Before we turn to the Bible, let us pray together once again. Father, in the light of the Bible and in the light of the biblical ideas in this hymn that we have sung, we do gladly say to you and to your son that we are gathered here all to hear from you. We thank you that you have given us the written scriptures. We thank you that over the centuries you did cause these words to be breathed out from yourself through men's minds and pens to be written upon the various parchments and medium that you used. And we thank you that it's pleased you to preserve these words for us. We thank you that your Holy Spirit does come and make those words understandable and wonderful to us, that he does communicate your mind and heart to us through the statements of the Bible. And we pray that as we are here now for the very purpose of studying your word, the Spirit, the very Spirit, your Spirit, who gave those words, we ask that the Spirit would now lead us into these words, help us to understand them, please, Open our mind to understand properly, open our hearts to respond properly, govern our wills that we would in every way be volitionally grasped by the truths that you would give us in the Bible. We pray that you would protect us from going into men's ideas and ideas that are not according to the Bible. and that you would help us to richly enjoy and understand and receive those things which the Bible does actually say. We pray that you would govern our minds, that you would help us. We pray for every Christian here that you would please stabilize and minister to them. We pray for every non-believer here, and we beseech you that you would this day give them faith. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. With some interruptions, we have been studying a a series of sermons on the Christian church. Our concern has been that for many in America, the Christian church has become irrelevant. And even for many of those who profess to be the Lord's people, they don't really know what the church should be. And sometimes they find church rich and sometimes they find it wearisome and And for a host of reasons, we believe that it was necessary to study the the biblical teaching of the Christian church. Perhaps one of the primary reasons that we believe that we should study it is simply because the New Testament says so much about the church and because God gave us so much about the church and the Bible, he surely must want us to understand it. And therefore, we'd like to take it up. We said that there is so much material in the Bible regarding the church that it's hard to know how to approach the subject. And the method that we took is first to look at a series of pictures which the Bible gives of the Christian church. And perhaps later, when we've looked at all of these pictures, we'll come back and pick up some of the high points of them in a more systematic manner. We first looked at the first picture that we looked at was the prototype church, the first church, the first Christian church, the church in the city of Jerusalem. The church that is described for us in Acts chapter two. And there are many things that we learned from that picture of the church, things that were true of that church and things that should be true of every other church. We learned there that the church is composed of radically converted people, that the church is composed of radical disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. Those the members of that first church were persons who heard Peter preach, who are deeply convicted of their sins, who cried out, what must they do to be saved? Peter told them that they must repent and be baptized. And the text says that as many as gladly received his word were, in fact, baptized because they did, in fact, repent. And according to that text, they were eager to distance themselves from what they referred to as a crooked and perverse generation. They were radical disciples of Christ. They were trying to get away from their generation. They were openly aligning themselves with the Lord Jesus, and they became the members of that first church. A second thing that we learn from that picture is that the church is to assemble. The church is not just to be a bunch of people off doing their thing. The church is to assemble for God ordained purposes. Some of those purposes, the church is to assemble for instruction. The church is to assemble for fellowship. The church is to assemble for prayer. The church is to assemble for fellowship. And the epistles even add more. But the point is that the church isn't its own master. The church doesn't decide its functions. The church is called to a symbol for God ordained purposes. Another thing that we learned about the church from that passage is that the church is the. We said the nursery, it's the depository, the churches, the nursery for new believers, that Christ, by his spirit, goes out and reaches individual lost people, sinful people. Jesus goes out by a spirit and reaches them and draws them to himself. And those very people are then gathered in. They are deposited by Christ into the church. And so the church is to be a nursery for new believers. It's wonderful for many of us to think on our own experience of being sinful people, sadly. And the Lord coming to us by a spirit and convincing us of our sins, the Lord coming and making Christ to be wonderful to us, making us see that he's an adequate savior, that he was able to forgive our sins, to make us see that he was worthy of our allegiance. And then the spirit giving us the new birth so that we did become disciples of his. And then we were gathered into one of his churches and the church then became a nursery to our souls. And we are glad to say that that was the experience for many of us. And if you're not a believer. We hope that the Lord will save you and that the Lord will bring you into one of his churches. And one of those churches then would be a nursery for the care of your soul. We move from that picture of the first church to the second picture, and that is the biblical picture of the church as the temple of God. And we said there were four passages that teach that the New Testament church, the local church, is to be regarded as the temple of God. First Corinthians chapter three verse sixteen and following first Timothy chapter