Wonderful to see all those who could be here.
As we continue our meeting from night tonight.
I want to begin by asking you to recall the time when you perhaps
started a new job and that's kind of a traumatic event.
And there are some things you want to know.
That's been a long time since I started a new job in my day job,
as I call it, I work at a regular job and it Addition to
preaching and so I know what it's like to work all day and go
to church all night. Like many of you are doing this
week and even though I've been with that company since 1971 in
my day job I still remember what it's like to start a new job.
There are certain things you want to know.
You want to know who's the Boss. That just seems to help you you
know if you know who the bosses are or who the boss is, that's
going to work well for you, not that you'd behave any
differently in the presence of those who aren't but it's always
nice to know who the boss is. Our one time I was on the phone
in the midst of a serious discussion when my boss walked
in and I was asking the veterinary of trivia question.
Veterinarian. A trivia question about the
number of stomachs that a cow has and my boss didn't
appreciate that too much. He thought I should have been
paying more attention to what I was hired to do.
You can understand that I suppose you want to know who the
boss is. You also you want to know, what
are the rules? How do you find out what the
rules are and you also want to know.
Are they serious about the rules?
Do they really really mean the rules?
Now, if somebody says, all right, you're hired to be here
from eight to five. What does that mean?
Does that mean 924? 10-ish, 22.
What does it mean? You want to know are the rules
really the rules? Or are they just kind of
guidelines or are they for everybody else, but not for you
in your position? You need to know what the rules
are. And are they serious?
You also want to know? When's payday.
Now, we might start with that one.
Because you always want to know if I'm going to work.
When do we get paid? How does that work here?
When does that happen? And if you start a job, those
are some of the basics that you really really, really need to
understand What do you need to know?
When you come to a church. You know, I I'll present that.
I think it's kind of the same. You want to know who's boss
around here? What are the rules?
do you actually mean those rules, you serious about those
rules and When's payday. No, we can answer those in the
Lord's church as well. One thing I want us to remember
is that when we start our new jobs, it's really confusing to
figure all of this stuff out. In just a little while though,
we figure those things out. In my day job, I write what's
called an employee handbook and it's-- employees from time to
time and I say, you know, don't you have your favorite passage
of the employee handbook memorized like I do and they
look at me, like I'm nuts. They do that anyway, you know,
as you can imagine. But that's part of the rules.
It's part of the rules and so when we come to the Lord's
Church, it's hard. You know, those of us that have
been around the Lord's Church, all of our Lives.
We end up forgetting how much we actually know and we forget how
comfortable we are with the routines years and years ago.
I attended the New Year's meeting in Oklahoma City and
came time for communion. I was sitting on the front row.
I was a teenager house was full. And where I had been raised in
the church in Missouri, the one officiating at the Lord's table
would give thanks for the loaf and then he would hand it off to
a person who would then go help pass and another person would
help pass. And the one officiating at the
Lord's, table would just sit out on the front row.
That's what I was used to and I thought, well, that's the way
everybody is, of course. And so at this, this New Year's
meeting Huge, huge crowd, and this congregation at Moore.
Oklahoma, the person waiting on the table offered prayer for the
loaf and he came right over there and he handed it to me.
As I was sitting there on the front seat and I thought, oh, he
wants me to help pass communion today.
So I hopped up and did that actually what it was is at Moore
Oklahoma. In those days, the one
officiating, the Lord's table also helped pass everything
around. I didn't know what the rules
were. I didn't know.
It's kind of confusing when you don't know what the rules are.
Really is. And when someone comes to a job
for the first time, we understand that we see them
being a little bit halting and fumbling and hesitant we
understand that. Let's be as understanding when
someone comes to worship with us as well.
It's going to take a while it's going to take a while.
I've had the absolute privilege and honor of studying with a
bunch of folks through the years that have never been to.
Worship anywhere that have never had a bible, let alone opened
it, let alone to read a single word out of it and you know what
happens to them. A lot of times they're
embarrassed, they're embarrassed because they don't know.
And they just presume that, you know everything because they
know that they they don't know anything yet.
