, you don’t if you don’t obey. That’s in a matter of obedience. What about other things in your life? Do we really trust in God or are we trying to work things out our own way? And it doesn’t mean that we don’t have to work and strive to do things on our own, because we do. There’s a balance in that like this series has been talking about. So there’s balance and soundness of mind. But, man, the bottom line is, the first thing is to look to God. That’s what trusting in God is all about. It’s about looking to God, trusting in God, praying to Him about those things first and foremost.

Trust in Him...sometimes? Part of the time? When you feel like it? When you can’t do it all yourself? Even if you can do it all yourself we should trust in Him, we should look to Him. It’s a matter of looking to God to bless us in our choices in life. We have to make choices. If there is no sin in it then there are all kinds of choices people can make in life but then we want God to be a part of it, to share in it. It’s a matter of sharing in life with God.

Trust in Him at all times you people; Pour out your heart before Him. This goes hand in hand. To trust in God is to pour out your heart before God, to God. It’s opening up. It’s sharing your life, the deepest things in your life and everything about your life with God day by day by day. God is a refuge for us. That sends chills up my spine. Selah. It means to meditate on that, think on that.

So this sermon has been about trust. We tend to think sometimes that we do trust in God and maybe think we do in all things, and I’m just telling everyone that no, you don’t. Everyone falls short. At some time we all fall short. If we truly trusted in God at all times there wouldn’t be any sin, let alone if we grasp that and what we’re like as selfish human beings reflects that we don’t always trust in God, we’re not always looking to God. We too often look to this, our way, the way “I” see it, the way “I” think about it, the way “I” think this needs to be done. There is nothing necessarily wrong with that if God is first, if God is in the picture first and foremost because we’re really trusting in God. I hope we can make that distinction in our thinking.

Some very important remarks were made in Part 1 that needs to be repeated here because this has a great deal to do with what we’ve been covering. I’m just going to read it as it was stated: “In God’s Church He teaches us a proper balance of how to trust in Him, and yet do for ourselves where we can.” We’re to do for ourselves what we can.

I think of this thing of healing. I maybe shouldn’t get in that because that’s yet to come here but there are things that God has given us in life. You know, for 5,800 years man hasn’t known a whole lot about the human body and about the care of the body and things that can be done with a human body to help. It’s just like technology that has developed over the last 150+ years of things we can do now. If we had certain mentality in certain things in some of this it’d be like, well, I’m not going to get a car because horses were fine for thousands of years and I don’t think I should use one. I’m being facetious.

But sometimes we have that kind of thinking when it comes to certain things having to do with doctors. God’s Church has had a bad problem with some of that. Those who came through Philadelphia and lived through some of those things, and especially I think of one evangelist that was very unbalanced in that. Not Mr. Armstrong, God’s apostle. If people had looked to that example and what he did in his life and what he did in Loma’s life and his influence in her life, what he did in his son’s life, who died in a car wreck, after a car wreck, and how he tried in every way he could physically so to give him the kind of help medically so to help him stay alive, but it wasn’t God’s purpose for that particular time that he should and God let him go through that trial, him and Loma.

But the point being is there was an example there. But some came along, and an evangelist in particular and some others as well came along and began to mess up this thing about faith and whether or not we’re looking to God. See, there’s balance and that was very unbalanced to think you can’t go to a doctor. People thought that! I know people to this day who have trouble taking an aspirin, a medication of some sort. You know, if you have a headache it’s like this guilt twinge, “Am I trusting in God? Is this a matter of faith and I don’t have faith in God if I do that?” Duh! That’s as bad as a person thinking they’re going to just continue riding a horse and not drive a car because that wouldn’t be trusting in God. Because the horse is created, but man, man brought along this technology, and man has developed this thing that goes so fast that it’s just too dangerous to ride in those things. You know, people had some troubles when they first came along – trains going faster. It’s like God never intended for us to go this fast. 10 mph! You know, there are people who went through some of that, not in the Church but in the world.

So again, in God’s Church He teaches us a proper balance of how to trust in Him. If I had some of the thinking that was used back even in this area here in particular because of a minster that was here, I wouldn’t be here. I remember visiting a deaconess in the hospital. It was her gall bladder. She was so riddled with guilt for being in the hospital. Its like, “I can’t be in the hospital. I should be at home trusting in God, having faith in God that He’s going to heal me. I shouldn’t be here because that’s not trusting in God.” Well, where did that thinking come from, that unsoundness of mind? Again, it’s a matter of technology and education and learning through time.

There are many things that human beings can do to help a body stay alive. Wars have shown that! There are things that have been done in wars long before. Most of the time it was just cutting it off, whatever it is, you know, to keep infections from spreading. At least they understood that you’ve got to stop that. And they did. Well, does a person if they’re in the Church think, “Well, you’re not going to cut off my leg. It may be gangrene, but I’m not going to have you cut it off.” But that’s all they understood. I hope you understand what I’m saying. Yes, there are things you can do.

They can cut through a chest through the bones. They can pull a heart part way out, and they can put devices in there to cool it down, (which has caused me a little longer to get well because it affected my lungs this time). So they can cool it down and they can take arteries out of your body. I don’t have many left that they can do that with. They let me know that. This is the second bypass. So anyway, they took two here out of my arm and they’re able to go in there and bypass the bypasses because they were all included. Nothing was pumping through those arteries so they put four in, bypassed four that were totally blocked. And right now I have more open than I’ve likely have had in twenty years. So I don’t think I’m going to get that same health back that I had twenty years ago, but, you know, I can try to think positively about that.

A lot of people are concerned that, “Hope this doesn’t mean we’re going to have more time! I hope it’s just so he can have more strength to do whatever he’s got to do here at the end.” My dread is I hope it’s not another book! Because some crazy things have happened in times past we know.

So anyway, we trust in God. He’ll guide and direct us to what we need to have and what we need to do. But this thing of healing has been a tough thing for many. But there’s a balance here.

