Well, we’re thankful that we can continue in the Lord’s presence today. I’d like to read, to start our time, some verses that we’re familiar with out of Matthew 16. We’re talking about the Lord’s promises today. This is another one of His great promises that we can stand on and believe, and see what all He is doing.
Matthew 16, starting in verse 16:
Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father who is in heaven.
And I also say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
Lord, we are thankful for all of those precious and magnificent promises. We’re thankful how they are fulfilled in You. You are the very promise indeed. And we’re thankful, Lord, how the promise of Your presence continues with us.
And Lord, by faith, we want to stand into all that You have for us. Lord, we’re thankful that You are the Lord and Head over this time. We’re thankful that we can boast in You, and that You would keep out anything that would try to compete for our attention, Lord.
We want the eyes of our hearts focused upon You, that we could see and behold You in the fullness and glory of Your resurrection life. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
As I mentioned in the email that was sent out, we’re going to be starting a series on this matter of the testimony of Jesus throughout church history. We had the promise there in Matthew 16 of how, through the Lord revealing Christ to Peter, the Lord then gave him a further revelation, saying, “Upon this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”
Now, if we look around with our natural eyes—and John spoke recently, sooner or later back, or whatever it was recently—that’s a good word. I’m going to count it. I’m not a word guy, okay? But he reminded us of the contrast between our natural eyes and our spiritual eyes, those eyes of faith.
If we look at this promise with the natural eye, it doesn’t look like it; you wonder, “How is it ever going to occur?” But we’re thankful that, as we see with the eyes of faith and keep our eyes upon Him, we recognize that He is doing a great work.
So we wanted to consider this matter of the testimony of Jesus throughout church history, just as a matter of encouraging us. There are so many things in this day that would discourage us, many things that would raise questions. But we’re thankful that, as we look back and see the great faithfulness of the Lord—the great, continual work that He has been doing—we can be encouraged, strengthened, and press on too.
Now, we’re obviously not going to be doing a detailed study of church history. We’ll be looking at a bird’s-eye view, and today we’re really looking more at an introduction. We’re introducing the time by setting forth what we will be looking at in the following sessions.
I had some verses out of Ecclesiastes regarding why we even need to stop and consider church history. These verses really help us put things in perspective, because so often we judge things by the present time that we’re living in.
So often, even in the current age, many people have said, “2020 is the worst year ever. In all of history, 2020 is the worst year.” Well, in our life and for a lot of our experiences, that’s true. But if you keep it in the perspective of the worst year ever, it doesn’t quite qualify. I’m not saying it wasn’t a bad year and all of that, but so much of this is a matter of perspective.
As we look at Ecclesiastes 1, starting in verse 9, it says:
That which hath been is that which shall be;
and that which hath been done is that which shall be done:
and there is no new thing under the sun.
Is there anything whereof it may be said, See, this is new?
It hath been already in the ages which were before us.
There is no remembrance of former things;
neither shall there be any remembrance of later things that are to come, among those that shall come after.
Nothing new under the sun. So often we think that things are new. Oh yeah, that’s right—I’ve got to push this button. Ta-da! I’m new with this too, so grace abounds. All right, if I don’t push it, somebody say, “Mac, push the button,” all right?
As we look at these verses, we see how often we think things are new, and there’s really nothing new. It’s just that we don’t remember. We don’t really know. We don’t reflect back on history. That’s why we want to look at this perspective.
As we look at these next few verses, the question is: are we living under the sun or under heaven? What I’m talking about there, under the sun, is the natural eye that John was speaking about. Under heaven is the eyes of faith, seeing it from His perspective.
Now, this is the second wisest man that ever lived writing this:
I, the Preacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem.
And I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom concerning all that is done under heaven:
it is a sore travail that God hath given to the sons of men to be exercised therewith.
I have seen all the works that are done under the sun;
and, behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.
You know, if our life is just looking at things from under the sun, from that natural perspective, it can be very discouraging. It can bring disappointment, despair, and hopelessness.
If we are focusing upon church history here, and we look upon the condition of the church, not many of us are celebrating and joyous. It really does bring us to a point of despair and sadness about the overall outward condition.
But if we see things under heaven, if we are living under heaven, under His throne, then it is like we have been sharing at various times in prayer meeting and on Sunday. The times we are living in, in Matthew 24 and Luke 21, are terrible times. But the encouragement is to look up—to get our perspective changed, to look up.
