Continuance in God's Love

If you have your Bibles, turn over to St. John, the 15th chapter, and let us pray. We're going to talk about continuance in God's love. I want you to pray with me this morning. Say, Father, open my heart that I can receive the engrafted Word with meekness, which is able to deliver me from everything that's not of God. Give me that spiritual ear to hear what the Spirit is saying to me today. For I am the temple of God, and Christ Jesus dwells in me, and I thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, Father, I pray for the holy anointing to come upon this Word, and come upon me, and come upon your people. I pray that you'll take this Word off the printed page and write it upon our hearts in the mighty name of Jesus.

Continuance in God's love. In other words, continue walking in His light. You know, in Thy light shall you see light. In His light, you come to understand what the Word is saying to us. You come to understand yourself. You come to a place where you can see inside of yourselves, because God will reveal your innermost beings, for it is God that works in you to do His will in you. So you have to cry out and have a prayer life with God and say, Lord, show me something in my heart that's not right. You know, most people always see what's wrong in someone else's life, and they don't know their hearts, because only God knows our hearts. For God is in us, and He wants to work His will out in us. The things that we begin so often fail, we so often fail to carry through.

So that means that we lack the grace of continuance. God never intends that some work should ever terminate, but that they should increase and abound until they go over into eternal perfections. Now, if you want love to be perfected in you, you can read 1 John 4:12, 1 John 3:18. It says, When you love one another in deed and truth, the love of God is perfected in you. It's when you love people in truth, you know, and it's when sometimes that you tell people the truth too. That love is perfected inside of you, and it grows. Christ in you is your only hope of glory. There's no other hope except through Christ. There's no other deliverer. There's no other healer. There's no one except Christ. He's the only one that can do anything for us or any man on this earth.

So the Galatians, you know, they didn't continue in God's love. The Ephesians didn't continue in God's love. They left their first love. And so many Christians today have left their first love today. Now, what does that mean? That means the fellowship. That means having fellowship each day with Him, piling around with Him, studying the Word, praying, exalting Christ. You know, my wife and I... Every morning we get up, we praise God and tell Him how great He is, and thank Him for writing our names down in the Lamb's Book of Life. And we thank Him for healing her. And I thank Him for raising me from the dead in 1976. I've never forgot that.

You know, don't forget what God's done for you. And don't forget what God's going to do for you if you walk uprightly before Him. Because He says, No good thing will I withhold from them that walk uprightly. He has a lot of things for us. He has peace. You can't get peace anywhere else. You can't buy it. They try to get it out of drugs. They try to get it out of all whiskey and liquor, but they can't get it. It's just for a season, but this lasts forever. God's love will continue forever and last forever.

Jesus said in John 15, verse 9, He says, As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you. Continue ye in my love. He wants us to continue in His love. If you keep my commandments, you shall abide in my love, even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in His love. These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, that your joy might be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. Now, His nature is not merely loving. His nature is love. The great expression of God's love toward humanity was at Calvary in John 3:16. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever would believe in Him. Should not perish, but have eternal life.

You know, that's good. God doesn't charge anything. He doesn't say you have to do anything but believe. Now that's eternal life. But the wedding, we have to press into the wedding. We have to prepare ourselves each day to be ready to go when He comes back or we'll be left. And that should put fear in us. The fear of God is departing from evil, laying aside the things that you know it's sin, and then you're ready. It means we have to develop a prayer life and a fellowship, a personal relationship with the Father and the Son. And as we do that, we'll start seeing things in our life that's not right.

You know, the Holy Spirit's job is to point out your faults, not me and not your brother. It's the Holy Spirit's job to point out your faults. He says so in the third chapter of Revelations, I believe in the nineteenth verse. Point out your faults. Now, 1 John 3:1 says, Oh, what manner of love that the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. What manner of love. You know, most Christians don't feel that love flowing in their hearts by the Holy Spirit because they don't keep on and continue, continue to pray, continue to ask God to fill them every day when they get up. My wife and I, we pray every day, and the Spirit of God just fills us with His love. He said the Holy Ghost would shed His love abroad in our hearts. It's what he said, if we'll continue in his love. If we don't continue having that personal relationship with him, we're not going to get filled.

