Separation

Let's turn in our Bibles, please, to the Gospel of Matthew, and Chapter 11, please. It's nice to be here. We give everyone a very warm welcome in the Lord's name, and we trust that what we have on our minds will be a help to God's people.

Matthew Chapter 11, now this is a very well-known verse, and it's often preached in the Gospel, but we want to bring a nice truth out from it relating to our salvation. Matthew Chapter 11, and I think we can all remember these words. 28, verse 28, Matthew 11, verse 28, Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

And here's what we're after, verse 29, Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. Four, my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Now let's go over to 2 Corinthians, please, and Chapter 6. 2 Corinthians, Chapter 6, and let's start at verse number 11.

I think I'll know that the Apostle Paul is writing to the Corinthians, and he was very instrumental in preaching the Gospel there and seeing the assembly formed. So in 1 Corinthians, he'll make reference that he's like a father to them. Something has happened.

There's been false teachers that have come into the picture, and they actually turned the heart of these believers against the Apostle Paul. And here's what we have, verse 11, 2 Corinthians 6, verse 11, O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you. We are speaking honestly, straight to you.

Our heart is enlarged. There's the heart of the preacher, the heart of the teacher, the shepherd, and he's got nothing but good intentions in his heart toward these believers. Verse 12, Ye are not straightened in us, but ye are straightened in your own bowels.

So really, what Paul is identifying to these believers is the problem is on your end. It's not on my end. There's no sort of utterior motives with me.

Everything is wide open. I have nothing but your good intentions at heart. And then he starts, verse 13, Now for a recompense in the same, he's wanting them to look at him the same way he looks at them, I speak as unto my children.

And here is a command, Be ye also enlarged. Now just a brief comment. The Apostle Paul, writing by the Spirit of God, is looking at these believers, and something has come into their life that has actually dwarfed their spiritual growth.

That's why now he was looking at them, writing by the Spirit of God, and he's going to give them some things that's going to help them grow spiritually, mature. That's why he says, Be ye also enlarged. Okay? So now look what he says in verse 14.

He starts off with a command, Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. Four, What fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? That word unrighteousness is actually lawlessness. So it's quite a contrast.

Righteousness on one side, lawlessness on the other side. And what communion hath light with darkness? Once again, total opposite ends of the spectrum. Verse 15, And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Once again, total opposite ends of the spectrum.

Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? Actually it's the opposite of believing, an unbeliever, an infidel. And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye, now he's zeroing in on the people in Corinth, for ye are the temple of the living God. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they shall be my people.

Wherefore, now verse 17 contains three more commands. Wherefore, come out, that's a command, from among them. And, here's another command, be ye separate, saith the Lord.

And here's another command, and touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you and will be a father unto you and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. Now verse 1 of chapter 7, Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh, a reference to the body, the physical body, and spirit, the mind, perfecting holiness or practical sanctification in the fear of God. I want to read verse 1 again of chapter 7. Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

Now it's very interesting, of all of the commands that he gave us in chapter 6 at the end, when he moves into verse 1 of chapter 7, having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse. It's not a command. He puts it in a grammatical mode where it's going to depend on you.

This is something that could happen, this is a wish, this is something that he's looking forward to happen, but it's all going to depend on them and their response to the Word of God. Now what is on my mind, dear child of God, is a little message on separation. Now oftentimes, as soon as that word is mentioned, people often go, ooh, that's a very negative word, they think.

But I want to show you what I have been enjoying from it. Separation is not a negative truth. It's a very warm, very positive... What I really want you to get a hold of is this.

I think it's tremendous, the end of verse 17. Seth, the Lord Almighty. Now that's tremendous.

If we take time to study through the Word of God and find out just how God addresses himself, sometimes he refers to himself as God. That brings a lovely set of truths with it. Sometimes he addresses himself as Lord.

That brings tremendous truth into the picture. Sometimes he refers to himself as a Lord, all capital letters, Jehovah. That is the covenant-keeping God.

We touched on that last weekend. Now this word here, Almighty, is one of the most tenderest terms, titles of God, to a Hebrew, to a Jew. You might not know that from not knowing what the history of it is.