Well, it's okay to not know anything at all about the Lord.
A church, it's okay to have not opened a Bible or to have read a
Bible. But you know, in order to learn
about God you got to start somewhere.
So this lesson is about Beginnings.
How do we start? Where do we go?
How do we figure some of these things out?
Because if I just simply say to someone, well here's what you
need to do, you just need to remember this book.
Oh, hmm. You know, there are a lot of
people that love to read and so if you tell a lot of people I'm
going to need you to read this book pretty quickly they're
going to say okay. But there's a lot more people
that never read or rarely read and hardly ever read a book.
And my day job, I do Management training once a year and I send
out a book for people to read and I've had folks tell me Greg
the only book I read all years. The one you send me And I've
told them one of these years, I'm going to send you a Bible
because you need that one a lot more than the ones.
I've been sending you on business but you know, if you
just tell somebody, okay, read this whole, that's a daunting
task. And so, where do we start?
How do, how do we get started with this?
Well, we kind of have to cut through some of the, some of the
fables, some of the tales, some of the, some positions.
And that's not, Always easy, but let me give you a few
experiences that I've had along the way.
Some years ago I had a weekly study at a lady's house and she
was a delightful woman, a member of the Lord's Church.
Her children were not and the children never would sit down at
the table and join in at the study.
They just never would they walk by?
You know, they'd walk slow. You could tell they were
listening but they really wouldn't get involved at all.
And so there was one daughter, one night that was there.
And it just so happened. We were talking about the word
of God and its Authority and and how we could know whether or not
we're truly following what the Lord wants, who's the boss of
the church and she happened to be walking by and she slowed and
she slowed and she slowed. And finally she stopped to talk.
I was thrilled. I was absolutely thrilled.
And she let us know that she used the Bible.
She used the Bible and she said, here's here's what I do.
She said, I believe in prayer. And I said that's great.
That's wonderful. Because the Bible tells us we
should pray without CC. The effectual fervent prayer of
a righteous man or woman availeth much, you know, our
prayers are powerful and effective as God's people.
So, whenever whenever people pray, it's a good thing.
It's a good thing in the direction of God, for those that
aren't Christians, you know, Cornelius was active in prayer
before he was a member of the Lord's church.
And so, it was a good thing for him to be praying, always Ways
that he might know the Lord's will and it's a it's a commanded
thing for those of us who are God's people to pray.
So she said, I pray a lot. I said, that's wonderful.
That's wonderful. She said here's what I do when
I'm faced with the situation. I pray and I pray and I pray and
I pray and then I just opened my Bible and wherever it falls,
open my eyes. Then, just land on a passage and
wherever that pass, wherever my eyes land, that's the passage
that guides me in the problem. I'm praying about And she says,
don't you think that's a wonderful way to use the Bible?
Now, you don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, okay?
You don't want to belittle anyone, you don't want to make
fun of anyone in any way. But that's not an appropriate
use of God's word. That's not how God intended for
his book to be used. And I asked her for an example
of how that had helped her and she said that she was having
trouble in her marriage and She did this, she prayed, and she
prayed, and she prayed. She let the Bible fall open and
her eyes fell on a page. It happened to be Mark 5:19,
where Jesus was telling a man. Jesus suffer him not, but saith
unto him. Go home to thy friends and tell
them how great things. The Lord has done for the in
half, had compassion on thee. Now, that's a story of a man
that Jesus heal that was possessed with demons.
And he wanted to go with Jesus and Jesus said, no, you go back
home and you tell folks, what's happened to you, Well, when she
used this verse, in the way I described, she said the Lord's
message to her from that word. Verse was that she was to go
home and stay with her husband. And she said, don't you think
that's what the Lord was telling me?
I said no. She said you don't I said no I
really can't see that from that verse.
I said now there's other Bible verses that talk about marriage
and about how you're to be in your marriage, is a wife and how
your husband is to be, but this is not one of those.
This is not a verse that applies.
In this particular way, we can apply it to things, but not to
the way you did. And she said, I'll tell you,
I'll tell you how you could know for sure that I'm on the right
path, that God approves of everything.
