John 15:8-11 part 2 Theme: New Covenant Branches

I don't know if you can see it, but there's a lot of yellow letters. Oh, look where it ends up going in.

Oh, I don't look at it. Yeah, don't look at it. It looks like this is where it ends up.

Yeah. Yeah, I don't know why I can't do it. I'll just do it like this. I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know.

Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and the one for whom

God, our salvation, came down from heaven, and which is

God, the Father, the Holy Spirit, and the one who takes away the sins of the world, and who is buried, and who thirsts, and who sins, that he shall come again with the fruit of the womb of the

Son, the gift of the Holy Spirit, from the Father, and from the worship, and the meal, and the life, and the end.

All right, and again, welcome. In order to please you, and in order to follow along with service, with your voices, those are found in our confirmation table as you walk.

I did have the tables and the new offering boxes for these three runs, and I was going to do that this week, but weather, and you can't miss the run, so.

Also, I was going to reveal three boxes to sit your feet in on, but I just didn't, you know,

I wasn't able to do that. So, I'm glad I'm able to do those things this week, but in order to follow along with service, you know, your voices, those are found back at the moment, they're back there in that order.

Also, back there, there's a right there's an offer box.

We have two ways to get, one is to the designated spot, the other is through our new website, which is crvctalahoma .org,

crvctalahoma .org, and for parents with small children, we do have a fire run slash changing room.

Also, the employers will be going back towards that way, which is the right. Each week, we do have a fellowship panel, and today, we have hamburgers.

And so, the point of this is once service is over, we'll all just hang out here until it's time to eat, and then we'll enter this door to be able to perform the line.

Also, badges, we have badges to be on both floors, so there's the bottom floor and the top floor, and you can walk down to any one of these two rooms and just shuffle around.

A women's book club starts January the 18th, and the new books, and the new books that we're going through is

Respectable Sins by Jerry Bridges, and that's a $10 each accessible order.

As far as activism, there's a lot of work being done on the church, and with the bad weather, we haven't been able to do much centralizing, and here in Tallahoma Lake, so if you're in church or in good weather, we can get back on that together.

Also, David and Donna, we get membership forms. That's on the left -hand side. Leggings, leggings.

Leggings, the membership form is in the foyer, please. Only in the leggings table, but we have three now, so it will be on this side.

If you're going back, it will be on this side, just a bigger table. So, if you are a member here, please make sure to grab a copy of their membership form, read over it, and we will be welcoming you into membership, not just this week, but all the next time that they come.

It could be next week, but I don't think that we have a place on the week after. I meant to announce this last week, and then totally missed off the ball.

Let's see. Also, if you want to join us in our Bible reading plan, we're doing a three -year plan at the church, and we'd be very happy to give you a report on that, and we can talk and discuss some of the questions that we have in that, in our business plan.

I think that's about it outside of Lazy Night Prayer.

If you're available on Lazy Night, please come join us for our prayer meeting. Now, if you look this year's copy of the

Bulletin, we will go over together the Call to Worship, and our

Call to Worship is taken from Psalm 118 .1, 22 through 24.

Psalm 118 .1, 22 through 24. We give thanks to the

Lord for he is good, for his steadfast love in whom we're prayerful. This day has become important to us.

It is a large feeling. It is marvelous in our hearts. This is the day that the

Lord has let us rejoice and be glad in. God, the

Father, Lord, we do come to you in the name of Jesus Christ. Jesus, we praise your holy name.

We thank you that the spirit has proceeded from you in the Father, and that we, your people, are filled with the spirit that you have in our hands.

And God, we pray that as we worship you today and experience you as a collective body,

Lord, as you've blessed us, that we're not only us, but all churches who have gathered together for the same purpose, to worship you for us.

For we ask that you may be a part of us, and you will lead us, and you will guide us. And now we pray that our

Lord will call us to prayer. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.

Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debts.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

In the spirit of Jesus, let's stand and we'll sing Psalm chapter 21. What we desire in this heart to fully have supply.

What we request in this heart to fully deny.

For you have a company with blessings manifold.

And you have a place in the midst of the love of your soul.

When we request a delight from you.

Give the life to him that gives. The holy strength of faith you give.

Full strength to keep us safe.

In your salvation we will sleep.

And glorify your name. And you upon the earth have peace.

For the Lord has sent us to you.

For you have a place in the midst of the love of your soul.

And you have a place in the midst of the love of your soul.

All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and your thanks will be blessed to you. Psalm 145

He loves us and takes us all the way to the other side.

How do you know He takes you to all the world? I think

He loves you. He takes pride in you all the way. So will you.

He takes pride in you. I forget you. I forget you.

He takes pride in you. He takes pride in you.

He takes pride in you.

He takes pride in you.

We have a very high proof that it's actually the head of the tree that's the son of God.

Let's hold that. We have a very high proof that it's actually the head of the tree that's the son of God.

