Death Faced without Fear

A Complete Death

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Consider the 2nd century believers in Jesus who displayed that belief, during the plague in the most brilliant light, for the Christians were the only people, who in the midst of so much and so great tribulation proved by deeds their sympathy and love of their kind. Some busied themselves day-after-day with the care and burial of dead bodies. They were without number and nobody else bothered about them. Others gathered together into one place all who were tortured by hunger and supplied them with food. When this became known, people glorified the God of the Christians and confessed that they alone were the truly pious and God fearing people because they gave proof of it by their deeds. And brothers and sisters, right throughout the centuries that is always the way that others have recognized Christians and it’s the way you see, that the New Testament emphasized.

You might like to look at one of those verses, they’re right through the New Testament and Old Testament, but one very clear one is there in Matthew 7:16-20. And it states this truth of the importance of Christian’s lives as a witness to unbelievers. Matthew 7:16, and Jesus is speaking and he’s talking about false prophets you see, people who say they are God’s servants but aren’t really, they’re dressed in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. And then in 16, “You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? So, every sound tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears evil fruit. A sound tree cannot bear evil fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.”

A Christian can’t behave in an non-Christian way. A non-Christian can’t behave in a Christian way. “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will know them by their fruits.” And you remember, we shared last Sunday that it doesn’t mean that you just exhibit the four classical virtues of temperance, and courage, and wisdom. It doesn’t mean that you just exhibit the virtues that Benjamin Franklin ( one of the American founding fathers) listed: integrity; industry; and loyalty. But it means that your life is filled with the beauty of Jesus’ own life and the fruits of his life are present in your life and by your fruits people know that you’re a Christian.

And you know that the verse that it’s very hard to get rid of in the New Testament that we studied last Sunday, puts this in very stark terms and it’s that verse, and you probably want to look at it to make sure such a heretical verse actually got into the New Testament. And it’s 1 John 3:9 and it is a verse that really sticks in our throats. 1 John 3:9, and you would like to feel that it’s a verse that John wrote in a moment of sleep, or in a moment when he was falling from grace, except that he keeps on writing it right throughout this letter. 1 John 3:9, “No one born of God commits sin; for God’s nature abides in him, and he cannot sin because he is born of God.” And you recognize a Christian because a Christian doesn’t sin. That’s it, a Christian doesn’t sin, that’s how you know a Christian.

Now loved ones, you know that Satan has got in with us on this verse and that’s why I dare to spend one more Sunday on it, because Satan has persuaded us all that that is heretical. That it’s in the Bible, but it’s a bit of the Bible that ought really to be examined, we don’t think that it’s absolutely true because we say, “Listen, I’ve been a Christian for years and I’ve found it impossible not to sin. So, I set up myself with my 60 years of life against this Bible that has existed for well, 1900 years,” anyway the New Testament. And so it’s very hard.

And brothers and sisters, do you see I sympathize with you with all my heart but do you see that we need to see what God believes and what God wants for us? Especially, in these days when so many look down on what is called the Christian church, we must try to see if there’s some reason for this and I believe we will find it in this verse. There are two extremes that Christians take towards this verse. One extreme is to over interpret it. One extreme is to proclaim an unscriptural perfection that is not God’s will in this life. That’s one extreme and some people do that. Some people take that verse and they proclaim an unscriptural perfection. A perfection of mind, emotions, and body, a perfection for mistakes from ignorance, from any unintentional deviation from absolute right that is just impossible with God’s help or without God’s help. And many proclaim an unscriptural perfection that just drives us into the ground. On the other hand, many others under interpret the verse and they proclaim such an unscriptural mediocre definition of sin that even a good humanist could live up to it, or a half surrendered Christian could live up to it, or a half born Christian.

Now dear ones, it’s important that we keep away from either of those, what Francis Schaffer ( Swiss theologian) would call the cliffs. You see, Christian truth lies down the middle and if you go far too over far to the left you fall off that cliff into unscriptural perfection and if you go far too far over to the right you fall off that cliff into a mediocre unscriptural standard that is too low. Now, we need to trust the Holy Spirit to keep us in the middle of the path so that we don’t fall off either cliff because if you call off either cliff it not only has intellectual difficulties and problems for you, but it also has spiritual problems.