I do, she said she was praying and praying and praying.
About whether or not her daddy was in heaven because he had
died. Not too long before, and she was
praying and praying and praying about that.
And one day she was shopping for a beanie baby and she said the
beanie baby that she picked up just as she was praying about
her daddy. You know, beanie babies have a
birth date. All of them have a birthday.
She said, the beanie baby. I picked up had my birth date.
she said, now that doesn't that prove to you that my daddy's in
heaven and that the way I use the Bible is correct And I said
no, it proves that there's lots of dates that you could look at
that, would give you a similarity and a coincidence,
but I don't think that's how God speaks to us.
And so if we're just going to use the Bible as a book, that
falls open at a random spot. And we're only going to confirm
that by a date that may happen to be coincidence in a Beanie
Baby. Is that really is that really
the rules of the Lord's Church? You see if it is then we need
more Beanie Babies. Okay?
If all we need to do by following the rules of, just let
the Bible fall open and do it then then we're okay.
But I wondered what she would have done.
Had she read about those verses of JL, driving a tent stake
through the man's head. I wonder what she would have
done at times. Had she read about when Judas
went and hanged himself. I don't think that's going to
work for us. I don't think it's going to work
well, and I don't think that's how God intends for us to use
his word. Now, with that said, we may look
at that and say, the very idea that somebody would try to use a
Beanie Baby to confirm their faith but understand, at least
she was trying to use the Bible. You know, of anybody that never
ever ever uses the Bible for anything.
I do lots of them, A buddy of mine at work.
He'll say it's so confusing. It's just so confusing.
I just don't know where to start, and I'll say so start
somewhere. Now, it's just so confusing.
I don't know where to start. After all, if you do get the
courage to open the Bible, it's not real simple.
Is it? if you look for the chapter on
worship, there's no heading just like that.
If you look for the chapter on how to be saved, There's no
heading like that. It can be very confusing to go
through the word of God. It can be very confusing to know
where to start. So if you'll allow me I will cut
through some things and just simply do some do some things
regarding the Lord's church and his rules and whether or not,
he's serious about them and what our response is to be the boss.
You might say, in the Lord's church is the Lord's.
Lord. And of course, by the Lord,
we're referring to God, who is God, the father and the Son, and
the Holy Spirit, all of those are referred to as God.
And we read about them in various passages, particularly
in the New Testament. And in one particular passage
when Jesus was being baptized, we have the voice of God, the
father from heaven, we have the Holy Spirit descending upon On
Jesus in the form of a dove and we have Jesus himself there,
being baptized and so we have God, the Father God, the son,
and God the holy spirit. All one God And that is the Lord
God of the Bible. Now we may look at that and say
you, but you say there's one God but there's three well, it's
kind of like a husband and a wife or one flesh.
The Bible talks about that to their their distinct separate
entities and yet they are Wang. And so the boss is the Lord, the
boss is God. The rules are the Bible And yes
God is serious about his rules. He always has been.
We see that from the very first people that ever lived upon the
face of the Earth, God told them to leave a certain trees fruit
along. This is in the Book of Genesis.
The very first book of the Bible said, leave it alone.
They didn't do that. What happened?
Did they get do-overs? No.
Did they get To hit restart? No.
Had they saved where they were and get to restart from that
point, like, some favorite games here and there?
No, they did not get do-overs, they had to suffer the
consequences of having disobeyed the law and hopefully we
understand that an art shocked by that, you know, if a boss
says, I need you here at 8:00 and I cannot have any exceptions
to that for any reason. And if we show up at 8:30 and
get fired, would we be surprised?
Should we be surprised? We shouldn't be and are we going
to say, what why did you do that?
Would we say, why did you do that?
You're firing me. I Was Here by 8:30.
Yeah, of course. We'd say that, of course, we
would so did Adam and Eve. Yes, we did this.
But and there were consequences to their behaviors.
And so the Bible is God's rule book.
God is serious about all of his rules and PayDay comes in the
form of the final judgment whenever we will.