Let's hold that.

We have a very high proof that it's actually the head of the tree that's the son of God.

We have a very high proof that it's actually the head of the tree that's the son of God.

Her brother and her mother said, let's get a woman to marry us while at least ten days.

After that, they go. But he said to them, do not delay me, since the

Lord hath fostered my way. Send me away with her, that I may go with my man.

They said, let's call the young woman and ask her. And they called Rebekah and said to her, will you go with this marriage?

And she said, I will go. So they sent away Rebekah, their sister, and her girl.

And they were very certain. And they blessed Rebekah and said to her, our sister, may you become thousands of ten thousands, and may your offspring be as great as those who hate you.

Then Rebekah and her young women arose and rode on their camels and followed the man who was serving her,

Rebekah, and went his way. Now Isaac had returned from Jerusalem, and was dwelling in the

Negev. And Isaac went out to meditate in the fields toward the east.

And he lifted up his eyes and saw in a hole there were camels coming. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes.

And when she saw Isaac, she dismounted from the camel and said to the servants, who is that man walking in the fields near?

The servants said, he is my master. So she took her veil and covered herself.

And the servants told Isaac all the things that he had done. And Isaac brought her into his tent up there, his mother, and took

Rebekah, and she became his wife. And he loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother's death.

This is the word of the Lord. It is enough. Let's put our votes in once again, and we will do our test in question number two.

Question number two. What is God? Answer. Answer. What is

God? God is eternal. Everything is unchangeable in his power, relentless in his glory, wisdom, justice, and truth.

Not to do. Do you, holy

God, reconfess our sin, where there's much shame and sorrow, and to be a monster?

We know we all do that because we are in return so blessed.

We confess to you, oh God, that we deceive ourselves of our own blessings.

And then we deceive ourselves of our own.

Slipping and sliding and sidestepping the truth. Oh God, you are holy, you have all that we need.

You are the source of righteousness. You are the holy fountain of greatness.

You make us jump off of the cliff, smudge, distract you from your purpose, and brush you back with the gods of this world.

Please, for example, show us through Jesus, through your faith in Jesus Christ, and I can assure you based on the shoulder of the word, it's been done.

Let's sing one more time. We'll sing together. We sing, oh

God, for the son of man, for Jesus, you are the keeper of salvation.

You are the source of salvation. We stand in awe of you.

We praise you. We sing, we praise you.

We sing, we praise you. We sing, we praise you.

The gospel of Jesus Christ.

It is written, I bear it in my heart, that my best friend, Jesus, may his passion be great.

He is baptized in the wilderness, and the flame of baptism, and the redemption, and the forgiveness of all the country of the dead, and all the roads of Jerusalem, for going out into the world, and will be baptized by Jesus in the river

Jordan, for his presence in their sins. Now John was clothed with handkerchiefs, who wore a leather belt around his waist and ate roses in the wildlife, saying,

After me comes he who is mightier than I. Stratus was saying in sign of the

Word to Sam, I have baptized you with water, that he will baptize you with the

Holy Spirit. In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, baptized by John in the

Jordan. And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the essence being formed, and the

Spirit standing on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven,

You are my blessed sons, with you I am well pleased. The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness, and he was in the wilderness for days, being tainted by Satan.

And he was with the wild animals, and the angels, and the men of the city. After John was arrested,

Jesus came into the city of Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying,

The time has come, the kingdom of God is at hand, to pray and to believe in the gospel.

This is the Word of the Lord. Blessed Lord, I rise to you at this time to make a copy of the scriptures and turn them into the gospel of John, chapter 15.

The gospel of John, chapter 15, we will consider verses 8 through 11.

The gospel of John, chapter 15, verses 8 through 11. This is message number 93.

Message number 93. Allow me to open this one first.

O God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we come to that portion of our service where we're looking to you through the text of the apostle

John, Lord, and through me to articulate well your message.

And God, we are dependent upon you through your spirit to speak forth through me in order for us to understand these things that you have laid out for us.

God, in the name of Jesus Christ, the power of your spirit, and through your spirit, we will speak to your people through this verse, we pray in the name of the

Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Well, it's been a joy to say the least, being able to stand before you all this time that we've been walking through this glorious gospel written by the apostle

John. And here in chapter 15, I've been applying the application of our text as we go.

So this is something I don't always do. However, I felt it necessary, I felt it necessary to do so in this church.

When we walk through this section of scripture, we're, what we have to walk away with is understanding that the direct interpretation was applied to his disciples at that time, which were physical descendants of Abraham.

But that's what we must understand first, that this portion of scripture, what

Jesus has been saying, is direct interpretations to physical descendants of Abraham, particularly those that were following him in his time.

But that in no way negates or nullifies an indirect interpretation and an application for us.

