The central claim in the passage is that true love for the Lord Jesus Christ is demonstrated not by words, but by obedience to His commandments and teachings. The sermon explores biblical passages, including 1 Corinthians 8, John 14-15, and 1 John, to establish that knowledge alone puffs up, while love edifies. The core lesson is that obedience to God's word, including the teachings of the apostles, serves as the ultimate measure of one's love for Christ and spirituality. The message concludes by emphasizing that willful disobedience to God's clear instructions, even seemingly minor ones, disqualifies one from being considered truly spiritual.
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Will you turn in your Bibles, please, to First Corinthians chapter eight. Listening to the ministry of the day, I would say we have had a very fine variety of ministry today. And I would like to add my appreciation for the nice things that have been said about our lovely Lord Jesus. As I listened to the two speakers before me, I was very much tempted to change my message this afternoon. I thought it would be quite appropriate if I could speak this afternoon about our lovely Lord Jesus, especially in relation to the place that he has in the assembly of God's people.
We have had brought before us this afternoon something about the Lord Jesus Christ and his place at that place called Calvary. It's wonderful that our eyes should be turned to that place often, necessary. We have had some thought this afternoon about our blessed Lord Jesus Christ and His coming again and oh how we need to be reminded again and again that our Lord Jesus is coming and coming soon. Did you ever take up a little study of the Word of God and if you haven't, perhaps you would like to and see the unique place that God always gives to His Son in the New Testament and in the Old Testament as well.
God said concerning the building of the tabernacle, let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell where? Among them. In the book of Psalm we have gathered my saints together unto me, those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice. In the book of Genesis chapter forty-nine we read concerning him who is Shiloh unto him shall the gathering of the people be. In the eighty-ninth psalm we read about the Lord Jesus that he is to be greatly feared in the company of his saints and to be had in reverence of all them that are about him.
If any of you do any printing of plaques, making of plaques, that's one I'd like to see printed up and I'd like to see it put in every chapel and gospel hall over the country. That God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of his saints and to be had in reverence of those that are about him. But the little expression, those that are about him. When we come to the New Testament, we find the Lord Jesus Christ in his birth, first of all, and where is he? We find him in the center of a gathered company, the shepherds came. And sometime later, the wise men came, and there was one person who captured their interest, and that was the baby, the Lord Jesus, and they were gathered about him.
The next time I see him, I see him as a boy of twelve in the temple, and the scribes and the doctors of the law are there, but the Lord Jesus Christ has captured that thing again, and they're all about him. Every eye was upon him. When I come to the cross of Calvary, I see the Lord Jesus Christ still has that place of being in the midst because he was hanging in the midst with a thief or a malefactor on either side, but the Lord Jesus in the midst. When I look at the heavenly scenes, I find that the Lord Jesus Christ in heaven, as the curtains are pulled back in Revelation four and five, still has that place that ever was his always in the midst.
in the midst of heavenly company of people praising and adoring the Lamb. But there's another place that the Lord Jesus Christ has which is very uniquely in the midst, and that is in the midst of His assembly, in the midst of His people who are gathered in His precious name. And if I would have had time to have gotten my thoughts together, I might have been very much tempted to have spoken on that this afternoon. It has been a long time since I did use that message, so I may not have been able to have thought of the Scriptures. However, with this much I would like to conclude this part before we come to, I've got something I want to say to you. I'd like to say that the Lord Jesus Christ certainly deserves every honor that we can possibly give to him and everything that we can ascribe to him he deserves.
You hear lots of eulogies nowadays. You go to funerals and sometimes hear the eulogy given, and you go home sick at heart. Because it wouldn't be possible that that person quite measured up to some of the eulogy that is given him. But concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, there is no eulogy too great for him. Perhaps it isn't proper to even use the word eulogy. There is no praise. There is no worship. There is nothing too wonderful that can be said about our Lord Jesus Christ. And I want to tell you that this is one of the things that I certainly have come to appreciate as a younger man in the assemblies of God's people.
And I visited many assembly over the Midwest part of this country. And I don't suppose I have been to one assembly that I couldn't have sat back and critically pointed out things which were lacking. I've been down to Springfield where Brother John comes from, and I think I can see a little room for improvement down there in certain lines. I've been over to the assembly at Lyman quite a bit, and I think I can see a few places where there could be some adjustments and some improvements. I've been at Berea, I've even been here at Atlantic a few times, and I think in every one of these, maybe I should tell you, even back in the assemblies where I come from, I think that there is a little room for adjustment and a little room for improvement in every one that I've ever visited.
