Matthew chapter sixteen, verse thirteen. When Jesus came into the coast of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of Man am? And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist, some Eli, Others Jeremiah, so one of the prophets. He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father, which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, that thou art Peter, And upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I read this for that last expression. Upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Now look at the seventeenth and eighteenth chapters of Luke for a little bit. Luke chapter sixteen and verse twenty-six. Luke seventeen twenty-six. And as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of Man. Now, I recognize that the term Son of Man is often applied to that particular phase of the Lord's return, which we call the Revelation at the close of the Great Tribulation. But because merely a matter of time and what is true at one point of time is very likely to be true at another point of time, I'm ignoring that for the moment. so shall it be in the days of the Son of Man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise also, as it was in the days of Lot, they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built it. But the same day that What went out of Sodom? It rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed. The next chapter, chapter eighteen, verses six, seven, and eight. And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge said. And shall not God avenge his own elect, which cried day and night unto him, though he bear along with them, I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? And I have read two statements that seem to be contradictory. The gates of hell shall not prevail against the church. When the Son of Man cometh, will he find faith on the earth? Of course this is only a seeming contradiction. There are no contradictions in the Bible. The gates of hell will never prevail against the church. The Lord is going to see his own safely home. but conditions are going to get increasingly bad on this earth, right up to the return of the Lord. I believe that every dispensation in the history of this world has ended in darkness, and I believe that the Church Age is no exception to this rule. And I want to talk to you a little bit, my part of this conference, about ourselves. Our brother, Mr. Gunn, has been giving us some lovely ministry about Christ. This is the positive side, but it takes positive and negatives to give a current flow. If you want any electricity in this, I want you to get tuned in and take in some of the negative side of it as well as some of the positive side of it. It's wonderful to get a sight of Christ and who He is, but it's just as necessary for us to get a sight of ourselves and where we are. It's much more pleasant to look at here. I would love to give you something along the same lines. I've been glad that the Lord had said, preach on the first chapter of Ephesians for the whole week. That just was a suit of Nephi. I don't make any apology at all for any telegrams that I deliver. I've never yet heard of a messenger boy who was supposed to censure his telegrams. His job is to deliver. I believe the Lord has given me this message to deliver, and so I'm going to try to do it, by His grace. If the hat fits, put it on, pull it down over your ears, because it's part of God's Word, and we need it all. The gates of hell will never prevail against Christ's church. But the individuals who compose that church, unless we keep close to himself, will be mighty worthless to him in these closing days of this dispensation. Now I said I believe that each dispensation has ended in failure. It doesn't matter too much the way you divide up the dispensations, whether you follow the Schofield division or whether you follow AE Booth or the simplified version or whether you make up one of your own. After all, dispensations can be divided in a number of different ways. There are subdivisions that would permit, I think, of... subdividing a dispensation into a number of sub-dispensations. We're not going to quarrel about that at all. The truth of the matter is that God has dealt with people in different ways, in different ages, and every single one of these has proven the hopeless worthlessness of human beings. I don't think I've ever preached on the total depravity of man, but what I've gotten there a little reaction to it, and usually from professing Christians. No, I think I could leave the word professing out. Christians. Christians do not like the doctrine of total depravity. Theoretically, we say we believe that we are no good. But don't you say it? A young man was preaching with an older man one time, and he got up and preached on humility, and he kept saying, well, why should I think a great deal of myself? After all, I'm nothing. He said this several times. So after the meeting was over, he said to the old man, how did I do tonight? He said, about like I expected you to do, you're nothing. And the young man was terribly offended. see was just mouthing these things, just saying these things from the lips out. It's awfully easy for us to say, oh, we're no good, but just like somebody else said. I'd like to get to the point during this conference where it won't even hurt me too badly if you say it. I'd like for you to get to that place where it won't hurt you too badly to hear me say it. It isn't going to harm us. It's going to be good for us. to learn what our problems are. Now you know, you go to a doctor for a diagnosis. I broke down in health a few years ago and my wife took me to mails. And what those fellows did to me was a caution. First thing they did is to take all my clothes away and give me a nightgown that didn't fit me. And then they ran me through one cold room after another and left me sitting