So I've been applying that as we go. We have all known people who profess faith in Jesus, live as Christians, and went to church, and then one day just stopped.

They stopped professing faith in Christ, they stopped living as Christians, and began to forsake the gathering with the saints.

Now this could be for a short time until the discipline of God comes upon them, or this could be because they were never a part of it.

One of the saddest verses in all of scripture that we as Christians have to come to terms with is found in 1

John 3 verse 19. If you're not concerned there, I will read that for you.

1 John chapter 3 verse 19 says this, they were not from us, but they were not of us.

For if they had been of us, they would not continue with us. For they went out that it might become plain that they all are not of us.

Now this too has a direct and indirect interpretation. The direct interpretation has to do with the physical dependence of Abraham to deny that Jesus was the

Christ. But still today, we have people that are joining up with the church and church membership to profess faith in Christ, live as Christians, and stop gathering with the saints, because they were not from us.

They were not of us. Our theme for this

Lord's Day is new covenant branches, and this is the second part of a two -part message. And my proposition is this, new covenant branches are not old covenant or visible church membership branches.

There's a difference. Last week we spoke about how the old covenant only branches and how they were cut off from the body when the new covenant took form.

And also we spoke about how visible church membership only branches and how spiritual was involved.

How someone can be a member of a church and not be in the new covenant.

He spent all these years, probably as a child, raised up in church, believing that when you die you're going to go to heaven, only to hear

Jesus said, I never knew. There are many people, sadly, who are going to hear the words,

I never knew. They were never truly sold out to Jesus Christ.

They were members of churches, but not members of Christ in the new covenant.

They're not outside of the emphasis and faith in Christ. They too will be cut off from the true body.

They were connected without a connection. Remember I touched on that last week. I mentioned how this week

I plugged my phone charger in. I didn't push it all the way in.

Sometimes I'll plug it in. You know how it's got the two devices and I'll just plug one device in and the other one will just hang out by itself.

I got my phone in. I'm thinking it's charging. I thought it was connected.

There wasn't a connection. Dear friends, this is what church membership can be like.

If you're here today thinking that you are connected to the vine and all the while you have not repented, you have not proved that your faith in Jesus Christ and your connection, but there is no connection.

There is a true connection to the vine through that they will go out from us.

When you see that the they that go out from us in the same way,

I refuse to see that they are connected to the church without the connection and you'll hear, not well done my good and faithful servant, but I never mean it.

Join me as I read through our text today. John chapter 15 verses 8 through 11.

Again, this is Jesus speaking. He says by this my father is glorified that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.

As the father has loved me, so I have loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love just as I have kept my father's commandments and abide in his love.

This saying I have spoken to you that you may have that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full.

In our outline today we're going to see that Jesus tells us how to bear, Jesus tells us how the branches are to bear much fruit.

We see that it's through abiding in Christ, through proving we are his disciples and through being joyful.

Point number one is what we looked at last week and it was about abiding in Christ. It was basically just an overlook of what we've been looking at from verses one through seven.

If I'm not mistaken this is our fifth message in chapter 15.

Points two and three is what we look at today. Point number two, proving we are disciples of Jesus.

Point number three, being joyful in Jesus. Now to transition,

I want to read for you verses one through seven so we can have our context and comment just a little bit.

Look at verse one. Jesus starts out with a text of gramophone, proclaiming himself to be

God. He says, I am. He says, I am the true bondage and my father is the vine.

At the time Israel was known as the vine. And as Jesus was leaving the upper room with his disciples, they passed by the temple.

I don't really know the map too well. It could have been way before or late. I just don't believe that this just popped in his head for no reason.

He just often whenever he's hearing something, he would take what was happening in that moment and he would use it as an illustration for himself and it showed how these things were pointing to him.

Now Israel itself points to Christ because we know the scripture that Jesus is the true

Israel. Jesus sees the temple with this gold -plated vine and he says that he is the true vine and his father is the vine dresser, which means true

God. Every branch that is in me, he says, that does not bear fruit, he takes away.

He removes it. And every branch that doesn't bear fruit, he presents, that it may bear more fruit.

This word here, plumes, the Greek word is tophairo. And I pointed out that this is speaking about sanctification and this word tophairo, it means to cleanse one of filthy impurities.

We talked about how that's what's taking place here at church under the ordinary means of grace.

As the work of God is being preached over you, as those who are baptized are partaking in the

Lord's supper eight times a week, God, the Father, with his knife and with his sin is cleaning us, sanctifying us, he is cleansing us from all filth and impurities.

And Jesus tells his disciples to listen because Jesus had already heard the betrayal.

He mentions that in chapter 13, he mentions that not all of you are clean because he knew he would betray him and in verse 33 he says, all of you are clean.

The word here for clean is the Greek word tophairo. Understanding the justification of our cleanse by course, the washing of three generations, the new birth.

