with you this afternoon on that passage which we read together, particularly where it says that Samuel took a stone and set it between Nisbe and Shed in verse 12, and called the name of it to Ebenezer, saying, Himeshu, have the Lord's help us. Well, there are a few churches in our nation which can actually trace their history back for more than 200 years. When the believers first met at Westminster Baptist Church in 1807, I'm sure they could scarcely imagine that 204 years later, believers would assemble again to give God thanks for another year of His goodness and faithfulness. because the Lord will know how to save every man that still lives. We are totally indebted to Almighty God for His grace in preserving this world down through the ages of time. If it wasn't for the grace of God, the doors of this church would have closed for the last time many years ago. The Lord has kept the candlestick burning, the Lord has kept the word of the witness going in this quarter of his vineyard, and this afternoon we want to give Him all the praise and all the honour and all the glory. There's been times over the years when the numbers of people coming to this church have been very, very small. There's been times when there's only been one or two people coming along for the Bible study. There's been times when the finances of this church have been extremely tight. But nevertheless, the Lord has brought us through those times, and we praise God for all of His blessings. We give God thanks for all the abundant love and mercy which he has seen fit in order to prosper and to preserve his work in this corner of his vineyard. He has supplied all the resources which this church requires, he has been faithful, he has supplied all the finances which this church needs, and he has given us this very spacious building right in the heart of central London. That poverty developers would love to get their hands upon this place in order to change it perhaps into flats and offices and make an enormous amount of money. But at the end we praise God that he has provided us with such premises right at the heart of the capital, not so far away from government, and we give God thanks for it. All the time that I've been here, the bookstore brings balance every year. We pray to God for all those who faithfully give to the collections and help support the work and the willingness of the fellowship here. We also give God thanks for the lovely atmosphere which we have between the believers. Everybody gets along so well and many visitors will comment on it, how friendly everybody is and what a nice atmosphere there is. You know, some churches have lots of splits and lots of divisions and lots of bad feeling and lots of bitterness between people, but we praise God that there's lots of harmony between the brothers and sisters and we praise God for all of their forbearance and their humility. We've also been blessed with a wonderful ministry for tourists over the years. I'm sure many of the tracts of the booklets which we give out every week end up in lots of different countries of the world. It's a great joy to meet so many lovely people from every corner of this world. We also have many visitors during the course of the year and we give God thanks for that as well. Every week we meet new faces who come onto the premises for the first time. Many of these people are just passing through, maybe they're tourists on holidays, maybe they're students on a short-term student visa, and then they have to go back to their country of origin. But where do you find these who happen amongst them? This area is quite quiet on the weekends, particularly on the Lord's Day, but between Monday and Friday it's a very thriving area where thousands and thousands of people will pass by this church on a daily basis. You know, I can sit here during the daytime and open up the gates and several people will come onto the premises of their own call. Some people are just curious to see what goes on here, some people might be interested in getting a hand out, but each person who comes there's a great opportunity to speak to them about the figure and to speak to them about the Word of God. Every year in our nation close to 400 churches close down. And as our society becomes more secular, more materialistic, many people say, well, you know, is there a place for religion and God in our society anymore? And although the size of our congregation is still rather modest, nevertheless we praise God for all those faithful believers who devote their time and their energy and their service to God's work in this particular place. And we praise God for their presence, we praise God for their prayers, and we praise God for all like-minded churches which remember this call in a regular basis before the throne of grace. The Lord prays for a lot of us people, he doesn't give us much encouragement, but he doesn't bring us too many to make a complaint. The Lord knows how to keep us humble, how to keep us charitable, how to keep us dependent, and we give God thanks that he knows what we have begun. You see, we're so independent upon the Lord in these days because we don't have the power in and of ourselves to give people an interest and an appetite for the things of God and the work of God. We trust in the Lord to do that. Paul says, I have stone and a pot of water, but God gives it the increase. So neither he that soweth is anything, neither he that forswears, but God, who giveth the increase. We go out sowing the seed of God's Word, but we are wholly dependent upon Almighty God and His passionous grace to bless the Word of God to people's hearts and to make people concerned about their soul and interested in eternal and spiritual things. We can't create slaughters