Welcome back to Bible time we are in 1st Thessalonians chapter 2 verse 10 today Ye are witnesses and God also how holily and justly and unblameably We behaved ourselves among you that believe this is apostolic behavior today Apostolic behavior now this applies to a lot more than the apostles that are mentioned here it applies a lot more than the twelve apostles of the lamb, but this applies directly to apostles as given the context so if you say that you're an apostle this ought to be how you behave and if you don't then you ain't no apostle and The Bible here's another evidence how to try them that say they are apostles and are not this is the behavior that Paul has been saying here That the Apostles had among them He says in the verse 9 for ye remember brethren our labor and travail for laboring. There's an aura of You are our our labor and travail for laboring night and day He says we there and he says we again and he says we in verse 8. He says we in verse 7 He says in verse 6 nor of men sought we glory neither of you nor yet of others when we might have been burdensome as the apostles of Christ chapter 1 verse 1 Paul and Silvanus and Timotheus under the church of the Thessalonians. So this is this group, these three men, who Paul says could have been burdensome as the apostles of Christ are here. He says, you are witnesses, and God also, how wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe. Father, in Jesus' name, I pray that you'd help us today and teach us from your word. Lord, we're nothing special, but your word is special. And Lord, I've got nothing to give, nothing to offer, Lord, but your word. And I pray, Lord, that you'd help me to not only share your word and preach your word and teach your word, but to live your word, Father. In Jesus' name, amen. ye here at the beginning of this verse the word ye is plural for the equivalent of you that we would use today. Today we would say you need to go to the store and if there was a whole group of people we might emphasize it by saying you guys need to go to the store or we might say in the hillbilly land y'all Y'all need to go to the store you all a messed up contraction you all need to go to the store And so that would show the plurality that we're not talking about just one and that is because we have lost the old Use of thee and thou and ye and you. Ye is plural and you is plural. Thee and thou is singular. So if I was looking at a group over there and I wanted you to go to the store, I would say thou. And you better look up to figure out who the thou is, because that's the thou right there that I'm talking to. Thou should go to the store or something to that effect. And a lot of those it's and eth's and all those kind of things, eth's and it's and all those other old English type things fit in there whenever you have the these and the thou's and there's a lot of reason that those are in there. But in any case, That gives us the specific nature of it. The thee and the thou is singular. The ye and the you is plural. So here he's talking to the church. Ye, in its plural setting, ye are witnesses. The witness is also there, gives us the plurality. So ye are witnesses. A witness is, as Brother Kime has been stressing, a witness has seen clearly something take place and gives testimony to what he has seen, felt, heard take place. You can be a witness and not actually see anything. If you were in a cardboard box and you got shipped to another country and on the way in the back of the truck, You were sitting in your cardboard box listening and you heard two pirates get in the back of the truck smuggling stolen goods and the court system found out that you had heard them because they caught those guys and they figured this all out. They could call you up to tell what you heard while you were in your cardboard box with it all taped shut and you wouldn't be able to see anything. Now, that's a bad idea, by the way, because you wouldn't be able to breathe either and it would be a rough ride. I don't even think it's legal. But in any case, Don't really know I've never tried it. Have you? Okay, I wouldn't start Now if you were there in your cardboard box and you heard something you might be called to the witness stand to say what you heard so a witness is someone who has experienced something and then they give testimony of which can be legal evidence in a court of law. They give testimony to what they saw and what they heard. And here Paul the apostle says, ye are witnesses, and God also, how wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believed. So here this evidence of their holiness and their justness and their unblameableness is something that is plainly seen to the whole body. Now this is only possible with something that we could call immersive ministry. Now that sounds like something that could get a whole bunch of good podcasts and we could get a whole bunch of yuppie guys in their skinny jeans and their big beards and their coffee cups to have big long discussions about immersive ministry and never do a lick of good for God but raise a lot of money doing it. Because it's one of those great catchy type of phrases, immersive ministry. I can see it going like wildfire, just give it to the right guy and it'll take off. But in any case, the idea there is having a ministry that is completely immersed in the people. The people see your walk, they see your manner of life. Now, this could be very different from the standard mahogany desk and leather chair ministry, where you get a ministry up in a high-rise somewhere at denominational headquarters, and there's maybe a handful of people that you actually deal with on a daily basis. The receptionist when you walk in, and maybe the chief financial officer, and a couple other officers there high up, and everybody else is a bunch of peons, for lack of a better word. You say, what does that word mean? Exactly what it says. It means you're a nobody. Literally a peon and then people use that word. It's a word that in the English. How about that? It's crazy, but it's there so these people that are nobody's to you They don't really see you they watch you walk in they see your car What kind of card everybody can see your car? because it's parked in the front and your reserved parking spot and it's sitting there all shiny with the Sun shining off of it because you make sure it gets washed all the time after all the cars expensive as that deserves to be washed all the time and and you walk in there in your fancy suit and you walk over then you say hi to the receptionist and if you're really nice because you've heard it was her birthday you might drop a little gift at the front desk and then you hit the button to the elevator and whoosh your way up to the top and you get there to the top floor above everybody else and you walk into your corner office that's as big as somebody else's house and you strut across there to your big leather desk and sit down in front of your mahogany Your big leather desk chair and your mahogany desk. Can you sit down there and minister? And he's a minister More exposure is probably gotten by that kind of a ministry whenever someone has to go on a business trip and they actually have to cram into a airplane than at any other time. But usually that guy can afford to get the business class or maybe the first class where he doesn't even have to rub shoulders with common folk and he can just live his life in the lap of luxury and ignore the lost and dying world around him. And that would be a more standard form of ministry. That's the kind of ministry everybody wants to get into. in our day and age, but the Apostle Paul's ministry was a ministry that was open and observable. The whole church body was able to observe. He said, ye are witnesses how wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe. So the Apostle Paul's ministry from start to finish, his work was transparent and open and observable. The people could see him. The people could get to him. The people could watch him. The people could hear him. They knew where he was. They knew what he was doing. He wasn't flying in the frequent flyer clubs, sitting in the high dollar lounges. He was out and rubbing shoulders with everyone from the commoner and up. That doesn't mean that Paul never had times where he got alone with God, and he never had times where he went alone and studied, but it means that Paul's ministry was not hidden and seclusionist, however you would say that. It wasn't monastic, in other words. There was no hermiting here. There was no monastery where Paul sat and wrote the epistles. This epistle was written while he was ministering in Corinth. I'm sorry, it's not Corinth, in Athens. As he was ministering in Athens and preaching the gospel, he wrote this epistle, and this epistle that people spend their whole lifetime studying was written by Paul while he was preaching the gospel full-time to the lost. Paul had a public ministry. Paul preached the gospel to the lost, and he also preached