He says, all of you are born again. That can be translated. Because of the words that I have spoken to you.

He says, abide with me before abiding to remain. And on me.

That the bread cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can ye unless you abide in me.

We saw in first John that to abide in Jesus is to believe in the name of Jesus and to love one another as itself.

And he goes on to say that he abides with us through the Holy Spirit. He says, abide with me, believe in me, love one another as you believe in me.

For the Holy Spirit says, the bread cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can ye unless you abide in me.

And his truth here from the context of Isaiah chapter 5 is justice and righteous. We found out that we are justified and made right with God because of what

Christ Jesus has done for us. He says,

I am the vine or the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit.

For for me, it can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withered.

The branches are gathered from the fire and burned. If you abide in me, in my words, abide in me.

Ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. There are two specific things that people have trouble with concerning this text and other texts that we've been looking at in John.

The first one is how God is only the father of the children of Abraham.

And he also goes and tells these religious Jews in John chapter 8, he says, your father is the death.

Yes, your children are the children of Abraham, but your father, your father is the death.

And these Jews, these children of the sons of Abraham, they hate their father. They say, we don't have a father.

When you read Galatians chapter 3 verse 7 and you're listening to the apostle

Paul's interpretation of this, he says, note then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham.

So it's not the physical descendants of Abraham who are the sons of Abraham or who have

God as their father. But it's those who have the faith of Abraham who have

God as their father. In other words, today, if you listen,

I love our Jewish brothers and sisters. I don't think there should be a racist bone in any of our bodies.

Because they don't look like it. So let me be frank, we need to understand this truth.

If they do not have the faith of Abraham, they are not children of God. They are not the

God's chosen people. Now, are the physical descendants of Abraham God's chosen people? Yes, for a purpose, to bring about the seed of promise to be given to Abraham for a long purpose.

That seed being Jesus Christ. They fulfilled that purpose. God's chosen people are those that believe in Jesus Christ.

That's really far for a lot of people and particularly a lot of Christians to understand.

The second was that those who did not abide in Christ will face divine judgment.

For those who do not believe that Jesus is the Christ, who love their brothers and sisters in Christ, will face divine judgment.

That's what the wheat told us. Remember it was that his wheat, speaking of Christians, will be gathered into the barn.

The barn here in the New Testament. But the chaff, non -Christians, will be burned with an unquenchable fire, divine judgment, speaking of hell.

There's only two places, two destinations for men and women to go.

One, you're wheat, you're gathered into the barn, and you're the people of God in the

New Testament. The second place is hell. You'll face divine judgment and you're going to go to hell.

Those who have faith in Jesus Christ, whether I was speaking to Doug yesterday where we were talking about this over the phone, the revelation that Abraham got, the gospel that was preached to him, that a seed would come from him that would bless the nation.

That was the gospel message. Abraham believed that. He was counted righteous.

We in hindsight have a more full picture of what took place.

However, we have something in the New Testament that they can keep people in our time from believing each other.

That was in the Torah too. If you tell somebody that God became man, that he was created in the image of creation, that he lived a perfect life, and then he died, died in the belly, on a throne, on a cross, and then he was buried in green and red, and came back to the grave.

That's foolishness. And so the message that we believe is full of picture, is full of picture, it's foolishness, the

Bible says that it's foolishness of those who are cursed, those who are going to face divine judgment.

However, what seems to really trouble people, and I'm speaking as a

Christian, is that Christians are to prove themselves to be faithful to Jesus.

Because you have to be faithful to Jesus before he's going to judge you.

And it's the same thing that James chapter 2 tells us. Now, Apostles tell you to look to your own truth, look to your own works in life, and judge by the works that you've done in life, to see if you're a

Christian. That's possible. That's possible. I'm talking about your focus sticks, your gaze upon Jesus, and runs the race.

But it's free for other people to learn if you are a Christian. Let's look at that real quick.

Point number two, proving we are disciples of Jesus. Verses 8 -13,

Jesus says, By this my Father is warned by, that ye bear much fruit, and so true to be my disciples.

That's what it says in Jesus. As the

Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my

Father's commandments, and abide in his love. Now, to say that all this links together is an understatement.

The whole abiding, the not bearing fruit, how do we keep this commandment?

We believe in Jesus. Those that believe in Jesus, we gather together forcefully in order to love one another and prove if we're able to bear fruit.

It's all interconnected, and I don't believe that I'm educated enough to even articulate well this diamond with its many facets.

I think if I were to start to speak about it, I would just be rambling, and begin to make up words that don't make sense.

It's so far beyond me. In Jesus, keeping the commandments of his

Father is how we are dedicated to life. Abraham was credited, all those in the

Old Testament were credited with a righteousness that had not yet been revealed. Again, it all points to when

Jesus Christ lived a life that he could not live, and took upon himself a punishment that we deserve.

Our righteousness, our right standing with God is based on the active and passive obedience of Jesus Christ.