Now you see how important it is not to have too mediocre a standard. The reason for that is that we have for years had such a mediocre standard for Christians, that Christians have been largely speaking undistinguishable from other people. And so in order to distinguish themselves they have invented cardinal sins, that they by their upbringing, never had anything to do with anyway. And so many Christians are so undistinguishable from people who aren’t Christians that they invent the sins. “Well, I don’t like the theater too much anyway, so it’s a sin to go to the theater and if I go to the theater I’m not a Christian. But I’m glad to say I don’t go to the theater so I’m a Christian. And, don’t drink. And I don’t drink anyway but it’s obviously a sin to drink and I don’t drink so I’m glad I’m a child of God. And, don’t smoke. And I’m glad I don’t smoke so I’m obviously a child of God. And don’t drink, and don’t dance, and don’t smoke, and don’t go to the theater.” And dear ones, you know that many of us have invented lots of other cardinal artificial sins in order to try to prove to ourselves that we are Christians because our lives has been undistinguishable from others by virtue of the fact that we have not lived as Christians.

Now the other thing is true, that one of the reasons we have so much evangelistic activity in the nation and so little revival, is that we have had a low mediocre standard of the Christian life. You remember, the promise that God gave us for the revival, “If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will forgive their sin and heal their land… ( 2 Chronicles 7:14) Now dear ones, we have great evangelistic activity in our nation but it is incredible that we have no deep revival. In other words, the courts are as full as they ever were, the jails are too full. The mental wards in our hospitals are overflowing. There has been no deep seated revival of ethical life and of emotional life in our nation, because really, we have proclaimed an unscriptural mediocre standard of the Christian life and we have slid around the whole business of sin.

Dear ones, it doesn’t matter which movement of God’s Spirit in our world’s history that you go to, it has always come from a new realization of what sin was. Really, it has always come from a new

realization of sin. Now, would you just share with me a little this morning? Let’s just look at it once again and trust the Holy Spirit to clarify it in all our minds. Let’s take the group that say that sin is anything that is not absolute perfection. That’s these people who say, “What that verse means is anyone who is not absolutely perfect as God is perfect, that person sins.” Or, “Anyone who deviates from absolute right at all, whether he knows it or not, that person is sinning.”

Now do you see that that means every one of us who makes a mistake has sinned. Every one of us who makes an honest mistake has sinned according to that definition. Let’s imagine that you’re in a group and I’m in that room with you and you don’t know that I’m from Ireland. And the conversation is going on and you make some sarcastic crack about those mad men in Ireland who are shooting each other. And you don’t mean to hurt me and you don’t mean to insult the place I come from, you didn’t know. You haven’t the perfect mind, you don’t know everything. You didn’t know that I was from that country and you didn’t intend to cause me any hurt or criticize me in any way. Now, do you see that that’s a simple mistake and that’s not sin?

Or say you, as an honest Christian tries to witness to someone on the University campus, and you end up putting them off Christianity, you end up causing an offense in them. Now, you did it with a pure intention and a pure heart and it resulted because you had not a perfect mind in saying something that put them off. Now, do you see that that’s a mistake loved ones? That’s not a sin and God does not hold us guilty for mistakes. Do you see also that if you held to the fact that sin was anything that was not absolute perfection, our emotions are unbalanced on many occasions, we do not have the perfect emotions of God. A times at a funeral we will indulge in excessive grief. Yes, we will grieve because of ourselves rather than for the sake of the dear one or another. At times we will indulge in excessive grief. Now, when our emotions are unbalanced the Father does not regard that as a sin.

It’s the same with our bodies. At times our bodies are set by weakness, and sickness, or colds and it prevents us doing what God would want us to do. That is not a sin. You see, God does not hold any lack of perfection in our minds, or our emotions, or our bodies as sins. He just does not. Dear ones, he defines sin very clearly for us and you remember, it’s in that verse James 4:17, and it has nothing to do with those mistakes, or ignorance, or involuntary unintentional deviations from absolute right. James 4:17 states plainly that sin is something that you do and you know you’re doing it, and you know that it’s rebellion against God at that moment you do it. James 4:17, “Whoever knows what is right to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.” That is sin. Sin is conscious deliberate disobedience to God’s will (to God’s will as you know it).