in people's hearts, only the Lord can do that. We can't make people love the places of God where he died on the dwells. We can sometimes coerce people to come to a new heaven, but we can't make them enjoy it. We can't make a person interested in the Bible if they're dead interested in sins. We can't give a person a passion for the work in Westminster. Only the Lord is able to do that. Therefore we take no glory, we take no credit for ourselves at all. This day we celebrate the 204th anniversary of this church, and we say to the hymn writer, none of the self but all have been. All we can do is that nothing were, unless God blesses the deed. Say indeed we hope for the harvest time, till God gives life to the seed. Well in this passage which we read, Samuel acknowledges his gratitude to God for his wonderful grace, It was the lords who had made the people of Israel so to make rivals. It was the lords who had given the Israelites a victory over their enemies, the Philistines. It was nothing to do with Israel, nothing to do with their strength or their covenant. It was everything to do with God's massive strength. So he raises his Ebenezer and says, him and Sue have the Lord's help done. He looks back to the past and he says, yes, the Lord has helped us this time. And it's so good, it's a monument to the fact that all that we have and all that we are has come about as a result of God's matchless grace. We would have had no interest in God if it wasn't that God first had an interest in us. If it wasn't for his softening grace, his quickening us and giving us spiritual life, we would be languishing in the world this afternoon with no interest in spiritual things at all. We love him because he first loved us. And he has given us by his actions, grace and by his wondrous power. And the Lord is building His church, the Lord is preserving His people, the Lord is keeping the light and the candlestick burning in this place. The Lord will add to the church such as shall be saved. You see the future of this fellowship is very much in God's hands. Therefore we have all our hope and all our confidence in Him. The Lord loves this cause so much more than we ever could. He has helped us through these past 204 years, and the Lord will continue to be faithful in harmony with his properties in the Scriptures. Now in this area it's almost impossible for people to acquire any type of affordable housing. People who live in flats which are owned by the Council or Housing Association tend to hold on to them and touch properties that are like gold dust these days. If they were to give them up, they may not be able to acquire a flat in the area of Westminster ever again in the future. In the private sector, prices are very high. The average cost of a one bedroom flat around here will be at least £350 a week to rent. A person would need an enormous salary in order to pay for it. You know, we have people coming to this fellowship who travel many, many miles every Sunday and also during the week in order to be part of it. There are some people who travel 15 miles or 30 miles here to worship with us. They pass over the other churches along the way, but we praise God for their faithfulness and their love of this cause that they're willing to make such a big journey in order to be part of this fellowship. Some people even come such big distances on public transport and some people come by coach from the countryside area at considerable cost. You know, some of the time which I spend will be chasing up people who perhaps only come occasionally to the church, trying to encourage them, trying to give them an interest to come back and not to fall away. Such a long time as ministers, it's easy to take for granted all those faithful brothers and sisters who are always there. You know, we tend to pray for those people who were here one week and gone the next week, those people who are a little bit half-hearted, those people we don't speak very much, we always remember them in our prayers. But are we as faithful in praying that brothers and sisters who are always there, they're faithful, they're very rarely prayed for in public because they're so rarely absent. Nevertheless, we praise God this afternoon for such characters who give their allegiance to the local church, and we praise God for all that they do behind the scenes. We also praise God for the liberties which we enjoy in our nation today, liberties which have very much been eroded away in a very subtle way. We praise God we can still go out into the streets and lanes of this city and have a witness outside. We have got banks for all those people that we're able to speak to about the Wales Foundation, all the tracks which we're able to give out on a weekly basis. If you were to look in our Visitor's Book, you'd probably find that close to 100 different countries have been represented as we have so many different people from all over the world coming to our services. from time to time. And therefore we need God's thanks that there are some people who write to us from places like America and they say that they're praying for this cause on a regular basis. Yes, thousands of miles away there are people who remember this church in their prayers on a regular basis and we praise God for all of these people who love this place. We are also thankful to God for the ministry which we have to many Roman Catholic people. This is an area where there's much Roman Catholicism. We have the nuns who live next door, we have the Cardinal youth who live next door, and just beyond that we have the Sacred Hearts Catholic Church. We have the enormous cathedral of Victoria Street and we meet so many people on Saturday mornings who just come out of the cathedral and we meet clergy