If we don't make him first, we're not going to be filled. That's what he was saying to the Ephesians: come back to the first love and get filled with the Spirit. He tells them in the fifth chapter and 18th verse, he said, Be ye filled with the Spirit. He wants us to be filled every day with the Spirit so we can walk in the Spirit and go out into the highways and hedges and compel them to come in, and so we can let his light shine through us, that they may see his good works, his good works, his light shining through us. And in 13th chapter here, 34th, 35th verse, let's look at it. Look what he says.

He says, A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another as I have also loved you. Now, the new part was that he had never come down on earth and walked with man, and he proved his love to his disciples. He proved his love to the world, and he proved his love to his Father to hang himself upon that cross and die for our sins. Not one of us was worthy to be saved, but Christ hath made us worthy, and we're worthy now because Christ is in us, and only because Christ. And we come here to gather ourselves together. To encourage one another, but to lift up Christ, lift up Jesus, and then hear the spiritual word that's coming down from the Father through the one that's teaching or singing or whatever. Only Christ is important. And you know we're all the same. No matter whether you're called to preach or witness, we all been called to be a light before men, to witness.

But you're important. And if people will come to know that they're really important to the body of Christ, that they can witness out there in the highways and hedges, that they can compel them to come in, that God's house may be filled. For the laborers are few, but the harvest is plenteous, Jesus said. So we need to be going about our Father's business everywhere we go. There's not a lot of time. We've always heard that, but let me tell you something. It's true, because we know what's coming upon this earth. Sin is abounding, and He warns us in the 24th chapter of Matthew. And then He says, By this, by this love shall all men know that you're my disciples. That you have love for one another.

Now what does that mean? That means you have to have a forgiving spirit. Well, how many times must I forgive a man? Well, Jesus told Peter, four hundred and ninety. That's each person. Well, praise God. Isn't that wonderful, that Christ can forgive through us four hundred and ninety times? That means that we must just go on forgiving people for what they've done to you or against you. If you don't, then your heart's going to get hard. Your heart's going to get hard if you don't forgive. God will not forgive you. I mean, that's exactly what the Word says.

Well, you just don't know what he's done to me. It doesn't make any difference. Doesn't make a bit of difference what they do to Jesus, what they do to Paul, what they do to Stephen, what did they do to the disciples? They stoned Stephen. They cut Paul's head off. They hung Peter upside down. They killed Jesus, and he looked off the cross and he said, Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do. People don't understand what they're doing. Even Christians, most of them are walking in the flesh, in strife, and when they do, they're taken captive in Satan's will, according to the Word of God. Second Timothy 2:26, James 3:16. There's confusion in every evil work, and it's sad.

But through Calvary, we have the measure of God's love. We have the breadth, we have the length, we have the height, and we have the depth of God's love. And God gave me this a long time ago. The breadth of God's love shows its extent to all nations and all ranks. His love goes everywhere, in every nation, in every rank. The length of God's love continues from everlasting to everlasting. Praise God. The depth of God's love is saving those that are sunk into the depths of sin and misery. He reaches down, and I remember saying this years ago, He reached down in that old garbage can and pulled me out. Praise God, and saved my soul. And I thank Him and I praise Him, and I've been glorifying Him ever since. And that's what God wants. He wants you. He come down in the cool of the day to have fellowship with Adam. Praise God, He still wants to come down every morning and have fellowship with you during the day and at night.

You know, I have fellowship with Him all the time. I praise Him and glorify Him and give Him honor, and He wants you to do the same. And then the height of God's love is raising you up to heavenly happiness and glory. Oh, hallelujah. Your life is hid with Christ in God. He raises you up and sets you where? Ephesians 2:6, far above all principalities and powers and rulers of darkness as well, and spiritual wickedness in high places. He's raised you up to that heavenly happiness and glory. He's given you the joy and set you free. I'll tell you something: you have that personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ every day and pray and cry to be filled. Praise God, He'll fill you. He'll fill you if you stay there long enough. If you mean it, He'll fill you. And He'll raise you up and set you far above all those things. Praise God.