If we can keep our eyes upon the Lord, we can be encouraged and strengthened to press on, and there is that hope set before us. Even as we look back through history, sometimes you look back and say, “Yeah, what was God doing during the Dark Ages?” But if we are looking with our natural eyes, we do not see Him.
But if the eyes of our heart can be enlightened, we can see the testimony of Jesus all throughout history and see His great faithfulness there. That is one of the reasons why we are considering the testimony of Jesus in church history: to see His faithfulness and the continuity of God and His purpose.
He has really been doing one thing continually, from eternity past through eternity future. He has been doing one thing with one purpose, and it is all related to the testimony of Jesus. It is related to His bride making herself ready, that there can be that testimony unto Him.
As we see that, it encourages us greatly. We also see our great heritage. We know that in the days we are living in, many people are looking at their history and their heritage, and all the websites of ancestry and this. But this is a glimpse into that. We won’t even charge you for it.
We can go back, and the ancestry that we have goes farther back than Ancestry.com. We see the great cloud of witnesses we have, and we see faithful ones throughout many generations. It encourages us to be faithful in our generation.
The ones who have endured through various trials—all by the grace of God—encourage us to press on and to be the testimony He has called us to be, faithful in this generation.
It also keeps what I call our special walk in perspective and balance. We do not think too highly of ourselves or too lowly of ourselves. What am I saying there? Well, we have been called with an on-high calling. We have a very special, precious walk with the Lord that He has called us to.
But we need to keep that in perspective. We can start thinking too highly. We can think, all of a sudden, “This is unique. Wow, what we’re going through is unique, and we’re so much better.” We look around and think we are better. All of a sudden, you can start thinking, “We are it.”
But then, as you look through history, God has been doing this great work—the same work—throughout history. It is very precious. It is very special. But it is not something unique to our generation.
It is unique in time overall, yes. It is a great, unique work. But within our generation, it is not unique. It has been going on. So we do not need to think too highly.
On the other hand, we do not need to think too lowly of it and say, “Oh, this is just kind of things. Church has been going on for these couple of thousand years, and everybody meets wherever they want to, and we’re just going on.” We must recognize the preciousness of it—the precious thing we have been called into.
I mean, He loved the church so much that He died for it. In Ephesians, it talks about His love for us. He died—His love for the church, He died. May we not think too highly or too lowly of it, but may the Lord keep us in balance and keep our perspective right.
We also see through history that it is really His story. It is His testimony of Who He is, of all that He has done, and all that He is doing. We are very grateful for that.
As we see particularly from these verses in Ecclesiastes, there is nothing new under the sun. What has been will continue to be. One of the things is, as you look through history, it is easy to get the facts, but we want to learn the lessons.
Kenny prayed before the meeting today that we can see the acts of God, but do we know the ways of God? That is what we are looking for: the ways of God. One reason I am putting the overheads up here as we move along is that they are the facts. You can get that. But we want to be focusing upon the lessons and learning the ways of God in a fuller and greater way.
As we mentioned, there is nothing new under the sun. What I am doing is comparing today and all that we are going through—the time that we are living in—with what was going on during the time of our Lord Jesus, when He was upon this earth, during the time of Acts.
I just picked some things here that seem to be major issues during our time: abortion, same-sex marriage, pandemics, social and racial injustice, and unjust governments. As you look back, it does not make what we are going through any less intense or severe, but we see again that it is not unique.
Now, we realize in these days, the closer we get to the Lord’s return, lawlessness is abounding. There is an intensity that is growing. It is like evil has been let loose. So I am not trying to minimize what we are going through, but we realize that throughout time others have been going through very intense situations also. Yet there is a special intensity about this time.
We are going to look at each of these. We are not going to look at social injustice or racial inequality today; that is really more for next time. There was great social injustice and great racial inequality during the time when our Lord was upon this earth under the Roman Empire.
That was the thing that challenged the Roman Empire the most: the teachings of Christ, the equality of man and woman, and considering and loving one another. That is the answer—still the answer today.
As you look at this matter of abortion, sometimes, again, from our perspective, we can think this is a twentieth-century issue. There was abortion going on in the first century, even before that.
This is some of the writing that we have from the Didache:
Thou shalt not procure abortion, nor destroy a newborn child.
