Good morning. This has been a delightful class to work with. You won't mind me referring to it as a class. I trust it makes me feel a little bit more like home. And I've just really enjoyed some of the things that you folks have shared with me through the week. Little insights from Scripture and experiences that you've had and other things. It's delighted me and I want to thank you very much and also thank those many who serve here to make this conference possible. We're going to read one more time this morning in Galatians chapter five. Galatians chapter five. And we'll begin at verse twenty-two. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, or faithfulness, meekness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vain or self-glory. provoking one another, envying one another. Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye who are spiritual restore such a one. In the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. Shall we pray? Father, we thank thee for another beautiful day. Any day, Lord, which is a day of grace for us is a beautiful day. We thank you for this week in which we've been so privileged to gather together in a free land, unhindered, not threatened in any way, able to open and study thy word together. Our Father, we pray that the things that we have considered together this week may have a lasting impression upon our inner man. that the Holy Spirit might take these words and multiply blessing to ourselves and honor to the worthy name by which we are called. We would pray this morning again for those who are sick. We bear them up before the asking that in thine own way thou wilt minister to them. Encourage and strengthen them we ask. And we pray our Father for those who must travel that thou wilt be with them and grant them journeying mercies. Now help us again we ask as we study together and we give thee our thanks in the worthy and precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. This week we were looking at the leading of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer. And if you were to say that the approach that we have taken is a bit different when someone speaks of the Spirit's leading in the life of the believer, there's usually a great deal more said about how the Holy Spirit works and I would answer yes that's correct in fact sometimes when I teach on God the Holy Spirit we have a lot more to say about him personally and we have many more scriptures to look at but I don't apologize for the approach that we've taken this week I felt the Lord has led in that and I also feel that from time to time we need to look at a very important aspect of the Spirit's leading that is that He wants to lead more than we even want Him to lead. The Spirit of God loves to lead the people of God. But there has to be the removal of those obstacles and barriers that prevent Him from freely leading. And so sometimes we have to take some time, even though it's difficult, and we have to think about those things. Now let me quickly review our three steps to date, and then we'll go right on with our last one. We said, first of all, it was important to make up our mind that would be some difficult things to face and maybe some tough decisions would need to be made. And that was really an act of the will, a decision that we must make to do that. Secondly, the importance of exposing our lives to the Word of God, the light of the Word of God. And you remember I said that that was not just for education, but it was for revealing, exposing. God's Word does that also. Then thirdly, we spoke about the importance we must, through the Spirit, put to death or mortify the deeds of the flesh. And you remember I gave you two words, easy words to help us remember, identify and crucify. Identify, we need to be able to identify strongholds of the old nature in our daily walk. Crucify, say no and suffer. Simple word. Say no and suffer, and there will be suffering involved. Now we come to the fourth step, and this one's a joy to speak about because if the others involve us in maybe some soul-searching and are maybe a bit convicting, this last one brings joy to our hearts. And I can say it in four words. Walk in faith, rejoicing. That's all. Just walk in faith, rejoicing. Now let me explain that fourth step. You know, sometime we have the idea that after we have removed the barrier of sin from our lives, or God has helped us by the light of His Word and the conviction of His Holy Spirit, and we have removed and dealt with that barrier of sin, a big question arises, what do I do next? Almost as if walking in the Spirit was reserved for a few select people who were kind of super saints, who had learned some deep, mysterious secrets, and they only had the privilege of walking in the Spirit, and we ordinary people would go along in kind of a, you know, kind of a middle-of-the-road place where it was neither fish nor fowl. What are we? Well, we don't know. We're not in sin any longer, and we've dealt with our sin, but we're not walking the special secret life over here. Nothing could be further from the truth. If we have been enabled by God's Spirit to deal with that which is grieving to the Spirit of God, we have confessed our sin and we are, by God's truth, enabled to mortify those things of the body, then I suggest that we need very much this fourth step simply to trust God that we're able to go out and walk in our day rejoicing in faith and confidence that I am loved by God and I accepted by Him. as I am right now. I can't stress the importance of that enough. I am to go rejoicing in faith on my way, confident that I am loved and accepted by God as I am right now. Now, are there weaknesses in my life? Certainly. Am I at the place where I hope to be someday? Not yet. I have not arrived. Am I in some respects like a child in the family? Absolutely. But does God accept me as I am right now, knowing my weaknesses and my frailties and all of my problems and whatever? Absolutely. And I think it's only the adversary that keeps wanting us to think about how God can't quite enjoy us yet because we're not fully