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Eden Valley SDA Church

Frank Fournier

Affliction Shall Not Rise Again

I have you turn in your Bibles to Acts chapter 10.

Have you ever heard someone say, I'd rather see a sermon than hear 1 any day?

Well, I'd rather see a sermon than hear 1 any day also.

However, there's only a degree of logic in that saying.

As a matter of fact, God never intends for anyone to just see a sermon.

God never intends for anyone to just hear a sermon.

God never intended for a preacher to just preach.

And God never intended for a medical missionary, self sacrificing servant of God to just serve either.

He intended for the pastor to preach and to serve, and he intended for the medical missionary to serve and to share his faith and to share the gospel as well.

It's not that, it's not to be so imbalanced as to only do 1 thing.

There's many of us, I think, would like to say, well, here's my talent.

But I don't think it's a matter of talent in this respect.

It's every, you know, there's probably not an individual in here that can't open his mouth to say something about God's Word and about God's plan and about what God wants.

And it's also incumbent upon all of us to do what we have received of the Word of God in our lives, to be like Christ.

It's just a matter of being like Jesus and opening our mouth and saying so.

Not being ashamed of the Lord and not being ashamed of acting like the Lord as well.

Our springboard texts, and by the way, I started a little series.

This is sermon number 4 in the series, and it happens to be called De Sozo, which you don't know what that means, and I don't have time to explain it.

In Matthew 24, 14, you don't have to turn there because we've been going there all along.

It says there, "...and this Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached unto all the world as a witness unto all nations.

Then shall the end come." When shall the end come?

Well, when you ask that question, It's automatic.

It's when the Gospel is preached unto all the world.

Not only is the end going to come when the Gospel is preached, but when the Gospel is witnessed by all nations, then of course shall the end come.

And that apparently has not happened yet.

As Seventh-day Adventists, we have been here for at least 167 years, and we've been preaching the Word of God.

And by the way, there's no lack of preachers in this church, And amazing preachers also.

And I don't know if there's any other church that has so many good preachers as this church has.

There's no lack of broadcasting and of programs and of radio and of television and internet.

We are everywhere and we're taking advantage of everything to preach the Word of God, and yet Jesus hasn't come back yet.

Is it because we haven't preached enough?

I think if there is a lack, it's the lack of demonstrating Christ's likeness in our lives.

Not only are we supposed to tell the world that there is a doctor that deals with the sin problem out there, we're supposed to be His hands and His feet.

Anyways, in our last study, we recognize that God's people are not sealed.

You remember how He sent 4 angels and the 4 angels were supposed to destroy the earth.

But when Jesus saw what the situation was in this world, He said, Hold, hold, hold, hold, because the servants of our God, they are not sealed in their foreheads.

And so He says, Until they are, everything is on hold.

It isn't because there is a dearth of knowing the facts either about the sealing or about the 3 angels' message or about our Laodicean condition.

Rather, it's a lack of grasping righteousness by faith.

And this is what we were looking at in our last talk together.

It's a lack of experiencing Christ as my righteousness.

What would it be like if Jesus was my righteousness?

If I had the righteousness of Christ in me.

And it was actually God's righteousness in me.

This is talking about Jesus, and He gives us, of course, the great example of how we should be like Him.

Starting with the second word in verse 38, God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost, and with power, who went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was in him." Was He?

There's 2 comments in my margin against this verse right here, and it's amazing.

The first 1 is from Desire of Ages, page 70, paragraph 2.

From his earliest years he was possessed.

From his earliest years, Jesus was possessed.

Wouldn't that be a wonderful spirit to have in us?

You couldn't meet anyone, and in your heart, the 1 thing you want is to be a blessing to that individual that you meet.

Are there not people that just turn you off?

And there are people that turn your crank, and there are all kinds of people out there and there are some people that you can really bless you want to bless them there are some people you wish you they would be out of your sight because they they are such a turnoff yeah but this is not the way it was with Jesus from the day that he was born he was possessed with 1 spirit he lived to bless everyone with whom he was in contact and I would like to say that that's what it means to be a Christian now the other quotation is similar only this 1 is addressed about us this is Acts of the Apostles 551 paragraph 1 The completeness of Christian character is attained when the impulse to help and bless others springs constantly from within.

You have arrived when the impulse is in you to bless someone.

And the impulse is springing forth constantly from within.

You just want to be a blessing to everyone.

And that's how it's going to be with God's last day people, His remnant, His 144, 000.

You call them whatever you want to call them.

Once they are sealed with the seal of the Living God, they are going to have 1 spirit in them.

And they're going to want to bless everyone with whom they have anything to do.

Well, obviously, then, if you want to bless anyone and you find someone that has a problem, what are you going to do?

You're going to help them to figure out, to find a solution.

Affliction Shall Not Rise Again

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