there and then did me an injustice of just calling me by a number. I lost my identity completely. I was just another misshapen man and an unfitting night guy. And then they got to do with it. I paid those fellows good money to insult me by telling me they're all what they found wrong. Why? Why? Because I thought it was a I think the same thing is true spiritually. I think you do, too, though you may find it a little painful in the process. As the dentist says, this will hurt a little bit. I hope it will hurt a lot. I think we need to be hurt, brothers and sisters. I think we are soft. I think that we have gotten indifferent and careless, especially in this country. Many of God's dear children are are in jail in other lands. Many of them are suffering actual physical hardships as well as the fight that's on. And we're soft here in America. We need to be stirred up. I want you to look at Second Thessalonians, the second chapter, for a statement about something which I believe has already arrived Second Thessalonians, the second chapter. Paul had written to the Thessalonians by the Spirit of God to tell them a great deal about the coming of the Lord, but there was misunderstanding, misapprehension, and this second epistle was written chiefly to correct some of these misunderstandings. They thought that the day of the Lord was already present. That's what the revised version says in verse two of the second chapter. We'll read from verse one, second Thessalonians two one. Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our gathering together unto him that you be not soon shaken in mind or be troubled, neither by spirit nor by word. nor by letter as from us. Somebody evidently had written a letter and signed his name to it, and that the day of the Lord is already present. Somebody said, the great tribulation is already started. That's why we're having all this persecution. The Lord's forgotten about his people and left us here. Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first. Now this word falling away, or phrase falling away, is the translation of a word which is brought over whole, complete into the English apostasy. The apostasy. I believe the apostasy has come. I'll give you my reason. Be free to disagree if you like. But I believe that the apostasy has arrived. That therefore we have nothing more to look for, to wait for. The Lord Jesus might come at any moment and take His people home. I do not believe that the Church will go through the tribulation or any part of the tribulation. I believe the Lord is going to take us home, and I don't see any reason why he can't come tonight. What is the apostasy? Turn back to the twenty-second chapter of Joshua. This is just a little word study. Joshua chapter twenty-two. As you know, there was an old translation made of the Old Testament. Because there were very few Jews who understood Hebrew, a translation of the Old Testament was made into Greek, which known as the Septuagint version. I'm not a Greek scholar, but I can read English fairly well, and scholars have told us that the word apostasy, the Greek word for apostasy, is the word that is used In Joshua twenty-two and twenty-two, and here translated rebellion. The Lord God of gods, the Lord God of gods, he knows, and Israel, he shall know, if it be in apostasy. Translated here in our English version, rebellion. What is apostasy? Apostasy is more than a falling away, it's a turning away. It's a refusal of the Word of God. It's a deliberate turning away from what God has to say. Is it here? I wouldn't have believed in my lifetime conditions would have reached the point where professing Christians deny the Word of God as it is denied today. I wouldn't have believed in these few short years that men, even in fundamental circles, would dare to raise the questions that they're raising today. In the state of Colorado, what has been a very fundamental group is now in the midst of thrills of division. Undoubtedly, we'll split wide open because the faction controlling the seminary at least is accused of turning away from the Word of God. You don't think it can happen here. It can happen anyway. I'm not going to go into that phase of it, but I have some very strong convictions about whether we're drifting to doctrinally, as well as in other ways. I just want to point out that apostasy is rebellion. We have the same phrase in verse twenty-three that we have built us an order to turn from following the Lord. And again in verse twenty-nine, God forbid that we should rebel against the Lord. The apostasy then is turning against the Lord. Now three times in the New Testament we are warned of what will happen in the last days of this age. In First Timothy, he warns us about the latter times. In Second Timothy, he warns us about the last days. But in First John chapter two, he warns us about the last hour, the revised verse and thing. Take those three together. Latter times, the last days. the last hour. What's going to happen to the church in the last day? I recognize that signs were given for Israel, but if the Lord didn't want me to look at him, he wouldn't have left them out where I could see them, because he knows my curiosity, and I'm looking at them, though I'm not looking for them. I see nothing wrong with that thought. I'm looking at the signs about us today. I'm looking at the signs in Israel. I'm thrilled to see what's happened in Israel in the last few years. I'm looking at the signs in the nations about us. Why shouldn't I look at them? They're there. And I'm looking mostly at the signs in the church. What will things be like in the church in the closing days of this dispensation? I'll turn to the second, third chapters of the book of the Revelation, and let's see a little bit about this. Now I recognize that there is danger in over-emphasizing the prophetic view of the seven letters to these seven