Ephesians 2:11-22

[0:00] That's my brother, Viscount. Amen. Being the New Testament, we'll see in the book of Ephesians, chapter 2.

[0:11] The book of Ephesians, Paul's letter to the Ephesians is a wonderful epistle. It's a wonderful epistle for one, for doctrine, and two, for practicality.

[0:26] In the first chapter of the epistle, he speaks mainly of redemption by Jesus Christ. What we need to keep in mind is the church in Ephesus that he was writing to, had a mainly Gentile audience.

[0:44] There was a small sect of Jews in Ephesus, maybe a couple of pods if you'd like to call it here and there, of Jews. But the church in Ephesus was comprised mostly of Gentiles.

[0:58] And the gospel had reached the city of Ephesus. People have been saved, a church had been founded, and Paul was now writing to this church, speaking to them of redemption in and through Jesus Christ.

[1:14] We get to the second chapter of Ephesians, and this is the chapter that most of us, or probably most familiar with, there's many quotes that we hear over and over in the second chapter of Ephesians.

[1:29] They're talking to the church about being saved by grace through the first 10 or so verses of the second chapter of Ephesians.

[1:41] This is where we have the famous verses in Ephesians chapter 2. One that was dead in trespasses and sin before we're ever regenerated.

[1:54] This is something that even today needs to be preached to the masses. It needs to be preached to people at large. If they don't know that they're sick, if they don't know that they're sinful, if they don't know that they're wicked, then they'll see no need for salvation.

[2:11] So this is something that continually needs to be preached. It does no good to tell people about their evil and tell people about their wickedness and their sinfulness.

[2:22] If you don't also tell them the gospel, you tell them the good news of Jesus Christ and how He and He alone can pull them out from underneath the condemnation of Almighty God.

[2:36] But the first several verses in Ephesians chapter 2 address being saved by grace, not of works, unless any man should boast. There's another couple of famous lines out of Ephesians chapter 2.

[2:51] This is something that Paul felt necessary to drive home to these people. I'm sure that the church had been infiltrated by people saying, well, we need to do this and we need to do that.

[3:03] No folks, we need Jesus. We need Jesus for salvation. I needed Jesus for salvation before I was saved and I need Jesus for salvation now that I am saved.

[3:14] It took God to save me. It'll take God to keep me and it'll take God to get me home one of these days. And I praise God for that day. He didn't save me and lay it in my lap. He didn't save me and say, now it's all up to you folks.

[3:29] I am saved by God. I am kept by God. I'll get home by God. Just as Paul wrote to the church at Rome in Romans chapter 5 when he spoke about how we were reconciled to God by the death of Jesus Christ.

[3:45] How much more shall we stay that way? How much more shall we continually be reconciled under God by the life that Jesus Christ has down? By the life that He now has as intercessor and as mediator between me and God and between every born again Christian and God.

[4:03] How much more shall we be reconciled for that? But we're going to pick up in Ephesians chapter 2 beginning at verse 11. And something to keep in mind here once again, the audience was mainly Gentile.

[4:16] But Paul is kind of going into some detail here about some differences between Jew and Gentile and how Almighty God has made them one, has made all believers one in Jesus Christ.

[4:31] And I thank God that He's done that. And I thank God for Jesus Christ that made it possible that I could be made one with a Jew, with a Gentile, with a Barbarian, with a Scythian, with bond and with three.

[4:44] Praise God that in Jesus Christ none of those things exist. There's no black and there's no white, there's no yellow, no green. There's no nationality.

[4:55] There's nothing along those lines. We are born again children of God. We have the same Father and God the Father and we have the same Savior and cross Jesus our Lord.

[5:06] And I thank God for this. But we'll begin in Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 11. It says, It says, Now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off or made nigh by the blood of Christ, for he is our peace, who hath made both one and hath broken down the middle law of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, for to makin' himself of twain one new man, so makin' peace, and that he might reconcile both unto God and in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby, and came and preached peace to you which were far off and to them that were nigh.

[6:15] For through him we both have access by one spirit unto the Father. Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, and are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and the prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom all the building fitly framed together, growing unto an holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are built together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

[6:48] We'll go back to verse 11 here. It says, Wherefore remember that ye being in time past Gentiles, in the flesh, who were called uncircumcision by that, which is called the circumcision in the flesh, may by hands that at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the Covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world, but now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off or made nigh by the blood of Christ. Paul begins this particular passage of scripture with the words Wherefore remember that word Wherefore puts us back to the previous 10 verses.

