Bom dia. Como vai você? How are you this morning? Okay? That’s all my Portuguese.
It’s just wonderful to be here and to have this wonderful opportunity to have fellowship with you, brothers and sisters. First of all, to meet with you at our Lord’s table and to join our hearts in worship with Him.
I don’t recognize all of you. Some of you I recognize; some of you, I recognize your face, but I don’t remember your name. So, if I get a chance to see you after the meeting, I hope you’ll be merciful and remind me of your name, okay? I think I know most of you, but some of you I’ve not had the privilege and joy of meeting.
I just want to introduce myself as the long-winded, loud preacher who is the father of three sons: fourteen, forty-five, and eighteen months. I hope you get to meet him after the meeting too.
Would you turn with me, please, this morning, first in the Old Testament, to the book of Proverbs, chapter 29? I’m sure that most of you can already guess what verse we’re going to read from: Proverbs 29, beginning with verse 18.
Where there is no vision,
The people are unrestrained;
But happy is he who keeps the law.— Proverbs 29:18
And in Acts 26, verse 19:
So, King Agrippa, I did not prove disobedient to the heavenly vision.
— Acts 26:19
And then in Revelation 3, verse 18. This is our Lord Jesus speaking to the church at Laodicea:
I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire, so that you may become rich;
And white garments so that you may clothe yourself,
That the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed;
And eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see.— Revelation 3:18
Let’s pray together.
Father, in the name of Your beloved Son, we want to give You again this morning the thanks of our hearts. We rejoice because we see in our lives, and in the lives of so many of Your people, such rich blessings being poured out day after day.
We rejoice this morning as well that You are the great I AM, that You never change, that You are always the same faithful, merciful, gracious God who has revealed Himself in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ.
So we’ve come here this morning resting in Your utter faithfulness to help us in our time together. Lord, You know everything about us there is to know. You know the kind of pressures and difficulties and problems that we encounter day after day.
And Lord, You know how sometimes we don’t allow Your Holy Spirit to work to the degree that He desires. And so we know that, Lord, we can experience negative things.
We’re resting in You this morning that, in some way that we don’t even have to ask, You’ll take Your written Word and the spoken word and make it a living word to each one of our hearts.
Lord, we want to be faithful to You. We want to endure to the end. So speak words of encouragement to us this morning, and we ask it in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
My own little observation is that we, as the Lord’s people, are facing a very serious crisis. I guess this can probably be said of virtually every generation, that they have their own set of problems and difficulties that they have to face, and they find the Lord in a living way so that they will be overcomers and not be overcome.
Our enemy, who is also God’s arch-enemy, is determined to try to weaken the people of God, to distract us, to so involve us in things that we cannot be about the business to which we’ve been called.
We don’t have the time, the energy, the other resources we might need—at least we don’t feel like we do. I guess every generation must feel this, but it’s almost like we don’t have twenty-four hours in our day. Somehow they get so shortened, and there’s not time to do the things that we know we should do.
I think it’s in a time like this that we should go back and examine carefully some of the foundations that the Lord has laid in our lives, or at least seeks to lay in our lives, that will enable us to get through.
Now, I hope in your hearts this morning, brothers and sisters, that you are totally convinced that our Lord Jesus Christ—in Him—are all the resources that you and I need to overcome any situation, regardless of how difficult and impossible it may seem to us.
I’ve been particularly impressed recently by that verse in Romans 8:37:
But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.
— Romans 8:37
Now, you can make your own list of those things, and maybe it’s a long list. But Paul says, “In all these things, we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.”
Can I say it this way this morning, without being critical? There are no excuses, brothers and sisters. There’s no reason for us to make excuses. We need to find the Lord in a fuller way. It is through Him, and through Him alone, that you and I are going to be able to stand all the way to the end.
So we need to find a way to come back to some of these very basic but necessary parts of our lives as individuals, as those who are His children, but also as an assembly of the Lord’s people. The Lord wants us to go through. He wants us to finish the race and be standing and running at the end.
Now, in this verse in Proverbs 29:18, how many messages have you, brothers and sisters, heard based on this one verse of Scripture? It seems like the Lord just keeps bringing us back again and again and again. Why? Because it’s a necessary part of our overcoming the situations that we’re in.
