Come, sing ye heavens and earth reply, Alleluia!
Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia!
Where, O death, is now thy sting, Alleluia!
Doubting ones, behold the same, Alleluia!
Where thy victory, O grave, Alleluia!
Love's redeeming work is done, Alleluia!
Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia!
Death in vain, forfeited rise, Alleluia!
Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia!
Sing we to our God above, Alleluia!
Praise eternal man's his love, Alleluia!
Praise him, all ye heavenly hosts, Alleluia!
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, Alleluia!
Oh, happy day, then mix my joys, I'll be my Savior and my God.
When his loving heart rejoices, when hell is wretched, all are proud.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
He taught me how to watch and pray, and live rejoicing every day.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
Oh, happy bond that seals my vow, to give the fairies all my love,
and cheer the lanterns to his house, all to that sacred shrine I give.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
He taught me how to watch and pray, and live rejoicing every day.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
He's done the great transaction's done, I am my Lord and David's son.
We truly live and follow on, try to confess the force divine.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
He taught me how to watch and pray, and live rejoicing every day.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
On the last, now rest my love, he died in heart.
He taught this blissful sinner rest, to never run like only fire.
With him I'll never resist.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
He taught me how to watch and pray, and live rejoicing every day.
Happy day, happy day, when Jesus touched thy sins of pain.
There shall be showers of blessing, this is the promise of love.
There shall be seasons refreshing, sent from the Savior above.
Showers of blessing, showers of blessing we need.
Mercies all around us are falling, but for the showers we cling.
There shall be showers of blessing, precious, reviving again.
Over the hills and the valleys, sound of abundance of rain.
Showers of blessing, showers of blessing.
Good afternoon, everybody, and welcome to Steadfast Baptist Church.
If we can go ahead and find our seats, we will get started.
And for tonight's first song, we will go to song number 258.
Song number 258, Christ Receiveth Sinful Men.
Song number 258.
Song 258, everybody, let's sing it out.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Come and eat, forgive your rest.
Trust him, Lord, his word is plain.
He will take the sinfulness.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Take it over and over again.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
In the message we remain.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Now my heart reveals me not.
You're before the Lord's hand.
He who blends, become a flock.
Satisfied, it's last event.
Sing it over and over again.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Make the message clear and plain.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Eat and eat with all my sin.
Birds from every spot is made.
Every limb I enter in.
Sing it over and over again.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Make the message clear and plain.
Christ receiveth sinful men.
Great singing, everybody.
Let's open up the service now with a word of prayer.
Lord, we love you.
We just thank you once again for this awesome church
that we get to gather here and sing unto you at.
And Lord, we love you.
And we just ask that you bless this service
and fill it with your spirit.
It's in Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.
All right, for our next song, let's go to song number 119.
Till the Storm Passes By.
Song number 119.
In the dark of the midnight
Have my arms in my face
While the storm howls above me
And there's no hiding place
In the crash of the thunder
Precious Lord, hear my cry
Keep me safe till the storm passes by
Till the storm passes over
Till the thunder sounds no more
Till the clouds roll forever
From the sky
Hold me fast, let me stand
In the hollow of my hand
Keep me safe till the storm passes by
Many times Satan whispered
There is no need to try
For there's no end of sorrow
There's no hope by and by
But I know thou art with me
And tomorrow I'll rise
Where the storm's never gone
In the sky
Till the storm passes over
Till the thunder sounds no more
Till the clouds roll forever
From the sky
Hold me fast, let me stand
In the hollow of my hand
Keep me safe till the storm passes by
When the long night has ended
And the storms come no more
Let me stand in thy presence
On thy prime peaceful shore
In thy land where the tempest
Never comes, Lord, may I
Well with thee till the storm passes by
Till the storm passes over
Till the thunder sounds no more
Till the clouds roll forever
From the sky
Hold me fast, let me stand
In the hollow of my hand
Keep me safe till the storm passes by
We are really, really
pressing hard towards that mark
and hopefully we can just shatter our previous records
Also on the right we have a list of our expecting ladies
We have some upcoming events, the Spanish Soul Winning Marathon and Breakfast
March 8th and 9th. If you do want to participate we'd love for you to come out for us
9 a.m. to 10 a.m. we'll be having just a meet up here at the building
but the Soul Winning again is going to be in areas designated to be
heavily Spanish speaking only so just keep that in mind
Of course there's still Saturday Soul Winning time with brother Jason in Arlington
for regular speaking, English speaking Soul Winning opportunities
The kids choir is going to begin March 2nd
If you have any questions you can ask my wife
Avengers Urbanic is going to be preaching for us March 12th
That's going to be a Wednesday night service
I'm really, really asking for people to please come even if you don't normally come on a Wednesday
just to support Avengers Urbanic
That would be really special
to have a big attendance and to have a lot of people
In fact y'all might even break the attendance record and get a bunch of ice cream
so it's just like a double win right? So you guys should try to come out
and it would be pretty easy if everybody showed up
Spring Recital March 22nd so if you want to participate in that
Also church reminders down there on the back we have our prayer list
I was hoping our missionaries would be back
before the service started to give a kind of a testimony
but I think that they might be in here just showing up a little bit later
Maybe they can give it after so I'd like to hear
I did get to talk to Evangeless Fur, they had already landed
and he said that they ended up having 209 salvations for the whole trip
and so that's really, really good, praise the Lord on that
And
even if they can't give a testimony today which I would prefer
but if they can't then we'll have it for another service
Definitely looking forward to hearing, he said that they have all kinds of amazing stories
They actually, I didn't understand the
itinerary exactly because I thought they were going to St. John but I guess they actually went to
Antigua so it's a little bit different than we were anticipating
but he actually said that he really enjoyed being there
and that it was actually very receptive and so he has a lot of cool things that he wants to share about
Antigua and I'm really looking forward to hearing about that as well
Hopefully we'll get to hear from them soon
Other than that we're going to sing our third song of the evening, Holy, Holy, Holy
So then your special handouts, Holy, Holy, Holy
Alright that was
Holy, Holy, Holy
Let's all sing it out together
Holy, Holy, Holy
Lord God Almighty
Early in the morning
As God shall rise to be
Holy, Holy, Holy
Merciful Almighty
God in three
persons
Blessed Trinity
Holy, Holy, Holy
Holy, Holy
All the saints adoring
Passing down their golden
crowns around the classy sea
Terrible
and terrible
Falling down before Thee
His Word and our hand
Evermore shall be
Holy, Holy, Holy
All the darkness
by Thee
All the eyes of sin open
Thine glory may not see
Holy, thou art Holy
There is none
beside Thee
Perfect in marriage
Love and purity
Holy, Holy, Holy
Lord God Almighty
Almighty
All my words shall praise Thy name
In earth, and sky, and sea
Holy, Holy, Holy
Merciful Almighty
God in three
persons
Blessed Trinity
Great singing everybody. Now as the offering plates are being passed around, go ahead and turn in your Bibles
to the book of John chapter number one.
That's John chapter number one.
.
John chapter number one, the Bible says, In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him,
and without Him was not anything made that was made.
In Him was life, and the life was the light of men, and the light
shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.
There was a man sent from God whose name was John. The same came
for a witness to bear witness of the light that all men through him
might believe. He was not that light, but was sent to bear witness
of that light. That was the true light, which lighteth every
man that cometh into the world. He was in the world, and the world was
made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own,
and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him,
to them gave you power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on His name, which were born, not of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld
His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of
grace and truth. John bare witness of Him, and cried,
saying, This was He of whom I spake. He that cometh after me is preferred
before me, for He was before me. And of His fullness have all
we received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by
Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. No man
hath seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom
of the Father, He hath declared Him. And this is the record
of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask
Him, Who art thou? And He confessed and denied not, but confessed,
I am not the Christ. And they asked Him, What then? Art thou
Elias? And He saith, I am not. Art thou that prophet?
And He answered, No. Then said they unto Him, Who art thou? That we may
give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself?
He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make straight
the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah saith.
And they which were sent were of the Pharisees. And they asked Him and said unto him,
Why baptizest thou then, if thou be not that Christ, nor Elias,
neither that prophet? John answered them, saying, I baptize
with water, but there standeth one among you whom ye know not.
He it is, who coming after me is preferred before me, whose
shoes latch it, I am not worthy to unloose. These things were done in
Bethabara, beyond Jordan, where John was baptizing.
The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the
Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. This is he
of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is preferred before me,
for he was before me. And I knew him not, but that he should be made
manifest to Israel, therefore am I come baptizing with water.
And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven
like a dove, and it abode upon him, and I knew him not.
But he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me,
Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on him, the same
as he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And I saw and bare
record that this is the Son of God. Again the next day
after John stood and two of his disciples, and looking upon Jesus as he
walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God. And the two disciples
heard him speak, and they followed Jesus. Then Jesus turned and saw
them following, and saith unto them, What seek ye? They said unto him, Rabbi,
which is to say, being interpreted, Master, where dwelleth thou?
He saith unto them, Come and see. They came and saw where he dwelt, and abode
with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour. One of the two
which heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother.