[7:30] As I said, he's talking in those verses about being saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. And he says, Wherefore remember that ye being in time past uncircumcision, ye being in time past, you were saved, ye being in time past, you knew not God.

[7:49] And he goes into the next verse. He says that at that time ye were without Christ. Folks, this is one of the most, if not the most definitive verse in the Bible of what it means to be lost and without God, what it means to be on the road to hell here in Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 12, that at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the Covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. This is the description of me before I was born again.

[8:23] It's the description of you before you were born again. We were without Christ. We were without God and we were without hope because we were without Christ and we were without God. But here Paul is saying ye were without Christ.

[8:39] He were without the Covenants of promise. The Jews had the Covenants of promise and this was one of the reasons that there was enmity between the Jews and the Gentiles because the Jews let it go to their heads. The Jews in their crowd would look down upon the Gentiles and they would say we have the blood of Abraham running through our veins.

[9:00] And Abraham is the one that received the promise that God would multiply his seed as the sand of the seashore and as the stars of the heaven. God told Abraham that he would multiply his seed and God told the Jewish people.

[9:15] He said that the entire world, all nations would be blessed by the Jewish nation that would all be blessed through Israel and this is the reason that the Israelites and the Jews would look down upon the Gentiles. They would say we have a covenant promise of God and you have nothing in folks.

[9:33] If this was the case and it was per the Scripture, this description that Paul gives of the Gentiles is very accurate and it was accurate not only in its time but it's accurate now that those that are out here in the world now and they have not God and they have not Christ and they have not the covenant of the New Testament in Jesus Christ and the blood that he has shed and they have not the promise of God that if they make confession with their mouth and they believe in their heart that God has raised them from their dead and if they have not these things they are without hope just as I was. Praise God. He came to me one day. He came to me by the Spirit of God and he showed me the lost state that I was in.

[10:20] He showed me that I was without Christ. He showed me that I was without the promise of the covenant. He showed me that I was alienated from the commonwealth of Israel. This statement that Paul makes here. He's saying you don't even have a country that you can go to.

[10:37] You are promised a land. We refer to it all the time as Canaan land, as Buta land, as the promised land. We refer to it as all kinds of things. This was a promise that God made to the Jewish people and he will make good on that promise one of these days after a while.

[10:54] The Jewish people have not inherited the land yet that Almighty God has promised them that there is coming a day that God will give unto them everything that he promised them in the Old Testament.

[11:07] We the Gentile Church, we the born again saints of God that are outside of the Jewish culture and outside of the Jewish religion and outside of those particular covenants. We have no right to lay claim to those covenants.

[11:24] But the Jews will look down on the Gentiles. They would say we have God. We have Christ. We have the promised Messiah. I'm talking about the Jews that were part of the church here. They would say we have these things.

[11:38] And the Jews, hey, they weren't without Christ and they weren't without God or in the Old Testament. The Jews, hey, they drink from a rock out in the middle of the wilderness. That rock was Jesus Christ. They were fed by the man. They had the Red Sea parted on their back. Almighty God done these things for the Jewish people.

[11:56] They had God on their side when they were out in the wilderness, when God was delivering them from Egypt. All throughout the 40 years they were Roman in the wilderness, even though God told them your carcasses will rot in this wilderness.

[12:11] And God still made provision for his people. He didn't break his promise. He didn't negate his promise with the Jewish people. The Jewish people still crossed over Jordan and still went into that land that was promised to them.

[12:26] He just didn't inherit the entire land as the dimensions are given in Scripture, but we ain't going to get into that tonight. But he says here about the Gentiles that at that time you were without Christ being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the Covenant to promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now, Christ God, he goes from then, he goes from then to now, but now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

[13:04] We are made nigh unto God by the blood of Christ. Ye that were sometimes far off, hey folks, I was sometimes afar off you or sometimes afar off we were all afar off from God.

[13:16] We were cast off from God. The entire human race was cast off from God in the garden when Adam and Eve fell. Hey, with that first sin, all of humanity was cast off from God.

[13:29] We were placed under a curse from God and not just us, but the entire world, the entire earth that Almighty God created was placed under a curse. We were all cast off from God. We were all afar from God. But now, now even though we were afar off and we were without hope and we were without Christ and without God and without the promise of the Covenant and we were alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel, those were the things that we were then, but when we come into the now, but now we are brought nigh unto God, nigh unto the Father, nigh unto our Creator by the blood of God, their Son Jesus Christ, hallelujah.