Very interesting that if you go into the Old Testament, you're going to discover that this term, the Almighty, it's used 48 times throughout the Old Testament. Now, what's interesting is this. Do you want to know which book in the Old Testament has 31 times God, in dealing with an individual, God calls himself the Almighty? Do you know which book it is? It's the book of Job.

Forty-eight references in the Old Testament, okay? Thirty-one of them in the book of Job. And you might say, why is that so interesting to you? Well, I'll tell you what the word Almighty means. It's the Old Testament word Shaddai, and it's really the God that comforts.

It's really the God that cuddles. It's really the God that embraces. It brings before the Hebrew mind a God that is so intent on providing care, nourishment, comfort.

It's of all the titles of God, it is the ultimate in warmth, in care, and to a Jew, to a Hebrew, that word captures the tenderness and all of the purposes that is in the heart of God for that individual. If you really want a visual picture, just imagine a mother with a child, and she's just embracing that child, holding that child close to her chest, just to care. Think of the mother as she looks at that child.

She has nothing but the best intentions for that child. Think of those arms that are embracing that child, those arms that are protecting that child. Now, can you understand how the Spirit of... I believe what the Spirit of God is doing when it's used 31 times in the book of Job.

We would read that, and we would almost wonder, what's going on? It looks like a game between Satan and God. God says to Satan, have you considered my servant Job? And it's almost like God is playing this game behind the scenes, and Satan is just going after Job with everything that he's got, and we go, Job, he lost 10 children. He lost everything.

And wouldn't you naturally just sort of step back and say, God, what are you doing? Look at this man. He's literally devastated. There must be something wrong.

You know what the Spirit of God is doing, dear child of God? He's carefully guarding what God is doing. And the most tenderest term in a book that brings before us probably the worst case scenario of a Christian and all the trials that they're going to, isn't it something how the Spirit of God brings in that, the Almighty, the Almighty, the Almighty, the Almighty. Should I repeat it 31 times so we get the understanding? What I don't understand about all the things that happen in Job's life, and I don't, all of the difficulties, you'd almost think that God wasn't even clued into the picture when finally God speaks to Job, and in all of this man's difficulty, what's the first thing out of God's mouth? Where were you when I formed the foundation of the earth? I laid it.

You'd almost step back and say, God, have you not been following what's happening in this man's life? And here you are talking about creation. But the Spirit of God brings in that lovely term, the Almighty. Dear child of God, my first point is this.

There's a lot of things I might not understand about separation. There's a lot of things I don't understand about things that happen in my life. But there's one thing I understand.

The Almighty loves me. And He cares for me. And He has nothing but the best intentions at heart for me.

And that's why this term is brought into the New Testament. Because in a context that has to do with yokes, here I am as a Christian, I'm getting involved in something that's what? Taking me away from enjoying the Almighty. You see, God is a jealous God.

And the moment that God saved me and delivered me from my sins and put the life of God in me, it's almost as if God is saying, Scott, I want all of you. I want every single part of you. I want your mind.

I want your heart. I want your body. I don't want you sharing your love with anyone else but me.

I want all of your affections. Scott, I want to be everything to you. Whatever you need.

Just like that little child. All it knows, it just looks up at that mother. They say the focal length of a newborn infant is that distance from the embrace to the eye.

I marvel at it sometimes as you see a mother holding a child. And I wonder sometimes what goes through that little brain. And you see those eyes as it's just locked upon the mother.

Wouldn't it be something if I could enjoy that with my God? Not that he's the second response, as I touched on last weekend in Stout, but whatever problem, whatever difficulty, that's all that child knows is mother. There it is. There's my mother.

Wouldn't it be something that the Spirit of God could get such a, impress this truth upon me that whatever difficulty is represented here this morning, you would just look into the eyes of your God and you would be impressed with this. He's the almighty. Nobody cares for me like he does.

Nobody has purposes for me like he does. There's nobody at the natural plane that is even able to come close to caring for me like the almighty does. And that is found, dear child of God, in a truth that we think is negative.

