All Things Together For Good: Chap 8

All right, so this evening we move into Chapter 8, and more than likely we will be done with Chapter 8 this evening, and next week we'll have

Chapter 9, and then we're done, we're moving on to something else. But obviously the book is all things for good, and the whole book is really an exposition of Romans 8 .28,

and so Chapter 8 here is exhortations to those who are called. We just spent a few weeks in Chapter 7 talking about the effectual calling, and so now for those who are called, here we are.

Let's see, if after searching you find that you are effectually called,

I have three exhortations to you. One, admire and adore

God's free grace in calling you, that God should pass over so many, that he should pass by the wise and noble, and that the lot of free grace should fall upon you, that he should take you out of a state of vassalage from grinding the devil's mill, and should set you above the princes of the earth, and call you to inherit the throne of glory.

Fall upon your knees, break forth into a thankful triumph of praise, let your hearts be ten -string instruments to sound forth the memorial of God's saving grace.

There are none so deep in debt to free grace as you are, and none should be so high mounted upon the pinnacle of thanksgiving.

Say as a sweet singer, I will extol you, O God my King, every day

I will bless you, and I will praise your name forever. Those who are monuments of mercy should be trumpets of praise.

O long to be in heaven, where your thanksgiving shall be pure, and shall be raised a note higher.

Hmm. So he's kind of like meh about the whole thing. Not very enthusiastic at all.

I tell you. It's amazing though sometimes when we come to church and we're exhausted, and we need

Watson to maybe walk up and just slap us in the face, like, what are you doing? No, but this is his exhortation to us as believers, all of us.

You know, as we've gone through the book, we've discussed at great length how all things work for good for those who love God.

And Watson has pointed out that those who love God have been affectionately called by him, and recognizing that our love for God originates in his love for us, and that by his unmerited favor, you know, and we'll talk a little bit more about that still, unmerited.

We didn't do anything. This is his free grace. Nothing that we've earned, it's not something he owed us by any stretch.

And so the only proper response is what? Admiration and adoration.

How can we demonstrate that? How can we demonstrate our admiration and our adoration of God's free grace?

Tell everyone you know about it. When you love something, the old illustration

I use all the time, you go out to dinner, you get something good to eat, the next day you're at work, you're like, oh, you gotta go to this place, they have the best this, this, this.

God just saved you for all eternity, and the next day you don't tell anyone? Like, that'd be the first thing that you would do, is to share what happened to you with someone else, so that it could happen to them.

First and foremost, I agree verbally. The second would be putting feet to your faith, living out what you've known to be truth by the fact that God has changed your heart, softened your heart.

Obviously, your perspective on things, your worldview is gonna change, so you glorify him in your living, in your actions.

Yeah. Steve? I'm gonna say thankfulness. Yeah? To be thankful for everything.

Mm -hmm. Okay. Indeed. All correct.

All good answers. Absolutely. All right, so that's the first exhortation.

Number two, pity those who are not yet called. Sinners in Scarlet are not objects of envy, but pity.

They are under the power of Satan. They tread every day on the brink of the bottomless pit.

What if death should cast them in? Oh, pity unconverted sinners. If you pity an ox or a donkey going astray, will you not pity a soul going astray from God who has lost his way and his wits as upon the precipice of damnation?

Nay, not only pity sinners, but pray for them. Though they curse you, you must pray for them.

You will pray for people who are demented. Sinners are demented. When he came to his senses. It seems the prodigal before conversion was in his senses.

Wicked men are going to execution. Sin is the halter which strangles them. Death removes them off the ladder, and hell is their burning place.

Will you not pray for them when you see them in such danger? I think that's all about that one.

Alrighty. So, I appreciate the contrast right away.

What does he say here? That they're not objects of envy. Why would they be objects of envy?

It's women in the world. Sometimes, you know, they appear to be, oh, this is a great life. But the reality is no one.

We have the great life. Are you familiar with Psalm 73?

My foot almost slipped, right? He's looking at the wicked. He's looking at the world. They always seem to get away with it.

Everything seems to be going their way. You know, until he came to the house of the Lord and he remembered their end.

