The concept of the body of Christ, drawing parallels between the natural human body and the mystical body of the church. It emphasizes that believers are baptized by the Spirit into one body, with Christ as the head in heaven and the church on earth. The message highlights the dual nature of believers, possessing both an old sinful nature from Adam and a new nature in Christ, and stresses that salvation and inclusion in Christ's body are a result of regeneration, quickening, sealing, and baptism by the Holy Spirit, all occurring simultaneously upon accepting Christ. The sermon concludes by urging listeners to ensure they are truly in Christ, as this is the sole path to salvation and eternal life.
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Message I noticed in replaying it that I said two hundred were baptized in the upper room instead of one hundred and twenty. One hundred and twenty is correct. I hope you'll note that as you listen to it. Turn to this verse in chapter first Corinthians chapter twelve, and I'm just going to read one verse. For by one spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free, and have been all made to drink into one spirit. Now, these studies, when you take up the word of God, they're not going to be something just so simple you can sit back and almost turn your mind on and off and just take it in.
If I get up here and denounce dancing, drinking, carousing, night spots, and all this kind of stuff, well, people would take that in. They wouldn't have to be too intelligent to understand those things. But we want to give you something that's solid, something with meat on it, something that you can learn from the Bible, and it's all here. And God, through the apostle, wouldn't give us this if he didn't expect it was, uh, such that men and women could take it in. You don't have to be a college graduate to take in the Bible. Some of these very Corinthians, some of them were very poor. Others were very educated. But the subject I take up this morning, or seek for the help of God to, I think it's one of the most important subjects in the Word of God.
It has to do with the body of Christ. Now, the other night, election night, I think it must have been about quarter after seven, I thought, well, I'm going to listen to the election, but I went and got my Bible and my writing pad, and I sat there till quarter after one. And when I didn't like about the election, I turned to my Bible and got a little list. So where I got discouraged about the one, I got encouraged about the other, and I'm going to give you this morning the things I jotted down during election night, and when I got to, I didn't care who got in at the election. So we have in this text the parable of the body, or the natural body of the Christian, uh, is an illustration of the mystical body of Christ, and eighteen times in this chapter, we'll read more of it next Sunday, Lord willing, eighteen times in the latter part of this one chapter, you have the body referred to.
I just underline that word body every time I read it, showing the importance that God puts upon the body that he's referring to here. The Christian's natural body, a wonderful illustration of the mystical body of Christ, and it's a wonderful subject. The gifts of the body, or the gifts of the body we took up last week, are mentioned in the first eleven verses. There'll be more said about them later on, as they are seen in the body of the church. But you have in verses eleven to twenty six more or less, the body illustrated, how God illustrates the body.
Well, the thought that struck me, we hear you've got one body with all its members, and you've got one head. Now, here's the body. All the body and its members, various members, and its various gifts, and you've got one head. Now, the one can't do without the other. If they took your head off, your body wouldn't be worth much, neither would your head be worth much. And so here we have a perfect body that says, so also is Christ. Now Christ, the head of the body, he's in heaven. The body of the church, and he speaks of the church, which is his body.
The body's on earth. Now that's really simple. Christ is the head in heaven, and the church, his body, is on earth. Now, how did they get together? How did this head in heaven, a living Christ, and the body on earth, which has been in growth for nineteen hundred years, it began a very small body on the day of Pentecost, when two hundred people were baptized into one tiny body. But that body has grown a lot for a few days later. You remember, in fact, only a few hours later, three thousand souls were saved to that body.
God added to that body, and later on there were five thousand, uh And ever since, there have been precious souls saved by the grace of God, put by the Spirit into the body of Christ, the Church, and so the body has been growing over the years. Now, about two hundred years ago, we had the birth of the United States, and this is the year we celebrate the two hundredth year of this nation. Now, when it started, when this nation was born, it was just a few. You might say it was the men who got together and wrote up the constitution, and the nation was born.
But ever since then, people have been born into this nation. Every time a babe was born by people who are Americans, there was another addition. Now, you don't have, every time somebody gets saved, you don't go through all that again, the writing of the Constitution, the ratification of the Constitution. That took place once, two hundred years ago, and the church had one beginning and one baptism, and that was what we're reading about here, and it happened at Pentecost. There are no such thing as two Pentecosts. A lot of people think today they can bring about a Pentecost by a bunch getting together, and they all seem to get filled with the Spirit and jabbering in tongues, and they say it's Pentecost.