Divine love flows through a heart that's given over to Christ. Christians may have their doctrine perfectly straight intellectually and yet lack love. They may speak with tongues of men and angels and yet lack love. They may have the gift of prophecy and know great mysteries and have faith so as to remove mountains and yet lack love. They may give all their goods to feed the poor. They may even take their bodies and give their bodies to be burned and yet lack this divine love. And if it be so, what does God say? God says that they are as a clanging cymbal. It profits nothing unless that love is in there, because faith worketh by love, Galatians 5:6.

So what am I saying? I'm saying to you to love people in deed and truth, and the love of God will be perfected in you and your faith will work, because faith works by love. But if you've got hate and envy and jealousy in your heart, you need to pray and cry out, God, take it out of my heart and replace it with your divine love. Cry out. Cry out to God. God wants you to. He wants you to be a man and a woman that'll be out there on the firing line telling people about Jesus.

But He wants you to walk in what you talk. He wants you to live what you tell other people to do. If you don't, you dishonor God. Romans 2:17 through 23, you can read it. You dishonor God. And I don't want to dishonor God, do you? Praise God. In spite of their gifts, and in spite of their knowledge in faith, and in spite of their helping mankind and voluntary physical tortures, they're nothing and are profited nothing. Why? Because they didn't continue in God's love. The Galatians didn't continue in God's love. I mean, they went back into Judaism. The Ephesians didn't continue in God's love. They were spiritually asleep.

He says there in the third chapter, he says, Arise, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light. He's talking to Christians. He's talking to Christians in the second chapter of Revelations that's left their first love. They started off right. God wants you to come back. He wants you to fellowship with Him every morning. He wants you to open your day up with prayer and praise Him and glorify Him and the study of the Word. And I'm telling you that you'll be a better person that day, and the Lord will day by day take your heart over. You'll die daily as you take that cross up.

Paul said, I die daily, that the life of Christ may be manifested in me. Do you want the life, the love of God to be manifested in you? Then you're going to have to die daily. You're going to have to take up that cross and deny self. And follow Jesus. Jesus said, If any man come after me, he said, first of all, you must deny self and take up your cross daily and follow me. This is a commandment of God. This is an order of God. Oh, you know what? People will take a doctor and they'll go to a doctor, and that doctor will give them all them instructions, and they'll do everything that doctor tells them. What about Jesus? What about His orders, the Captain of our salvation? Why don't Christians take His orders and obey them? The only thing, you know, and they wouldn't have to go to that doctor maybe, huh?

Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth, as your mind is renewed, as your will is turned over to God. Your body reacts to the Word of God because the Word is life to those that find it, and health to all their flesh. That's why the Word is so powerful. You know, the Word is quick, it's powerful, it's sharper than any two-edged sword. It pierces even down through the asunder of the soul and spirit, of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and knows all about your heart. You can't fool God. He knows every thought. He knows every intention in your heart, what you intend to do.

So we need to get our hearts right, all of us. We need to cry out to God, Lord, I don't want any envy in my heart. I don't want any envy. Envy is the rottenness of the bones. I don't want any jealousy. Jealousy is as cruel as the grave. I don't want any pride. Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. I don't want any covetousness in me. I want Christ to live in me. I want to be what You want me to be, Father. Praise God. You may always attend church. You may pay your tithes. You may go through all the routines of Christian life in the eyes of men. You may have a long list of things you do not do that you may feel mark the backslider.

But if you don't have a love relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, He sees you as one backslidden from His first love. His words to you in Revelations 2, verse 5 are, Remember therefore whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works. The first works is to have that relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, to praise Him and to glorify Him. People are so selfish. They're always praying for theirself instead of praying for their family and their loved ones. Oh, let me tell you something. God wants you to pray for the sinners out there, the ones that's lost. You have eternal life. He wants you to pray for your relatives to be saved.