Here, living the life that we could not live, and taking the punishment that we deserve.

I was talking about earlier, our day and our days need to be focused on Jesus. That's what it is to be focused on.

We're to live our lives with looking to Jesus Christ, the life that he lived, and the atoning death, and he died, his burial, and his resurrection.

My dear friends, I believe that everybody needs to be able to bear fruit. We as the people of God gather together, we assemble together, because we believe in Jesus Christ and we love him.

And through that, the Father turns us, he cleanses us from our guilty and impurities.

We're able to bear fruit. The Son of Jesus Christ loved the

Father, and the evidence of this is that Jesus fulfills his role, because he keeps his commandments.

Jesus kept the commandments of the Father. It had to do with his role in the covenant of redemption.

So we need two ways to understand Jesus keeping these commandments, and we already mentioned them.

The first one that we mentioned was him fulfilling his role in the covenant of redemption. The covenant of redemption is a timely covenant with God.

The Father chose to save the people. The Son comes into time to save that people through his life, death, burial, and resurrection, and the

Holy Spirit applies that perfect salvation to those who fear the gospel. The Father chose them to come to the gospel and to save them.

Jesus did his part. His part was to come into time. Y 'all, he steps into a holy throne.

He enters into time. He takes on the flesh. He lives in a time that he and I do not live, and he takes the punishment that we deserve in his death and is buried, and he rises again on the third day.

That's a part of the commandment that Jesus kept, and it says right here, it says,

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved thee. Abide in my love.

Keep my commandments. You will abide in my love, just as I have kept my

Father's commandments. Abide in his love. Speaking of his role in the covenant of redemption, but also the second way to understand it is him keeping the law of God in our place as a substitute.

Dear friends, if Jesus had not fully been obedient to the law of God, if he had not lived the life that you and I cannot live, his death would not be a perfect ending.

Jesus, in verse 8, is telling us how to glorify God. Now, I hate to do this, but I'm going to quote from the

Westminster Session today, the Shorter Catechism. I'm going to be smiling. Stop it.

But it's just a fantastic passage, and I'm going to read the

Shorter Catechism. I just did it a little bit backwards. The Westminster Shorter Catechism, question one says this.

What is the chief end of man? Man's chief end is to glorify

God and to enjoy him forever. Let me read that again.

What is the chief end of man? Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

We glorify God according to verse 8 by bearing fruit. Bearing fruit.

And through our bearing fruit, we prove ourselves to be disciples of Jesus.

Some of the best times is love of verse 8. My dear, my

Father is glorifying you, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciple.

You have to love me.

I have to love you. That's probably one of the hardest things about being a Christian, right?

Is this love for one another. Like, we were born, we're so set, and we're so set that it's all about me, me, me, me, myself, and only me.

That's how I'm supposed to be in the Christian. We glorify God according to verse 8 by bearing much fruit.

And it has to do with those who believe in him, gather together, and love one another. And we can only bear much fruit through our inviting of Jesus, our believing in him, and loving one another.

It's the only way that we can bear much fruit. That's the only way that we can prove ourselves to be disciples of Jesus.

Because those who truly believe in Jesus, gather together and love one another. I think

Christians would do well to understand that the church is a gift given to us by God so that we can carry out this commandment.

You cannot carry out this commandment without the church. You cannot do it.

Without the gathering, we do not bear much fruit. We cannot come to ourselves to be disciples of Jesus.

We cannot love one another if there is no gathering. This is why what took place in 2020 was so important in the church, right?

You know, this COVID, this shot thing that came about, and the world was trying to keep people from gathering together.

Your friends, they're trying to keep us from being able to keep the commandments of God. And then they said, if we gather, we love one another.

If we don't gather, we love one another. That's all good. Things that are good are equal, and things that are equal are good.

Man, this is the only way that we can fulfill this commandment.

Those that believe in Jesus, gather together and love one another. When you're sleeping, you can't sleep at night.

It's still the Holy Spirit. But even if you're selfish, me and myself are not.

There's selfishness and selfishness, right? And I just say that we need the

Holy Spirit in order to carry out these commandments. And I don't know about you, but I really love the fact that the

Bible, when it tells us to do something, it tells us how to do the something that it tells us to do. But it doesn't leave you one way.

It tells you to abide. It tells you how to abide. It tells us how to abide in Jesus.

And it tells us how to abide in Jesus. It tells us how to bring those truths and the power of those truths for you.

And yes, gathering together, all the Lord says, I don't know what I can do. I just know that I can't do it.

In this gathering, God is pouring over us, sanctifying us, giving to us a deeper and richer knowledge of Him, a deeper and richer love for Him, a deeper and richer love for one another.

Now, this might not be true for all of us, right? My hope is that you love me more today than you did the first day you visited me, right?

But if you love God more today than you did the first day, that is just fine.