three verse fourteen and following first Peter chapter two verse five and following Ephesians chapter two verse twenty and following. And for those of you who are visitors. I would like to go off and to go over all of those verses again, but we can't. It would take too long. You just have to look at them yourselves and study them. But those passages, among others, do teach this, that we are to think of the local church, the New Testament church, were to think of that as the temple of God, what the Old Testament temple was in shadow and type. The church is in fulfillment and central. We learned that central. To the biblical picture of the church as temple central to that is this biblical idea that God dwells in his church. God dwells in the assembly of his people. You remember the statement that Paul made to the Corinthians, which was almost a statement of astonishment. He said in first Corinthians three sixteen. Do you not know? Like, it's incredible to him that they would have missed this. Do you not know, he says, that you are the temple of God and the spirit of God dwells in you? Don't you understand that? He says to them, your whole conduct should be governed by this reality. You're the temple and God dwells with you. In Ephesians, chapter two and verse twenty two, Paul concludes that statement by saying you are being built together. You, the church, you are being built together for a dwelling place of God by the spirit. When we think of the church as temple, we're to think primarily as the church, the assembly of God's people being the place where God especially dwells. And still, by way of review, the Old Testament temple, that was what was true of the Old Testament temple. It was the place where God in a special way dwelt. Please. Those of you who have been here all along, please bear with this review, the The foundational idea here, I mean, the idea that I want us to remember is foundational to everything that's going to be said this morning. The central idea of the Old Testament temple was God was there. Now, God was everywhere. God was everywhere, but he promised that at the temple he would be present in a special way at the temple. He promised that he would meet with his people and at the temple he required special worship. And he expected his people to worship him every day and in all sorts of places. But at the temple, there was to be something special. He would be there. He would communicate there. And he wanted to be worshipped there. There are many parallels between those ideas and the New Testament church. God now is everywhere present. Of course, he's everywhere present. We can go nowhere, even into the depths of hell and escape the presence of God. But he has promised that in a special way, he'll be present when the people, when his people assemble. God can and must be worshiped everywhere. You should have worship every day somewhere. You should rise and meet with God and pray and read the scriptures and sing and glorify him day by day by day. We should be worshiping God in all sorts of places. But he also requires us special worship in his temple, in the church. And we can't say that we're pleasing God when we're just giving ourselves to the ordinary worship and we're not worshiping him in his temple. He requires that just as he did before. He has promised that in the church he would manifest himself and he manifest himself primarily by his spirit through the word. He manifests himself primarily by the spirit of Christ coming to us, revealing the things of Christ, revealing the things of God, animating our hearts, animating our spirits, enlivening our feelings, gripping our volitions. The spirit comes to the word and reveals God to us and ministers to us. Now, we said, if that's true. If the primary idea about the temple is God's presence with us, then we said several implications follow. One is that our great concern in the local church must be to preserve and to sense the presence of God among us. If everything else that we've said is true, this deduction is true. One of our great concerns in this local church and one of the great concerns in every local church must be to preserve and to sense the presence of God with us. That's what we considered last time, and that's what I'd like us to consider, continue to consider this morning. God has promised his presence with us. So why should we be concerned to preserve it? Well, there are two reasons, if you remember. Number one, God has promised his presence to be with us, but he hasn't promised that every time we assemble, that each one of us will fall down with awe with the sense that he is present. God is very often present in fulfilling his promise, but we don't sense it because there's something wrong in our souls is because there's something wrong in the leadership of the of the of the worship period. It is true that God promises to meet with his people, but we can't deduct from that that just just go and you'll sense it. We have to come with the spirit and the disposition that God is pleased with if we're to sense his presence, and sadly, it is also true. That even though God has promised to be with his people when they assemble, there are statements in the Bible of God withdrawing that presence. He threatened to withdraw his presence from the Ephesian church. He did withdraw his presence from the Laodicean church. There are situations that arise where the people of God and the given assembly can be so grievous to God and so much grieving the Holy Spirit that he actually does withdraw his presence. It's a horrible. It's a horrible thing to consider, but it's true. And so because of those things, it's our great concern should be to preserve the real presence of God among us. That is to live in such a way that we don't breathe them away and to nurture a sense of God's being present with us. And we said if we're to do that, that there are several attitudes, several dispositions which we must bring to the assemblies when we gather. And these are some that we considered last time. Number one, we said we must come to the assemblies of the people of God with an intelligent, determined desire for communion with God himself. How did you come this morning? Did you come because, oh, I've got to come? Oh, it's ten thirty. I've got to get there. Oh, somebody's going to see if I'm not