And I've just never quite found the perfect assembly yet. I guess I'm going to have to wait till I get to heaven to find that perfect assembly. But there is one thing that I want to say in appreciation for those assemblies, every one that I have mentioned and many more, and that is the place that they give to the blessed person of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is one thing that I can certainly appreciate with all of my heart that the Lord Jesus Christ has given his place of honor. And he is the one who is the center of gathering. I was in Minneapolis about three or four years ago having some meetings and a woman, a young married woman, got saved.
Her husband was not yet saved, but I went to visit in the home one evening after meetings. When I got there, there was another lady, a friend of a family, was there. And so I'm kind of retiring most of the time. And I kind of let them carry on the conversation pretty much to their own heart's desire. I didn't have very much to say. This friend was a woman, she was quite arrogant. I detected that from the very outset. She had quite a bit to say. And the conversation soon turned to this young woman who had just been saved. And of course she was quite new to the assembly. She hadn't had assembly background. She didn't know much about the assemblies of the Lord's people.
She wasn't raised in them like some of us. This is the way the conversation went for just a little moment. Well, what is this place now that you call your new church and so on? And of course this young Christian, she didn't have all the technical terminology that most of us would have had if we were trying to answer her questions. And so it was rather interesting to hear a young babe in Christ try to describe the assembly and try to answer this woman, some of her difficult questions. And what do you call this place? Well, how do you operate? And this, that, and the other thing, you kind of know how the conversation went. And all of this time I was just sitting back with all ears but saying nothing.
And then it came to the place where the woman said, well, who's your pastor? Well, said this young Christian, we don't have any. Now, technically, that wasn't so, because I happen to know enough about this assembly that they have several pastors there. But because we do not have the hired Reverend so-and-so, she answered to the best of her ability, and she said, we don't have any. And this woman threw up her hands, and she laughed with a big peahaw. And she said, why, our church would fall apart if we didn't have a pastor. And I said, and this is the first thing I said, I said, lady, you never said truer words.
I said, that is just exactly what would happen to your church if you didn't have a pastor. It would fall apart. But I said, you know, this little group of people that this sister is telling you about is different. Because it is not held together by machinery. and not held together by organization and certainly not held together by a pastor. But I said it is held together by the blessed person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I went on to explain to her the difference between her very, very fine church as she spoke about it and the little assembly of God's people over at Sunnyside in Minneapolis. I went on to explain to her that this is one, just one of many distinctive characteristic features of an assembly of God's people.
They're held together by the Lord Jesus and they rightly give him his honors when they're gathered together, especially to remember him in his death. Now I better get my sermon here. First Corinthians chapter eight. I want to come back to kind of where we started this morning about this business of love and it's been carried on pretty much through the theme of the conference today. I'm going to talk about two things this afternoon rather hurriedly. They may seem a little bit disassociated at first, but I hope that we'll be able to link them up together at least sufficient so that you won't think we're way out. The two things I want to talk about this afternoon is love and spirituality.
Love and spirituality. Maybe I could introduce my subject by asking a couple of questions. First of all, are you in love? And as I look around the audience, I might catch a young lady whose eyes are twinkling and rolling a little bit. And she says, oh, yes, I'm in love. Well, I'm not going to talk about that particular kind of love because I'm not even sure you know what it is. Maybe you know more about it than I do. I don't know. But that's really not what I'm concerned about. The thing that I really am concerned about this afternoon is whether you're in love with the Lord Jesus or not. And then the second thing I want to ask you this afternoon is whether you're spiritual.
And these are kind of searching questions. They're a little difficult to answer. You know, I'm going to give you kind of a low blow right now and dispense. This is the eliminations, I guess. If you think that you have a real deep fervent love for the Lord Jesus, And you are real sure that you are very, very spiritual this afternoon. You're already eliminated. Because the person who thinks that he is most in love with the Lord Jesus and brags about it the most, and the person who thinks he is the most spiritual and is the freest with his words usually is the person who is down the scale the furthest.
