2024-05-19- Sunday School- All Are Servants

The speaker starts by expressing gratitude and welcoming everyone to the house of the Lord. They mention that someone's father is present and that they have been praying for him. The speaker acknowledges that they are not Brother Michael and that he is a good teacher. They mention that they will not be following the lesson book closely and will be using various scriptures instead. The topic of the lesson is serving as a servant. The speaker poses the question of who is your master and refers to Bible verses about serving two masters. They discuss how in the days of slavery, a slave served only one master and emphasizes that serving two masters is not possible. The speaker then talks about the importance of serving Jesus Christ because everyone will face judgment and must be accountable for their actions. They mention that the pastor or preacher is not who they are serving, but Jesus alone. The speaker refers to the story of the children of Israel serving Baal and forsaking the Lord, wh Well, we certainly appreciate the Lord this morning, glad to see everybody in the house of the Lord, glad to see Lindsey's dad with us, been praying for him, so glad he could be with us today. And of course, I'm not Brother Michael, so I know that you miss him. He is a very, very good teacher. When I'm teaching the teen class back there, I do hear him sometimes, a lot of times. So we appreciate the Lord this morning. I don't know about your all's lesson books, I don't know how close they are to ours, but I'm not going to be in the lesson book a whole lot. I am using the topic, and I will be in it some, but I've got several scriptures and verses that I'll be going to, and bear with me because last Sunday, my reading glasses broke on me, and I've been so busy this week, I've not went and got another pair, so that's my own fault, but I think we'll be all right anyway. So I do appreciate the Lord this morning, and again, glad to see everybody out with us. Our lesson this morning, our topic, is dealing with servants. The title of our lesson is All Are Servants. I'm going to take this thing off. All Are Servants is our title. The heritage is dealing with three, basically, questions about servants, and the questions are why, how, and when. Why should I be a servant? How to be a servant? And when should I be a servant? Let me get my notes here, all unorganized. All right, so All Are Servants. I want to kind of go a little bit different direction with this this morning, and I want to ask this question because all are servants. We are all servants, no doubt, but I do want to ask this question along with the title, we all are servants, but who is your master? That's what I want to deal with this morning, basically more than anything, is who is your master? Start out with, in the book of Matthew, chapter number 6, and then in the book of Luke, chapter number 16, there's two verses, or there's one verse here, actually, and it's a statement that Jesus has made, but Matthew writes it, and Luke writes it, and there's only one word in that verse that is changed from what Matthew writes and what Luke writes. In verse 24, Matthew chapter 6, Matthew writes, No man can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and Mammon. Now Luke chapter 16 and verse number 13, Luke writes that same statement that Jesus made, but he makes one word change, and he says no servant can serve two masters, and the rest of it is the same, for either you will hate the one and love the other, or else you will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon. So Matthew says no man can serve, but Luke says that no servant can serve. That right there, when Luke says that no servant can serve any two masters, I mean, that covers every single person. I mean, Matthew covers all of it also. But the title this morning is, All Are Servants. We all are servants right here this morning. But my question to you is, who is your master? In the days of slavery, the slave was to serve one master. I kind of studied that out just a little bit and found out that when, and I know that's a topic that we don't talk about a lot nowadays. We do not do slavery in the day that we're living in. But in the day of slavery, a man would buy a slave, and that slave was loyal to that owner. That was his master, and he served that one master. He didn't serve anybody else. He served that one master. In the days of, one commentator writes that if you think you can successfully serve two masters, then you're deceiving yourself. It didn't work in the slavery days. It didn't work with Israel when they tried to serve God and tried to serve the world at the same time. It didn't work with Israel, and it's not going to work today. Jesus says you cannot serve two masters. You must serve one. You must love one and hate the other. Amen. They were reminded that they could not serve the Lord God in Baal, but they were reminded that they had to forsake the Lord God to serve Baal. So all are servants. That's what our heritage says. All are servants. Now, in the Scripture reading of our textbook, and I won't read all of it, but a few things I want to point out here this morning, is Paul writes here, he says, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. For the love of Christ constraineth us, because we thus judge, that if one die for all, they were all dead. Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things are passed away, and behold, all things are become new. Thus he said, therefore, we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. We are all servants. We are all serving a master today. Who is the master that you're serving? What is the master that you're serving? Why should we serve Jesus Christ? I believe Paul sums it up right there when he says, We are all going to the judgment seat. We're not going to escape judgment. The Bible tells us, the book of Hebrews, that at the point another man wants to die, and after this is the judgment. There's nobody here this morning, this is a small congregation, this is a small little crowd, but there's nobody here. There's nobody at another church. There's nobody in this world that's going to escape judgment. We are going to go before the judgment seat. We are going to go before Christ. He's going to open up the books. He's going to judge us by the books. Amen. We're either going to hear him say, Well done, enter in. Or we're going to hear him say, Depart from me, ye work of iniquity. Why should I serve Jesus Christ? Because I know one day after a while, he's going to judge me. I know he's going to open up the books. And I've got to line up to every single word. I've got to line up to his judgment. I understand, and the Heritage even brings this out, and I'm glad that they did. I understand that we look to the pastor as a spiritual leader, and I understand that the pastor is a spiritual leader. Amen. But the pastor is not who we're serving. Amen. The evangelist is not who we're serving. The preacher is not who we're serving today. Amen. We must be serving Jesus Christ in Jesus alone. God brings it out so plainly that the children of Israel could not serve him and Baal also. They had to serve one or the other. Now bear with me here. I've got several readings to do, a lot of reading, so please bear with me. But if you want to turn with me to the book of Judges in chapter number two, and we'll start reading at verse number six, just to try to kind of lay a foundation right here, because I'm going to get to the how here in just a little bit, and that's probably where I'll park for a while. So bear with me here. But I'm dealing with why right now, why we should serve the Lord. Judges chapter two and verse number six. The Bible said that when Joshua had let the people go, the children of Israel went every man into his inheritance to possess the land. The people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, and who had seen all the great works of the Lord that he did for Israel. And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died being 110 years old. And they buried him in the border of his inheritance, Timnathos, in the Mount of Ephraim on the north side of the hill Gash. And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers, and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the Lord, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Balaam. And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and vowed themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger. And they forsook the Lord, and served Baal and Ashtaroth. And the anger of the Lord, I want you to hear this, was hot against Israel. He delivered them into the hands of the spoilers, and spoiled them, and he sold them into the hands of their enemies round about, so that they could not any longer stand before their enemies. And whithersoever they went out, the hand of the Lord was against them for evil. And as the Lord had said, and as the Lord had sworn unto them, and they were greatly distressed. One thing that stands out to me here as I was reading this, yes, last night I was reading this here in Judges, that while Joshua was living, the children of Israel were serving the Lord. But the generation that followed, the Bible said, did evil in the sight of the Lord, and they served Baal. But as they were serving Baal, the Bible said that the Lord was hot, his anger was hot against Israel. I've been studying a little bit, and I don't want to get on a rabbit trail this morning. I want to try to stay on topic here. But I've been studying a little bit about the wrath of God. And the wrath of God is going to be eventually poured out upon, amen, a wicked generation, a wicked nation. I don't want to try to cross your doctrine or anything like that. I'll tell you, I plan on being out of here, okay, when the wrath of God comes, okay? We'll just leave it there. Amen. But the wrath of God is going to be poured out one day here after a while upon a wicked generation, upon a generation that's chose to serve mammon instead of God, upon a generation that's chose to go their own way and choose their own way rather than to choose to serve God. Why do I want to serve God this morning? Amen. Why should we be serving God? To escape a place called hell. That is the most and foremost, amen, the most reason of all is to escape a place called hell. Amen. To escape His wrath. Amen. To escape the damnation that's coming upon this world one day after a while. Amen. That's why, and it's very simple, that's why we must serve the Lord, to be servants and be servants of God. There is a statement made here in the Heritage, and I don't know if it's in yours or not. It may be in the, it's in ours, but I really like this and I highlighted it, and it says that we're living in a time when people want to know why. There was once a time when an anointed preacher, a teacher, stood before our congregation, expounded the Word of God, and the people would accept it as it was delivered without question. But today they want to know why. Why