So the principle that the writer of Proverbs lays before us is a principle that you and I need to get solidly built into our lives: without vision, you ain’t going to make it.
If you don’t see what it is that God has provided for us, and you don’t understand the way that you appropriate that, you just are not going to make it through.
Now, I don’t want to be a prophet of doom, but brothers and sisters, I don’t think it’s going to get any easier. Maybe I’m wrong. I hope I’m wrong. But I don’t think it’s going to get any easier. I think five years from now, it’s going to be more demanding, more costly for you and I to follow the Lord than it is today.
And so this necessity of seeing has to be a part of our lives. Now, let’s not talk in big spiritual terms this morning. First of all, I can’t do it. That’s not even an attempt. But let’s first of all ask ourselves: What is the writer talking about when he talks about vision?
Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained.
— Proverbs 29:18
Now, our God is Spirit. Remember the words of our Lord Jesus in John 4:
God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.
— John 4:24
We know that our God, who is Spirit, has His throne established in heaven. So, as I understand this matter of vision, it is one of the important ways that our God, from heaven, communicates to us here on the earth. It is a means of communication.
Certainly, when we think of it in a large sense, we’re talking about all that God has said, all that God has communicated, that we have a record of in the Word of God—from the first time He communicated until the final record that we have.
Now we know that the greatest, clearest, and fullest communication that God has ever spoken or given was through His own Son, who is the Word of God.
So when we talk about vision, we’re not talking about visions, although they may be necessary. We’re talking about God communicating to us—His people, His children, His sons and daughters—here on the earth, going through and experiencing the reality of what is happening here.
It seems, my brothers and sisters, that the enemy is doing everything he can possibly do, within the sovereignty of our Lord, to prevent you and me from getting through to the end—to make us give up and not discover that we can overcome in Him, whether we’re talking individually or corporately.
And so our God is prepared to take the revelation that He has given us in His Bible. You see, God doesn’t give us revelation outside of the Word of God. This is His revelation. It’s all you and I need in order to be able to make it through.
The Holy Spirit can choose what part of that revelation you and I need to see and experience under any given situation. So I say to us again: there are no excuses, brothers and sisters. We need to stop making them.
Sure, it’s tough. Sure, it’s hard. But you know what it should be? It should be something that drives us to the point of total failure on our part, of trying to work it out on our own. And in that condition, we find ourselves able to lay hold of the Lord—or, should we put it the other way, the Lord lays hold of us—and strengthens us and enables us in ways that we can maybe not even imagine, but gets us through.
So God is prepared, and is continuing, to communicate. One of the ways He communicates is through this matter of vision.
Now, sometimes we talk about vision in such a way that we think it’s only for the super-spiritual. Well, first of all, brothers and sisters, there ain’t no such creatures. There are no super-spiritual people.
There may be people who are more spiritual than we are, but the only reason they’re more spiritual is that they have discovered something of the Lord Jesus that we haven’t discovered yet, for whatever reason.
I don’t know who you consider to be the most spiritual person you know, but the reason why they’re in that place is because God, in His mercy, has shown them something, enabled them to see it, and given them the grace and strength to be obedient to what they have seen. That’s why they’re there—not because they’re such great people.
You notice, brothers and sisters, God hasn’t chosen the great people. He’s chosen the nobodies. Please forgive me if you’re offended by that. But He’s chosen those who hopefully will stay in a place where they desperately need the Lord Jesus Christ in a way that they’ve never known Him before.
So vision is God’s way of communicating to us. And I’m so glad this morning to report to all of you—the younger ones, the middle-aged, the older ones—this is for you. Vision is to be your ongoing experience. It is not just for a few people.
Every time you open this Book to read it—and I trust it is often—the Holy Spirit wants to enlighten you. He wants to enable you to see the truth: God as He is revealed in the Scriptures.
So that, in seeing that, something will happen inside of you. You will find a strength that is not your own to enable you to get through all the pressures and other kinds of situations that you encounter.
I think one of the very subtle ways the enemy is working now is keeping us so busy, so preoccupied. I am amazed, brothers and sisters, when I’ve gone to another country and come back. Many of you don’t have opportunities—you don’t have time, according to you—to sit down and have a conversation over a cup of coffee. You’re just too busy.
