I heard an old, old story, How a Savior came from glory, How he gave his life on cavalry, To save a wretch like me. I heard about his groaning, Of his precious bloods atoning, Then I repented of my sins and won the victory. I heard about his healing, of his cleansing power revealing, how he made the lame to walk again and caught the blind to see. And then I cry, dear Jesus, Come and heal my broken spirit. And then my Savior came and brought to me the victory. Oh, victory in Jesus, my Savior forever. He sought me and bought me with his redeeming blood. He looked near, I knew him, and all my love is due him. He plunged me to victory beneath the cleansing flood. I heard about a mansion he had built for me in glory, and I heard about the streets of gold beyond the crystal sea. about the angels singing and the old redemption story And some sweet day I'll sing up there the song of victory. Oh, victory in Jesus, my Savior forever. He sought me and bought me with his redeeming blood. He loved me. I knew him and all my love is due him. He plunged me to victory beneath the cleansing flood. Someone here for the first time who's never been to a service at the Northgate Chapel. If you are, we have a little packet of material we'd like for you to have. No hands. Well, it's good to see a number out this morning to enjoy the Word of God. And I meant to mention also, today is Bulletin Day, if you didn't get yours. They are on the table in the back. Our brother Gene is absent today, and well, I don't think anyone was back there giving them out. But in that little folder, you'll find a little folder sharing the Word. It tells you about the Gideons. And there's something else there. That looks pretty good too. There's something about eating. I don't know what it is, but I like it. It's a pizza party, six-thirty, so on. You look at it and you might want to get in on that. Well, it's real joy to have our brother with us today. Stand forward and turn the service over to him. I wonder if we could turn together into the Acts of the Apostles, please. And I'd like to read just a verse or two from chapter twenty-six. And as soon as I say that, you know what's on my heart. Chapter twenty-six of the Acts of the Apostles. By the way, I see you haven't changed at all since last I was here. Last time I threatened to preach one night from that end to make sure you'd all be in the front seats. I'll have to do it before the day's over, you know. I'll have to do it. Ah. Well, it's nice to see you. Acts chapter twenty-six, if we may please. Verse twenty-seven, for the sake of time, King Agrippa, may I please remind you that this is the last of the Jewish kings. The Jews haven't had a king since this day. They won't have one until he whose right it is to reign will reign. But this is the last of the Jewish kings. King Agrippa, believeth thou the prophets? I know that thou believest. Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian. And Paul said, I would to God that not only thou, but also all that hear me this day, were both almost, and altogether such as I am, except these bombs. May the Lord just add his blessing to us once again as we consider his word. Just a word of prayer. Dear Lord, our hearts have been moved as we have been hearing how thou hast worked through the Gideons, and thou hast blessed the distribution of thy word. We ask this morning that as that same word is preached, that each one of us here may be blessed of thee. We pray thee, O Lord, that thou wilt make us realize that thou hast in the day in which we live a message for each one. We pray for listening ears and receptive hearts that we pray most of all for obedient wills that we may be stewards of the Word of God. Bless us then, we pray, for Jesus' sake. Amen. Amen. I wonder if I may ask a question and I do trust that not one of you will be offended by it but I must ask it it's simply this are you a Christian are you a Christian oh I've another question it's almost as important it is not only are you a Christian But what sort of Christian are you? What sort of Christian are you? It is not necessary for me to remind you in a Bible-loving church like this that although we speak about being Christians and we talk about it in such a light fashion, the word itself only occurs three times in the Bible. You were taught that in Sunday school. I'm not telling you something new. You know that the name, the word Christian, only occurs three times in the book that has all to do about Christians. And so I think you will grant me that surely those three occasions must instruct us as to what a Christian really is. You remember that it occurs, first of all, in the Acts of the Apostles, in the eleventh chapter and in verse twenty-six. They were first called Christians at Antioch. Now it's possible to be called a Christian without being one. You know that's true. May I remind you of a very ridiculous story that I expect I've told you before, but if I haven't, I should have. And if I have, I'm still going to tell