and all sorts of characters and we can speak to them about the way of salvation, we can tell them about the word of God and we're so delighted to do so. We may be the only Protestant church in this neighbourhood But by God's grace we seek to be faithful to the physical gospel, and we preach and proclaim on a regular basis that salvation is only by God's grace, that salvation and justification is only by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I know by God's grace that this place will always be a beacon for the gospel. As every people come along to our lunchtime service, I want each and every person that leaves this place knowing exactly what they must do to be a child of God, knowing exactly what they must do in order to be saved. Yes, there's only one narrow way of salvation through the only saviour and mediator whom God has provided, the Lord Jesus Christ. And it is a great joy, a tremendous privilege, a tremendous delight to be engaged in a small way in the vital and the urgent task of bringing the good news of God's salvation unto others. May the Lord give us so much joy and so much encouragement as we look back during the past 12 months, and also that God will bless us in the future as we look to Him to be faithful to us as He always is. Here I reign by Ebenezer, here by thy great thy tongue, and I hope by thy good pleasure faithfully to arrive at home. This Jesus, the first of the last, whose spirit will guide us safe home, will praise him for all that has passed, and we trust him for all that's to come. To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory, and majesty, dominion, and power both now and forevermore. May God bless his words to our hearts this afternoon. And when he brings the Word of God, it is captured in Ephesians, chapter 2. or writes to the Ephesian church and says, and you, happy brethren, who are dead in trespasses and sins, wherein in times past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the precision power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, on whom also we all had our conversation in times past, in the lust of our flesh, We'll put in the desires of the fraction of the mind, and work on the nature that children are brought, even as others. But God, who is great in mercy, for his great love by which he loved us, even when we were jailed for sins, has quickened us together with Christ by grace, he also, and has raised us up together Let us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that, not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should boast. We are at this workmanship. We only need Christ Jesus and the Good Works, which God hath before God done, that we should walk in. Wherefore remember that ye men from past Gentiles in the flesh were called the uncircumcision by that which is called the circumcision in the flesh made by hands. At that time you were without Christ. being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of Christ, having no hope, and without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, you who sometimes were in sorrow, are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the little wall of partition between us. having abolished in his flesh the enmity in the law and commandments contained in ordinances, to make in himself the twain one new man, so make in peace, that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby, and claim and preach peace to you, which were upon and to them that remain. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Now, therefore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God. Now, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself, being the King for us now, who all have built in fitly framed together, grand and holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are built in together, for inhabitation of God through the Spirit. Thus reads the Word of God. Thank you for our evidence. It's a reminder to us that even as we read such a chapter, what God has done for sending us. Thank you for inviting me to your 240th anniversary, and to listen to your pastors speaking. Those things have gone undone through the years. It is an encouragement. It's a privilege to see God's face, for as proof it were four years before such an occasion. To all our friends, greetings from pastor, Pastor Bass, and the fellowship there at Ridley Hall, and we rejoice with you. God's goodness to all of you. One last anniversary. Some people go on for a hundred. A time when you can stop and look back, and look at what God has done in your life. Amazing. I like more to look forward and to think of what lies ahead. And I especially like church anniversaries. I'm always reminded that the church is a miracle. Church of Jesus Christ is a miracle. Every local church and the church universal is a miracle. We are Gentiles here, and I'm no doubt most of us are Gentiles here. And if you just look at that portion we read together, there in verse 12, and it reminds them that they were Gentiles, well, without Christ, denying Him from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenant of Christ, having no hope, without God in the world. Well, what a state. You know how the Jews looked upon the Gentiles. And that's who they'd write into. And there was no hope, if you read that verse today. It's hella obsessed, isn't it? No hope. The only God in the world. And there'd be speech to them. But now, in Christ Jesus, he who is sometimes lowered off by maiden's eye, by the blood of Christ. And the church is a miracle. Nothing but the power of God could produce the Church. In fact, if you look back to the previous chapter, chapter 1, and look at verse 19, he prays there that they might know what is the exceeding greatness of his power to