This is one of the ways the enemy erodes away our understanding. After a while, what begins to happen is that our seeing is affected—our ability to go to the Word of God and for God to reveal a further aspect, a greater dimension, of the truth we have here. Somehow we’re just not able to do it.
Because, you know, my brothers and sisters, if we’re going to be strengthened in the Lord, if we’re going to find the Lord in a new way, it’s expensive. It’s not cheap. Oh, even though it’s free, it’s not cheap. It costs.
You have to find some time somewhere. You have to buy it. You have to lay hold of it. You have to push aside some of the other things, establish some priorities, and say, “This is going to be first.”
If you don’t do that, what you’ll find is that the unimportant things get pushed to the top, and the important things get pushed to the bottom of your to-do list. Sometimes they never get done at all, and we wonder why.
Why is my heart not as in tune? Why is it that I’m not so in love with my Lord as I was when I first came to know Him? Why? It’s simply because we’re living in enemy territory. Don’t forget: this is enemy territory.
God has sovereignly allowed the enemy to set up his kingdom here, and we are living in enemy territory. Even though we have been transferred from this dominion into the kingdom of His beloved Son, the fact is we still have to live here.
We have to learn how to live in the kingdom of God while we’re living in the kingdom of His enemy here. And so God, in His great mercy, is prepared to give us the enlightenment that we need to go through.
I’m so glad to report to every one of you this morning: it’s yours. It’s part of your inheritance. You young brothers and sisters, I know some of you don’t know me, but it doesn’t make any difference. You need to start now.
You need to say to the Lord, “I’m not going to read my Bible merely as a duty.” One of the most unfortunate things that happens is that somehow we begin to read the Word of God just as a duty, and we don’t meet Him when we go to it.
I don’t know how you work all of this out, but I want to encourage you this morning that you find a way, you find the grace, and you say to the Lord, “I’m not satisfied just by reading this Book. I want the Holy Spirit to take the truth that is here and make it real to my heart, to where it changes the way I think and it changes the way I live.”
You know, when I was in the denomination—I’m not going to tell you which one—every Sunday night they had this special program. They had a little piece of paper you had to fill out, and you had to make a check if you read your Bible every day that week. You had to make another check if you gave money, and on and on and on.
But, brothers and sisters, you can just go through and check all of these things. You may have actually done them, but you reap no benefits. It doesn’t produce anything of any value in our lives.
So may the Lord, in His mercy, create a holy dissatisfaction if you’re only reading the Bible so that your conscience doesn’t bother you. Oh, may God help us to see something very wonderful, so positive: the Lord wants to meet us and reveal to us a greater understanding of our Lord Jesus Christ, who we are in Him, and what’s available to us.
Regardless of the situation we’re facing, there’s a way through, brothers and sisters. Only one way, but there’s a way through. Our Lord Jesus Christ is that way.
But if you don’t see it, if you’re blind to it, if you’re ignoring it, if your head is in the sand, then you don’t reap the benefit. How can you obey something you don’t see? How can you obey something you don’t understand? You can’t.
That’s why Paul said, “O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision.”
Now, what is the secret of Paul’s life? We’ll look at it a little bit later, but what is the secret of this man’s life? How is it that this man, at the end of his life, can say:
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.
— 2 Timothy 4:7
Now, some of you are not even engaged in the fight. You’re just sitting down and letting things happen to you. You need to stand up. But the only way you’re going to do that is through a fuller, greater, more complete understanding of our Lord Jesus Christ, His finished work on Calvary, and how you individually must find the Lord.
I can’t do it for you. You can’t do it for me. I have to find the Lord. Now, we can help each other, we can encourage each other, and we can pray for one another, but, brothers and sisters, we still have to find Him on our own.
So I’m glad to report to you: this is for you, not just for the so-called spiritual giants.
Now, the way I want to try to underline this matter is to show what happens when there is no vision, and then contrast it with what happens when there is vision.
When the writer in Proverbs says, “Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained,” some translations say, “The people perish.” But I think the best way we can perhaps translate that today is this: where people don’t see what God has provided, they make a mess of things.
