Doing what is Right

We'll read in Galatians chapter 6. I'm hoping that I'm following along with my brother I've been speaking about Galatians chapter 6 It's been an encouraging weekend. I've appreciated being here in Cedar Falls again Listen to our brethren Helpful ministry and encouragement. I trust we've all had the same result.

I Just want to read one verse in Galatians chapter 6 That's verse 9 Paul is coming to the close of this wonderful epistle But he says and let us not be weary in well-doing For a new season we shall reap if we faint not There's something about this verse has been speaking to my heart and a mind I trust it'll be used in some measure to encourage each one of us that we might be able to go on and faithfulness of the Lord having heard what we've been listening to over the weekend and Receiving some encouragement and challenges from it Appreciate the way the afternoon has begun and I'm just going to try to follow up with what my brother has been speaking about In some measure at least let us not be weary in Well-doing that's an exhortation It begins with an exhortation Brethren, don't be weary in well-doing And then it gives us a promise he says for in due season we shall reap and Then it's a condition if we faint not There's something necessary in the work of God, isn't it? And that is perseverance The ability just to continue and not give up. I Think sometimes the easiest thing to do is to give up Sometimes you feel overwhelmed or maybe underwhelmed with the lack of results in the work You're seeking to do Maybe you've tried many times to do what you believe is right in terms of communicating the gospel To a friend or neighbor or to someone that you know, and you haven't seen results easy to give up No, he says let us not be weary and the word weary means don't be Don't be exhausted. Don't let it overwhelm you don't become spiritless Don't lose your heart in it.

He says don't be weary in well-doing And it gives us a promise. He says in due season and that doesn't mean right away It doesn't mean immediately You know, sometimes well you farmers are getting ready to go out in the field pretty soon. You're not going to harvest it in April It takes time.

It takes labor. It takes work. It takes care And in any work that you and I seek to do no matter what it might be in the gospel or whether be in the Assembly or to encourage another believer or whatever it might be in due season And that means it's not your time or my time that we receive the results.

It's God's time. I learned a lot I wish I'd learned more from brother the laborer on the West Coast. I Don't think anybody here knows him He labored up and down the West Coast And he saw at least two assemblies established One was Salem.

The other was Grants Pass His name was Lester hind He actually married my wife and me. So he's very special to my in my relationship But I had a great admiration for that man, but he told me one thing that I've never forgotten He said I believe that my responsibility is to preach the gospel And leave the results with God He said I don't believe the results are mine those that's that's a responsibility the Lord. I'm Responsible to do my work and leave the results with God And he consistently labored according to that pattern He did something actually in his labors that I've never seen anybody else do And that is that he told me and I saw it in practice He told me that I believe the right way for me to labor in the gospel is to go where the Lord directs me to go and Stay there until he directs me to leave And of course in that climate you can live in a climb and a camping trailer Which is what he did at about a 15-foot camping trailer, maybe 20 foot I don't know what it was.

I stayed with him in it. Somehow. There's a room for both of us, but nevertheless He would go and he'd take that and he would begin working visiting door-to-door Meetings and homes Bible studies and he just stayed there We didn't see him sometimes for months He'd be there working And you know eventually saw a work done for God I'm not saying that's the only way to work, but there was a man that had to consistently Continued to labor and in due season in due season he reaped You know brothers sisters you and I are exhorted in the Word of God as we've heard from a brother Brody Lift up your eyes behold the fields are white of the harvest That was in a time of the Lord Jesus and it's still true today And he alone could tell us that because he knows But I want to notice with you just a few things before I sit down because I'm not gonna speak long Got other men here to speak.

I want to notice five things in his one gospel I mean, there's one epistle. Sorry. It is one epistle five things I want you to notice will be pleased that have to do with well-doing Have to do with doing what is well, what is doing, right? Just consistently continuing in a pattern of labor.

That may not be outstanding may not be Flamboyant may not be attractive may not be interesting may not be that which which causes a great deal of excitement But just doing well, and you'll find that expression I think a number of times in the scripture the thought of just doing well is doing well It's interesting. He comes to that at the end of this epistle Because he'd been dealing with things that were not going well. We're not doing well Those that were introducing wrong doctrine in so far as the gospel was concerned and undermining his work Those that were causing problems and divisions among God's people and they weren't doing well At different ways.