it. But years ago, you know, when the father of the present queen, oh, by the way, you must forgive me for all my stories being English. Well, I don't know any American ones. But years ago when the father of our present queen was just a boy, he and his brother were playing in Windsor Great Park near to Windsor Castle where they lived. Now while Windsor Great Park is owned by the monarch, it's open for anyone. But of course these two boys, the princes of the realm, as they played, Nearby was an English bobby, complete with helmets, policemen. And as they kicked their hole, one of them up with his foot and kicked the hole, and it went towards a little fellow who was walking through Windsor Great Park. There was a bit of difference between him and the two princes, because his seat was nearly out of his pants. And he had journaled over his face. And his hair was as ruffled as a boy's can be. But what boy could resist a ball? And as the ball came to him, he up with his foot, and right through the air it went. And over went the policeman's help. Now you might do that to American policemen, but you can't do that to a great policeman yet. Straight away, he grabbed the three boys. Took his notebook out. What's your name? Police, sir. I'm Prince George. Where do you live? Winter Castle. What's your name? I'm Prince Edward. Where do you live? Windsor Castle. And all the while the little boy with a dirty fence in the seat out of his pants was listening. Now go. And suddenly the policeman looked at him and said, and what's your name? Call Governor, he said. Call. I'm the Duke of Wellington! Oh, I say. I say. He might call himself the Duke of Wellington. But the only way you can be the son of a king is by being born the son of a king. We might call ourselves a Christian. But the only way we can be a Christian is by being born again. And here the first mention of that they were called Christians, but what was it that made them Christians? Surely it was this, that here were people who were committed to the Lord. May I read just what that great chapter says of them? It says that here were people who believed and turned to the Lord. Here were a people, verse twenty-three, that they were exalted with purpose of heart to cleave to the Lord. Here were a people, verse twenty-four, they were added to the Lord. Have you noticed, not added to the church? Sir, if you will permit me, not added to the Gideon. Here were people who were at to the Lord. They were committed to him. May I ask, have you believed? Have you turned? May I ask, please, are you cleaving to the Lord? What does the Lord mean in your life? That's the first mention of a Christian. they were people who were committed to the Lord. The second mention is the verse that we're going to consider. Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian. So a person not only has to be committed, but a person has to be convinced about the Lord. Committed to the Lord and convinced about the Lord. Almost thou persuadest me. You see, it's not enough to say that my mother loves the Lord. It's not enough to say my father loves the Lord. It's not enough to say I was born in a Christian home, born in a Christian country. There has to be a time when we ourselves are a people not only committed to the Lord but convinced about the Lord. It affects not only our feet, It affects our head, our mind, our convictions. The last mention, of course, as you know, of a Christian was written by Peter. When Peter took his pen and wrote that sixteenth verse of the fourth chapter of his first letter, he spoke about those who because they were Christians, they suffered. If any man suffer as a Christian, or he goes on and says, not suffering as a murderer or an evil doer, not suffering as a thief or a busy body in other people's matters. But if ye suffer as a Christian, happier ye. And if words tell me anything, these words tell me that a person who is a Christian is not only a person committed to the Lord, convinced about the Lord, but he's controlled by the Lord. Here's a man whose life is such that you can say of it, he's not a murderer, he's not a thief, he's not an evildoer, he's not a busybody. He's a follower of the Savior. May I ask again, as I ask myself, are we Christians? Are we those who have committed ourselves to Him? Are we those who are convinced about Him? Are we those who are controlled by Him? Now, in the story that we have read a few verses of, When Paul stands for his life before the last of the Jewish kings, we have two classes of people. We have a person who's a Christian. We have a person who's not a Christian. And I want us to look at them as men. I trust before we finish, each one of us will be able to examine our hearts that we will know where we are found today and make our decision if we've not trusted Christ to trust him. First of all, let's think for a moment of this king, King Agrippa. Now there are one or two very strange things about him. One or two things that really, when we casually read