They’re out of control. That’s really what the idea of the word is. It’s like a woman who takes her hair and beautifully puts it all up here, then sticks pins in it to keep it in place. But when you pull the pins out, what happens to the hair? It’s out of control.
This is what the word means. So, without seeing what God has revealed in the person of His Son by the Holy Spirit, if you don’t see it and allow it to control you, you will be out of control.
You may be living a life that you are satisfied with, but it will not produce the kind of results that God is looking for in our lives.
This is a principle, my brothers and sisters. This is an eternal principle that God has established, and if we violate it, we pay the consequences. Where there is no vision, where there is no seeing of what God has revealed, the results are always that we make a mess of things. Things are out of control, and they result in something that is not acceptable to the Lord.
It means just the opposite if we have vision. If we have vision, and we’re allowing the Holy Spirit to enable us to be obedient to that vision, then the result will be that we will have an ordered life—not one of chaos, not one out of control, but one that is ordered.
You know, there’s a hymn. I don’t remember the name of the hymn, but just one line:
Let my ordered life confess
The beauty of His holiness.
Oh, my dear brothers and sisters, how we need to understand that an ordered life—not with some kind of great restriction, but a life that is ordered and has beauty to it—is a result of seeing and obeying vision.
Seeing who we are in Christ, seeing what’s available for us, seeing how we can take steps so that our lives become something that is an honor to our Lord.
Everything in this world is against something like that. In subtle, subtle ways, they try to get us in and affect us in such a way that we make decisions—sometimes lifetime decisions, decisions that affect fifty or sixty years of our lives—on the basis of what the world dictates to us and not on the basis of what the Word of God says to us.
So may I encourage us to be people who really see the necessity—the absolute necessity—of having the eyes of our spirit opened to see and understand the spiritual truth that God has revealed to us in His Son through His Word.
What I want to do—and some of you help me, because sometimes I lose sight of the time, and I don’t want to live up to my reputation this morning—is read together some portions: three in the book of Acts, one in Galatians, and one in Philippians, about this man Saul of Tarsus.
Saul of Tarsus started off as a man without vision. This is B.V.—before vision. But once he had vision, you see a totally different person.
Hopefully, this will somehow write it indelibly upon our hearts how important it is for us not to remain people without vision, but that we pay whatever price is necessary to become a people with vision.
Our Lord will not do anything for the apostle Paul that He will not do for you. He plays no favorites. He shows no partiality. Not that we become an apostle Paul, but what Paul experienced is to be a part of the life of every believer. They are to have a vision that transforms and redirects their lives.
Let’s begin in Acts 7. I’m going to be reading quite a bit, so you be patient and hang in there with me. If you don’t have a Bible with you, try to get beside someone who does.
Here they’re talking about the martyrdom of Stephen, one of the men who were chosen to serve in the church in Jerusalem.
When they had driven him out of the city, they began stoning him; and the witnesses laid aside their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul.
They went on stoning Stephen as he called on the Lord and said, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!”
Then falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them!” Having said this, he fell asleep.
Saul was in hearty agreement with putting him to death.
— Acts 7:58–8:1
And on that day a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles.
Some devout men buried Stephen, and made loud lamentation over him. But Saul began ravaging the church, entering house after house; and dragging off men and women, he would put them in prison.
— Acts 8:1–3
Now Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest, and asked for letters from him to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, both men and women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
— Acts 9:1–2
As he was traveling, it happened that he was approaching Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him; and he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?”
And he said, “Who are You, Lord?”
And He said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting, but get up and enter the city, and it will be told you what you must do.”
— Acts 9:3–6
The men who traveled with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one. Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could see nothing; and leading him by the hand, they brought him into Damascus.
And he was three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank.
— Acts 9:7–9
Paul later testified concerning this event:
I persecuted this Way to the death, binding and putting both men and women into prisons. As also the high priest and all the Council of the elders can testify. From them I also received letters to the brethren, and started off for Damascus in order to bring even those who were there to Jerusalem as prisoners to be punished.
— Acts 22:4–5
But it happened that as I was on my way, approaching Damascus about noontime, a very bright light suddenly flashed from heaven all around me, and I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?”
And I answered, “Who are You, Lord?”