That we're growing in our knowledge of God, we're growing in our love for God, and we're growing in our love for one another.

This is a part of our rewarding God and enjoying Him. If you do not gather with the saints on the

Lord's day, and let me just say this, if you're not enjoying this gathering, if you do not want to gather with the saints on the

Lord's day, you will not enjoy it. I just imagine the best moments that we have here at church, right?

The best moments that we have in our lives, theological talks, the bantering back and forth, right?

Or even if it's just with the guys hanging there, or the women in the book club, or the guys on the street, but we're just together, and we're hanging out, and we're laughing, and we're talking about the things of God, and we're celebrating, and I imagine that they're the best moments for me, and they're the moments that I don't want to walk away from.

I'm not sure. So, we are so blessed to be touched on the fruit of righteousness and the fruit of repentance.

And we read from Galatians chapter 5, concerning the fruit of the Spirit. And those fruits, you see in Galatians chapter 5, was love, the fruit of love, so joy, peace, patience, kindness, spiritualness, faithfulness, and goodness, faithfulness, faithfulness, and self -improvement.

You know that we practice those things here. We've been speaking about love, right?

And how we're to enjoy God, we're also to enjoy one another, right?

And we're here that our hearts should be filled with joy, and we should be joyful that we're able to gather together.

And there should be a house, a church, a local church who has peace, like there should be peace in this house.

And we're able to display to one another our kindness, and goodness, and our faithfulness, not only to God, but to one another, our gentleness to one another, and our self -improvement towards one another.

This is what we're talking about. I'm going to complete this,

I'm going to move this over, I'm going to talk over here, this is where we need to work a little bit. This is where we work on it.

This is where we need to work on it. These nine truths that we read down in Galatians chapter five are the first of all to be displayed,

I'm going to read this out, are first of all to be displayed with those in our own hearts. And then in the first one, in this first one we have this common faith.

Sometimes we get into 2 Peter chapter one, but as we turn to 2

Peter chapter one, I feel like I need to again remind you, as you're coming at it, you need to understand that these truths here in Galatians, and also that we're going to look at in 2

Peter, do not justify our virtues for God. I'm not saying do these things and God will be pleased with you and grant you salvation.

And then, vertical justification is by grace alone through faith in Jesus Christ.

For God has forgiven us of our sins because of the life, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. You believe in that, and that's how you're justified.

However, horizontal justification is the fruit of justification.

In my case, we are justified not before me, but before men.

Imagine, I'm sure all of us have known someone who says they believe in Christ and live like a devil.

Right? We probably know people like that. Well, we can't think of a professional faith spirit if people don't like it.

If we see it all the time on the internet, you see these big church measure groups, and I hate everyone that doesn't believe in Christ.

I have always found that there's bridges between people who have a slightly different belief in Christ. But you don't have to be able to explore that as something that you need to write in a pile of sand.

It's called these bridges, these bridges in Christ. The Bible tells us that we are to know one another by our spirit.

So there's a difference between vertical justification, believe right with God, faith alone in Jesus Christ, versus horizontal justification.

Right? When you tell me that I believe in Christ in my life, it's like taking your things to the point.

We'll start reading in verse three. Verse three,

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to want and want not, that Satan our father is building us up for what's coming.

Read that again. It's a divine power. It is divine power.

In Ephesians 36, the Holy Spirit is in us, calling us to keep his command. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to want and godliness through the knowledge of him who calls us to his own glory and excellence.

By this he has granted to us his precious and very great promises so that through him we may become partakers of his divine nature.

Speaking of our resurrection of the dead, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desires.

First of all, for this very reason, for this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue.

Where virtue here is moral excellence. Moral excellence.

And your moral excellence, your virtue, this is how you live, with knowledge.

With knowledge. Where do you get the knowledge from? Study.

Get a part of the church. It's important to have knowledge. Make every effort, make every effort, this is you, put in some effort to supplement your faith, your believing, with virtue, with moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, and knowledge with self -control, and self -control with steadfastness.

The steadfastness here is perseverance. Perseverance. You're coming.

You keep coming. You keep coming. You keep coming. And to the very end, perseverance.

And your steadfastness with gladness, and your gladness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.

For at least quality, what I've just read is page three. Faith, moral excellence, knowledge, self -control, perseverance, gladness, brotherly affection, and love.

And for if these qualities are yours, and are increasing, they're growing, they keep you from being ineffective, or unfaithful, in the knowledge of our

Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you, Lord. For what is equality?

What's the point of equality? Faith, moral excellence, knowledge, self -control, perseverance, and love.

For what is equality is so nearsighted, that he is blind, having forgotten that he was slain.

Therefore, you must be all the more diligent to confess it, to call it an election, for if you confess these qualities, you will never fail.

If you confess your faith, moral excellence, knowledge, self -control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly affection, and love, you will never fail.