the gospel to the church. Now, there is a time and a place to get alone with God. Again, and there's time and place to have a study and a quiet place where you can get alone with God. That's all fine. There's nothing wrong with that. But the concept of this, of ministry not touching lives, is completely foreign to the Bible and completely foreign to the gospel. Ministry, by the essence of the word ministry, requires people to minister to. And if your ministry isn't touching lives directly, then it really should be called into question whether or not it's a ministry at all. And then that, of course, would have to have the whole question of whether or not it's touching lives for Christ. I recently saw a sign about a rodeo ministry that has a young people's rodeo ministry. And I have no idea what they're trying to do or what it might be. I don't want to speak evil of things I know not of, but the whole idea is pretty far from biblical. You don't find Paul or anybody else having rodeo ministries or clown ministries or any other kind of weird ministries in the Bible where the main thing is a show and the secondary thing is the gospel. For Paul, the gospel was always primary. He said to the Corinthians, I determined to know nothing among you save Christ and him crucified. Now, as we say this, and you can see the guy with the skinny jeans again standing up in front of a black background well-lit stage in a blackened room audience, and he's up there with his little coffee cup talking about immersive ministry. And I don't want to get into that kind of junk. It's a bunch of garbage out there. They like these fancy words and stuff, but I do want you to think about this concept of having a ministry that is in the people and among the people, a ministry that touches lives, a ministry that is transparent, as it were. This could be linked very easily to lifestyle evangelism, which is an absolute joke. Lifestyle evangelism is a joke in hell. It's a joke to the devil. If you want to make the devil laugh, start talking about lifestyle evangelism. He'll be rolling on the ground, holding his side because he's getting side stitches from laughing so hard. The modern lifestyle evangelism would follow the kind of ideas that would be gotten from the skinny jean guy preaching on immersive ministry. But the idea that we're trying to get here is that your ministry should touch lives. That doesn't mean that you never preach the gospel. It means that while you're preaching the gospel, you are accessible to people. If you're driving your Bentley down the street, or your chauffeur is, rather, driving your Bentley down the street, and you're not even touching people's lives, and you go into the high ritzy restaurants and sit down, and you're waiting on hand and foot, and nobody can ever get near you, and you're never near anybody that would be in need, you have missed your greatest opportunities. Lifestyle evangelism is a joke. God has ordained preaching of the gospel to save some. But preaching from a safe space has limited effectiveness, just like this that I'm doing right now. This work here on the podcast has limited effectiveness. I believe that God burdened me to do this, and that's why I do it. But if this is the limit of my ministry, I'm not going to have a ministry. There's not going to be any reality to my ministry. I could hole up somewhere in a monastery and preach a podcast online for the rest of my life, and I could put out thousands of messages and thousands of sermons, but if I'm not actually getting out in the real world and touching real people's lives, then my ministry has become a joke. It's become in vain. Preaching from a safe space has limited effectiveness when you are in and among the people. Doors open, hearts open, people are right there, they can see your face. One of the best parts about this podcast ministry is those that are here gathered listening right now. You guys will probably get more out of this message than anybody that ever listens to it online. Its effectiveness online is limited. I wouldn't have even started this thing if I hadn't believed that God had led me to specifically start it because of this very fact that it is in many respects far less effective than a ministry that is out touching other people's lives. And I hope someday to be able to enhance and open the doors for this part of the ministry to more people so that it can be more accessible. In this weird day that we live in with the virtual day that we live in, everything's virtual and lives are virtual, we have people going up and down our streets that live in their own safe space and never come out of it. They go home at the end of the day, they go out to their work and they sit down at a computer or they stand at a piece of machinery and they put earbuds in their ears, they turn on their music, they barely know anybody, they talk to the few people at work. Everybody else that they know is in a virtual world and they go on Facebook and they look at pictures and they comment and that is the most that they ever touch anybody. And when they get done at work, they might swing by the store where they probably put on a mask. and go in and stare at anybody that comes near them for the fear of getting a germ, America's in trouble. You see, broken immune systems come from sin, and America has been living in sin, and America's immune systems are broken, and America is in big trouble, and masks ain't going to fix it. In fact, in any kind of case, it's making it worse because people are not being exposed to normal sicknesses so that their body can maintain a normal immune function. And so we're in for it, but that's all right. God is in control. But they will go to the store, they'll pick up their freezer pizza, they'll go home and turn on the TV, a virtual world, and they'll sit there with the TV on, or they'll sit at the computer and scroll through blogs and articles, or they'll turn on something and tune into a podcast like this. And maybe that's why God has prompted me to put some of these up on podcasts, because some of these people are untouchable. unreachable you never even interact with them they don't get out of their little bubble they're hermited into their virtual reality but that in and of it that lifestyle of being hermited back will destroy a ministry the lifestyle of Is not evangelistic and cannot be evangelistic and cannot be a matter of discipleship Lifestyle matters though, and that's what we're getting into here. Your lifestyle does matter how you live your life will determined to a large degree the effectiveness of your ministry. So he says, ye are witnesses, and then he says, and God also. Now this may seem to be unnecessary, but it's here for a purpose. God didn't waste his words. And there's two basic purposes for this statement. First of all, God sees everything, even whenever everybody else is asleep. When nobody is around but me and God, God knows what I'm doing. God knows your every thought and every motive and every action God sees in the dark and God is the judge and every hidden thing will be made manifest go to Luke 8 So well, you may go out and have your ministry and you may have an open ministry in some regards Let's take for example a man that may have devoted his life to a street preaching ministry and he goes out and he goes into the public and he sets up his little Signs that he's got or however he likes to do it and he starts to preach the gospel and try and speak to the passerbys That go by that man may stand there for eight hours nine hours ten hours eleven twelve hours in a day But whenever he goes home to his house those people that he's ministering in front of are not seeing him And to a large degree, most other people won't, especially if he's a single man. His home, he may be living in as a single man, and he may be there in his home, but God is there. And this is what Paul is saying. He's saying, you are witnesses, and God also. Not only do you see, but God sees. Luke 8, 17 says, for nothing is secret that shall not be made manifest, neither anything hid that shall not be known and come abroad. So a man may go out and street preach for 12 hours and be holy, and then he may come home to his wife and be the most unholy, ungrateful beast of a man. rude to his children. He may strike his children, which is wicked, to just go up and strike them for no reason and to treat them in an abusive manner and be absolutely a beast. And this man's manner of life at home may be completely different from his manner of life on the street. He may go out to the church house and be the sweetest man at the church house that you've ever met. And he may be your best friend, but whenever he gets home, he's yelling at his children. And whenever he gets alone, he's looking at dirty pictures and doing all this garbage, and God helps such a man. It says here, God sees. This is what he's saying. You are witnesses, and God also. Again, our verse here says, for nothing is secret that shall not be made manifest, neither