And He said to me, “I am Jesus the Nazarene, whom you are persecuting.”
— Acts 22:6–8
And I said, “What shall I do, Lord?”
And the Lord said to me, “Get up and go on into Damascus, and there you will be told of all that has been appointed for you to do.”
— Acts 22:10
Paul gave this same testimony before King Agrippa:
So then, I thought to myself that I had to do many things hostile to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. And this is just what I did in Jerusalem; not only did I lock up many of the saints in prisons, having received authority from the chief priests, but also when they were being put to death I cast my vote against them.
— Acts 26:9–10
And as I punished them often in all the synagogues, I tried to force them to blaspheme; and being furiously enraged at them, I kept pursuing them even to foreign cities.
— Acts 26:11
In Galatians 1, Paul says:
For you have heard of my former manner of life in Judaism, how I used to persecute the church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it; and I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries among my countrymen, being more extremely zealous for my ancestral traditions.
— Galatians 1:13–14
And in Philippians 3:
Although I myself might have confidence even in the flesh. If anyone else has a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more: circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless.
— Philippians 3:4–6
I know that is a lot of Scripture to read, but I believe, my brothers and sisters, that this is a portrait of a man who is living without vision.
Now, as we have read those passages, what words struck you? What caught you in terms of what kind of a man Saul of Tarsus was—also known as Paul? What kind of a man?
He was a zealot. He gave his whole life. His life was committed totally to serving God.
Driven. Driven, yes. Great motivation. Highly educated—at the feet of Gamaliel, one of the great teachers. Very, very religious.
Oh, my brothers and sisters, a religious man without vision? Oh, maybe. He was blind. He was born blind. Guess what? We were too.
Self-confident. What about his background, his heritage? Anybody here do better than he could? Anybody have a better list than what you find in Philippians 3?
A Hebrew of the Hebrews, a Pharisee of the Pharisees, of the tribe of Benjamin, of the nation of Israel. Anybody beat that one? A perfect lawkeeper—without blame, he said. In his own mind, he understood he was keeping the law.
Now, those are the good things about him. What about some of the negative things? He was an accomplice to a murder. He stood by and may have been the instigator of the stoning of Stephen. How could an educated, religious man do such a thing?
He was cruel. Both men and women—he threw them into prison.
Now, brothers and sisters, we could go on giving more characteristics, more adjectives, to describe this man. But most of what is said is that he’s a good man: religious, intelligent, educated, all of these things.
Yet there was something operating in this man that caused him to be hostile to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. He was zealous. He tirelessly tried to destroy the church of the Lord Jesus Christ—the very work of God. The God he claimed to serve, he was now seeking to destroy His work.
How is it possible, my brothers and sisters? Why? How can you explain a man of this caliber doing such things? One simple answer: he was without vision. He didn’t see. He thought he was doing the right thing.
Now let’s go back to those portions of Scripture and look at the other side. Let’s go back to Acts 9.
Remember the crisis? The crisis was that he was encountered by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.
Now, brothers and sisters, probably none of us will have an experience similar to Paul’s—that is, we will not be walking on the road to Damascus and have a light brighter than the sun shine on us and strike us to the ground. But I want us to understand that God has revealed Himself. It’s just as real. It can be just as life-changing and transforming. That’s what happened to him.
Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias; and the Lord said to him in a vision, “Ananias.” And he said, “Here I am, Lord.”
And the Lord said to him, “Get up and go to the street called Straight, and inquire at the house of Judas for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying.”
— Acts 9:10–11
And he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him, so that he might regain his sight.
— Acts 9:12
But Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he did to Your saints at Jerusalem; and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on Your name.”
— Acts 9:13–14
But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of Mine, to bear My name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; for I will show him how much he must suffer for My name’s sake.”
— Acts 9:15–16
So Ananias departed and entered the house, and after laying his hands on him said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you were coming, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”
And immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales, and he regained his sight, and he got up and was baptized.
— Acts 9:17–18
And he took food and was strengthened. Now for several days he was with the disciples who were at Damascus, and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.”
— Acts 9:19–20
All those hearing him continued to be amazed, and were saying, “Is this not he who in Jerusalem destroyed those who called on this name, and who had come here for the purpose of bringing them bound before the chief priests?”
