The Message and the Method of the Apostle Paul

We open the Bible, if you care to follow the Scripture, to the book of Colossians. The book of Colossians, at chapter 1. And I begin reading at verse 25. And I'm making an effort to speak tonight on the method and message of the number one preacher of all time, the apostle Paul.

The method and message, they must go together. Can't have one without the other. We've been pretty certain what the method was.

We must come to see what the method is. We've been pretty free in talking about what the message is. God give us the message, baptized in tears and fire and passion.

God make us a little like him, who when he saw the multitude of his day, being torn to shreds by religious itis of his day. The Greek on it, I've been to school. The Greek on it was that he compassionated them.

He reached in the air and took out his great bleeding heart and let it bleed over the multitude. Oh, he said, they have nobody to shepherd them. God, break our stony hearts.

Tear our lives out. That can get involved in the 25th verse of the 1st chapter of Colossians, this method and message. And since I believe that we must yet face the fact that while they were used of God in their day, they're dead, they've served God in their generation.

And I join with Brother Spurgeon, we quoted him last night. Suppose we stop in the 2nd century, quickly, the Bible. And the message and the method they preached and taught.

And not the least of these apostles was a man by the name of Saul, whose name was changed to Paul. And he gives us this about his ministry. And because I believe that the day God saved you, he put you in the ministry.

Because I believe that the entire New Testament is one long protest against the division between clergy and people. I believe it with all of my heart. Because I believe that he has given the five full ministries to make good ministers out.

Because I believe that by decisions this world has turned God's day into a holiday. You've got to speak. Because I believe that if you hold on to truth, well, I'm going to get to my picture.

I think you are too. According to the economy of the arrangement, it may manifest to his name, know what teaching every man is. When our Lord was there, he taught, he healed.

I wonder if the great need of thou now is not teaching. We know so little, so little. For my mother, we've all got to buy the wrappers off of them.

We know so little. This is the best educated bunch of religious ignoramuses God ever had put up with. We know so little.

But Paul proceeded to preach preaching as to warn men and to teach men. When we preach warning every man, this has been preached here during this conference that I will not repeat, was from Arthur Pink. Down in Spartanburg, those of you who have read his messages, in his name, he's gone to glory now, so I'll talk about him.

But God set him aside to write. Many of us, we don't need some balanced Christian to get them in the middle of a little while. But Arthur Pink, and in its proper order, it's amazing how many of God's people who have done everything in their power, it's amazing how in the nation we have produced the Bible.

I'm driving at the truth that's been emphasized, and I know from this book, that it was the Bible's people, and thus ignored, and then raised them from the dust, so we must preach the Bible in its proper order. And Lord, in that state, I think I'm preaching law, he's on average, the beginning of the Christian life is not in positive self, modern day evangelism, I know I made a million, what I have done, I have done a good job, I've done the best time, I've done the dead scream, against the steamroller evangelism, that comes out of zealous, if you don't need to pray for yourself, I beg, I gotta go from this conference, thanks to what I know, that the beginning of the Christian life, is not in positive self, but it then is to preach, unto men of law, Jesus Christ didn't come down here, to make men a little better, he didn't come down here, to give us a little better standard, my God sent me, even so send I you, unto men of law, I think I built a fire in this, men made for heaven, going to hell, men made for service, men made to err over righteousness, watering in a hog pen, I tell you ladies and gentlemen, the sons of the record said Paul, for the space of three years, I cease not to warn everyone, my God, if you don't cry in your hearts, for sinners to find the name of God, don't you quit disgracing the name of Jesus, his heart was moved, for by his message, message, message go together, he warned people, warned people, on the positive side, he preached first to persons, whom we preach, yes, sometimes it's slow, everybody else sees things, for I do, I'm not a theologian, I'm a copycat, I sit somebody's feet, while I give a little truth, that began to stir in my bones, that people called fundamentalists, and I've run with them all my life, were preaching that salvation was believing the facts, I heard all over the country, that God loves us, and Christ died for us, don't you believe that?

I heard that if a man believed, that Jesus died for him, that he is saved, and I saw some truth there, that began to boil in my soul, I've been trying to get the truth of it ever since, and I began to splash around at least, but it was clear that everybody else, I had to splash along, but I began to see, that a man could stand afar off, and be as orthodox as the devil, for the devil sure believes in the death of Christ, he had something to do with it, and I began to see, that a man could be as orthodox, about the death of Jesus, as all get out, and he could believe the facts, and put it on the shelf, and not be bothered about it anymore, all the time of course, none of the New Testament preachers, ever, the work of church, we preach, I know, we've heard this, was not in believing, but

it's almost that, well at the center, must be the person of Christ, the doctrine of a living person, who was dead, but he's alive, and carries the power of the blood in his hands, Adam, was a life giving, I saw, in the so called, ongoing, that in the course of time, we found, instead of a, as your members, most of you pastors, as orthodox, about the fact business, they even argue about, the theory of the atonement, whether it's universal or limited, but I have some to argue about, they ain't acquainted with the one, who is the atonement, are you saying we mustn't preach facts, no, isolated, from the one they're talking about, preaching is not so much, part out of our own hearts, shoving into the heart, as far as I've been able to read, his life has been attended to the miraculous, I hear