Again, I want to read this. “In God’s Church He teaches us a proper balance of how to trust in Him and yet do for ourselves where we can.” It’s not a lack of faith to drive a car. It’s not a lack of faith to be in a plane. It’s like, “Well, if God had intended us to fly He’d have given us wings!” No. There’s that kind of mentality that has existed in times past.

The same thing is about healing. If things can be done for you it’s not a lack of faith to have something done, it’s just smart. You want to go ahead and stop now, that’s fine. That’s your choice. It was a Feast site, I believe, when a girl, teenager, got appendicitis. Father was a minister. Didn’t take her in. She died. Now, that’s a simple procedure...a simple procedure. Happened many, many years ago, but it still happened because of his thinking and his having listened to that evangelist, and he got his mind screwed up not understanding a balance about faith and how to live life. Anyway, sad. Sad. I’m so glad we’re way, way past that and the influence of that particular individual is no longer around anywhere.

“So God teaches us soundness in such things and He warns us of real danger when it’s potentially before us, of knowing when we are to more fully place our trust in Him and to flee from placing our trust anywhere else.” So He shows us how about those things and the dangers involved, of learning that we’re to place our trust in Him and to flee doing it any other way.

“How much of our lives do we truly place in God’s hands, His care, as a matter of trust?” So again, I’m reading what was given in that Part 1. “There are so many areas of life in which we should think about this trust and help that can more fully come from God as we focus more fully upon Him being very much a part of our daily life. This can have great impact in family life…” It’s like the degree of drama in one’s life. “…health,” in other words, healing and the medical profession, “…protection,” even planning for end-time events.

Some will struggle with some of these things. Where’s the balance? Church has tried to give what the balance is and what is wise in some of these areas. Even in that it’s still wise to be preparing and to be prepared. You prepared for maybe 2 or 3 days and that’s it, whatever is in your cupboard? Not too smart. See, at some point it’s coming and it’s going to last for a while, what’s coming on this earth.

I’ll tell you what, right now if you’re watching the news things are being set in place so quickly it’s really getting scary. All because of things having to do with—they don’t want to maybe call it that—trade wars. Every one that’s ever happened in history, that’s been of any magnitude, has ended up in war, great war. Every one of them of any great magnitude have always ended up in great war. Those things have countries shaken right now, some of the things that are taking place. Turkey. That is such a hot bed in such a hot spot right now it’s not even funny. That could change the world overnight.

So hopefully we’re able to get some news out there that you can’t normally just get here in the U.S. by watching CNN or FOX or any of those. You have to dig sometimes. And hopefully you’re able to come across some of those things from time to time.

So there are things that have great impact in our life. Protection, as I mention here, even planning for end-time events. Hope we’re still planning. Hope we’re still planning. Water? Don’t take it for granted. Just have a gallon jug in your house? Some day your water is going to quit. It’s not going to come into your home anymore. Things you take for granted….things you take for granted just aren’t going to be there. When there is no electricity water doesn’t flow, things don’t work. Those things are going to happen. So hopefully we’re being wise. God works to give us balance, teaches us through the Church what the balance should be.

Still a matter of trusting in God to go through all that time period. It’s not a matter of just saving yourself, because you can’t, but it’s a matter of being fully prepared with some of those things so that you can take care of what you can do and what you’ve been shown to do. So there’s a balance in there of trusting in God and yet realizing that in trusting in God oftentimes there are things we have to do that’s a part of that, He expects us to do, work that we have to do. It’s not just sitting back and letting God do everything.

Just like with healing and we don’t do anything, we don’t try to change our health, we don’t try to change what we eat, and we think we can just do anything we want to do and somehow when we get sick God’s going to heal us? That’s not how God works. He wants us to learn. He wants us to grow. He wants us to be wise. He wants us to do the things He’s led, guided, and directed us in in the Church about taking care of ourselves and how we do it.

Anyway, I’ve already mentioned some of these things, things about finances, safety, even in doctrine and what we’re given by God to believe. So again, just trying to catch up on some of those things that were given in Part 1.

So we’ve had three parts to this series and in Part 3 there were some specific areas of life that often try us as to whether we are truly placing our trust in God. In addition, there is a need to add to that specific sermon as something has changed since it was given, so let’s review one section of Part 3 and add a little bit to it before we proceed. I’m just going through some of these things we went through and I’m going to add a little more when we get up here.

Proverbs 1:7—The fear of the LORD… Again, we’ve read through this but just reviewing it and candidly adding a little bit to it as we go along. The fear of the Eternal is the beginning. It means “the principle part.” It’s the main thing “the fear of the Eternal.” In other words, to not listen to God, to not take into account those things that God gives to us, we should fear that. And yet our nature doesn’t tend to as human beings. The fear of the Eternal is the beginning/principle part of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. That’s what we are if we don’t want to grow and come to understanding the knowledge that God gives to us and that comes by applying the things that God gives and then in time it’s a part of us and it’s a matter of wisdom we have, the wisdom of God, the wisdom that comes from God of life.

So there’s knowledge, then there’s understanding, and then there’s wisdom. That in itself is an awesome thing to understand the process of. I’ve given sermons over it.

…but fools despise wisdom and instruction. My son, hear the instruction of your father. It’s our choice whether we hear what God says. I think of things at different times that even as far as the Church has given certain guidance and direction in things. I think of the battle we had of trying to get things under control when it comes to little iPhones and iPads and little things before services and during services and after services. We went through a battle with that for two or three years. There should never have been a battle. There should never have been a battle in any of that. But parents or whatever didn’t listen, didn’t hear what God was telling the Church. They had a better way or a different way or, “That’s his opinion. Who is he to tell us that this is how we should function within the Church?” Well, that tells us right away, that screams volumes as to whether or not we’re really placing our trust in God.