But it is true. We can still have that temptation today to think, wouldn't it just be easier if I wasn't living by this higher standard?

You know, it just seems to cause trouble sometimes. Sometimes our thinking can get muddled and we lose perspective.

But here he reminds us in very blunt terms of their situation.

They're treading every day on the brink of the bottomless pit. You know, going out to the abortion mill and, you know, you hear all these different excuses.

Like, oh, no, God understands or God will forgive if they're not cursing you out just, you know, straight away.

And we make justifications for ourselves and for our sin. Oh, you know, I'll ask for forgiveness later on.

And lots of people will say that. It's a common saying. It's easier to ask forgiveness than it is for permission, right?

And so some people just go on and do what they're going to do. Like, oh, I'll get it right later on. And yet, you know, we see the war in Ukraine, a subway shooting the other day.

You know, there was a drive -by. A 12 -year -old was sitting in a car and eating lunch and was a victim of a drive -by.

You know, he thinks, his parents think he's got decades of life left to do whatever he needs to do. And yet this very night, your soul could be required of you.

So no one is promised tomorrow. And people we know and love are treading on the brink of the bottomless pit.

You know, we think of sinners in the hands of an angry God and that very graphic description. See, so we should pity them.

You know, they're not getting away with anything. It sometimes seems that way, but they're certainly not.

So not only pity them, but pray for them. And of course, as we've said, share the truth with them.

Any questions or comments on that? I think we should pity them not only because we have been shown grace, even if they haven't in that sense, but we could be in their place as well.

We were in their place before we met Christ. So just to keep that in mind, to see us in their shoes,

I think that's important. Yeah, I mean, we're to love others as we love ourselves.

Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you. You know, if you're heading for hell, wouldn't you want someone to tell you?

I mean, most of us, you know, if apart from Christ, we could reject that, and people often do. But who was that magician?

Was it Penn and Teller? Was it Penn? Yes. Well -known atheist, right?

Doesn't believe in God, and yet he's offended at Christians who won't try to give him the gospel.

He goes, you know I'm heading to hell, and you won't tell me about it? How much hatred do you have to have for your fellow man?

An atheist gets it. Common grace. He's an image bearer. He understands, but sadly, he rejects the truth that is the means of salvation.

But yeah, so we should pity them, pray for them, and share the truth with them.

Number three. You who are affectionately called, honor your high calling.

I beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling. Christians must keep a decorum. They must observe what is lovely.

This is seasonable advice, when many who profess to be called of God, yet by their loose and irregular walking cast a blemish on religion, whereby the ways of God are evil spoken of.

It is a Salvian speech. What do pagans say when they see Christians live scandalously?

Surely Christ taught them no better. Will you approach Christ and make him suffer again by abusing your heavenly calling?

It is one of the saddest sights to see a man lift up his hands in prayer, and with those hands oppressed.

To hear the same tongue praise God at one time, and at another lie in slander. To hear a man in words profess

God, and in works deny him. Oh, how unworthy is this!

Yours is a holy calling, and will you be unholy? Do you think you may take liberty as others do?

The Nazarite had a vow on him, separated himself to God, and promised abstinence.

Though others did drink wine, it was not fit for the Nazarite to do it. So, though others are loose in vain, it is not fit for those who are set apart for God by effectual calling.

Are not flowers sweeter than weeds? You must be now a peculiar people. Not only peculiar in regard to dignity, but deportment.

Abhor all motions of sin, because it would disparage your high calling. Well, what does it say here?

So we're to honor our high calling, and in a minute we'll go into that. And so he gives us a mouthful of a description there, and we kind of touched on it actually with the first exhortation, how we show our admiration and adoration.

But, in your own words, how would you describe what he's calling you to in living this life?

I remember when I had gotten saved, there was always the talk about we gotta go out and witness.

The reality is witness is what you are. You know what I'm saying? A lot of people have taken it to mean, well,

I'm witnessing what I'm sharing about. No, your very life should be a witness to Christ.

The interactions. I've thought about this recently in the context of work, and I've tried to make that a prayer that I say before I go into my office every day.