There's only one Pentecost. And the day the church was born nineteen hundred years ago in the upper room, when that room was filled with the Holy Spirit, the church was born, and that has never been duplicated. There are many fillings, but the church had one Pentecost, but since then a lot have been added to it, just like the United States now. Two thou- two million and a few more. But they've been added over the two hundred years. So over nineteen hundred years, the Spirit of God has been baptizing into that body that began like a babe in the upper room in Pentecost.
The Spirit has been adding to that body, and that's what he's bringing out here in this subject. How wonderful to know that in this verse you have all these members. Before we were saved, we were lost, but once we accepted Christ, we were baptized, made part of, one with the body of Christ, the mystical body known as the church. I only read one verse because I want you to read a lovely passage over in Romans. Now, Romans is just before First Corinthians, and I want you to get this, because it's the secret, and if you get this, you'll be a very happy person.
In Romans chapter six, and I want to say this, at Calvary, you have all who are saved. Now, they were crucified with Christ at Calvary. Now, the Bible says that. But that baptism, the water baptism, is a figure of our baptism into Christ's death. Paul says, I was crucified with Christ. But when we were baptized into the body of Christ, that's Pentecost. And I want you to think of that as we go over these verses. In Romans chapter six and verse three: know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
Now here's our water baptism illustrating our being baptized into the Christ in his death. As lost human beings, we had to be crucified with Christ before we could have life. Now what is four: Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death, that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. Here's where Pentecost comes in. For if we have been planted together, talking about the whole church was planted together in the likeness of his death, that's Calvary, his crucifixion, we shall also be li- in the likeness of his resurrection.
Here we have Pentecost. Now you notice verse six: knowing this that our old man, now you don't know what that old man is, do you? If you're a Christian, you ought to know. The old man is one way God has of describing man's sinful nature that he was born into this world. It speaks of the old man and the new man. The old man is Adam and all the human race since then. That's the old man, the sinful nature we receive from Adam. But when you receive Christ, you've got a new nature, a new man. You've got a spiritual life. You have the two. So notice these verses carefully, knowing this verse six, that our old man, our old sinful nature is crucified with him, with Christ, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
For he that is dead is freed from sin. Now, if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Christ, with him. We died with him, we died to what we were in Adam, and now we live to what we are in Christ. But it tells you in verse nine, now knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, dieth no more, death hath no more dominion over him, and death has no more dominion over a child of God if he's been born again, he's in the body, he can't be taken out or severed from. One death God reckons, and that's Calvary, when Jesus Christ, the head of the church, died, and what he did for the church, he did for everyone in the church.
Now notice for verse ten: For in that he died, he died unto sin once, in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Verse eleven: Likewise, reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin. That's Calvary, where you were crucified, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. That's Pentecost, where you were baptized by the Spirit into the very body of Christ. Now, these things are remarkable, and I hope you're able to take them in. So that the whole church that was crucified at Calvary, we died when he died.
Paul says that in Galatians two twenty, I am crucified with Christ. Did he mean he was a dead man? He had a new life. But what he was in Adam, what he was when he was born into this world, a sinner. God saw him as a sinner, and that's how he sees you this morning, if you're not dead, just a sinner. And you're a sinner because Adam sinned. But when you accept Christ, God doesn't see you anymore a sinner in Adam. He sees you in Christ with new life. With new life. You have life now, whereas once you had death. Ah, but you still have that old man around, and he'll bother you until you get to heaven.
If you didn't have that old nature around, you'd never get sick. If a person could be sinless and sin root and branch taken out of his body, you'd never get sick, you'd never die. It's sin that worketh in you that bringeth forth fruit unto death. And the most saintly child of God is are going, is going to have sinful thoughts, and he's going to do some things sometime for which he pays the price, being out of fellowship with the Lord. But remember, the Bible says every born-again Christian has two natures. He has the old one, and he has the new one. He's got the nature he got from Adam.
Now he's got the nature received from Jesus Christ. The one was sinful, the other is sinless. And the old nature can no more be holy than the new nature can be unholy. The one comes from Adam, the other comes from Christ. That's why the Lord Jesus came into this world. These things are wonderful, they're all in your Bible. All you got to do is go home and read what we have read here in Romans. Now it says that he did this, that we all might become one, and it tells you the end of that verse, so there's neither Jew nor Gentile, bond or free, master or slave, or male or female.