these people that go into hell, trusting their little particulars, but there's lots going on, God's alive, yeah, he does things, about these things, perhaps, had more to do with, producing us some Christianity, in the 20th century, than any living man, he was lecturing, and one of the professors, well he said, what inside Christianity, he said, didn't find any, well the professor said, what principle, did you find, in Christianity, that you didn't, did you find, in Christianity, that you didn't find, in Hinduism, major change, he said, didn't find any, well the professor, what is it, and that humble servant of the Lord, said, I found, at the heart of Christianity, the living, John Bunyan lives, who being, convinced of his own, not a dead person, but a living, regal, bringing, life, and it

is foolish, when he preached, the gospel of possession, Christ, in you, Christ, in, you, we used to sing that old song, how you know, it is script, within my heart, generations too ago, Albert Schweitzer, a new trend, theological war, and he wrote the book, a quest for the historical Jesus, see whether they could find out, whether there was such a person as Jesus, and I know, that our faith, is not built on fables, we have not followed, cunningly devised fables, at a given point, in a given time, almighty God became incarnate, right here on this earth, I know that the Bible, is a book of history, it is not given in a vacuum, human and divine, that God carries history, with it, in him, I know there is a place, for Christ in history, there was a man, by the name of Jesus, he did die, on

Golgotha's hill, he was buried, in another man's grave, as far as history can go, but the Bible, and every child of God, can go still further, God raised him, all of these things happen, right here on this earth, in time, I know, that the Christ of doctrine, has a place, ringing in my heart, so much for my own soul, there is that text, we ought to adorn the doctrine, I know, that you cannot believe in Christ, apart from believing in the truth of it, as it is in him, and about him, Pastor Fenn told me, took old brother Rufus Mosley, the old Saint of God, to a man's house, man warned him to come and pray fine, he got in brother Mosley, sat on one knee and prayed a short prayer, Lord, if the brother knew better, he'd do better, and if he'd do better, he'd know better, amen, that long enough,

but while Christ is a Christ of history, and Christ is a Christ of doctrine, that ain't enough, must be Christ in you, Christ in you, that's the mystery, that's the secret, it's all got out on us now, it's the divine indwelling, with God's tabernacle in man, hear me, it's the word that comes flesh again, it's to be in his church, members of his many-membered body, it's an open secret to those who are in, in the body of Christ, in whose heart Christ has come to dwell, a great host in our ears, we think you're sacred, you're mine, took the time he has since to go through the New Testament, and discover the key to Paul's writings, and then when he found the expression or an equivalent of it in Christ, picked 164 times, it's the key to unlock every doctrine of the New Testament, you preach

justification by faith, apart from this key, and it will turn out people who rejoice in the grace of God, so they can raise some more teeth.

Every one of the doctrines is by this little key phrase, it's not what you believe near as much as where you are, in Christ, in Christ, in Christ.

I say to you, the whole of the gospel turns there, in you, in him, we live and move and have our deeds in Paul's faith, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. William Long wrote these words, this is the whole gospel, the birth of the Holy Lord Jesus within us. He is conquering life, Christ, not in us.

Why is this true? It's true because all our world is on me, and we've got to be the same, to make one turn, the whole family of Christ God, the other will perish. Same thing. Why? Because everything worse than pain comes from in here, in here, yes Jesus, in here.

The climate on the inside is an inward distance, nobody but the Holy Ghost takes the spirit to deal with the spirit, and improve your soulish disposition, your moral disposition, inside a man, a salvation. The hope of glory is Christ in you. Our spirit penetrated by him, a strong blessed God, the resource of all power.

How we do it? At the bottom, at the end of the rope, we'll come up when we hit bottom, but when we hit bottom God will lift us up, and everything will be different. Wills that bend easily as God pulls and directs. Minds that are teachable, God taught.

Emotions that are God saturated. Life restored. Man can't know God by a grasp of ideas.

The Holy Spirit must plant Christ in here. He preached the gospel of procession. The gospel of procession.

I had another point, but I'm going to quit. My time's up. I'm passing.

Old Brother Burke, way back yonder when I was a pastor, had a long flowing mustache. And every time we'd have a testimony meeting, which we had very often, Old Brother Burke'd get up. I'd always know what he'd say to me.

He'd say, I've been through. He's in his late seventies, but he always blessed our hearts. And he'd get up and tell God his experience of grace.

Yes, yes, that's right. His experience of grace. And he'd get up and hold on to the bass, and I'd rather insist it.

He said, you know, God's the neatest man there was. I never wanted that old thing. He said, you know, I lived out on there and had a little farm.

They had a meeting on Saturday morning. He said, preach the priest, and said he insulted me. And he just stood there and asked me, and he just called me everything.

But a gentleman said, it's pitiful how he abused me. He said, I went out of there that morning, and I said, boy, it wasn't against the Lord. He said, I saw Ronald last noon.

He said, you go on to preach. He said, I ain't going up there. But he said, find another way to go.

And I just said, one word about me tonight. I'll get up out of my seat, and I'll give him the lead. And he said he was.

And he said, after that, he was going home down the country. Starlit night. And he said, you know, the birds, they never sang so sweet.

I never heard anything like it. Said every last one of them had had their voices trained since I'd heard them. Ah, he said, everybody.

He said, I walked along the trees, and there was a large mill set. He said, I looked up in the sky. He said, I began to run.

I saw faces that would tear. And he said, my brethren, I've been a-walking with him for 62 years. 62 years he was.

And he said, he's Christ in you. The hope of God in you. I want you to do something for me tonight.

We haven't done any night. Three thousand. Some of you vistas may not know it.

I'd love for you to sing it.