arrived, whatever that means. You know, I have three children at home and one of them is only three years old. Now, there's a lot of ways in which she has not developed or matured yet. She's only about this high, and she has quite a strong will. That seems to be in good shape. But she's a very small person, and in many ways she's still a baby, three years old. And yet the suggestion that I don't quite love her as I do the others because of her immaturity would be a repulsive idea to my mind. I love her dearly. And that's the way we need to think of God looking at us. By the way, I might say it's important for those of you who are involved in assemblies somewhere, I hope all of you, that you pray that God would help the leadership where you fellowship to make certain that there's a good spiritual nursery in your assembly. Because we need to make sure that young ones who are newly saved and come to the Lord really have a spiritual nursery to grow up in. And I think sometime young Christians get into places where the impression is given that God really likes those who are in college of his word or high school best, but if you're still in kindergarten or first grade, well, you're kind of on the outer fringe. Let's remember that God loves babes in his family. And he's a father. He has a father's heart. And he loves those little ones as well as the older ones. Now, what I want to do for the remainder of our time is I want to give you some things that characterize the spirit-led person. We've been talking about being led by the spirit, and I've just noted down some things that we should just consider for a few moments. What do you really see when you look at person who is a spirit-led person? Is this someone who is doing tremendous acts of power dazzling displays, miraculous things each day? Well, I don't think so. I think Scripture has a good deal to say by way of precept and example about what a spirit-led person really looks like. And you know, of course, these things, this is nothing new, you recognize some of these things in yourself and in one another. But as we have been focusing on some hard things, envy and jealousy and enmity and those kind of things, Today I think it'd be nice if we could focus on some very positive things. What are the characteristics of a spirit-led person? Now I'm going to miss some of your favorite ones, but I want to give you some of my favorite ones, and we'll go quickly on these. First of all, let me suggest that a spirit-led person is characterized in their life by praise. The word praise, they know something about praising God. I think those who have submitted to these four steps, not my list, but these concepts as they're revealed in God's Word, can praise God best. People who really know something about praise in their life allow God's Word to shine on their life, and they tend to think more about what God wants me to learn than what I hope my neighbor who's here is listening to. I'd like to suggest that a person who wants to skip those first three difficult things that we've been studying this week and not pay attention to those difficult matters and go right to number four, go on your way rejoicing, I don't think they're praised. I don't think they can really praise God. And sometimes, you know, we hear people talk about praising God. I know up home we do. And you really listen to it and you look at their life and the whole thing seems very shallow and empty. and you realize that they have not really faced and dealt with sin. I think God loves the praises of His people, but I believe He wants those praises to come from a heart that has been willing to face and deal with sin in the life. So a spirit-led person then knows something about praise for God. It's good for God's people to praise Him. We should do that every day, shouldn't we? And then secondly, person who is led by the Spirit is a person who manifests confidence. Now you'll notice that I didn't say self-confidence because that takes us right back into the old problems, doesn't it? Confidence in self. Confidence in the Lord. One of my favorite verses is Romans eight, twenty-eight. I visited with Brother John Galvix yesterday and one thing he said to me just stuck in my mind. He said, you know, I have learned in my life that Romans eight twenty eight God works all things together for our good is true whether we recognize it or not not just the good things and the comfortable things but all things work together for good and I thought amen amen to that but very often we don't study that verse carefully we recite it too quickly we go by it too fast go over it slowly all things work together and you have to have all the pieces together before you can understand how it's good now you know many times we don't have all the pieces do we in fact sometimes I suppose we'll have to wait until we're home with the Lord before some of the pieces that we didn't know are revealed to us and so there's a sense in which we have to really take Romans eight twenty eight by faith I don't know the rest of the pieces of the puzzle Lord I've got a few but you've got the rest and I have to trust you that if all the pieces are together then I would see and enter into the joy of understanding how they work together. But I don't have some of those pieces, so I have to take it by faith. So I suggest then that a spirit-led person has confidence in God, that God has those other pieces of the puzzle in his hand. By the way, we have to be careful about our emotions, don't we? Sometime the human body, which is a marvelous thing, the hormones and the fact that we might have some late nights or we might have a little cold or a flu or some sickness and we're just not feeling maybe we haven't been well rested or whatever, haven't gotten our exercise or one thing or another. And the truth of the matter is we're just in a little bit bodily worn down frame and if we're not careful we'll reinterpret that to mean we're not really close to the Lord. If you had that experience in your life, you feel that you're not close to the Lord. And the real problem was nothing stood