That the greatest human experience is knowing Jesus Christ as Lord, a truth illustrated by the Apostle Paul's testimony in Philippians 3. Paul counted all his earthly achievements as loss for the surpassing worth of knowing Christ, highlighting that this knowledge is more valuable than anything the world can offer. The message further explores the Christian hope of being absent from the body and present with the Lord, described as "far better" (Philippians 1:23), and the ultimate future transformation into Christ's likeness, both spiritually and physically, as described in 1 John 3 and Philippians 3. This future glory, where believers will be like Christ and see Him as He is, represents the highest bliss and the ultimate prize for believers.
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I mentioned to you this morning that my wife and I are delighted to be back again at Park of the Palm. We are just in the United States for a couple of weeks, leaving this Friday once again for Santo Domingo. I would like to take tonight just a few moments before we look at the Scriptures to share with you some of the developments in that land in this last year while we have lived and worked there in the service of God. May I begin by just making brief reference to some of the Lord's people whom I'm sure some of you know and love and respect very highly in the Lord. Three weeks ago today, Grace and I were in the city of Puerto Plata on the northern coast of the Dominican Republic, where Mr.
and Mrs. Duncan Reed have served the Lord for many long years. Over a year ago, Mr. Reed went to England. with a very delicate and severe problem in one of his legs, and as I presume most of you know, the leg was amputated in England, and many thought that he would never again return to the Dominican Republic. He is seventy-seven years of age, but earlier this year, Mr. and Mrs. Reed did return to the Dominican Republic and are back again in the city of Puerto We were in their home three weeks ago today and ministered in the home church where Mr.
Reed has labored for many years and have great joy in sharing with you tonight that in spite of all the infirmities and the trials of the last year, we have never seen in recent times Mr. Reed in such a happy frame of mind and interested and active within certain limits in the service of God. He has an artificial leg and is able to go down to the services. Periodically he ministers amongst the Lord's people. By no means is he as active as he once was. But he's back there again, his heart in the Lord's work and active in a measure in the Lord's service.
Some of you will remember Miss Rene Bolton, who for many years served the Lord in the Dominican Republic. We call her Rene, and she left this past summer for retirement and now is relocated permanently in the city of Vancouver, Canada. Miss Bolton will also be missed, having lived there and worked there for many long years. I went in And Rini had been there long years before that. So after many years of active service in that country, she is now retired to Canada. Someone this morning asked me about Rini, pardon me, Ivy. We call her Ivy.
I think you know her perhaps as Marion Iverson. She also is in Puerto Planta. And she lived for many years with Rini both. And now she has moved into a small home on her own. and is very active in children's work and in ladies' work in that area of the Republic. I have not seen in recent months the widow of Mr. Ralph Carter, Marion Carter, but I did speak with her on the phone not too long ago. She lives in our second largest city, the city of Santiago, and she is well and active also in school work, and in women's and children's work in that city.
Many of you will have known personally Miss Eva Russell, who very suddenly went home to be with the Lord in the early part of this year. Eva was also a servant of the Lord who was in the Dominican Republic before nineteen forty-seven, so she was there a long time, was highly appreciated amongst the people where she worked in the Monte Plata area, and very suddenly, I believe it was in the month of April, she went to be with the Lord. At her own request, and with the approval of her family in British Columbia, Canada, her remains were buried in the little town of Monte Plata, where she had put her heart and her effort for many years.
It's very difficult tonight, just in a moment, to share with you something of what a woman like Eva has done, but Monte Planta was away from the capital city about an hour and a half drive. I've gone there with her in years gone by. The road was terrible, but Eva every Sunday made the trip out there, and then laterally went out at least twice a week. The road had improved a little. And I believe today there are two local churches in that area that Eva was related to either in the beginnings or in the building up of those groups. And they go on today in the service of guns.