walk to us with human beings according to the working of his mighty power. And he wants them to understand and to know the power of God that brought the church into being. It seemed to be impossible for one who wrote to the Ephesians here. Nothing, nothing but the eternal power of God could turn this blasphemy, blasphemy, heresy into the apostle of Jesus Christ. And it requires that same power to bring every soul to the Lord Jesus Christ, to himself. So if you're a born-again Christian and you belong to Western Baptist Church subterranean, then you are only such because of the mighty power of God. And as we think about that, Blessed is the Baptist church. It's a miracle that it's still here. I've listened to the pastor speak there, and he speaks of times when the numbers were low, speaks of the difficulties of the area, and so on. It's a miracle. Did you exist? That you're here. And it demonstrates the power of God to all around, if they could only think about it. Churchants have demonstrated the glory of God. God manifested his power when he created the world out of nothing. When he said, let there be light, and there was light. Mountains, the rivers, the raging sea, the lightning, the thunder, they all proclaimed his glory. The heavens and affirmer shows his handiwork to God and our King. But nothing can claim the glory of God but the Christian Church, the body of which Christ is the head. Nothing is so wonderful as the fact that men and women, young people, people like you and I, who have found Never have I been saved from sin, once lost, dead. And yet, we are now members of the body of Christ. I wonder what they would think about it. In John chapter 7, verse 10, Jesus said to his father there to his bride, I am glorified in thee. and extols through our beloved Saviour. It's no wonder that at the end of chapter 3 of this letter to the Ephesians we have that remarkable doxology. Now under him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask of them according to the power of God within us. Under him in glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages. without end. And it's not a surprise that as you spend time looking through these chapters, the first three chapters of the Biblicals, that as you move through, that doxology swells up in your mind, doesn't it, that you recognise and understand why it is that Paul had to do that. Satan has worked and worked and worked to bring the Christian church down in the eyes of the world. We're despised by the world. They have no time for us. Sadly, as Christians, we have lost the wonder of just what we are. It's only when we read Chapter 11, at least the first three of it, in the Ephesian letter, that we begin to understand again and grasp and appreciate Christian change. So I trust that this afternoon, this weekend, as you celebrate such an anniversary of a very young, pretty woman in Paris, and I think we're only about 127, so we're way, way behind you. But 204 years is a long, long time, isn't it? So it's come very low in the world, just imagine. in our estimation as a people of God. So as I talk about the fact of what we were, what the Church is, that it's a miracle, if the Church is what I've just briefly described then, what does God expect from His modern-day miracles? What does He expect us to display? I've been recently looking at Paul's famous letter to the Scanton church, and it was written to these early believers who were suffering. Paul didn't look at the Scantons. He was writing to Christians, and he was telling them how they should live in a hostile world. He said, there's much there. And if you've got time and want something to read quickly, you can read them very quickly, but they're such an encouraging two letters there from Peter. Because we're in a hostile world, aren't we? You're going to die in a hostile world, and they haven't lost all of their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So Peter brought an issue about this too. Scattered folk living in a hostile world. And I have this reading here, and I reckon two things that ought to be prominent in the midst of this modern-day miracle, the church. If you come with me to Peter, Peter's first epistle, chapter 1, verse 22, I just want to speak for a few moments this afternoon about two things in those next six verses down to chapter 2 and verse 3. Two things that we at the Modern Day Miracle ought to despise. And the first thing here you see, if you read those verses, they ought to be prominent in the Christian Church It's the Word of God. Verse 22 speaks of the truth. In verse 23, the Word of God. First part of verse 25, the Word of the Lord. Second part of verse 25, the Word. We have to go to verse 10, the milk of the Word. There is so much here that doesn't have to be selected. We must now get some confirmation that God has spoken. Spoken with a glory. What we have in our hands is the word of God. God ordained that his word should be written down for thousands of generations, for you and I. Scripture means what he's written. Written words like scripture. God insists that Moses wrote of him. In John chapter 5, he said, Well, had you believed Moses, you would have believed me. For he wrote of me. And if you believe not his writings, how shall you believe my words? And on many, many a country, you'll recall in your mind that The Lord Jesus Christ himself appealed to what he'd written. What he'd written. Verse 23 speaks of a living word. I like to read biographies very often, and I just recently had a book, a biography of a missionary, The lady went out to Congo in the middle of the last century, just after the Second World War. I enjoyed the grief, the great joy and grief of all that she went through and her faith and her trust in the