But you want Him to hear you, don't you? Then you're going to have to walk with Him every day for Him to hear you. You're going to have to lay aside sin. If I regard iniquity in my heart, David said, God will not hear me. If you have any known sin in your life, God will not hear you until you get it under the blood and get it cleansed. To know what to do good and do it not is sin, James says in the fourth chapter and the seventeenth verse. To know what to do good and do it not is sin.

So if you have any known sin in your life, keep it under the blood. Don't do it anymore. Repent. Repentance means turn completely around away from what you were doing. The question that faces us individually is, how shall I keep myself in the love of God? I know I ought to do it. I know there's lax in my relationship to Jesus. But how shall I keep myself in the love of God? How shall I continue in God's love? What does the Scripture say? Let's look at the message of Jude. Turn over to Jude. It's right before Revelations. Praise God.

Let's look at the twentieth and twenty-first verse. But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. It says, Keep yourselves in the love of God. This is preceded by two points of instruction as how we can do this. First, we're to build ourselves up on our most holy faith. Second, how to do it is praying in the Holy Ghost. Praying in the Holy Ghost. You've had people filled with the Spirit and never pray in the Spirit. Christians never pray in the Spirit.

So if you hadn't been filled, ask God to fill you. Ask God to fill you. That's a commandment of God. God will fill you, but you must ask until you're filled, and He'll take your tongue over. And if you don't know how to pray as you ought, He'll pray for you. Romans 8:26 and 27 tells you that. We must do this. So that's another step of obedience that we have to do. There's so many Christians that have never been filled. They got saved, but they've never been filled. They got baptized with water, but, you know, I guess that they think that's all, or they've been taught wrong.

But Jesus gives a commandment in the fifth chapter and the 18th verse of Ephesians, Be ye filled with the Spirit. Well here, the Ephesians, I don't know whether they had been filled before, but I'm sure they had because they left the first love. But you know what happens when you are praying in the Holy Ghost, you build up your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, and that second scripture there, you keep yourselves in the love of God. What does that mean? That means protection. That means that Satan can't touch you. Praise God. You're surrounded by the glory of God and by the love of God, and he can't enter in. Sickness can't come.

The first point of this instruction reminds us of these precious words in Colossians 2:6. And let's look at—let me read that right quick. Let's look at it, and then we'll come back there. I want you to hold that place right there. Let's read Colossians 2:6. I said this reminds me of His precious Word. Let's look at 6 and 7 in the second chapter of Colossians. As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord—now we've all received Him, haven't we? Say amen. He says, Walk ye in Him, rooted and built up in Him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving. In other words, He wants you to abound in that place He's put you in, not to stop, but to continue on.

Now, how many Christians have stopped after they got saved and baptized with water and never went any farther? He wants you to abound in that faith. Praise God. Faith is spirit, as you started off. You know, every Christian that's been saved started off in the Spirit. But here come flesh, and here come preachers behind the pulpit preaching salvation again and again. But you know the word salvation means healing, deliverance, safety. It doesn't mean just, just, just being saved. I don't believe anybody here wants to be saved just as by fire. I believe everybody here would like to be in the wedding.

But according to the Word of God—and I'm not going to preach on it, but I got sermons on it—you won't be in the wedding unless you continue in God's love, unless you continue on with God, praying and being ready. That's simple. Praying every day, you'll be ready. Having fellowship with the Father and with the Son, and then one another that's walking in love. You cannot fellowship with a man that's not saved. You can talk to him and be good to him and work around him, but you've got to be a light before him. You can't enter into his dirty, filthy conversations, the way they think and the way they talk. You cannot enter in. You're in the light, and Satan's always trying to enter you into doubt and unbelief and all trashy talkings. He wants you to, so he can take you captive and destroy that temple, that flesh. And then he...

So the foundation of your most holy faith, the rooting in Christ, had its beginning in the new birth. Look at verse 3. In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Where are they? In Christ. Where did God put you? In Christ. Ephesians 2, verse 6. Your life is hid with Christ. You see, nobody can take my life. They can't murder me out here on the streets. I'm not going to be killed that way unless it glorifies God, as long as I walk in the Spirit every day. You see, Satan couldn't bother Job until God took the hedge of protection from around him and allowed him to test him.