I should mention tonight Miss Edith House, who went down to Santo Domingo in nineteen forty seven when I went down. Edith was from Vancouver, Canada. She has been back in the Vancouver area for over a year in very poor health. But just before we left Santo Domingo, we had news that she was recuperating after some major surgery and had the hope and the will of God of going back again to Santo Domingo, our capital city. Those who are there may be known to some of you, Mr. and Mrs. Ian Raffey. Our veteran missionaries in the Dominican Republic, we had lunch with them just two weeks ago, and Mrs.
Raffi has been in poor health ever since that very bad car accident about two or three years ago. She doesn't keep particularly well, but she is certainly active in the service of God. Her personality, her temperament is of that nature that you must be up and doing. and she is active in the Lord's service, as is her husband. And then Miss Genevieve White from the Chicago area is also in the city of Santo Domingo. Some of my close colleagues in the service of God are younger men, perhaps not known to those of you who are here tonight, but very close friends of mine, Mr.
John Shannon and his family and Mr. Bill Kent and his family. They are located in our capital city, And together with myself, the three of us, together with a number of Dominican colleagues, are active in the daily ministry. Now, I mentioned that to you on previous occasions. Daily is just a little Spanish word made up of four letters D-E-L-E. It stands for a very long Spanish title that has to do with literature, with radio work, and with Christian films. And we've had the joy of participating actively in the daily ministry since returning to the Dominican Republic.
Towards the end of nineteen seventy-three, we were sending out each month from our office in downtown Santo Domingo about three hundred to three hundred and fifty Emmaus Bible school correspondence courses in Spanish each month. None of us were satisfied with that with that particular figure. was not really a lot of work to send out three hundred courses a month. And so we made it a matter of prayer, and God has blessed in this year, nineteen seventy-four. On an average, we have sent out each month approximately one thousand Bible correspondence courses to all parts of the Dominican Republic.
And this ministry warms our hearts. We receive every day letters from students, young people, and older folks, some who have come to know the Lord Jesus through the study of the courses and many others who have grown in grace and have become more active in the service of God. I have during this year tried to make a study in view of the people who do the courses and the correspondence we receive from them, and I come to the conclusion that this particular ministry has a far greater impact in the life of the church in the Dominican Republic than perhaps we previously realized.
Many of what some people call the lay preachers get their preparation for the ministry of the Word of God through the study of these Emmaus courses. And many who are imposterous of small rural country churches, they study the courses. And many of those men and women who've never had the opportunity to build up a library or to sit under the ministry of a competent minister of the works have found that through the study of these courses they have been able to prepare themselves for the service of God. And then the radio work continues over Trans World Radio.
Our daily program is built around the Emmaus courses, and it reaches right down into all of South America. We've been encouraged this year, and the reference now is only to this year. The encouragement goes back a few years, but I'm just going to mention one or two things during this year, nineteen seventy-four. A long, tight-written letter came to my desk just about four months ago. from a man who lives in a little town in the jungles of Peru. The town is actually located where Bolivia, Peru, and Brazil come together.
It must be one of those backwoods rural towns. And in the letter he said that there was no Protestant or evangelical church in his town. The only church was a Roman Catholic church. And the building was in a state of ruin because for the last three or four years, there was no priest available to service the people in that community. The only direct spiritual help that they received was over the radio. And in the second or third paragraph of the letter, he mentioned listening to Trans World Radio, And hearing the broadcast in Spanish, it is called su clase biblica and listening to the gospel for the first time.
It led to his conversion. We spoke this morning on the new birth. He was born again on the basis of repentance and the work of the Spirit of God in his heart. When I got down that far in the letter, I'm a very conservative man, but I almost said out loud, Hallelujah. You know, you spend money. and time and work to see these broadcasts go out over the radio, and then now and then you get a letter like this. Well, when I read on, the letter said that after a short time, his wife and children all came into a knowledge of the Lord Jesus as their saints. Well, I thought that was great news.