Why would it be negative? You know what the devil says? Do you know what the world, the flesh says? This truth of separation, it's going to restrict you. It's going to make you weird. It's going to make you legalistic.

Oh, you can't do this. You can't do this. Listen, you get a hold of it.

You don't want to do that because I want to enjoy my God. I want to walk close to my God. I want to hear like John.

I want to hear that heartthrob of him for me. I want to feel that embrace of the almighty. So could I challenge some people today? Could I ask you to maybe put those negative thoughts of separation out of your head for a minute? Sort of sit in your seat there and let your, just let your shoulders fall, okay? Don't get tense.

What's he going to come off with up there? What's he going to tell us not to be yoked with? Just relax, okay? Enjoy it. Allow that lovely picture of the almighty. Interesting.

You know how many times, I just throw this in, you can study it. Do you know how many times the almighty is used in the New Testament? Ten times. It's used here once.

Do you know where the other nine times it's used? In the book of Revelation with John. There is John, an old man near 85, 90, and he's been banished to the Isle of Patmos, and he's been cast into that old rock-barren land, and you'd almost stand back and say, is that how you treat your servant's God? The man has defended truth for how many years? He's an old man. Couldn't he just retire easy? You know what John saw, the first thing he saw in that cave on the Isle of Patmos? He saw the almighty.

You know what John was impressed with? I'm not left alone. Here is the almighty with nothing but my best at heart. Here is the, nobody else is able to comfort me on this barren rock, but the almighty is there to comfort me.

So you ask yourself the question, what's all this about yokes? We don't really see, well, we don't see farmers today with animals that are yoked together by that wooden yoke. Well, that's really the idea. If you want to get a picture in your mind, I want you to think of two oxen, and there they got that wooden beam, that wooden instrument that's carved out, and it's around each of their necks, and they're tied to it, and really if you want to get an understanding, a yoke really brings before you, there's a goal in mind, there's a single purpose, and those two animals with two different minds, two different attitudes, two different strengths, that instrument is tying them together, and they're being forced to go down one way.

Now in the Old Testament, Deuteronomy 22 is it, God gave his people a law. God was very kind, you know, God looks after the animal kingdom. God says, don't you take an ox and a donkey and yoke them together.

You got this big massive ox, right, with all of its strength and power, you got this little donkey over here. God says, listen, the ox is going to harm the donkey. Don't do that to the donkey.

Let me ask you something, dear child of God, who has the potential of being harmed? You're a Christian, and you're unequally yoked with a sinner. It's going to be you, not the sinner. It's the total opposite now.

In that yoke to the ungodly world, I'll tell you who's the strongest one, it's going to be the one that's the sinner. I have yet to meet a Christian victoriously living for God that was able to handle an unequal yoke. I've yet to meet them.

And the very thing happened in Corinth. Paul came in with the gospel, and these people were blasted out of the quarry of sin, and the life of God was put in them, and there was harmony, and there was unity, and there was growth and potential for God, and all of a sudden these false teachers came along, and Corinth, of course, for those that know the history, Corinth was known for all of its labor unions and yokes and everything else, and the carpenters had a union, and the stonemasons had a union, and all these people had a union, and of course at the head of all these unions, these pagan unions, there was an idol. And that's where all of your temple, your sacrifice meet to an idol, and all that sort of stuff plays into a part.

You know what happened to these believers? They got so involved into some of these yokes, business yokes, social yokes, religious yokes, and on and on it goes. Do you know what it did? It actually restricted their growth. That's why he says be also enlarged.

It actually dwarfed them. Satan and the devil's in the background going, this is great, because I'll tell you what unequal yokes do, dear child of God. They sap your strength.

They grieve you. Now we're living in a society today where it seems like everything's okay. Everything's okay.

But I want to tell you, I want to labor this point. You enter into an unequal yoke. Do you know what happens? You cannot enjoy the Almighty.

You will never enter into that truth. I will be a father unto you. Oh, we understand.

I understand. The moment I trusted Christ, God is my father and I'm his child. I understand that positionally.