Now maybe it would be in all fairness to us if we would examine these two things and find out whether we really are or not. This is pretty practical, I know. After all, maybe we have a little difficulty deciding how we are getting on with God. Maybe after all you have heard from our dear brethren today, maybe you're just not quite sure where you stand in relation to this and the Word of God. I believe that the Word of God gives us a couple of very acid tests that you and I can put ourselves to. Let me remind you at this point, my dear brother and my dear sister, that this is the acid test for you and for me, not for your neighbor, not for the person sitting next to you, not for the other people that you know in the assembly who need this so very much.
This is for you and this is for me from the Word of God. God's acid test as to whether I love the Lord Jesus. Now look at First Corinthians chapter eight and verse three. He says, if any man loved God, the same is known of him. Now someone might very supposedly wisely say, well, there isn't any kind of a thermometer that you can measure a man's love for the Lord Jesus. Isn't there? I'm not so sure about that. I think that the Word of God provides for us a thermometer where at least we can get some idea about our love for the Lord Jesus, at least to my own satisfaction for myself and perhaps even some degree of measure that I can measure others with.
Because this verse of Scripture says, if any man loves God, the same is known of him. Now, the Apostle has made it very clear to us here that he's not talking about knowledge because you'll notice what he says in the first two verses of this. Now as touching things offered unto idols, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifies. Knowledge puffeth up. If I were to ask you how you're getting on with God... And if you think that you have gotten on with God pretty well in these last few days or maybe few years of your Christian experience, perhaps your answer would be something like this.
Well, you know, I've been reading the Bible an awful lot and I've been studying it. I've even gone to a Bible school or I've been taking Bible courses or I've gotten a hold of some of Kelly's and J.N. Darby's books and I've really devoured them. And I really have increased in knowledge. Very good. Very fine. We appreciate that a great deal, but don't forget what the Apostle said. He said, Knowledge puffeth up. And there's a world of difference between knowledge and love. Knowledge puffeth up, but love does something else. Love edifies. I don't think by saying this that the Apostle Paul was trying to impress us with the fact that there should be a premium placed on ignorance.
The Scripture says many things... which are written to us so that we will not be ignorant. There are things written to us so that we don't need to continue in ignorance along some certain lines. And sometimes the scripture says, let him that is ignorant be ignorant still. Or am I not quoting that right? Anyway, God places in his word no premium upon ignorance. But there is the kind of a knowledge which can pop up. You will notice that Peter tells us when he spoke about growing, he said, grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And he did not say grow in knowledge only.
He said, grow in grace and in knowledge. And he didn't even stop there. He said, grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, if there is any verse of Scripture that takes the wind out of my sails when it comes to how much I know, about the Bible or think I know about the Bible. It's this next verse. It says, if any man thinks that he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know. I tell you, that punctures my balloon. God says, if you think you know anything, just remember you don't know anything yet as you ought to know. But then he went on to say, if a man loved God, it will be known of him.
Now, what is the acid test of love? It certainly is not what comes from the list. I was having meetings last winter in a certain assembly, and the brother, out of the goodness of his heart, took me around to do some visitation among some of the people in the assembly. Some of the widows, some of the older folks, some of the shayans, and so on. I enjoyed my visits very, very much, except one place that he took me, and this wasn't his fault. He seemed to endure it without any problem at all, but I had a terrible time. When I came out of that place, I was ready to pull my hair right out of my head.
He took me to visit a lady, and she didn't look like a Christian. She looked like she had just come out of a dress rehearsal and was ready to make a Hollywood film. She didn't look like a Christian in any sense of the word. And then as I listened to her talk, and her sight was bad enough, as I listened to her talk, I grew sicker and sicker and sicker at heart. And if I ever was glad to get out of a place, I was glad to get out of that place that day. You know why? Oh, it wasn't because we talked about sports, which I don't know anything about. It wasn't because she talked about her family very much.
Or about her business or her work or things private very much. That wasn't it. I'll tell you what she talked about. She talked about the Lord all the time from the time we got there until we went home. And I got sick of it. Now, that's strange. That almost calls for excommunication from an assembly, doesn't it? That a man would stand up here and say that she talked about the Lord and I got sick of it. Now, maybe I was wrong. I don't know. But I'll tell you what was wrong with me. I happened to know too much about her, and the very sight of her was enough, first of all, to tell me that this was nothing but a big mouth running off, like a long play record, and it was a long play record, and that the things that she was talking about weren't real to her at all.