He first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, We have found
the Messiahs which is being interpreted to Christ, and he brought him
to Jesus. And when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou art Simon the son of Jonah.
Thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation a stone.
The day following Jesus went forth into Galilee, and findeth Philip,
and saith unto him, Follow me. Now Philip was of
Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip findeth
Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him of whom Moses in the law
and in the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth the son of Joseph.
And Nathanael said unto him, Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?
Philip saith unto him, Come and see. Jesus saw Nathanael
coming to him, and saith of him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom
is no guile. Nathanael saith unto him, Whence knowest thou me?
Jesus answered and said unto him, Before that Philip called thee,
when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee. Nathanael answered and
saith unto him, Rabbi, thou art the son of God, thou art the king of Israel.
Jesus answered and said unto him, Because I said unto thee, I saw thee
under the fig tree, believe is thou? Thou shalt see greater things
than these. And he saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you,
Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and
descending upon the son of man. Let us pray. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this day.
I want to thank you for the souls that were saved today. Thank you for the blessed
Holy Trinity. I pray that you would please help Pastor Shelley as he teaches your word.
Please give him clarity and help us to be attentive to the word.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
Before we get into the sermon this evening, I want to let
both these guys that just got back on this missions trip give us a little bit of a testimonial.
And so we're going to hear from Evangelist Fur about their trip
and then also Brother Marcel. So why don't you go ahead and give us a little testimonial.
Well, first of all, I just want to thank Pastor Shelley for giving us the opportunity to go.
The soul winning, if you've never, first off, I
have never been on a missions trip anywhere. And so this was kind of my
first opportunity to get out there and experience that.
And I have to say that at least the only litmus test
that I have at this point is that the soul winning in the Caribbean is amazing.
People are so receptive there. And I've heard so many
great stories about the Bahamas. And the Bahamas
did not let us down at all. That was the first island we
ended up going to. And we had ninety five salvations that day between the four
of us and then also Kenton. And so, yeah,
I mean, we were at the college pretty much the entire time.
And we happened to be there on a really good day because there was a lot
of people and there was just constant traffic
back and forth. We just kind of stood out in the open and it was just
constant preaching. I mean, it felt like I was preaching the gospel just over and over
and over and over again. And I pretty much lost my voice at the end of that first day.
And I think the total amount of times
I'd preached was nine times. I preached the gospel nine times back
to back to back to back. But it was awesome. I mean, it was great.
And then the second island we went
to was St. Thomas. St. Thomas was a little bit
more difficult, even though it was still very receptive.
We found a college there and were able to get a ride to
the college. The college was a little bit further spread out. And so it
wasn't as easy where you just had constant flow of people to talk
to. And so you had to work a little bit harder. Also,
the people there were just not as the young kids were just not as
receptive. I don't know really how else to put it other than they just kind of were,
you know, there was a handful that were nonchalant about the Bible
and God and just not really caring about
afterlife and things like that. Whereas in the Bahamas, it's
everyone cares about what the Bible has to say and
they're interested in knowing how to be saved. They're
very in tune with what the Bible already says about Jesus Christ
and the gospel and how he came to this earth to die for our
sins. And so getting them saved was so much easier, whereas you had to work
a little bit harder in St. Thomas. Also, St. Thomas is very mountainous.
So going anywhere on foot is pretty much out of the question.
We went to that college. We spent several hours there. We came back
to the port and Brother Marcel and I decided we're going to hike to
this apartment that was maybe three or four blocks away
from what we would typically think of a block. And it was
like a real hike because
we had to go up quite a bit and we were just exhausted
by the time we got to the apartment just walking up there. And we've got some
video of preaching and Brother Marcel, you could hear him
just, and then I'm like trying to preach and I'm like,
you know, trying to get everything out. But we got a couple
young kids saved up there in that apartment and
a lady and
then we got another guy later on as we came back down. So all in all,
we had 42 salvations there in St. Thomas. And then probably
the funnest island or the one that is
maybe more near and dear to Brother Marcel
and I's heart, I think, is the last one, which is Antigua.
Antigua was an adventure as
well. It actually wasn't even the island we initially thought it was going to be.
We were looking up and there's an island in the U.S. Virgin Islands right
next to St. Thomas called St. John's. So we thought because we had, it was
like back to back days, we thought that that was the island that we were going to. So
none of our scouting even really mattered when we
woke up because we figured out that we had actually sailed much further south to
Antigua. And Antigua is a very poor country.
I really felt like I was on the mission field there.
You did not feel like you were in a tourist area. Now there were some
shops and you could still experience
that if you will. But we
got, again we found another college that we, because we went to
two already, had some success. We thought we'd go to this third one. It was
not at all the same as the other first two islands.
We got to the college and there was a building there and there was
pretty much nobody there. And so we're like, great. Well we started
walking and we just got, you know, where the spirit blows
we will go, right? So we just started walking and we ended up coming upon
a school. It was a school probably for junior high
boys. And you know, brother Marcel,
as bold as he is, he just walks up there like he owns the place, you know. And we're
kind of following behind him as he's going through the gate and we're like, alright, well I guess we're doing
this. So we get up in there and we're able to preach
to pretty much every boy that went to that school
and got so many people saved. I believe our total on
that island was 58, but we were honestly only still winning for two to maybe
two and a half hours. Because it started raining so much
and I was pretty much sick the whole week, but I was
really feeling bad that day. And I could not even go any further
and it was going to rain, so we decided just we're going to cut it. And we had already
talked to everybody at that particular school. And brother Marcel,
he's got some good stories there as well. We got a lot on footage
for that. But that place for sure is a place that
I know both of us would love to go back to sometime and just spend
more time on that island. Because there's also
a lot of darkness on that island. A lot of spiritual darkness.
Catholicism is really big, but also
we ran into a lot of people that were Seventh-day Adventists or they've been influenced by
Seventh-day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses and just a lot of people hung up on
some weird hell doctrine and able to get a mother saved
that was kind of hung up on some of those things. And so
yeah, it was a great experience. Highly recommend
if you've never been on a missions trip that you have to
go to a missions trip in the Caribbean. You have to. It has to be on your list.
You know, the fact that we're going through the Bahamas as a church
and going to make it very easy for all of us to be able to do that,
I can't say it enough. You have to go. It is so much fun.
It's the easiest soul winning you'll ever do in your life.
It's great. It's amazing.
How many people did you talk to that were saved already?
Very few. Very few. I mean, I would say
on Bahamas was the only island I remember running
no, I did run into one person on St. Thomas. There was a girl
she had the right answers and then I was going to preach to her friends and they had to go
but she said there was actually a Baptist church there on St. Thomas.
And she was saved. So they must be preaching the right gospel there. But outside of that
there was very little.
Well I just want to say thank you to Pastor Shelley
and allowing us to do this mission trip. It was a lot of fun. It was better than I
expected. I wasn't expecting to get so many salvations. I believe we got a total of
209 people saved within three days of soul winning.
So it was a great turnout. I'll just go over a few things really quickly just about
the cruise itself. So it was my first time ever taking the cruise. I'm not sure if anybody has ever done
one. But the cruise was an experience.
You know if you ever watch Titanic it's like I don't know if I want to go on a cruise so
I had to have a lot of courage to do that. But the cruise is kind of
like a hotel on a boat and it's like a small town on the boat
where it's kind of like a strip mall. There's a lot of places you can walk
and buy stuff. The greatest part for me was all
the free food. I mean obviously it's not free because you got to pay to get on the boat. But it's breakfast, lunch
and dinner, snacks, desserts, coffee all day unlimited.
That's not good for me personally but I took advantage of it
because I'm like you know what you only live once so I was going to eat, drink and be married while
I was on the boat. What I think is really cool too is like
the cruise trip I think is really ideal for families because a lot of times
if you take your family on a vacation you have to like buy the hotel
you got to get a ride, your wife had to make food, clean up
the place. Whereas on the cruise they clean up after you, they clean up your hotel
room, you get all the food you want so you can feed your kids as much as you want
non-stop and they clean up after you, everything is taken care of. So I think it's definitely a great way
to spend a lot of family time and even do some soul winning with your family
or if you have a couple families go together just have the family go to the beach, you do some soul
winning. So there's a lot of great options I think with the cruise trip it's kind of
like you can have a good time just doing both so that was a lot
of fun. Now I will
kind of go over the Bahamas. So going to the Bahamas it was super
receptive compared to St. Thomas and St. John's. I kind of just
figured that St. Thomas you know just in the name itself is probably not a Christian
nation to begin with in St. John's. So it actually made
it was actually true because like when you go to the university in Bahamas everyone you
talk to they pretty much already have a lot of the gospel figured out
like we're literally entering into other men's labors and all we have to do is connect the dots
for them really quickly and they get saved right away. And when I was over there
I mean we were just there for five hours I mean it was literally non-stop soul
winning. You're talking to one person right here as soon as you're done you're going to the next person right here
and a couple things that I learned was like how powerful the word of God is and
when the Bible says that the word of God is quick and powerful it's no joke.