there. Or did you come with a conscious, intelligent desire? I want to meet God. I am going to go there because I want to meet God. Well, we said that's one of the things that's necessary if we're to preserve his presence and if we're to maintain a sense of his presence, we have to have that disposition. Psalm 27, for one thing, have I decided of the Lord that I will seek after that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to behold his beauty and to inquire of him. Psalm 63. Oh, God, you are my God, early will I seek you, my soul thirst for you, my flesh longs for you. Well, that's the disposition that we're to come to the assemblies with. Secondly, if we're to preserve his presence and maintain a sense of his presence, we must come with reverence and awe. God does not promise to reveal himself to the flippant. God does not promise to reveal himself to the irreverent. God does not promise to reveal himself to the indifferent. The basic meaning of both the Hebrew and the Greek words for worship is to bow down or to do obeisance. If we really believe that God in some special way is present when we assemble, the only appropriate way for us to come is with the spirit of deep humility and reverence. We are called upon to sing and to shout and to rejoice, and we should. But all of that is to be done. under this sense of bowing to God, of being reverent in the presence of the almighty, holy God. The third thing that is necessary is that we must come with humility and conscious submission, which is only slightly different than the first. We are to come with humility and conscious submission. If we really want to preserve the presence of God in this place, If we desire as individuals to sense the presence of God in this place, we must come with a conscious sense of submission to him. So when his word is read, we have that disposition that pleases God, that we tremble at his word. When his word is read, we come with such a sense of humility and such a sense of submission that when it's read, we say yes. Whatever it says, we say yes. However, it directs us, we say yes. Whatever it tells us to do, we say yes. Whatever it says to stop, we say yes. Whatever disposition requires to say yes, because we're coming with that sense. God is here. These are God's words. We must be submissive to his words. You remember, it was somewhat of an interesting, almost surprise to me in the study for last for that last sermon that the submission that God requires is not only submission to him. God requires that when we come together that we come with a sense of submission to one another. That was the point of the Ephesians five passage in the first Peter three first Peter two passage that were to come to God not as individual isolated units who are perhaps at variance or at distance for one another were to come as the body of Christ were to come as the assembly of the people of God in submission to one another. If we're to have the presence of God among us God does not dwell with the independent. God does not dwell with the arrogant God. God does not deal with the isolationist. God deals with the God dwells with the body. God dwells with those who come into conscious submission to him and to one another. Now there are some other. Dispositions that we must have if we are to please God, if we are to maintain a sense of his presence and to preserve his actual presence with us. I'd like to carry them on this morning, we talked about those three last time. Now, I'd like to bring up these few more this morning. If we are serious about wanting to preserve the reality and the sense of God's presence. We'll come in this way also, this is number four in that list. Will come with sincere expressions of love and devotion to God. Will come to the assemblies with sincere expressions of love and devotion to God. God does not dwell with the indifferent. Now, how many times has that been said? God does not dwell with indifferent. Who does he dwell with? He dwells with those who come to him with conscious expressions. of affection, of devotion and of love. What is the great commandment? Every new believer knows the great commandment, right? When Jesus was asked, what is the first and great commandment? What did he say? The first and great commandment, he says, is you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. And Mark says, with all your strength, what is the great commandment? The great commandment is not to be in a worship service. The great commandment is not this or that or another. The great commandment is to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. Now, apply that to corporate worship. Now, that passage obviously is infinitely larger than the subject of corporate worship, but apply it to corporate worship. What is first commandment is to love God with everything that's in you. In the light of that, what is the greatest sin? The greatest sin is to fail to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, all your strength. The greatest sin is not to be an adulterer. The greatest sin is not to get engaged in some kind of sexual perversions. The greatest sin is not to be a murderer. The greatest sin is to fail to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Apply that to worship. What is the greatest sin of corporate worship? It's to come into corporate worship without love. It's to come before God, before the very presence of God. It's to come into the place where the Lord has advertised. I will be there in a special way. It's to come into God's presence. And to be so distracted or so preoccupied or so indifferent that we don't come to him with conscious expressions of love. Do you remember Jesus castigation of the hypocrites, the religious hypocrites? And Matthew, chapter 15, verse seven, hypocrites, he said, hypocrites, he said, Well, did Isaiah prophesy about you saying these people draw near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Now, Jesus is drawing attention primarily to their lack of sincerity. Their heart was far from him. They were engaging in all the appropriate acts of old covenant worship. They were doing the things that they were supposed to do in the temple. But their heart, their sincerity there was far from him. Their love was far from him. They were engaging in all the things that were appropriate under old covenant