Now loved ones, it’s not enough for you to say, “Oh, I know that is wrong and that person is doing it so he must be committing sin.” No. That brother or sister may not have had that revealed to him in the way that you have. They are responsible to God for their obedience, you’re responsible for yours. You can never guarantee that everyone has had the light that you have had. But sin then is any disobedience to God’s will as it’s revealed in the 10 Commandments, in the moral law of Sophists, in the Sermon on the Mount, in the Beatitudes ( Matthew 5-8) , and in Christ’s own life, and in Paul’s Epistles.

Sin is any refusal to enter into obedience to God’s will as it is revealed there. So, for instance, let’s look at just one or two of them. If you look at Exodus 20:12-17. Exodus 20:12, “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which the LORD your God gives you.” So, if you deliberately dishonor your father and mother, and you know it at that time, that’s a sin. “You shall not kill,” and Jesus’s elaboration of that, “If you’re angry with your brother you’re

guilty of the judgment.” If you are angry, you know you’re angry, you persist in your anger, then that’s a sin. The Father is gracious to you before you’re baptized with the Holy Spirit when anger rises up in your heart, as long as you resist it the Father recognizes that. Now after baptism with the Holy Spirit it is possible even to get rid of that rising up of anger, but before that Jesus’ blood applies to your heart as long as you resist what is rising up.

Brothers, it applies the same way you remember, to that next one in 14, “You shall not commit adultery.” And Jesus said, “But I say unto you if you look unto a woman to lust after her in your heart, you are guilty of adultery.” It applies to that. Before the baptism of the Holy Spirit you’ll find your heart rising up and answering Satan’s temptation. As long as you resist that rising up, and you deliberately turn from it, God regards you as not sinning. Now after the baptism of the Holy Spirit it is possible to be delivered even from that rising up. But do you see that God is gracious to us? He asks us to deal with what we know is wrong at that time and to resist it and stand against it.

Now so it goes on, “You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house.” Now, if you do those they’re sins. And so it goes on you see, right through if you look at Leviticus 19:15-18 you’ll find that God states clearly there what is his will for us. Some of us think, you know, these things are wonderful discoveries of the social activist. Really, they were given by God 2500 years ago to a people. Leviticus 19:15-18, “You shall do no injustice in judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor. You shall not go up and down as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not stand forth against the life of your neighbor: I am the LORD. You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason with your neighbor, lest you bear sin because of it. You shall not take vengeance or bear any grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.”

Now, if you deliberately disobey that and you know you’re disobeying it, there comes a shadow into your heart. That’s why when you have a grudge against someone, or you hold a resentment against someone, there’s a shadow comes into your heart you see. God is faithful. We may not believe that he rejects us but he witnesses his rejection at that moment and his condemnation by a shadow in our heart, a sense of guilt. A shadow comes between ourselves and another person in that relationship. But sin is something knowing.

Now dear ones, some of us say, “Oh no pastor, sin is sin whether you know it or not.” No loved ones, sin is only a knowing, conscious, deliberate disobedience to God. Now you have that taught clearly for us in Leviticus 5. Leviticus 5:3-6, and these are concerned here with the laws of hygiene that God gave but they do indicate his attitude to conscious sin. Leviticus 5:3, “Or if he touches human uncleanness, of whatever sort the uncleanness may be with which one becomes unclean, and it is hidden from him, when he comes to know it he shall be guilty.”

So, in other words, there comes times when you do something, you don’t know it’s wrong at that time, but later on it comes to your heart, “That was wrong.” Then it’s up to us to turn immediately to Jesus and say, “Father, I didn’t know that was wrong at that time. Will you forgive me? I confess it now.” But you see, you aren’t guilty until you know it. “Or if any one utters with his lips a rash oath to do evil or to do good, any sort of rash oath that men swear, and it is hidden from him, when he comes to know it he shall in any of these be guilty.” But you can see yourselves, that God does not regard us as guilty unless we know we’ve disobeyed him. In other words, sin is a conscious deliberate disobedience to God.

Now, some brothers and sisters say, “Alright pastor, then I can see that sin is not ignorance, it is not an unintentional or involuntary deviation from an absolute right. It is not a mistake. I can see it isn’t any of those things, it’s something a conscious disobedience to God. Okay, now is it true that if you sin then God immediately rejects you, shows you that you aren’t his child and you have to start all over again?” No, loved ones.