Now, the Didache means “teaching,” and it was a compilation of writings during the first century by various writers. Some say some of the apostles were involved; others say they were not. There are still little debates over exactly who wrote it. But it is a compilation, and it deals with some major issues that the church was facing at that point in time.
It starts off on the ways of life—principles of life and death—and it really parallels the Sermon on the Mount. Within it, it deals with practices they called rituals at that time: baptism, the Lord’s table, fasting, guidance for believers, and also church order and church government.
So this was a document written during that time that was available to believers. Notice that it says, “not procure an abortion or destroy a newborn child.” What would occur many times, if a person did not have an abortion—and they were pretty brutal back in that day and time, as you could imagine—they would just kill the child at birth if they did not want it.
Or the third option would be that they would sell the child for prostitution. There were these so-called schools that would buy babies and raise them up to be prostitutes. It was not a very healthy environment. But this teaching was going on as these different ones were getting converted.
We can see this in the Letter of Barnabas. This is not Barnabas in Scripture, but another Barnabas:
Thou shalt not slay the child by procuring abortion; nor, again, shalt thou destroy it after it is born.
Even Tertullian, writing later on, around AD 190 to 197, wrote again about not destroying the child. I appreciate what it says in the very last line there, where it talks about that which is a man and is going to be one. Even back then, they recognized that an unborn child was a person to be.
These are things that the church—the testimony of the Lord—has been battling for centuries, and we are still battling today. We continue to stand for His righteousness in that.
Also, when you consider this next matter of homosexuality and same-sex marriage, during the Roman Empire it was pretty pitiful. Homosexuality, sexual promiscuity, and even pedophilia were all accepted by Rome. There were no guidelines.
Later on, some laws began to be passed, but it was rampant. Really, the immorality within the Roman Empire was one of the things that ended up bringing it down. There were several factors that brought the Roman Empire down, but this was one of them. The promiscuity and all of that ended up destroying that great empire.
We see it going on in the world today, and even in our country, how promiscuity and all these things are continuing to increase and are destroying us. Again, there is nothing new under the sun.
Same-sex marriage was present then as well. Emperor Nero, whom we hear about often because he was there during the New Testament times, was one of the first public figures to enter into same-sex marriage. He married two different men.
His first marriage, in AD 64, was to Pythagoras. Nero dressed as the bride and played the role of the so-called wife at that time. It is sad.
Then later on, after he got rid of that one, he married a young boy, Sporus, and dressed him as the bride. It is really sad. In one way, I hate having to say these things, but I think we need to know the conditions. This is what was going on when our Lord was upon the earth and when the New Testament was written. This was the great battle.
Also, the pandemics that we see going on—there have been some horrendous pandemics throughout the ages. I just listed a few of them here.
One of them, during the period of the early church in the Roman Empire, was the Antonine Plague. They are not sure what that was; they think it was smallpox. Probably the one most people are familiar with is the Black Death, the huge one, which was really through bubonic plague.
They did not have great record-keeping back then, so there are various estimates. The estimates range from seventy-five million to two hundred million people who died. But it was roughly a third of Europe, along with parts of North Africa and Eurasia, that was wiped out. That is hard even to fathom.
But praise God, during that time there were faithful believers who were not caring about their own lives, but were reaching out to care for those who were sick. Literally, many of them were laying their lives down. They lost their lives in serving others. There are precious testimonies throughout that.
We can see these other pandemics that have occurred, and then we see the one that we are living through right now. It is really sad.
When we speak of unjust governments, the first-century Roman emperors who were there during the time of the New Testament writings included Nero, Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian.
We are pretty familiar with Nero because he blamed the Christians for the burning of Rome, and that was the first persecution. Now, it was not an empire-wide persecution. It was restricted mainly within Rome and Italy, that area there. The empire-wide persecutions did not start for another hundred or one hundred fifty years, though there were sporadic persecutions throughout the empire at various times.
Vespasian was the one who ordered the temple in Jerusalem to be destroyed. His son, actually, Titus, destroyed the temple. I put “nobody knows” as far as the exact dating of Hebrews. We know it was before the destruction of Jerusalem, but we are not sure whether it was written under Nero or Vespasian’s time.
Another one we are familiar with is Domitian. He was the one who had John on the Isle of Patmos. That was one of the more widespread persecutions of believers, though it still was not fully throughout the whole empire. We see the conditions that the dear ones were living under.