But dear child of God, practically, you will not enjoy that relationship the way El Shaddai wants you to. You won't. And I'm amazed as I look at this.

I look at verse 7 and how strong it is. He says, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness. Do you know how the Word of God, the Spirit of God views unequal yokes? Filthiness.

Filthiness of the flesh, the body. They defile the body. They mar the body.

Filthiness of the mind. You know that Greek word filthiness? It's a very interesting word. You know, if I was to take my white handkerchief, I don't have a white handkerchief, but if I had a white handkerchief and I was to take it out of my pocket and just just run it along the edge here, even my thumb has picked up some dirt.

Poor housekeeping here, okay? And really all it does is, I mean, you're looking at my hand there and you're saying, well, that hand looks fairly clean. But you know what has happened? There's just a little staining. Do you know what happens when I, as a believer, I start to get yoked with the unbelievers? It stains my body and it stains my mind.

And already even it might look, oh, that looks okay. Oh, that feels okay. And a stain is such a little thing.

You kind of just, you just sort of brush it off and you go, oh, that's all right. The majority of it is clean. You know, the people principle that you'll get in the word of God, dear child of God, sin never stays dormant.

Never. That unequal yoke will just get more of a grip and more of a grip. You know, I'm thinking of a, I'm thinking of a dear, a dear man that, a Christian that I did a little bit of preaching with.

And my dear brother Murray would know him from PEI, that man could preach. My, he had a lovely, lovely, lovely way in the gospel. He had verbal ability.

I used to love listening to him. He's not in the assembly anymore. He's not married to his wife anymore.

Would you like to know where it started? He joined and became a volunteer firefighter. Now, am I up here saying firefighters are wrong? No, I'm not saying that. If that's your job, fine, go put out fires.

On PEI, it's a little different. They don't have enough money to pay five fellas' salary so they're full time, they're putting out fires. Everything's volunteer.

You know what that involved? Well, that involved a lot of training. That took them away from meetings. Then what happened is you just naturally got close to these men.

And then what happened was you're sitting around the fire hall with them playing games. Just started to lead a little bit more. Then all of a sudden, don't have time to go preach the gospel.

Then it gets to more part. Then all of a sudden it led to, hey, we're having a barbecue. Why don't you bring your family over? Oh, there's a little bit of alcohol.

We know you don't drink. That's okay. That's okay.

That's how it first started. And now I would look at the man's life and he's gone. That grieves me.

Such potential for God. Such ability, such gift. If we could just see behind the scenes, here's the almighty saying, let me embrace you, dear child of God.

Here's the world saying, don't you enjoy it? Don't you enjoy that? You come over here. It's not going to hurt you. I was talking to John Meekin there this morning.

We were just back and forth on a few things. I said, can you imagine now, I love my wife, Wilma. I'm married to her.

Love her. Love her to death. Can you imagine the effect it would have on her if all of a sudden she saw me walking hand in hand with another woman? Wouldn't that have an awful effect on her? She'd be starting to wonder, what's with his affections? What's going on here? I thought he was devoted to me.

You see, what happens is this, and in her mind will come this almost a pulling back. He said, that's what all meekly yolks do to us. God says this, the world, it's totally opposite to me.

Totally opposite. It's the opposite end of the spectrum. You couldn't get anything further away from God than the world, the flesh and the devil.

And when I, as a believer, start to move toward it, do you know what God has to do? I can't embrace you, Scott, because I don't want that world. I want you, but I don't want you and the world. God says, I want you.

So when he starts to go through this, he starts off at the very top and he says, here's the very top thing. On righteousness, lawlessness. Could you get anything further apart than that? There's not a bit of a mixture.

It's not 50% and 50. No, totally opposite. Dear child of God, that's what's in the world.

Now, you know what you and I have a hard time doing? We have a hard time with the balance. I want to see my co-worker saved. I want to see my fellow students at university, college, school saved.

Where is that balance? Where separation is being, there it is, or where I go too far? Well, that's where you need to keep in the word of God. That's where you can take things. I mean, I've gone through a number of things, you know, I'm 46.