laws, but they were hypocrites. Why? Because a heart of affection was absent. We are called upon to come into God's presence and give him a full expression of worship. And that full expression of worship includes a lot of things. It includes singing to him. It includes praying to him. It includes the reverent and eager way that we receive his words, the whole host of things that we're expected to do in the worship of God. But all of it is futile if it isn't done as a conscious expression of love and affection and devotion to him. That's the greatest requirement that we love him. And so it doesn't please him if we just sing. without loving him. It doesn't please him if we just dutifully follow along in the Bible when it's being read, if we don't love him and out of love and reverence, receive the words that are read. I'd like you to turn, please, to John, chapter 14. It's a passage that's well known to many of you. John, chapter 14. It's not about corporate worship, but I would like us to take the principle and apply it to corporate worship in John, chapter 14. John, chapter fourteen, Jesus words and verse twenty one. John, chapter fourteen, verse twenty one, he who has my commandments and keeps them is he who loves me and he who loves me will be loved by my father and I will love him and manifest myself to him. Verse twenty three. Jesus answered and said to him, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word and my father will love him and we will come to him and make our home with him. I think about that passage for a moment and then I'd like to apply it to worship. What is the reward that Jesus offers in this passage to the disciples? What is the reward? The reward that he promises is intimacy with him. I will come to you. I will manifest myself to you. I and the father will come to you. I and the father will make our home with you. We'll live with you. That's the reward that's promised in this passage. What is required to obtain that reward? What's required is obedience, is it not? If you obey me, he says, if you obey me, then I will come and manifest myself. I'll reward you with intimacy. But notice that the obedience in this passage Is not raw obedience, the obedience of this passage is the expression of love. If you love me, you'll keep my commandments and the reward is that you'll have intimacy with me, it's not bare acts of submission to the raw forms of the Bible, it's not obedience in that sense that is rewarded. It's love expressing itself in obedience to the commandments. When love expresses itself in obedience, the commandments, there's this tremendous reward. I'll be with you. I'll manifest myself to you will now apply that to corporate worship. What is our goal in corporate worship? Well, the great goal in corporate worship should be that we want to draw nigh to God and we want him to draw nigh to us. The goal for ourselves is to draw nigh to God. The reward we hope for is that God will draw nigh to us. How does that passage apply to us? How are we to hope? What are we to do with the hope that God will indeed draw nigh to us? Well, we're to be obedient, OK? We're to be obedient. We're to sing because he requires us to sing. We're to come with thanksgiving because he requires us to come with thanksgiving. We're to assemble because he requires us to assemble. But all of that's nothing if it isn't done as an expression of love. If you love me and keep my commandments, I'll be intimate with you. If you love me and engage in the corporate worship, I'll draw near to you. The point that I'm trying to make, I trust, is a simple one. We cannot hope. We cannot hope. We cannot argue with God. We cannot hope that just by coming to the worship services or to the prayer meetings that the Lord will draw near to us. We have no guarantee. We have no promise to plead. We cannot go to chapter and verse and say, God, you promised that if I just show up, you'd be near me. He didn't make that kind of a promise, but he does promise that to those who show love to him in obedience, he'll be intimate with them. Well, let us let those of us who are anxious, those of us who are concerned to preserve the presence of God among us, those of us who want to sense his presence with us, let us be careful that every time we come, Whether it's a Bible class or worship service or a Lord's Supper or baptism or a prayer meeting, any time that we assemble that we're conscious to come, having fought and done what's necessary to stir up. Sincere, conscious expressions of love to God. When you're sitting. before the meeting or maybe at home before you get here or maybe in the parking lot before you come in when you're preparing yourself for worship. You should be telling God that you love him and that because of love for him, you want to be in the place where he is and you want to be with his people and you want to join the strength of your affection with theirs because you know that he wants you to love him with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And then when we come to the prayer meeting or we come to the whatever the meeting is, it should be in our minds. When the men lead us in prayer, we should be saying to God, God, we love you. We I thank you, I love you because of this and this and this, that should be the ethos of our meetings. And it can't be something that's whipped up by the leaders or whipped up by the music, it has to be something that spirit puts in our hearts. But the fact that the spirit must do it does not leave us free of any obligation. It's for us to thoughtfully prepare for worship, to thoughtfully stir our love, to thoughtfully do what David did in the hundred and third Psalm and speak your soul and persuade your soul of all the reasons that you should give God expressions of affection. Another thing that is necessary, a fifth thing that is necessary. If we are to preserve the presence of God among us and if we are to sense his presence with us, the fifth thing is that we must come in the context of moral purity. We must come in the context of holiness. It's interesting that all four of those passages that describe the church as God's temple, each one of them emphasize that the temple is holy. Now, we should not be surprised. If the central feature of the biblical picture of temple is the presence of God and the primary