churches. I mean by that, you can... be so taken up with the prophetic view that you fail to recognize that there were seven actual churches in the first century to whom these letters were written. You can be so taken up with the dispensational view, with the prophetic view, that you forget that it's quite possible to have a local company of believers like any of these seven. I believe that some of God's people are like Smyrna today, suffering. I believe that some of God's people are like satire, lauded over by a little pope or a woman, Jezebel. I think that there are companies of God's people, a great many of them, that are like Ephesus, full of orthodox And I believe that there are many, many companies, and I think I have been in some of them, that are like Laodicea. Let's read the first and the last ones and see the gap between these. Ephesians, I mean, the letter to the Ephesians, chapter two of Revelation in verse one. Under the angel of the church of Ephesus, write these things said he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand. These were told were the messengers of these seven churches, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks. I want you to notice that there were seven candlesticks. These are literally lampstands. It's not a seven-branch candlestick. Seven-branch is running out of one pedestal. No, no. Every assembly is autonomous. There is no such thing in Scripture as an association of assemblies. There's no such thing as national headquarters. There's no such thing as one assembly controlling sub-assemblies, branch assemblies. Not at all. Each assembly is autonomous. Each assembly is completely dependent upon the head of the church. These are seven lampstands. But I call your attention to the fact that there are seven, not six, land or sea, bad as it was, was considered a lampstand. And the Lord was walking in the midst of these seven golden lampstands. I know thy works, and thy labor, and thy patience. and thou thou canst not bear them which are evil, and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles and they are not, and hast found them liars, and hast borne, and hast patience, for my name's sake hath labored and hath not tainted. Sounds pretty good. Perfectly odd about. I think you'd look this and send me over and say, that fits me. That's pretty good. Nevertheless, nevertheless, I have somewhat against thee. Somewhat is in italics. My friend Bill Somerville, Lawrence, Kansas, said if you want some word to put in there, use the old English word much-wise, instead of somewhat. Somewhat sounds like some little thing. There's nothing little about this. I've got a great deal against you. I've got this against you, because thou hast left thy first love. Now this is the first of priority, literally best, not first chronologically necessarily, but first in priority. Your first love, your best love, the Lord Jesus Christ. Who else could it be? It isn't the church, it isn't the local assembly, it isn't some truth, it's Himself. Think of it, they had actually... left him in the very first century. Oh, he still says, the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And these twenty centuries have seen the church survive in spite of the fact that in the very first century they left their first love. I'm ashamed to tell you how many times I've left my first love. I trusted the Lord Jesus as my Savior in nineteen hundred and eleven. I don't think very many months have gone by with what I forgot about him. I don't think very many years have gone by with what at some time during that year I've forgotten about him. I'm not proud of my record. When I think how much he loved me, when I think how kind he's into me, when I think how much it cost him to save me, I'm ashamed of how little return there is in my heart. I say that to you sincerely. We're just like Ephesus. We've left our first love. This is the thing that's wrong with the church. On the way here, Brother Bag and I were discussing some of these things together, and I said, Ken, what do you believe is the message for this day? What do you believe is the need for the professing church for our day? And he thought a little while about it, and he said, John, I think there's hardly an area where we haven't departed from the Lord. He said, I don't believe there is any line of ministry in the Word of God that we don't need. But he said, if there's any particular emphasis, we'd have to say we need our hearts to return to Christ. I'll read the last one with me. Well, I didn't finish this, but that's all right. You read it when you have time. Look at the last one now. Verse fourteen of the third chapter. And under the angel of the church, of the lay of the sins, write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. I know thy works, but thou art neither cold nor hot. I would thou work cold or hot. So then, because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mind. That's a strong word. That's the word for vomit. You make me sick. We sang tonight, speak thou in tenderest tones, Lord. It's all right. That's what you need. That's what you get. But that isn't always what we need. I don't think for a minute that we are on your right to expect the Lord always to speak in tenderest tones. Is that the way he spoke to us now? Well, you say you talk to the unsaved. Well, what about Peter? He said to Peter, get me behind me, Satan. Thou save us not the things that be of God. Our time is when faithful are the wounds of a friend, but you and I can't take it. We don't like it. I visited the place a while back. I had been there before, and I had given some ministry of searching quality. I hope I'm not a scold. What I'm saying, I tell you, Brother and Sister, it's a two-edged sword. It cuts me just as much as it cuts you. And I don't think I had scolded the people, but anyway, when I came back, the brother got up