I kind of use this illustration as like if you see like a boxing match
if you watch Mike Tyson back in the day he can knock people out in one round
right. So like sometimes in the Bahamas all you have to do is show them John 3 16
Ephesians 2 8 9 and they're ready to get saved they understand the whole truth
there's no hang ups whereas in St. Thomas and Antigua
St. John's there was a lot of like doctrines you had to overcome so there was like
maybe a lot of seven day adventures that was there so we had to overcome like you know there's one
lady she was she didn't believe that Jesus was God. I was like you know I got a perfect sermon
it's called Trinity views let me send you a new WhatsApp and here you go watch this. So
there was a lot of doctrines and stuff like that we had to overcome and I kind of thought of this
verse I thought it was pretty cool in 2 Samuel it talks about like David and all his mighty men
and it says these be the names of the mighty men whom David had it says the Tachmonite
that sat in the seat chief among the captains the same was a dino the
ezanite he lift up his spear against 800 whom he slew at one time
and you literally feel like you're in a like in the battlefield because when you're in the Bahamas
talking to everybody nonstop you're just like killing one person killing the next person
killing the next person getting the next person safe getting the next person safe for five hours
straight I mean like I think we stopped maybe one time for water because now we would have killed ourselves
and poor evangelist fur literally like lost his voice
the first day just like Brent did last time in the Bahamas and then
he's like sick the whole entire trip he's not going to tell you this but he was sick as a dog
he was pale and I'm like you know I'm sick I like to be baby
I like to be pampered I don't want to go nowhere and he was still walking around the whole island
with us trying to get people saved you know blowing out snot
but he's like I'm alright we're going to keep it going and you know what
he definitely trooped it out and I thought of this verse about him because
it says right here it talks about one of David's mighty men it says he arose and smote the
Philistine until his hand was weary and his hand clave unto the sword
so literally like we're out there just fighting until there's none left
you know until your hand cleaves unto the sword the word of God and that's what we're doing
I'll just kind of wrap up on the last time on St. John's the story he kind of mentioned really quickly
actually I had to do two more stories so there's one more so St. John's was pretty cool because
we were into the university that's typically like our main focus let's go to university try to see if we can
find some younger age people to get saved but nobody was there so we were like well let's just
start walking and just see where God leads us right so there was a school
and there was like a gate but there's like a crack in the gate and there's like a bunch of people
and I'm like let's just go so we like snuck into the back
and like the guy there's like maybe eight kids in the front so we preached
them the gospel we get them all saved right away and I'm like hey who's the security
here he's like I am I'm like okay so like I was like well
if anybody acts I'm gonna just say you let us in he's like okay whatever so
literally like we're going inside we're preaching to kids and as we're talking to kids you have more kids
just coming talking to us and it was just like nonstop action for a couple of hours
kids playing soccer playing soccer we just stopped all of them got them all saved so that
was really cool now the last plug he forgot to plug this what
it was about the Baptist bias shirt I think he had about three four people stop
him just because of his shirt they're like oh that shirt is nice so one time we're at
dinner and there's an Indian guy and he's like he's like oh
Baptist you followed John the Baptist he was like
well you know we believed on the Baptist but we're Baptist and then he pretty much starts
preaching him the gospel and this guy gets saved at the dinner table this Indian waiter
and he gets saved because of the Baptist bias shirt so that
is something we all need to wear whenever we go out in a missions trip so that way
we can represent yeah and a lot of other people can stop them as well but yeah it was a lot of
fun Bahamas if you haven't been on a missions trip I recommend
Hali going it was the most receptive it was nonstop action
I think with obviously with this trip we got about 200 people saved so if you divide that by four that's
50 people I mean if you do two missions trips a year I mean that's 100
people you could get saved a year besides just your everyday soul winning on Sunday so
I recommend going to Bahamas check it out you know Pastor Shelley has a great zeal
for soul winning so let's follow him let's do as much soul winning as we can
here take
this and give that to them for me thanks
he has some great testimonials and of course we had two ladies on the trip as well
Miss Miller and Miss Garcia and I know that they also had
some great numbers some very zealous soul winners and honestly
we had an all star team go on this missions trip and
it's great to see people who even when they're not feeling good
just stick it out and be steadfast and you know it's hard to match
brother Marcel's zeal that's one of the things I just love about brother Marcel is
he just has a genuine love for getting people saved and
being a zealous soul winner and so if you ever get an opportunity to go
on a trip or soul winning these are two great guys to go with and really appreciate
the hard work you guys put into the soul winning efforts
and of course we appreciate our church for you know of course the money that you give to our
church we try to use in ways like this to go on missions trips and
send people out on the mission field and get people saved and really appreciate also
faithful word is kind of gave us the idea I'd never heard of this idea I personally
like don't want to ever go on a boat but like
I've seen Titanic alright so yeah but
you know they try to make it a lot of fun and I've heard from a lot of people
they really enjoy going on the cruise ships even if you're not going
soul winning it's just a fun time and you can have a good opportunity to
hang out I think some cruises they offer for
your children under I think the age of 12 for free so I think like some cruises
have special deals and special discounts we'll probably
try to organize maybe another event at the end
of the year that's going to be pretty similar to what those guys
did so you've got plenty of opportunities I know other churches are doing
cruise missions trips if you're interested you could always ask us and we could try to give you
that information additionally our church is doing the Bahamas October
6th through the 11th that's going to be a direct trip so we're just kind of trying to target
that one area and then we'll probably have another cruise missions trip that we
at least recommend if people want to try and go of course you can always do your own
thing you can always just grab a buddy grab a friend say you want to go
there are cruise missions trips that focus in Spanish speaking countries
as well so there's ones that leave from Galveston and kind of go down through Mexico
and kind of target a lot of Spanish speaking areas
so there's a lot a lot of opportunity really the
harvest truly is plenteous it's just who's going to go
and one thing that they didn't necessarily express but I want to reiterate is that
you know a prophet is not without honor save in his own land
in his own country and something you just don't really understand is how
people just want to hear the gospel from someone that's not there it's just
weird even America people sometimes want to hear from foreigners way
more than someone that's from America but when you go to these foreign countries
there's just something special about wanting to have a message
and wanting to talk to people people often will give you more attention and more
time of day and that's why it's such a unique experience that when you talk to
people in these areas and so you know it's some of these numbers
honestly they seem unbelievable like they just seem like they're not real
but I'm telling you it is there's something special about the Bahamas
I preach the whole sermon called Bahamas soul winning made easy
and look I'm not just saying it by myself everybody that's gone there has given the same
testimony and you know I don't know how long it's going to stay like that
just because obviously you know once you get everybody saved
there's not anybody else left to get saved but with 250,000 people
I think there's still a lot of opportunity we keep hitting the schools every couple years
so there's a new crop or new generation but obviously you know
it's good to get the getting when the getting's good right so
we want to try and work really hard and try to get a lot of people saved while we can so
just pray even if you can't go on one of these missions trips just pray that our
trips go well of course you know just being just someone
that supports our church really helps us with those and
we really appreciate the missions that we're doing down there and it helps us to try and compete
with Evangelist Urbanic who's in another awesome spot the Philippines
which is also a great place to go soul winning so thank you guys for
giving that testimony thank you so much for going out there also the ladies
that went out there they did a really good job and worked really really hard and so we appreciate that
I want to preach a sermon now in verse number 14
I want to start in verse number 14 of John chapter 1 that we read
the Bible says and the word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory
the glory is of the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth now
this sermon is kind of a culmination of the previous three sermons that I've already done
so we've gone through a trinity series and we've established
some really important doctrines number 1 that Jesus is God
the Bible is extremely clear we see this in verse number 1 right in the beginning was the word
and the word was with God and the word was God that shows that the word God
can be used in a couple different ways because the first mention of God in verse 1
is talking about the father the second mention of God is talking about
deity and so Jesus Christ is with the father and
Jesus Christ is deity he is God that's what the Bible clearly
teaches that Jesus is God he's just not the father and that was of course the second
sermon I talked about trinity views and how we understand the distinction of persons
we have the father son and holy ghost three persons
one God and in that sermon I lay out the evidence
in the Bible for them having their own will self and witness
which is constantly brought up in the gospel of John specifically
now this morning I preached a sermon on old
testament appearances of God and we see
you know several different places we saw in the garden we saw Jesus Christ
there with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joshua, Manoah
and his wife and then Daniel we see him showing up
now I'm not saying that's the only times those are the times that I see very clearly
you could maybe make a few other arguments but those are some seven really
clear examples of a Christophany Jesus Christ showing up
in the old testament however here in John chapter 1 verse 14
we have the Bible bringing up something changed about the Lord
Jesus Christ the Bible tells us in verse 14 and the word was made
flesh so something has changed here and this is what's often
referred to in a theological context the incarnation
who's ever heard that term incarnation yeah ok so
that's what I want to preach about this evening is the incarnation
incarnation I'm going to read for you what the dictionary