When you accept Jesus Christ, now in our re- relation to Adam in this world, we have the sexes, we have our nationality, but when God sees all those who are born again in Christ, there are no nationalities. And like the angels in heaven, they neither marry nor give in to marriage. Aren't some of you glad you're going to heaven? I'll tell you this, it's a wonderful thing to see this. And if you don't think you haven't got the old man hanging around, get married and you'll find out. Yes, a Christian has the old nature, but God has given a remedy whereby you can overcome the old nature.
Like the other night, my old nature came up two or three times watching that election, but when I get in my Bible, the new one popped up. Yes, I got something to rejoice over. And this is the new life in Christ. And I hear some as and so's, and this is what came into my mind the other night. As you died as a sinner before God at Calvary, so you live before God at Pentecost. Now, that shouldn't be difficult. Adam was your natural, federal, fleshly head. You would have sinned if it got Adam's sin. His fallen nature was transmitted to his generation on to now. But when you accept Christ, Christ is your spiritual head.
Isn't that easy? Adam was your natural, federal, sinful head. But when God saves a person, he takes them out of that and puts them in his son. Now Christ is your new head, and you're in his body. That's a wonderful thing. So Christ, as Adam's sinful nature was passed on to you at birth. That's natural generation. As Adam's sinful nature was passed on to you by natural generation, so the spiritual life of Christ is passed on to you in regeneration. You get that?
Just as Adam's fallen nature, sinful nature was passed on to you, and it was in that little baby cooing in the cradle, the cute little thing, the holy little angel. Listen to it sometimes when it can't get its own way. No angel, fallen angel. You've got that sinful nature passed on to you through Adam, but just like a baby is born into this world physically, when you accept Jesus Christ, you're born into God's family spiritually, and you're a member of his body. Isn't that nice? See what God does. Now you must have the regeneration to be in the body, regenerated by the Holy Spirit of God.
I want you to notice verses seventeen and nineteen ah of that same chapter in Romans. And see what it says. Seventeen and nineteen. of that same, of chapter five in Romans, rather. We read in chapter 6. Cha- Romans five and seventeen: For if by one man's offense, death reigned by one. Now, who was that one man who committed that offense? Adam. For if by one man's offense, death reigned by one, much more they which received abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.
One man's sinful work and deed turns the whole human race into sin. One man's deed of righteousness at the cross, meeting God's righteous demands, he is the one that introduces us into a new spiritual life. He is our new federal head. You're taken out of Adam, you're put into Christ. That's pretty simple. It tells you that right in that verse, for if by one man's offense death reigned by one, much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ.
Adam's one sin plunged the world into sin. Christ's one deed of finishing the work on the cross enables all who believe to have life and life return. Notice verse eighteen: Therefore, as by one offense, or one offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation. There's Adam again. Even so, you'll need to notice that as and so, even so by the righteousness of one, this is Jesus Christ, free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. And verse nineteen, for as by one man's disobedience, there's Adam in the garden, many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one, Christ Jesus, when he carried out the will of God, shall many be made righteous.
There you have the whole thing in a nutshell, and it shouldn't be difficult to take it in. The two federal heads, the old creation, the new creation. Christ is the new creation. All were born again, except the fact that God says we're sinners, lost, and undone, and we need salvation. We find it in Christ. When we receive Christ, we have life now instead of death through Adam. We have life, and Christ is my new head. He's the head of a spiritual body of which I am a part. You know, there are four ways in which the Bible describes the new birth.
One is you must be born. John said that to Nicodemus, except a man be born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Now, Nicodemus was a Jewish theologian. He was one of the leading theologians of his day. And yet the Lord told him, this religious man, Nicodemus, you need to be born again. And with all his intelligence, he couldn't understand that. It's strange how intelligent people can't understand simple things. Nicodemus says, well, how can a man be born when he's old? Can he enter the second time with his mother's womb be born? Nicodemus, your head's thick.
No, a man can't be born again a second time into this world. I'm talking about a new birth, Nicodemus, and he points back to Numbers twenty one, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that he who has believed in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Nicodemus says, I get it. With all your intelligence and your learning, you're still part of Adam. You've only had one birth. That's a physical birth. You've got to have a second birth, a spiritual birth. And friends, it's a sad thing to only have one birth. If all you have in this birth life is one birth, the natural birth, you're going to die twice.