And then I led the next paragraph And he went on to say, and since then two more families have come to know the Lord Jesus as their Savior. And then in the last paragraph, he got to the purpose of the letter. He said, I'm writing you this letter to see if you will help us and tell us how we can set up a Christian church in this town. Now, of course, there was no way that we could visit him a way down in that obscure part of South America. But I did send him that copy in Spanish of Bill McDonald's course on the church and other relevant material and commended him and those who belonged to that group to God for his blessing and his encouragement.
We've had many letters coming from down as far as Chile and the Argentine, just one other example of this year, The man wrote us from the Argentine, and he said to us that he had tried many things in his life. Most recently, he had spent fifteen years in a spiritist group in the Argentine. Now, I've never been involved in any way with the spiritist movement in Latin America. I'm not at all familiar with their vocabulary. But this man in his letter explained the different degrees and how a man progresses.
And he told us how he moved from one status to another and apparently had gone very high in this particular spiritist group in the Argentine. Until finally over financial matters, he became disillusioned. And he left completely empty, spiritually bankrupt, and one night, late at night, He heard the broadcast over Transworld Raising. And he was led to go out the next day and buy a Bible. And he never bought or read a Bible before in his life. And he began to read the Bible and to condense the story, it led to his conversion. And he said to it, how much he would have given if the Bible had come into his hands many years before.
But hearing the broadcast, which is built around the Scriptures, in Spanish it's called to Classes Bibrica in English, that would be more or less your Bible class. And the emphasis on the Bible led him to purchase the copy, and that led to his conversion. Strange things are happening in Latin America today, even in our country, the Dominican Republic. I have received two letters this year from a Roman Catholic nun. who lives in the city of Puerto Plata, where Mr. Reed lives. I've never met this nun. I made a trip over to see her one day, but she happened to be away from her convent and was down in the capital city, so I've never met her.
But the first letter came. It was directed to us as an institution, a known evangelical institution. And in the letter, she asked if we would send her copies of the New Testament and Bible correspondence courses that she could use with the children and the young people in the rural communities where she worked around the city of Puerto Plata. Well, I'd never received a letter like that from a nun before, so I decided I wouldn't send it through the mail. I would take it up personally to her. So not many weeks later, I made the trip up to Puerto Plata and went along.
to the convent and the school where she lives and works. And when I arrived there, I was met by the mother superior of the institution who told me that this particular nun was over in Santo Domingo. So I told her why I had come and she asked me in and we sat down and talked. I would say for about an hour. And I came away wondering deep in my heart if I hadn't met another sister in the Lord. Her interest in the Scriptures and in the Bible correspondence courses was most remarkable. About a month ago, another letter came again from the same nun whom I have not yet met, asking for further Bible correspondence courses and copies of the Scriptures for these people, these young people, with whom she is working.
Well, we thank God for all of those contacts. and commend the material and the Scriptures to Him for His blessing as they are used in this particular way. Now, I mustn't go on tonight. Just let me share with you that during this year we made a trip all along the northern coast of the Dominican Republic, visiting many of the assembly, congregations of the Lord's people in that area, and have been encouraged by the number of young people The number of people committed to the things of God, and I was impressed, and I rejoiced in this, and I share it with you tonight. We have not just one or two meetings, but meetings, I think, in almost fifteen different communities right along that central, northern part of the Republic, some of them outdoors under trees, some of them in private homes, some of them in little churches.
And the gospel was preached, the word of God was ministered, and there was evidence of blessing in that time. So we're going back again after this very short stay in the United States. And I know that some of you pray for us in the Dominican Republic. I share these things with you tonight, for God is working in our land, and we rejoice as we actually see it day by day. One further thought about our home church, in Santo Domingo. My wife told me to mention this to you tonight, and I almost forgot. We've seen growth there in recent months that has been very, very wonderful.