Do we understand how God calls us, how He begins to teach? He teaches us through the ministry Sabbath by Sabbath, and then things are given to us about how we’re to conduct ourselves in our lives, period. Period! That’s how He works with us. So if those things are deeply embedded in us, we know them, then when we hear something we think, “Ah, absolutely! I support that. I’m behind that. That’s the way I’m going to do it.”

To do anything else is rebellion, and God says rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft. Isn’t that amazing? But we don’t think of it being that way. “It’s just his opinion, it’s the way he thinks of it.” “It’s not a big thing. It’s a little thing.” “How short my dress is, how far down I can wear my blouse, or whatever it is, what I can show or don’t show.” “The length of my hair, whatever I decide to have I’m going to do. No one is going to tell me how to do that differently. I’m not going to be that much different from the world.” Think, oh, okay, God can’t tell you anything can He?

These things are things that have been with us from the beginning and through time in God’s Church. But they reveal much, don’t they? Where do we place our trust? Do we place our trust in God, that when we come into His Church He’s going to teach us the truth of how to live and continue to teach us? Or does He just kind of bring us along and then just let us go? Or does He continue to give us truth?

Now, a unique thing happened in Laodicea that led to the Apostasy, and I don’t have to go through all that again. But that was all of our fault, not God’s. It’s what we did. Amazing!

So, Hear the instruction of your father; that’s placing our trust in God. God’s first so we want to hear, we want to apply what He says. …and do not forsake the law of your mother. That is the Church. The Church is the mother of us all. God makes that very clear because that’s how He works. He doesn’t come down and speak to us. He doesn’t come down here and get in our living room and say, “Okay, this is…” No, He doesn’t do it that way. He speaks with human beings, through human beings. That’s how He teaches us. He’s in heaven.

Only rarely did He ever come on this earth in the form that could be seen, any form that could be seen. It wasn’t His form because no man can see it, no human being. It’s spirit. He’s spirit. But He appeared as a High Priest, Melchizedek at one time. He appeared as a man, again, to Abraham. Not just as a man at one time, but also as a High Priest. Two different ways He appeared to Abraham alone. Incredible.

God works through the Church. If only people could have remembered that, ever since I’ve been in the Church since 1969, to understand how they came into the Philadelphia era of God’s Church, they would never have spoken against Mr. Armstrong because they would have recognized he’s God’s apostle. He’s the one through whom God is working. That’s how we learn what we’re to do; that’s how we learn the truth. They are simple things, but they’re not for human beings and for human nature.

…and do not forsake the law of your mother, the Church, because things have to be decided, as we have gone through in this series already. Things change in the world, styles change, clothing changes, and sometimes in simple things like that things are stated of how we need to respond to it so that we can understand right moderation. Because the primary thing is moderation in life, and so we’re given guidelines.

Just like in drink, whether it be wine or beer in an evening or something of that nature, a mixed drink at a meal, guidelines are given. Moderation. What is the moderation? Now, I’ll be candid with you. For some, some people could probably sit down, because of their metabolism, because their bodies are different, and have four or five drinks… I’m not going to say four or five, but maybe four over a period of a couple hours and it not bother them, and they get up and nothing is there. Okay? I know because I tended to be that way, in times past. I don’t do that today, okay? I follow moderation, strive for moderation. So that helped me to understand that there are people.

I also know of people who can have two little drinks, two sips and they’re wacky. I’m serious! It’s like they had four or five or six drinks. Because alcohol affects different people in different ways, so some people, because we’re all different, respond to it differently. So we have the thing called moderation and guidelines within the Church and those who maybe just have a sip they learn pretty quickly they can’t touch it, period. It’s better to stay away from it, because if one little sip bothers you and causes you to lose control of things you’re saying and how to say it, just better not to have any at all, you know?

So we’re all different, so we should strive for the moderation, and those guidelines have been given by the Church: “the law of your mother.” The guidelines of your mother, and we should want nothing more in life but to do what we’re shown. Yet there are those who have resisted through time or try to make excuse of why that doesn’t apply to them – because they “are that type of person that can have four or five and it doesn’t bother me.” Well, you’re not trusting in God. You’re not listening to your mother. So what are we? “Well, I’m different and so I can do it.” No, you can’t. You’ve been given guidelines of what you’re to do. The example alone if anyone were ever to see or learn of that example alone is the major thing, is the most important thing, because it’s about love toward others.

…and do not forsake the law of your mother, for they shall be an ornament of grace upon your head, like a wreath upon the head, like a crown, as it were, almost. In other words, it’s like what you wear, that by living this way that’s how it appears in life then. It should make us feel and others should be able to see that as well, this is good, this is right. …and chains about your neck. Something that honors God; it honors God to listen to His Church.

Proverbs 3:1—My son, forget not my law; and let your heart keep my commandments. That should be our heart. That should be our desire. Love of God, love God and want to do what He says, to live by what He says. …for length of days, and years of life, and peace shall they add to you. You know, the more people—even in the world—the more people live by those laws that God has given to mankind, though they don’t understand them or know them themselves, the better their lives are going to be, the more peace there will be in their life. You know, if they have less jealousy or no jealousy, no envy, if they don’t steal there’s going to be more peace in their life than for those who do and practice those things.

Adultery, or whatever it might be, you want a little bit of war in your life? Screw up your marriage like that and that’s happened in God’s Church. People have not been immune from going off and doing dumb, stupid things, and there goes peace. There goes happiness.

So, years of life and peace shall they add to you. Do not let mercy and truth forsake you. I love that. The truth? Don’t ever let it slip. Don’t lose it. Hold on to it with all of your being. I think of that one booklet, I think it was the first one, Time is Running out, and that big sequoia. I think that’s what it’s called. The big one, the great big one. It was a picture there and it was about holding on to the truth, basically. That’s what it was about, in essence, holding on to the truths that God had given through Mr. Armstrong. That’s what we were given charge of. Then later on God gave us more. Don’t let them slip. Don’t let them slide.