do I got to live that way? Why do I got to go that way? Now I understand this morning, listen to me, I've always, I've always said this even when I was pastoring at Seabreeze, amen, I don't have all the answers, and I'll make mistakes, I've made mistakes, and I will make mistakes, amen, but I understand if a preacher is preaching something that is so far out of the Bible, you need to question that. I understand that. But when he's in the Word of the Lord, when he's preaching the Word, and he's preaching the Bible, there was a time when the anointed preacher would preach God's Word, and there was no question to it, amen. If there was, I used to hear Sister Wanda say all the time, you all have heard her say the same words at Highway, when she would stand up and say, I'd put it on a shelf, amen, I'd put it up on a shelf. I may not have understood what the preacher said, amen, but I would just put it up on a shelf and pray about it, amen. But now we're living in a time where they're asking, why? Why do I got to live this way? Why do I got to do this? Why do I got to be a servant of the Lord? Why can't I do what I want to do? We are to be servants because, amen, that is what God expects of us. The Word, my words are running together, I'm sorry, the Word, servant and servants are in the Bible, and I did not know this, I found this out studying it, for a combined total of 971 times. Surely there is a measure of importance here that we must consider. Why should I be a servant of the Lord? Because it is expected of me by Him. Revert back to Matthew, in the book of Luke and Matthew, no man can serve two masters. No servant can serve two masters. We are to be servants to God so that we can show others how to be saved. I read that and I begin to think, and I don't want to, like I said, get on another rabbit trail here, and I'll be careful this morning and what I do say. But that spoke volume to me when I said that. We are to be servants, when I read this here, so that we may show others the way to be saved. And I begin to think about Gospel Light Holiness Church. This is my church. This is where I attend faithfully and gladly to attend here. But if somebody comes in off the street, never walked in this door before, didn't know who we were, had no idea who we were, what would they see when they walked in? Would they see us serving the Lord? Or would they see us being grudgingly here, wanting to be somewhere else? Years ago, and I say several years ago, there was a statement that was made. And I'll tell you, it broke my heart when I heard this statement. I'll be just brief here. I don't like social media, if you have it, that's you. I don't like it. But when I was pastoring, there was a statement that was made on social media that got back to me. And this person made a statement referring to another Christian, Brother Ronnie. And this person that made this statement was a backslider. They had known the way. They were out of the church. They were out living in the world. They made a statement about another Christian, and this is what they said. They said, if that's what a Christian is, then I'm better off the way that I am. It broke my heart when I heard that. That bothered me. And I thought to myself, I don't want nobody to ever make a statement, if they look at me and say, if that's what a Christian is, then I'll just go on living the way that I'm living because I'm better off than they are. Oh, I'm telling you, amen, we're going to be judged one day. We're going to stand before Christ one day, amen, and He's going to open up them books and He's going to judge us, amen. And we've said it so many times, Brother Ronnie, when you go into the jails, you go into the nursing homes. I've been praying for your ministry, amen. You may be the only one that they ever see. You may be the only Bible they ever hear, the only testimony, amen. I want to know this world, amen, or at least let this world know, amen, that I'm a servant of Jesus Christ, amen. I'm doing my very best to serve Him and not this world. Why? Because I'm going to be judged one day. I'm going to stand before a judgment bar, but not only that, because that sinner may look at me, amen, and when they look at me, I want them not to see Anthony, but I want them to see a product of Jesus Christ, a product that's been on the potter's wheel, a product, a vessel that could be used of the Lord, amen. We are to be servants so that we may show others how to get saved. When the time of trials and great stress come our way, we'll be better able to cope if we're dedicated, if we are dedicated servants of God. We are to be true servants of God to avoid being a hypocrite. I'm telling you, when I was reading this, it just jumped out and slapped me on the face. I don't want to be that. I do not want to be that. I don't want to be somebody, amen, that comes to a house of God and lives one way in the house of the Lord and then goes out in this world and lives another way. I want to be the same wherever I go, amen. I want to be true. I want to be a servant to the Lord. We are to be servants so that we can discern the truths from God's final words to us of what will take place in the last days. I do believe we are living in the last days. I absolutely do believe that. Paul said that in the last days, the last time and the last days that perilous times will come. I believe we're there. I'm not going to get on it. That's a totally different subject. But I believe we are there. I believe we're living in the last days and we need