I got painfully sick listening to that woman's talk, which some of it wasn't even very intelligent. It was all about the Lord, but it was nothing nice about the Lord. That made me think that she was growing in her appreciation. I tell you, it was different kind of talk than what we've heard today. But it was about the Lord already. She could talk about how much she loved the Lord. She could talk about how much the Lord has done for her, and it was the Lord this and the Lord that. And some of the things that she said she didn't even finish the sentence until she started something else. and it was all said and done, it was just buckets full of words and absolutely no thought, rhyme or rhythm to it whatsoever.
You cannot tell how much a person loves the Lord by his talk. A person can do a great deal of talking if you've got that gift and your heart may be as cold as Flintstone. There is a test, though. Let's look at it. Turn to John's Gospel, Chapter Fifteen. John's Gospel, Chapter Fourteenth. After all, we're justified in looking for this, because the Scripture has just said, if a man loved the Lord, it's known of him. Now, God said that, didn't he? So if God tells me that a man's love can be known, that a person's love for the Lord Jesus can be measured, then I'm going to have to look into the Word of God to find out what that major is.
And this is what I do when I come to John's Gospel. I've got the answer to the question. Verse fifteen. If you love me, keep my commandments. Now there's the measure. There's the thermometer. The Lord Jesus said in just a few words that anybody can understand, He said, If you love me, keep my commandments. You want to go on? Well, let's look down a little ways further. Verse twenty-one. He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me, and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him and will manifest myself to him.
You might want to hold your place because we're coming back to this. Turn to the first epistle of John. And I want to tell you, when we get to the first epistle of John, he sure doesn't leave any others feel very comfortable, does he? Sometimes I'm almost scared to look at this book. But we have to, it's the Word of God. First John chapter five and verse three. For this is the love of God that we keep his commandments. Well, that's exactly what we had before. But he all goes on to say here, and his commandments are not grievous. If you love me, keep my commandments.
My dear brother, my dear sister, what I'm seeking to point out to you this afternoon is that if you want to know whether you really love the Lord Jesus Christ or not, and if you want to impress anybody else with the fact that you love the Lord Jesus Christ, it's going to be seen in how particular you are to the keeping of His commandments. Isn't that what God is telling us? The Lord Jesus is simply saying here in words clear and plain, if you love me, keep my commandments. And he just as plainly said that if we do not keep his commandments, and I think this is in first John chapter four again, isn't it not?
First John chapter two perhaps. Look at this. He that says, I know him and keepeth not his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his word in him verily is the love of God perfected. The measure of my love for the Lord Jesus Christ is determined by the respect that I have for His commandments. And if I am not willing to do the commandments of the Lord Jesus Christ, then I can put it down in no uncertain terms that I do not love the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the measure of love. Do you love the Lord Jesus Christ?
I'd like to ask you young people here today, do you love the Lord Jesus Christ? I suppose if you were called upon to give an answer audibly, you would say, oh yes, like Peter, I do love the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you like to keep His commandments? Do you enjoy keeping His commandments? Do you have respect unto His commandments? I'm going to nail you a little bit further. It's impossible for you to love and to keep the commandments of the Lord Jesus Christ if you don't even bother yourself to find out what they are. If you're just too plain lazy to read the Word of God and you do not find your interest in the things of God and this book to you is dry, then how can you have much love and much respect for the commandments of the Lord Jesus?
that you don't even bother yourself enough to read them and find out what they say. You have to acquaint yourself with His commandments in order to keep them. He that has my commandments and keepeth them, said the Lord Jesus. This is the test of love. Now back to John chapter fourteen. I want you to notice something else. Some people object to this word commandment in the New Testament because it sounds too legalistic. It sounds like God's people are being put back under the law. Of course, most people, when they think of the word commandment, the first thing that comes into their mind is the Ten Commandments from the Old Testament.
There are far more commandments in the Bible than the Ten Commandments. The New Testament is full of them. The Lord Jesus gave some commandments. One of His commandments was that you love one another. We'll get more of that later on. Keeping the commandments of the Lord Jesus does not put us under the law, but it does fulfill the law. For the Scripture says that love is the fulfilling of the law. And so there's no disagreement even in the Old Testament about our keeping the commandments. But now if you should feel and you still want to feel that the word commandment puts you under too much of a bind, look at verse twenty three.
Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man loved me, he will keep my words. And nothing here is said about commandment. This gets beyond the bare commandments of the Lord Jesus. He said, If you love me, you will keep my words. So if you don't like the word commandment and you feel it puts you back into legality, then just go on to the next one and you're still up against the same thing. The Lord Jesus said, If you keep my words, and he said in the next verse, He that loveth me not and keepeth not my sayings. I don't know how the Lord could have been much more comprehensive than this. He doesn't leave any loophole for us here, does he?