So sure, you have, you have experiences. I'm going to touch on, I'm going to touch on anonymical yoke. And it's my, well, I guess if you don't invite me back, well, okay.

My intentions are good. An awful thing called sports. Now, I'm not talking about a person that's little activity and Christians get together and they play a game of b-ball and whatever.

I'm not talking, I'm talking about organized fellowships. Now, you might say, oh man, we kind of liked you until that point, but well, okay, just keep listening, please. Just, just listen.

It's not that there's something wrong with the sport, but it's the environment surrounding the sport. Now, I'm going to give you a practical example. Before I was saved, I was big time into bodybuilding and it was a religious, every night I went to the gym from 7.30 till 9 with a buddy.

I mean, I let nothing get in the way of that. So I remember I got saved and I remember in my mind there was a bit of a conflict. See, that should have been my first, that should have been the first red light going off in my brain.

Why am I having this sort of back and it's okay. No, it's not. See, that's the spirit of God.

Why? I didn't listen and I kept going to the gym and I remember that conflict kind of, it started getting a little more and then I said, you know what, I should start to pray about this. Someone says, what's wrong with exercise? Nothing's wrong with exercise, but the environment that I was putting myself into, what was it? Well, number one, as soon as you walk into the gym, what do you hear? The old music's just a pumping and old Scotty loves that. And then you get the weights going a little bit and what happens then? Oh, the muscles getting a little bit of a blood flushing.

Look at that. Look at it. Well, it's not as big as it used to be.

And then you know what happened? It just happened to have all of these mirrors all around the place. Then old Scott starts doing the old peacock strut. Yeah.

Attitude. Meanwhile, the music's going bang, bang, bang. Yeah.

Oh yeah. Do you think the spirit of God is behind that going? Oh yes, Scott, way to go. No, 100% flesh.

Look at self. Yeah. Oh, it's all cloaked under exercise, man.

You got to keep your heart healthy, don't you? You know what did it for me? My praying got more intense because I started to see the attitude, the cockiness. I started to see what it was doing to me. Then the language.

You're just right side by side with sinners. And what are they talking about? The night at the club last night. It just keeps going.

It's not an upward conversation. It's all going downhill. I remember the day, and this is telling myself, okay, it was a Sunday afternoon.

Oh, you're going to excommunicate me. And I said, I'll go to the gym today, Sunday afternoon. Should have been out exercising my legs, passing out tracks at Murray.

But this is the young, this is the young years, okay? And I remember I got to the gym and it was leg day that day. Going to do legs and shoulders. Anyway, I got on the bike, warmed up my legs, and just a friend from the gym sat next to me.

So we're only about that far apart. Know what he started telling me about? I'm not going to use the words, but a particular type of club that he visited in Montreal. And it was defiling.

And he had about a couple of sentences out of his mouth, and you know what hit me? This is no place for a Christian. And I said, excuse me, I need to go to the washroom. And I went, I got my little bag, and I never went back.

You say, oh, pretty severe. No, that was constantly grieving me. I was constantly grieving me.

That was just like a spiritual drain on me. You see what I mean? There's nothing wrong with exercise. I can go walk quarter mile, half a mile, two miles.

I can do that. I can go out to Canadian Tower, buy a little tiny gym, and put it in my basement, and just put no mirrors up. Get my wife to tell me, hey, you look good.

Wow, tough guy. I can do that, right? There's different. I can control things.

But I'm trying to get at this. If we understood that the world, the flesh, and the devil is going out of its way to say, don't enjoy God. Don't enjoy your father.

It's tremendous, the terms. You will be sons and daughters onto me. John was pointing it out.

I don't think there's another place in the New Testament where that term daughters is brought in. It's always sons. And really, the uniqueness of this relationship.

God is saying, as you pull closer to that world, that world is just drifting from me, Scott. It's a total ends of the opposite. It's total ends of it.

I'm not even touching it. You actually drift away from me, Scott. And you know what happens? Situations come into my life, and I have to make decisions.

Dear child of God, it's a wrong time to make life decisions when you're not in fellowship with God. I always keep thinking of the nation of Israel. They asked, and they asked, and they asked, and they asked for a king.