I know Jerry mentioned it Wednesday night at prayer meeting. When you think of Paul’s writings during the time of Nero, it is interesting. In Romans 13:1:
Let every soul be in subjection to the higher powers: for there is no power but of God; and the powers that be are ordained of God.
Then in 1 Timothy 2:
First of all, then, I exhort that supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for all men;
for kings and all that are in high place;
that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and gravity.
As those verses continue, it is for the sake of the gospel. He does not want anyone to perish. To me, it is quite a contrast when you see the environment that these brothers and sisters were living in, and the instructions of how the Lord, through the apostles, was telling them to react and respond during these times.
I think there is a lot for us to learn in the days we are living in about that. We also see Peter’s writing. Again, under Nero’s rule, he says in 1 Peter:
Be subject to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether to the king, as supreme;
or unto governors, as sent by him.
Honor all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king.
That is the role of us as believers. That is our attitude toward every human institution: honoring the king and the governors, those set over us. We do not have to agree with them, but there is a respect and honor that we have to give to them. We need to be considering that.
All of this was shared for perspective. As we start looking through history, we would be reminded of the days and times and what they were like back then. So often—and I am sorry, that is probably one of the great downfalls of the woke culture today—everybody is judging the past through what we see today and today’s standards.
It does not mean that the things in the past were done right. But many of them were done because that was the way things were done back then. It does not make it right or wrong, but we are rejudging things, and it is sad.
We will see throughout church history also that, as ones were following the Lord, they had light. They did not have the full revelation, some of the full revelation of things that we see. But they were faithful to the little bit of light they had, and the Lord honored that. The Lord encouraged them in that way, and He blessed them.
So all of that is for us to get perspective.
Now, as we move on more into the history of the church, we have the birth of the church. Thank the Lord. One brother who could not be with us today sent me a text. He said, “Mac, the history of the church goes before AD 33.” He had not even looked through this.
It does, because it was predetermined before the foundation of the world. This has always been upon God’s heart and His desire. It is not a New Testament concept either.
As you look throughout the Old Testament, God has always had that desire for a people to express His life. Through Abraham, a family came about. Through Moses, you have a nation coming about. That nation, that family, was to express the life of the Lord.
Through David, you had a kingdom coming in. It was a kingdom to display the life of the Lord. So this is, as we said, even from Adam and Eve. There is a picture there of Christ and the church.
We see that this is not something New Testament, not created by man at some point in time. The origin of the church came from God, not man.
We know that the church was birthed through Christ’s travail on the cross. Praise God, in the spiritual realm the church was birthed through Christ’s travail on the cross, and the church on earth begins in the book of Acts.
We are thankful for that precious day, the day of Pentecost, when those one hundred twenty individuals were baptized into one body.
As it says in Acts 1, we see that it is the church of the living Christ, because he says, “The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach.” Acts is showing us all that He continues to do and teach.
The book of Acts still has not ended yet. Praise God, He is continuing to do things. He is continuing to teach, and we are thankful for that.
Thank the Lord, the church had a very good, healthy birth. We know from the very beginning there was a rich testimony there, in spite of the problems and everything. They were never sinlessly perfect, but in spite of that, we see how the Lord continued to grow and manifest.
Peter and John got arrested, but praise God, they kept going on. Ananias and Sapphira had problems, but praise God, it kept going on. You had the Hellenistic widows and all the issue there. Praise God, it kept going on through every one of those issues.
There is a Scripture later on, in the context of that story, that says the church grew and was strengthened; many were added to their midst. It was through those issues.
Then we are thankful how it continued to spread. It spread to the Gentiles, out to Antioch. Really, if you look at why it spread and ended up at Antioch, it was through persecution.
The Lord had told them to go throughout everywhere and spread the gospel, and they were so happy in Jerusalem that they just stayed there. He had to bring a little persecution to drive some of them out. It was through the persecution that ones ended up sharing the gospel with the Gentiles and how they were brought into the church.
From the Roman Empire perspective, Christians were considered a sect of Judaism at that point. But then, as we said earlier, in AD 64 Nero burned Rome, and he blamed the Christians for it.
In AD 70, the temple was destroyed. There was no earthly center, and after that a distinction developed between Judaism and Christianity. There was a great distinction that came.