to pray before I spoke, and he told the Lord, he knew I was listening, the rascal. He told the Lord that he was sad that I was here and that he hoped that I would give them something kind and gentle and that they'd comfort them all and make them, send them home feeling good. You ought to know better than say that, Brother. I did not give that kind of ministry because the Lord had not given you that message to give that night. And I do not think that that assembly needed to have some nice things that would send them home real comfortable. They had a man baking bread there that left the meeting. After the meeting was over, it went over to the counted barn, and won ten or eight dollars in the crack game after the meeting was over. He was baking bread with the Christians. You think that kind of a man needs to be spoken to in tender tones? He needs to be shook up. I'm glad to tell you. that I had a personal talk with that fellow, and he did get shaken up, and the Lord brought him back to himself. No brother and sister. The word to Laodicea is, You make me sick to my stomach. The Lord Jesus said this, and He said it because He loved them. My proof for that? Verse nineteen, as many as I love, I review. They tell me many years ago that Old Donald Ross, one of the pioneers in this country, wrote that he was away up in the North Country. He wrote him home and said, I want to go down to the Orillia Conference, and I hope somebody thrashes me within the needs of my life. See, he wanted rebuke if that's what he needed. There's one who shall break this and say, there's something wrong with a horse that doesn't like a curry comb. The old-timers will appreciate that, even if the young fellow is going to know what a curry comb is. There's something wrong with a horse that's hide when he doesn't like a curry comb. There's something wrong with a Christian when we don't want to be straightened out in the Lord's presence. Why shouldn't we want to if we're hurting the Lord Jesus like this? If we're making him feel like this, Why shouldn't we want it straightened out? Now why did he feel like this about them? Why did he say, I'll skew the out of my mouth? Because, thou sayest, I am rich and increase the goods and have need of nothing, and knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. Is there anything wrong with saying that we're rich? Why, I've said it many times. You're looking at one of the richest men in all God's universe. I'm a child of a kid. That's what every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus. You think of anything to add to that? The thing that was disturbing here was that they were rich and increased with growth. It was the growth materialistic attitude toward life, rafting for fame here on this earth. I leave it to you. Is it true of the United States? Is it true of the Christians? Or do we fellowship? Two years ago, I had the privilege of leading a young Korean doctor to the Lord. some classes that I was holding for foreign students in Denver. And when Dr. Chung got saved, well, he was over here taking some postgraduate work, some studies in TB control, and he's now in South Korea in charge of the largest government hospital there for TB. And he conducts a daily Bible study for the other doctors and nurses, too. It's wonderful to have a have a child in the face down there doing missionary work where I could never could. But anyway, when Dr. Chung was hearing a Christian, we had some nice visits together, and one day I said to him, just off the record, what do the Koreans think about the people in the United States? And the typical Oriental reticence he says, I'd rather not say. Oh, I said, come on, just tell me. Well, he said, then if you excuse me, in our country we say, in America it is, how big is your house, how big is your automobile, how big is your bank account. There you are. That's exactly what the rest of the world thinks about us in the right. And this thing is contagious. It's getting a hold of Christians. Labor feminism is showing in every... carrying our bodies. When I was in New York just recently, I shared a conference with Ernie Wilson, T. Ernest Wilson, who has returned from Africa, a man whom I love and respect very highly. And almost with tears in these eyes, he says, Brother I'm appalling what I see in this country, and I beg of you, get this idea out of your minds. You cannot cure everything with men, mummy, and machinery. All of us see it. We find out we're not getting along very well in the local assembly. We're not seeing blessing. What should we do? Instead of getting on our faces in humble confession, we form another committee. We recognize that the work of the Lord is not being supported. Instead of getting along with God and saying, Lord, what will thou have me to do? We form another firm. Or devise on any kind of a get-rich-quick scheme that we think eventually will be, it will be like the perpetual motion machine, it will run by itself. We will never have to give anything anymore. Go round and round, get no place. Man, money and machinery. And we don't have any stuff. I'm rich, increase the goods at need of nothing. Oh, I don't know anything worse, better than sisters, than this appalling indifference. to our needs. Anything is better than that. We're sitting in a rocking chair. We're perfectly contented. Not with Christ. Look at the conditions here. These people said they didn't need nothing further below Jesus. Verse twenty. Behold, I stand at the door. outside the door. I'd only preach the gospel from this. I did last Sunday. I don't know who taught it for you. Preach the gospel from it. But listen, brother and sister, this has not said to the unsaved, it has said to the Christians that lay at this here. The professing church had the Lord Jesus on the outside. Where is he in relation to your own heart and life? Well, you say, I lay him in. After