Think of all the people that used to be right here in this congregation who are not here anymore because they let them slip between their fingers or just didn’t value them, didn’t agree with them. “Women shouldn’t be ordained,” or whatever it might be.

“Don’t let mercy forsake you.” So many things can be solved in life if people are merciful to each other. Not hard, not harsh, not expecting too much of others, being expectant. If we expect things of others you’re going to be disappointed. You should expect things from self first and foremost. If you want to change, this is all you can control. You can’t control anything else. You can be an example, a light, and so forth, and often times even in the areas of mercy. I’d far rather err on the side of mercy than being too hard on someone, see? And if I make a mistake and an error in that, well, shame on them if they misuse that mercy; not on me. Yet there are times, too, that you can’t show mercy, you must show correction. So there’s a balance, always a balance.

…fasten them about your neck; write them upon the table of your heart. We may just catch up today, okay. This is going to be a lot of catch up. Then so shall you find favour and good understanding, good success in the sight of God and man. That’s what it’s talking about here. If we live this way, if we think this way we can receive greater favor from God. God looks down upon that, “You’re learning.” See, you know what you’re learning when you show mercy? You’ve received so much mercy, how can you do less than to give mercy to others? Truly. If we really understand what God has poured out upon us – forgiveness of sin – who are we to hold something against someone else? So it has so much to do with how we think toward others.

Trust in the Eternal with all your heart. What we’re discussing here is about trusting, placing our trust in God. That’s what these things are about, placing our trust in God. That means we have things to do. Don’t let mercy and truth forsake you – don’t let them slip out between your fingers. That’s up to us! That’s not up to God! He gave them to us. He’s given us all the truth that we have. It’s up to us to hold on to it, to cherish them, to be thankful for them, to meditate upon them, to think about them, to pray about them, to remind ourselves of them. It’s not up to God! He already gave them to us! He wants us to hold on to it! That’s up to us. That’s up to “me.” We all have to make those individual choices. Trust in the Eternal. That’s what it’s about. We have to do things. God expects us to work at what He’s given us. We enter into His work, His labor, His way of life to live life His way.

Trust in the Eternal with all your heart, and do not lean to your own understanding. That’s our battle! That’s our problem, our battle! We tend to lean to our own understanding. Why we don’t need to ask for anointing – “Well, I’m not really that sick and…” I mean, we’ve all gone through those things. Sometimes I have to measure that in my mind, “How far do I go… This isn’t that bad yet, but do I want it to get really bad before I ask?” So I’d rather ask a little sooner. But we go through this in our thinking. Why wait? Why wait it out? Why toughen it out? Trust in God. Look to God. And if He heals you right away, blesses you, what an awesome blessing. If He doesn’t then whatever else I can learn by going through this so be it. It doesn’t mean God’s not there. Doesn’t mean that God didn’t hear. He just doesn’t answer every prayer you have because if He gives you everything you want, everything you desire, you wouldn’t learn. Even that, sometimes the answers are just not right now, there’s some things to learn here. Then it’s up to us to ask the questions, “What can I learn through this? How can I grow through this?”

In all your ways...In all your ways acknowledge Him. God must always be first. That’s what it’s talking about. Everything you do, in all your ways, whatever it is you put your hand to in life day by day is God first? Are you praying to God about it, to be with you that day in the battles you’re going to confront before you go to work, in the things you’re going to have to deal with? You want God there with you to help you, to give you strength, to give you sanity in dealing in this world?

In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths. See, God will work with us. We may not see something immediately right then and there, but if you’re looking to God and you’re acknowledging Him you’re going to learn through whatever it is you go through. He will direct your path. He won’t let you go through things without growing in the mind, and this is the most important of all. It doesn’t matter how much suffering we go through. It doesn’t matter how much of evil we experience in life. If God is there, if we’re close to God and we’re looking to God as we go through these things He will teach you; He will help you to learn things that you could learn in no other way.

I think of an elder’s report I read here this morning, brought tears to my eyes. Someone going through and talking about their life and what they have experienced and how they know God worked in certain areas of their life and they brought to memory what I’ve made a comment about and have made comments about at different times, that I wouldn’t trade anything I have gone through in my life for anything else, because in everything that’s been hard, that’s been difficult God has molded and fashioned something in the mind. “He shall direct your paths.” You’re going to learn. You’re going to grow. You’re going to be made stronger in God’s way of life. Without hardship, without difficulty we can’t grow. He can’t intervene every time we don’t want something to happen that’s bad in life. Then if we get upset and think, “Well, God, why did You let me go through this? Why?”

I think of Paul, you know, things that he went through. And if anyone had a time, an occasion to think, “What did I do wrong?” You know, all the things he went through. Shipwrecked, beaten, stoned so bad they drug him out of the city one time they thought he was dead. Now, I decided I don’t want to trade that one with him, but this last time around with this here cut open I did decide that I’d far rather be in the Mediterranean for a day or day and a half, because, see, after that it’s over. But I was in the hospital for nine days and I didn’t like it and I was hurting the whole time and afterwards. So that’s one thing I did decide I would trade with him.

But we all go through hard things in life and we can learn through it. We grow through it. It’s awesome! I’m dumbfounded now by reading some of the things in scriptures oftentimes about Paul and his being imprisoned, and basically is house arrest for so long in Rome, that so many of the letters he sent out he sent out from there. He was there for a long, long, long time. Amazing! And yet God blessed him in being able to send these different letters out that you can read in here now and he speaks of those things. See, because there was a time when some would talk about that he was a prisoner of Christ. It’s like, well, it didn’t mean he was in prison it just meant that this is what he recognized in his life, that his life was God’s and he was totally submissive. No, he was doing a work, a servant of Joshua the Christ, a servant of God Almighty, and God was still using him in a very powerful way to write things that are read to this day. Awesome!