Now sometimes God will take the hedge out and allow you to be tested and see what you're going to do about it, see if you're going to overcome, because He wants overcomers running His kingdom and His nations. And the thing about it, you don't have to be some big shot in this world to be an overcomer. Just be a Christian that loves the Lord, going on about your Father's business, hallelujah, learning to be obedient to His voice and His Word today. And you can be over a nation, or you can go whithersoever the Lamb goeth. That's what I want to do. I want to go whithersoever the Lamb goeth now. I want to go whithersoever the Lamb goeth then.

You know, there's a lot of people would, oh, they'd give anything to follow that president, to be in that inner core with the president. You know. Well, I want to be in that inner core with the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what I'm pressing toward. That's what I'm pressing for in my life. And whatever He decides that I can have, that's all right with me, Lord. But I want to be in that wedding. And I'm going to be, and the way I'm going to be is to trust Him and keep my eyes on Jesus. Don't get your eyes on circumstances. Don't even get your eyes on faith. Keep your eyes on Jesus, and your faith will work. Get your eyes off your problems.

But the only way to get your eyes on Jesus is at the feet of Jesus. Praise God. If you keep yourself in the love of God, your Christian life must be progressive, one in which there's a building up in union with Christ through faith. Calvary, the supreme expression of the love of God, makes no provision of spiritual stagnation. You cannot keep yourself in the love of God except by continuing to let the cross work in your life so that Christ may, Christ's life may, more and more take control of you. As Paul said, I die daily, that the life of Christ may be manifested in me and take control of me. That means growth. That means progress, the building of Christlike character. That's what it means.

The second point, let's go back over where I told you to hold your place to Jude. The second point of the spiritual instructions to keeping ourselves in the love of God is that we should pray always in the Spirit. Now he tells you to pray always in the Spirit in Ephesians 6:18. He tells you if you don't know how to pray as you ought, he says, then let the Holy Spirit pray for you over in the eighth chapter, the twenty-sixth verse. Now he needs your tongue, so he wants to take your tongue over. These signs shall follow them that believe; they shall speak with new tongues.

Jesus takes your tongue over and prays for you, takes your heart over. He's got to take your heart over first before He can speak through you. He's got to renew your mind so He can drop the Word of God from your mind down into your heart. Then He wants to write it on your heart so you won't sin against Him, the Word says. Oh, let me tell you something. It's very simple. All it is is to pray, seek His face, do His will as He tells you. How vital it is for us to yield ourselves by faith to the Holy Spirit for Him to pray through us. It's so important.

You know why it's important? It's because the devil cannot enter into that place. And I'm telling you, you won't have any thoughts that Satan tries to put in you while you're praying because he can't enter in with his thoughts. He can't even come against your mind. I'm telling you the truth, and the truth will make you free, saith the Lord God of hosts. So yield and listen to what I'm saying. Put it in practice in your life. He'll not spare flesh. He'll pray according to the will of God. Jude connects us all of this with the Lord's coming. Keep ourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy, looking for the Lord Jesus Christ, praying in the Spirit. If you pray in the Spirit, you're always going to be looking for Christ. You're even going to be looking at Christ. You're going to be changed as you pray in the face of Jesus Christ. According to 2 Corinthians 3:18, you're changed from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

That's the only place you can be changed. You can hear this Word. This Word is not going to change you unless, praise God, you pray to God and ask God to change you. Sure. Listen, Satan quoted the Word to Jesus. I've had all kind of people to get up and quote the Word to me, but their heart wasn't right. Didn't mean a thing. Didn't have any power behind it because the heart hadn't been dealt with. When the heart is dealt with, then you start changing. And only Christ in you is your only hope for that and the hope for glory. We're not talking about being saved. We're talking about growing up into sonship, growing up and be sons of God and daughters of God and not be babes.