he comes in, he never goes out. Don't you fool yourself so far as salvation is concerned, of course. You'll never be lost again. But don't you think for a minute you can't lose a sense of his presence. Don't you think for a minute that he can't be out of your life for all intents and purposes, so far as guidance is concerned, so far as provision is concerned, so far as lordship is concerned. It can be completely out of your life. I've answered a cousin in Chicago. I remember when she taught a Sunday school class in our assembly. She lived in our home. She was more like a sister to me than a cousin. After her mother died, she came to live with us. She went on farewell for the Lord, played the piano for the meetings, and helped in many different ways. And then she went to Chicago. Her father had been the law enforcement officer, and she took her job as a police matron on the force in Chicago, and then she began to drift, stay away from meetings, and she met and married a Roman Catholic. He had no use at all for God's things, and when I went there to visit them, he hadn't come home from work yet, and we were talking about something, and I said, I left my Bible in the car. Where is yours? Oh, she said, I'll go get it. I keep it in the drawer in the dresser. Well, I said, you ought to keep it out of here where Johnny could see it occasionally. Oh, she said, it makes him furious. I said, but how can you live in the same home with one who is curious over the Word of God and not be concerned about his being lost? And she reached across the table and she drew a circle on the tablecloth with her finger. She said, this is my Christian life and this is my private life. Do you see what that means? That means God is watching in this one but not in this one. On Sundays I have to do with God. The rest of the week I'll fight him to keep his nose out of my business. Well, she didn't say that and what else could it mean? This is my Christian life. This is my private life. That's lay of the sea in this. If there is any area in my life in which the Lord Jesus Christ is not welcome, I am lay of the sea in my heart. Is that too strong? Well, you water it down and suit yourself. I think that's right. The Lord Jesus was outside. knocking in the door, running in to the offender, to the company of Christians, but willing to come in to any man, any individual who would make room for him, he was willing to come in. Brother and Sister, I just wish I could I could get every Christian to sit down, get along with the Lord, and just say, now, Lord, show me, show me if I'm slipping. Show me if I'm really led to sin at heart. Show me if this thing has crept in, and I haven't realized it. Oh, it's so easy to say, Lord, that's where the church is around us. We're Philadelphia. and all else is Laodicea. I was taught that kind of trial when I was growing up. I was among the company of Christians who really believed that we are Philadelphia and everybody else is Laodicea, the poor outcasts. Well, the very fact that somebody says, I'm Philadelphia is a pretty good indication of the Laodicea. For he's saying, I don't need anything. That's what Laodicea said. I was bad up on that. I was made to think that in some way there was a magical circle going around what we call the assembly. And the devil couldn't get out of it. We were right. I think we ought to get on our faces before God and acknowledge that the seeds of Laodiceanism are in every human heart. and that we too have been guilty of shutting them out. I'm almost afraid to say some of the things that I think, but I think the minimum. I think that our assemblies, those who meet as we do, are substituting committees, funds, sexualization of power, all kinds of things for the simplicity that we once believed as the New Testament patch. I went to Chicago, and a man whom I told you his name had surprised you, told us to because I'm not going to tell you. He said to me, John, I've got a scheme. He said, it'll put your home on the map. I thought it was. Well, he said, what you want to do is to get all the church women, Colorado Springs, together and form a citywide women's guild. Well, I said, we've already got two assemblies there, the Christian women and both assemblies come and sow for us. Well, I said, I'm not talking about dying thoughts, I'm talking about raising money. I said, now listen, you know me for a long time. And you know that I believe in the simple pattern of daily bringing to the throne of grace our needs. We have a prayer meeting each day when the staff come together and we tell the Lord our needs. And just, we were sitting at a lunch table and just as though he was wiping it off the table, he said, Don't give me the old stuff. If you don't raise the money, somebody's got you. That's the theory today. That's the idea. Why isn't the fashion business of trusting the Lord about things? When we can organize. When we can fix it up yourself. And you can leave him outdoors and never miss him. It isn't only financially that this is true. When an assembly finds themselves in a destitute condition spiritually, without leadership, what do they do? Holding election. I can tell you a number of assemblies that are electing deacons, elders, I believe, a scriptural for an assembly to appoint the deacons to the various jobs, according to the Sixth Chapter Acts. But elders are formed by the Spirit of God, and it's their responsibility to act as God has given them that place. I know a number of places where instead of getting on their faces and saying, Lord, we do not have spiritual leadership, they decided that the whole thing can be handled through a business meeting, a town hall meeting. Well, after all, this is the democracy. And in the democracy, everybody votes. So we won't admit our spiritual poverty. We will organize this thing, and we will ramrod it through. Or, even worse, if possible, a