It's his commandment. It's his words. It's his sayings. And how much you love the Lord Jesus Christ is determined by how much you love his sayings and how much you're willing to practice them and how much you do them. Every wish for every commandment and every word of the Lord for a Christian is a command. I think there's a nice illustration of this back in the life of David. You remember one day in the twenty-third chapter of the book of Samuel, second Samuel it is, David was in the cave of Adolim. It says that he was in a hole. We read concerning the Philistines that they were in Bethlehem, and David in the presence of his men said one day, Oh, that I might have a drink of water out of the well of Bethlehem.
Now I want you to notice this. David did not command his men to go get him a drink of water out of the well of Bethlehem. David had too much consideration for his soldiers than that, because the Philistines were in possession of the city and the well. And in order for them to get a drink of water from the well at Bethlehem, they would have had to have broken the lines, and it would have been perhaps at the price of human life. While David wanted a drink ever so badly, David made no command to his servants to get him a drink of water from the well of Bethlehem. But he did express his wishes. And he happened to have breathed it out audibly, Oh, that I had a drink of water from the well at Bethlehem.
And three of his mighty men said, One to the other. Did you hear that? What was that he said? David said he would like to have a drink of water from the well of Bethlehem. Come on, fellows, let's go. And without David even knowing what was being done, without him giving the orders to go, those three men went at the cost, perhaps of their own life. At the greatest expense to themselves, they went to Bethlehem, and they succeeded in getting a drink of water for David out of the well of Bethlehem, and they came back and gave it to David. Did David give those people a command? No, but David expressed his wish.
They heard David's word. They caught David's sayings. And David's word and David's sayings was all that was necessary to those three men to go and get David a drink at the expense of perhaps their own life. That, I believe, illustrates what the Lord Jesus wants from us. And it was so precious to David. He says, it's a price of blood. I will not drink it. And he poured it out as an offering unto the Lord. You know, those men, if they would have stood around and talked for ten years and told about their love for David, wouldn't have meant as much to David as that one act that they performed that day.
They could have talked about their love and their admiration for David until they were blue in the face and it wouldn't have meant as much to David as that one single act that they showed their love for David that day by the act that they performed. Now time is hurrying away. There's another thing here. First John again, First John chapter three. I'm going to dispense with this last one in a real hurry so don't get nervous about the clock. First John chapter three, but I'm still on this business of love for a minute. Incidentally, brother John, I'm not on the war path now, but these are some things that John puts before us and they sure humble us and sure put us to thinking.
Chapter three of verse and verse sixteen. If a man loved God, it is known of him. Don't forget the text. How? Number one, it is shown by his obedience to the commandments, the saying, and the words of the Lord Jesus. Number two, verse sixteen. Hereby perceive we the love of God because he laid down his life for us. We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. That's the most that you can do for your fellow believer, your fellow brother, is to lay down your life for him. You can't do anything more than that, can you?
But in verse seventeen you have the least that you can do for your brother. Whoso hath his world's good and see it his brother have need and shut up his bowels of compassion from him? How dwelleth the love of God in him? The second test that John gives us as to whether we love God is one that we sure don't like very well. It's a test as to whether and how much we love our brothers. And I want to tell you, dear brother and sister, you can talk until you're blue in your face again about your love for fellow believers and your love for Christians.
But James says, if we talk about these things and don't do them, what profit is it? And what we need to do is to go in action when it comes to these things and quit telling people how much we love them and show them a little bit of love. And sometimes when you see the way Christians treat one another, you'll wonder where the love is, at least in manifestation. Some of these hate campaigns that are carried on today surely don't seem to indicate very much love, do they? And sometimes when the brethren and the sisters are busy throwing mud in one another's face, you wonder how they interpret that in the light of what John says in his little epistle about us loving our brethren.
He says, if you say you love your brethren, then it's got to be proved. How dwelleth the love of God in you? It was kind of a strange thing Some time ago, rather only a few weeks ago, some of you perhaps will remember because I think you were at this meeting where I spoke. On a Sunday afternoon and I was referring to the book of Nehemiah, where Nehemiah encouraged the brethren who were building the walls around the temple, he said, Brethren, fight for one another. Did you get that? Fight for one another.