characteristic of God is that he is infinite in holiness, if those things are true, we should not be surprised that all the passages that deal with God's church as temple would also emphasize the necessity of holiness. Ephesians, chapter two and verse twenty one, he says, the church is the building which grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In first Timothy, chapter three and verse 15, he refers to the church as the house of God, and he's instructing Timothy how people should conduct themselves in the house of God. And you remember the instruction that he gave to Timothy when the first things he was that the men should all pray. And how should they pray? They should be lifting up holy hands. Because they're in the temple of God, they're to pray in the context of holiness. In first Peter, chapter two and verse five, he says the church is as living stones which are being built together, a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer up sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. And the passage that I referred to earlier in first Corinthians, chapter three, verses 16 and 17. Do you not know? Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him for the temple of God is holy, such which temple you are. Now, these passages focus in two different directions that come back and forth upon each other. These passages focus, number one, on the need for individual holiness as we come into God's presence. And they also focus on corporate holiness that is necessary if we're to maintain God's presence. Consider the emphasis upon the need for individual moral purity. You understand what I'm talking about when I say that. Because the temple of God is holy, because God is here and because God's holy. We as individuals who come and we individuals who want to sense his presence. We must come in the context of personal holiness. The passage from First Timothy 315, Paul demands that the men pray, lifting up holy hands, that's a need for the individual men who pray to be themselves holy. It's not a reference to imputed holiness, imputed righteousness. This is a reference to them in their conduct. There to come into the context of the church and pray with holy hands, not with unclean hands, with holy hands, without wrath and without division, without disputing, without arguments there to come with holiness and purity and unity to pray to God. The passage in. First Peter, chapter two and verse five says that the individual Christians are likened to living stones, a whole bunch of individuals, and together they compose a holy priesthood. Turn, please, to first Peter. First Peter. Chapter two. First Peter, Chapter two, verse one. Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy and all evil speaking as newborn babes desire, the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby. If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious coming to him as to a living stone rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious. You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Now, we have on other occasions looked at verses four and following. I'd like you now to look at verses one, two and three. The focus of those verses is not exclusively upon corporate worship. But notice that the focus is upon corporate holiness. The focus is upon corporate holiness as a prerequisite for receiving the word of God. Look again, lay aside. There's a whole host of sins you have to lay aside their relational sins, laying aside all malice, all deceit, all hypocrisy, all evil and all envy and all evil speaking. As newborn babes desire, you have to lay those things aside. If you're going to desire and receive the milk of the word of God, you have to come in the context of corporate holiness. Now, that could apply to your devotions, personal, individual devotions. Certainly, you could say that if you hope to receive anything from the word of God, if you hope to have a desire for the word of God and your private devotions, that you have to have laid off all of these sins. That would be appropriate. That would be right. But the passage does go on to talk about the corporate church, and the passage is in many ways in reference to relational sins, which are not necessarily private sins. And the point that I'd like to make is that it does apply to corporate worship. If we're to engage in corporate worship as we ought, if we're to have the desire for the word of God that we ought, if we're really to succeed in following this admonition to desire the sincere milk of the word, if we're going to do that, We have to come in the context of personal holiness and you appreciate this is an admonition. He says, desire, you're supposed to work up this desire. How do you do that? It's a wonderful thing to be given the love for the truth, is it not? It's one of the marks of the unregenerate. One of the horrible things is one of the marks of the unregenerate and second Thessalonians that God has not given them a love for the truth. And if you have a love for the truth, that is the gift of God to you, that he went to you when you were indifferent to him and cold to him. And he gave you a love for his truth and stirred you to want his truth and to want him. That's a wonderful privilege. But how do you maintain a daily desire? How do you obey this commandment desire? He does. It's not a description, is it? He's not saying you're like a little baby and you know how little babies, they just are impatient to get milk. And you're like that. He's not he's not making that as a description. It's an admonition. He says you're supposed to be like the little baby who's always hungering and hungering and hungering for his mother's milk. Well, how in the world do you do that? Well, he doesn't give a complete answer to that question. But if you could think of this analogy that others have used, it's like Imagine a little baby who's sick and has all kinds of germs in his tummy. What happens? He gets milk. He has no desire for milk. He's not hungry because these germs are churning in his tummy. It's a flu virus. You give him milk, he'll vomit it up immediately. Those flu viruses and the bacteria and the rest, they indispose him to want milk. And I think Peter's point is like that, if we are going to the word of God and here we've got a belly full of sins and flu viruses