would say about incarnation that we're going to talk about it says incarnation is
being embodied in flesh or specifically in human form
especially a deity or spirit
if you look this up on Wikipedia or other places it'll say quote
the union of divinity with humanity in
Jesus Christ so many times people will refer to the
incarnation as the moment in time when Jesus Christ
put on human flesh and became a man now the Bible
is very clear about that that the word was made flesh and dwelt
among us so I want to talk about what that looks like and
kind of how do we understand then Jesus Christ appearing
in the old testament and then how do we understand the
incarnation how do these things work together now go over to John chapter 6 verse
62 go to John chapter 6 verse 62 and we're
going to look at some different verses on this John chapter 6
verse 62 Jesus says this what and if you shall see the son of
man ascend up where he was before so the Bible
tells us and it's very explicit that Jesus Christ is not a created being
Jesus Christ is God and Jesus Christ has eternally existed
additionally we've seen many pictures of the
quote pre-incarnate Christ where he appeared in the old testament
in the garden with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and
so on and so on so we have Jesus Christ appearing Jesus Christ
was in heaven prior to him coming down from heaven
entering into Mary's womb and putting on human flesh
now the Bible says in chapter 3 go back
chapter 3 look at verse 13 we're kind of just seeing some verses
that talk about Jesus Christ look at verse 13 of chapter 3
and no man ascended up to heaven but he that came down
from heaven even the son of man which is
in heaven now this is a very very interesting verse the word
even you always have to refer to it in my mind is specifically
okay so Jesus is talking to Nicodemus he's saying
no one's ever ascended to heaven no one's ever done that and then he
says he came down from heaven and then he says specifically
the son of man and then he says this which is in heaven
now that's interesting because how is Jesus Christ on the earth
talking with Nicodemus and then simultaneously
stating that the son of man is in heaven I don't know
but I do believe it right I don't understand how Jesus
Christ can necessarily be in two places at the same time
but this is evidenced by other verses in the Bible because the Bible tells us
in the revelation in other places about the Lord Jesus Christ that people
are going to be tormented in hell in the presence of the holy angels
and in the presence of the lamb so in some way
the lamb of God is going to be there with those being tormented in hell
I don't understand how that makes sense I don't exactly understand how that works
but obviously he's transcending our human capabilities of only being
in one place at one time now obviously humans
can also be in multiple places at the same time
in a different context because we can die
and our body can be here on earth and our soul and spirit can be
in heaven or in hell and so you kind of have a split
of who we are but I don't think that's necessarily how we would define
or explain these things I'm just saying you could technically be in multiple places at the same time
somehow Jesus Christ can be in heaven and he
can be on earth and talk with Nicodemus I don't understand that but
we see that he transcends our capabilities
he transcends our capabilities in a lot of ways in the New Testament and I want to show you those
go to John chapter number 8 verse 42
John chapter number 8 verse 42 but what's special about John
114 is that Jesus Christ literally put on
the limitations of humanity
that he really humbled himself and he really became a man
and he wasn't something that's like a hybrid where
he has a supernatural flesh he's Hercules or something
he really is just a man in a sense but we understand that he's
100% God and 100% man in the sense that he's still God and he's still
100% human there's nothing about him that's not human he really put on the limitations
of our humanity while he went through that experience so he could
experience exactly what we go through and what it's like
he went through the full human experience somehow when he came to
this earth and that's very special why is that special? So that he could be
touched with the feeling of our infirmities the Bible says so that he could
taste death for every man as the Bible tells us in the book of Hebrews
and that he could learn obedience as the Bible says
I mean just read the book of Hebrews and it really just kind of tells you why
Jesus did what he did and why it was so special his
experiences now John chapter 8 verse 42 says about Jesus
Jesus said unto them if God were your father
you would love me for I proceeded forth and came from God
neither came I of myself but he sent me so I'm just
proving very clearly Jesus Christ already existed he was already in heaven
he was with the father but he came down from heaven and he put on
human limitations mortal human
flesh which we would call the incarnation now
let's go to keep your fingers around here because we're going to go to
Mark but I want to go to 1st Timothy 3 first I want to go to 1st Timothy 3 and then we're going to go to Mark
chapter number 9 but we're just kind of proving some different things
here and this is kind of a Bible study so
we're going to look at a lot of verses and then we're going to make some conclusions here at the end
1st Timothy chapter number 3 the Bible says in verse 16
and without controversy great is the
mystery of godliness God was manifest
in the flesh justified in the spirit seen of angels preached
to the Gentiles believed on the world received up in glory now manifest means to appear
or to be made obvious so we have God appearing
and made obvious in flesh and of course we understand that to be
the Lord Jesus Christ who is also justified in the spirit
he was seen of angels he preached unto the Gentiles he was believed
unto the world and he was received up in glory he literally ascended up into heaven
where no other man has ever ascended they've been carried
by angels okay that's what the Bible talks about is how we would be carried he actually
ascended now go if you would back to Mark chapter number 9
Mark chapter number 9 now I don't want to get too far ahead
of myself but I do want to just make this point and then I'm going to prove it a little bit further
but the Bible makes it very clear that Jesus Christ
put on mortal flesh
put on mortal flesh when he came here but
even though he had that limitation he apparently has the ability
or God just decides at will that he could transform
Jesus at any moment in time and even though he has mortal flesh
while he was on the earth there was a moment when he
went through a special transformation or what's called a
transfiguration it happens in a couple places look what it says in Mark chapter 9
verse 2 and after six days Jesus taketh with him
Peter and James and John and leadeth them up into a high mountain apart by themselves
and he was transfigured before
them and his raiment became shiny seeding white as snow
so as no fuller on earth can white them that's really confusing sentence
it's just basically saying like a fuller is someone that's going to make
clothes white he deals with garments and cleaning them
and when it talks about making these garments white it's saying like
think about the most bright white cotton shirt that Haynes t-shirt
all cotton how white it is it's saying these clothes are somehow
whiter than that which we think of that as kind of like typically at Haynes pack
of white t-shirts it's about as white as you're going to get he's saying no one
could put this white garment on Jesus no one could make a garment that white
as the whiteness of the garment that Jesus had he was
shining so bright says and there appeared unto them Elias with Moses
and they were talking with Jesus so
we have the Lord Jesus Christ is in human form
but the couple of apostles here Peter James and John
they get the special privilege of seeing Jesus
transform back into his I believe previous state
his previous state which would be a glorified flesh state
so he's in a mortal flesh state but then he's transfigured
you could say this is a foreshadowing what he will be I think is probably even
what he had before but he's definitely capable of going in and out
of a mortal state and an immortal state and that's kind of
demonstrated here in verse seven when this happens it says there was a cloud
that overshadowed them and a voice came out of the cloud saying
this is my beloved son hear him so we talked about God the father
when God the father shows up he's always with clouds or something
he's always like clothed with fire or clouds again
why because you can't handle him right so he always has to be shielded
by clouds or by some fire or something like that
and yet we have that voice coming from God the father saying this is my beloved son
and so we have all these different confirmations of Jesus Christ
to these apostles and this is very important because they were going to have to go out onto a
very pagan heathen world preaching the gospel with the threat of
death regularly and so I think that God privileged them to see
many different confirmations throughout their life so they would have the boldness
to endure through great tribulations and great difficulties
and you know when God does miracles in your life or you see God really show up
in your life in powerful ways you need to take hold of that and really get it in
your memory banks so that when you go through difficult seasons in the future you'll remind
yourself of why you're still serving God and that God is powerful
and that God is real you know the children of Israel kind of forgot
about that Passover lamb I mean the death angel passed
over their house and did not take their firstborn that was a major event in their life
and here's that picture it's salvation when you got saved that was
a major event in your life now some of us got saved as a child who got saved as a child
in here yeah a lot of people who got saved as an adult
now for you that got saved as an adult some of you and I'm not saying all some of you
might have had an actual transformation of your life like you might have been headed down
a certain way of your life and then when you got saved you kind of made a major change
that should be something that signifies you God is real and he's done miracles in your life
so therefore you need to make sure to keep that with you and keep serving God
you know maybe some people they made a major transformation when they got baptized
like walking through the Red Sea maybe you started hearing really good preaching
or going through difficulties in your life and you made some positive changes and God's
really blessed you you need to really hone in on those changes
and allow them to stick with you so you keep saying steadfast you stay
with the Lord and you don't forget those experiences
we definitely have the Lord Jesus Christ transfigured for them and God the Father saying
hey this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased go over to Matthew
17 I want to show you this from another passage go to Matthew chapter 17 we'll see the transfiguration
of Jesus again so apparently God can just do whatever he wants let's just be honest
I mean he can he can take deity and he can cause
him to be born as a baby and be completely incarnated
to where he has human mortal flesh and the limitations of humanity
it's mind boggling how that could even happen I mean just birth itself is mind boggling
let alone to Jesus Christ which is deity clothed in flesh
not only that while he's walking on earth he says the son of man is still in heaven
additionally at any point Jesus Christ could just even be transfigured
like in a moment to transfigure and then transferred back
and of course God can just he can raise the dead I mean God can do whatever