He is contrasting what he's exhorting the believers to do with what he saw That was taking place at that time And dear brothers and sisters you and I don't have to follow the pattern that maybe others may be Carrying off on it may not be doing well at all But we have instruction for the Word of God to tell us what we need to do in order to do well Think about the first chapter of this epistle They bring before them the need to maintain and proclaim correct gospel He says there are those that are bringing a false gospel among you He says there's other ones that claim perhaps authority from heaven and they're telling you a false gospel He says if anyone brings any gospel unto you other than what you've heard from us, let him be accursed Even if he's an angel, no matter who he is don't listen to him because he's bringing you something of a message of destruction He's not doing well And what I think of well-doing in your life and my dear child of God first of all you and I have been called by God to maintain the correct message of the gospel and to proclaim it in one way or the other We may not all preach of preaching the platform. We sure have an opportunity And I I'm convinced in my own mind. I'm convicted also of my own failure how many opportunities I miss How many times it could be that I could have passed a little word to another person Maybe a person by the well Maybe someone who you encountered And some are more adept by doing that than others of of simply opening somehow directed me the conversation of the gospel But I know that you and I God brings many people into our life and our experience and we feel to realize That's a person that's a candidate for the gospel That's a person that needs to know the truth That's a person that may be dependent on something that is absolutely false and is never going to bring them blessing well-doing begins with The gospel, you know dear brother the gospel brought you and me the greatest blessing we can we could possibly enjoy We would not enjoy what we have and the things of God today had it not been for the gospel being brought to us I Thank God for the man that brought me the gospel I thank God for parents that were faithful in bringing the gospel before me continually.

I Remember Even in my mind today. I remember Every morning that my father gathered all six of us children in the living room Read a chapter from the Bible And we kneel down and he prayed for all of us prayed for other things too, but he prayed for us as well So there were those that had a concern about the gospel I remember a Sunday school teacher that was faithful They're bringing the gospel When I was just a young little boy, I remember what he had to say Messages that stick in my mind. He was doing well And he was using opportunities that God gave him to be effective in Speaking to souls So Paul reminds him in chapter 1 of the need They might not listen to a false gospel and dear brother and sisters You and I need to be so solidly established in the truth of the gospel That we can convey it to others that we can communicate it properly You and I need to ask yourselves.

Could I really give another person a clear message of the gospel? in a way that was said before them the The ruin of man the sinfulness of man and the need for the Savior and the Sufficiency of his work at Calvary, you know, we are left here for that purpose one reason that we might minister the gospel to others Paul said what was me if I preach not the gospel And you and I have a great responsibility And we can do well and bring you the gospel for others In the second chapter, I noticed this and well-doing and that is setting a good example before a brethren You remember he says there in that chapter. He speaks about Peter and The fact that Peter was eating with the Gentiles Before there are certain Jews that came down from James and from Jerusalem and in that sense Peter was doing what was right It was recognizing the fact there were no distinctions That these were accepted and a part of the church just as much as the Jews were and so they're all one in Christ But then something happened because when the Jews came for Jerusalem, he separated himself And what he was doing was a bad example It was an example that was going to ruin the entire work It was going to tear down what God had been doing among them It was going to contradict everything that Paul had been preaching to them and teaching them and Peter was failing to set a good example and Paul of course rightly Had him set him straight Had to correct him and he did so publicly because it was absolutely serious Very very essential that that be that be stopped that had to be stopped And so we find there that there's a need for you and me To set a good example before others a pattern others that can follow us And we won't lead others Astray, you know what Paul was asking for he was looking for consistency Not only a correct gospel, but a consistent life a life that was continually Exemplifying the truth that he professed to believe And I asked myself and you can ask yourself at our times what we feel to be consistent You know, I believe sometimes that we we profess things up here somewhere. Sometimes we live down here somewhere relatively speaking we feel to live lives that are Consistent in every circumstance every condition we find ourselves in and every environment But God is looking for consistent believers Paul could say to the believers is what he said it to Timothy without example be that example And you and I should ask yourselves in a neighborhood where I live.