Hopefully Be rewarded with heaven.
But if we are not approved by the Lord, we will be rewarded
with that horrible place called hell.
Now, we don't want to go there, so we want to concentrate on how
to get to this place by doing what he wants according to his
rules. Okay.
At this particular point. hopefully, everything is okay
with anyone that has The faith to acknowledge that God is who
the word of God says that he is, hopefully we can have agreement
on these points up to this time. Now if we're going to sort
through these rules, how are we going to interpret these rules
so that they can apply to our lives in an appropriate way.
And this is the study of what is called hermeneutics and you You
can buy books on this subject and it's quite interesting but
let's never get away from the simple facts.
That God is he rewards those that diligently seek Him and we
have to turn to his word for what the rules are.
Let's not forget that and going through some of these concepts
of hermeneutics, Romans chapter Romans, chapter 10, and verse 17
reminds us. So then faith.
Cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God.
Now, this is basic, and this is fundamental that if we are to
have faith in the Lord, God of the Bible, then we have to read.
We have to hear about the word of God.
We have to hear about God from his word.
We have to read those words and have them under explain to us so
that we might have understanding Faith cometh by hearing.
By hearing and hearing by the word of God.
So if we say, well, I've got a Bible, but I don't want to open
it. I don't want to pay any
attention to it, but still, I want to be a person of God.
Sorry, faith comes from hearing and hearing from the word of
God. The word of God is where we all
have to go. We all have to go there.
Well, once we decide to do that, it starts with Genesis and it
runs through the book of Concord ants in my Bible.
It actually runs through the Book of Revelation.
The last book that is revealed as the Book of Revelation, but
it starts with the Book of Genesis, and let's just simply
say that for time sake, we will go about in the middle to the
end of the Old Testament, which is this many books Genesis
through Malachi constitutes, What's called the Old Testament.
The old Definite, the reason we know this is called the old
Covenant is because words in the New Covenant says they're old.
That's how we know now. So our books Genesis through,
Malachi have an important purpose.
All of them are intended to point in a certain direction.
They're intended to point to Jesus Christ, and him crucified
that was the purpose of God's creation and Revelation and the
purpose of Israel and the purpose of the Nations.
And all that was done in Old Testament times under What's
called the Ten Commandment law. And that usually is a very
familiar law to people who even have not ever read the Bible.
Oil, but they have the purpose of bringing us to Jesus.
Now, that is the Old Testament in a nutshell.
Someone may say, well, I heard a religious program the other day
and they were talking about the importance of Israel today.
Well, Israel has no more biblical importance because
their purpose was to bring Christ into the world.
And once that was accomplished, there is no more place for or
purpose for National Israel, there is a spiritual Israel, but
anyone from Any Nation Under Heaven can be part of spiritual
Israel. Now, we then have the New
Testament. And remember, the reason we know
that is a new testament, or a New Covenant is because that's
what we're told in the Bible to remember, Faith cometh by
hearing and hearing by the the word of God.
And in the first part of the New Testament.
From Matthew through John, we have the story of the life and
the death and the burial of Jesus Christ.
And also the story of his resurrection from the dead for
books. Matthew Mark, Luke and John
repeat the each giving different facts about Jesus Christ and
about his birth about his life. About his death, burial,
resurrection and Ascension. Now averse, I've looked at
several times already in John chapter, 20 tells us these
Written that. You might believe that Jesus is
the Christ, the son of God. Why do we have Matthew Mark,
Luke and John for writers telling us the same story
because we're slow Learners. Well, aren't we?
There was different purposes to those books.
I faked. But you know, God wants us to
really get this thing called faith in Jesus down.
Doesn't he? So if you start with the New
Testament and you read Matthew, if you Wade, through the
genealogy, you're going to get to some good stuff.
All about Jesus. And then you say, well, here's a
book of Mark. What's that all about Jesus?
Again, here's the Book of Luke, that's all about Jesus again,
here's the Book of Job. What's that all about Jesus?
Again, you think Jesus is important?
Oh yeah. We just never get over Jesus.
We never get past him. We never do.