I mean God can do whatever he wants so we can understand those things
we're just kind of getting an idea of what the Bible says about Jesus and his current state
look at Matthew chapter 17 verse 1
three tabernacles one for thee and one for Moses and one for Elias
while yet spake behold a bright cloud overshadowed them and behold a voice out of the cloud
which said this is my beloved son whom I am well pleased hear ye him
and when the disciples heard it they fell on their face and were sore afraid and Jesus came
and touched them and said arise and be not afraid and when they lifted up their eyes they saw no man
save Jesus only so they get to go up to the mountain they see this special
event Jesus is transfigured they see Moses and Elias
and then a shadow over
the cloud overshadows them or comes around them it's a bright cloud and of course it says
this is my beloved son whom I am well pleased hear ye him
and then they just like fall down because they're just terrified
it's an awesome experience and then Jesus comes and comforts them and he's kind of back
to normal it's kind of back to the normal situation but they see Jesus being
transfigured before them now
I want to take a moment here to talk about flesh in general
and I want to start in Genesis chapter number 6
go back to Genesis chapter number 6 one thing that we know for a fact and let's just
lay down some of the facts that we've already discovered number one is that something
changed about Jesus Christ in John chapter 1 verse 14
something changed because the Bible says the word was made flesh
something changed the second point that I'm kind of working
on is the idea that that flesh was a mortal flesh
meaning it was capable of dying it was capable of
perishing and that's important because without him putting on mortality
we could not have forgiveness of sins we could not have the death burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus
Christ so that was a major component of the transformation is that
the transformation was into human mortal flesh
then the third thing that we want to tease out and think about is how does that make sense then
with how he appeared in the Old Testament but before I kind of answer that question
I want to talk about flesh for a moment because the Bible paints this picture
that human mortal flesh is a problem
there's a problem with human mortal flesh
and in fact it's actually described as an enemy in the Bible look at Genesis chapter 6
and look at verse number 3 and the Lord said my spirit shall not always strive with man
for that he also is flesh
and today shall be 120 years so the Bible gives this idea
of us being flesh and there is multiple kinds
of flesh we're going to go through verse Corinthians 5 in a minute but I just want to prove this point
further go to James chapter number 4 and I want to go to James chapter number 4
and I want to show you another verse on flesh
but when we think about the flesh that's often what we talk about when we think about someone being
carnal or living worldly
we say this person is in the flesh what do we mean by that
we're saying this person is not really doing the things of God they're not really in the spirit
they are in the flesh and the Bible talks about
and we're going to get some of these verses how there's war between that flesh and that spirit
James chapter 4 look at verse 5
do you think that the scripture saith in vain the spirit
that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy
the Bible says there's something about our human spirit that lusts
unto envy and it's saying like do you think the Bible is saying this in vain
it should be obvious it should be obvious that our human flesh has problems
and what is one of the main problems the Bible says that our human flesh has
envy you know when someone says like oh I don't struggle
with envy they're basically saying they're a perfect Christian
because what the Bible is saying is that almost like the biggest problem that we all
struggle with and a thing that's very common is envy
and anybody that's in the flesh is going to often struggle with envy
envy is a major component and when you see someone being very envious
just take it to the bank that person is being very carnal they're in the flesh
they're not really thinking about spiritual things
so the envy is a major component of our human spirit
look at Jude we're right there just skip to the right look at Jude verse 23
let me prove again I'm trying to prove here something about flesh
there's a problem with flesh
Jude look at verse 23 others save with fear
pulling them out of the fire hating even the garment
notice this spotted by the flesh did you notice that the Bible
is bringing up this idea of being spotted by what by your flesh there's a problem
with flesh our flesh is what we call sinful
now go back to Romans and let's look at a few verses here on this
we're kind of proving now when Jesus Christ came
in flesh he obviously never sinned
he was without sin the Bible says he was tempted in all points
like as we are yet without sin but
we are going to sin we don't do things
perfectly and part of our problem is that we are in this flesh
and we don't have the capability of always making the right decision
overcoming that flesh and so we constantly are falling
victim of the flesh even the apostle Paul relents that he's often
a victim of the flesh Romans chapter 8 verse 7
because the carnal mind is enmity against God
for it is not subject to the law of God neither indeed can be so then they that are
in the flesh cannot please God notice that the Bible
there's a problem with your flesh now this is what's silly
is the Pentecostals and the Charismaniacs they think
that not wanting to serve God is just something they can slap you on the forehead and you'll magically want to serve
God but the problem is you're always going to be tempted to not serve
God while you're in the flesh because our flesh doesn't
desire God our flesh is very sinful we're often
failing we're often doing carnal things the carnal mind is at
enmity with God that's war there's a conflict there's a struggle
with us wanting to serve God because our flesh is so powerful
the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak and often our
flesh is struggling to serve God because it has no desire for God
it doesn't want to be with God it's our spirit that we have to walk into
that wants to serve God look at chapter 6 verse 19
Romans chapter 6 verse 19 says I speak after the man or men
because of the infirmity of your flesh
for as ye have yielded your member servants to uncleanness and to iniquity
and to iniquity even so now yield your member servants to righteousness and to holiness
now the word infirmity just simply means weakness so he's just saying the weakness
I'm telling you these things about not sinning because of the weakness of your flesh
because you're so weak and you're so likely to just be lazy
the chances of you being lazy are just so high
most Christians are just lazy bums that will never serve God
most Christians will never preach the gospel
most Christians will not do much for the Lord it's like where are the nine
nine out of ten didn't even say thank you one time
I mean a lot of Christians won't even go to church
a lot of Christians won't read their Bible let me tell you this a lot of pastors won't go out
and preach the gospel and when they won't preach the gospel they become a forgetful hearer
because they're not a doer of the work and so they invent false doctrine
to excuse why they don't actually evangelize they come up with weird ideas
like Calvinism to basically teach why they won't go out and preach the gospel
and try to evangelize and so you see presbyterians having those
beautiful churches you've ever seen your entire life because they don't spend a dime
on cruise missions trips they don't spend a dime going out there and actually evangelizing
and reaching people they just want to have a high tower few people
you know high steeple few people and they don't really care about the rest of the world
dying and going to hell you have people making dumb excuses to not go
soul winning saying well if you're too sinful you shouldn't go soul winning
that is a wicked satanic false doctrine I don't want to hang out
with these people I don't want to allow them to influence me I heard someone say
there's these certain soul winners who have the right gospel
with their mouth but they preach a false gospel
with their actions like what does that even mean
first of all I could be as sinful as possible and that does not
contradict my gospel presentation because you know my gospel presentation
teaches that you can do literally anything and if you just believe one time
you're saved I mean I'm at the door
and I'm explaining to somebody hey salvation is such a free gift and they're like yeah
are you super sinful yeah I'm super sinful but I believe in Jesus and I'm saved
that doesn't even contradict my gospel presentation
I heard this stupid pastor say this about like oh it's a good thing
people don't know what you're really like when you knock on their door to try
and give them the gospel and I'm thinking like yeah I'm glad they don't
I'm glad no one does do you really think I want to walk around with a list of all my sins
like here you go here's what I did this week that would be weird
we would have respect for zero people I mean just think if your marriage would
survive if for one day if your wife could hear every single
one of your thoughts especially if she knew that and started asking you questions
that would be really really dangerous you know it's just silly because
we have to realize our flesh is very sinful we sin all
the time the thought of foolishness is sin if you're not going to go soul winning
because you're too sinful then no one's ever allowed to ever go soul winning ever
no one's allowed to do it but you know what that's evil
and that's wicked and that's satanic you know what I don't care how sinful you are
preach the gospel period if you have the opportunity to get someone
saved you know what just get in the spirit a little bit for that one moment
and then just if you want to go back to the flesh whatever but you know what just get in the spirit
for 10 minutes and preach the gospel and you have to realize that yeah our flesh
doesn't want to do it so it comes up with all these excuses well I just feel too sinful
you know that's a dumb lame excuse you know don't make
excuses for not serving God you know that's your flesh talking not
the spirit the spirit is willing the flesh is weak the flesh is lazy
the flesh comes up with dumb excuses not to preach the gospel
or to do things for God Romans chapter 7 this is Paul talking about
it for I know that in me that is in my flesh
dwelleth no good thing for to will is present
with me but how to perform that which is good I find not he's saying man I just really want to do what's right
and I'm just struggling to figure out how to do it I'm so glad
for these chapters it actually makes Christianity realistic
where we actually think like man you like wake up one day and you have all these plans like I'm
going to serve God I'm going to read my Bible for two hours a day and I'm going to do all these things and then like
at the end of the week you're thinking like I failed you know you're like oh man I wanted to do
these things or you give up some sin or you're getting something right and then
a week later you feel yourself you find yourself falling back in the same trap
making the same mistakes having the same dumb thoughts losing your temper
whatever having envious thoughts being prideful being lazy doing whatever
because we're flesh and the person that gets up and acts like
well I serve God perfectly is a liar and a holier than thou
OK no one is just this perfect little Christian that never does anything
bad well I never cuss this is what I would like to ask this person