I interact with so many people on a daily basis, and it's just in absolutely everything that we do, and it's something that I've struggled with.

It's in one sense, I say, well, now I'm at a Bible study, and now I'm at work. But trying to find a way for myself to keep this mindset in all areas of my life,

I've actually tried to make that my prayer, because it's a big struggle. A big struggle. You have to be intentional about it.

It doesn't happen by mistake. Go ahead,

Mike. Yeah, I think it could even be in certain things as praying and reading your Bible. Something that you don't have to be loud and bold about.

It could be simple things, because we're called to live by Christ.

So, yeah. I've found that even simple things, like if you do blow it, apologizing and doing it in front of those who may have known about it, not in the sense of, look at me,

I'm apologizing, but being sincere. Say, I remember this a while back, but I lost my temper because one of the

CSR people were just pounding me on a problem. My reaction on the phone was poor.

So I walked over to that group later on, and I openly to that one person apologized, but because I knew the other

CSR people had heard this, they needed to hear that apology as well. It's gone a long way in my relationship with that group.

So much so, I was just sharing with Scott and Alex, some of the people from work want to donate towards the

Ukraine, and our company refuses to touch that. But they had come to me, and I'm asking myself, why did they come to me?

And I realized why they came to me. Again, this plays out in each one of our lives in different ways, but to what everyone has said, how we come off in front of people plays a major role, and they begin to realize there's something different.

Like Jason said, he's now got a totally different mindset when he goes into work, and he's praying,

Lord, help me to maneuver my day that however

I react is going to be appropriate. And I think we have to, as humanly speaking, we're bound to screw up one way or another.

I mean, when Paul is talking about that we shouldn't be complainers, and that we would show ourselves to be children of God because we don't complain, that's how stark the contrast is, that something that's just, it's just a given that if you're in a work environment, someone's complaining about something.

You have guys complaining about the workload, or complaining about the boss, or the boss is complaining about the employee, or he's complaining about the client.

To not be a complainer is just like, they just know that there's something off about the vibe because you're not doing what everyone else is doing.

And if you do blow it, yeah, unfortunately I've had that experience myself of blowing it, and being less than gentle when

I was talking with the supervisor, we were just kind of at odds. But recognizing that I had gone too far, if I had allowed anger to influence my reaction,

I went and apologized to him. And that's just, it does set you apart, because most people don't apologize unless they need to do it to save their job or something.

They need to do a press conference because their livelihood's at stake. But to just say, I was a jerk,

I'm sorry, will you forgive me? It can. So on the positive side, we want to make sure that we're intentional to be different, to abstain from those things other people are doing that we know

God has called us to something higher. But should we fail, to ask for forgiveness is also not expected, but can also set us apart.

To pray without ceasing, so that your mindset is always to please

Christ. And that, you know, we want to abide in Him, so we don't want to forget about Him.

We don't want to let the world take over our, you know. Yeah.

Amen. Okay, so, we cover all that.

How contrary. Sad sight. To see the profession, but then everything that they do is opposed to that.

So the question is, what is it to walk worthy of our heavenly calling? One, it is to walk regularly, to tread with an even foot, and walk according to the rules and axioms of the word.

A true saint is for canonical obedience. He follows the canon of scripture.

As many as walk according to this canon. When we leave men's inventions and cleave to God's institutions, when we walk after the word, as Israel after the pillar of fire, this is walking worthy of our heavenly calling.

Do you understand what he means here? He threw in some phrases we might not normally use, and some descriptions we might not normally use.

What does it mean to walk regularly? What does it mean to walk with a tread with an even foot?

You guys say that all the time, right? Jason, is that in the papers?

I wish. Does another word mean consistently? Exactly, yes. Exactly right.

To be consistent, to tread with an even foot, and consistent with the word of God.

Talking about the canon. He says when we leave men's inventions, what do you think he means by that?

The man's worldview. Yeah, man's worldview. Just thinking of just like, you know, even though we take technology, for example, we have to remember.

Yeah, I don't, I mean that can apply. It certainly can. But I think here in the context of what he's saying, men's inventions versus God institutions.