Baptism, people converted to the Lord, a number of families that have moved, one from New York, one from the city of Santiago in our own country, over to the capital city and have joined with us. And today there is a growing congregation marked by a lot of young people, a lot of children, a lot of young couples, and most of them are desirous and anxious to serve the Lord. In the congregation itself, God has blessed them. There are a number of very competent people, both men and women, and as we work with them in the things of God, we trust that you'll remember us periodically and ask for God's blessing in the Dominican Republic.
Our home church, by the way, is called Salah Evangelica, and it is right down in the main part of the city of Santo Domingo. If you ever come down to visit us, you'll find us right off of Independence Park, and you'd be most welcome to join with us in our fellowship there. Now, this evening... I would like to share with you from the Scriptures just three fonts. I did not come with the intention of speaking on this subject tonight. But when we arrived last night and taught with John and Jesse, they shared with us that a number of friends whom we have held in high esteem and whom we have loved in this particular church fellowship have gone to be with the Lord since we were last here.
For instance, Mr. Anderson, who always led the singing, is not with us tonight. No doubt he's participating in a much greater service of song and praise in the presence of the Lord, but we miss him here at Park of the Palm. Mrs. Bennett, who maybe most of you wouldn't know, Mrs. Bennett and her husband entertained us in Miami long years ago when we were on the way to the Dominican Republic. And then Mr. Tom Lacey, who was in my home in Vancouver, Canada, when I was just a little boy, and that goes back a long time. And he's gone to be with the Lord.
And Mr. Jack Sheffield, whom we learned to appreciate in recent years here, is no longer with us. and others who have gone from our midst and are now in the presence of the Lord. Most of us here knew Rina Harvey and no longer with us but went just last week to be with the Lord and as we think of Rina, many of us who belong to the old timers now who have been associated with the part, our hearts are filled with mixed feelings as we remember someone we loved and worked with and now is absent with the Lord. There are thoughts of joy when we think of them and there are thoughts of sorrow when we think of ourselves, for we miss them and we love them and they're no longer with us.
Let me build tonight a very simple pyramid. And you begin with a very solid foundation that the greatest experience in life is to know personally Jesus Christ as Lord. Now, not as often said, may I just repeat it tonight, there is no greater experience in life. Many people who call themselves Christians really don't give evidence that that is true. You can tell sometimes by looking at them that their passion their interests, their desires are in other things, primarily.
And only apparently in a secondary sense are they involved with Christianity and with the person of the Lord Jesus. But when you come to the Scriptures and you meet men like Peter and Paul and John and others, there is absolutely no doubt that in the experience of those men, This was the greatest thing that had ever happened to them. First of all, to know the Lord Jesus, and then to learn to love him, and then to have the opportunity of serving him. There was absolutely nothing that could be compared to him.
Now, I'm not really sure if most of us give that impression today or not, but I do know that was the impression given by men. Two thousand years ago, and down through these two thousand years ago. And it was such a great thing in their lives that sometimes when they were called to recant, they would not do it. Rather, they were prepared and ready to die for their trust and confidence in the Lord Jesus. Let's just take Paul for a moment tonight in Philippians chapter three. whereas I mentioned this morning he gives us very briefly his testimony, Philippians chapter three, and in verse seven, Paul says, But what things were gained to me, those I counted lost for Christ, yea, doubtless, And I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them
but done, that I may win Christ. He makes the contrast, and in the same category as Nicodemus, he had from a human point of view a great deal to be proud of. a great deal in which, humanly speaking, he could glory. When he puts it all together, and then on the other side, he puts the possibility of knowing Christ Jesus his Lord, Paul says, I'm going to reject all that I have in order that I may win Christ, to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him.
Now the key phrase in verse eight is this phrase, the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord. One translation reads as follows, the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus Christ as Lord. And the thought, the surpassing worth, gives you the idea of making a comparison, of making a contrast. And when he does so, it was a surpassing work to know the Lord Jesus, far surpassing anything that he could find in all that he had accomplished in this life.
