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Hello, welcome to "The Final Word".
If you follow us, you know that on the Final Word
we take God's Word on a subject and we study it in depth
until we come to a final conclusion-
or the final word on that subject.
In the religious world there seems
to be many different answers
to some of the most simple questions that man has.
Yet, God has given us His word
so that we can all come to the same conclusions.
He wants us all to be united in the Truth.
His Word teaches us the Truth, the problem is that
man has so often changed the word of God
or misused his word, until it makes Unity seem impossible.
But it is not impossible, and so at the Final Word,
we research the questions, from the Biblical perspective,
and we come the answer that God has already given us,
in His Word.
Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:10,
"Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name
"of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing,
"and [that] there be no divisions among you;
"but [that] ye be perfectly joined together
in the same mind and in the same judgment."
Is that a possibility?
I believe that it is, I believe it is a command,
and we need to follow it.
The question today is, how do we have unity -
when everyone seems so contrary to one another.
Denominations don't teach the same thing,
people don't have the same mind.
So, how can unity be attained?
Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:3
He said, "Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit
in the bond of peace."
Endeavouring - that word shows us that there is
an eagerness to be united, and a work towards unity
- unity does not just happen .
It takes work on the part of people
to be able to live together.
Let's go back for a moment- and let's put ourselves
in the midst of the Jews and the Gentiles.
On one hand you have Gentiles
- they are off worshipping in paganism.
They have different gods, they do unholy,
and ungodly things during their pagan worship services.
Things that are base and disgusting.
In Corinth and Ephesus,
they worshipped many different gods and idols.
Now that is on one hand.
Then you have on the other hand Jews,
who had been separated from everyone.
They had been worshipping the true and living God.
Of course many of them misunderstanding the law.
And now you bring those two together.
And both of them despising one other.
That is what was going on here.
Now let's try to get them to live together right here today.
And Paul says you have to get them living together, in peace.
How are you going to do that?
Well, the only way it can be done, is by the Spirit of God,
by his word, changing attitudes and hearts,
and everyone joining together to teach the same thing.
We are so thankful that Brother Curtis Cates is back again,
to present another lesson from God's Word,
on The Unity of the Spirit .
God's plan for unity.
We want to know what the Holy Spirit has to do with unity,
the unity of the Spirit.
Then we go to Ephesians 4:1, where Paul said,
and if you want to turn there that'd be great,
"I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you
to walk worthily of the vocation" (or the calling)
"wherewith you were called, with all lowliness and meekness
"with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love,
"endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit
in the bond of peace." Ephesians 4.
"There's one body and one spirit,
"even as you are called in one hope of your calling, one Lord,
"one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all
who is above all, through all and in you all."
Now notice that he said,
"I plead with you, I beg you, I beseech you, to walk worthily."
Now there are some people who say that we can't walk worthily,
we can't be worthy of salvation.
Well, you know, Christ didn't know anything about that,
because if we were to go over to the book of Revelation,
we would read about one of the congregations
that had not denied the faith, a few names.
Notice in chapter 3 of Revelation, verse 4,
"But thou hast a few names in Sardis that did not defile
their garments, and they shall walk with me in white."
For what? "For they are worthy."
"He that overcometh shall be thus arrayed in white garments,
"and I will in no wise blot his name out of the Book of Life
"and I will confess his name
"before my Father and before his angels.
"He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit
saith to the churches."
And so through God's grace, we can walk worthily
of the vocation whereunto we were called.
And notice, "With all lowliness."
Brethren, these first three verses demonstrate and show us
the proper attitude for unity.
If God's people are going to be united in various places
and over all, we're going to have the right attitude.
And one of those attitudes is humility.
Humility. Pride will not produce unity.
"Pride goeth before destruction."
That's certainly true in the church of the Lord.
Worrying about who gets the credit.
I remember one time when Annette and I were preaching
in Warrior, AL.
There was a nurse, a member of the congregation,
who worked at Dr. Dan Karnes'.
In fact, our son Dan's named for him.
But anyway Sister Kathleen Mitchell was his nurse,
one of them. I went in one day and I had a shot,
I think it was a tetanus shot.
And I was wondering how much is the shot,
now this was back in the 60s.
And Sister Kathleen said, "Just go on, Brother Cates.
We'll handle it."
Well, I got the idea, "We'll let you know how much it is."
Well, several weeks later, it hit me,
"I haven't found out how much that shot is.
I haven't even paid them for the shot."
He didn't accept anything for treating us.
I met Sister Kathleen when she was going out the door
at the close of one of the services at the church,
and she said, "Brother Cates, I was hoping
"that you would forget that. I took care of that.
I paid for your tetanus shot. I wanted to do that for you."
She didn't want the credit.
You know, he that gives a cup of cold water in the name
of the Lord, the Lord will remember,
it'll not go unnoticed.
We need to be humble, we need to be servants of others,
and not worry about who gets the credit.
"With lowliness and meekness."