what about in your mind because it's the same
have you ever thought a bad word because that's also bad
I guess you're not so perfect no one is perfect folks
I mean the apostle Paul says I am carnal
for we know that the law is spiritual but I am carnal
sold under sin don't ever think like hey
if I serve God long enough then I'll just stop wanting to be carnal
no no the apostle Paul the greatest apostle doing great works for God
he still feels like in his current state I am carnal
the apostle Peter when confronted by the Lord Jesus Christ says
depart from me Lord for I am a sinful man
praise God that he picked sinful man to do great things for him
you know what Jesus didn't do is he didn't go find twelve holier than thou
to go follow him around and be disciples he found people that felt like they were
too sinful to serve the Lord Jesus Christ and even when they made mistakes
which isn't so funny to me I mean think about the mistakes that the disciples
actually made here's a mistake that Peter actually made
he denied that he even knew Jesus Christ don't you think that's a pretty big
mistake and yet sometimes Christians will crucify
other Christians over things that don't even matter at all
think that they should give up or try to demonize them when the apostle Peter
literally denied the Lord Jesus Christ and Jesus didn't give up on him
Jesus still wanted him to go out and preach the gospel and do great works because you know what God
uses sinful people he uses people that make mistakes and you know what
we're a bunch of sinful people that are saved by grace
and praise God I don't have to go and show a resume to people at the door before I give them
the gospel of how awesome I am and how many sins I've repented of
and how amazing of a Christian I am before I can convince them to be saved
in fact typically I usually just say hey if I told you that I've never lied before would you
believe me and they're all like no they already know me
they already know I've lied before they already know that I can do things
they're not sitting here thinking that I'm so amazing
this is a silly silly silly doctrine we understand that the flesh is not good
look at verse 24
oh wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of this death
I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord so then with the mind
of myself serve the law of God but with the flesh the law of sin
how many more verses do I have to prove to you that the flesh is a problem with flesh I think the Bible
is really clear there's a problem with our flesh now go to Job chapter 19
I want to also explain though that the Bible teaches while there's a
problem with our flesh we will still have flesh again in the future
we will still have flesh again in the future it's just going to be a different
type of flesh right now we have a mortal flesh
and in the future we will have an immortal flesh
and there's an interesting verse in Job look at chapter 19
verse 26 this is Job speaking if you look at verse 1 then Job answered and said
before you believe anything in Job let's ask who's talking
this is Job it's safe Job chapter number 19
look at verse 26 and though after my
skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh
shall I see God so notice how in the world is his flesh going to be destroyed
by worms and then in his flesh he's going to see
God because he's talking about how he's going to be resurrected he's going to die
worms are going to decompose his body but then he's going to be resurrected
and he's still going to be resurrected in what? In flesh just like the Lord
Jesus Christ when he appeared unto the 12 disciples he still
was in what? In flesh but he was in glorified flesh
he was in an immortal state so he has transformed
let's uh yeah let's go to Luke 24
go to Luke chapter 24 actually
before we get there go to 1 Corinthians 15 before we get there let's go to 1 Corinthians let's prove
this before I get to this point number 1 we've learned that Jesus Christ changed
in John 1.14 and the word was made flesh number 2 I'm
proving that it's mortal flesh which is really important you understand this from
1 Corinthians 15 and in the book of Hebrews it makes it abundantly clear what we're going to prove here
and then 3 we're going to talk about how he appeared in the Old Testament 1 Corinthians chapter
15 verse 39 here's a good verse
all flesh is not the same flesh all flesh is not
the same flesh now in this passage he's going to describe the difference between humans
and animals and different things like that he says but there is one kind of flesh of men
another flesh of beasts another of fishes and another of birds there are also celestial bodies
and bodies terrestrial the word celestial means heavenly the word
terrestrial means earthly ok but the glory of the celestial is
one and the glory of the terrestrial is another now of course Jehovah's Witnesses I'm not
sorry Mormons they'll take you here and they'll say that there's
3 different kingdoms in heaven there's like the celestial there's the
terrestrial and then they make up a word I don't know what the other one is but
telestial thank you telestial or something I don't even know what that is but
it's like terrestrial is earthly so it's like funny there's 3
kingdoms in heaven and then like one's earthly it's just like they just don't even
understand what this is saying ok because it's an interesting word we typically don't think of this
but terra like terraform have you
who's heard of terraforming Mars you heard that the terra is trying to make it
like earth or if you think about in Spanish if you speak
Spanish la tierra what does la tierra mean
earth yeah exactly la tierra is earth so it's a lot
easier for a Spanish speaker to understand we're talking about the terrestrial
we're talking about the earth so the things in the earth are different than the things in
heaven than the celestial bodies than the heavenly bodies
verse 41 there is one glory of the sun another glory of the moon
and another glory of the stars for one star differth from
another star in glory so also in the resurrection
so also is the resurrection of the dead it is sown in corruption
it is raised in incorruption so notice we're currently
in corruption we have a corrupted flesh but then we'll have
an incorruptible flesh verse 43 it is sown in dishonor
it is raised in glory it is sown in weakness it is raised
in power notice this it is sown a natural body
it is raised a spiritual body there is
a natural body and there is a spiritual body
so notice will be changed from a natural to a spiritual
body but of course the Bible uses the word flesh for both of these
verse 45 and so it is written the first man Adam
was made a living soul the last Adam was made a quickening spirit how bay it
that was not first which is spiritual but that which is natural
and afterward that which is spiritual the first man is of the earth earthy
the second man is the Lord from heaven notice again Jesus is the Lord
from heaven as is the earthy such are they also
that are earthy and as is the heavenly such are they also
that are heavenly as we have borne the image of the earthy
we shall also bear the image of the heavenly now this I say
brethren that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God neither
does corruption inherit and corruption we cannot go to heaven in
our current state of our flesh because it's corrupted
it's corruptible so it cannot go up into heaven that's why when someone
dies their flesh stays here and their soul and spirit goes up into
heaven okay and the only person that's in heaven with
flesh is the Lord Jesus Christ because he has been
glorified and he has the incorruptible flesh that is
in heaven okay so he is unique in that regard he's the first
fruits is what the bible says we'll get to bear that image though at some point
verse 51 behold I show you mystery we shall not all sleep but we shall be
changed in a moment the twinkling of eye the last trump for the trump shall sound
and the dead shall be raised incorruptible and we shall be changed just like Jesus
think about it and the mount transfiguration Jesus just
just just swapped right there in front of him right some people
will never die there are some people that are going to at the rapture
they are just going to in the moment of an eye and the twinkling of eye just bam just
immediately into glorified flesh and then they're going to be carried up
by the angels unto the Lord and will be gathered with the Lord
in the air and so shall we be with the Lord forever is what the bible says
so some people are just going to be immediately just bam we have a couple guys in the bible
kind of like this you have Enoch was just translated is what the bible says
the bible talks about Elijah and Moses we could have different opinions on that but
you could at least say Enoch he walked with God and he was just translated
whatever that means okay maybe you just I don't know what it means so you can come up
with your own idea but it says he was translated right now let's keep reading
because this is important verse 50 now this I say brethren that flesh and blood cannot enter verse 51
behold I show you mystery we shall not all sleep we shall be changed verse 52 and a moment the twinkling of eye
the last trump for the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible
and we shall be changed for this corrupt almost put on incorruption and this
mortal must put on immortality
so the bible says that we are mortal we have mortal flesh
and the bible is saying eventually we'll have immortal flesh
so now we're in mortal flesh then we'll have immortal
flesh verse 54 so when this corruptible shall put on incorruption
and this mortal shall put on immortality then shall be brought to pass
the saying that is written death is swallowed up in victory
oh death where is thy sting oh grave where is thy victory
so here's the thing if you're immortal you can't die
if you're mortal you can die it's that simple right what's the difference between
mortal and immortal mortal you can die it's possible
immortal it's not possible to die okay that's important to understand
go to Hebrews chapter 2 go to Hebrews chapter number 2
so we've learned lots of different things
number 1 Jesus changed number 2 he put on mortal flesh
we've learned that flesh is a problem we've learned that our problem
our corruptible flesh we'll have to put on incorruptible at some point we know that Jesus Christ
has already done that and this is important because
when we talked about the old testament appearances of the Lord Jesus Christ
I believe that he was in immortality so
something had to change if he can't die then he can't die
so what would have to happen he would have to put on human flesh
mortal flesh so that he could then die for the sins of the world so he could
be touched with the feeling of R and firmities the Bible says in Hebrews chapter 2
look at verse number 9 but we see Jesus who's made a little lower than the angels
for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor that he by the
grace of God should taste death for every man the Bible is telling us that Jesus
he was condescending but he didn't take on the angel the state
of angels he had to be crowned even lower he had to become something lower
than an angel so that he could be what so that he could die he was made
a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death that is why Jesus
Christ had to become a man so that he could die verse
14 for as much then as the children are partakers of flesh
and blood he also himself likewise took part of the same that through
death he might destroy him that had the power of death
that is the devil and deliver them who through fear
of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage for verily it took not
on him the nature of angels but he took on him the seed of
Abraham so Jesus took on the seed of Abraham
verse 17 wherefore in all things that behooved him to be like unto his brethren