to be serving God more now than we ever have. Amen. All right, I'm going to try to move on here because it looks like it's about 1025 back there. So why should I be a servant of God? I think it's pretty simple. It's pretty plain that why I should be a servant of God is because I'm going to stand before Him. He's going to judge me. Others are watching me. Others are looking at me. Children are watching me. If you think they're not watching, you're wrong. They're watching. I promise you. They are watching us. But that's why I should be a servant of God. But then the question is, how must I be a servant to the Lord? And that, I think, may be a little bit more complex than it shouldn't be. But it goes a little bit deeper, I think. How can I be a servant of God? How can I just serve Him alone when I've got so many other things? We're living in probably one of the busiest times we've ever lived in. Since I've stepped out and started working for myself, I'm more busy now than I've ever been. And I thank God for that. That's a good thing. It just seems like the phone is constantly ringing. I've got customers calling. That's good. I'm thankful for that. Amen. But it's busy. It's go, go, go, busy, busy. And so how can I be a servant of God? Paul writes here in our blessing text, in 2 Corinthians 6, verse number 4, he said, But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God in much patience and afflictions and necessities and distress, by pureness, by knowledge, by long-suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned. In chapter 7, verse 1, it says, And having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. The ministers of God are the children of God who are willing to serve God and do His will. But I want to encourage you this morning on how to be a servant of God. I read to you there in our scripture reading, but I want to go on a little further down. And if you want to read along, we're in 2 Corinthians chapter number 6. But I want to read to you what Paul says here in verse number 14 on to the end of the chapter there. Paul says, Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. What fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? What communion hath light with darkness? What concord hath Christ with Bilal? What part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are of the temple of the living God. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God and they shall be my people. Therefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you and will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." Paul here, he's given a description, I believe, of how we can be servants of God, true servants of the Lord. First and foremost, you've got to get connected with God. Our pastor spent two or three Sundays preaching and did a wonderful series, I'm going to call it a series if that's okay, on drawing nigh to God. We've got to draw nigh to the Lord. If we're going to be His servant, we've got to get connected with Him. We've got to lay aside our weights. We've got to lay aside our desires, our wants, put all that aside, and we've got to make time for the Lord. How am I going to be a servant to God? I've got to get connected with Him. We're living in a time when connectedness is the rule of the day. There's a strong push in the world today to bring everyone together under the same umbrella, one world, one society, one church. This is the heartbeat of the world, and sadly, it is becoming the heartbeat of the church. Sadly, the things that have been pushed out there is creeping into the church houses today. Now, I'm not saying necessarily it's crept into gospel-like holiness church, amen, but oh my, yes, we've got to be careful. How can I be a servant to the Lord? I've got to get connected to Him and get disconnected from the world. Just to remind you that this morning that God did not call His people to be inclusive, but exclusive. Paul said there, let me read to you again what he said. He said, Wherefore, come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord. And touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you. Now the question bears, how can I come out from among this wicked generation when I go to a public job? And how can I come out from among this wicked generation when I've got to go to town daily? And I've got to go out. I can't just stay in these four walls of my home. I can't stay inside all day long and never go outside. Amen. It's called getting connected with the Lord. It's called getting alone with God, spending time in your prayer closet. There's been a lot of preaching here lately about prayer, about spending time with God. And I'm telling you, it's done wonders for me. Amen. And there's been a couple of days that I've been so busy, amen, that I just did not have the... I did have the time, but I didn't make the time. All right? Amen. I would go into the prayer closet, amen, and not as long as I should have been. Amen. I remember the other day, or the other night, when our pastor made that statement. I don't remember who it was. He was quoting there. Amen. But they said there, if I don't make time for God, then I don't have time for nothing else. Amen. God should be number one, always. He's got to be number one in our life. We cannot put Him on the back burner. We can't put Him aside. He can't be second. He's got to be number one. Amen. Why must I be a servant of Him? He's going to judge me one day. How can I be a servant of God? Amen. It is when I get connected to Him and get