[14:13] Praise God for now in Christ. He sometimes were far off or made nigh by the blood of Christ. And don't you let anybody convince you otherwise. Don't you let anybody convince you that you may be made nigh to God by any other way.

[14:29] You were made nigh by the shed blood of Jesus Christ on the cross on the hill called God off the 2000 years ago. His blood was shed and it was so that I could be made nigh unto the Father. It was so that I could be an heir to God and I joined there with him.

[14:45] Jesus Christ, these are the reasons that Jesus Christ shed his blood. Verse 14, for he is our peace who hath made both one and hath broken down the middle wall, the partition between us, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances for to making himself a twain, one new man, so making peace.

[15:09] And he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby and came and preached peace to you which were afar off and to them that were nigh. For through him we both have accessed by one spirit unto God the Father.

[15:27] For he, back to verse 14, for he is our peace who hath made both one and hath broken down the middle wall, the partition between us. Who is the us here that the middle wall partition was broken down between, that would be between the Jew and the Gentile?

[15:43] Paul here shares that middle wall partition has been broken down, it was broken down because the commandments that come about by the ordinances that were taken out, this would have been the ceremonial commandments that separated the Jews from the Gentiles.

[16:01] This would have been the circumcision, this would have been anything to do with the ceremonial law, that's why the Jews would refer to them to the Gentiles as the uncircumcision, it was meant as an insult to the Gentiles, it was meant as something degrading toward them.

[16:17] Paul here says that Jesus Christ being our peace has broken down the middle wall, the partition between the Jew and the Gentile meaning that when we come to God, whether we're a Jew or whether we're Gentile, we come the same way we come through.

[16:33] Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ is our peace and he is the one that broke down this middle wall partition that we could all have access to the Father, he didn't bring us up to equal levels, he brought us up to the same level in Christ Jesus before God the Father.

[16:53] Hallelujah, praise God. It's not that he was practicing equality, it's what I'm getting at and saying that, he wasn't practicing equality, praise God the ground is level at the foot of the cross.

[17:09] It doesn't matter if you're a king or a pauper, it doesn't matter if you're a liar or a thief or a murderer, it doesn't matter if we're black or white or any other color, it doesn't matter if we're Indian or American or Chinese or any other ease that may be out there, the ground is level, praise God at the foot of the cross.

[17:29] Everyone can come unto God, Jews can come unto God, Gentiles can come unto God, those that swear up and down that there is no God can come unto God, those that believe in the God like many of the Romans did and many of the Greeks did.

[17:43] He wasn't dealing with a bunch of atheists here, he was dealing with a bunch of polytheistic people that had thousands of gods that they worshiped, they had thousands of gods that they would burn incense to, that they would go to the temples, they would offer meat offerings, they would offer their drink offerings under these gods.

[18:01] He wasn't dealing with atheists, he was dealing with people that did not know the one true God until Jesus Christ saved our soul and the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit created a new heart inside of these people.

[18:16] That's who Paul was dealing with at the church at Ephesus, having a boss in his flesh, the enmity, the enmity, the hatred, the issues between Jew and Greek, having a boss in his flesh, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances for to making himself a twain, one new man, one new man so making peace.

[18:44] Praise God, do you get what these verses are saying? Amen. We are rick and south of God through Jesus Christ, yes and I praise God for that. I praise God that Jesus Christ laid down his life, he shed his blood, he took the beaten, he took the mockery, he took the humiliation upon himself, he took the abuse from mankind from both Jew and Gentile elect from the Jews and from the Romans as well.

[19:13] And he took this homage to reconcile me back to God. Praise God, that's not the only benefit that we have in this. According to what I'm reading in these few verses here, not only did Jesus Christ reconcile us back to the Father, but he made a way that we could be reconciled back to one another, that the middle wall of partition was broken down and there are no longer any differences as far as the spiritual realm is concerned.

[19:41] As far as religion is concerned, as far as salvation is concerned, there is no difference. If you are born again child of God, you are washed in the same blood of Jesus Christ than I was.

[19:54] And we had differences beforehand. We shouldn't have them now. That's not to say little small things might not come up, little insignificant things.

[20:05] Secondary issues may come up as far as the scripture goes and as far as the gospel of Jesus Christ goes. There should be no division, there should be no enmity.

[20:16] We are one in Jesus Christ. We read about the examples of the body of Christ in the Bible. Paul gives those examples of the body of Christ and I've preached it and I've taught it several times over.