that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest and things
pertaining to God to make reconciliation with the sins of the people for in that he himself
has suffered being tempted he is able to succor them that
are tempted in other words succor means help so it's saying
when we struggle when our flesh is weak when we
don't want to do the spiritual things or when we have temptations or
we have trials we have persecution people are lying about you people are
stabbing you in the back people are gossiping about you people are
attacking you even physical attacks the Bible talks about
people being I mean we've had soul owners punched we've had people that
have lost money lost jobs we've had threats
we've had protesters coming to our church protesters showing up at our house
people losing access to all kinds of banking and things
online it's just saying Jesus knows what that's like
and he can help us when we're going through those difficulties
you know the loss of a loved one he lost Lazarus and he wept over losing
a friend just a sickness he knows what it's like to have people betray you
lose loved ones have to go through evil rejection
Judas is all the things you can think of he knows what it's like and he can help us
and that's why he wanted to come and experience that and have
the limitations of humanity and have those feelings have those emotions
one of the most powerful verses in the Bible Jesus
wept he really did weep he really had that
great sorrow and he had to go through that experience of loss and we
understand that sometimes losing someone when someone dies there's really not
much of a worse feeling it's pretty much the worst feeling look at chapter 3
verse 15
I meant chapter 4 I'm sorry I said verse chapter 3
I mean chapter number 4 verse 15 for we have not an high priest which
cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities but was in all points
tempted like as we are yet without sin let us therefore come boldly on the throne of grace
that we may attain mercy and find grace to help in time of need so Jesus Christ
experienced the things look at chapter 5 verse 7 this is a really interesting
verse says who in the days of his flesh
when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him
that was able to save him from death and was heard and that he feared now
it's saying it was in the days of his flesh talking about a period of time
well currently Jesus Christ is still in flesh and I'm going to prove that in a minute but in Luke chapter
number 4 when he appears unto his disciples in his resurrected glorified state
he says you know the flesh that you see me to have
okay the flesh and bone as you see me to have so he had flesh but if we
think about the word flesh as sometimes just meaning mortal
then we're saying in the days of his mortality in the days
of his limited human capabilities
what is it saying when he offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him
that was able to save him from death and was heard and that he feared though he were a son
yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered and being
made perfect he became the author of eternal salvation unto all of them that obeyed
him so of course he actually went through the experience of the garden
of Gethsemane not wanting to go to the cross and what that's like having to go
through something difficult or being asked something difficult of the Lord and not
necessarily wanting to but he says nevertheless not my will but thine
be done I mean he asked God he said let this cup pass
from me he does ask him if he can not have to go through that
but he says nevertheless not my will but thine
be done and we see the learning of obedience we see the
subjection and we see him going through this difficulty he was
praying and it was like the sweat coming out was as a great drops of blood
is what the bible says he was sweating profusely knowing what
was going to happen now it says in chapter 10 look at
verse 5 chapter 10 verse 5 about Jesus it says wherefore when he cometh
into the world he saith sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not but a body
hast thou prepared me now some people would twist this
and try to suggest that Jesus didn't exist or something or had
no body prior to the incarnation but I believe what we understand what we've learned is
is talking about that mortal that human limited
capability body that was given to him that he was going to go into
where great is the mystery of godliness God was manifest in the flesh
where he had to put on those limitations for the days
of his flesh but that doesn't mean that he didn't have a body prior to we're talking
about the special mortal body that he had to experience that transfiguration
of going into mortality now the bible says in verse
10 by the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body
of Jesus Christ once for all so of course him sacrificing his
mortal flesh is what gives us that sacrifice of blood and without
blood there is no remission of sins is what the bible says
so he came not by water only but by water and
blood and then of course we needed that blood to be extracted but the
only way to extract that blood without him sinning is for someone else to kill him
and so someone else killed him as a perfect sacrifice to sprinkle that blood
and have that blood shed so that he could take his own blood and ascend up
into the mercy seat and sprinkle his own blood as our high priest
and make reconciliation for us make atonement
for our sins we believe in the blood atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ
and that is a testimony and a witness to the sufferings of Jesus Christ
and how his blood was shed for our sins so that for
all of eternity God can be just
for all of eternity we can say God did not just say
you know what I don't care about sin for all of eternity God can't just say sin was
never taken care of no we can always look at the blood and see no sin was
paid for sin was taken care of whereas Allah the false
God of Islam he just weighs his hand and just says like I forgive sins
but there's no punishment no one has to pay for it you know that's a false
you know that's a false religion and it doesn't have a just God
Allah is not just our God is just some people make fun
of Jesus Christ dying on the cross but you know what that proves that God
is just and he does not allow sin to go unpunished
he had someone else take that punishment for us so we can see that he's just
and merciful so we can see the love of God and the wrath of God
mixed in the persons of the Father Son and Holy Spirit
what a beautiful picture verse 20 the Bible says this
by a new and living way which he has consecrated for us through the veil that is to say
his flesh so of course the flesh is important now
I want to go to Colossians chapter number 1
go to Colossians chapter number 1 let's talk about things that we just know
for sure the Bible just clearly teaches
number 1 is that Jesus changed
in John 1.14 something changed and that change was being
made flesh number 2 that it was a mortal flesh so that he could die
and that's what's clearly articulated in Hebrews the third thing that we know for sure
is that Jesus Christ appeared in the Old Testament
everything that I said just now is just Bible doctrine it's
crystal clear that's what the Bible teaches I want to then just
spend just a few minutes explaining though my just personal
opinion on how that could make sense ok so what I'm going to say
I'm not going to say this is like for sure what the Bible is saying but this is my
interpretation of all the verses and all the facts that we've had so far
because we have to ask this question how did Jesus show up
in the Old Testament then right I mean we have them in the Old Testament walking
talking wrestling with Jacob all kinds of different things
now one thing the Bible does teach in Colossians chapter number 1 is that Jesus Christ
has all of the preeminence look what it says in verse number 15
who is the image of the invisible God the first born of every creature for by him were all things
created that are in heaven and that are in earth visible and invisible whether it be thrones
or dominions or principalities or powers all things are created by him and for him and he's before
all things and by him all things consist and he's the head of the body the church who is the beginning the first
born from the dead that in all things he might have the preeminence for it pleased the father that in him
should all fullness dwell and having made peace through the blood of his cross
by him to reconcile all things unto himself by him I say
whether they be things in earth or things in heaven so according to the Bible
all things are created by him and for him and in verse 18
that in all things he might have the
preeminence meaning that he is the first he says that he's the alpha
and the omega he is the root and
offspring of David so my personal
interpretation of these verses and how I would explain it
is that I think that Jesus Christ had an immortal flesh
all the way back into eternity past and that
when he created Adam he created Adam in his image but of course
that difference is that Adam was made of the dust of the earth so he had a
terrestrial body which is that mortal flesh but he
looked like Jesus Christ who was in a immortal
flesh state okay then when we look at the Old Testament appearances
Jesus is showing up in his immortal flesh state just like
he did post resurrection now go to Luke chapter number 24 let me show
you this Luke chapter number 24
because we think about it he eats in the Old Testament he
wrestles with Jacob in the Old Testament but notice something specific when he shows
up with Daniel in the book of Daniel not with Daniel but when he
shows up in Daniel with Shadrach Meshach and Abednego in the fiery furnace he's in the fire
and there's no hurt he's like immortal in a sense there's no
there's no harm that's done unto him or those people and so
I would suggest he was still in that immortal state and that all the
experiences he had of the Old Testament were not the experiences of the
human mortal flesh but rather they were just him interacting with his creation
in the state that he is in now it says in Luke chapter 24 verse
39 behold my hands and my feet that it is I myself
handle me and see for a spirit hath not flesh and bones
as ye see me have now there's
lots of ideas out there for a second time I'm not going to go through all of them you can go through
my trinity matrix and you can hear all kinds of weird ideas some people think that Jesus didn't
even exist obviously you know that's false doctrine some people think that Jesus
didn't exist until the manger that's obviously false doctrine some people
would suggest that maybe Jesus Christ was in a spirit body
and just a spirit and then he put on flesh I think that that's possible
I'm kind of suggesting that I think he was in an immortal flesh
and changed to a mortal flesh and then went back to an immortal flesh
but in his immortal state in his glorified state he could still be handled and he describes himself
as not a spirit but saying he has flesh and bones as ye see me to have
now that's different than flesh and blood he has flesh and bone
so in our mortal state again this is my opinion my opinion is in our
mortal state we're powered by the blood that's what the Bible
says that there's life in the blood in our immortal state
we're not powered by the blood we're powered by what? By the spirit exactly
so the Lord Jesus Christ has flesh and bone but he's not powered by blood he's powered by
the spirit he lost his blood his blood's on the mercy seat that's where his blood is and when we lose
our blood well we're going to be powered by the spirit in our flesh and bone body again these are
just my personal opinions if you don't agree with this you can close your ears or something
you know saying Jesus loves me or something you know hum it or something