great many companies are Christians say, well, we have so-and-so. He's a successful businessman. And they're so-and-so. He's a millionaire. I visited one center here. two years ago, and every assembly that I went to in that large city, they all said the same thing. You know, we're doing really well. We've got several millionaires in our assembly. Well, I said to the Lord, Los Angeles, same as anybody else, let's pay for them. Well, I said, you don't understand. This is a great asset. A man who can make a million dollars has got to be a smart man. And that's the secret of success in our assemblies, is to get important businessmen, successful businessmen, that makes them elders, does it? Instead of acknowledging our joyous and poverty, we try to get around it like that. We're not seeing souls saved. What are you doing when you don't see souls saved? Why, you put on a campaign, a drive, anything, except a firmity. How much better it would be if we got on our faces and said, Lord, why are we not seeing blessing? Have we shut the outside the door? Are we trying to conduct our assembly affairs without thy help? Lord, show us why we are not seeing souls saved. If a thought is in me, we are moving it necessary. Do we do that? We do not. We say, now let's see how does that have done to us, or have. This is nothing against him. I pray for him every day. But I don't think for a minute that all of the things that are being done in the Permanent of Christen today are commendable. You don't either. We're having trouble in finances. What should we do instead of getting on our faces and acknowledging that we are covetous? We are looking for things for ourselves. As Mr. Shalbreak used to say, the Lord's people are suffering from better homes and gardens. Instead of acknowledging that this is so, we say, well, we've got to do something to sort of pep up the collections. He saw we give pep talks. It'll give scriptural education. You get pep talks. We do a lot of things. We haven't started bingo yet. Thanks God. But I can tell you some other things that make your hair curl. What's wrong? We do not like to acknowledge that the Lord Jesus is outside. Why don't we get on our faces and say, Lord, we can't even get along with each other? No, he says it's his fault, the big deal. and it may not be his fall at all. And it has to be partly mine, for it takes two to make a quarrel. Only by pride come of contention, are we acknowledging that the contention in our assemblies, the divisions between God's people, are the result of our shutting the Lord Jesus out? We are not. We say, well, we're right. They want to come back to us. They want to come back and get on their knees and we'll take them in instead of acknowledging our distance from God. Brother and sister, you could take each one of these troubles and these difficulties and these poverty indications in our assemblies and say they're all a mark of Leia Decianism. But now let me say this before I stop. The remedy is simple. and it is personal. It is simple. Jehovah's God. We don't need men, money, nor machines. We just need Himself. We don't need a reorganizational program. We simply need Himself. We need to get back into His presence. A mystic of the Dark Ages, who never had a Bible but knew something about the presence of the Lord, said this, What tools we are to search the world over for happiness that can be found in the quiet of his presence in our own rooms? The remedy is simple. We need himself, and we need nothing else. You've learned of the problems of the first century. Look at each of the epistles, see what they pointed out. See if any of them would ever suffer because they didn't have money, or because they didn't have a new building, or because they didn't have a good family, or because they didn't have a good family. Any of them would suffer because the Lord Jesus was left out. It's very simple, but it's drastic. What can Laodicea do except to say, I am wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked? And that's pretty hard for any of us to say. I can't believe to buy of me gold pad in the fire. That thou mayest be rich. And white demons that thou mayest be clothed. that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear, and anoint thy eyes with eyes there which thou mayest see. Gold, raiment, and eyesat. Gold to make us really rich, the gold of heaven. Raiment to attempt it for his presence, not to make us respectable in the religious community. Eyesat, that we may really see things as they are. and not as they appear to be, not rationalizing from a human viewpoint but seeing things through his eyes. You want it? This is a personal matter. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him. Brother and sister, you do not need to be without his friend. Neither do I. I have gone for days without a sense of His presence, and I never needed to go a minute. Mary didn't even miss the Lord Jesus till the end of the day. She supposed that He had been in their company all day long. Can you imagine the mother with a son like this, not wanting to hear His voice all day long? Not wanting to stick to Him all day long. not wanting to do anything for him all day long? And yet you and I do. How long has it been since you heard his voice? I don't mean since you read the Bible. You keep up the show, the shame, with pretense. Well, how long has it been since you really heard his voice? How long has it been since you really had to talk with him? if he wants it. And he does. He wants your company. He wants to come in. He's doing the knocking. If he wants your company, surely you and I want his. So we'll be nervous about this. So we'll be honest about it tonight. We'll go to our rooms. We'll go down before him. Say, Lord, if I'm keeping you out, I'm ashamed of it. Show me. Restore me. Bring me back to thyself. Our Father, we pray, for thy blessing on thy word.