Peter said in 1 Peter 2:2, he says, As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the Word, that you may grow thereby. He wants you to grow up into sonship where you can use His Word. He's not going to give His power over to these people that are not walking right in their hearts. He wants you to have that power. He wants you to use His Son's name and cast out devils and lay hands on the sick and win souls. He wants you to do that. But He wants your heart to be right. How often have we had heaven open to us, revelation of the Word in a time of prayer, only to lose both when the cross is presented to us in the daily walk. The Word gives light unto a path. What good is that light to us if we don't walk in it? The light. In that light, Psalms 36:9 says, You shall see light. You'll come to understand about yourself. And the more you see about yourself, you'll see how much wretched man's flesh really is.

And then you'll quit looking to people, and you'll see them, and you'll pray for them instead of finding fault with them. You'll pray for them. Yes, you'll see their faults. But you see, there's not one perfect except Christ, and He wants you to be perfect, and He's working in you for you to be perfect. And one day you will, when you receive your glorified body. That's when you become perfect. There's only one man that was perfect on this earth, and that was Christ. What did He do? He prayed all the time. He only spoke what His Father told Him to speak. He prayed all the time. He took the Holy Spirit. He laid His deity aside. He come down on this earth and overcome through the Holy Spirit. As a man, only He was God-man, but He laid His deity aside. And He says, You can overcome too. He said, I'll send back the Holy Ghost, and He'll teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I said unto you, and show you things to come.

The reason people don't know about Revelations, there's a lot of reasons. One is the preachers have never seen that in the first place. And the people don't study the Word for their own self and to find out about Revelation, and have the Holy Spirit to teach them and to reveal to them the depths of God. And only bondservants can really see in their hearts. A bondservant is one that's turned their whole life over to Christ. A bondservant is a person like David was. David finally come to that place. Oh, he sinned and failed and committed murder by proxy, committed fornication, but he finally come to see, now I see, my heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed. Finally, he come to have his heart fixed on God. And that's what it takes for our heart to be fixed on God. God wants to use you. He desires to use you, but it's up to you.

But the Word gives life unto our path, and to walk in it will always involve the way of the cross. Isn't that what our Lord said in Luke 9:23? He said, If any man come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. Well, I want to come after Him. I want to walk in that light as He is in the light, don't you? Then you're going to have to take up that cross. You're going to have to deny this. This here wants to do this, you know. Don't want to pray this morning. I don't feel like praying this morning.

Well, what are you going to do? You're going to deny this and pray, or are you going to let the flesh lead you? Simple, isn't it? You know, I remember, and I've said this before, but I'm going to say it again. I used to get up and I felt so bad, and I'd take hold and I'd play games. I'd say, Flesh, I'd roll out of the bed and fall on the floor. I'd say, In the name of Jesus, you get up and serve God today. Brother, let me tell you something. I meant it. And I mean that I'm going to serve God. I don't care as long as I can wiggle my finger to God, I'm going to do it. That's how determined I am to go on with Him. And I'm not saying that I'm the only one. There's a lot of men and women of God that's that determined.

But I know you need to have that goal, that goal determined to serve Him, determined to go on and continue in His love. A man who obeys is constantly being released from captivity. He is constantly being released from a satanic power. He is made free by the Spirit and by the power of God. Where does the power come from? Paul said in the 15th chapter of Romans, 19th verse, he said, Through mighty signs and wonders and by the power of the Spirit of God, I have fully preached the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. He wants you to fully preach the gospel.

Well, you can't fully preach the gospel until He gets full of you. Until you're filled with Him, then you come to know what His gospel says, and you start preaching. Oh, you can lead people to Christ when you're just saved. But what I'm saying, continue in the level of light you're in and preach what God has showed you and live what you preach. Then you can grow up a little by little. He takes your heart over, and as He does that, He gives you light. Then you can say, you experience, I preach that. I've experienced that. I know that God will heal. I know that God will raise from the dead. Because I have experienced that. And the things that you experience, you know. I mean, you know, the devil will even try to steal that away from your mind. That's why you need to pray and stay continuing in the love of God, because he comes to steal, kill, and destroy. He wants to steal that word out of your heart.