The next chapter, which I think is the sixth chapter, do you know what his brethren were doing? They weren't fighting for one another, they were fighting with one another. And I want to tell you that oftentimes just that one little word can make a great deal of difference in our attitudes toward our brethren. Would you rather fight for your brethren or would you rather fight with them? Some of us, I would suggest, perhaps rather fight with them than we would for them. We seem to feel very, very at home and very, very comfortable when we can carry on an all-out war against our brothers.
And at this particular conference meeting, I made the mention that it isn't usually fundamental things, things which are basic and things which are important, not usually in a way. that caused the brethren and the sisters to fight together in local assemblies and local churches. It's usually things which are of no consequence at all, and I made a reference to such a small and a trifling thing as brethren fighting over the color of the carpet that they're going to lay down the aisle of the chapel. And I thought I was way out. And a brother and a sister came to me afterward, and this is what I said.
I said, what's the difference, brother or sister, whether the carpet is blue or green? And the brother and sister that came to me afterwards said, who told you? They said, you even got the color of the carpet right. Ah, but I want to tell you, if we really had a love for our brethren, it would show. And a real love for our brethren, my brother and sister, would eliminate a lot of the talk that we do about one another. It would. A real love for my brother and my sister would eliminate some of these after meetings that we have at the back of the chapel or on the outside when anything but pleasant things are said.
Don't talk about your love for God, my brother and my sister, if you can't show it to your brother. Don't talk about it. It's absolutely nothing in the ears of God but nauseating to Him because He knows you don't mean a thing of it. The Word of God says, if you can't love your brother whom you have seen, how can you love God whom you haven't seen? I think I probably have told you the story before about the two brothers who couldn't get along at all in this world. They just had so many differences and they just didn't see anything alike and finally... The one brother came to his senses and he said to the other one rather apologetically, he says, now, brother, we shouldn't fuss and fume and fight like this.
He says, after all, we're going to be in heaven together. And if we can't get along down here, how are we going to get along in heaven together? And the other brother looked at him and said, but you'll be different then. I'm afraid that's our attitude all too often. It's always the other person's fault, you know. This is a test of whether I love God. It's whether I love you. And I might suggest at this point, don't be too loud and too noisy about saying something like this. Oh, I love him. I just don't like what he does. That may be very true, but don't be too noisy about it.
Because there may be something more deep-seated than that. And it may be just a display of words. What's the test of spirituality? I'm going to eliminate this one very rapidly. First Corinthians fourteen, because I may not get to preach to you again on this subject. First Corinthians chapter fourteen and verse thirty-seven. If any man thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, here's the test of spirituality. Are you spiritual? I remember when I was a boy, a fellow said one day that you cannot test another Christian's spirituality.
You can judge his godliness, his godlikeness, but you cannot judge his spirituality. I thought that was true. But now I'm not so sure after I've come across this verse. Not all together in a way. To a certain extent this would be true. When I come to this verse, I find that I've got something a little bit different, another slant on this. He says, if a man think himself to be spiritual. Now there are some people who are very proud of the fact that they're not very spiritual. And I think you have nothing to be proud of. I have heard people say on more than one occasion, well, I'm a weak Christian. If you're a weak Christian, you've got nothing to be proud of.
And you ought not be so noisy about it. I know a man who said that one time and he'd been saved for fifty years and someone said something he didn't like and he was offended and he says, and I'm a weak Christian. Well, he ought to have been ashamed of himself that he was such a weak Christian. It's all right for a babe to drink milk, but it's awful when a person has been saved for fifty years is such a weak Christian. And Paul, I tell you, made us feel very uncomfortable about that in Hebrews five. The Scripture speaks about He that is spiritual. Are you spiritual today? And as I said at the beginning, if you brighten up too fastly here and say, oh, yes, I think I'm very spiritual, look out.
Because I want to tell you, God puts us to a pretty rigid test here again. But you know what the test of spirituality is? I've got to hurry here. Look at the rest of the verse. Let him acknowledge that the things I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord. You know where we are? We're back to where we started. We're back to the commandments of the Lord. If a person thinks that he is spiritual, if he professes to be spiritual, and if you're not spiritual, don't be proud of it. You ought to desire to be spiritual. We all ought to desire to be spiritual. But here's the test as to whether we are or not. Let him acknowledge that the things that I have written unto you are the commandments of the Lord.