Lord. You know, I thought I would really love to have her in my sitting room and speak to her face to face, to hear her talk about what she had experience. But this word lives. The only experience that it speaks to us is the living world. I remember the first time that it spoke to me, and it was the time when I was converted, and the words seemed to jump out of the page, and I couldn't put them away in my head. It's a living And also, it's an enduring word, it says in verse 25. It applies forever, verse 23. And that's encouraging to us, because everything in this world changes, doesn't it? But this world is like the author. It's unchanging, it's unchangeable. Not one jot of Temple shall pass away. Not one letter of the Hebrew alphabet Job said, look, any inflection over just any letter, let those things just pass away. But then it's a word to be preached in the second half of verse 25. So we could leave out all of those points, but just remember to keep them in your mind and think about them. I want to look at the place of God in the local church. And in verse 23 we say, first of all, it is by the word that a Christian life begins. See how important it is? For the word to be central in the local church. For you've born again, not out of corruptible sin, but of incorruptible by the Word of God. How are we born naturally? Saved with some, we were conceived, there was a period of gestation, and we were born. That's a corruptible sin. And it confirms the idea that we have in John chapter 1 and verse 13, where it reads, his wives were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. Or as James puts it, of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth. So James endorses the means that God uses in his creation story. Peter said, by the word of God. James said, with the word of truth. The seed is placed in the soul through the word of God, and we are spiritually able to see that bobbled head. How important that the word of God can be central in the local church. How important, with this area of three million people that come in from every part of the world, that there are a hundred of them across the South, or a hundred different nationalities represented in that visitor's book. How important that they hear the Word of God. Because it's through the Word of God that that's who you summon, that they may be born again. in his diary that he was a godless man, said nothing would induce him to read about the Lord Jesus Christ, nothing would induce him to read the Bible, wouldn't give him any thought or consideration of God. But did you know, he says, one day he had a little girl outside his window, singing over and over again, Just one line of it, something should go to the Sunday School. Take up and read the Bible. And she gets to the singing and it's spectacular. I went to lunch with a young lady, a young boy, about three, I think, years. I went there Sunday before last, I think it was. And here, in the Sunday School, they taught one line of it. chorus he'd been singing at Sunday school, and he went on and on and on singing this. I thought to myself, you know, I'd like to take him the upper line, but he's getting on my nerves. But that's it. He must have heard this young girl singing these things. And as it went on, it impressed him in my mind, and it impressed him to read the Word of God. He said he didn't want to He almost impelled him to read it. And the ultimately final word he came to, he said, is just, hit him precisely in the right place. And that's what he read. It's Proverbs 13, verses 13 and 14. I'm not going to go into it now, but that's what those two verses hit him. And he became the most influential Christian for the next thousand years. By the Word of God, spiritual eyes are opened. So it's vital that the Word of God is central in the lineage. It must be preached. It must be received and appreciated by the flock. It must be obeyed. What do you think encourages a pastor most as he's preparing his first ministry on the North Bay or any other day? When he comes into a church and the people appreciate the Word, he sees them talking about it. That's up to them. And it's a wonderful incentive to a pastor when that's appreciated. I've been to another church and they speak to preachers. That's what I found. People do appreciate the Word. Come up to me afterwards. I wanted to talk about it. I wanted to. And it was such an encouragement. Let people come into the house of God. You have visitors every week. Isn't it right, as they come in, that they see you pouring out the word of God, listening to the pastor preach it, or whoever was in the pulpit preaching it. It's difficult for them to understand. This is a bit of a triangle. It's a dead continent. If you're not free from them, love the Word of God. And then I became concerned that this book that I've neglected for so long, that's this book I've despised, doesn't have anything to say to me. And surely it means that we must preach philosophy. We must preach it. I know you're a pastor, and I know there's no problem with that. Here, he approaches the gospel. He loves to approach the gospel. If God commends, do they see you, the church, appreciative of the Word of God? Do they understand what I do? Do they hear that people have love for the Word of God? Does it make them think? What is this? How is this done? People, read this book. It's an English book. So, by the word of God, say to someone, man or woman or son, that by the word of God, the spiritual life becomes obvious. We say that in verse 20, for I'm seeing in you, purify your souls in the abatement of truth, through the Spirit. It should become obvious. By the word of God, spiritual life becomes obvious. In natural birth, there's an unseen work, isn't