disconnected from this world. Amen. Sadly, the evil of that society has penetrated the church, and things has gotten pretty bad. They got bad in Corinth, and this is why Paul was writing this letter to them. There was a little distinction between them and the world around them. But Paul in this passage was letting them know that things don't have to be that way. There can be a difference, and there should be a difference. I've heard it said before. I've even preached it myself. If I'm living for the Lord the way that I'm supposed to live for God according to His Word, I don't have to go out here in this world and just proclaim it as loud as I can and tell everybody, Hey, I'm a servant of the Lord. They're going to see it. They're going to know, Brother Ronnie, if I'm a servant of God or not. They're going to know the way that I conduct myself, the way that I present myself. They're going to know whether or not, Brother Ronnie, so many times I've heard him say it and commend him for it as well. He'll be out in a store somewhere and walk up to a complete stranger. Hey, man, Brother Ronnie, I'm telling you, I respect you for that, and I want to get to that place. That's a downfall of mine. I have a hard time with that. Just walking up to somebody and opening a conversation and just talking to them one-on-one. I'm so much more comfortable like this right here. That one-on-one, I heard him say the other night, you like the one-on-ones. That is the hardest thing for me. I struggle with that. And I'd love to be able to be better at it. But I don't have to go out into this world and holler to the top of my lungs, I'm a servant of the Lord. If I spend time in my prayer closet, and if I decrease the way John said that I must decrease and he must increase, then I'm a servant of the Lord, and it's going to be known by this world. There are things that we need to get connected to. It's prayer. We need to be connected to prayer. That's the first and foremost. That is the number one thing is prayer. Get along and pray. We've got to get connected with His Word. We must be fed daily by His Word. I was thinking about that there. I like to eat. Most of us do. But we've been trying to save money also, and trying to get on a little budget. So my wife, she makes my lunch for me. And I've been eating a lot of bologna sandwiches, a lot of ham sandwiches, and that's okay. That's fine. But there are times that I'll be out working, and I'll be in an area, and I know there's a Chinese restaurant down the road, and I love Chinese, and I want to go there. But I'll refrain myself most of the time. I'll say, no, I'm going to try to save money, and I'll eat that bologna sandwich. But I'm going to tell you, church, we've got God's Word right here. We've got it right before us. We have all the food that it takes for us to be a servant of the Lord. And it don't cost us a dime to eat this Word. It costs us our time. We've got to sacrifice our time, lay it aside, and say, I'm getting connected to God's Word. I'm getting connected in a prayer life. I'm getting connected to Him. And I'm going to disconnect these things that is keeping me from serving Him. I'm going to disconnect whatever it is that is hindering me from serving God, because I must serve Him. There should be a time of prayer, a time of devotion. There should be faithful servants to the house of God. How can I be a servant to the Lord, being faithful to His house? Faithfulness seems like, and I know this is a touchy subject, but it seems like faithful to the house of God is nothing anymore. I remember there was a time growing up, and I didn't grow up, per se, in a holiness home. I grew up in a Christian home. But I will say this for my mom and dad, my dad especially. When the doors of the church was open, he was there. He taught me to be faithful to the house of God. You want to be a servant to the Lord, you be faithful to the house of the Lord. You be faithful to God and God alone. You be faithful when we're having church meetings especially, but also being faithful when it's just a work day. And I understand people have got things to do. I know that. I understand that. I'm not trying to overstep my boundaries this morning, but I'm just trying to encourage you why you need to be a servant of the Lord, how to be a servant to God. We've got to be faithful. We've got to be genuine for the love of God. We can't just be half-hearted. We've got to be genuine. We've got to fully commit ourselves to God. There has to be a complete commitment, complete dedication. We've got to get connected to Him and get disconnected from this world. God still expects His people to be different. He expects us to stand apart from the world around us. These verses tell us here in 2 Corinthians how to accomplish that. These verses not only tell us how to be different, but they show us why we should remain different as well. While all the church world around us is changing to accommodate the world, we have some very good reasons for staying in the old paths of righteousness and worship. Paul understood the importance of fellowship, but he also understood that we must be careful not to let down our guard. The word righteousness has the idea of a purity of life or that which is pleasing to God. The idea here is that God's children are to be different from this world in the way they conduct their lives. We're not to put on the world, but we are to put Jesus on in front of the world. I was teaching last Sunday, I think it was, or I believe it was last Sunday, it