But Saul kept increasing in strength and confounding the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that this Jesus is the Christ.
— Acts 9:21–22
In Acts 22, Paul speaks again of Ananias:
A certain Ananias, a man who was devout by the standard of the Law and well spoken of by all the Jews who lived there, came to me, and standing near said to me, “Brother Saul, receive your sight!” And at that very time I looked up at him.
— Acts 22:12–13
And he said, “The God of our fathers has appointed you to know His will, and to see the Righteous One and to hear an utterance from His mouth. For you will be a witness for Him to all men of what you have seen and heard.”
— Acts 22:14–15
Now why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.
— Acts 22:16
It happened when I returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple, that I fell into a trance, and I saw Him saying to me, “Make haste, and get out of Jerusalem quickly, because they will not accept your testimony about Me.”
— Acts 22:17–18
And He said to me, “Go! For I will send you far away to the Gentiles.”
— Acts 22:21
And in Acts 26:
So, King Agrippa, I did not prove disobedient to the heavenly vision, but kept declaring both to those of Damascus first, and also at Jerusalem and then throughout all the region of Judea, and even to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds appropriate to repentance.
— Acts 26:19–20
In Galatians 1, Paul says:
But when God, who had set me apart even from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son in me so that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with flesh and blood.
— Galatians 1:15–16
Then three years later I went up to Jerusalem to become acquainted with Cephas, and stayed with him fifteen days. But I did not see any other of the apostles except James, the Lord’s brother.
— Galatians 1:18–19
I was still unknown by sight to the churches of Judea which were in Christ; but only, they kept hearing, “He who once persecuted us is now preaching the faith which he once tried to destroy.” And they were glorifying God because of me.
— Galatians 1:22–24
Oh, brothers and sisters, just listen carefully to these words in Philippians:
But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ.
More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ.
— Philippians 3:7–8
And may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.
— Philippians 3:9
That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
— Philippians 3:10–11
Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.
— Philippians 3:12
Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
— Philippians 3:13–14
What a transformation, brothers and sisters: to come from being one who was so hostile to the Lord Jesus to saying, “There’s nothing—nothing—that I won’t get rid of, just so I can know Him in a fuller way.”
And why? What explanation do we have? What he saw—Who he saw—on the Damascus road transformed him. It changed him. He was never the same again.
This man came to know his Lord, and he discovered in Him a resource that enabled him to go through anything. You don’t believe it? Read 2 Corinthians 11.
Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they descendants of Abraham? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? I speak as if insane—I more so: in far more labors, in far more imprisonments, beaten times without number, often in danger of death.
— 2 Corinthians 11:22–23
Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep.
— 2 Corinthians 11:24–25
I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren.
— 2 Corinthians 11:26
I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches.
— 2 Corinthians 11:27–28
My brothers and sisters, I doubt if any of us here have even experienced one of these things. Yet this man remained faithful. He made it through. He fought the good fight. He finished the course. He kept the faith in the face of all of this.
I’m not trying to make anything out of this man, but I’m trying to encourage us this morning to become people who obey what God has already shown us, and to be before Him and plead with Him to do what He needs to do to open our eyes, so that we see our Lord Jesus in His fullness.
Regardless—I don’t care what your situation is—I’m not trying to share some cheap thing with you this morning. I don’t care what your situation is. The Lord Jesus can enable you to get through.
But if you’re a religious person, just religion won’t make it through. In our Lord Jesus Christ is the resource that enabled this man to be faithful in the midst of all this, and I’m here this morning to remind you: it’s true for you too. It’s true for you, regardless of how difficult it is.
I don’t know that Paul could have ever come to Philippians 3, where he was willing to throw everything on the rubbish heap that he might gain an experience of knowing his Lord, had he not gone through some of these experiences here in 2 Corinthians.
So, brothers and sisters, it needs to begin with vision. It needs to begin by seeing. If you are simply trying to accept the doctrines of the so-called Christian faith, they won’t stand the test, my brothers and sisters. It may be right, but you need to have a living experience with the living Christ.
You need to find in Him. You need to see, and you need to continue to see.