Judaism was still authorized by Rome. Christianity was not authorized. It was not illegal yet to be a Christian; it just was not a recognized religion. Throughout the Roman Empire, they had certain recognized religions. Christianity was not illegal at that point, but it was not recognized. Therefore, Christians did not have some of the protections that those under Judaism would have had.
Finally, around AD 90, Christians were barred from going to the synagogues as well. The split between Judaism and Christianity grew. There was a revolt in Jerusalem that believers would not enter into, and because of that the Jews said, “You can’t come into the synagogues anymore.” This separation continued to grow.
I have been using this phrase, “the testimony of Jesus.” Why is the testimony of Jesus so vital? Really, because it is the key to everything God is doing.
When you look throughout Scripture, how does God ever start something afresh? How does He renew something? How does He recover? How does He strengthen His people? It is by that new, fresh, and greater revelation of Jesus Christ—an unveiling of Jesus Christ. That is the answer to every issue throughout Scripture.
Even in the Old Testament, how did He get hold of Abraham? The God of glory appeared to him. When Joshua goes into the promised land, what does he see? He sees the Captain of the Lord’s host.
When Isaiah is facing that challenging time after Uzziah has died, what was the answer?
I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and His train filled the temple.
Jesus Christ came in, and there was the answer and encouragement there.
When we come to the New Testament, I think about those verses we read in Matthew 16. How did Peter really come into seeing what he saw? The Lord says very clearly, “It was not flesh and blood. It was My Father who revealed it to you from heaven.” There was this revelation of the Lord Jesus.
Paul tells us in Galatians how the Lord was pleased to reveal Christ in him. “It was the good pleasure of God… to reveal His Son in me.” Brothers and sisters, we see how the Lord is pleased to reveal His Son in us.
Somehow, when we talk of this word revelation, it can be intimidating sometimes. It can be like, “Oh, that’s for a special group of people.” But actually, the Lord has revealed Himself to each and every one of us. That is why we took the table. We have experienced the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.
All He is desiring to do is reveal His Son to us more and more. Revelation should not be something that has a mystique about it. When we talk about revelation and revealing, it should be a normal, daily experience.
We are in the Word. Ben started by sharing how he was doing his devotions and that word leaped out to him. That was a revelation of Jesus Christ in the book of Numbers. As we go through our Friday-night times, we had a review this last Friday night, and ones were sharing different verses—different verses of how the Lord revealed Himself.
So let’s, in one way, take the mystique out of this word revelation. Let’s bring it down to everyday life, because this is what pleased Him: to give Paul a revelation and to give us a revelation of Jesus Christ. We should not be intimidated by the word. This should be part of our normal, daily Christian life: Christ being revealed to us.
We see in the book of Hebrews that they were getting ready to go through a tremendous shaking. It has been mentioned several times how that shaking was getting ready to come. How did He encourage those believers? He says, “Consider Jesus.” There are a lot of other ways He refers to the Lord during that book, but it is a refocusing upon Him.
Then you come to the book of Revelation. What is the book of Revelation? It is the revelation, the unveiling, the revealing of Jesus Christ. He reveals His Son to us because the time is near; that time is at hand.
So we really need to be praying in this day and time for the Lord to reveal more of His Son, Jesus Christ, to me and to us. This is our prayer: that there would be a greater revelation, a greater revealing of Him.
The more we see of Him, the more we are strengthened by Him. The more we see of Him, the more we see that this is what He is after. He is after the life of His Son to be expressed in His people.
Now, when we talk about the testimony of Jesus, what is it? What is the testimony of Jesus? I think whenever we want to hear a testimony, we should go to the first person and see what they say about themselves.
The great “I Am” says this. They asked John the Baptist who he was, and John the Baptist said, “I am simply a voice, one crying in the wilderness.” That is who he was.
In Revelation 1, the Lord says who He is. It speaks of His testimony. It is a testimony of who He is.
Now, in full disclosure, so I do not get charged with plagiarism or anything, I appreciated how Brother Kong, in his book The Key to Revelation, summarized this. As I looked at it in different ways, this was probably the way I could understand it and eat it best. It made sense to me. So I borrowed this from him.
In Revelation 1:17–18, the Apostle John says:
And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as one dead.
And He laid His right hand upon me, saying, Fear not;
I am the first and the last,
and the Living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive for evermore,
and I have the keys of death and of Hades.