but what I'm saying matches these Bible verses I'm not just coming up with this
randomly I've proven a lot of things already Jesus is God there's three distinct
persons we see the Old Testament appearance of Jesus Christ we see clearly that Jesus Christ put on
mortal flesh at one point even in that midst he could just change whatever he wants
back in that immortal state but I think
that he had some kind of an immortal state prior now look at John chapter 21
go to John chapter 21 for a moment we're just seeing in his
resurrected state when he appears unto the disciples
he says like you see my flesh and bone
and he's saying that's different than a spirit so he's not just in a spirit he's in a flesh
body okay in John 21 we also see
the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ eating look at John 21 verse
12 Jesus sayeth unto them come and dine
and none of his disciples dares ask him who art thou knowing that it was the Lord Jesus
then cometh and taketh bread and giveth them and fish likewise so Jesus shows up
they eat they dine if you study the Bible the Bible talks about
how the Lord Jesus Christ is going to literally serve us in heaven and we're going to eat
in the new heavens and the new earth and so we're going to enjoy so even in our
resurrected state we still get food right which is that's a Baptist
doctrine I'll tell you what okay now what food I don't know
well we can argue about that later I have personal opinions of what it won't be okay
but I don't have to offend anybody right now
go to Mark chapter 14 go to Mark chapter number 14 and look at
verse 25 Mark chapter 14 if we don't have
meat because we're not killing animals maybe you could just transfigure
it into it for me just take some bread and just like make it into a
steak or something for me you know it's the impossible burger but with God
all things are possible you know what I mean? Mark
chapter 14 look at verse 25 the Bible
says verily I say unto you I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine
until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God
so we have clear Bible verses talking about in the future
the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ in his immortal state he's still going to eat he's
still drinking he still has flesh and bone and again I think that
it's because Jesus was always like that and his
immortal state in the past now let's go to one more
verse and I'll kind of just make a few more comments go to 1 John chapter number 3 but
you have to at least say somehow this
happened right Jesus Christ showed up in the Old Testament in my mind
there's only kind of like three things that I've heard is the how to explain this
and maybe there's others my opinion is that
Jesus just already had glorified and mortal flesh that's pretty simple
okay another interpretation would be that there was
multiple incarnations right that Jesus is just
he's in a spirit he's a spirit that he's just showing up when he shows up he just transfigures
into mortal flesh every single time he shows up
the reason why I don't like that answer that solution
is it now makes the incarnation less significant
because the incarnation what was the point of the incarnation again we've read a lot of verses tonight
so hopefully you've been thinking about them the point was that he could be touched with
the feeling of our infirmities so that he could die on the cross well if he could just
zap into human flesh couldn't he just zap in and then they just
kill him right away but no but he went through the whole human experience didn't he he was
born he had to be raised he went through all of those different feelings
and emotions being about 30 years old going out and preaching going through
this experience was what gave him that knowledge
if he was zapping into flesh in the Old Testament
then he would have already known those things he would have already wrestled with Jacob
he would have already gone through he would have already eaten he would have already gone through some things and you could say like
oh he already knows what it's like to be human because he's done it seven times in the Old Testament
right but it's basically alluding in Hebrews that he didn't know what that was
like until the days of his flesh right and it's saying
that this is a period in time well that doesn't really make sense
if he's just zapping in and out since the beginning right in Genesis
he's walking around so if we say the days of his flesh that sounds like
the whole time but what are we talking about we're talking about that mortality state
right in the days of his flesh which was mortal state as
distinguished from the Old Testament so I think that if you have multiple
incarnations that's a problem how do you
that doesn't really make sense and it really undermines the
significance of the incarnation I mean we really celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ
there was angels singing you know about how magnificent
it was glory to God in the highest you know and
good will towards men because Jesus literally showed up in the flesh
where this is significant God has limited himself
and become a man whereas in the Old Testament I don't think
he had those limitations I think he was showing up in his immortal
glorified state I don't have this in my notes but I'm just thinking about some other verses
you know the Bible tells us when Jesus showed up and the demons saw him
they were like I know thee who thou art thou art the holy one of Israel
how do they know him they recognize him because he looks like
himself right they've seen him before so they're recognizing that's
my interpretation there's so many verses that if you have my view they
just make a lot of perfect sense so when it says when the word was made flesh and dwelt among us what does that
mean in my view it just means he was made mortal right he put on the limitations of
humanity and that was in the days of his flesh now he's put on that immortal
flesh that glorified flesh and it's similar to John chapter 17
which he said the glory that I had with thee before the world was
you know he was in glory in the past he put on he humbled himself
and became a man and in the sense of how we're
limited we have our human flesh and blood body he didn't
come by water only but he came by water and blood so there's a lot of verses I could go to
there's too much to go to this evening but there's a lot of verses to really think about
here's the third approach that I've heard as a solution is that
it's a time travel thing that when Jesus showed up in the Old Testament
it's like his resurrected or future state
time warping and just appearing because he exists outside
of time so he's just like entering into his creation and we don't
understand how time works I can't say that that's not true
obviously you see in John chapter number 3 somehow Jesus is on the earth
and in heaven and simultaneously so I can't say that that's not true
I just think it's a more complicated answer and I just don't see
any evidence of time travel in the Bible
I don't really see any evidence of Jesus like time traveling and doing these
type of things obviously he's capable he can do whatever he wants I would not want
to suggest that that's not possible I just don't think that's the best solution to
that appearance of Jesus Christ in the Old Testament I think you just
say Jesus literally just showed up as himself in the Old Testament
and then he put on mortal flesh in the incarnation and then he returned to a
glorified flesh state when he was resurrected from the dead
now no matter what though the good thing
is we're going to all be like him in the future
and think about this you know he gets all the preeminence from my view
he was the first man in a sense
and he created Adam and his image so Adam is not the first to be in
flesh he is like Jesus right so in
all things he has the preeminence that's what I really like about
my personal opinion here but no matter what we will be like him
look what it says in verse John chapter 3 verse 2 Beloved now are we
the sons of God and it does not yet appear what we shall be
but we know that when he shall appear we shall be
like him for we shall see him as he is
right now we're in a limited state we have limited knowledge we don't understand all these
things work but we can study the Bible and we can try to glean some wisdom
number one Jesus Christ changed for us he put on mortal flesh for us
and then he was glorified for us and so not only we get
to share in his death we share in his resurrection
and I gave what I think is a reasonable explanation for the Old Testament appearances
it really doesn't matter too much but at the end of the day what's
great is that he is definitely in a glorified flesh state and we too
will one day get a new body and as I age I appreciate that fact
more and more every single day I'll tell you what you know it's great to know that
one day all of our infirmities all of our
the problems that we have the pain the sicknesses all the different things
they will be taken away there will be no more pain
no more crying you know there's no more anything
that's bad and that's great comfort
now we have to go through the difficulty now we go through the trials so you know what
this is your time to cry guys this is your time to cry
this is your time to go through pain so let's not
let's not forfeit those opportunities this is our one time to go through it
let's live the full human experience because one day we'll have the glorified state we get to be with
Jesus and this is what I like it's almost like
if someone gave you a rental car and said
you know what it's yours you don't have to return it
and no matter how much you use it or trash it it doesn't even matter
I'm going to drive that thing hard you know what I mean
like think about it and you know like as soon as you come back
we're going to get you a brand new one I mean you're thinking like great
so then I'm going to drive this thing like it's meant to be driven
my body is meant to be used you know what I like
the brother Fer spoke until he couldn't speak
God gave you a mouth to preach the gospel
God gave you feet to walk up a hill and give someone the gospel
God gave you arms to hold a Bible and turn pages in your Bible
God gave you eyes in front to hunt
for someone that needs to hear the gospel and you know what we need to make sure
that we're using the body that God gave us to serve him
and use it until you lose it because guess what we'll get a brand new one anyways
and you know praise God for his sacrifice and what he's done for us
because we get to be glorified in the future let's close in prayer
thank you heavenly father so much for sending your son and
and causing him to put on mortal flesh and to be touched with the feeling
of our infirmities thank you for allowing him to suffer death
but to then be resurrected to give us hope hope of our
resurrection and that we too one day will be changed
and will be like your son we don't deserve such a great
salvation as this but i pray that we would be a living sacrifice
knowing that one day we too will be glorified and will be like
him and it's in Jesus name we pray amen
all right in closing let's go to
song number 356
i must tell jesus
song number 356
let's sing it out on first
i must tell jesus
all of my troubles he is a kind
compassion and friend
if i would ask him
he will be delivered
make up my troubles quickly and then
i must tell jesus
i cannot bear my burdens
alone
i must tell jesus
jesus can help me
i need a great
savior
one who can help my burdens to bear
i must tell jesus
need all my cares and sorrows to share
i must tell jesus
i cannot bear my burdens
alone
i must tell jesus
jesus can help me
jesus alone
i must tell jesus
i cannot bear my burdens
alone
i must tell jesus
i cannot bear my burdens
alone
i must tell jesus
jesus can help me
great singing everybody you are all dismissed
music