in the soul, the word of God is not attractive to us. And if somehow the word of God is forced into us, we'll get rid of it. We'll vomit it out. We won't it won't have any good effect upon us. That's true in private devotions. If you have a rigorous schedule, which you keep no matter what, and you get up at six o'clock and you read your three chapters of the Bible every day. And if you do that one day and your spiritual gut is full of sin, you'll read the words and not profit from them. Your spiritual digestive tract will not accept it. If you come to the ministry of the word on the Lord's Day or the Lord's Day evening or some Bible class and you're, as it were, force fed the content of the Bible, you wouldn't have read it yourself, but you're here and you have to listen to it and it somehow gets to you. If your spiritual digestive system is full of sin, you won't digest that word and you're very likely just to vomit it up and get rid of it. Well, that's the point, if we're to come to God. In the meetings of the church and to preserve his presence and to sense his presence, we have to come in the context of personal holiness. Now, this is only in reference to the reception of the word. But surely the principle is true in reference to receiving anything from him. Will not enjoy praising God with songs if our spiritual digestive system is full of sins, will not enjoy engaging him in prayer. Will not will not enjoy the fellowship of the people of God, and this person is praising the Lord for what he did yesterday and this person. We won't enjoy that. We won't enjoy the presence of God and we'll lose the sense of his presence. If we don't come to him as individuals in the context of personal holiness, you remember Jesus statement in Matthew, chapter five, verses twenty three and twenty four, in reference to old covenant worship, he says, if you're to go there to the altar and you're about to offer your gift at the altar, old covenant worship. And he says, if there you remember that your brother has something against you, just lay the gift down. Don't proceed any further with the old covenant worship, just lay it down and go find the person that has has an offense with you and go straighten that out. What's Jesus saying? We're supposed to come to the worship of God in the context of individual purity, and if we know of some sin, if we know that somebody thinks we've sinned against them, we're supposed to take care of that. Now, there are many things in the Sermon on the Mount where I think Jesus speaks in a radical way for the sake of effect, like cutting off your right arm and plucking out your eyes. And I do not think that Jesus means you should just abstain from public acts of worship until you've got everything sorted out with every person you've ever offended in the world. But I think the principle is you better do what you can do as quickly as you can do it. To deal with sins in relational sense, because you're supposed to be clean when you come to the worship of God. Turn, please, to the passage that has been referred to twice now in First Corinthians, chapter three. It's not only that the individuals are required to maintain personal holiness. It is that the church is to main personal holiness. I've quoted this passage twice, but I want us to see it. I want. I want you to know that I didn't imagine this or misquoted, I want you to actually see it with your own eyes in the Bible. You've often heard. People lament the state of the church in Corinth. It's not my purpose to simply repeat all those discouraging facts about the church in Corinth, other than to say it was a very discouraging church, there were doctrinal Issues there, there are people who didn't believe in the resurrection. There were all kinds of personal sins in that church. There were there were sexual sins, relational sins of people being cruel and unkind to one another. You really get the picture that there were certain aspects about the church in Corinth who would make you want to look for another church, you want to move to Rome or someplace and find a different church. But it was nonetheless a real church with all of its faults, but it wasn't acting like it should. And in the context of these divisions, Paul puts his finger on what the problem was. And now I want you to look at it for yourself. And first Corinthians three. Verse 16, Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him for the temple of God is holy, which temple you are. Now, there were individuals in the Church of Corinth who were very simple. And you would think that if they had any sense of the reality of God, if they had any sense of apostolic authority, you would think that when this epistle was read in their hearing, that they would shudder. Because there were people in the church, the context here is about causing divisions. There were people that were causing divisions. They were speaking against the Apostle Paul. They were belittling his authority. They were belittling his person. They were belittling his message. They were exalting opponents to the Apostle Paul. And Paul says this, don't you understand this? Have you missed the most basic issue? Don't you understand this? The church is the temple of God. You Corinthian believers are the temple of God. God dwells with you. The temple of God is holy. Now, they obviously weren't holy. So what does he mean by that? There was so much unholiness in the Corinthian church, but Paul says to them, the temple of God is holy. The point is that the temple of God is to God. It's separated to God. The temple, the church, is not just an ordinary assembly of believers in God's eyes. In God's eyes, the church is sanctified. In God's eyes, the church is separated unto him. The church is not the Elks Club. The church is not the Boys Club. The church is not the Girl Scouts. The church is not any other wholesome or unwholesome group of individuals that you can think of. This is special. This group of people is set apart to God. It's holy. Don't you dare, he says, defile the church of God with division. Or God, he says, will destroy you. Well, it's a sobering thing. We do often act like it's our church, we do often act like we make the rules and we vote and we have meetings and we choose the officers and we do this and we do that, we don't like something, we talk about