It's the way to life, a purposeful mixture of loving one another, being joyful, being sensual, and persevering, if our

Jesus is the Lord our God, it is so dear to my soul and my heart, and it's so dear to me, it's so dear to you, that you make your calling an election, to the people who know you.

Let's pray with me, Jesus Christ. Oh, part of my personal life, that was not true.

Father has loved me, so I am loved thee. Abide in my love.

If you keep my commandments, if you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my

Father's commandments, and abide in his love. In other words, in order to measure how much

Jesus loves us, we would have to be able to measure how much the Father loves

Jesus. We have that kind of measurement. We have rulers that day, right?

And for us to keep the commandments of Christ, we are to love one another with an unmeritable love.

Do you know how much we are to love one another? Nothing. That's why you're not looking for it as well. Jesus said, this is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.

How much has he loved us? As much as the Father loved him, he said.

You're going to love me. Love me with the unmeritable love that the

Father loved the Son, and the Son loves us. We're to love one another with that kind of love.

In the same way that the Father loves the Son, the

Son loves us. We are taught to love one another with that same kind of love. And here goes in Scripture, the gospel has not lost its strength, hence has lost their ability to love.

Christians have lost their ability, if you will, to love. In the same capacity as the Father loves the

Son, the Son loves the Father. Do you know what I'm talking about? And this is why

Christianity has lost its strength. I'll tell you one thing. It's lost its strength because it's lost its ability to love.

When the church looks like the world, the church is persuading the power of God. It's persuading the power of God.

Who wants the power of God? God loves us. It's the Holy Spirit. I kept her warm.

I kept her safe. It's the Holy Spirit. Yes, we have the Holy Spirit, but in football you have that term, that they sit on.

I'm telling you, so much what we're doing, we're forming the Holy Spirit. We're programming the

Holy Spirit now. It's as simple as that. So this section of Scripture has convinced me and has challenged me in so many different areas.

Most would rather betray you with a kiss than to repent and ask for forgiveness. The most intimate way of betrayal, we see it with Judas.

We spoke about it last week, how Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss. Most people today would rather betray you in the most intimate way than to repent and ask for forgiveness.

In John chapter 13, verse 35, Jesus says, by this all people will know that you are my disciples.

Yes, we love one another. The people know that you are disciples.

The only little baby in the nose is we love one another. We love one another.

In order to bear fruit, we must abide in Jesus and we do that through keeping his commandments, by believing in Jesus and loving one another in the same way that the

Father loves the Son, the Son loves us. And my business here today is to encourage you to be a disciple.

I tell you, he's an inspiration to all.

He's a demigod. He's a Presbyterian. He's a father. He depends on all of us.

Once again, we are not addicted.

And if we are not abiding, we show ourselves to be false protectors of the faithful.

And we will be for those who follow us, but they're just like us, who will go off on us because we were never like them.

If we are not loving one another, we cannot show and prove the

Spirit to one another. And in our last point, we're going to see that abiding in Christ, Christ abiding in us, bringing us through and glorifying

God is for our joy. Point number 20, in a joyful Jesus.

Look at that for a second. These things I have spoken to you that you may be their people.

Let's read that verse. These things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you and that this joy may be full.

Again, I was trying to touch on this earlier. The last two weeks, this message has been really weighing on me.

Again, as I'm going through it, I would say the last seven or eight weeks because I've been preaching through the whole thing, was this whole idea of keeping

His commandments, loving one another, bearing the fruit. It weighs heavy.

It's got to feel the weight. It felt like He failed in His arrogance.

I'm not, I'm still failing.

Maybe this is why that the power of the Holy Spirit is not displayed in the church today.

And we have all these fake, phony proclamations of what the Holy Spirit is doing, but the authentic spirit, the power, that authentic power of the

Holy Spirit, we don't see. And what

Jesus is saying to us in verse 11 is that His commandments are, His commandments that we are to keep are not a confusion.

That His commandments, and we are keeping His commandments in order to bear fruit, and it is a good thing and it's not a bad thing, meaning that it's not our, that Him telling us to keep

His commandments, that's a good thing. It's not a bad thing. That it is something that you should do and that you do it out of His brand new joy.

It should be a joyful thing to live the life of a

Christian, to live the life of believing in Jesus Christ and doubting what

He's saying and loving one another. And for this, He says, moral excellence, knowledge, self -control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly affection, and love.

That should be a good thing for us. But this is not a fantasy, this is not a burden.

Jesus said that His burden is life. And His life is what's in the

Holy Spirit, is His power, that strong in us to keep His power. It was only busting from Jesus to fulfill

His heart and the presence of redemption as painful as it was. And to live the life that you and I cannot live as our substitute.

As a matter of fact, I would argue that it was the joy of Jesus Christ to live. It was

His joy that the Father did not make Him take on flesh, live the life that we could not live.