If you do sin, we have an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous. Otherwise you see, you’d lapse into legalism and we’d all be walking in fear. See, if I was walking along and wondering, “Boy, if I sin once I’m finished. If I sin once I’m finished.” Then soon I’m walking in fear all the time. I’m wondering, “Where is sin? Where is sin?” No loved ones, you see children of God do not walk that way. Children of God walk in conscious joy and in absolute confidence that as Christians it is unnatural, it is alien to our nature to sin, it is something that we do not do, it is something that we don’t want to do. If we ever do it we thank God that we have an advocate with the Father and the proof of our childlikeness is the penitent heart. Immediately we make a quick adjustment, we go to the Father and we say, “Lord, we have sinned. We confess it to you, we trust you to forgive us.”

In other words, even after you’ve tied sin down to deliberate disobedience, do you see that we walk not in constant fear of sinning, we walk confident and joyful, and knowing all the time that if we do, in an emergency sin, then we have an advocate with the Father. Now loved ones, it’s important maybe to define emergency. Emergency is not just when we come into emergency situations, God is able to keep us peaceful and calm in those situations, and free from panic. But do you see that sin is an emergency? If you sin, that’s an emergency situation for a Christian. It’s something that is not natural for the Christian to do. It’s alien to him. He’s come into something that is against his whole nature and that is an emergency situation and he ought to treat it as such.

Now, let me show you the verse where God teaches that plainly. It’s that verse 1 John 2. 1 John 2:1 A and B, and many of us live on the basis of B and you should live on the basis of A and B. 1 John 2:1 A and B, that’s both parts of the verse, “My little children, I am writing this to you so that you may not sin,” that’s why I’m writing it to you, “But if any one does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” In other words, it’s like me saying to you, “Look, when you’re driving that oil light should never light. It’s not a natural thing for that red light to be on when you’re driving, it’s an unnatural thing. So, if that red light ever does go on it doesn’t mean you’re engine is ruined, but stop. Stop the car and get oil in it.”

Now, do you see that it is madness to live on the basis of the emergency? It’s madness to say, “Oh well, he said the engine wasn’t ruined if the light when on. Well, I’ll drive for 20 or 30 miles and when I have time I’ll put oil in the car.” You can see that it’s an emergency when we sin and we ought to treat it as such. Now, that’s what that verse means, that many of us have difficulty interpreting about mortal sin, you remember. Would you look at it in 1 John 5:17-18 and I’m sure you’ve had the difficulty that I’ve often had with it. 1 John 5:17, “All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin which is not mortal.”

In other words, you see, there is an emergency situation that arises at times in a Christian’s life when he sins, but as long as the whole bent of his life is against it, as long as his whole nature rejects that and treats it as an emergency, then that is not a mortal sin. But if a sin – if a Christian is walking in a sin weekly, or monthly, or periodically over the year, then do you see that he’s beginning to walk into a sin that will bring death? In other words, the attitude of a

Christian is, “Once I’ve received Jesus I’ve stopped sinning, and I have no intention of sinning from now on, and sin is something that I reject and resist as unnatural to me.” And this is the attitude dear ones, of a Christian.

That’s why brothers and sisters, I know you do it in a moment of extravagance, but do you see that we should not say that Jesus’ blood covers all pass sins and all future sins. That’s madness you know. That’s like saying to the Lord Jesus, “Lord Jesus, I know you will take the thrust of my sword into you at this moment, and I know you’re borne it and now I’ve stopped, you’ve forgiven them, but I know you’re going to continue to take every thrust that I put into your body from this day forward.” Now that is not right, you see. A Christian has no intention of sinning when he receives Jesus. As far as he’s concerned he is finished with sin and if he ever does sin it’s an emergency situation. Otherwise you see, he’s involved in mortal sin, or sin which brings death by willing repetitive volition.

Now, could we look just for a moment or two at the other extreme, the other attitude? Some people you see, take that ridiculous over exaggeration that sin is anything that is not absolute perfection, and that obviously is not what sin is. Some go to the other extreme and they say, “You’re dead right, sin is something that we can’t avoid, because after all let’s face it I know we’re children of God and all that, but we’re only human. We’re only human beings, and we cannot avoid sin. So, sin I something that occurs from time-to-time in the Christian’s life and the only difference between a Christian and a non-Christian is that the non-Christian’s guilt gets him down because he can’t do anything with it, it demoralizes him whereas we Christians, we can sin with impunity. We can sin and Jesus’ blood covers our sins, we get rid of the guilt.” In other words, we can sin without any guilt.