It’s amazing some of the things we come up with our minds sometimes that just aren’t really there because it means a lot more to me now because I see it in a different light than I used to because of what I’ve gone through, what I’ve experienced. I wouldn’t have traded that for anything in the world, for what I’ve gleaned through it. Made me a much stronger person, given me insight that I couldn’t have any other way, and helped me to understand things of life and of people’s lives that I couldn’t have experienced any other way. I hadn’t been in those environments but I experienced it there, of what people live through in ways that most don’t comprehend, don’t experience. I learned a lot through that process, think differently toward a lot of people because of that as well, have a great burning desire to see things change in this world, to give people opportunities, to give people justice, to give people certain freedoms and help, things that they never got as they were growing up. It’s a sick, sick world we live in.

Verse 7—Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Eternal and depart from evil. Because if we rely on ourselves we’re in evil. That’s just wrong. To rely on self, to not trust in God, not to put God first, that’s evil. For us that’s really evil because our trust is to be in God and God is to be first. It’s commanded. It shouldn’t have to be a command. Basically it is.

As was stated in that Part 3 this can be about small things and big things. It doesn’t always have to be about big things in life. It’s about everyday life of trusting in God. Before you go off to work! You know, you talk about the importance and need of prayer, the things you have to go out and face sometimes in this world, the attitudes that are out there? Incredible.

It can be about matters like clothing style, length of dresses, swimwear. So again here, things in the Church, the mother of us all, what’s permissible to wear and what is not, the use of makeup, tattoos, the format of Sabbath services. That’s changed a lot and that tried a lot of people in the Church, took away sermonettes. Oh, revealed some attitudes that were there. It was like, “Who are you that you’re hogging up all the time for speaking?” I don’t know; let’s see… Basically I was asked that one time by one of the fellows because he wasn’t going to get to speak at the Feast. Well, that shows why he wasn’t going to anyway because of attitude I already knew was there. But things come to the surface.

I remember when we stopped the music. We didn’t have piano. We were so large at one time we had a piano player, as a whole, almost in every Church area. We had song leaders. Didn’t know anything about music, but we had song leaders. I was one.

So, things about format of services. The Church decides that. Things change so you change with it. We’ve made a lot of changes because of conditions that change within the environment of the Church that fit the need for this time. And yet I’ve known of and I’m sorry, but I see people in my mind, different ones. I’m talking about a lot of people just over this that quit, that got offended and quit just because of a change in different things in different format for Sabbath services. Quit! Now that’s a big thing to quit about isn’t it? Something changes in the format of services. “Well, it’s been this other way for 50-60 years and you’re going to change it?” Yeah. Are you going to change with it? Are you going to listen to the mother of all, you know, of us all?

So once again we’re going to address a matter of how we’re going to modify and update some matters of proper clothing to be worn in Sabbath services. I want to use this opportunity to stick this one in here. I am never going to wear a tie in Sabbath services again (no, take that back), as something that I feel I have to do. I will maybe do it at times if I choose to, but after going through what I went through I became even more convicted of how dumb it is for me to get up here and speak and have something tied around my neck tight when I have a bad flow of blood through my body in the first place. Why not just cut off the flow up to the brain. Now, that’s really smart for human beings, isn’t it? You get up and you give a talk, business men get up and they start talking. If they’d just loosen their tie they’d probably make more sense. They’re cutting off a blood supply.

Anyway, the point being is things have changed even in the world around us in moderation in that particular area, and so even in this we’ve had some struggles. People haven’t known what to do. “Well, what’s the temperature out today? Maybe I can go without the jacket and maybe I can go without the tie today because…” Don’t worry about temperature anymore, okay? Wear nice clothing, a nice shirt, nice dress pants or pants. We don’t wear things like blue jeans and whatever they call some of those kinds of things, maybe even different colors, but they’re blue jeans. They may be brown or black, you know. But even in there there is a balance because some things are nice materials now a day, the things that are made out there. So just ask God for help to use good judgment in those things.

But basically this is going to be what I wear from here on out, something that is loose around the collar here. It might be just an open collared shirt with a sports jacket or whatever. So you don’t have to feel that you have to wear a tie all the time to Sabbath services. It’s a choice. And if you like to do that and you want to do that, fine. Me, I’m tired of it. I’m just kidding. It’s come to the time here where I’ve thought, I’ve battled with this for a time, because I’ve been in that same mindset since 1969 and some things are kind of hard to change sometimes. That’s been a difficult one. But it shows something else, too, that sometimes we can get caught in a rut on some things like that and we don’t change because it’s so deeply embedded in our minds we think that’s the only way, that’s the right way. No, not now. Not in this age. Not at this time. I can just tell you, very soon now it’s going to change even more. But we have these things in society, things about what we think is right and wrong that comes from society, not from God. Okay?

They didn’t have this problem during the time of Christ. They didn’t have this problem in the early Church, okay? They didn’t have these problems of fashion in the early Church. Keep clean what you have. Wear the best that you have for services. That’s good. Try to improve where you can. That’s good.

But today this world is so screwed up; such pressure in people’s live about what you can wear and what you shouldn’t wear. Styles. We’re bombarded with things in advertisements. That’s why people have battles sometimes even with certain things because that’s what they see in the world around them and it’s like if you do something different or you do it more in a matter of moderation, if you don’t wear this particular brand… Give me a break! Can we get caught up in those things? Yes.

So it’s a choice. So I just want everyone, all the men to understand this. You don’t have to wear it. I probably will a few times when it’s really cold out, but I don’t want anyone to feel like they have to because of the past. There’s balance in this. Anyway, enough said on that.

Been a rather long intro, hasn’t it, to catch back up.

Let’s turn over to Proverbs 6 where we left off in Part 3. By looking at the last set of verses we covered at that time, verse 20. Again, Proverbs 6:20—My son, keep your father’s commandment, and forsake not the law of your mother. Bind them continually upon your heart and tie them about your neck. And when you go it shall lead you; when you sleep it shall keep you; and when you awaken it shall talk with you. Basically it’s just about a way of thinking and how you think toward God and towards God’s way of life, and a matter that you want God to be a part of your life and so the decisions and choices you make you want to make sure that they’re in unity with God and unity with the Church. It’s what it’s about.