You know, what's an institution that God has established? You know, think of it that way. The church.

Marriage. I mean, what are our inventions that depart from marriage?

Civil unions. Common law marriage. And then it just gets worse, right?

What's that? Cohabitating. Cohabitating. And then the other parodies, and calling you know, two of the same, rather than two of the different, and calling that marriage.

No, these are the inventions of men. You know, so the different things that men incorporate in terms of how to live justly, how to live righteously.

I mean, God established the civil magistrate. He gave us the law. He gave us judges. And man has sought to leave that behind and redefine it, and make something for themselves that they feel like they're happier with.

So there's all sorts of ways that men go about life. We go about our relationships.

We go about our business according to our own wisdom. It's our invention.

It's not God's institution. It's not God's word. It's not His ways. But if we're going to walk worthy of our heavenly calling,

He makes it clear here. We should know the canon of scripture. We should be seeking to live consistently with it.

It's said in the world today If you've ever heard pastors talk about counseling, we hold to enthetic counseling, biblical counseling and experiences with others who have all the pop psychology books on the shelf of today.

Let's hear what man has to say about this, rather than what does God's word say about that. When that's in the church, that's rot and corruption.

That's not walking according to our heavenly calling. So we want to know what the word says, and we want to seek to apply it to every area of life.

Any other questions or comments about that little one? We have more.

To walk worthy of our calling is to walk singularly. Among all the people of the earth,

I consider you alone to be righteous. When others walked with the devil,

Noah walked with God. We are forbidden to run with the multitude. Though in civil things, singularity is not commendable, yet in religion, it is good to be singular.

Melanchthon, I'm saying his name wrong, I'm sorry, was the glory of the age he lived in.

Athanasius was singularly holy. He appeared for God when the stream of the times ran another way.

It is better to be a pattern of holiness than a partner in wickedness. It is better to go to heaven with a few than to hell in the crowd.

We must walk in an opposite course to the people of the world. And so what's he saying here?

How would you put that in your own words? Our God can, our God will, but even if he doesn't,

I will not bow down and worship him. Singularity of heart, an undivided heart. Even if all the rest of the inhabitants of Babylon are bowing down, even if the other

Jewish exiles are bowing down, partaking of the king's delicacies. Daniel and his friends refused to eat the king's food that violated the dietary laws.

Daniel's friends refused to bow to the image of Nebuchadnezzar, risking the fiery furnace.

This gentleman here, Melanchthon, he's a German theologian. He was a friend of Luther, so he was active during the

Reformation. So when everyone else is walking one way, and we know Athanasius, Athanasius against the world, right?

Want to give it a Latin phrase? Contramundum. I can barely speak English. I'm working on my

Latin. But yes, we don't walk differently just to walk differently.

We're not seeking to be distinct or different just for distinctiveness' sake. But we must walk in contrast to the worldliness that is around us and the wickedness that's around us.

We must be different. We must go the other way. Questions or comments about that?

Fairly straightforward, right? Three. To walk worthy of our calling is to walk cheerfully.

Rejoice in the Lord always. Too much drooping of spirit disparages our high calling and makes others suspect a godly life to be melancholy.

Christ loves to see us rejoicing in Him. Causinus speaks of a dove whose wings being perfumed with sweet ointments drew the other doves after her.

Cheerfulness is a perfume to draw others to godliness. True religion does not banish joy.

As there is a seriousness without sourness, so there is a cheerful liveliness without lightness.

When the prodigal was converted they began to be merry. Who should be cheerful if not the people of God?

They are no sooner born of the spirit but they are heirs to a crown. God himself is their portion and heaven is their mansion and shall they not rejoice?

Yeah. It's a Puritan. I thought they were all sour dour -faced guys, right? What's this cheerfulness talk?

No, but of course they understood. You know. They were serious about holiness and so sometimes people confuse that but you can be holy and quite cheerful.

Any comments about that? About this drooping of a spirit disparaging our high calling?

Do we see that these days? Not here. Unless it's too early or the coffee's out.

Nothing? I've heard the Christian walk be described as an unbeliever.