That's what he said in Mark 4. He said, as soon as the seed is sown, he's talking about the word, Satan comes to me to steal it out of your heart. In other words, if you get healed up here, the word went down and the Spirit touched you and you're healed, then he comes to steal it out of your heart through doubt and unbelief. And doubt and unbelief is sin. Hebrews 3, verse 12 tells you that. So biblical unity is not based just on love and acceptance. Biblical unity is based on both love and truth. Ephesians 4:15 says, and you can turn there and look at that, to speak the truth in love, that you may grow up into Him in all things, which is the head, even Christ. He said to speak the truth in love.

Now what do you got to do to be in love? You got to continue in God's love. You got to continue walking in the Spirit every day. And when you make a mistake, just repent and get right back in the light. See, if you get mad, well, you're over in Satan's will, repent. Get back in the light right then. Don't wait. Don't go to bed without repentance. Don't ever do that, because he might come back. Be quick to repent, and God will forgive you. He's looking for what? A repentant heart, not a perfect heart. He's already found Jesus, but He wants you to be honest and repent of your sins. When it's sin, you know it, repent, or your conscience will be smeared with a hot iron. And He's talking to Christians, and that's what's happened to most Christians. The majority of them today, their conscience has been seared, and when your conscience is seared, it has to be healed again. And when your conscience is right, you feel the presence of God in your heart.

Praise God. A lot of Christians have sick spirits. Their spirits need to be healed. Having these precious promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the spirit and the flesh, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Second Corinthians 7:1. Praise God. You have to do that. You have to get before God and cry, Cleanse my conscience with your blood. Have your conscience sprinkled with blood, and you can enter into the Holy of Holies and stay there. Satan's always trying to take you out of your place now. Always. And when he does, you don't have any power over him anymore. That's when he strikes you with sickness or something happens to your children or something. Men, you should be protection over your family. Women, you should be protection.

You know, the Bible says the wife sanctifieth the husband, the husband sanctifieth the wife. Because of what? Because of their children. Praise God. So you got to walk uprightly, ladies, just as the men have. Be obedient to the Word of God. Let's go back to John 14 chapter. We don't like too much, maybe. Praise God. Let's read the 22nd, 23rd. He said, Judas saith unto him, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world? Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words; and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.

Let's read verse 21. He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will do what? Manifest myself to him. He'll shed his love in your heart by the Holy Ghost. He'll touch that heart when you start keeping his commandments. Well, how do you keep his commandments? Well, I don't know all his—well, that's exactly right. You keep them by walking in love, because love fulfills all the commandments. Love fulfills all the commandments. And as you walk in that light, in that love, you see—well, he says, Raise your hands in the sanctuary and praise me.

Now God's talking to you, see. You don't do it because somebody else is doing it. You do it because the Spirit tells you, and you want to be obedient to his voice, and you just lift them up and praise him. You could care less who's watching you. You know God is. You know you're obedient to him. He says not to forsake the assembling of yourself together so much the more as you see the day approaching. When you read it, that's a commandment of God. It's up to you when you read it. He says to tithe. Given, it shall be given to you, good measure, pressed down, running together, shaken together, running over, shall men give into your bosom. That's a commandment. Can't touch you unless God allows it. There's no way. And what do you do if it comes against you? If you're walking in His love, God's allowed it. He wants to show you something. He wants to prove to you, praise God, that the Word will work if you use it.

And I taught, I preached a sermon, I think I got it on paper: Let us prove the gospel works. My wife today, thank God, she's proving that God's Word works. The doctors told her that she must have this operation. The doctors told her that a lot of her veins were closed. And the doctors told her that even if she had it, she wouldn't be completely... they didn't know. But she didn't listen to the doctors. She listened to the great I Am, hallelujah. And she did it because she desired to do it, because she desired to stand on the Word. And all I did was pray and had people praying. And I thank God. She went with a checkup last week, been three or four weeks now, I think. Everything's perfect. She's going back and be a witness before those doctors, and be a witness for those people, and she's a witness before me too, praise God. And God's bringing her closer to Him. And I thank God for it today.