That's strength under control, being able to control ourselves
and stand for the truth and yet have the milk of human kindness.
"And longsuffering" - suffer long.
Do we in the church suffer long with one another
and have patience with one another
and try to work with one another?
And understand, hey, Christians have good days and bad days,
just like other folks?
"Forbearing one another in love."
And love is that bond that holds us together.
"Giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit
in the bond of peace."
And so when we think about unity,
these are some attitudes that we are going to have to have.
And then he goes into the seven ones
of the unity of the Spirit.
I want you to notice when Dad drew up this chart,
he noticed each one of these characteristics,
these areas of unity, and then he pointed out
in each one of these ones here, these seven ones,
what each one of these ones will produce.
What kind of unity it will bring about in the church
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Oh, our Lord doesn't like division.
In John 17, he said, "Neither pray I for these apostles alone,
"but for all of them which shall believe on me
through their word, that they may be one."
Here's Christ's prayer to his Father.
"Even as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee,
"that they may be one in us,
that the world may believe that thou hast sent me."
You know why there's so many atheists in this world?
I'll tell you.
Because so many of the people who claim
to be following Christ, they're not following Christ.
They're fighting each other tooth and nail and like two cats
with their tails tied together thrown over a clothesline.
Brethren, that doesn't impress the world.
Sometimes I've heard people say, "If that's what Christianity is,
rule me out. I don't want to be a part of that."
And then in verse 23, he prayed that they may be
perfected into one.
Now that's an important prayer, brethren.
And how is that produced?
It's produced by the seven ones.
It's produced by the word of the Spirit.
"Neither pray I for these alone, but also for them who shall
believe on me through their word, that they may be one."
We have to give heed to the word of God, don't we?
We have to live it in our individual lives and live it
in our collective lives as we work together in a congregation.
And in the church, the various congregations in association
with each other throughout the world.
In I John 1:3ff, I find that not only am I united
when I obey the gospel of Christ
with God, Christ and the Holy Spirit, but I'm also united
automatically with everyone who is united with God,
Christ and the Holy Spirit.
Now how does this happen?
Through obedience to the truth, right?
But our Lord abhors division.
When the apostle Paul wrote the church in Corinth,
and he had established it, he said in I Corinthians 1:10,
he pleaded with them, "I beseech you, brethren,
"that there be no division among you,
"that you all speak the same thing,
that you have the same mind, and the same judgment."
In fact, it was so terrible, the division was,
until in I Corinthians 11:18ff, he said,
"When you come together, it is not even possible for you
to partake of the Lord's supper,"
the American Standard Version says.
Now that kind of division is terrible, isn't it?
You can't even partake of the Lord's Supper.
Outside of the worship, you are divided,
you don't even love one another, some of you were lifted up
with pride til you're not concerned
with each other's attitudes and then you come into the services
and you claim to partake of the one bread
which represents the one body of Christ (I Corinthians 10).
The unity of God's people, and on the outside of worship,
you are making a mockery out of unity.
When you come together, it is not possible
to eat the Lord's Supper.
And so, hurriedly - our time is rapidly passing,
we want to speak concerning these seven ones and what each
one of them, what area of unity is noticed in each one of them.
I won't be able to deal with all of these Scriptures.
I wish I could.
First, we'll talk about the one God.
In I Corinthians 8:6, we find that there are many lords,
many gods in this world, small "g," there are many gods.
Those things, those persons, whom people put first.
There are lords many and gods many,
but there is only one true and living God
and there's just one Lord.
So there is only one Lord, there is only one God
that made heaven and earth.
In Deuteronomy 6:4, "Jehovah our God is one Jehovah, one Lord.
"Therefore, thou shalt love him with all thy heart,
mind, soul and strength."
God will not accept divided allegiance.
We can't love him on the level that we love our family.
And boy, do I love my family!
We can't love him on the level
that we love our physical possessions.
I tell you, he's going to be first.
In Ex. 20,
we find "thou shall have no other gods before me."
God is a jealous God.
And Christ said if you love father, mother, brother, sister,
husband, wife, more than me,
you're not fit to be my disciple.
We love God supremely and then that shows us how to
love our mates and love our children and love our families,
our mothers and dads, and our neighbors as ourselves.
But we have to love the Lord supremely.
He will not accept second place. He will not.
"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,
soul, mind and strength."
Now what does that mean? That means unity of worship.
We heard a tremendous sermon this morning on worship.
I benefitted from it.
In John 4:23, 24, we find that God seeketh such to worship him,
for "God is a spirit and they that worship Him
must worship Him in spirit and in truth."
In Matthew 4:10, we find that Christ was tempted.
He said, "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God
and him only shalt thou serve."
Do we want to be united in the Spirit?
We're going to have to honor and love supremely our one God.
And we will worship Him and that will bring about unity.
But in the second place, there is one Lord.
As we said in I Corinthians 8, there are many lords (small "l")
people who lord it over others.