You'll die physically, and you'll die spiritually forever. The lake of fire is the second death. So if you only have one birth, the physical birth, and you're not born again into the body of Christ, you're going to experience the physical death and the death of your soul separation from God forever. That's the second death. But if you're born twice in this life, you won't likely die at all. Isn't that wonderful? If you have a second birth, it means you've been born into the family of God, and if the Lord were to come in your lifetime, you wouldn't experience death at all.
You one birth, birth, you'll die twice. If you have two births, you likely won't die at all. In fact, when you do die, God says it's sleep. God rechristens the word death to sleep for the Christian. You're just asleep in Christ, and you'll awaken on the resurrection. But notice more about this. The new birth, you've got to be born. And then it speaks of in Ephesians two one, you have be quickened who were dead in trespasses and in sin. So salvation is likened unto being born again, it's likened unto being quickened, and he speaks in Ephesians four thirty one, you're sealed by the Holy Spirit of God until the day of redemption, until the redemption of the body.
Isn't that remarkable? Born again, quickened, and sealed. And that's a government seal, I'll tell you that, no one can break it. You're sealed by the Holy Spirit. But then the fourth thing that is mentioned about conversion, you're baptized in our birth. Verse thirteen, of chapter twelve, verse thirteen, you're baptized into the body of Christ. Now let me ask you this question. Which one of these four comes first? They're all mentioned in your Bible. In what order do they come? Born again, crept in, sealed, baptized into the body of Christ.
Which one comes first? Supposing you make a circle and put a cross in the middle of that circle, what have you got? A wheel with four spokes, right? And when you turn that wheel, which spoke moves first? They all work and move simultaneously. And all these four things happened in a moment, the moment you trusted Christ. You were born again, you were quickened, you were sealed, and you were baptized into the body of Jesus Christ. All in one. They all happened at the same time.
And don't let anybody, let anybody try to tell you they're different experiences, they're one and the same experience. That's what the Bible teaches. When you said, I accept Christ, that's what happened. There's so much more happened in the life of a young Christian than that young Christian realized at the time. May I use a, a comparison? When you said I will, you said a mouthful at the altar. There was a whole lot going to happen that you hadn't had any idea was going to.
A lot of it's going to be pleasant, a lot of it's unpleasant. But when you said I will, I'll accept Jesus Christ, you didn't have the slightest idea all that was involved in that one confession, I will have. Wonderful thing. Young convert says, well, I know I've accepted Christ. And what's the first thing a young Christian realizes? Well, he realizes my sins are gone. That's about all he knows. Like the young couple wake up on the hunt, well, we're married. We're married. What about building a big home? Oh, let's forget that. I'm not thinking about that.
All the young convert seems to think about, no, the moment he gets saved is my sins have gone, are gone, and I've got peace. I never had it before. But after a little while, he begins to grow, and he begins to learn something. Why, he finds out I've got eternal life. I can never perish, the Bible says. Isn't that wonderful? I'm assured of eternal life. I can never perish. The Bible says it. My, that's wonderful. I didn't know that the moment I accepted Christ. I thought maybe I could be lost again. But no, the Bible says, save once, save forever. I give unto my sheep eternal life, they shall never perish.
That's remarkable. But I tell you, when you read your Bible and study, you start learning some other wonderful things. You learn this wonderful thing that you're in the body of Christ. I heard that when I was saved. I heard it before I was saved. I was brought up in a Christian home at the age of nineteen I heard that when I went to the church, what I went to, I heard them talking about the body of Christ. They might have been talking about something else. I didn't know what they were talking about. But after I got saved, then I began to realize that I was in the body of Christ, and Christ was my head, and the same light that's in Christ the head is in me, a member of his body.
That makes it pretty secure, doesn't it? That's wonderful. To know that Christ is my spiritual head, and I'm a member of his body, and Christ will never lose one of the members of his body. He will not have a marred companion throughout eternity, his church. He'll not have a disfigured body. Everyone that goes into that anatomy, that divine and spiritual anatomy, is there to say, and we'll notice next Sunday morning if we don't get through it this morning, God has set each member in its place. That's a remarkable thing.
God has set us in our place in the body. These are some of the things you learn as you grow as a Christian. When a baby's born, well, a man with a Halloween face on could look at it and it wouldn't be scared, it couldn't see what it was. A little baby's vision is blurred. Now, this is a bachelor talk. Maybe I'm wrong. But the little baby sees something out there, looks like a pillar, something blurred, or maybe a mattress, just see something shaved. After a while, as it grows and it grows and its vision begins to focus, it knows who's mommy and who's daddy.