Jesus is testifying of Himself, of who He is. He says, “I am the first and the last.” That does not mean He is just the beginning and just the end. He is the all-inclusive One—everything in between.
Look at all the “I am” statements in Scripture. The “I am” statements are not just limited to the Gospel of John. There are “I am” statements all throughout Scripture. We see God saying who He is.
But praise God, He is that all-inclusive One. It is so hard—how do you describe Him other than He is that all and in all? Praise God for that.
He says, “I am the Living One.” He is life. He is our very life. His life shows His character and His nature. This is what He is jealous for.
He says, “I was dead and behold, I am alive forevermore, and have the keys of death and Hades.” He is that all-victorious One. He won it at Calvary, that great victory. He is winning the victory every day in our lives, and we know there will be the consummation of that victory ahead.
That is a sure thing. We talked about the promises of God: they are yes and amen in Him. There will be that consummation of the ages when everything is summed up in Christ. Praise God. This is who He is.
In my own words, I kind of put it this way: this says who He is—His character and nature, what He has done, and what He is doing. That, to me, is the testimony of Jesus. He is all-inclusive. He is everything, all in all. His character and nature are His very life. Then we see all that He has done, is doing, and has always done in victory. Praise God for that.
As we see that, we see how He desires that His life would be expressed throughout the times of history. Brother Sparks, in one of his writings, defined the word testimony, because testimony is used all throughout Scripture.
He said testimony is what God wants to be displayed or seen. It is something displayed, something seen—not just a mental thing, not just a creed, a doctrine, or a system, but His life in His people. That is what God is jealous for.
The testimony of Jesus, as we have heard before, was entrusted to the church. The church is to be that vessel to keep, guard, and display the testimony of Jesus.
In Revelation 1, you have that picture of the candlestick. The Lord was among them. The issue is not about the candlestick. The candlesticks are the churches, but there is a light on top of a candlestick. The candlestick simply holds the light. That is what it is for.
That is what we are as the people of God. The Lord is looking for His testimony among those seven churches, looking for the testimony of His life. That is what He is jealous for.
We need to pray that more and more of the reality of the testimony of Jesus—of His life—would be seen in our daily lives.
It is interesting, as you look at the book of Revelation, that great prophecy, that John was on the Isle of Patmos. Why was he there? He was there because of the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
I always thought that was unique: he was not on the Isle of Patmos because of the Word of God and the church. Now, I am not trying to diminish the church here; be clear on that. But it was the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus. That was the issue He was after.
We need to pray for a fuller and greater revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ, because as Peter saw the Lord, the Lord revealed the church to Peter.
Brothers and sisters, if we want to see more and more of the church, of His body, we need to pray for a greater revelation of Jesus Christ. If we pray, “I want to see the church,” sometimes, if we are looking for the church, we can find a doctrine, a system, or an organization. We could miss the Lord.
I am not saying that flat out, but you could possibly miss the Lord. But if you look for Christ and a greater revelation of Him, you will see Him, and then He will show you His body, which is the church.
Our eyes are fixed upon Him. That is what we need to be diligently pursuing. Sadly, throughout church history, we will see that this testimony of Jesus and this outward thing called a church, Christendom, or Christianity—there is a great difference there.
Fortunately, at the very beginning we see the oneness. But even at the end of the New Testament, you are starting to see some of the deterioration. We need to have the eyes of our hearts open.
As we see the fruit of the testimony of Jesus throughout history through His people, we will see that, to one degree or another, in every work of God, these seven things are manifested. They are all about Jesus.
In every move of the Lord, we will see these things working in various degrees—some more, some less—but they all speak of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Lord Jesus is seen as the living Head in every believer’s life. You do not see a man, a teaching, an organization, or a tradition, but His life in a very practical way manifested in the people of God. Praise God for that.
Then you will see the Holy Spirit given His rightful place. The Holy Spirit has freedom. What is the role of the Holy Spirit? The role of the Holy Spirit in us is for Christ to be formed in us.
The Holy Spirit is there to do a transforming work within us. The Holy Spirit is there to lead us to the Lord in all His ways.
Sometimes the Holy Spirit is the most shy individual within the Trinity. The person of the Holy Spirit never really wants us to focus our eyes upon Him. He says, “No, do not look at Me. Look at the Son. Look at the Lord’s Son.” That is His right. He is jealous for that.