But there is only one living Lord,
just like there is only one living God, the Father,
and I'll tell you, that Lord has to be honored.
And when we honor our Lord, then that brings unity of authority.
Who's the authority in religion?
In Matthew 28:18, Christ said, "All authority has been given
"unto me in heaven and on earth.
Go ye therefore and teach all nations."
In Matthew 17:5 when Jesus was on the Mount of Transfiguration,
do you know what Peter suggested when Moses and Elijah appeared?
He said, "Let's build three tents here.
"Three places of worship and honor. Let's build
one for Moses and one for Elijah and one for Christ."
Let me tell you something,
the Lord quickly put the quietus on that.
There was a voice out of heaven, that said,
"This is my beloved son, in whom I am pleased.
Hear ye him."
Don't hear the Law of Moses of the Old Testament,
don't hear the prophets in the Old Testament.
You listen to Jesus Christ and you follow his will.
You follow the apostles' doctrine.
And then in Hebrews 1:1, "God in time past spake through Moses
"and the prophets" and so forth.
"But now he has spoken to us through His son,
by whom he has built all things," and so forth.
In Acts 3:22, 23 when Peter and John
are preaching in the temple.
They said, "Moses said, A prophet like unto me
shall God raise up. Him shall ye hear in all things."
You don't think that brings unity,
when you have the unity of the authority of Jesus Christ?
One Lord. One ruler. One king. Yes sir. But then one Spirit.
In John 16:13 and John 14:26, we find that Christ talking
to the apostles said that he would pray the Father
he would send the Holy Spirit
who should guide you into all truth.
Revelation 2:7, "He that hath an ear,
let him hear what the Spirit says unto the churches."
In I John 5:7, we're to be lead by the Spirit.
Now what does that mean? That means unity of life.
How are you living? How am I living?
Do we want unity among God's people?
Do we want unity in following Jesus Christ?
Then we're going to have to have unity in life.
We're going to have to say no to the world and we're going
to have to obey Jesus Christ and walk in the law of the Spirit.
And when we do that, what will it bring?
It'll bring unity of life.
In Romans 8:1,2, "there is now no condemnation to them
"that walk after the Spirit and not after the flesh.
"The law of the Spirit of life hath made me free
from the law of sin and death."
We're to walk after the Spirit, we're not to walk
after the flesh (Romans 8:9-11).
In John 6:63, Christ said, "The words of the Spirit,
they are spirit and they are life."
And so notice, the one Spirit brings unity of life.
And what does that mean?
That means we have spiritual life in Christ,
in walking after the will of Jesus Christ.
We are so thankful to Brother Cates for his help
in our study on Unity.
We noticed from his lesson today, that in reality,
there are two things that we can do to be united.
First is having the right attitude.
An attitude of humility .
I have known lots of churches to split, and split
and split... not because of some doctrinal difference,
but because people had prideful attitudes.
So if we want unity, as Brother Cates talked about,
we must have the right attitude.
But also, if I might sort of summarize what he was
spelling out for us, - we must all agree upon the same source.
And that is God and his Word.
Jesus hates division.
He prayed in John 17, that we all could be united,
just as He and His Father are one .
He wants us to be one as well.
Denominations have caused split after split after split,
because they have gone away from the simple truth
found in the Holy Bible.
Paul also begged for unity.
He said (1Co 1:10) "Now I beseech you, brethren,
"by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
"that ye all speak the same thing,
"[that] there be no divisions among you;
"but [that] ye be perfectly joined together
in the same mind and in the same judgment."
Paul tells us, we can be unified,
and I know that today if people would have the right attitude,
and would come together to discuss the truth
of the Word of God,
then the end result would be Unity.
Now you might want to know what you need to do
to become a child of God.
I'm glad to help you out in this. The Bible is clear.
First of all, you must believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
(Joh 3:16 KJV) "For God so loved the world, that he gave
"his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him
should not perish, but have everlasting life."
Secondly, you should repent - that is, you change your mind
and that change of mind brings about a change of action.
(Act 2:38 KJV) "Then Peter said unto them, Repent,
"and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ
"for the remission of your sins, and ye shall receive
the gift of the Holy Ghost."
Thirdly, you should confess
that Jesus is both Lord and Christ.
In Rom 10:9, we read, "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth
"the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart
that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."
(Rom 10:10 KJV) "For with the heart man believeth
"unto righteousness; and with the mouth
confession is made unto salvation."
Then fourthly, you must be baptized (immersed)
in order to have your sins washed away.
(Mar 16:16 KJV) "He that believeth and is baptized
shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."
(1Pe 3:21 KJV) "The like figure whereunto [even] baptism doth
"also now save us (not the putting away of the filth
"of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God)
by the resurrection of Jesus Christ:"
Folks, these are the things that you need to do to be saved.
The Holy Spirit has spelled it out for us in his word.
Well, we are so thankful that you have taken the time
to be with us as we continue to study the Holy Spirit.
We ask that you come back
and join us for more in-depth studies.