Now dear ones, do you see that that’s terrible? That is heresy and yet you know that many of us have come close to that, we’ve said sin is the normal part of a Christian’s life. Some of us have pleaded you see, 1 John 1:10, maybe you want to check it. 1 John 1:10, and some of us take that verse, “If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” And some people say, “Now there, if you’re a Christian and you say you’re happy you don’t sin, you’re a liar.” Now, do you see that it says, “If we say we have not sinned,” and John is obviously talking about fellowship between life in darkness and he’s talking about our previous pre- new birth experience. If we, when we were pagans, we said we didn’t sin in those days, then we make God a liar. All of us have sinned.

Now, some of us of course say, “Oh, but doesn’t Paul say, ‘I’m the greatest of sinners,’ doesn’t that prove that even he sinned?” No dear ones, you remember, Paul among other thing says, “The imitators of me, even as I am of Christ,” in Philippians he says, “Let’s as many of us therefore as be perfect.” In other words, he believes that you can enter into a perfect obedience, not a perfection of mind, or emotions, where you never make mistakes but a perfect obedience and we know that one of the marks of great saints is that the closer they get to Jesus the more they feel their own ugliness. And this is what Paul was saying, “I’m the greatest of sinners. Not only was I the greatest of sinners when I persecuted the church of God, but Lord Jesus, as I see your beauty, I feel more and more my own ugliness.” But Paul wasn’t saying, you see, “Oh I continue to sin night and day.”

Now, many of us say, “Oh well, 1 John 3:9 does not mean what the RSV ( Revised Standard Bible) says it means.” In other words, it doesn’t really mean does not sin. It really means what the Amplified Version ( A V – Bible) says it means. And the Amplified Version, you remember, says, “Anybody born

of God does not habitually sin.” Now loved ones, let me read from Christianity Today first of all, and let me share with you I am not a Greek scholar and I can read the New Testament in Greek and let me share with you that the Amplified Version is not a translation, you see.

If you notice, the Amplified Version is based on a linguistic principle that is actually invalid. That linguistic principle is that you pile synonym, upon synonym, upon synonym to get to the real meaning of the original. That is not linguistically valid. Now, this fellow, who wrote in Christianity Today say this, “The Amplified Version is a blessing at times,” you see I’m not saying don’t stop reading the Amplified Version but don’t decide doctrine and truth on the basis of the Amplified Version because it is like Kenneth Taylor’s work, it is not a translation – it’s a paraphrase.”

They say this, “The student should be aware that the Amplified Bible,” ( this is in 1965), “Which is based on an erroneous linguistic foundation,” in parenthesis, “The incorporation of synonyms and alternative renderings into the text in order to bring out the full sense of the original and Kenneth Taylor’s ‘Living Bible’ series, completed 1970, are not among the better English translations.” Well, dear ones, I don’t say it – just because they say it – but I know that it does not fairly treat the original or translate the original.

Now some of you may say, “Oh, but isn’t the original the imperfect tense?” The imperfect tense, doesn’t it mean the same as for instance in Latin,” any of you who know Latin, ‘amabam’ would be I was loving in Latin and I was loving can mean I was accustomed to love, or I used to love. And some dear ones say, “Ah, this is the imperfect tense here, it means I was accustomed to sinning.” Any one born of God is not accustomed to sin. He is not used to it, he does not do it habitually. But dear ones, the tense is not the imperfect.

Now brothers and sisters, I share with you in love again, it is not the imperfect tense, it is present tense, it is the ordinary present tense and it just means what it says. A ‘teetotaler’ doesn’t drink, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t drink habitually it means he doesn’t drink. A Christian doesn’t sin, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t sin habitually, he doesn’t sin.

Now some dear ones say, “Ah but brother, doesn’t habitually translate the sense of the passage more. I mean, you yourself have said that if we do sin in an emergency we have an advocate with the Father. Now, are you not saying habitually?” Well loved ones, I think semantically habitually in the English language does not mean that. For instance, if you say to me, “I sleep in one morning,” and you say to me, “Do you sleep in habitually?” Well, I answer you, “No, no I don’t do it habitually I just do it from time-to-time.” Now, that’s normally what habitually means, isn’t it?