Then we will also see the Word of God as the sole authority. Praise God for that, because He is the living Word. The Word became flesh. The Word of God is not separate from Christ. He is the living Word, and we see Him in that. It all comes back to the Lord.
We see the functioning priesthood of all believers. The functioning of the priesthood of all believers occurs when they recognize who our great High Priest is and are operating under the direction of the great High Priest. Praise God.
We also see the love of the brethren manifested in word and deed. Jerry shared recently on this matter. There is a great love of the brethren because we realize He first loved us; therefore, we are to love one another.
Not only in word, but in deed, in action, and in life. This is what He is jealous for.
Then we also see the cross working daily in believers’ lives. Why does the cross work in our life? The cross is essential in our life because we see that I must decrease and He must increase.
The more the cross works in us, there is less of us seen and more of Christ. It all leads to the testimony of His life in His people.
Then there is a separation from the world and unto Him. Praise God for that. There is a distinction that occurs, that comes about, that draws us unto Himself. This is what we are jealous for.
This whole matter of separation from the world and unto Him is a continual battle.
In this separation from the world, there is an ongoing tension between two extremes. From John’s teaching, you have “in the world” but “not of the world.”
Throughout history, we will see that when ones focus on being in the world, the testimony starts to lose its identity. There is no distinction there. But when ones focus only on not being of the world, the testimony becomes irrelevant.
I appreciated how A. T. Pierson, a dear brother, shared about this. He said that if there is no accommodation to the current culture, Christianity is unintelligible and cannot spread.
What does that mean? It means we need to stay current in the life of the Lord. Probably an example of this is if you think about the Amish or the Mennonite. They started out as a very living testimony to the Lord, and there was great power and works done through them. But they stayed where they were.
I want to say another thing. When I speak of groups like Mennonites, Amish, Baptist, or anybody, I am not speaking of the individual believers within them. Within any of these organizations, groups, or whatever is out there, there can be precious believers who love the Lord.
I am talking about the overall organization or system itself. It is not directed at any believer, because I am sure that within the Amish and Mennonite communities even today, there are dear believers who love the Lord.
But when we think about them in a broad, general sense, they have not continued on, and therefore they become irrelevant, as one said. There is not that testimony coming out.
On the other hand, if there is too much accommodation to the current culture, it will spread, but it will no longer be Christianity. That is like some who focus so much on a social gospel that they take the cross and Christ out. Then you do not have Christianity. You do not have it.
So there are always these two extremes pulling us. That is why we want to stay balanced and have a right perspective.
We do not want to remove the ancient boundaries, but we also want to be living in the life and testimony in the times that we are living in, in a very relevant way. We would be that bright light needed so greatly to draw ones to the Lord Himself in these days.
As I said, this has just been an introduction to church history. Next time, we are going to consider the testimony of Jesus in the first few centuries.
I think probably my burden on my heart is that there is a very special call the Lord has upon us. As we reflect back on our great heritage and see the great faithfulness of the Lord, we would be those that He could use in this day and this time.
Through time, as we will see, where things have been lost and the testimony has been weakened, He has always found individuals that He could use to strengthen the testimony and to reveal more of Himself to them.
We want to be vessels available for Him to reveal more of Himself to us and to continue to recover and reveal more of what He is desiring for us to do and to be in these last days.
I believe we all sense His soon return. We hear often about being prepared. How are we prepared? It is by having a greater knowledge and a greater revelation of Jesus Christ in our life—of Him being the reality of our life, far beyond just the teaching.
We are thankful for the teaching, but it is really allowing Him to be expressed and to live out His life through us for His glory and for His honor.
So that wraps up the introduction. Like I said, we will be looking at the first few centuries next time. Let’s pray.
Lord, we do come and we thank You. Lord, we are thankful how, as we look back, we see You as the faithful One, faithful and true. Praise God for that.
Lord, as we have said, we do not want to be learning the facts, the acts, but we want to be learning Your ways. We want to be learning the lessons. Lord, we want to have a teachable heart, that You could really speak to us in this day and this time.
We pray that we could be the testimony that You are calling us to be for the specific time and the specific place that we are living in. Throughout history, You had specific ones at specific times. Lord, we are here for such a time as this.
So we want to live, Lord, for Your glory and for Your honor, and that You would continue revealing more and more of Your Son to us individually and together. In Thy name we pray. Amen.