“When you go it will lead you.” So, in other words, if God is first and foremost and our trust is in Him and that’s how we feel, that’s how we think toward God then that will lead us, that will help us to grow in balance and soundness of mind. It’s a part of how God will lead us and work with us through His power of His holy spirit.

Verse 23—For the commandment is a lamp, and the law is light. That’s an amazing thing. If God gives us things at different times, not just as a matter of something we can more clearly see concerning, like, the 10 Commandments. That’s much easier to see. But there are a lot of other things stated throughout scripture that are a light to our life, that brighten up our life. Things that are given in the Church to give us a greater uniformity, oneness, it’s important that a body have this as well, the Body of Christ.

One thing that I was always so dumbfounded by when I first came into the Church and so many people in different areas, Wichita, where they had about, when I first came in, Salina, then went down to Wichita for a time, and nearly 600 people in that one congregation. And you know, I was lost because I grew up in a town of less than a hundred people and here are 600 people in a congregation. But you could go visit any church area anywhere throughout the United States, and if you went around the world in different places, you went there, there was that uniformity and oneness. It’s hard to describe except that we experience it and we know that to be true, that you could talk to someone who is of the same mind and it’s like you’ve known them for so long. It doesn’t take very long you can start talking to someone in another area, someone of a different culture, different part of the world and it doesn’t take very long and it’s like you’re close and it’s like you’ve known them for so long. So that unity and uniformity that we have and how we do things, it’s worth its weight in gold. Not divisiveness. Not division. Not things where different area judge one another. Yet that started kind of working its way into some congregations, but it shouldn’t have.

For the commandment is a lamp, and the law a light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life. It’s an awesome thing to understand, “reproofs of instruction.” You know, when we hear sermons oftentimes it’s about correction. What an amazing thing that God’s people would actually ask for correction in a prayer. I tend to ask for mercy when I ask for that one. I learned that very early on, patience and mercy from God because sometimes if you see too much at one time it can be a little overwhelming. God’s very merciful to us, He truly is, and works with us in a very merciful manner.

“For the commandment is a lamp, the law is a light; and reproofs of instruction are…” It’s just the way of life. It shouldn’t be any other way. Because we’re selfish and we need to be able to address that selfishness in ourselves. Truly, that’s where the battle is.

To keep you from the evil woman, from the flattery… Now, something is used here in Proverbs to teach about things that are, that can be seductive as far as carnal human beings is concerned. But there are things on a spiritual plane, and that’s how this is used, that are seductive to the human mind. Part of that is self, relying on ourselves. Candidly, we’re drawn to that as human beings. And that’s a type of seduction that’s wrong because it works against God. It’s trusting and relying on something, even self, that’s wrong, and it’s equated with things like this. Because if we listen to self, if it disagrees with what God says, if we decide that we know what’s better, that we know what’s best, and that that doesn’t really apply to me, then we’re doing something that’s against God. If it doesn’t agree with God it’s against God, it’s against Christ, it’s antichrist. It’s against God’s spirit. God uses things like this to help us to learn there are things that draw at us.

That’s why this thing of drama, I hate it with all my being. People get caught up sometimes in drama and family drama and their whole lives revolve around drama. I don’t want to hear it. Go tell somebody else that might be interested because I’m really not interested. Hope you understand what I’m saying. To me drama is such a sickness in society, in the world today.

Look at what people watch on TV. People like to watch drama. They like to watch things in people’s lives, and if that’s not enough now a day they even do it naked out there and they’re afraid. You think, well, if you’re stupid enough to go around out there you ought to be afraid of something. Dumb! But its drama and people like to watch that kind of drama. I’m sorry. I don’t get it. I do and I don’t, but that’s everywhere out there anymore. Hidden cameras – not even hidden anymore. Just everything that you can think of that’s out there and people like to sit around and watch it. “I like the drama.” People get caught up in it and before long their life is drama. “Oh, I saw this but this is my experience. This is what I experienced last week. You’ve got to hear this.”

I’m sorry, but it’s that thing about drama just about kills me. We were in the airport, when I was still flying here a few weeks back, and about the last flight we were on I was in this long line. There was a woman behind me talking to a man behind her and I don’t know if they were married or just going together or whatever, but it was kind of weird. But she was going on and on and on about somebody, what they had done wrong, and she called them out on it and I had to listen to this as we kept going. This is a long line and she’s right behind me and I hear this drama all the way. I think, “Oh, give me a break. I’m going to start screaming here any minute!” because I hate drama so much. I didn’t know how the other person listened to it, it was like, “Oh yeah. Huh. Yeah. Uh huh.” I think, “Is that what your life revolves around? Get a life!”

I’m sorry, but we have to be careful in God’s Church because we have too many people caught up in drama right now in their lives. If your life starts thriving on drama, on what’s happening more than it does the Church or upon God and God’s way of life you’re in trouble! You’re in trouble! Get rid of the drama! Flee from it. Cry out to God for help to escape it because it’s bad. It truly is.

Anyway, we went on into and finished the series talking about Halal food, meat which is on the Muslim side. Then there was Kosher which is on the Jewish side. We discussed some of that and showing what the balance was and that there’s nothing wrong with it. Most people who attack those things have prejudices and so forth. That’s why they attack certain groups and the like. Yet some of their methods of how they kill and clean animals and put it in the market is better than some of the plants that are out here today. So you just have to ask God for help and wisdom in things that you do of that nature.

Anyway, let’s turn over to Colossians 2, continue on. We are going to get just a little bit of a start into the next section here as we continue on because that’s where we did leave off then, discussing about these things and the reason these things were mentioned is because people in the Church can get caught up in these and have, into something that’s kind of sweeping through different areas right now, this Halal meat, and it’s no different than other meat in a butcher store. Beef is beef. Chicken is chicken. And frankly, some of them do a better job of keeping things clean and working with it than some of the big plants here in the U.S. You go through some of those and there are some things you’d probably never eat again.