So from the point of view of Paul, the greatest possible human experience was in this life to know the Lord Jesus and to serve him. Now, many of us have never really achieved very much in the world. We're ordinary people. But even so, we have made that contrast. We've compared what we have and what the world potentially can offer us. And as we've come to the Scriptures and by faith have caught a glimpse of the glory of the Lord Jesus, we have faith.
It is surpassing work to know Him, and we've accepted Him as our Savior and Lord. I know, and I speak personally and no doubt share your experience tonight, that there have been times when the glory of the world has come back and fascinated us for a moment, for a time. but we've come back again and we have remembered that there is nothing that compares to the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord. If this is true, then when we think of those who die and who leave us, we come to the first chapter of Philippians, and we find a most remarkable phrase in the writings of Paul, Another one of those phrases that is well known, but just because it is well known, never detracts from its significance.
Philippians one in verse twenty three. For I am in a strait betwixt two, Paul says, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. Now that phrase in English, which is far better, doesn't really give the force of what you have in the original language. You can add the word very far better, or you can add the word exceedingly far better, and that begins to give you the force of what Paul has in mind.
It's not something just a little better. not something just better, it is something exceedingly far better than anything in this life which we know and experience as Christians. Now, that takes you a great step higher in this period. If in our Christian experience today, in spite of all that the world offers, We come to the Word of God and find it established in God's Word, and then we back it up by our own experience that the greatest human experience now is to know Jesus Christ.
And then you find that when the moment comes to lead this world and to pass into that next world, though we may not see clearly all that awaits us, nor can we make out the details of that glory before us. This much is clearly stated that it is far, far greater than anything we have experienced none. You may remember that in Second Corinthians chapter five, Paul tells us a little bit about that experience. Verse one, For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God and house not made with hands eternal in the heavens.
For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven. If so be that being clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened, not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon that mortality might be swallowed up of life. I hardly think to this audience that verse need be clarified, but perhaps I should for any who might not be familiar with what Paul is saying." The phrase to be found naked or to be found unclosed refers to that experience of being absent from the body and present with the Lord.
Sometimes we think of our body just simply as a house easily discarded and left behind, but Paul knew much better than we do if we think that way, for the house or our bodies They are not simply dwelling places. They are part of what we are as human beings. A human being is made up of spirit, soul, and body. Now Paul says what we really want is to be present when the Lord Jesus returns. Then in a moment this body will be changed, transformed, and we will be with the Lord in a state of glory, spirit, souls, and body.
But of course that didn't happen to Paul. It hasn't happened to that great multitude of Christians during the last two thousand years who have fallen asleep in Jesus. Their bodies remain in this world, in dunks, Their spirit, soul, present with the Lord. Now that experience, which is not the complete, glorious experience that awaits us, that experience of being with the Lord, without our body, even so, it is far, far greater, far, far better than anything we have now.
Paul says, I'm really in a street. I would like to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. But he also had that keen desire to be a faithful servant of the Lord and to be present here in the service of God. But his longing, his longing was to be in the presence of the Lord. Now we've gone two steps tonight. The first step we have all experienced in our own way. and in our own world. And in our own words tonight, each one of us could express in some way what Paul says when he speaks about the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord.
Perhaps we'd have a difficult time to find adequate words, that spiritual experience which is tender and intimate of our Christian life. There is nothing, nothing else, in this world that compares to that relationship with the Lord Jesus. Now, some of our friends whom I've missed today, they've gone the second step. For they're absent from us. They're present with the Lord. Their bodies were buried, no doubt, in this area. But with the Lord tonight, They are enjoying an experience that can only be described as very far better than anything they ever experienced here.