could have been Sunday before last, and I made a statement to my class that I don't want to be a fake. I don't want to be just a put on, but I want to be real. We've got to be real, church. We have a generation out here, and I'm getting out of my notes completely right here, but we've got a generation outside these four walls that is dying and going to hell. They're looking for answers. They're looking for help, and when they come to Gospel Light Holiness Church, I want them to find help. I want them to find what they need when they come here, and it's going to take us being a real servant of God. It's going to take us decreasing ourselves and letting God increase in our lives. I've got to move on here, I'm running out of time. We've got to be a compassionate and caring love for people. I was reminded that Jesus there, one day He looked upon a crowd. The Bible said He looked upon them with compassion. He looked upon them with compassion, and I thought about that, that when I look at this world out here, I'm seeing a harvest, but how am I looking at that harvest? I want to look at it the way Jesus looked at it, and how can I do that? I think about myself, Brother Ronnie. I think about myself today. I'm not, don't claim to be, I'm not much of a teacher. I try. Not much of a preacher also. I try, but 22 years ago, I was dying, lost, and on my way to hell. But Jesus looked at me, and He changed my life at an old-fashioned altar. And I wasn't fit for nothing. Brother Austin, I was bound for hell, and hell is what I deserved. But God brought me out of a horrible pit, out of a mirey clay. He set my foot on a solid rock foundation. He had compassion on me. How can I be a servant of the Lord? I got to have compassion. I got to have love for them. Jesus loved the sinner. He didn't love the sin. He loves the sinner, though. We don't got to love their ways, and we don't got to entertain their ways. Paul said, come out from among them and be separate. We don't got to engage in their ways, but I don't want to shun them. I told this to my class, and I've told it to the church, that when Daniel came here that Sunday morning, just what little time he'd come in, that Monday morning when he saw me at work, he said, I appreciate your church. He said, I was welcomed there. That meant a lot to me. That meant a lot to me, to know that we shook his hand. We reached out to him, told him, come back. He didn't look like us. He wasn't like us. He's not like us, but I don't want to shun him. I want to be a servant of Jesus Christ. I want to love them and tell them, this is where you can find help. Number seven, we are to serve Him in praise. Servants of God need not to wait for church, but we serve Him where we are, no matter what we're doing. That's been preached about here as well, serving Him at home, serving Him wherever you're at. On the job, in the car, being a servant to the Lord. The whole point here is that God's people are to be different from the world around them because they possess a new nature. Talking about where Paul said, if you're in Christ, you're a new creature. Old things are passed away. We're new, a new creature. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new. So why must I be a servant of the Lord? He's going to judge me. I may be the only testimony or the only Bible that someone reads. I've got to lead somebody to Christ. How can I be a servant of the Lord? I've got to get connected to Him. I've got to get disconnected from the things of this world. And then the final question was, when do I become a servant of the Lord? The time to begin serving or to be a servant is when you get saved. Paul told the Ephesians that the status of the servitude was a gift and it was given that when they first became acquainted with grace, that he became a servant. That's when you become a servant of the Lord, is when you give your life to Him. You turn everything over to Him and He saves you and He brings you into the family of God. He didn't have to. He could have turned you away. He could have turned me away and should have turned me away. But thank God He didn't. Paul said there in Ephesians 3 and 7, he said, Whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God, given unto me by the effectual working of His power. When we accept the calling of God, we then must accept the status of a servant. We are saved by grace, but we are holiness by choice. When one chooses to live a life of holiness, it is also the time to accept the status of a servant. When we serve the Lord Jesus Christ, we must do it every day, daily. It's what Jesus told us to do. He said, Deny yourself daily. Take up the cross and follow Me. It's everyday life. It's everyday that I've got to go to my prayer closet and say, Lord, purify me. Lord, sanctify me. Brother Camden preached so well the other night. Sanctify your stuff. Go into that prayer closet, Lord, sanctify me. Purify me. Purge me, Lord. Search me, Lord. If there's anything that's wicked in me, show it to me. You know, I looked at that verse and I thought about that. You may have mentioned a little bit about this. I don't know if you did or not, but that verse I quoted the other night with David. He said to search me and try me. Know my thoughts. And I began to think about that, and I didn't really bring it out when I was talking about it, but I thought about that. We look at ourselves, but we can only look so far. When I look at myself in a mirror and I see things, or I know I shouldn't have done that, I shouldn't have looked