That's like walking into a casket. Burying yourself. And the Christian says, no, it's more like opening a treasure chest where every day you're pulling out more jewels and more things that you've never seen before and you're loving what

God has done for you. Yes, you're dying to yourself but you're living for something that's transcendent that's eternal, that has actual meaning to it.

Eternal meaning. So many people devote their lives to things that are a vapor.

That are going to be gone. I was watching this documentary about people who love the movie

Back to the Future. They've devoted their entire lives to this movie.

I'm not kidding. The first one, memorabilia, books, this guy, he is solely devoted to Back to the

Future. And I'm like, are you kidding? Like, this is the purpose for your life?

Gosh, and that's a guy who's to be pitied. He's so short -sighted.

Yeah. Yeah, I like the way Watson says also you can have it without likeness.

Because sometimes people have, Christians in particular have a wrong impression of what it means to rejoice or to be joyful.

And it can very easily lapse into giddiness. Remember a couple years back they had laughing in the spirit.

If you weren't laughing in the spirit you didn't have the joy of the Lord. Biblical joy has nothing to do with that.

In fact, probably the best description of what it means to be joyous is that you have a calm delight.

And that's really what it's all about. It's not, I mean obviously there is a time to laugh but look at me like this.

If you guys can't hear this on the tape you've got to go to the Reformed rookies. Their microphone picks all this up much better.

But you know, you can have joy in the midst of sorrow.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. We don't mourn like those who have no hope.

There's a difference. And so we can when he says rejoice always that's actually not hyperbole.

We always have a reason to be rejoicing. It doesn't mean that we don't have sorrow at times.

But you know, a lot of people will think, oh it's going into the casket. They'll put off, oh maybe

I'll get right with the Lord on my deathbed. I want to have my fun first. I refer you back to the fact that no one knows if today is their last day or not.

But no, it's a shame when sometimes Christians reinforce that stereotype like whoa, I can't have any fun.

We have these standards. Really? Do you know what you do have? So yeah.

Cheerfulness. But we'll continue on. To walk worthy of our calling is to walk wisely.

Walking wisely implies three things. To walk watchfully. The wise man's eyes are in his head.

Others watch for our halting, therefore we had need look to our standing. We must be aware, not only of scandals, but of all that is unfitting, lest thereby we open the mouth of others with a fresh cry against religion.

If our piety will not convert men, our prudence may silence them. Do we understand what he's saying there?

Sometimes Christians, we watch like We can do this as adults.

I see it sometimes with younger people. How far is too far? How much can

I get away with and not be sinning? So he goes, not looking only for the scandals, but all that's unfitting.

You know, and Thessalonians were told, avoiding even the appearance of evil.

When I'm counseling and mentoring, I point people to Proverbs 22, 3.

The prudent sees danger and hides himself, but the simple go on and suffer for it. You know, being watchful.

I mean, sometimes we're watching out for those big sinful things, but if we start going down the wrong road, you know, if we start flirting with temptation and situations that could be a problem, before we know it, we're stuck in the mire of sin.

And others have the opportunity then, again, to bring reproach on Christ, saying, these are

His disciples. You know, and they love to do that. But if we're godly, if we're prudent, we can at least silence them, perhaps.

If not convert. Mike? Yeah. That's Sunday, though.

Yeah. Yeah. That would fall under that. Sure. Recognizing that God is sovereign over our comings and goings.

And while He doesn't tempt us, He does test us. You know, we're tempted by ourselves, our own desires, our own lusts.

But yeah, so we can pray that. I mean, Jesus says, watch and pray, you know, that you don't fall into temptation.

The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Indeed. And just being wise, being aware about the relationships we have, the decisions that we make, the places we go, all sorts of things.

We want to be mindful, because we want to walk holy. And so walking in wisdom.

We're talking about walking wisely, so to walk watchfully. The second one of three is to walk courteously.

The spirit of the gospel is full of meekness and politeness. Be courteous. I'll put that out there for now.

ESV and the NASB talks about speaking, speaks of a humble mind, so be courteous. But humility leads to courtesy.

Take heed of a morose or haughty behavior. Religion does not take away civility, but refines it.