between you and God and your fellowship, just that you're not feeling that well or you're not well rested. And you get a good night's sleep and you say, well, I feel much closer to the Lord today. You know, working with college students and young married couples, we find a lot of that. People judging their relationship with the Lord by their emotions or their feelings. And as we mature, we learn, that's not the test, is it? Third mark of a spirit-led person is openness. I haven't said this so far during our study in the morning, but I think it's worth pointing out. As we are becoming more sensitive to what the Spirit of God and the Word of God has to say about sin in our life, we may not realize it, but we are at the same time becoming more sensitive to other things God would say to us. So there's a sense then in which to be sensitive to the word in the spirit about sin is to sharpen our sensitivity at the same time about God's guidance. I hope you understand and grasp that point because it's very important. Allowing God's word to speak to my heart about things in my life that God may not be pleased with is convicting and sometimes it hurts. It's not comfortable. but it's a good spiritual exercise. It not only takes away the barriers and allows me to walk with God, but it also sharpens my spirit's ability to pay attention. What is God saying to me in His Word? And I will find that God's guidance comes more easily to me as I go through this exercise. So it's a very healthy and profitable exercise to be sensitive and open. What would God like to say to me? One of the men who's here... During the week, as he went out through the door, he shared a story with me, and I have just enjoyed it all week. He spoke about being on a bus in the back of the bus, and when he came to his stop or near his stop, the Lord burned his heart and said, I want you to share some money with a man up on the front seat. So walking in the spirit, as he was, he took out the money that the Lord laid on his heart, and he went up, and as he handed the money to the man, and the man turned, he saw the pin. from the Christian mission on his lapel. He gave him the money and went out the door. He said, I never heard from him. Didn't know any more about it. I just absolutely knew that God had said to me, I want you to do this. Now, you know, that's a simple experience. But I thought of that man sitting in that seat saying, Lord, where are you going to meet my needs? How are you going to help me do whatever it is you've called me to do? Imagine the joy in his heart as a brother comes up and says, here, the Lord has put this on my heart. I've had that experience in my own life. And it absolutely throws your soul. It doesn't have to be any big public thing. We don't have to sound any trumpet over it. You just quietly respond, God wants me to do this. And we do it. There needs to be openness in the life. In our elders' meetings up in my home assembly, we have been exploring the matter of prayer in our elders' meetings. And for many years, I suppose I had thought of prayer as just kind of a one-way communication. come into the presence of God and say what it is that's on your heart and close in prayer by saying amen and that's the end of the prayer time but we have come to learn that prayer goes much deeper than that doesn't it and when we face some difficult decisions we have a time of prayer we have five brothers who meet together every Monday night from seven thirty till well I'm sorry to say it's midnight or after many times and we always try to spend at least an hour in prayer Many times it has nothing to do with any problems in the work. It's prayer that we might know God and love one another. That's all. Just prayer to know the Lord and to love one another. We have one brother with us who's a refreshing young leader and he says many times, has the Lord said anything to your heart while we prayed? I used to wonder when he said that. And I felt perhaps I wasn't a very good listener. And so I ask the Lord to help me and develop more listening skills in prayer. And I find that it is true. Many times if we will pray, not just making requests, but wait on the Lord and listen, many times he impresses the inner man with a little direction or a verse of scripture or a piece of guidance. And we've really enjoyed how God is able to lead us and guide us. And someone will open the word of God and read something and you find it's just It fits so perfectly. We've been enjoying a brother handed me a book the other day about listening prayer. I haven't read it yet. But I think we need to think about that as Christians. Not just to rush into the presence of God and say our peace and then rush out. But it takes some time and listen and be open. Lord, would you like to say anything to me? The fourth mark of a spirit-led person? Fruitfulness. fruitfulness. Galatians five, twenty-two and twenty-three gives us the nine parts of the fruit of the Spirit. I have some fruit trees in my yard at home. Some of them bear well and some of them don't bear very well. Some not at all. I'm trying to be patient with them, not cut them down. But I have one peach tree in the front yard. that was my pride and joy. I just felt that that was the greatest little tree you ever could see, and it was just approaching the age of bearing. And some years ago we had a hurricane, and my son and I stood in the front window of our house and watched the winds come and twist that tree right in half, and it left two branches, just the stub sticking out of the ground and two branches, and the rest of it was carried off into my neighbor's yard. Well, I said to my boy, that's the end of the peach tree. After the storm, I went out and I thought, you know, it's not going to hurt anything to leave it here and see what will happen. So I sawed that stump off and put some paint on it and left those two branches sticking out. That tree began to grow and sent branches out from those two branches in every which way. And if you were to see it, it would occupy a space no higher than my head, but as wide as from the piano to the