anything hid, that shall not be known and come abroad. Now, I have sinned and I've confessed my sins and repented of my sins, but this here still applies that it's going to be made known and come abroad. If it isn't made known in this life, it will be at the judgment seat of Christ, and that should cause us to tremble. There are things I'm ashamed of that I don't even want to remember. but they're going to be made known and they're going to come abroad. That's what God says. And this is, this should all induce us to want to live a holy life free of offense before God. It says, for nothing is secret that shall not be made manifest, neither anything hid that shall not be known and come abroad. So that's the first purpose for stating that God is also a witness. But the second part here, the second purpose is to point out that what the people of the church saw, the ye who are witnesses, what ye saw and what God saw agreed. And God also, that what I am in front of you at church, I am at home in the middle of the night when nobody is watching at all and it's just me and God. That's what he's saying. And God also. The public ministry was not a show. It's relatively easy whenever you've got a Bible under your arm and a suit coat on to keep from doing stupid things while you're at the church house because of the peer pressure that's on you. But when you get home, what and who are you? I'll tell you right now, I've sinned more in my own heart, and I've sinned more in my thoughts, and I've sinned more in private than I have in public, and I would warrant to say that's true for all of us. In fact, I'll tell you this, what a man does in public is usually a tenth of a degree of what he will do in private. and maybe far, far, far less of what he will do in private. Whenever a man walks out in public and he's checking out the ladies and he's making flirtatious remarks and gestures at other ladies, you can rest assured that what's going on in his mind and in his home and in the darkness of his own bedroom is ten times or a hundred times or a thousand times worse what he's letting be seen publicly. And you don't think that's true, just ask a lot about Sodom after dark. because they didn't act that way until the sun came down and then they gathered around the house. Jesus talked about the hour of darkness. So what you are in public, you may be able to cover up and make everybody speak well of you and act like you are holy, but God sees what you are whenever nobody else sees you. He sees what you are whenever you think that there's no way anybody can trace your actions back God is still present and God sees it. And Paul here was able to call God to count and call God to witness that not only was their manner of life holy, just, and unblameable in the presence of the church and of the brethren of the Lord Jesus Christ, adopted joint heirs with Christ, but that it was equally as holy, equally as just, and equally as unblameable whenever only God could see. that deep down in the heart and in the motives and in the daily walk and the daily life of that man of God and of Silvanus and of Timotheus that God was as pleased with their conduct while they were alone as the people were pleased with their conduct when they were in the church This is a high standard, but this is what we must have. This is what I must have. Our ministry will be destroyed otherwise. The brother preached about that yesterday. He mentioned some of that. We'll look at some of the same verses actually as we continue this study. It is not your walk alone. They say your walk talks louder than your talk talks, but if your talk doesn't talk, your walk doesn't talk at all. If your talk doesn't talk, your walk doesn't talk either. Do you hear me today? Your walk talks louder than your talk talks, but if your talk doesn't talk, your walk doesn't talk either. Do you follow that? People can't tell if you are a Buddhist or a Catholic or a Christian unless you will own Christ Yourself with your mouth so to speak and you may do it with a sign or something if you're not able to speak But ultimately your mouth would be the mo is the most powerful instrument with which you can own Christ and if your walk doesn't if your walk is is the most holy walk in the world, but you don't talk and confess Christ publicly, nobody is gonna know it. So it's not your walk alone that counts, and it's not your talk alone that counts, because if you talk Jesus and live like hell, then it negates what you said and actually does despot to the cause of Christ. It's not your walk alone nor your talk alone, but it is your walk and talk together, and your walk and talk when you're alone. You're walking talk when you're with people and you're walking talk when you're alone. You may think, well, this won't hurt so bad. I can get away with this. I've been a pretty good boy. I can allow myself a little indulgence of the flesh. Nobody will really see me, but God sees you and at the very least what you will suffer is the chastening hand of God and the loss of power and direction in your ministry at times when you need it most, which is why the devil tempts you with that trash. Because even if you do get away with it on the outward, get this, can get it good and God helped me to get it. Listen today, even if you can get away with it and nobody sees it in this life, it is going to be made manifest. And if it's not made manifest in the public eye, it will be manifest in the spiritual realm as the devil and his angels will gain ground and gain victories, and the angels of God in heaven will look down on you in your sin and say, On earth is that no good, backwards, ungrateful, wicked person doing that says that they're saved by grace? How can somebody like that sin against our thrice holy God? Don't they know that Jesus died for him? Look at the ground he's giving up to Satan. Look at the advances that the devil is making in the kingdom of heaven and on earth because of what that Christian is doing and the angels, as they rally their forces to go into battle to try and stop the damage that's happening on the spiritual plane, know that you're sinning! And you might think nobody can see you while all the host of heaven is watching! What shame! What shame! What reproach on the name of Christ! as ground is lost to the devil. And to cap it all off, someday you will stand before Christ and I will stand before Christ and we will give an account for the things that we have done in our body of flesh and we will stand there as the hidden things are made manifest. And the people that didn't find out while you were alive are going to find out! It matters! It matters how you walk. It matters what you do. It matters how you live. Beware of hypocrisy. Beware of hypocrisy. Beware of hypocrisy. Beware of the little sins that go. You think unnoticed that you don't want to deal with and you don't want to get right what God about. Beware of the hypocrisy. The following areas that Paul gives us wholly, justly, and unblamely are not given to us as Sunday's best performance, but as a manner of life. I remember as a child, I used to think that if I could do certain good things, For example, if I read my Bible for a certain amount of time in the morning that I basically had absolvence from responsibility to God because I had fulfilled my duty as a Christian and now the rest of the day could be mine. I can remember also as a teenager, taking part in an evangelistic outreach on a weekly basis, and almost getting the attitude that since I gave God one evening every week for evangelism, and I was already giving God Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night for church services, that I had earned to myself the right and the privilege to live however I wanted to live on those other times. Now, at those times as a Christian, I was not using that philosophy to excuse sin in the open sense of the word, but I would use it to excuse laziness and apathy and to faint from the ministry and to be a part-time Christian. Oh, I wanted to be a full-time Christian as it regards eternal security, going to heaven, et cetera, et cetera, but I did not want to be a full-time Christian as it regards the call of God on our lives to be a witness. to be obedient to God, to be ready always to give an answer. Man is always looking for a way to be a part-timer. The whole Sabbath worship system is designed to absolve you from the responsibility of giving God seven days. The man told me the other day, well, we should worship on the Sabbath. God never negated it, and I told him, no, we should worship Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. we should worship seven days a week. He said, no, God wants one day of a week that you really focus on him. I said, no, God wants seven days a week that you really focus on him. He said, God wants one special day for worship. I said, no, God wants 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 and some odd minutes a year. including leap days, every day, every moment, every hour, you are gods and you are to walk in the spirit and not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. That was a horrifying thought to me as a young man because I was trying to do it in my own strength. It was hard enough to act like a Christian three or four times a week, much less to think about 24-7. God help us to follow Christ. This is not given as something that Paul and Silvanus and Timotheus lived on Sunday. But this is given to us as a manner of life. Let's look at holily, justly, and unblameably here real quickly. Holiness is the greatest attribute of God. Go to Isaiah chapter 6. Isaiah chapter 6. There's some incredible verses here. I want to live up to this and I pray God will help me to obey Him and to turn and live in such a way that I can say that I'm living what I'm preaching because this is not what is characterized every day of my life and I want it to be. It says holiness here is the greatest attribute of God. Holiness is the greatest attribute of God. Isaiah 6, 1. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up. And his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims. Each one had six wings. With twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet. And with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another and said, Holy, Holy holy is the Lord of hosts the whole earth is full of his glory the Holy Spirit of God has as part of his name holy You have God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost God the Holy Ghost. Holy is the only descriptive word included in the basic names of God. Holy Ghost, Holy Spirit, Holy, Holy, Holy. Go to Revelation 15.4 quickly. Revelation 15.4, Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? For thou only art holy. Now if you compare these two passages, Isaiah 6 and Revelation 15.3, Isaiah 6, where it says, holy, holy, holy, I think in verse 3. And then Revelation 15, 4, you'll find that in Isaiah 6, it applies holy, holy, holy to Lord, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, in the Hebrew, which is Jehovah God. And then here he says, in Revelation, only thou art holy to lowercase l, lowercase r, o, lowercase r, lowercase d, God Almighty, just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints. And the Bible says that Jesus Christ is Lord, lowercase l, lowercase o, lowercase r, lowercase d. Jesus Christ is holy. Jesus Christ is Lord. Here the Lord is holy holy holy in the Old Testament with the name Jehovah and here God Almighty Jehovah God is equal with Christ and Christ equal with God though Christ is the Son and God the Father is The Father and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit yet. These three are one and that's absolutely Clearly represented throughout the whole Bible and if you chop out any part of it, you'll suffer the curse of God You got to take all of it All or nothing. Go to 1 Peter quickly. Only thou art holy, he says. This gives us the backdrop for this command in Peter. Here it says, but as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation. Because it is written, be ye holy for I am holy. The basis that God commands us to be holy with is the fact that he himself is holy, as we just looked at in the Word of God in the Old and New Testament. Holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty. Only thou art holy, Lord God Almighty. So God is holy and God commands us to be holy, but God commands us to be holy in all manner of conversation. That means when you get up in the morning, when you go about your day in your home, when you leave your home to conduct business, to work, et cetera. Whenever you get back to your home, when you sit down to eat, when you stand up to walk from the table. Whenever you lie down to rest, whenever you sit to rest, your recreation, every part of your life should be holy. If you want to put something in front of you on the screen in the way of a motion picture, a moving picture, a movie, DVD, video, recording, whatever you want to call it, whatever format it comes in, you are commanded by God that what you set before your face should be holy, that all manner of your conversation must be holy as he is holy. It is written, be ye holy for I am holy. Be ye holy as I am holy. Look at verse 17. And if you call on the Father who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man's work past the time of your sojourning here in fear. Holiness is linked to the fear of God. 2 Peter 3 and verse 11. Seeing then that these things shall shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought you to be in all holy? conversation and Godliness he's saying this earth is going to be burnt up. Look at the context there on your own the earth and the heavens will be will pass away the elements will melt with a fervent heat or What manner of persons ought you to be in all holy conversation and godliness? God, help me to be holy. God, help me to be holy when nobody can see me. God, help me to be holy when I stand before everyone. Help me to be holy every moment of every day, whether waking or sleeping. When you go to bed at night and you rest your head on your pillow, you are commanded to be holy. And you are not exempt from being holy in your dreams even. In your sleep, in what goes through your head in the passing of the night. Go to Deuteronomy 26. And verse 19, he says here in the end of that verse, and that thou mayest be unholy people unto the Lord thy God, as he has spoken. Unholy people unto the Lord thy God, as he has spoken. Go to Hebrews 12. You say, I can't control my dreams. Yes, you can. What you put in is what's going to come out. You can control your dreams. If your heart is full of wickedness, then you'll have wicked dreams. If your heart is clean and pure, you will not have wicked dreams. The devil may afflict and may attack, but God will win the victory. You have a lot more control over your dreams than you think. But if your mind has not been renewed, If you are living with an unrenewed mind, then you probably don't have much control over your mind. That's why the Bible commands us to renew our minds, so that responsibility then falls back again upon you. Hebrews 12 and verse 14, follow peace with all men and holiness. without which no man shall see the Lord. You will not see the Lord if you are not holy. You will not get into heaven if you are not holy. Now, there are two parts to holiness. There's a holiness that is imparted, imputed at salvation, the righteousness of the saints, wearing the righteousness of Christ. There's a state of holiness. But then there is a life of holiness. And this statement here in chapter 12 of Hebrews says, follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. And it links the seeing of the Lord with your outward holiness, not your state of holiness. but your life of holiness be ye holy he says as I am holy we are commanded to be holy you say we have a body of death yes we do so did Paul read Romans chapter 7 that's where you're going next where it says the good that I would I do not in that which I would not I do as you grab your porn magazine and you grab your newbie and light it up and have yourself a good old joint and drink your Bud Light and your Coors and everything else that you do and go to your football games and enjoy all the pleasures of sin for a season and watch all the filth on your TV and you say Paul said the good that I would I do not and that which I would not that I do. Paul also said I thank God through Jesus Christ my Lord so that with the mind I myself serve the law of God and with the flesh the law of sin and then he went on to Romans 8 and told us that in Christ and through the power of the Spirit you have the power To have all the righteousness of the law revealed in you. The righteousness of the law is an external righteousness. And Paul preached in Romans 8 that through the power of the Holy Spirit you can live a holy life. And you do not have to sin. through the power of the Spirit. And then here in our text in Thessalonians, he says, Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe. So Paul here is professing that he lived holily before them. Now, we know he was only there three Sabbath days. But that's three Sabbath days. If that's two weeks and one day, 15 days, when was the last time you lived 15 days without sinning against God? Paul says that they lived holily, justly, and unblameably among the Thessalonican church. That's what Paul said. So while you wanna quote Paul, couldn't do right, quote the rest of it too. There's more to it than Paul's, I can't do it. Because when Paul said, I can't do it, the Holy Spirit of God said, I can. And Paul let him. And Paul said, I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me. All things? Well, you'll never be sinlessly perfect. You can't live without sin. I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me. If I sin, it's my fault, not God's fault. I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me. And I can be sinless. Do I? Have I been? Not