that way, I shouldn't have really done that, but then we get to a place, Brother Ronnie, where we can only look so far. Then that's when we've got to turn and say, God, I've looked as far as I can look. Now will you go further and look into the depths of my heart and let me know if there's anything in there that's not pleasing to you. Let me know if there's anything in there that's not serving you right the way it needs to serve you. Am I not praising you the way I need to praise you? Am I not worshiping you the times as I need to worship you? Am I not being faithful like I need to be faithful? You know, there's times that we ourselves, we love to be, I can't think of the word I'm trying to say here, but not self-righteous, that ain't the word I want to use, but anyway, we love to lift ourselves up or maybe say, well, I'm trying to do the best I can and I'm okay and this and that, amen, but oh, I don't want to do just the best that I can. But I want to hear my Lord say, I'm satisfied, I'm pleased with what you're doing, I'm pleased with your life. I don't want to get to a stopping point, don't get me wrong, amen, we're forever more learning, amen, we're forever more being sanctified until the day of redemption. We've got to continue following, we've got to continue serving Him, amen, go back to Matthew when he said you cannot serve two masters, amen, I've got to serve the Lord daily. I've got to lift Him up daily. Why? Amen, because I am His child and He is my Father. He saved me. He brought me out of the life of sin. How can I be a servant to the Lord? I must get disconnected from the things of the world and get connected to Him through His Word, through a prayer life. When do I get connected to the Lord? It is when I lay down my life and I surrender all of it to Him and say, You are my one and only true God. I cannot serve Him, amen, I cannot serve the material things. I know we've got to have money to live, I know we've got to work, amen, I understand all of that, but it must all come second to the Lord. We must put Him first, seek Him first, the kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto us, amen. I'm hurrying here to closing. The Bible is divided into chapters, but we must not let that detract from Paul's line of thinking. He did not divide chapter 6 from chapter 7, amen, He simply, in my own word, merged them. In other words, let me say it like this, if I can say it. I understand there is different, how do you say that word, I know it's on the tip of my tongue. I'll say that, well, anyway, there's different timelines in the Bible, thank you, dispensations, thank you. There are different dispensations in the Bible, I understand that. There are things that's from Genesis to Revelation, but the Bible is one book, amen, it is God's Word from Genesis to Revelations, amen, so it all stands for itself. It does not contradict itself. There's nothing in the Bible that's going to contradict. You may read something over here in the old and you go to the new, amen, it's going to all come together. So Paul, when he divided these, he did not divide them, but he just merged them together, if you will. It is a result of the work of the Bible translators and scholars. This is not to say that divisions are wrong, in fact, they are a great help to us in this age. Paul was saying now that you have the knowledge of how to be a servant by adhering to all that he had said, he said now that you have read his appeal to be sanctified, this is the time to become a servant. They go on to say, they said, let us today pray and seek to have a servant's heart. Let us first serve God and then serve our fellow man. Paul gave added emphasis to all the points in chapter six by telling us to cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit. The flesh part of us is what we do. In other words, our conduct. The spirit part of us is our character. In other words, what we are inside. It is up to each individual to decide to turn from the fleshly dictates and serve God. There is no applied force that makes us be a holiness Christian, it is voluntary. To be a voluntary servant of God is depicted in the Old Testament by a slave, a bond servant loving his master so much that he volunteered to serve him as long as one of them was alive. And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children, I will not go out free. They would give indication of this act of devotion by putting their ear to the door post and having the master pushing all through the earlobe. Exodus 21 and 6 says that, then his master shall bring him unto the judges, and he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post, and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him forever. They close with this, they said, today we don't mark ourselves by punching a hole through our earlobes, but however a holiness Christian will be visible in our society today. We must be careful to only let our credentials show while in the spirit of humility. In conclusion of this lesson, it says to emphasize your class that we are to note that we are not to be lofty and high-minded. We are not to display to our friends, neighbors, and associates an attitude of I'm holier than thou. We are not allowed to show a hurtful pride. We are to occupy a position that is lower than others, for we are to serve them. The servants of God are to dictate, not rule over others with loudness of voice or intimidation of speech. A servant of God is humble, compassionate, and thoughtful of others first. God bless you.