Abraham stood up and bowed himself to the children of Heth. Though they were of a heathen race, yet Abraham gave them a civil respect.

Paul was of an affable temper. I have made all things to men that I might, by all means, save some.

In lesser matters, the apostle yielded to others, that by his winning manner he might win upon them.

So what is he saying here? To walk wisely, how should our, what our temperament should be?

How should we be with others? That's what

I told him. This is just a show of respect and the view of others, even if they're of deprivation.

Yeah. We're to give honor where honor is due. We're to give respect. You know, we're not supposed to speak evil of our leaders.

Honor the king, right? When he says does not take away civility but refines it, is this civility that if the heart is not you could be civil and polite and appear courteous but I know because before I was saved

I was able to put that out there like oh, this is a professional courteous man.

But my heart wasn't in it. I didn't really care about the other person. I didn't love my neighbor.

So it's a similar pattern of behavior but there's something more there. Not only by asking how are you doing but I care what your answer is.

Yeah. Alex and then Ashley? Ashley then Alex. Ladies first.

Thank you. I was just thinking like blessed are the peacemakers and they are the children of God and how it's not just being polite but just I guess being peaceful too in a way.

Kind of like what Steve was saying that it's not just being civil but also bringing harmony as well.

I mean we think of peacemakers I don't remember my brother got my older brother, one of them, got into a lot of trouble in a high school fight.

Something had transpired and there was a fight and they had gone to a teacher who was nearby to break up the fight and he refused and he said blessed are the peacemakers.

Walked away. He got sued for not doing his job of getting in there.

I mean when we think of making peace first and foremost we're thinking peace with God and seeking to bring this ministry of reconciliation that others would have peace with God.

So but yeah what flows out of that is seeking to be people of peace and to seek to be ministers of peace and being that and well let me take

Alex's and then we'll I was just going to add to what you said about the leaders and have respect for the leadership and everything that feels like I'm sure this has gone on as long as history has gone on but it feels like it's amplified nowadays especially with social media and everybody thinking they have a platform and it goes beyond simple, it goes beyond questioning authority to like just outright being nasty.

Disparaging them, speaking evil. Something even came to my mind recently a few months ago.

Some church some pastor led a chant in his church of let's go Brandon. I mean I heard about that.

Yeah. And people are seeing that. That's what you're doing in your worship service, yes.

That's not appropriate for any believer to leave their lips never mind to come and worship

God and say that. Yeah there is something about disagreeing and I mean John the

Baptist went to Herod and said it's not lawful for you to have her but he didn't go around calling him all sorts of names and speaking all sorts of wicked things and we went from just having an opinion or sharing freedom of speech to we speak evil of each other.

Where is Martin Luther? Yes. He was a fallible man is what

Martin Luther was. Earthy I think is how they referred to him back then. I think that's a euphemism.

He was earthy. Yes. Chew up the meat and spit out the bones of our brother

Luther. Yeah so we need to be careful about that about being courteous you know going back to what

Stephen said you know sometimes when you're trying to win friends and influence people you're trying to you put on this whole facade of you're trying to win their favor you know and I don't know

I forget who said it what's that? No I was thinking of the phrase

I'm about to say is you can tell a lot about a man by the way he treats people who can do nothing for him you know that's when you know this person over here they have no wealth no influence nothing that in humanly speaking that they can benefit you and you can see how some people treat them like dirt like they're beneath them like they're not even you know worthy of their consideration but courteous is to each one treating all you know how we would want to be treated as a standard but those are opportunities to walk wisely regardless of what their situation is we're told even with our enemies you know to be loving towards them to be kind towards them we need to set ourselves apart from how the world handles conflict and disagreements we still need to speak for truth but we can do so in love

He's not a respecter of questions Yes they are yes they are moving on we're almost done here to walk magnanimously though we must be humble yet not base it is unworthy to prostitute ourselves to the lust of men what is sinfully imposed ought to be zealously opposed conscience is

God's diocese where none has right to visit I'm not Catholic I don't know but he who is the bishop of our souls we must not be like hot iron which may be beaten into any form a brave spirited