Now, do you see that isn’t the sense of that verse? The sense of the verse is that there’s absence of sin in the Christian’s life. A Christian doesn’t sin. The purpose of the Greek is to exclude sin from the Christian’s life, not to limit the extent of the Christian’s sin. Not to say, “Well, a Christian, I mean, he doesn’t sin every day but he sins maybe weekly, or two weekly, or three weekly, or monthly.” Now loved ones, it doesn’t mean habitually it just means the Christian doesn’t sin and oh brothers and sisters, if we will rise to God’s standards for us, we’ll find more than sufficient grace in his Holy Spirit, to enable us to live in that standard.

Do you see, any humanist – Aldous Huxley, Bertrand Russell, Socrates, could live up to the low mediocre standard that many of us have interpreted God as wishing for our lives? Do you see that only a person who has received the Spirit of Jesus into himself can live at the level that God

describes in the Bible, and that’s the need for the new birth loved ones. If you’re having trouble with sin in your life, what you need is to allow God to send the Spirit of his Son into your life and that alone will enable you to live above sin, and to live in perfect obedience to God. Not to live above mistakes, not to live fearful of ever falling, but to live above sin in your own life.

Some of us say, you know, “But ah brother, that is a ridiculous standard. It is beyond human ability. It drives man to despair.” Praise God it does just that. Yes, it does. It does. Dear ones, if you can ever come to the Bible and say, “Well, that describes me I don’t need Jesus.” Then you’re in trouble. You see, you’re not reading it right. The whole purpose of God’s law is to drive us to the end of ourselves, to drive us to that place where Paul described in Romans 7:18, “I know that no good thing dwells in me. I know I cannot live this way by myself.” That is the purpose of God’s love, to drive us into the depths of despair until there is only one thing to do, that is to receive the spirit of this person Jesus into our lives.

Now loved ones, that is what the new birth is and what we need is a complete birth. We need a complete birth. We need not a believing in Christ, and a feeling sorry. That’s what many of us do, we feel sorry for our sins and we believe. We haven’t to do that, we have to repent and receive, not feel sorry and believe, but repent and receive. Stop doing the sins and receive the Spirit of Jesus. So brothers and sisters, if you’re in that position, you know, where you’re really having trouble do you see that it could be that you have not had a complete birth? You have not really dealt in honest repentance with the sins that were in your life, turned from them, and asked Jesus to come in. And so what you’ve entered into is an emotional osmosis of Christianity and not a real regeneration.

You’ve entered into a moral reaffirmation plus a set of doctrines and principles instead of a real repentance and an actual regeneration. Now it is God’s will for us to experience a complete rebirth and next Sunday I’ll share with you a complete death because it is that sin that rises up that needs to be dealt with and can only be dealt with by complete death. But oh I urge you to experience a complete birth as a Christian and find yourself walking in this way without resistance and without criticism.

Can I share one last thing? If you’re heart reacts against this truth, that’s an indication a wee bit of the state of your heart you see. A child of God, when he hears God’s truth responds to it even though he isn’t living to it. He says, “Ah, but I want that. I want that.” But the person’s who heart is not right reacts against it and wants to tear Isaiah out of the Bible, 1 John out of the Bible! But a child of God says, “Father, if that’s your will I want to be that and I want to be a lot more as well,” and you know that, that’s the spirit of your own heart if you loved your father and your mother, it’s the spirit of the child of God really.

Well I pray the Father, you know, that’ll he’ll keep us from error and from misunderstanding and that he’ll bring you into a complete rebirth that makes supernatural living possible. Let us pray.

Father, we thank you for the peace and quietness of this morning time together. And we thank you our Father, for your word that it does not bow to our human weakness, but it raises us into supernatural strength. Father, we thank you for that. We thank you above all that you are a loving Father, ever stooping down to lift us up. That you are more anxious to forgive us that we are even to repent. And oh Father, that you will at the end of the day forgive us until 70 times seven as long as our hearts are penitent and soft enough to repent. And so Father, we would trust you to keep us well clear of sin, enable us to see it as alien and unnatural, as the reason for the

atonement, as the reason for all that you have done in this earth, and Father enable us to hate it as much as you do, and to love purity and obedience as much as Jesus does.

Now Father, we trust you to give us a good day, each one of us. We trust you to guide us this day and to make us a blessing to each other in our homes and our dormitories. And now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and ever more. Amen.