[20:33] Some people may be a finger, some people may be an arm, some people may be a leg, some people may be this and some people may be that, but praise God. It doesn't matter how insignificant you might feel or how significant you feel that someone else is.

[20:46] If you are in the body of Christ, this is what matters. It doesn't matter if you feel like you are a pinky toe or if you feel like you're the heart of the body that's keeping it going.

[20:57] If we're in the body of Christ, we are in one single body that is in Christ and Christ is the head. He is the head of the church and he is prepared to present us spotless and blameless before his father one day.

[21:13] Praise God. So, the Lord we reconcile to God, we reconcile to our brothers and sisters in Christ in the same manner and came and preached peace to you which were far off and to them that were not.

[21:29] Those that were far off and to them that were not. Who was far off? We've already established it. That was the Gentiles. Who were those that were not? That would be the Jews. Hey, Christ preached peace unto both of those.

[21:41] Christ preached peace. Does the Bible not say, Isaiah chapter 9, that he would be called the Prince of Peace? Folks, there's peace that surrounds Jesus Christ. The Bible talks about the peace that God can give, the passive all understanding.

[21:55] And we are brought to peace with God through his cross priest. There's peace all over the Scriptures that comes with knowing Jesus Christ. And I praise God for the peace that I have with God through Jesus Christ.

[22:09] And I praise God for the peace that God gives me in knowing that I, or in the fact that I know who Jesus Christ is. There's a peace that I have that I didn't have when I was lost.

[22:21] There's a peace that I have now that I didn't have when I was far off in the distance. When I didn't know God, when I didn't have the promise, when I was an alien, when I was all these other things that were described in verse 12.

[22:34] There's a peace that I have now that I wouldn't pray for anything in this world. And it's the peace of God which he gave me through Christ Jesus.

[22:45] Hallelujah. You can't even preach peace to you, which were far off and to them that were not. But through him, we have both accessed by one spirit unto the Father.

[22:59] Paul gets into some deep stuff here, this is a huge verse in Ephesians chapter 2. For through him, we both have accessed both Jew and Gentile life.

[23:10] For through him, who is him? Jesus Christ. For through him, we both have accessed by one spirit. There's God the Son and God the Spirit. Who do we have access to?

[23:21] We have access to the Father too, unto the Father. We have the entire trinity wrapped up in just a few words here in Ephesians chapter 2. And this was huge territory for Paul to be getting in.

[23:32] The function is through. Jesus Christ is in. Jesus Christ is in the spirit of God that we have access to the Father. If either one of those things are left out, we have no access to the Father.

[23:45] But praise be unto God when I get the Spirit, I get Christ. When I get the Spirit, I give God the Father. For the three make one. There are three persons that make one try in God's head.

[23:56] And if I have one, dwell them within me. I have all three, dwell them within me. Hallelujah. Praise God. Now therefore, you are no more strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God.

[24:12] You're no more strangers and foreigners. Again, we've done from what you were then in verse 12 and we're still in what you are now. And what we are now, we're no longer strangers. We're no longer foreigners. We're of the household of God.

[24:27] Folks, I should put all of us on the shat and ground. That should cause everyone of us to have a praise to God upon our lips that we are of the household of God. We are of the household of faith and we have been placed there by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit in our heart.

[24:43] We've been placed there by the blood of Jesus Christ. We have been made nigh under God the Father by the blood of God the Son. Jesus Christ, these things should produce praise upon the lips of those that have been saved.

[24:57] Therefore, you are no more strangers. You are no more, excuse me, no more foreigners but we are fellow citizens. Hey, it's not that we're neighbors that don't know each other anymore.

[25:10] The I have brothers and sisters that are plundered on the other side of the world that I've never met. But we are all fellow citizens in the same country and we belong in the same city because we all have the same Father which is God the Father Almighty. Praise God!

[25:29] Glory to God. We're fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, the Holy Intering with Brother Vernon. Praise God all along. If you're born again, if you are a saved one again child of God, you are a saint of God.

[25:44] It doesn't take a council of people gathered together in a room to determine if you are a saint or not. The Bible teaches that if we are born again, if we are a child of God, then we are a saint of God.

[25:59] And we are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God and are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets. Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone.

[26:12] We're built on the foundation of the Apostles and of the prophets. The Apostles being the 12th, Jesus Christ would have handpicked and of course it included Paul himself.