the story, we're apt to forget. May I remind you, first of all, that here was a king who recognized the truth. Oh no, he was no hot and tart. He was no disbeliever in God. here was a man who recognized the truth do you remember the first words that the Apostle said to him when King Agrippa said to him thou art permitted to speak for thyself he looked into the face of the king and he said I find myself happy this day King Agrippa because I can answer to thee concerning these things because I know thee to be an expert in all questions concerning the Jews. An expert in all questions concerning the Jews. My friends, I haven't time to go into its depth, but may I remind you of it. If you turn with me in thought back into the book of Deuteronomy, you will remember that God laid down certain laws concerning who should be a king in Israel. God said to the king that came to Israel that he had to be a man, that's the seventeenth chapter, and I believe it's about the eighteenth verse of Deuteronomy. God said about that king that he had to be a man. who would write, who would read, who would learn, who would keep and do all the law of the priests and the Levites. And here was a man that looked into the face of King Agrippa, the apostle Paul, and said, I know you're an expert. Oh, you've read the law. You've read the prophets. You not only have read them, but you have learned them by heart. Oh, come on now, you Christians here today. If I was to start off into the books of the Pentateuch or the books of the prophets, how many of us here today, and I speak around heart, how many of us could have put them all by heart? Oh, we can read to it, but have we learned it by heart? But here was a man who showed you his Old Testament. He just quoted all by heart. And yet he wasn't a Christian. He wasn't a Christian. Oh, we've been reading today or hearing today of man and women who have taken the word of God and raised and have been convicted of their sin and have led to the Savior. Don't you forget the book they have read contains the New Testament. It contains the story of Jesus. He was a man who knew all the Old Testament. I say he was a man who not only recognized the truth, but you know the Apostle Paul looked at him and said, King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets? I know thou believest. What? Is it possible to believe the prophets and not be a Christian? Well, that's what these words say. Here was a king. I say, King Agrippa, if he were here today, I would ask him a question. I would look at him and say, King Agrippa, tell me, sir, tell me. Do you believe the prophets? Do you believe what was written seven hundred years before Jesus was ever born, when Micah took his pen and wrote, that Jesus should be born in Bethlehem? Do you believe that? Believest thou in the prophets? I know thou believest. He believed Micah five and twelve. Do you believe that when Jesus should be born, that would not be the beginning of him? that before he stepped into this world and came here as a babe in Bethlehem's barn that as our brother read to us in the eighth chapter of Proverbs this morning he lived believe us by the prophets oh yes I believe that fifth chapter of Micah I believe that he existed for he was from everlasting I say believe us by the prophets do you believe do you believe indeed what Zachariah dared to say that there would come a time when the Messiah would be sold for thirty pieces of silver that was written five hundred years before Jesus came believe us they the prophets I know thou believe us oh King Agrippa do you believe do you believe in the words of Zechariah twelve and ten that they would pierce his side? Five hundred years before Jesus said, I believe, I know thou believe us. Oh, I say, let's come nearer our time. Let's remember the words and deed of Isaiah. What was it, Isaiah? He dared say that here was one who would suffer for our sins, wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities. But not only would he die, but he would be buried. Not only would he die and bury, but he would be raised from amongst the dead. Not only this, but when he died, he would die in the midst of criminals. and he'd make his grave with the wicked and the rich and his dad. Believers, thou the prophets, I know thou believest. Listen, friend, it is possible for men and women to believe intellectually all those things. I meet hundreds of people all over the world. And when I speak to them of the claims of Christ, some of them will rip through the words of the Apostles III, I believe in God the Father, Creator, and heaven, earth, and in Jesus' postage. They'll even say, I believe in the forgiveness of sins. Yet the tragedy is then. that while they believe in the head, they believe there was a man who lived once long ago called Jesus, they believe he went about doing good, they believe, but they never believed in their heart. We had a dear old brother in our meeting years ago who in rather a remarkable, somewhat crude way used to say, I don't want you to believe in your head. If you believe in your head, I'll take a fledgehammer to you and give it a bang so it gets down in your heart. And I'll give you another bang so it goes down into your feet and you're walking the ways of it. Oh, I wouldn't say that, of course. I'm only repeating what he said. I only know this, that it's not enough just to believe in our head. Believers thou the prophet? He believed, but he wasn't saved. He said so. Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian. It wasn't someone else said he wasn't a Christian. He said it. Although he recognized the truth. For the tragedy of this man is that the man who recognized the truth was the man who resisted the truth. Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian. Almost. My friend, if you're hungry, almost eating doesn't fill you, does it? If you're thirsty, almost drinking doesn't quench your thirst, does it? If you're tired, almost sleeping doesn't restore you to strength again, does it? If you're traveling on a train, almost catching the train doesn't take you to your destination. I think almost is one of the bitterest words in the English vocabulary. Almost. Almost. He said, almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian. This is the story of near achievement and yet total love. This is the story of a Moses, surely, who blazed a good trail, who climbed Mount Nebo, who saw the promised land, but never entered it. Oh, my friend, almost is not enough. Almost. Is there someone here? Oh, please, some of you I remember. long as you don't ask me afterwards what's my name I remember your faces some of you I can remember where I saw last and how you stood with me and the children as we had the children's services here those years ago but some of you I've never met before am I talking to someone who says this morning I'm almost a Christian I've been going along there so often. I've heard the gospel preach so frequently. I've been stirred in my being. I would say amen to the historical truths that they preached there in the gospel, Jackal. And yet you've never trusted the Lord. The man who recognized the truth, the man who resisted the truth, But please, the man who renounced the truth, for there came a time when he committed Paul to prison, when he committed Paul to prison, and in committing him to prison, told the whole world, no Christ for me. I shudder that the day will have dawned on anyone's experience when we will renounce the truth. But against him, alongside him, if you will, there stands another man, not a king, but as you gaze at him with the chains on his hands and feet, chains that made him say, I wish you were just like me except these bombs. Oh, what a man, you say. If ever there was a person that we would say was a Christian, this is the man. Saul passed. Paul the preacher. The battle was given to us, led by the Spirit of God so much of the Holy Word. And as we look at him, all we're bound to ask the question, is he a Christian? This prisoner, what is he to say to us? He leaves us in no doubt, you know. He tells us that first of all, he was a man who thought. For in the words of verse nine, he says, Verily I thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. he looks back over his life and he remembers the time when he gave some consideration to the claims of Christ he fought indeed of the truth of the word of God for he was a Pharisee of Pharisees and yet in his thinking he was led to say no to Jesus Christ but he was not only a man who thought I say could I say he was a man who fought who fall. There is many a man or a woman who thinks about the claims of Christ and says, not for me. There are some men and women who not only think of the claims of Christ and say, not for me, but openly will stand and will fight against the things of Christ. We are living in a day of a sick society. Oh, please, I find no joy whatsoever in opening my newspaper and turning the knob of my wireless, looking at my television and hearing the news. I find no joy in going through a list of things that is breaking up our nations. In my country, the same as yours, the breakup of marriage, the increase of drugs, the drinking among young people. All around us we're finding folk indeed who can't be trusted, whose word is useless, prisons full. In lands where the gospel's been preached, I can understand that happening in China, I can understand that happening in Russia, I can understand that happening in lands where the name of Jesus has never been heard. But in our land, I look and I say, oh, there are those who not only think about Christ, but there are those who fight against Christ. Those who go forth and like Paul say, and many of the saints I shut up in prison to stifle down the voice of that which is righteous and good. But something happened. the man who thought and the man who thought was the man who fell the man who fell for he saw light above the brightness of the noonday sun and he says and when we were all fallen to the ground