Am I exempt an example of Christ? Am I representing a believer? Am I setting before them the pattern that would be? attractive to them and Consistent with the truth that I seek to proclaim So he says there's a need for having a correct message There's a need to have Consistent behavior that's well-doing a third thing The third thing is that he wants he says in chapter 5. He says there needs to be constancy a walking in the spirit That's well-doing You notice what he says in that chapter. He develops the work of the flesh He develops the inconsistency of believers behaving in a wrong manner And then he brings to the point of it in the chapter that he divides and he changes over and he says There's a different pattern of living that God wants for you and me He wants us to be walking under the control of the Spirit of God Allowing the Spirit of God to have his place Not only as a resident in my life and my art But as the president you might say as a one who was in control He says if you want to if you want to produce the fruit Singular the result of the Spirit of God in your life You've got to allow him to have the place that God wants him to have He must be the one who was in control. He must be walking in his spirit you must be allowing him to have his place of directing and Maintaining the right principles of God in your life.

It's one thing very evident. That is that the flesh can't produce anything that pleases God So then that they that are in the flesh cannot please God and if we walk after the flesh, we can't please God either It requires a work of the Spirit of God in us Because there's something innocent acts contrary to the desires and purpose of God and he wants to conform us more and more to the image of his Son and the Spirit of God is jealous over us with a godly jealousy a Jealousy according to God and he wants to maintain us He wants to separate us and he wants to enable us To produce that kind of fruit that is so honoring to the Lord Jesus the fruit, you notice it's the works of the flesh in plural a A person may be characterized by doing one thing or another thing or another thing But when it comes to the fruit of the Spirit, this is the well-rounded result of what the Spirit of God will produce in your life And that's well doing That's what he wants to do. He wants to make us more conformed to the one who saved us Who were identified with the day? So we're constant in their message We're consistent or a baby behavior we're controlled by the Spirit that's well-doing And then in chapter 4 he tells us there that we are those who are enjoying Christian liberty Not under the bondage of the flesh not under the bondage of legalism No, he says you're able to enjoy the liberty that has set you free The work of Christ are the enabling blessing of God He says you remember You're not like Hagar.

You're not you're not children of the bond woman. You're children of the free You're the result of the grace of God operating in your life and your soul It has liberated you from that power that once held you in bondage And he set you free stand fast. He says in chapter 5 in verse 1 in that liberty Or with the Spirit of God has set you free So you and I are to live in the Spirit and to walk in the Spirit and we're to Enjoy the liberty of Christ that he has brought us into You know Christian life is not intended to be lived Under the control of rules and regulations.

It's not a matter of do's and don'ts If that's the level you're living on then it's very low level that's a that's a level of legalism That's the level of those that are under the law. No, he says we have been set free set free from the bondage of sin and impelled by the controlling power of the Spirit of God and constrained by a love for the Lord Jesus That's a different different level of living all together And you know that is well doing so far as God is concerned That's pleasing to him But last of all in chapter 6 he says there's another thing that's a matter of concern a Concern for my brother. He says brother If a brother be taken no default if he's overtaken in a mistake You that are spiritual? restore Mend that man Bring him back Whatever is necessary do it if possible to bring him back into the enjoyment of the things that he once had in Christ Jesus He said ye that are spiritual Restore Such a one in the spirit of meekness You don't go to him with a superior attitude Let me set you straight.

Let me tell you where you're wrong I'll get you right pretty quick here now And you shake your finger at him, you know like that say you should have done that Well, that may be true, but that's not the right way to go He says with a spirit of meekness Another translation says in a spirit of gentleness We ought to ask ourselves if I'm going to try to be a help to my brother or sister who maybe is Somehow to trespass a blunder a mistake How would the Lord deal with them? After all they belong to the Lord Jesus I'm not in this world and you're not in this world to try to To take a position of superiority and tell them. Well, I know better than you do I Can take care of you pretty quick No, he says in a spirit of meekness And you know why the spirit of meekness has to reveal he says because I know that I can fall just the same I had the same potential Are the same reality exists of me that exists in them and that is that there is a spirit as a There's a potential in any one of us That we can also fall out by the way So the apostle ends this lovely epistle by telling them We got weary well-doing Don't be weary well-doing brethren sister. Don't go away tomorrow after this conference that has lifted you up And forget everything all about it Go away and do Those things that are contrary to what you've been listening to No, he says don't be weary well-doing Because in due season You'll reap It's a promise of a harvest as a promise of results a wonderful thing To know that God rewards all that we do for him He's faithful But he's dependable in every way may we be faithful to him