You know what God said? He gave them the desires of their heart, but sent leanness into their soul. There are consequences to decisions. Wouldn't it be tremendous just to know that enjoyment of my God, my Father? And that's what he said.

Having these precious promises, why would I want anything to take me away from the almighty God? And that relationship, that comfort daily, walking with him. He says, cleanse yourself from all of this filthiness. Get rid of it.

I wonder if I'm talking to someone today, and you've got that unsaved boyfriend or girlfriend. I'm not being derogatory. No, I'm not.

I wish they were saved. Get them out to the gospel. Don't, don't think about marrying someone who's not saved.

It will ruin your life if you just want, just go talk to some people. We have them on the island. You have them here.

Just talk to them. They'll tell you, run, run. You can't take oil and water and mix it.

You can't take righteousness and lawlessness. You can't. The environment they produce, light and darkness, and it goes right back to Christ and Belial, the authors.

There's two masters in this world, Christ, Belial. Do you know what it produces? He that believeth, an infidel. And then he takes it from the individual and he goes to the corporate, temple of God, idols.

You know, another thing, brother, and that is sapping the life out of us is religious yokes. Religious yokes. I will tell you, and if you don't agree with me, fine, I will not give my money to anything linked to the dominational system of men.

I will not. Oh, that's, you say, oh, you don't believe in charities. I'll give it to a charity that is non-denominational.

But there is a religious world out there that is opposed to the assembly and all that it stands for. But you know what we're getting now? Well, they believe in the gospel. They preach a fairly good gospel.

Hey, listen, there's only one type of gospel, all right? This easy believism, all of that stuff, I'd run from it. I'm not yoking to anything like that. Always remember, dear child of God, the devil will try this yoke and this yoke and this yoke and this yoke and this yoke, and he'll just keep on going around in a circle until he gets you.

Keep into this book, please. Bring everything. I said this recently.

Isn't it amazing? Isn't it amazing that there are things that I'm faced with or things I would like to do? And you know the very first thing that goes through my brain is, well, don't pray about it. You don't need to. That's another massive red light.

I'm amazed when I read about the disciples. They were afraid to ask them. I shouldn't be afraid to ask God anything.

Why? Because the Almighty has my best intentions at heart. He's not going to try to restrict me. God will give me and God will lead me into things that will only encourage my growth and my development as a mind.

So I trust as I end. I hope no one thought I was hard. You stand back and you start to watch people and you just go, oh, could you not see where this is going? And then the problem happens.

I've been dealing with a couple of gentlemen back home, one particular that was out of the assembly and got into an awful mess. And it takes the energy out of you. Because God never intended that for a Christian.

And then it leads to more problems and more problems. What a wonderful thing when God in his mercy begins to restore and they say stuff to you like, wow, I never saw how wrong it was. I never realized.

So allow the word of God to search your life. What am I being yoked with? You were going down the road with this and all of a sudden you saw a farmer and he had a dog and a cat yoked together. He would say, what a foolish man.

Look at the poor cat. Anybody today business yoke? Oh, the money's good. Let the money rot.

Don't lose your testimony. How's your friends? Oh, you're going to tell us not to have friends. No, you befriend them.

Always keep the gospel paramount. When I worked at the telephone company, there was a gentleman that I worked with, lovely man. I worked with him for a whole year, five days a week, eight o'clock in the morning to 430 at night, up in a pole, outdoors.

And we would talk about everything. You know what happened one day? I tried to get him out to the gospel, the gospel, the gospel. One day he said, Scott, why don't we go fishing on Saturday together? Do you know what I told him? I said, Monday to Friday, that's enough time with you.

If I want to go fishing, I want to take my wife and my kids and we're fishing. Any Christians here today and you say, my best friends are those that are not saved? I would question whether you're saved. Because light and darkness cannot mix.

Christ and Belial cannot mix. Lawlessness and righteousness, that's moral, but you cannot condone sin. So may God give us help to enjoy what God intends for us, the Almighty, the comfort of God.