Colossians 2. So we’re going to continue in the flow of this series. The apostle, Paul, addresses much about the spirit of what we’ve been covering up to this point and throughout this series about putting our trust in God.

Colossians 2:1. He says, For I want you to know what great conflict, or “concern” is what he’s saying here. That’s what the word means. …that I have for you. So he’s just expressing something here toward the Colossians. He’s heard some different things that have come back to him from the ministry and he’s deeply concerned about it because he recognizes the danger involved here for the Church there in Colossi. It says, that I have for you, and for those at Laodicea, so another area that they knew of that was also going through some of this, and for as many as have not seen me personally, so that their hearts might be encouraged and joined together in love... God’s love.

So he recognizes here that as time is passing there are more and more who have come into the Church who have not met him, who have not heard him personally. So it’s only been through letters or through ministers that have gone back and talked to them about things that have been given to them through Paul, and Paul trained and taught different ones.

As it says here, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the knowledge of the mystery of God... Speaks of this, Paul speaks of this often as a mystery. I love the way he talks about it in Corinthians. But it’s referred to in this manner because it’s something the world can’t see, and even in this, the world of traditional Christianity. What we think, what we see, what we believe, we see it clearly. We know it. We believe it. But to them it’s a mystery. They can’t see it. In other words it’s something that they can’t understand. It’s something that is not clear to them, and so much so that they think you’re weird.

That you’d keep clean and unclean meats? “Well, that’s just for the Jews.” Or that you keep the seventh day Sabbath? “Well, there are Seventh Day Adventist’s, but don’t you understand that it should be Sunday now? It’s fine to do on Sunday?” And so it’s a mystery; they don’t know how to deal with us, with God’s people.

Then if you go farther into different things, and the farther you go, and even to the scattered group that’s out there now, what we have is a mystery. They can’t see it. They can’t grasp it. They think you’re nuttier than a fruitcake. “You don’t believe that,” the one they call “Jesus Christ has eternally existed?” Well, no, we know he didn’t. But neither did Joshua. I hope you understand what I just said. He didn’t eternally exist. That’s a part of the trinity. He had a beginning. He had a human birth from his mother Mary and his Father, God Almighty. Different from any other human being who has ever lived. That was his beginning. He had no pre-existence. He had a beginning then.

Then after he died he ascended to heaven, and as it makes it very clear in the book of Acts, the only one who has ever ascended to heaven of human beings, one, the Son of God. Awesome to understand those things. But to a scattered group out there even that’s a mystery and they think, boy, you really went off the deep end if you don’t believe that he eternally existed because they can’t see it it’s going to be a mystery to them until God lets them see it, because it takes God’s spirit.

That’s what Paul goes through in Corinthians explaining, it’s only by God’s spirit. We don’t know what we know because we’re smart. We don’t know what we understand and see because we’re so good at studying our Bibles or so good with a Strong’s Concordance. I’ve know of people who thought they were and thought they were learning things and coming up with ideas of things. No, the only thing they ever understood that was true did not come out of their pea-brains. When they thought that way it came from God Almighty! He has to give it to the mind to see. He gave us everything. When we were being called, when we were being drawn He’s the one who opened up the mind and gave us the ability to see it.

That’s why I’ve made comment at times about the first time I heard about the Sabbath, the first time I heard about Israel and how they’d been taken captive, the ten nations, and that only the Jews to this day, a part of Israel, not Israel (they’re just one of many nations), and how that the other ten tribes were taken up farther into Europe in regions of Germany, and then they spread throughout the western part of Europe, from Denmark, down through the Netherlands, all the way down through Switzerland, who is Gad. Great Britain, Ephraim. Then the United States from Manasseh and promises that God gave and said what these nations would become at the end-time. Awesome! But you know what? I didn’t have to go read those things. I did but I knew immediately when I heard it it was true.

It’s like something you see, you know but you’ve never known it, and that’s an awesome thing. The seventh day Sabbath? The holy days! The first time you hear it, and you talk about something coming together in the mind, Passover, the days of Unleavened Bread, and all of a sudden, it’s in your mind and you think, “This is so sound. This is so clear. God’s plan and what it means. Pentecost!” Nobody figured it out on their own. Not one person has ever figured it out on their own. God has had to open the mind and give it to them. It’s how He communicates, through His spirit to the spirit essence that’s in every human being. But until He does that that human being can’t see it. It’s a mystery to them. They hear it. They don’t look at it as a mystery, they just think you’re nuts. But you see it and you know it’s true.

Paul talks in this vein. I love it. I really do. Because I’ve known of so many in God’s Church who lost sight of this and they began to think they were smart, they were intellectual, they were seeing things that Mr. Armstrong couldn’t see or their ministry couldn’t see. I’ve known so many of them that went off in different directions, so much so that they had some little beings helping them out, and it became evident with time. Not things to monkey around with. People who have done that in the environs of God’s Church paid a horrible price for it, for such rebellion and disobedience to what God was giving to them. It’s even happened in this period of time of the remnant Church, that some have gone so far that they have these beings who are messing with them and have swayed them in different things and led them to such unbalance and weird things that have happened in their life. It should scare people. Should. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding, truly, to fear to leave the truth that God gives to us. Wow!

…to the knowledge of the mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ, in whom is hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. It’s in God. That’s what it’s making clear. That’s what Paul is saying here. These things are in God and if you’re able to receive them how blessed are you? That doesn’t make us better than anyone else. It doesn’t make us above anyone else. It just means we’re exceedingly blessed to be some of the first to receive it. Because it’s God’s plan in His time; He’s going to give that opportunity to all who will receive it. Not that all will.