organ there. And last year, Two years ago, I think we got six or eight bushels of peaches off it. It was absolutely hanging, and this year, by all accounts, it looks as if it'll have a harvest twice that size. It's just so absolutely covered with blossoms. It's very deformed, but it's very fruitful. And I said to my son, you know, I think the Lord wanted me to know that I don't know much about pruning peach trees. And he said, stand back, I'll show you a lesson. Well, I thought about that and as I go out in the spring sometime and walk by that tree and I see that beautiful orange, luscious fruit being produced, I listen carefully and no matter how hard I listen, I never hear a thing. No grunting and straining. The tree never says, look what I'm doing. The fruit just comes quietly, doesn't it? And it's so satisfying when it's produced and from beginning to end there isn't a sound. I'd like to suggest here that the fruit of the Spirit as we read it doesn't have to be some spectacular thing. God looks down on his people and he sees a piece of fruit being born in the life. He said, oh, I see patience there. You know, my son was very patient. I think that's one thing that delights God's heart when he sees fruit in his people's lives. Because each one of these fruit of the Spirit that's born by God's Spirit in our life It reminds the father of his son. And he loves that. Number five, spirit-led person is a watchful person. Let me explain what I mean by watchful. We have to be on our guard because, you know, the world and the flesh of the devil are right there as our enemies, aren't they? The wiles of the devil we read about. He's tricky, clever. But I want to apply that matter of watchfulness in just one way, almost like a little review this morning. We all sin from time to time. We're not sinless yet. We're all sinners and we sin from time to time. But the watchful Christian quickly identifies a sin while it is just a single act or deed, just like we were studying yesterday, he applies First John one, nine and confesses that sin quickly. It's removed, put away under the blood of Christ. the fellowship is restored and he goes on his walk in the spirit rejoicing what's my point the watchful christian doesn't let a single sin turn into a stronghold remember that term first corinthians chapter ten in verse four the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through god to what the pulling down of strongholds and we don't want strongholds of sin strongholds of the old nature to come back in our life. It was hard enough this week to study them and deal with them. As the sin comes up, one bad attitude, one envious thought, one unkind word, one little bit of enmity or hatred, deal with it, put it away. Go on rejoicing, walking in the light. No more strongholds of the old nature. The sixth mark of the spirit-led person Contentment. Contentment. I put this in here because it's particularly applicable, I think, to Christians today who are surrounded by the impression on the radio, some speakers, and books and magazines, that if you're a spirit-led believer, your life moves from one spectacular event to another all day long. And I would like to suggest that contentment is a mark of the spirit-led Christian. Most, if we're honest, most of the activities of our daily walk consists of the mundane, ordinary tasks, don't they? And isn't a spirit-led Christian somebody who gets up and makes their breakfast, has to wash their dishes and fold the clothes and tidy up the house and all the other things? And we tend to look at those kind of ordinary, mundane housekeeping tasks and things at our job and all the rest and say, well, how could a spirit-led Christian do anything so ordinary? That's just not true. A spirit-led Christian is content to do the ordinary. Now, I suggest that if we're faithful in the lesser things, God will from time to time by His grace allow us to participate in something that's not so lesser, something that's a little bit more out of the ordinary. where we can serve in a special way. But let's don't get the idea that spirit-led Christians are those who don't have to wash their dishes or make their bed or take care of their lawn. No. Spirit-led Christians have a lot of the ordinary and mundane to do. But the point is, can we be contented in the inner man as we do those things? Finally, number seven. This one is near to my heart. I believe that a spirit-led Christian is also a restorer, someone who knows something about restoration. Because they have been through it in their own life, they desire to help others be restored. You know, this is a great ministry, needed today. Notice what he says here in chapter six in verse one. In fact, go back to verse two. Let us not be desirous of vain or self-glory, provoking one another, envying one another, recognize those words from yesterday, very self-centered person. Let us not be that way, but in chapter six and verse one, let's be a restorer. Brethren, if any man be overtaken in a fault, ye who are spiritual, or let me paraphrase that, ye who are walking in the spirit led by the spirit restore such a one in the spirit of meekness meekness is one of the fruit of the spirit considering thyself lest thou also be tempted that's a great ministry today and i believe that's a work spirit led people need to be involved in restoring saints who maybe have gotten a little off the track let me say i think we have far too much in the church The Christian church today. It's far too much gloating over the fact that so-and-so has gotten off the track. You ever heard someone say, did you hear about so-and-so? We need to pray for them. Somebody else says, oh yeah, what did they do? And the whole thing can become just an exercise of the old nature, can it? But God wants us to have that desire. Because I love so-and-so, because they are God's sheep, The thing that I would like best in my life is to help restore them. Participate in restoration. I wonder if in our assemblies today we have a very good environment or climate or that's not really the word, if we have some kind of a place or a