[26:25] But we are built on the foundations that they laid, the foundations that they preached, the foundation of none other than Jesus Christ. But it goes on to say, not only are we building on this foundation of the Apostles, but it's also on the foundation of the prophets, the prophets of the Old Testament, the prophets all the way up through John the Baptist.

[26:48] The Bible says that the prophets were until John, speaking of John the Baptist. But the same foundation was laid by the prophets as was laid by the Apostles.

[27:00] The prophets never heard the name Jesus Christ. The prophets never heard of this virgin woman, Nang Mary, that gave birth unto Jesus Christ.

[27:11] But they had the same faith and they had the same belief and the same promises that Almighty God has made me that one day after a while, God would send a deliverer, He would send a Messiah and this is what they had faith in.

[27:26] They may not have known his name would be Jesus Christ, but they believed the Word of God. They believed what God said and it has always been the faith and belief in God.

[27:39] The Bible says they believed God and it was kind of the infariousness. He believed God. It wasn't his works. We just got through going about Ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 through 10 a little while ago.

[27:52] Not works, let's say they mentioned that there's never been of works. It has always been by faith in what God has said and God promised in the Old Testament that He would send a deliverer.

[28:03] God promised in the Old Testament that He would abolish death, that He would do away with death. And He shows in the New Testament just how He done that. He shows in the New Testament how Jesus Christ defeated death, hell and the grave.

[28:16] And these are the words that the prophets would have preached. These are the words the prophets would have believed and they would have been telling. Other people on this is the foundation that the prophets would have been laying on, would have been laying.

[28:28] But the Bible continues here in this verse to say that Jesus Christ was the chief cornerstone. We have nothing to fear with Jesus Christ being the chief cornerstone of the church.

[28:40] Being the chief cornerstone of all of us that are born again children of God. We are building a church where God is building a church unto Himself. God is using us as lovely stones in this church.

[28:53] He is using us. He's putting us where He wants us. He's putting us in this position or in that position. But with Christ being the chief cornerstone, hey the Jews would come in one way, the Gentiles would come in another way, and both of them would be knit, and both of them would be martyred to the same exact cornerstone.

[29:13] Hallelujah! With Jesus Christ being our chief cornerstone, we have nothing to fear. We have no fear. We should have no fear that the church will fail.

[29:24] The church won't fail. I promise you that the church will not fail. Amen. We might see people, we might see people backslide, we might see people go out the door, we might see this, and we might see this, but the grand scheme of things, and in the big picture of things the church will not fail.

[29:43] It was something, or it is something that was ordained by God millennia ago, and it will not fail. God was the designer of it, God is the implementer of it, and God is the keeper of it.

[29:54] The church will not fail, and especially with Jesus Christ, who cannot fail with Him being our chief cornerstone, we church have nothing to fear. Praise God!

[30:05] Thank you, Lord. Hallelujah! We are built upon the foundations, the fossils, and the prophet Jesus Christ himself, being the chief cornerstone in whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord.

[30:20] All the building, fitly framed together, as I just said, God, God might take you and put you somewhere in the church, and He might take me and put me elsewhere in the church, but just as I said a little while ago, using the body of Christ as an example, hey, if we're in the church, if we're in the church, if we're in this temple that is being built unto God, being built by God unto God, if we're in this temple, we have nothing to fear, we have nothing to dread.

[30:50] We are in the household of faith, we are in the household of God. We need to just sit back and allow God to use us how He is going to use us. Some people may preach, some people may teach, some people may be the ones that need to be taught, some people might not pray, some people might be better on visitation, some people might be this, and some people might be that God needs different people doing different things in his church, or God wants different people doing different things within his church, and folks, it doesn't matter how relevant or irrelevant you feel like you may be, if you are in the household of God, if you are in the temple of God, if you are being in this temple that is being fitly framed by Almighty God, hey, allow God to use you for whatever His will is.

[31:37] As we taught in Sunday school this morning, Jesus Christ said it was His beat to do the will of the Father and to finish what the Father had sent Him to do. It should be our need, it should be our want, and it should be our first desire to do the will of the Father.

[31:55] In whom all the building, all the building, I mean, if they are born again, they are part of that building. Now if you are like me, they might be some Christians, they might be some about true blue, brothers and sisters in Christ, you might try to avoid.

[32:15] I ain't saying they ain't saved, I ain't saying they ain't called to do this or do that, but there are some that we might try to avoid. But it says, in whom all the building fitly framed together, grow it into a holy temple, it grows into a holy temple.