there? There's a secret work that goes on in the womb. But there must obviously come a sign of Arakawa, one of the likely to now church chief, texted and said, just to let you know, we don't have a binding. I came back to the church but it was a while prior that I came back and I almost never had known. But, just beginning, just beginning to become obvious. And there's a secret work of the Spirit of God in Iraq. So what no one can see in those early days, God alone knows it. To some extent the New Charter of God is aware of it, but it cannot remain invisible, cannot remain a secret. It comes about for billions to live through it. Have you seen God? The Word of God says repent and believe, and we do. The Word of God says, come to Christ and rest in Him. And we do. And as we go on, we realise that we're not brothers and sisters. And the Word of God says, and I've done it now with a pure heart, permanently there in verse 22. And we do. And by the abatement of the Word of God, there's a transformation of life. But it's through the Word of God. It's through obedience to the Word. And then it becomes obvious. We see it. A pastor told me a little while ago that he had in his congregation a young man who said he was converted, but he wasn't sure. Dr Lloyd-John came to his church and this young man engaged the doctor in a conversation, and they spoke together. The pastor went to Dr Lloyd-John afterwards and said, I'm very unsure about that young man. the system. It's only a brief conversation and we know it. No light is there. There's no light in it. See, that light has to be obvious, has to be seen. Only by the Word of God we grow as Christians. So in regards to chapter 2, has a newborn baby desire the sincere milk of the world that she may grow thereby. Babies are born, but they can't be made babies. It'd be a tragedy, wouldn't it? They get milk, they give them milk, they begin to grow and to give birth as they receive that nourishing milk. It's a picture In the time that I noticed the war ago, that maybe happened, and not quite certainly, maybe it's not very big, very quickly, but I don't know, maybe it is, but obviously, that maybe's a nourishing thing. Heals you from very quickly. Gives you a rather quick healer. And the Word of God is that nourishing tool. My God, it's pure milk to a young believer. And there was a grower there together. It's wonderful to see a young Christian, isn't it? Grumbling for us. Harry, have you ever been in a spiritual life? Well, likely, of course. It will be me. And if he meets a soul, he'll grow and develop. But it's all pain. Here, no experience or no set of experiences will give you growth. Growth has to be aligned to the Word of God. That's why you've got to keep the Word of God central in the local church. Having a good authority is not something I've just stated. There's one man who's an assistant pastor in a very advanced current magic church. He was a Christian pastor there. And I asked him why he left. And he said to me, well, I saw people that slide in a sphere. I saw people on their hands and legs barking at one another like animals, dogs and other animals. And he said, I noticed over the eight years I was there, there was no Christ in those people. They had all these experiences, and talked about them, and doubted them, but there was no Christ. Now, if you are serious, here in Westminster, whether it's about your Christian or not, you need to be serious about the Word of God. You need to hear it preached. You need to study it publicly together, and you need to study it privately, and sometimes you're serious about memorising it. wonderful if you can look at it. If you never look at the book, and you will surely grow up as individuals and as a local church, there is no doubt. Or perhaps brush on by love of the word, you will be seen to be genuine. Look at verse 3 of chapter 2 there. If so be it that you say to them that the law is racial, He'll send him in January. Peter's not doubting that he's reading a text in Jesus Christ. But if he knew that that's what he thought it would be, it would be great proof that they were alive. Soccer's a great sport. You get at the table and you eat. Soccer's your life, isn't it? A healthy baby is always looking for food. Mother said to me the other day that the baby was always hungry. It's a sign that life gave. And babies are healthy aphrodisiacs, don't they? You see a man or a woman who's tasted the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will see a great love. Whilst I sat and read about it the other day, he said that he judged his own spiritual state, the thermometer of his spiritual state, by how much he wanted to read the Word, how much he wanted to read the spiritual books. He said, it comes on to me where I am. If I am at a point where I let it go, then I know Nothing is there so illuminating, so quickly, as the truth of God. If you've got a Bible there, turn to Psalm 19. Look at verses 7 and 8. The door of the Lord is perfect. Converting the soul, the testimony of the Lord is sure, making why ask the simple. Statutes of the Lord are bright, rejoicing the heart. The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. What a wonderful couple of verses there, aren't they? And it just gives us that understanding, doesn't it, of what the words of God can truly mean to us. So he also says, God has magnified his word. above this night. And it would have rusted that people back to them. He jealous! He jealous of the purity and the honour and the glory of the revealed Word. Westminster Baptist Church, you are members of it. It's God's Word, sweeter than honey, do you? Is it more precious than my love to you? Is it to you? Is that your love for church? Do they love the Word of God? Is it evident