And if some stranger took it into his arms and start hauling right away, it can detect the difference. He knows who his mother is and who his father is. And when you grow spiritually, you begin seeing these things. You're in the body of Christ. That's where God put you, and he's given you something to do in that body. You're a member of his body. Now, he says that. That's not what I say, that's what he says. But how wonderful to realize these things. The moment I accept the Lord Jesus, I'm in his body, and his life is my life, his future is my future. His position at God's right hand is my position.
Aren't these wonderful things for a real Christian to know? In joining a local church, you can join, you can leave it, you can go to another church, join it, you can leave it, you go to another church, you can join it, you leave it, you shop around. Friends, that doesn't mean a thing. If not joining a local church that takes you to heaven, you've got to join a body that is a living organism. An organization is a dead thing. An organization is one thing, an organism is another. And what Christ has in his body is an organism.
The same life that's in Christ in heaven this morning is in everyone who is saved on earth. Now that's what he's talking about. Are you in the body of Christ this morning? I'm not asking you, are you a member of some church? You could be a member of them all. It wouldn't take you to heaven. You've got to be a member of the body of Christ, or you'll never, no never, enter heaven. I want you to know this is. But not this church, which is his body, he calls his body. Notice you can't perish in it. It's in Ephesians one and twenty two. And he hath put all things under his feet and gave him, Christ, to be head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all.
Now that's his body. And you're in the enjoyment and prospect of all the fullness that's in that person, Jesus Christ. You'll never, throughout all eternity, exhaust the riches that you have being a member of that body. Being a mem- member of some earthly organization is one thing, but being a member of the body of Christ, with Christ your head, and you a living member, having the same life as Christ has, because we're partakers of a divine nature, that's something different. All the difference between heaven and hell. This is what God's word said.
You know, we were taking up over in chapter ten about they were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and in chapter ten it says these things were written for our learning. I don't suppose those people, possibly two million Israelites going out of Egypt through the Red Sea into the wilderness on the way to Canaan, I don't know whether they knew anything about what the experience was through which they were passing. But thousands of years later, their experience was looked upon as a baptism. Well, they said, we didn't even feel a drop of water. What was the experience?
Dry land under their feet. God rolled back the waters of the Dead Sea, and there was a wall of water on one side, a wall of water on the other side, dry land beneath their feet, and God's cloud came over their head. They were in a living coffin, and they all went through. All they could hear was the clatter of Pharaoh's army coming after them. But that army couldn't touch them because God put a cloud between them and the Egyptians. And later on, that's likened unto a basket.
They were all baptized unto Moses, their new leader, in the cloud and in the sea. Now, when Jesus Christ suffered for you and me on the cross, we didn't feel anything. I didn't feel any nails going through my hands. I didn't feel a crown of thorns on my head. I didn't feel any suffering when Jesus Christ was on the cross. He got the feeling. He was wounded and bruised and chastised for me. All I know is this, I got the salvation that he purchased.
And although he got the feeling, a lot of people are wanting a feeling when they get saved. They'd like to hear the windows rattle and the roof about to cave in, a lot of commotion, an earthquake. No. Friend, when you accept Jesus Christ, it's just like a breeze coming through an open window to fan the face of a sick patient. It's just something like take a big breath of fresh air. My Jesus died for me. I, I know history records it, just like it does that Columbus discovered America, but this is a revelation.
I know Jesus Christ died on the cross. That's established. That's in, that's a fact. Even history tells us about it. Josephus, an unconverted Jew, gives you a graphic picture of it. But friend, it's not a historic thing when you get saved, it's a revelation. It's the fact that that person who died on the cross nineteen hundred years ago died for me, my sin. That's it. Christ, like those children of Israel, they were baptized unto Moses, their new leader. Christ is our new leader. And that big tomb through which they passed severed them from Pharaoh's rule and reign, and severed them from Egyptian bondage and destruction.
And the death of Jesus Christ, and he likens it unto a baptism. He says, I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened until it be accomplished? The baptism of Jesus Christ, his crucifixion on the cross, his death is there, his resurrection is what severs me from Satan's power and separates me from ever, forever from Egyptian bondage and doom. I didn't feel what Jesus Christ went through on the cross, but I have the joy of it in my heart. He got the feeling, and I have the proof.