And not in the death that we deserve. It was His joy, it was His presence to do so. It was

His joy to keep God's commandments in order to be that spotless lamb that we receive righteousness from.

God has graciously gathered us together as a local body of Christ to love one another.

And that our love for one another should give us great evidence that we are in Christ and that Christ is in us, and that our joy is made complete.

That whenever we are believing in Jesus and we're loving each other, and we know that this is what

God, this glorified God, that our knowing that it's glorifying God should make our joy complete.

Do you know that you're daring what God has called you to do as a believer? Have you looked to do things for your salvation?

No, you look to do the Christ. Because these commandments are impossible for us to keep outside the church.

God has called those who believe in the Son to gather together in order to love one another so that we can share

Christ's praise. And in bettering those praise, we can be full of joy.

The difference between Old Covenant branches versus excuse me, Old Covenant branches versus New Covenant branches.

The difference between New Covenant branches and Old Covenant branches and church membership is that the branches in the midst of it do not complement each other.

There is a serious fight between the people of each church.

And we can do so in a CPR code. And as I close, I want you to serve yourself by asking yourself some questions.

I wrote an ancient report on this the last few weeks, or probably since we started John chapter 15, because I was curious and I don't think that someone can be in the

Old Covenant and remove Christ who are physical descendants of Abraham and can be removed from Christ and become a new

Covenant and a new Covenant and it's not weird that we have many, many thousands of people, hundreds of thousands of people who are members of the church such as Pentecostal, Protestant, and even in the future who are members of churches that are not in Christ.

And I want you to think, I don't know what to ask here. I want you to think of the aspects of do you really, like do you really, like do you really believe in Jesus?

Do you really believe that the second person of the Trinity, Blessed Pentecost, took on flesh and lived the life that he commanded and that they really did put him to death and that three days later he came out of the grave and that he ascended into heaven and he's in heaven roaring and roaring and putting all the things under his feet and that he's going to return again one day to compliment him?

Do you really believe that? And I want you to ask yourself, are you really loving your brothers and sisters?

Are you really loving your brothers? Are you willing to give up your life for the faith?

And most people will say yes, but I didn't say yes. Are you willing to give up your life for the faith?

How much does a father love his son?

How much does a son love his father? How much does a son love his father? Just for the love of Jesus. Are you willing to give your life for the faith?

There are many false brothers who say that they believe in Christ Jesus Christ. There are lots of people out of that community

There are many people who love their brothers and sisters but do not believe in Christ Jesus Christ. True authenticity can't be exposed.

Both must be true. If you have to believe in the true son of God, Jesus Christ, and love your brothers and sisters with an unmeritable love, the love that God has for God the

Father, love of the Son, and the Son of God, you have to have it in heaven.

Both have to be true. Both have to be true. However, if it's not today, it is the day of salvation.

The Bible is clear. Today is the day of salvation. Today, you can be given the

Holy Spirit and you can love your brothers and sisters. You can believe in Jesus and love your brothers and sisters.

In fact, let me tell you something. Truly and truly, the point of the Word of God is clear. If you really and truly desire to hear the

Scriptures proclaim the love of the Lord, and I'm just fully convinced that if you do those things, really you can turn to each other a little inside.

You really can be connected with a connection. The Holy Spirit can really, like really, really work through you so that you don't have these problems where you don't love.

When we refer to the Father, this is a point in time that we're going to be touched on.

What I'd like for you to do is I want you to meditate on this. We're exiting this portion, but it's going to be strengthened in the next section.

First, I want you to meditate on this. And there's five verses.

It's going to say everything that we've been looking at. Verse one.

Verse two. Verse three. Verse four.

Verse five. Verse six.

Verse seven. And his semantics are not verdicts.

For everyone who has been born to God overcomes the world.

And this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith.

Who it is that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the

Son. His voice is available to anyone who wants to follow him.

This character is a privilege of the portion where we're to love one another as much as we love the

Son and the Son loves us. A lot of barter and tolerance by them do not identify themselves in this throughout my

Christian life. And I'm sure everyone in here has.

Thank you for the word. Thank you for your spirit that convicts us. And what we ask is that this energy that's been brought to our attention, brought to light to us and reflected.

The juice of the power of your spirit will turn on us and it will remove that guilt in us from Jesus from doing these things.

The language you have us to do. So we want to be a people who serve the risen

Lord. We can only do that if you lead and guide us.

We pray to be leaded for you to guide us. We love you.

And as we're about to partake in this, we ask that you lead us to grow into the world.

Whether you will feed those who have understated or who have not been to me in this collection or all those who we have granted to be repentance.

If you haven't given us the ability to confess our sins, we pray that you will use this meal as a way of turning us to grow more in the likeness of Jesus Christ.

And we know that you will do this. We know you will. Let's say it.

Thank you. Amen.