Ron Bailey - Part 2

He is not an ascetic angel. He isn't a one-way-go. He hasn't just left us a message that we'll get our way. He is present. He is present in the midst, and this was Paul's absolute conviction, that because the Word of God would continue to come into the Church of Ephesus, he was absolutely sure that they would be built up and that God would give them an inheritance among those who were sacrificed. Not only would they grow in their own Christian experience, but he knew that God would give them responsibility. He would give them something to trust. That's what an inheritance is. It's something which is entrusted to you. And he knew that the Spirit of God would continue. He knew that they wouldn't have to live on the legends of Paul having been here 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago. I want to read about the Bible, but I can't give a legend. I never can. We need the Word of God. We need to be open to God, for God to speak into our hearts and into our situations. Because actually, being a child of God, being a Christian, being the kind of man or woman that God wanted to be, is as complicated as all the Hampton books of men. It's not nearly so complicated. There's a very simple thing that people used to say in the olden days of converted Catholics. They used to say, there's only one commandment you need to remember. Whatsoever He says to you, do it. That's it. It doesn't need to get any more complicated than that. Whatsoever He says to you, do it. And don't say, I can't. Because the moment He said it to you, you can. I'm not talking about mind games, and I'm not talking about deciding yourself up. It's grace. It has an enabling power within it. When Peter wrote in his first letter, he spoke about the revelation, the grace that comes to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. And I know he was talking primarily about that. But there is a sense in which grace always comes to us in the revelation of Jesus Christ. Is that too mystical for you? What I mean is this, that when God opens your heart, when He opens your eyes, to see some truth about God, it is never just academic. There's always grace that comes to you. He's not playing with you. He's not educating you. He's bringing into your life the word of His grace, which is able to build you up, to give you an inheritance. He hasn't abandoned His church. He walks with it in wonderful connection. What I'd like to do now, having turned to that, is keep my promise, and take you to the book of Revelation. You get nervous, and I'm going to stay in this safe stuff. Probably not the book of Revelation. It is just that. It is the revelation. It is the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him, to show to his servants, by signs, to signify to them things which must shortly come to pass. And he gave it, through the Lord Jesus, through his angel, to John. And John was commissioned to make sure that this revelation got into the hands of certain people. And it's addressed primarily to the infants of certain churches. Let me read it to you. In Revelation chapter 1, and verse 9. I, John, both your brother and companion in the tribulation, and heathen, and patience of Jesus Christ, was on the island that is called Patmos, for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the spirit of the Lord's day, and I heard behind me a loud voice and a trumpet saying, I am the Elf-Poet, and the Obedient, the First, and the Last. And, what you see, write of the book, and send it to the seven churches of your nation, to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Phogatis, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea. Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me, and having turned, I saw seven golden lamps there. I'm going to pause for a moment, and ask you to turn to chapter 4.