[32:35] And those people like I was speaking about, if they are true blue child of God, if they have truly been born again, folks, they are part of that temple. And they are being fitly framed just like you are.

[32:47] And we are going to spend all of eternity with those folks, whether we like it or not. And we should like it, we shouldn't want anybody to go to hell. We shouldn't want anybody to miss out on being part of this temple, being fitly framed by Almighty God for Himself.

[33:03] We shouldn't want anybody to miss out on that. But it's a growth into a holy temple in the Lord. It grows into a holy temple in the Lord, folks. Every time a person is born again, every time someone is saved, that temple grows just a little bit.

[33:19] But folks, I'd like to take it up just a little notch above that and talk about our sanctification and talk about our consecration just a little bit. Folks, if we have been consecrated unto God, if we have been sent off to the South for the service of Almighty God, that service shouldn't ever get stale.

[33:37] That service should grow in the Lord. And our knowledge in Almighty God should grow as well. Our knowledge and our desire for the things of God should grow. Everything about us should grow in the Lord.

[33:49] God has saved our soul. It should be our number one desire to please Almighty God. Our knowledge of the Word should grow. Our knowledge of God should grow. Our knowledge of salvation should grow.

[34:03] Our knowledge of the gospel should grow. And people might say, Spencer, the gospel is pretty simple. I think I've got it down pat. Hey, folks, I'm glad to tell you I still don't have the gospel down pat.

[34:14] But I know enough about the gospel to know that I was a wretched sinner and that Almighty God is a wonderful Savior. And he said, Jesus Christ, to God for me and to bleed for me, I could have life and heaven more abundantly.

[34:30] But I still don't know all there is to know about the gospel. And I want to grow in my knowledge of that. And whom we also are building together, again, building together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

[34:48] Building together for an habitation of God. Hidden Paul too, I believe, was the Corinthian Church. Paul said, no, you're not that your body is the temple of God?

[35:00] The temple of God dwells within us. What condescension that God has made, what condescension he made to begin with in Jesus Christ to come here and live among sinners, let alone die for those sinners.

[35:16] But what condescension that he currently makes to live in the heart of a lowly human being, of someone that is undeserving and none of us are deserving.

[35:28] What condescension is that? Folks, that should humble us. That should humble us to the greatest degree that Almighty God has chosen. He has selected to dwell within us.

[35:41] He who inhabits eternity. He who the heaven of heavens cannot contain has chosen to dwell inside of his chosen people, of his elect, of those that he is saved, of those that have repented and trusted and believed in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

[36:00] He has chosen to dwell within me, has chosen to make my body a temple. The least I can do is draw my best to keep that temple as clean as I possibly can.

[36:12] But praise God when he saved me. He's the one that done the cleaning. He done the cleaning. He continues to do the cleaning. Folks, we're tempted or not.

[36:24] We're tempted with sin. We're tempted with drudgery. We're tempted with sadness. We're tempted with all kinds of things that can take us off the path that Almighty God has got us on.

[36:39] In whom you also are built together for an habitation, for God to dwell in for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

[36:50] God chose to dwell in me and in you if you're here born again this season. He chose to do that. This God that created everything. This God that spoke the universe into existence.

[37:04] This God that commanded the land to come up out of the water to command the land to put forth the animals and the water to put forth the animals and the file and the fish.

[37:15] This same God has chosen to dwell within me and to dwell within you and to dwell with every believer the world over. It's talking about being fitly framed and growing.

[37:29] The temple, it grows. This temple, it's got such a vast proportion to it. It's not just here at Free Gift Gospel Mission.

[37:40] It's not just at the local assembly. This temple is the world over. It has got such a huge proportion to it. God is building to this temple daily.

[37:53] I'm persuaded that there are souls being saved daily. I might not see it. I might not witness it. But I'm persuaded that the Spirit of God is convicting hearts and showing those hearts just how black and empty they are and that Almighty God is doing a regenerating work in those hearts and He is saving souls on a daily basis.

[38:15] It says it grows. There in verse 21, it grows unto a holy temple unto the Lord. It grows. Praise God and it continues to grow. It's continually growing unto a holy temple.

[38:28] You are building for the inhabitation of God through the Spirit. Praise God that He chose to dwell within me. We may not be able to explain all the wiles.

[38:40] We may not be able to explain all the hows. But I believe what the Word of God says and what it teaches. May God chose to dwell within me and within you when they were born against the Saint and child of God.

[38:54] Let's stand out to message God. God bless you all. Appreciate your attention.