that they love the Word of God? original supporter of the mission in Madagascar, named David Mann, came to us on Friday nights and he told us that Christians walking a hundred miles to his station, the hospital, where these people didn't come because they needed that sort of treatment. They came because they heard that they could find a Bible there. They'd seen one, but they'd never had one. And they told him, and they said to him, we have some of the works of David, but we've heard that there are works of Jesus, and there are works of Paul, and there are works of Peter, and we would like them. And so the David man asked them to show what they had, and they were quite reluctant, because they thought that they might be taken away. But in the end, they produced them under their throne. And David said to us that As they produced them, they were just a couple of pages of the Psalms. And they were battered, and torn, and dirty, and they apparently had been made out to print, and remade, and borrowed, and so on. So they remained, and I did a new show for them, and the Psalms are back. It's the big people. They opened the Psalms, and they took down the one sheet that they had, and they chapped them against what they got. I'm unsure if they got the Word of God. And it was a great challenge to them, because they went on rejoicing that they, in their riches, had been given the Word of God. So the place of the Word of God in the life of the local church. By the Word of God, the Christian life begins. By the Word of God, the Christian life becomes obvious. By the Word of God, the Christian life develops. By the Word of God, the Christian life seems beginning. Love of the Word is what our Lord requires. It is modern miracle. That's what he wants us to show forward. But we are people of the Book. You want to see people born again in York? Come on, wherever you are. You want to see people born again in in this church. You don't want to see people cry. If you want to cry, then put out the word of sin. If you want it to be, you want to be seen to be genuine, truth and word. I'll be very quick on the second thing, but it's here very clearly, isn't it? And this is what God wants to say in the modern miracle of the church. There's a clear, distinct instruction from the Apostle that the Christian and Apostle of the world were to love one another with a pure heart, fervently. That's 23rd. The Apostle spoke about the fact that there was harmony here. That's lovely to hear, that there's dynamite in the Christian church. This is much stronger, isn't it? Last year in Westminster Baptist Church, is there this love for one another? Love for one another, pure heart, firm love? Two distinct different pictures here. A pure heart and a firm love. In verse 23 we have the basic fundamental motive to cultivate and express that Christ-like affection. You see, Peter knew that naturally we don't love one another. It's not natural, is it? We don't love people in that way. And so he knew that he had to give them more spiritual instruction if they were to find out. to give them scriptural reasoning. And he says there in verse 23 that they were born again, and by that act had become children of God from faith in Jesus Christ. Therefore he's in fire, speaking to them as if they were brothers and sisters. And this tie of brotherhood between God-like you and I natural ones, not like our natural relatives, our parents, our children, or whatever, in that relationship. Often that is not what we're waiting for, isn't it? My father and I had a very good relationship in many ways. We were like brothers at times. But it was a human relationship, and he got laid down and reverted, unfortunately. And the bond has been broken forever. But my relationship to you, as a believer, if you're a believer yourself, then what do you decide? Whether you like it or not, you have me for a brother. And you've got me for a brother for all eternity. You can't get rid of me. We all have a primary duty, one to another, as eternal brothers and sisters. But of course, I know we have a duty to all men, don't we, in Romans 13, we're told that. But that's up there in Romans 13. It's without reference to a spiritual state. It's just a love for another fellow human being. It's fulfilling the law. All the others are Romans. And we should please do good to all men. That's right. Put it in Romans 13. But the affection for a brother or sister in Christ is a peculiar mode of thinking and feeling, and it's produced by the Holy Spirit of God. It's not natural. It's through knowledge and belief of Christian truth. And the Pope has said often, brethren, I believe God's Word. I believe all that John tells us in the first letter there about love and reverence. We love God. We say we don't love God. We don't love our partner. And so there's got to be that understanding of that. Romans chapter 5 reminds us that God's love has been poured into our hearts by our mistake. John says we must love one another in truth and for the truth's sake which abides in us and will be with us. ever. John, 2nd John, verse 2. One characteristic of that love is the love of a pure heart. The lady might hear the risk, it's a genius, a sincerity, it must be real. You know, we can affect that, can't we, and show it to me, I think it's because we can do that quite easily, I think. to put it on, but it should be from the pure heart, he says. I was talking about this in a man in a very large church, and he told me that a brother in his church had... they ever spoke to him from one year to the next, he suddenly came up at one point, embraced him, Upped him on the back and I asked him aloud how he was and afterwards asked him about his situation and so on. He said, you know, I was so shocked. He