Like Paul, what he saw on the Damascus road, even though it was so glorious, was only the beginning. The Lord didn’t talk to him anything about the church there. But is there anybody who had a greater vision of the church than the apostle Paul?
The church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.
— Ephesians 1:23
That didn’t happen on the road to Damascus. It began there, but it became more fully developed as he went on. When the Lord Jesus said to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” that little seed began to fall into Paul’s heart, and it grew. It blossomed.
So he saw this universal picture of our Lord Jesus Christ. Dear brothers and sisters, this is for every one of God’s children—no exceptions.
We have to learn to obey. That is, we simply obey the light that we receive. If the light you have received is that Jesus died for you on the cross, then receive it and obey it. And then the Lord will continue to add to your seeing.
And the verse in Revelation 3:18—some of you, I know, have studied carefully and thoroughly these letters to the seven churches. But the church in Laodicea, in many ways, seems to picture some of the situation that we’re faced with today.
Especially in American Christianity, in many, many circles, brothers and sisters, everything is so successful. Megachurches, as they call them; paradigm churches; seeker-sensitive churches. Thousands, tens of thousands of people on their membership—seem very successful.
This is apparently the way it was with the church at Laodicea. They were so successful. You know what they said?
I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing.
— Revelation 3:17
Including the Lord. Where was the Lord? He was on the outside, knocking at the door, trying to get in.
Now, what was the problem? Their eyes. They were blind. They were blind.
So this ought to be a lesson to us as assemblies: even though once we may have seen, that doesn’t mean we will continue to see. It doesn’t mean that something won’t happen to our spiritual sight, so that we cannot see clearly like we did before.
This apparently is what happened to the church in Laodicea. Because they were blind to the reality of the situation, from all outward appearances things were great. They had a great music team. Thousands of people were coming. They were just flooding the place. Everybody had their own parking place.
It’s an amazing thing what they’ve developed in the United States. You can have your own parking place if you attend some of these churches. So they advertise, “Come and have all of your needs met.”
They had need of nothing, in their estimation. Brothers and sisters, there’s a danger that comes with success. You know what the danger is? It’s been the story of God’s people through the centuries: they forget their God.
They’re able to do things on their own by their own strength and their own wisdom. Maybe they create, as the prophets did in the Old Testament, their own vision. But it’s not the vision we find in the New Testament of the church.
We need to be alert to this. Realize it can happen to us. If it’s happening in some way, we need to take the remedy our Lord Jesus gives us. If it hasn’t happened, at least we need to take some precautions to make sure it doesn’t happen.
Because the moment we think it can’t happen, already something has happened to our hearts and our minds. We’re already partially deceived, because it can happen to anybody or any assembly.
Brothers and sisters, I’m so glad to report this morning: there’s only one solution to this spiritual blindness. You know what it is? For Jesus says:
Come, buy from Me gold refined by fire, white garments, and eye salve.
— Revelation 3:18
It’s the only place you can get it. You can’t get it anyplace else. The Lord Jesus is the keeper of this eye salve.
Somehow, in the mercy of God, you have had vision—a seeing of the Lord in a greater way—but now it may be beginning to fade. Maybe you’ve developed a cataract, or something else has happened to your eyesight, spiritually speaking.
I’m so glad to report, once again, all you have to do is go to Him. Now, it’s free, but it costs you everything.
Isn’t our Lord so wonderful, brothers and sisters? Isn’t it wonderful that our heavenly Father has made it so that we only have to go one place? We don’t have to go many—just one place. It’s all located in the Lord Jesus Christ. In His sight, all the fullness is there.
But we foolishly try to find it someplace else. And I say foolishly—it may not look like it in the beginning of our foolish actions, but eventually the foolishness will appear. It will be seen for what it is: just something of man’s effort.
My dear brothers and sisters, I say it again: our Lord is beyond description, too wonderful for words. Why do we want to go someplace else? Why are we trying to see something else when it’s all focused in Him?
So my encouragement to us this morning is very simple: get vision and keep it—individually and corporately.
And then obey what the Lord, in His mercy, has so clearly shown us of Himself and His purpose for His church.
Let’s pray together.
Oh, blessed Lord.
Tell our brother or sister, rather than me, to pray. Why not some of your brothers and sisters pray?