We can never forget him. We can never forget that when we
read the Gospels it is, as though we are there with him, as
he does, all that he did, including dying on the cross for
our sins. And so when we go from Matthew,
Mark, Luke and John into the book of Acts, We then find that
there was something that occurred.
Very early in that book. There was something called the
church that emerged and people were doing certain things to be
able to be members of that church.
Now, reckon whose church that was.
Well, who have we just spent four books?
Reading about. Hmm Christ Christ and so it
shouldn't surprise us that early in the book of Acts, we find
information about the Lord's Church, the Church of Christ and
how people were added to it and how they were saved.
You know what they needed to do, they needed to have and this is
already a familiar word. They needed to have faith.
Remember where faith comes from Faith, cometh, by hearing
hearing by the word of God, they needed to repent of their sins.
They needed to confess that Jesus was the Christ, the son of
God, and they needed to be baptized for the remission of
their sins. And then they needed to live a
holy life because those are the rules.
So, we find that very early in the New Testament.
Matthew Mark, Luke John acts the rest of the books have different
purposes, but some of them are to remind people.
Don't forget the rules here. Here's the rules in some
instances, people have been going astray.
Now, within the word of God, we have these things in hermeneutic
studies that are simply well. Hear the terms, they're called
commands examples and inferences and through a study of those we
can determine what is appropriate for us to do.
There are commands or precepts that are in the word of God.
Such as Acts 2 and verse 38 where the Apostle Peter said
repent and be baptized. That was a command to be obeyed.
So God commands individuals, then there are those times when
there are Burrs of what individuals are to do and those
examples become things that we are to follow.
First Corinthians 4:16, wherefore, I beseech.
You be ye followers of me. Paul said, for this, cause I by
Senator you timotheus. Who is my beloved, Son?
And faithful in the Lord who shall bring you into remembrance
of my ways, which be in Christ as I teach everywhere in every
church. So, he saying, here's what I do
and Timothy follows me and you follow me.
As I follow Christ, you thought of Timothy is he follows me.
Follow us as we follow Christ, those become examples for us to
follow. Then there are those things that
are implied and those are a little tricky and this seems to
be really nitpicky. But in order to understand this,
let's go to a conversation that Jesus had with some people,
Matthew 22 verse 29. Jesus was answering the question
of somebody. And Jesus answered and said you
do earlier, you're making a mistake not knowing the
scriptures nor the power of God, then in verse 31, he says, but
as touching this is Matthew 22 verse 31.
But as touching the resurrection of the Dead, have you not read
that? Which was spoken unto you by
God. Saying now, there were
individuals questioning Jesus. They did not believe in the
resurrection of the dead and they were questioning God, they
were doubting the word of God and Jesus said, have you not
read? So what did Jesus have them?
Do he had them go to the book. He had to go to the Bible and
this case, they would have gone to the Earth Testament for proof
of what he was saying. And so in religious issues, we
always need to go to the book, the word of God to fight, or
what the answers are. And here is Jesus saying, have
you not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying I
am the god of Abraham and the god of Isaac, and the god of
Jacob. Now, there's a little word here
that So she used that is very key to this entire discussion.
It's the little word am Jesus said I am the god of Abraham.
He said, have you not read in the Old Testament where it says
I am the god of these people. Now, what's the issue?
The Sadducees said there is no resurrection of the Dead.
Jesus is saying, when God said I am the god of Abraham.
He was using the present tense of a word.
Word, meaning, they were still alive.
God didn't say, I was the god of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
He's saying, I am the god of those people.
And so de small words, make a difference in the rules.
Yeah, they do they do and so we can't just pick and choose which
of these things we would like and which we wouldn't we have to
be very, very careful and Those are necessary inferences.
Jesus uses a necessary inference to prove that there is life
after death and he did. So based on a two letter word at
least in English and that is very amazing to me to see the
Lord himself. Using a hermeneutical concept of
necessary, implication or necessary inference.
Now here's how some of these things can work.