said, it just got much younger for me and I didn't realise what was going on. When I recovered from the shock, I told him that this was insincere. And he thought it, and I told him it would be far better if he came up to me Each time he saw me and greeted me, greeted me quietly, that he'd come up once a year and a quick show of. Our love, from that pure heart, is not like that. Our love is that thought that's set in the Roman letter, love without dissimulation. We simply lose love without hypocrisy. John Watson in his first letter in chapter 3, verse 18, that they were not in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. But a pure heart is even more than that. It includes freedom from all love and selfish emotions and ends. Love from a pure heart speaks of that open, benevolent love, open, benevolent affection that flows from the same divine heart. There is no other fountain from which that love can come. We cannot love one another in that way unless it comes from a pure heart. The heart of the person who loves God must automatically love the That Greek conveys many ideas. It conveys constancy. It's the word used at the prayer that was made for Peter when he was an early president, if you remember, in the book of Acts 7. He made a prayer without ceasing. Same word, fervently. Rather than in art than in God's modern miracle, It must be a love that prevents a weariness in what we're doing, because if we love one another, then we will seek to do well, to do good to each other, won't we? And it must be a love that is firm and keeps us doing good to others. The Christian brother, when he acts as he should act as a child of God, loves at all times. No change of circumstances, from the part of himself or his brother, will do that. In the great work of thoroughness of faith, also includes the meaning of intensity and power. St. George, when he said of the Lord being impetuous, he prayed more earnestly. Samuel, it should be that intensity of our love for one another. Christian love should be strong, as well as constant, as well as sincere. It should be sober that we're willing to make strenuous exertions, costly sacrifices for our brothers and sisters, especially when There were great games in store. I remember, going back now for 40 odd years, I remember when I first became a professor at the Bridley Hall. And there were different times then, 40 years ago, in the 1960s, late 60s. Different times then, and money was so short. There was a few revolving like that. You remember those times? And we had to move. I was living six miles away, and we tested the pool by asking the Lord to give us a house nearer to the church there in Battersea. The houses there were much more expensive than where I was living. And so it was a very difficult time, and the Lord gave us a house, and we were grateful to go there, but it was taking so much work. One night when the church came up, they paid, if I remember correctly, it was £15, which I was going to buy a coat. He said, oh my, how does a 10-year-old now buy a coat but feel that no one's going to give this to you because you need it to get two things in the house? I'm like a sacrifice. But it was practical, wasn't it? That one is. The third is you have to increase what I'm actually doing. So you have to to. This is how I love it. It's a bit picturesque, but I hope you can understand it. Someone said that our love for each other ought to be like a sacred fire that descended on me like a sacrifice, and lit up all the water and mud of the French, and still remained strong enough to send up to heaven the grateful fumes of the sacrifice. fervently to the world, with a fervent desire to the world, just lick up the water and the mud, obviously the obstacles we place obstacles that way and wipe them out, say things that we ought not to say, do things we ought not to do. Sometimes it's wrong, isn't it, to love a brother who can do something against us, or they put an obstacle in the way. Here's this love that ought to be out for once upon a time. Burn up all of those things, and still display such a love. But it's the system in which there's the Baptist church. How does such a love affect this church here? How will my love affect you in your church? My love should be like a sacred love, shouldn't it? If I were to say to you, Christ, it's a new command that I give unto you, that you love one another as I have loved you, that you also love one another. But this is not the way. Breathe, be considerate, wise, expensive, generous, self-sacrificing, always looking to be a choice about us. So, you are a continuing modern-day hero in this local church in Westminster today. And these are two ways, I believe, that the Word of God, the three-apostle prayer, says that we should disdain. Two main characteristics that we should disdain, I believe, are very evident. To be quick to the point. evident here. Strangely, it comes in tomorrow, the morning service, the evening service. I see a beautiful love for the world. As you hear it, you focus with real eye and real life. Then you hang and look in to see. I see that tomorrow. After the service, a lot of people of Christlike faith. So it wasn't everything. People of all faith-shows taking part, and I had a number of them. So that's a lot of the Bishops and Baptists. They saved pretty much all of them. They saved whatever church they could find. Some of them sprang out of their mess of that building. Trust that these things might make you consider your attitude towards God and your attitude towards the reverend. Next year, when I go back inside, our church changes. We'll do that when we go to a different church. So, may God bless you. It wasn't until I was there that I really came to trust these two characters.