I have a brother, as some of you know, younger than I am, who three years ago, after serious illness, went to be with the Lord, and I find myself even yet now and then in a moment of melancholy, a moment of sadness, thinking of Bill, but Then I remember that it's simply sadness for myself, not for Beth, for he is now present with the Lord. But there is one experience that we await, and those that have fallen to sleep in the Lord also await, and that we're all going to share it again. And that is referred to in many places in the New Testament, but Let me take you to First John chapter three, where we read in verse two, Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.
Now, in that sense, the Lord Jesus has not yet appeared. He stands, so to speak, just behind the stage of human affairs. No one knows the moment here in our world. We who are Christians, we wait. If we really love him, our waiting is an exercise in patience, for we long to see him. But the Scripture states that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.
Now, I think that last phrase is the highest bliss that is sent before the Christian, and it is linked with the fact that we shall be like Him. not just morally, and we thank God for that, that we will be as He is, without spot, without blemish, no more sin, perhaps not even the memory of sin. We shall be like Him, but also physically. For back in Philippians chapter three and the last verse of that chapter, Paul says, who shall change our vile body, our body of humiliation, that it may be fashioned like unto his body of glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.
Thus when he comes back, the dead in Christ shall be raised first. and we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air. And there will be a transformation of our bodies. And then, in glorified bodies and glorified spirits and souls, in the totality of what we are as human beings, but now transformed and glorified, We shall see him, and we shall be like him, and we shall be with him forever.
All through the New Testament and in the Old Testament there's just a little insight into this precious truth also. For the psalmist said that when I see him, he longed to see him in his faith in righteousness. He says, I shall be satisfied when I awake with his likeness. But in the New Testament, in far greater detail, it is spelled out that there is a moment coming when having seen the Lord Jesus in all that he is today as the second man, as the head of a new community, we shall see him, and we shall be like him, spirit, soul, and body.
And in that we shall see him. are included all of those who have been redeemed by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Not one will be missing. So there will be no more separation. No one will be thought of but missed. But all of those whom we have known and that great multitude that we do not know altogether. In a glorified state we shall praise and honor our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So we have a great deal to thank God for today.
And I don't say this tonight with arrogance, but with that sense of joy and confidence in the Word of God, it doesn't matter what the man of the world has to date. whether it has to do with wealth, whether it has to do with talent, whether it has to do with power and authority, there is nothing that the man of the world has that compares to what we have, the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord. And tonight we can only let our imaginations governed by the Word of God try to grasp what Mr.
Lacey and Mr. Sheffield and Mr. Anderson and Mrs. Bennett and many others that we've known and loved what they have tonight. Perhaps the very most that we can say is go back and borrow the words of Paul. What they have is far better than anything the Christian could possibly have in his unique experience in life. But that's not the greatest point in our Christian bliss and happiness, for they wait, as we wait for that moment of transformation and of the fullness of our salvation, when our bodies, souls, and spirits are all transformed and fashioned like unto our Lord Jesus Christ in his state of glory today.
Join with me in singing just a verse or two as we close tonight of hymn number six hundred and twenty-nine. And is it so I shall be like thy son? Is this the grace which he for me has won? Father of glory fought beyond all thought in glory to his own blessed likeness brought. Let us stand and sing hymn number six hundred and twenty-nine. The second verse reads, O Jesus, Lord, who loved me like to thee.
Let us stand and sing hymn number six hundred and twenty-nine. And is it so I shall be like thy son? Is this the grace which he for me has won? Father of glory, thought beyond all thought.
In glory to his own blessed likeness brought. O Jesus, Lord, Full on me like to thee. Fruit of thy word with thee do thereto see. Thy glory, Lord, while endless ages growl.
myself the prize and travail of thy soul. Yet it must be my love hand were thy redeemed not with thee fully blessed. That love that gives, not as the world but shares.
All it possesses, with its love for air. Nor I alone, thy loved ones, all complete. Though there were joy shall meet all like thee, for thy glory like thee, Lord, objects supreme of all by all adorned.
And now may the love of God our Father, and the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all until we meet again. Amen. You may be seated. I'm going to get out of here.