Christian will rather suffer than let his conscience be violated here is a serpent and the dove united and innocence this prudential walking corresponds with our high calling and much adorns the gospel of Christ that's wisdom is another word for that with innocence we know that right out of scripture what's that I realize the base of the word is sage yes excellent excellent

Joelle's always really good with vocabulary she got some Latin and some word roots so she's always just speaking highly of my wife she's very good with the words better pronouncing things too right so you know some people term you know they're used to this kind of idea as being charitable and being forgiving but it also can mean being of a courageous spirit and so we are courteous but we're not compromising you know we must be courageous see there you go yeah he spoke out right see so we take there we go walk with wisdom right but exactly exactly that and so we must be careful to be courteous and yet not compromising he talked about the 11th commandment thou must be nice right thou shalt be nice but too many times that sentiment is used to compromise truth we can't speak against so and so because that wouldn't be nice no there's a there's a balance there that we must walk in so to walk worthy of our calling is to walk influentially to do good to others and to be rich in acts of mercy good works on a religion as Mary poured the ointment on Christ so by good works we pour ointments on the head of the gospel and make it give forth a fragrant smell good works though they are not the causes of salvation yet they are evidences when with our

Savior we go about doing good and send abroad the refreshing influence of our liberality we walk worthy of our high calling tripping over my words here that's to be influential how do we do that?

how do we walk influentially Mike I think it starts with your own personal emotions to be filled to bless others so yeah starting with your own relationship with the

Lord that being evidenced and showing up in other people comforting other people yeah

I mean here you know he talks about good works we have the ministry of mercy right where we seek to minister to people and while we have opportunity to bring influence because we can benefit others and show them love that helps to give an audience with them having

God's word they have greater needs than even their hunger and their thirst and their need for clothing and being in the word and being able to speak a due word in season is going to go far so yeah we do need to be grounded in Christ we need to be in our devotions we need to be imbibing the means of grace and then manifesting that to others doing good works

I was thinking of the sheep and the goats where Christ says on the last day you know those who helped the poor those who fed the hungry those who visited the sick that you know he did it for them as if he did it for me and those who are cast into punishment are those who didn't help others indeed it's a great example

Steve I think getting involved in people's lives that we engage with you know asking how they're doing if they want to tell you about their family or something personal and then you can follow up and ask how that's going and you know showing that you care and then you're influencing them and you're also watching how you behave because you're around them and um yeah you know just engaging with people and getting into their lives you know whether you're showing hospitality or you're just showing concern for them

I mean with this whole COVID thing something that was brought up time and again was how much of that human connection was lost people are locked up in their own places and if they're single or whatever they have no one else

I mean suicide rates were on the rise because people were feeling disconnected they were feeling depressed so to show love to people you know and to engage with them and get to know them that can be an act of mercy yeah certainly in our day and age where we've lost sight of community you know

God has made us to be in community with others so yeah that's certainly part of it as well and we can influence that way alright we're going to finish up here here's a matter of consolation to you who are affectionately called

God has magnified rich grace toward you. You are called to great honor to be co -heirs with Christ this should revive you in the worst of times.

Let men reproach and miscall you. Set God's calling of you against man's miscalling let men persecute you to death they do but give you a pass since they need to heaven the sooner how may this cure the trembling of the heart what though the sea roars though the earth is unsettled though the stars are shaken out of their places you need not fear you are affectionately called and therefore are sure to be crowned and so what's our consolation here what's this matter of encouragement that he's giving in an exhortation um where's he telling us?

We can't lose can't lose right even if they kill you they're just sending you to heaven sooner than you expected it's it's a positive way of looking at it right um it is true and so recognize what he's implying as he said it though God has magnified grace in you and blessed you with abundant blessings abundant blessings numerous blessings more than you could ask or think but you will be a target of those who hate

God you know even when you seek to show mercy even when you seek to speak the truth even when you seek their own welfare and their good there are going to be times where you're going to be a target um it says fear not continue to walk worthy recognizing the worst they can do to you is send you to heaven a little sooner than expected um but all these forms of persecution that we can encounter they still work for the good of those who love