I accept it. It's accepting a fact. God has declared it. I'm going to believe it. And if you were to turn over to that passage where we read in Romans six, it uses a remarkable word there, and it is we are to reckon. Notice that word reckon. We reckon ourselves dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Verse eleven um of Romans chapter six. Reckon, isn't that something? Likewise, reckon ye yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
I can reckon it. And allow it to be the fact that was established at Calvary when Jesus Christ was crucified for me. He crucified, was crucified for my sin. And when I accepted Jesus Christ, there was something else happened, and I had a little more sensation here. I had that peace, that joy, that assurance that I'm now in Christ. I'm a member of his body, and his life is my life. That's wonderful. That's a peace, and that's a joy. That's what it means to be in Christ Jesus.
By one Spirit, not by your good works, not by your good life, but by one Spirit, that is the Holy Spirit, are we all. Last week we were noticing a number of negatives. Do all speak in tongues, and by the end of that verse, verse twenty nine. are all apostles, are all prophets, are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all have gifts? Do all have healing and speaking in tongues and interpreting tongues? Seven negative questions, and there's one answer, and that's a negative answer. No. They don't all, even in those who believe in these things.
Over the centuries, there's been a few who have been able, there were a few apostles, there were a few prophets, there were a few teachers, and there were a few of these. But now compare those alls there. Do all do these? No, just a few. But compare that with the two alls in the verse we read this morning, it's mentioned twice. What does it say? For by one spirit are we all. All, all who are born again. All are baptized into one body, whether we be Jews, Gentiles, whether we be bound or free, and have been made all to drink into one spirit.
And this is something I jotted down I'd never thought of before. We are put in Christ by the baptism, but it says that verse, that we're all made to drink into one spirit. In other words, when you drink something, you take something in. So I am in Christ as to my position for eternity, but Christ is in me each day down here. I can drink on his life. That's something that's mine. I am in Christ, and Christ is in me. You know, there's a solemn verse in the disc we gotta close. It says over in Ephesians, you're without Christ. That's the saddest place to be in the whole world.
I wouldn't be without Christ for one minute, for during that minute I could drop dead. During that minute, Christ could come. During that minute, the Spirit of God ceases to side with me, and I'm done. Without Christ, friend, you're either in Christ or you're out of Christ. And we had time to go into the various expressions we read in the Bible, without Christ, in Christ, live Christ, with Christ, like Christ, see Christ. How wonderful to know that you're in Christ Jesus. You may not be without sin. A lot of people have good sense. You may not be without honesty, you may be honest.
You may not be without morality, you may be kind, you may not be without charity, you may not be without character, you may not be without love, but you're without Christ, and you can have all these other things and perish. You've got to have Christ. He's the way to heaven. I am the door by me of any man enter in, he shall be saved. My question to you this morning, are you in Christ? If you're in Christ, all that's in Christ is yours for time and eternity.
And if you're not in Christ, all the devil has and is will be yours for eternity. You're either in Adam or you're in Christ. You'll either be in heaven or you'll be in hell. The choice is yours, and it's free. Right where you are, look at the cross where Jesus died and say he bore my sins in his own body on the tree. Take it in, accept him, and you'll be born again. You'll be quickened, you'll be sealed, and you'll be baptized into the body of Christ, there to stay and to reign with him forever and forever.
Will you accept Christ? Now, shall we pray? Our Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus, we come into thy presence, we ask thy blessing upon thy word. May some here today make that decision, that glorious decision of receiving the Lord Jesus. How wonderful life will be with him. How sad it will be without him. We may get through life without him. It will be awful to get through death or try to get through death without him. May people who are not Christian come to know the Savior. When death does come, he'll be passing through the valley of the shadow of death, but he says, I will be with thee.
Death holds no dread for the child of God, will have the sweet companionship of the good shepherd who gave his life for the sheep. Bless thy word, we pray in the Savior's name. Amen. Shall we sing closing familiar hymn to three hundred and seventy Just as I am without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me. That thou bidst me come to thee, O Lamb of God, I come. If you trusted the Savior on any previous occasion, you haven't confessed him publicly, here is your opportunity. Maybe you trust him this morning, or you want to.
Come up and tell us. We'll do all we can to help you. Room on my left, glad to take you in there and take the Bible and answer your questions and try and point you to Christ. The decision is yours. Shall we stand and sit?