And I thank God that God will bring you close. Trust Him. All I can say is the same as I said to her, Honey, you pray. You find out what God wants you to do. I can't tell her. I can't be your Holy Spirit. You've got to find out yourself. And the only way you can find out is through prayer. Now I'm going to be praying for you, and just as I was praying for her, and all the saints that's walking in the light will be praying for you. Because all people that walk in the light are prayer warriors, or they couldn't walk in the light. Right? Sure. Praise God.

So there's a path which no fowl knoweth. Isaiah 60, verse 13 says, I will make the place of my feet glorious. Habakkuk, the third chapter, says, Cleansing powers went forth from his feet. Where was Mary? Tenth chapter of Luke, she was sitting at the feet of Jesus, hearing his word. Brother, there was glory coming forth there. But her sister Martha was anxious. She was bothered about many things, Jesus said. She wanted to take Mary up from the feet of Jesus and get her over here and let her be bothered about many things. But the Word says through Paul in the fourth chapter of Philippians, and the eighth verse, fourth verse says, Be anxious in nothing, but in everything with supplication and prayers let your requests be known unto God, and be ye thankful. Praise God. Don't be anxious. Just pray. Wait on the Lord and see the salvation of the Lord work for you and in you.

Paul says the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love. Galatians 5:6. The only thing that counts, the only thing that counts, is faith expressing itself in love. Paul said, I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. That means we can continue in God's love, doesn't it? We can do all things through Christ who strengtheneth us. It means that we can continue in God's love every day. But we're going to have to pray. First Corinthians 10, verse 31. Turn over there. I'm going to close with this. It says, Whatsoever things you desire when you pray, O Lord, believe that you receive them and you shall have them. Praise God.

First Corinthians 10:31. Whatsoever you eat, whatsoever you drink, whatsoever you do, do it all to do what? To glorify God. So even when you take a drink of water, say, Lord, you know, I made this a habit. When I was working, I drank, you know, quite a bit then. And every time I'd take a drink of water, Father, I just drink this to glorify You. I eat this food to glorify You. Praise God. Get in a habit. Get in a good habit. And do those things what the Word says. So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth; it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.

Let's get up and thank God for the Word. Just thank Him and praise Him. Lift your hands up and just thank God for the Word.

Father, we thank You for this precious Word. We thank You, Lord, for these brothers and sisters that are here today. We glorify Your name, Jesus. We give honor to You. We give praise to You. We give glory to You, Jesus. O Lord God, we thank You today that You are the King of kings and the Lord of lords. We thank You today, Lord, that we're saved, and Lord, that we're going to be with You soon. Praise God. O Lord God. Father, we ask you to give the angels charge over our brothers and sisters as we leave here. We ask you to keep them safe in all their ways and their families. And Father, we place all our families upon the altar this morning. We ask you, Lord, the ones that's not saved, that you save their souls. The ones that's backslid, Lord, touch them. Only you can draw them to you. I know you'll heal their backsliding. You'll love them freely, and your anger will turn away from them.

But Lord, I know you have to draw them to you. You know how to bring the [unclear] back to you, Lord. We cry out that you bring them back. And Lord, put many souls in our path, Lord. Put many souls in our path that we can win to Christ. We know Christ in us will win those souls. Touch their hearts. Prepare, O Lord, the people in England as we go over there to preach, Lord, the crusades. Lord, prepare them in Israel and everywhere we go. Prepare their hearts to receive Jesus's word as we go. No, Lord, we pray for those people that prayed for us. I want to pray for all the people that was involved in praying for my wife, O Lord, in England, and Brother Jerry, and all the ones, and Leslie, and Mary Jo, and all the ones that was praying, Lord, that knew about it. I pray, God, that a blessing would be upon them. Lord, I praise you and glorify you.

No, God, we ask you to give the angels over Brother Bod as he makes another trip, and keep him safe, Lord, and his family. And Father, we ask you now to guide us as we go today, and give your angels charge over us to keep us in our way. In Jesus' name. And everybody said, Amen. Praise.