Let's look at at Mark chapter 16 and verse 16, Mark, 16 and verse
16. Jesus says he that believeth and
is baptized shall be saved but he that believeth not shall be
damned now. What is inferred in that
passage? What is inferred in that
passage? At least among other things?
Is this whoever is going to be baptized and needs to be old
enough to believe You see that? So if somebody says well I was
baptized as a baby. Well were you able to believe?
No couldn't do that then. Okay then you just got wet,
someone may have meant it for religious statement.
May have meant it for your salvation but the inference is
until someone can believe they should not be baptized.
And so you'll not see us baptizing.
APS. We dare not do that because it
is inferred that all those who are baptized need to be of the
ability to reason acts 2 and verse 38, Peter said repent and
be baptized, what is inferred there.
We have to be mature enough to understand the difference
between, right and wrong and to be able to make a commitment to
do. What's right?
And until we're mature enough to do those things.
Then we are are not ready for baptism.
Those things are also inferred within those things that are
commands. There are those things that are
that are General in nature and specific in nature.
Let me give you an example of one of those in the Great
Commission. Jesus said in Matthew 28:19 go,
ye therefore and teach All Nations.
Baptizing them in the name of the father and of the son and of
the Holy Ghost and So, we understand that Jesus is telling
us to go into all the world to preach the gospel, and we
lovingly and gladly do that. Understand when Jesus said go,
ye that is a command. However, it is generally nature
because he doesn't say how to go.
I am so thankful he didn't say walk you there for All right, is
still been trying to get here from Sacramento?
Frankie wouldn't have been back from the Philippines yet Go, ye
therefore allows us to take a walk or a train, or a plane, or
a bus or an automobile and that is simply okay with the Lord.
Now, as we look to all of these things of a religious nature,
there is a difference between those things that we may use as
expedience, those things that are AIDS vs.
Those things, that would be considered Sinful additions to
the Lord's. Well and we have to be careful
about these as well. Now we are not to forsake the
assembling of ourselves together.
Hebrews 10 and verse 25, the disciples came together on the
first day of the week to break bread.
So we know that assemblying is authorized when we assemble, we
could assemble under a tree somewhere or just out in the
open without That a tree. If you would, then we could
assemble in a building. And a building is simply an
expedient that aids Us in. Observing the command for us to
gather for worship in one place. Now, an expedient can't violate
a command. It can't violate how a command
was exemplified or else. It becomes sinful.
Now, within our building we happen to be seated in pews,
okay? Does having a Pew keep us from
being able to worship God? No, it doesn't.
It really doesn't? There are some religions around
the world that don't have pews in their buildings.
They make everybody stand up the whole time and That could be
quite interesting as a whiteboard used to put
Blackboard but they're not chalkboards anymore.
But oh right board is simply an expedient in teaching which is
part of our worship whenever we have the collection on Lord's
Day, a bag or a basket, becomes an expedient that does not
violate that in any way we have a baptistery to help with as an
aid to baptism but again it Not violate baptism in any way.
We have songbooks to Aid with the commanded singing that we
are to do. All of those things we can say,
in no way, violate the commands, the inferences, and the examples
of how we are to worship and serve God, they do not.
Now, there are many other religious things that people do
that are a violation of the commands, the examples of the
inferences of the word of God, some of those Those have to do
with different assemblies. Bible classes are Sunday
schools, different ways of worshiping god with multiple
vessels or loaves having musical instruments.
Having multiple communion times for a congregation and I put
down here having pie suppers only.
I realized that most folks no longer know what a pie supper
is. But by that I simply mean the
Lord's church is financed by the voluntary contributions of the
members are whenever the time forgiving is observed on Lord's
day. And so we are, we're not engaged
in other businesses or other ways in which to gather funds.
And so in the Lord's church today, We want to be very
careful for what we do to make sense.
We thank you for listening to our podcast, put on by the
Church of Christ at 22:15 plans. Road in Bakersfield, if you
would like any additional information, or you would like
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Please email us at info at her Church of Christ
Bakersfield.com. Our service times are on Sundays
at 10:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. and Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m.
Please make plans to join us. We would love for you to be our
honored guest.