it, we. This is the Lord's church. And we must engage in conduct. We must govern ourselves and attitude and speech and whatever thing that we do, we must govern ourselves in a way that displays this, that we understand this, that we know this is not ours. We know that we are set apart to God. We know that the corporate body is holy and God is with us and God meets with us and we're going to act like we know that. It's quite likely that we take far too much for granted when we come to worship God. It's quite likely that we take far too much for granted when we come to a symbol. It's wonderful for us to be excited about seeing one another. It's wonderful. It pleases God. Christian fellowship is one of the means of grace that God has kindness is given to us. But I do fear that many are more excited about seeing their Christian friends. than they are about coming into the presence of the holy God. And I'm simply trying to say that when God describes the church as the temple. One of the central issues is it is to be holy. We as individuals are to come in the context of holiness and the church itself is to live in the context of holiness. The spirit is here. God who is holy has sent his holy spirit here. And we are to live in the light of that spirit. Therefore, Ephesians 430 says, do not grieve the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 430 is in the context of corporate sins. We're not supposed to sin in this way or that way against each other. We are supposed to act righteously in reference to each other and right in the midst of those corporate relational issues. Don't grieve the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of God is here. The Holy Spirit is here. And we must live in such a way that does honor to the holiness of the Holy Spirit who is with us. There are some dramatic illustrations in the Bible. Of churches that failed to live up to the holiness of God. of churches who failed to bring the kind of devotion and reverence that God requires in the assemblies. You know them well, most of you. The Ephesians church, Ephesian church, as addressed in Revelation chapter two, as you know, is that very Orthodox church. They were commended for their orthodoxy, but they had this fault. They had left their first love. The initial ardor of their first love had dissipated. And Jesus threatens them. He threatens them. He threatens them that if they don't shape up, if they don't repent and if they don't go back to their first works and if they don't restore themselves to their initial ardor, he says, I will take your candlestick away from you. And the context of that passage, the candlestick is what represents the essence of the church. Jesus is among the candlesticks. Jesus is among the churches. If the candlestick is taken, they're not a church anymore. They're just a group of people. The threat is that if you don't revive your original love, all disenchurch you, if we may coin a word. The Laodicean Church is the church that was accused of being lukewarm, Jesus ready to vomit them out of his mouth, and he pictures himself as being outside of the church there on the inside. He's on the outside. He's knocking, but he's on the outside, willing to come in if they'll open the door and and and invite him to come in. But he's already left that church. Because they were lukewarm. The point is that churches who will not live in the light of what the church is, they won't bring love, they won't bring holiness, they won't bring what the Lord requires. They're in jeopardy of being unchurched. They're in jeopardy of the Lord simply stepping out and leaving them to themselves. And what a horrible thing that would be for us. There's a sixth thing that we must have if we're to properly assemble before God. That is, we must come together with a vibrant hope in Christ. We must assemble with a vibrant hope in Christ. This also is stressed in these passages where God likens the church unto a temple, because our time is so far gone, I'm going to have to ask you to look at these passages on your own. First, Peter, two, five, Ephesians, two, eighteen, Hebrews, thirteen, fifteen. All these passages talk about how it is that we bring our sacrifices through Christ. What was preeminent in the Old Testament tabernacle and temple? An altar was preeminent. An altar was preeminent and all the accesses to God and those old covenant structures was in the context of the altar. Go to the tabernacle, you go through the altar, you go to the temple, you're confronted with an altar. Every access to God, every approach to God, every meeting with God was in the context of an altar. And in symbol, that was to always remind the people that their sins were so many. There's only one hope of them meeting with God in the temple, and that was that there was a symbolic sacrifice for their sins. When we assemble in the New Testament church, we have no altar, this is just a table. Somebody said it took them a long time to stop calling that table an altar. It's just a table. There's no altars in the churches of Christ. Why is that? Because Christ is here and our focus has to be upon the Lord himself. The altar is finished. The sacrifice is finished. We who come to God, we who are desirous to bring our affection and our devotion, we who are concerned to come with clean hands. How do we do that? We come in the context of confidence in Christ's sacrifice. This is one of the most refreshing Psalms to me. What is the Old Testament hope of being accepted by God in the face of their sins? Listen to Psalm 65, verse one. Praise is awaiting you, O God, in Zion. And to you, the vow shall be performed. Oh, you who hear prayer to you shall all flesh come. And then he says this iniquities prevail against me. And you immediately have a shift of feelings there. There's all this desire to praise. Iniquities prevail against me. As for our transgressions, you will provide atonement for them. What a statement. Iniquities prevail against me. As for those iniquities, as for those real transgressions, you will provide atonement for them. Well, that was a wonderful hope for him. He's looking to the future. Why does it for us? We're not looking for the Lord to provide atonement. The atonement has already been provided. The Lord has already laid himself out on the cross by the eternal spirit. He was