nearly as I should. But if you walk in the Spirit, the Bible says, ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. That's holiness. Live holy before God. So go to 1 Corinthians 3.17. This speaks of the Holy Spirit living within you. He says, know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost? And then in verse 17 down here, he says, or let's finish 16, and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you. If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are. So that temple of God, first of all, the body of Christ is the church. We are the temple of God, both individually and collectively. The Bible talks about us being a building fitly framed together, lively stones built up unto God, a habitation of God. And God requires that the temple be holy. God requires that if any man defile the temple, him will God destroy. And he says, his temple, which temple are ye? There's a lie going around the world that your body is the temple of God. And they'll say it this way, your body's a temple. Well, there's some truth in it in that your body is designed to be a temple, but you in and of yourself are nothing more than a temple of Satan unless the Holy Spirit of God is the one that is inhabiting you. And in any case, think about this for a moment, the temple had an outer court, that's the body, it had an inner court. That's the, so your outer and your inner. So the first court that you get into there would represent your body, the inner part of your body, your organs. Whenever you get down into the holy place there where the showbread was and all that, that represents your soul. And whenever you get into the innermost holy place, the most holy place, that represents your spirit. And I ask you today, what do you think God would allow the most uncleanness in before he brings the hammer down? The outer court, the holy place, or the most holy place? You say, I'm just going to entertain this dirty thought, which is taking place in your holy place, your soul. I'm not going to go touch that lady. I'm just gonna have a lustful thought about that lady, which is taking place in the holy place. The touch takes place outside the holy place. Which one's more serious to God? They're both serious. They're all serious. God will destroy if we're doing any of it. But I'm here to tell you today, the thought is more serious to God than the action. And the action is enough that He says He'll destroy you over the action. but the thought in and of itself. And you think, oh, well, nobody saw me think that. Nobody saw me consider that option. Nobody heard what I said in my mind. Nobody saw the dirty little thoughts going through my mind. But God saw it. That's what we're trying to get driven home today. God saw it. Ye are witnesses, and God also. How wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe. Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty. Here in verse 17 again, If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are. So there is a state of holiness by dedication. When the temple was dedicated, it became holy, and it was the holy temple of God. But people did unholy things in the temple, didn't they? Did that mean the temple was not holy? No, so there is a state of holiness because of dedication and that happens to the Christian through the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ when you are born again bought with a price you are holy in a state of holiness, but God says if you won't live in the state of If you won't live in the outworking of the state that you are dedicated to maintain, I will destroy you. And you can go back to Shiloh and the tabernacle. And you can go back to Jerusalem and the temple of Solomon. And you can go back again to Jerusalem and the temple that was called Herod's temple. And you can see that when the temple is defiled, God destroys the temple. 2nd Corinthians 7 1 says having these therefore these promises go and turn there quickly having therefore these promises dearly beloved Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit perfecting holiness in the fear of God now he wouldn't tell us to cleanse ourselves if there wasn't something that needed cleansed and So there's obvious work to do. When the temple gets dirty, clean the temple. When you've been defiled, get the defilement out. When you've sinned against God, repent of your sin and turn back to God. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Who was it that would clean the temple? When Hezekiah was the king and the temple had been defiled, he sent in the priests and the Levites to clean the temple, to cleanse it out. And then they had a dedication and the high priest offered an offering. Your job as a king and priest in Christ, as the book of Revelation says, is to get the trash out of the temple. Only Christ can sacrificially sanctify the temple. He will cleanse it, but he's not gonna come in and cleanse it until you get the trash out of the temple. We got to keep moving here. Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit. I would to God, I would never, ever, ever sin again another time. That is why I want. I want that. I never want to sin again, ever in my life. The possibility of that is next to none. It's a very small possibility, but it is a possibility. And all things are possible with God, and that's the only reason it's any kind of a possibility. But the reality is that as long as we have the body of this death, we are susceptible to the potential of sin. But if you sin, get it clean. Get the trash out! And go to the high priest and get the temple cleansed. If you defile the temple, God will destroy you. That's what he says. They said, we lived before you holily. Go to Psalms 86. Well, we're on this topic. And we're just gonna mind God, and I'm gonna give what God gave, and we're not gonna worry about the time. Psalm 86. This deals with holiness and it deals with a man who has sinned but is crying out to God on the basis of his holiness. Do you hear me? The basis of that man's own holiness. He's crying out to God even though he's sinned. We gotta get this right here. Bow down thine ear, O Lord. Hear me, for I am poor and needy. Preserve my soul, for I am holy. This psalm used to bother me so much, I couldn't even read it out loud, for fear of sacrilege against God. I'd say, I'm not holy. But there's the state of holiness that you're put into when you're saved. Holy because you're declared holy by God in heaven. And this is what he's pleading here, and therefore I pray this psalm. And this psalm comforts me. Preserve my soul, for I am holy. O thou, my God, save thy servant that trusteth in thee. Be merciful unto me, O Lord, for I cry unto thee daily. Rejoice the soul of thy servant. He said be merciful. That means he's not doing everything right. He says, rejoice the soul of thy servant, for unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. And in case you don't, you think that this guy's sinless that's saying this, look at verse five. For thou, Lord, art good. For thou, Lord, art good and ready to forgive. and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee. Give ear, O Lord, unto my prayer, and attend to the voice of my supplication. In the day of my trouble I will call upon me, for thou wilt answer me. Among the gods there is none like unto thee, O Lord, neither are there any works like unto thy works. All nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship before thee, O Lord, and shall glorify thy name. For thou art great, and doest wondrous things. Thou art God alone. Teach me thy way, O Lord. I will walk in thy truth. Unite my heart to fear thy name." The fact that he's crying out for God to unite his heart to fear God's name is proof that his heart is not all there. His heart is not all right. His heart is not all righteous. His heart is not all holy. And he's saying, God, unite my heart to fear thy name. Remember, holiness and the fear of the Lord are directly linked together. He says, unite my heart to fear thy name. I will praise thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart, and I will glorify thy name forevermore. For great is thy mercy toward me, and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell. Hell! He says I'm a hell bound, hell deserving, wicked sinner with a double heart that goes one time after the world and one time after God. I've sinned against you God and I need mercy and I need forgiveness. Preserve my soul for I am holy how can he say that he is applying the state of holiness that God put him into at his salvation to his need for practical daily holiness and he's laying on hold on his position in Christ for a practical outworking of a daily holy life before God hallelujah Hallelujah! He says, I will praise thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart, and I will glorify thy name forevermore. For great is thy mercy toward me, and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell. O God, the proud waters, O God, the proud are risen against me, to correct that. O God, the proud are risen against me in the assemblies. A violent man have sought after my soul and have not set thee before them, but thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion and gracious, long-suffering and plenteous in mercy and truth. O turn unto me and have mercy upon me. Give thy strength unto thy servant and save the son of thine handmaid. Show me a token for good that they which hate me may see it and be ashamed, because thou, Lord, hast opened me and comforted me. This is the holiness that the Apostle Paul said, we have walked before you, you have been witnesses in how, and God also, how holily and justly and unblameably we have behaved ourselves among you that believe. Justly is the next one. We will move quicker on these. That holiness is such a big topic, it's hard to even leave it with only that much study. But it will continue to come up throughout the Bible and we'll trust God to continue to open our understanding to it. Justly also applies to a state and a life. A state and a life. The state is mentioned in Romans 5, 1. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. So the position of God, the peace that we enjoy with God, comes from the justification through faith. And that's the only way that you can get it. and that begins and puts you in a state of justification so that you can justly say, I am justified and justly before God as a saved man. Though at some point you may sin, yet you are still just, and that is a contradiction unless you lay hold on the justly in your life as well. 2 Thessalonians 2 10. That's our text that we have here and that gives us the sanctification how justly we have behaved ourselves Just justified in heaven should translate to walking justly on earth go to 2nd Corinthians chapter 6 walking justly means a circumspect conversation it means a and circumspect means checking it out from all the angles and making sure it's right and Circumspect, it means circle-spect. Circle-spect, walk around it and inspect it from every angle. Circumspect. So a circumspect conversation, a circumspect manner of life means no respective persons here if you're just, no bribery, no theft through deception, no false pretenses, no association with professing sinners. who claim the name of Jesus and live a life of unrepentant sin. Look at 2 Corinthians 6, 14. Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers, for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God. God has said I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they shall be my people wherefore come out from among them and be Separate sayeth the Lord and touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you and will be a father unto you and ye shall be my sons and daughters sayeth the Lord the Lord Almighty Now If Paul was to respect persons and put the rich man at the head of the church, if he was to take bribes or steal from people under false pretenses, take support for a ministry he's not doing, for example, for a fake and phony ministry, then he would not be walking justly. But in the same vein, if he was to walk with sinners who claim the name of Christ, he would also not be walking justly. If Paul walked into church and a man walked in who was married and he had sat with his wife last week and this week he walks in with his arm around some other young lady and his wife is sitting over there alone and he's acting like he's married to this other girl and Paul says nothing about it, he would not be just. Holiness and justice are also related to one another. If you are not just, you will soon be unholy. In fact, justice derives all of its power and all of its goodness from holiness. Justice that is not at its roots holy is injustice. You would say of a man that had a, let's say two men strove together and they fought one another and one man killed the other man. having a fight together, and the judge said, hang him high. Hang him high so the whole town can see him. And they hang that man until he's dead. And then the judge's son goes out because somebody sold him a bad apple, and he goes out and lays in wait for a man and catches him in the middle of the night on his way home and kills him. And the judge says, pay a fine of $50. Would that be just? No, that would be unjust. There would be no justice there. Lack of justness comes from lack of holiness. Now here in 1 Corinthians 5, he says here in verse 3, for verily, as absent in the body but present in spirit, he says, I verily, as absent in body but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present concerning him that hath so done this deed. There was a man who had his father's wife. He'd left his wife for his daddy's wife, which would have been his stepmom, and took her and treated her as his own wife and lived with her in such a case. And Paul said, I have judged already in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ when you are gathered together in my spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus to deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. And in this passage he teaches much about biblical judgment and church judgment. I have a book We're gonna try and get it available online called the unrecognized blessing of church judgment goes into great detail on this Taking all the scriptures into account that could be found upon this subject We're not going to dig into that judgment very much right now. Subject for another time. Verse 12, for what have I to do to judge them also that are without? Do not ye judge them that are within. Paul said, I walked among you justly. Judging justly means no respect of persons. It means that the pastor has to live by the same standard as everybody else. and everybody else has to live by the same standard as the pastor. And there's no respect to persons, and there is no respect to persons with God. He says here in verse 13, but them that are without God judgeth, therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person. Walking justly means judging self first, and judging righteous judgment second, even of others. Living in adherence to Christ's commands is walking justly. If you tell somebody to do something and you don't do it yourself, you're walking unjustly. And then here we're going to look at unblameably. Go to 1 Corinthians 6. Verse 12, all things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. So here Paul brings us into a third realm. Holily is that which pertains to my walk before God primarily, and it is visible to man. Justly is my walk between God and me and between man and me combined. If I am just towards God, it is that I have taken care of all my sin with God. And if I'm just before man, then I have taken care of all my sin with man. And I have no open accounts, no unconfessed sins, no undealt with offenses. I've done everything in my power to walk right before God. But unblameable behavior is primarily before man and it is visible to God. So walking unblameably means that people when they see me cannot accuse me falsely because of appearances that I am allowing. Does that make sense? Now anybody can accuse anybody of anything they want. People lie all the time. False accusations are a normal part of life. That's why God said in his word, thou shalt not bear false witness. But it happens. But if you are living in a way that can cause other people to have just reason to suspect you of sin, you are not living unblameably. Paul said not only did we walk holily, and not only did we walk justly, But we walked before you that believe unblameably. We lived in a manner of life that no one that's a Christian could say ought of what we did as being wrong. Go to 2 Corinthians 6 and verse 3. Here he says, giving no offense in anything that the ministry be not blamed, but in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God. And he goes through some of those things that they went through. For example, much patience in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults. in labors, in watchings, in fastings, by pureness, by knowledge, by long-suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned. Let me give you an example here today of unblameableness. If a pastor is pastoring, and a woman in his church, he's not married to her, she's another man's wife, comes to him and says, I have a deep question to ask you. It's a private question, I need your counsel. And that man goes into his office and shuts the door with him and that woman in his office and comes out an hour later. They may have been holy in that office. They may have stayed on opposite sides of the room. They may have been just in that office and committed nothing to offend anybody alive or to offend God and His laws. But being in that room alone with the door shut together and no accountability whatsoever gives cause for the enemy to speak reproachfully and now the ministry can be blamed. And it doesn't matter how holy they were or how justly they behaved themselves, they have given occasion to the enemy to speak reproachfully. And