all fallen to the ground my friend If there is one thing that I am more persuaded than I've ever been in my life, it's the need of our dead. It's a need of old-fashioned repentance, a need of the realization that when we come in contact with Christ, we are coming in contact with a twice-holy God. Oh, my friend, my friend, When you and I compare ourselves to one another, we're not too bad, are we? I was speaking at a school the day before yesterday on Friday. And as I spoke to this crowd of youngsters, first of all, of course, I spoke to the little ones. And then I just took two or three minutes and spoke to the seniors there. and I just used a little illustration that I sometimes use and I may have used in schools around here but I whipped out a piece of chalk and on the board I said oh when I went to school we used to have arithmetic of course they're very posh today they call it mathematics but you know the master you took his piece of chalk and he drew a little horizontal line and he said boys don't forget that means and they got it right and then he took his chalk and he took two horizontal lines and that means and they got it right and then he put a piece of chalk and he put a perpendicular line and a horizontal line and that means then we spoke of a little verse in James what is your life is it minus is it equal Or is it plus? And I reminded them that there's lots of folk I need to say, Oh, I'm as good as you. I told them of an occasion when I was in South Wales and we were inviting folk to the service and I knocked the door and spoke to a good gentleman and asked him to the service and he poked me in the chest and he said, It's the poor. I'm as good as anyone that goes there. and I poked him back and I hope I poked him back a bit harder. And I said, listen, Mr. Williams, you're not only as good as anyone who goes there, but you're as bad as anyone who goes there. Who are you equal with? You're not equal with the Lord. And Paul suddenly saw the brightness of the sun and he fell down. My friend, A man who was thinking. A man who was fighting. A man who was fallen. But oh, hallelujah. A man who followed. For he looks up into the face of King Agrippa in verse nineteen and he says, And I was not disobedient to that heavenly vision. May I ask you today. King Agrippa? The Apostle Paul? Who would represent you? The man who recognizes the truth, but resisted it and renounced it? Or the man who renounced it, resisted it? Hallelujah, then received it. Are you a Christian? If you are, if there's been a time when you took Jesus Christ as your Savior, what sort of Christian are you? What sort of Christian? I was not disobedient. How easy it is to disobey the Lord when we've even trusted him and asked him to be our Savior. All that we hear may be found as a people who are not only those who receive the Lord, but those who follow him. Follow him. Oh, my friend, our time has come to a close. May I ask you, are you a Christian? What sort of Christian are you? Oh, that we may be found as those who have taken Christ as our Savior and are seeking day by day to crown him as our sovereigns. that we may be followers of the Lord. And if by chance there's someone here, and you've never trusted the Lord, you say, I'm not sure that I am a Christian. Can I help you? I took from the shelves and the little study I'm using a few of these little tracks. I didn't ask permission to take them, sir, but I took them. I'm not going to take them away, will be, sir, not as they did the Gideon Bible. But if there's someone here this morning, and you are not sure, you want to be sure, I hold in my hand a few copies of that lovely little tract, God's way of salvation. Not my way of salvation, I haven't got away, but God's way of salvation. If you are not sure and you want to be sure, come and ask us for one. And I would accept that as a sign from you of your willingness to talk about these days. I'd love to open my Bible and point you to my sake. If you'd rather speak to a lady, my wife's heel, there are plenty of sisters here, trained counselors, plenty of brethren you know much better than I, no virtue in coming to me. If we can help you find Christ, That's why we hear. Trust the Lord whatever else you do. Pray his name, sir. Shall we close the prayer? O God and Father, we bless thee together for thy word. We thank thee that you leave us in no doubt whatsoever that it's possible for us to know thee. the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. And we don't want to be like that last king of the Jews. We don't want to be folk who give some outward assent to things who recognize truth. We don't want to be those who resist it. But oh, we long tonight to say that we might be the receivers of that truth. And as the receivers of the truth, the recipients of the salvation that Jesus Christ died on Calvary's rock cross to secure for us. Bless us, then we pray. And as we part one from another, let not from thee, make thy face to shine upon us and grant us by thee.