…in whom is hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. In this I say…. It all comes from Him. Everything comes from God. Everything created comes from God. Everything that exists is sustained by God. Our wee, little brains can’t even begin to comprehend that one. What an awesome thing! He’s called us to share and to eventually become a part of His family. That’s the purpose of mankind.

People think their purpose is when you die you go one place or another. You go down and you’re going to get in a hot place from here on out or you’re going to go up and you’re going to be kind of in these clouds or looking on the face of God for all eternity or out there fishing, what you’ve always wanted to do. You get so sick of fishing after the first 20,000 years you don’t ever want to see another spiritual fish in your life! It won’t take that long. I hope you understand what I’m saying, how stupid some of that stuff is. It’s just that they don’t know. It’s a mystery.

How blessed are you? How blessed are you to know, just to know the different resurrections, that everyone is dead. I love that in the book of Acts where on the day of Pentecost Peter makes it clear to the Jews, because they didn’t all think the same way, and they said, David, of all people, the prophet David, the king and the prophet David, he’s still dead and in that sepulchre to this day. He didn’t go anywhere. He didn’t go up or down. After all these hundreds of years he’s still there, and the things he spoke were not about himself, not about him but about Joshua, the Son of God. Incredible! I love those scriptures in through there. Those are the things that reveal to us the truth, that there is only Yahweh who has eternally existed, the Eternal God, the Self Existing God.

How blessed are you to know such things? Well, it’s because God has given you the ability to see it, not because you figured it out. Not a one of us did.

…in whom is hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, and this I say lest anyone should beguile/deceive/mislead/delude/attract you with persuasive words. Anybody who’s been around for a long time through the Worldwide Church of God, lived through Philadelphia and on into Laodicea, especially if you lived during the time of Philadelphia, you have seen this over and over and over again, where people in our own midst with persuasive words and arguments would come up with different ideas to lead people in a different direction.

We had evangelists trying to do it. In the 1970’s, late 70’s, early 80’s, evangelists were doing it, preaching things that were different from Mr. Armstrong. Thousands of people followed them! Different ones, but followed them in different directions away from the truth. So that’s what he’s saying here, “I’m warning you.” “And this I say, unless someone come along who should deceive you, mislead you with persuasive words,” “attract” you as the word means in the Greek language, with persuasive words. They have a ring of soundness. Only problem is its carnal thinking. It’s not with God’s spirit. Some who left in this area here and some of the ones they tried to pull and some that they did pull – persuasive words because they didn’t agree with certain things and then they start talking about those things and it can pull at people.

For although I am personally absent, yeah, he was absent, yet am I with you in spirit. “I don’t have to be with you to know this, to see this, to warn you, to judge you of what your battle is.” So he says, “although I am personally absent, yet I am with you in the spirit,” because it’s of God’s spirit. God was blessing him to see, to know exactly what was going on.

I think of three years that I was away and all I had to do was have, as a whole, my wife, and some I might have talked to on the phone, inform me of various things, and because of God’s spirit this is what needs to be addressed, this is what needs to be done. This is how this must be dealt with in spirit because it’s from God. It’s in agreement with God. It’s not a hard thing.

For although I am personally absent, yet am I with you in spirit, rejoicing to see how orderly you are and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ. So he’s speaking to the group as a whole in this manner, and this is good. Showing them, “This is your strength.”

As you have, therefore, received Christ, Joshua the Lord, so walk in him… In other words, remember what you’ve received and walk in what you have heard. …rooted and built up in him… You want your roots to sink deep and then to be built up in him in the message that they received from the ministry, in the message they received from Paul, in the letter being written. …and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. The more we understand what God has given to us, the more we grasp that we didn’t do any of this on our own, the more we’re able to see and understand not a one of us is better than anyone else. It’s not about that.

Again, I see faces of so many who lifted themselves up because they were better than others. They were so much better they could sit at a table and have others with them while the congregation is down below, and being served on china because being so much better than the rest. That stuff just made me want to vomit. It does to this day because it’s so wrong!

People would go off to college, “You’re better than them.” “Do not date anyone back there because you’re better than that.” Where did that crap get started? Who started that? Some evangelists. What was that? What were they doing? Stirring up division. God never intended for there to be that kind of division. Mr. Armstrong worked to have three colleges to train, primarily, the ministry, and then you’ve got some people that come along to just screw things up and begin to put wrong ideas into the minds of different ones, that you’re better, you’re better than the ones that are back there in your Church area. That’s basically what they were told.

I remember some that came back out. I remember one. The first church area we had and we had some that came back out of college that were out there and they were so much better than everybody else. I’d do a slow boil inside; you think, no, you’re not. You’re far worse than most and don’t even see it, and yet you have this haughtiness that you think you’re better.

I think of this one that began to date, began to become serious about a particular man and she had to counsel because she wasn’t sure that he was worthy, basically. I’m not saying that as well as what I know my wife could tell me, because she remembers these stories more vividly than I do. Me, I try to forget them because I don’t even want them to pop back up. But sometimes it’s good that people hear them because these things happened because of human nature, things that should never have happened.

Surprised that Laodicea came along? Surprised the Apostasy came? Not one bit. That’s where things head when people began to be lifted up and think they’re better than others. What a sad thing to happen in the environs of God’s Church. No human being should ever think that way about another human being. And if people could think that way there would be no differences in how people treat each other in various things of life, male and female, race, whatever it is. Those things are inexcusable and sick! Yet they exist and they’re so plentiful out here in this world. They truly are.

…rooted and built up in him, in Christ, and established in the faith as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. I love that. Thanksgiving. To always be thankful for what we have. And if we grasp what we have that God has given to us and we’re thankful for that? You’ll be exceedingly blessed. Your mind will be far more balanced and far more at peace.

You know what? I’m going to stop there for today. I’m feeling good. I thought that I’d probably be worn out by this point in time but, hey, not so.

We’re going to go on, and this just tickles the tar out of me that we’re going to have Part 5 next week. So with that we’ll stop with this particular sermon today and continue on Part 5 next week.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1