strengthened and enabled to lay himself out on the cross. He took all of our sins upon himself and bore them up to the cross. And there on the cross, the wrath of God that our sins stimulated the wrath that our sins deserved was poured out upon him. And so when we come to worship. And our hands have been unclean and our thoughts have been unclean. And we know that God requires us to come in the context of holiness. What do we do? We bless God and we consciously come in Jesus name and we remind ourselves that all of our sins have been taken away by Christ and that all of God's anger has been taken away. And therefore, in Christ, we come forgiven. And we remember this, too. That all of Jesus obedience has been imputed to us by faith. And although our sins are so foul. They're forgiven. But we still have no standing with God except this. The obedience of Jesus has been given to us and God looks upon that obedience and his face smiles and it pleases him. And he says, you are accepted on the basis of Jesus obedience. So here we are. The church is the temple of God. God promises to meet here. He requires all these things of us, which every Christian wants to bring. And every Christian finds himself falling back in some kind of sin and some kind of fault. When we come to meet with God, perhaps more than any other time, we realize the dynamic of Romans chapter seven, when we would do good, evil is with us. How do we proceed? We proceed with this. We come in the name of Jesus Christ. In this temple, the altar is empty because the sacrifice has been given. And we bring our spiritual sacrifices and make them acceptable through Christ. We bring ourselves through Christ and thus there's hope, thus there's hope for us. And that should be at the center of all of our thinking when we assemble together. We're assembling in this New Testament temple. Without an altar, because the sacrifice has been slain once for all, never to be repeated. And there are now no more remains of sacrifice. If the church is the temple, God meets in a special way in the church, we must be concerned to preserve his presence and we must be concerned to sense his presence. If we lose his presence, or if we lose the sense of his presence, we've lost everything. It would be a wearisome, humdrum, unrewarding, unsatisfying experience to meet together for prayer, to meet together for study, to meet together for worship, if we lose the presence of God. There are all sorts of churches that have lost a sense of the presence of God. And they go to great lengths to manufacture something that will give them a sense of satisfaction. There are churches who say that they sense the presence of God in their music. How sad. Secular people sense the same things in their music. There are people that are turning to liturgies because they've lost the sense of the presence of God in the liturgies. They hope that they can bring some kind of dignity to bear that will give them a sense of satisfaction. There are efforts being made in various churches to change the form of communications because they want to make things more relevant. They want God's presence to be more obvious. So they do away with preachers and institute mime or dance or drama or some other means of communicating God's truth. All these efforts to stir up something that will be meaningful, to start something that will replace the absence of God's presence. We'll just close if we lose the presence of God. Will not insult God by those kinds of manipulations. We'll just close. But we should never close. Because God has promised to be with us and God has promised to give us his spirit. And if we'll be faithful to what he gives us, if we will draw near to him as he calls us to, he will draw near to us again and again and again and again. Some of you who are here this morning perhaps didn't expect this. Some of you perhaps are not Christians and you hope to hear something that will give you hope. You hope to hear something about the forgiveness of sins. You hope to hear something about how you could be reconciled to God. And I'm conscious that those things have not been addressed this morning. And I'm not going to give you an add on sermon at the end. But I say to you who are in that position quite sincerely, I say this to you, there are many people in this church that would delight to talk to you about those very subjects. I would delight to talk to you. The other two pastors of this church would delight to talk to you. We make ourselves available to you. If you're disappointed that you got the sermon about worship because you wanted to hear something for the salvation of your soul, please talk to us. We have a lot to say to you. Let us pray together. There is truly wonderful that you would love us. It is truly wonderful that you would actually. Meet with us and minister to us by the Holy Spirit. Many of us have known times where we assembled with your people in many degrees of discouragement, but we came hungering for you and you met with us. There are times when you have ministered to us in special ways and times you've ministered to us in ordinary ways. Father, we want to give you more honor. We want to bring more delight to you. We want that the church would be more of a beacon of your praise and of your glory. We want that it would be more obvious to ourselves and more obvious to anyone who would notice that you meet with us in this place. We pray that you would please grant more and larger displays of yourself by the Spirit. We do not want displays of men and women or displays of great personalities. We want the displays of yourself. We desire that there would be more displays of your truth, that we would understand the Bible better, that the preaching and teaching of this place would be more illustrative of the scriptures, that there would be more evidence of your spirit ministering to our spirits as we study the Bible, that you would help us in the context of our fellowship to really be a holy temple where we glorify you with our words. But in the prayer meetings that you would help us, that we would unite our hearts again and again with the multitude of voices praising and beseeching you in our prayers. Help us really to be, really to be the temple where you would dwell and where you would be glorified. We pray together in Christ's name. Amen.