Now notice here the apostle says the things that I have written unto you. This means that all of the apostles' writings are the commandments of the Lord even though they're not stated as such. For instance, take the first book of Corinthians alone. Everything that Paul has written in this book alone to these saints are the commandment and the will of God. We were singing about the will of God. You certainly can't measure a man's spirituality by his gift. The least spiritual assembly that I know of in all of Scripture is Corinth. And it was the one assembly where people were very proud of the gift of time.
And it wasn't a sign of spirituality. It was a sign of the opposite. Sure there were those who had the gifts of tongues, but it wasn't spiritual necessarily, especially not the way they were using them. That isn't all. We can carry that on further. No gift indicates spirituality. Why, the Apostle Paul says in the thirteenth chapter that if I speak with the tongues of angels... And he says, if I could speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge. And yet he says, I have not law.
He says, it's nothing. Tinkling brass. Nothing. The test of spirituality, my brother and my sister, is your reaction to the Word of God. You know, this was impressed upon me of late. I have visited some people who have taken a deliberate act. They have made a deliberate act against their better knowledge about some things in the Word of God. I'll just get right playing with you, just as practical as I can get. Let's suppose that you know that the Scripture teaches that we are to Keep the women silent.
No, I shouldn't put it like that. The women are to keep silent. We're not to keep them silent or to keep silent in the church. And then let's suppose you leave such a gathering where the women are keeping their place and start going to a church gathering, so-called, where the women don't keep their place. And you know it. Is this keeping the commandments? Let's suppose that you know from the word of God that God has ordained it in his word, that we are to remember the Lord Jesus Christ and show forth his death on Lord's day, the first day of the week. You know this. And then you leave such a gathering and you go someplace where they don't do this.
Is that keeping the commandments? You know very good and well that the Scripture teaches. Paul writes, Paul teaches that the sisters are to wear a head covering. And I'm not making any apology for saying this. It's one thing we need to be getting a little more particular about. The woman wearing the head covering in the local church. I don't care how many. It doesn't bother me at all. How many fine evangelical preachers tell the woman, the hair is her covering, that's all she needs. It doesn't bother me in the least because the scripture teaches it very plain. It's as plain as John three, sixteen, when you see it in its right light. And we'd better be getting particular about it.
You cannot afford to play fast and loose with the word of God and let these things slip. This is a commandment from the Lord. Paul's writing. Let's suppose we leave a place where this is taught and practiced and go to a place where it's not taught and practiced. You know that I have known some people who have taken this step and it appears on the surface that they have gotten very, very spiritual. My, they talk about the Lord faster than they could ever talk before. And they seem to have a spirituality on the surface that is better than they've ever had before. And then I go away scratching my head. How do you make it out? How do you make it out?
until I come to this scripture and it satisfies me with one thing. I don't know how to figure these things out, but God does. And here's the test. God says, if any man think he is spiritual, it's not told out by the words that he says. It's not told out by the outward show. It's by his regard for the commandments of the Lord. There is such a thing as being ignorant of some of his commandments and who of us aren't. But there is such a thing as willful disobedience and that's a dangerous thing. Being willfully disobedient when God has instructed us something, the writings of Paul, just go down through the book of Corinthians alone and see what Paul has written.
In chapter three it's the case of people being followers of man. In chapter five, it's immorality in the assembly. In chapter six, it's the Christians going to law. In chapter seven, it's the regulation of the marriage of man and wife. In chapter nine, it's the regulation concerning those who preach the gospel. In chapter eleven, it's the woman's head covering. In chapter eleven, it's the Lord's supper. In chapter twelve, it's gifts. In chapter fourteen, it's ministry. This says the apostle Paul is the commandment of the Lord. Because it's Paul's writings. Oh, it isn't said anyplace in the Bible. Now, you women put a head covering on it. It isn't said there. It's not in that form of a command, but it's taught there.
And his teachings are commandments. That's what Paul said in that verse. Look at it carefully. Paul says, The things that I write unto you are the commandment of the Lord. And I want to say to you, last of all, dear Christian, that you can't play loose with the word of God. and disregard these simple plain teachings in the Word of God. When you know better, you can't disregard them and then pass yourself off as spiritual because you're already eliminated. God says you're not. You're not spiritual. A man who loves God and loves the Lord Jesus loves his commandments, his word and his saying, and they abide by them. The person who is obedient and spiritually minded, is the person who pays close respect and attention to what God has said.