Paul says here, I would not give offense in anything that the ministry be not blamed. He's saying, I'm going above and beyond the call of duty. Matthew 5, 48 says, be ye therefore perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. And truly this whole concept of unblameable behavior is set forth by Jesus Christ in beautiful color in chapter five of Matthew. Justly is the second mile faith. Or justly goes the first mile, I'm sorry. But the unblameableness goes the second mile. You can walk justly and fulfill the law by carrying that Roman centurion's pack one mile. They had a law that allowed them, a Roman soldier could walk up and grab a Hebrew boy and tell him, you've got to carry my backpack for one mile and that boy had to do it by law. no matter what else was happening. And if his daddy tried to stop it, his daddy would go to jail. So that boy would take that soldier's backpack and walk behind the soldier for one mile. That's justly. He would fulfill the requirements of the law doing that. But unblameably goes the second mile. Jesus said, if any would compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. And that is the idea that he's talking about. Somebody makes you carry that pack one mile, go with him twain. And Paul is saying, ye are witnesses, and God also, how wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe. We would not allow ourselves to be in a situation or to be in a set of circumstances that we had any power over whatsoever that could even give somebody a hint of sin. That's a standard most people won't even think about touching. We won't even give the impression. The Bible says to do that, by the way. It says, avoid all appearance of evil. Don't even look like you are sinning. These preachers get up in our day and they get up there with their pants hanging down around their lower hips. And they get up there with gold chains all over their bodies and showing off their tattoos like they're some kind of war battle scars that make them qualified to stand up because they've got a so-called powerful testimony. Do you hear me? And they get up there flaunting their worldliness, looking like gangsters, looking like drug heads, looking like mafia, and they get up there and they flaunt their appearance of evil as if it gives weight to their testimony and the word of God says avoid all appearance of evil so you've got a good testimony pull your britches up go home and get a decent pair of britches put on a decent shirt Cover up your tattoos of pentagrams and Satan symbols as best you possibly can. Some of them are going to peek through and we'll forgive you for what you can't cover, but do the best you can. And I'd venture to say if you've got to get a sharpie marker and mark out that demonic goat head on your neck, do it for Christ's sake. And then get up there and tell everybody your powerful testimony. But avoid all appearance of evil. Do you hear me today? I am sick to death of this fake garbage that passes for powerful testimonies and powerful stuff whenever people flaunt their sin and they look like they're still dealing drugs. Avoid all appearance of evil. Does that mean you gotta put on a five-piece suit and $500 shoes and a Rolex watch? Absolutely not. Go down to the thrift store and get some guy's old corduroy suit that's not even in style with brown leather patches on the elbows if you've got to and cover up your stinging body and go to church and praise God and worship God and don't put on airs and don't flaunt your sin. And don't make your past life and the wickedness you were in and the sin you were in the focal point. Make Christ the focal point if your testimony is so powerful, sir. Amen. Unblameably, you are witnesses how wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you. that believe, 1 John 2, 6 says, hereby, well, let's turn there before I butcher, I'm getting mixed up with the other one. It's the one that speaks of we ought to walk even as he walked. You don't see Jesus flaunting around doing gangster signs and flipping his hands around and dancing around with his pants hanging around his legs, do you? That never happened. If you got a powerful testimony, start acting like Jesus. Amen? You don't have to show me all the marks of your sin to prove to me that you got saved out of it. A lot of people will do that verbally. Even if they get dressed up, they will tell you all their dirty sin. All the nitty gritty details of it. We don't need to know. We are all sinful people. We don't need to hear about your trash. need to hear that Jesus took the trash out and then we need to see by your holy and just and unblameable deportment and conversation and manner of life that he has changed you and you better let your walk talk the way your talk talks. You say Jesus cleaned you up, then clean up for Christ's sake. Get the earrings out of your ears, get the necklaces off your neck, cover up your tattoos, put on some different decent clothes, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. More people will be blessed and edified by your great testimony if you'll put on some decent clothes and sit down and shut up. Do you hear me? Prove that you're saved by shutting your mouth and stopping to flaunt the sin. So, moving on here, we behaved ourselves. I didn't leave a verse hanging, did I? I did. First John, and then we get into behavior. This ties into behavior. First John 2.6, he that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. He that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. So that is wholly before God, primarily invisible to man, justly before God, and justly before man, and thereby visible to both, and unblameable before man, and therefore visible to God. All in the sight of God and evidenced in the sight of man. 1 Peter 2.12, we're about done here. A few more verses in a few places here. 1 Peter 2.12. having your conversation honest. He says, dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul, having your conversation honest among the Gentiles, that whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation. Hallelujah. They may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation. If you don't like that Sharpie marker idea, get a scarf, but do something and cover up your satanic junk for Christ's sake. Praise God, you got saved out of it, hallelujah. I don't hate you for that stuff, but I don't want you parading it around and neither does God. 1 Peter 3 is a lot bigger than just that, as you know. He says, among you that believe. This should be a given, but it's often among the brethren when it's just us regular folk at church that stuff really gets out of line. They say familiarity breeds contempt. Go to 1 Peter 3, 8 and 9. He says that they behave this way among you that believe. Now sometimes you'll find people, they'll go out and they'll share the gospel with people and here comes a guy and he's got the pentagrams all up and down one side of his head and he's got a snake tattoo wrapping around his neck and going up the side of his head and the head of the snake comes down around his eye and his fangs are marked on his face right here and he's got them filed down teeth with metal sharp teeth all stuck in his face He's wearing a tiny scrap of a shirt trying to show off his muscles and all of his tattoos of devils and goats and all this other satanic things. He's tattooed all over his body. And here goes a man that last week was fighting, get this, he was fighting with another family in church because they allow something he doesn't really like. and he was telling them how wicked they are, and he's thinking about cutting them, breaking off fellowship, and he walks up to this other guy, and he's got tears coming out of his eyes, and he's showing this man the love of Christ, and he's weeping over this poor lost sinner trying to win him to Jesus. And then he gets back to the church house next Sunday, and he's duking it out with the deacon over whether or not they should have this tract or that tract, and he likes this tract, and the pastor doesn't really like it, and why doesn't the pastor like the tract I like? Okay? He says, how wholly and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe. 1 Peter 3, 8. Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous, not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing, but contrary wise blessing, knowing that ye are there unto called, that ye should inherit a blessing. Go to 1 Timothy 5. We are to be a family in the church house. And while it matters, listen, we've laid a lot of stress at the start of this message on what you are in the dark, what you are when nobody sees you but God. But it's a strange phenomena that people that are walking with God in their secret place and they're out sharing the gospel will often be the very people that turn on each other at the church house and can't stand each other at the church house. It's just, listen, anytime God gives you success in one arena, expect the devil to hit you in another arena twice as hard. 1 Timothy 5, he says in verse 1, Rebuke not an elder, but entreat him as a father, and the younger men as brethren. The elder women as mothers, the younger as sisters with all purity. Now, when I was a boy, there were a lot of guys I would never hit at church. And I was nice to the guys at church, but when I got home, it was my brothers, me and my brothers, who would duke it out. me and my brothers who would get in a fight and get angry with each other, and this ought not so to be. The family ought to be the closest. The family relationship, the relationships within the church, should be the pinnacle of love and purity and genuine, filial affection, family affection. The most genuine affection should be amongst the household of the faith, to skip Now to skip these three things wholly justly and unblameably wholly justly and unblameably and move on to the affection ends in fornication and Probably because we're so used to the wickedness and the sin of our immoral culture. We're gun-shy in this country There's a verse at the end of Thessalonians that we're gonna have to look at when we get there says greet greet one another with a holy kiss. Yay. I And we'll look at it, and by God's grace, we'll study it out and find out what we're supposed to do about that command that's in the Bible. And what the biblical, what it means, and how to obey it. And Lord willing, we'll obey it biblically, what it says to do. But we don't want, we're gun-shy of anybody. You know, we can't even, we look at any, if some guy starts talking to my wife, the thought hits, well, what's he got in mind? And I start talking to somebody else's wife, they're like, oh, oh, what's he doing? What's he doing plowing with my heifer? over there. And you might just be talking about sunflowers that were planted outside or something. And I'm not saying that that's always the case everywhere that people go, but there's a suspicion that has crept into fundamentalist churches, evangelical churches where we have standards. Now this doesn't exist. Again, we're in churches where they have no holiness, no justice, and no unblameableness. Then everybody just flirts with everybody under the name of Christian love and charity. And I have seen this. And you say, oh, because it's this old thing. It's all in the family. So you can hang out and flirt with somebody else's wife because it's all in the family. That's not what I'm talking about right now. That's wicked. We've already covered holy, justly, and unblameably. If you've got the holiness, you've got the justice, and you've got the unblameableness, then that woman across the aisle sitting next to that man is your sister, and the man is your brother, and you ought to have a deep, affection for your brother and for your sister and for their children because they are family and you ought to care about the man and the woman and the children across the aisle from you and you ought to have a deep interest in their success spiritually and physically but We're scared to death because of all the junk that's gone on in the name of Christianity. That's not what I'm talking about. In the context of holily, justly, and unblameably, you ought to love one another. And we're going to look at a couple verses and we'll be done. John 15. Go to John 15. And if you think these verses apply to a segregated church where all the men have to sit on one side and all the ladies have to sit on the other, and that the men are supposed to love the men and the women are supposed to love the women, you're off your rocker. God wants us to love one another with a pure heart, Fervently, that's what God's told me to do. That means that I need to love my wife as my wife, but I need to also love the other ladies in my church, the younger ladies as sisters. Now there used to be protection in this land for sisters and brothers used to take care of their sisters and open the door for their sisters and ask after their sister's welfare and if their sister needed something they'd be quick to jump and help with that. That used to be commonplace in this nation, but perversion and immorality and fornication and incest have swept through this country and destroyed even family relationships so that we can't even think right anymore. It is amazing to me that the wicked licentious world full of all their wickedness, will go into a job situation and some guy, listen to me, pay attention right here, some man will send his wife to work in a bank somewhere where the bank president walks in and asks her how she's feeling, leans up against the counter, they chit chat, other men come in, they talk back and forth and act normal all day long, and act like everything's okay, and it is, they're not committing sin, they're not doing anything wicked, and they'll have a decent relationship between a man and a woman in a workplace, and then you get into the church place, and it's not there. Either there's flirtation, or it's just flat, dead walls up. And the men and the women have no ability to even be friends with one another, and I tremble even saying this because of the excesses. But it's true. This is what Jesus taught. Look at John 15 12. This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you. That means that I should love my brother and I should love my sister. I should literally love every man and woman and child in the church. And if I truly love them, it'll stay in the bounds of holily, justly, and unblameably. But there will be love, one for another. Chapter 17, verse 11. And now, he says, I am no more in the world, but these are in the world. And I come to thee, Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one as we are. Verse 21. And you can't be one if somebody's going around honking after somebody else's wife. That destroys it. Immorality in a church destroys the ability for people to fellowship together. That's why the devil loves to get it in there. As bad as the immorality is to the individuals who commit the act, do you listen to me? What it does to everyone else in the room is bad on a whole nother level because it polarizes people and it makes everybody suspicious of everybody and then you can't have fellowship one with another. Everybody's always looking over their shoulder. Everybody's always staring everybody else down trying to make sure that everything's done right and that's garbage. Do you hear me that? Do you hear me today? your church is so wicked that you cannot even let your wife walk across the room and talk to people on her way and Say hello to people because you feel like somebody's gonna cheat on you You are either so wicked or your church is either so wicked that a lot of people need to get right It's not the way it should be Verse 23, I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in one. Go back to verse 22, and the glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be one even as we are one. I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in one and that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as thou hast loved me. This is something I desire in my heart and God desires us to have in our hearts. And this is something, this is a hard, this is a hard line to walk. In fact, it's impossible without the fullness of the Holy Spirit of God. But what God desires us to do is to love one another with pure hearts, fervently, as family. As brothers and as sisters. And if you do that, there will be no hanky-panky. There will be no trouble. There will be no problems if everybody is loving one another in Christ's love. 1 John 3, 10. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil. Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother." And if you go cheating on your brother with his wife, you hate him. The Bible says if you love your brother, there's no occasion of stumbling in you. Verse 14, we know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. And the last verse that we intend to look at here, hereby perceive we, verse 16, hereby perceive we the love of God because he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. We should have such love and such unity in our hearts toward one another that we cannot but walk wholly, justly, and unblameably before the brethren and in private. This whole thing is comprehended in love. This whole concept of walking wholly, justly, and unblameably is comprehended in love. If we love our brethren, there's no occasion of stumbling in us. Father, in Jesus' name, I pray that you take this message and use it. I pray, Lord God, that you would be glorified through it. We thank you, Lord, for your word and the goodness of your word, and Lord God, the fullness of your word. Even when it seems like there's not much there, Father God, when we study your word, it becomes evident, Lord, that there is plenty. and Lord that you'll feed us from every text. We ask you to help us to be holy and just and unblameable in our behavior one with another. We love you today in Jesus' holy name. We worship you and we praise you for Christ's sake. Amen. you