time where restoration can take place. Many times it can take place individually as one person goes and ministers to another. But I wonder if there's some kind of an opportunity where we can say to the saints, Brother so-and-so has had a rough time over the past few months, and we've had the joy to make sure that he's back in full fellowship, and we need to surround them with love, pray with him, and for him, and put our arms around him. Paul said that we ought to do that to the man who sinned, lest he get swallowed up in sorrow. God forbid that we should be filled with pride and have an aloof kind of an attitude, well, now that you've made a mistake, even if you've gotten right with God, you're kind of a second-class citizen. The body of Christ is to be the family of faith. We take great pains in our home that when someone, one of the children steps out of line and needs to be disciplined, we have a very solid and clear restoration process. And I might add an immediate one. No second-class citizen, no going around for a day or two feeling like you're just less than good. If it's been dealt with, it's put away. And you're back a hundred percent in full fellowship. We need that today. I hope you're involved in that with other believers. Well, a restorer also helps people who don't know the Lord Jesus to come to know him. That's a restorer, too, isn't it? Bringing someone who is separated from God to know Christ. And I would suggest that a spirit-led person has a bright witness, a bright testimony, is involved in that kind of restoration, too. Really, the word should be repentance. Well, we need to draw some conclusions here. We're about at the end. Let me conclude by saying, I think if there's one thing God has laid on my heart in preparation of these messages, it is that the greatest part of any ministry is God's work in the servants. Greatest part of any ministry is God's work in the servants. We tend to think about what a great thing or a job we're going to do. God says, I'm interested in that job you're going to do. But I'm even more interested in you as a person and what I'm going to do in your life. The other night we had some people over for coffee and we were talking about the kids and I showed them this little paper. You probably can't see it from there because it's so small, but this is the daily paper that my daughter prints. She's nine years old. I guess she's ten now. And she writes this up and leaves it at everybody's place at meal time. And this is called Key Thoughts. And there was a stack of them that I got to keep me company while I came down here. But I just wanted to bring along one this morning and hold it up and show you. Thought you might be interested in this. It's a bit convicting to me. She's a good strategist. On the front cover, she puts very encouraging things, you know. It says, number one, be thankful. Number two, pray. We are praying for you, Daddy. And then there's an item of praise and prayer. Number one is pray for Daddy. And number two is thank God that the war is over. Well, you open it up on the second page, which is also the last page, has in great big red letters, the key thought. God will do what he needs to do with you. Be flexible. And then this closing line, all things work together for good. So I had to remember this week that God is working in the servant, not just doing a job. I have to remember to be flexible. I have a little prophet in my family, I guess, who had that to say. I want to close this morning by referring you to three verses in the fifth chapter of Ephesians. I was reading there this week and a couple of things stood out before me and I thought, my, that would make three nice verses to read to close our morning sessions. Ephesians chapter five, Paul is concerned with the walk of the believers. And I thought, boy, that's appropriate because we've been speaking about walking in the Spirit. You know these. This will be a review, but it's good to look at them. Ephesians five. In verse two, he says, notice this is addressed in verse one to followers of God. You see God going out first and then us following on. So it's very appropriate. He says in verse two, walk in love. Walk in love. That's a command. If any of us have any question about what that is to be like, what does it mean to walk in love, Lord, what am I to do? How am I to do this? What can you shed light on this for me? You have only to read the rest of the verse, as Christ hath loved us and given himself for us, the model of my loving walk is to be his loving walk. Now, let me ask you a question. What condition were you in when Christ loved you and gave himself for you? Were you a lovely, gracious, spirit-filled person, or were you a lost sinner? Well, I know that I was a lost sinner when he loved me and gave himself for me. So if I'm going to walk in love then, that means that I am going to have that kind of a love for those around me even if they were unloving people, very ungracious people. See, that's the model of my walk, his walk. He loved me when I was a sinner. I'm to love those around me, even if they sin. So the walk in love. And then in verse eight we read, Ye were once darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. I'm telling you earlier about that peach tree in my yard. I have another tree. It's an apple tree. I've had it for fifteen years and it hasn't ever borne an apple. And I couldn't understand it. It's a good northern spy apple tree and it should produce abundantly and it has never produced an apple. Now my wife was a bit hard-hearted when it comes to these things. She says, saw it down. And I keep saying, and we'll give it one more year than doing that now for about six years. One more chance, tree. The other day, or actually it was last winter or last fall, I was walking out in the yard and I looked up and it struck me why it's never borne any fruit. It's right in the shade of a big maple tree. You know, it takes light to bear fruit, doesn't it? And it says here, walk in light. See what he says in verse eleven, have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. The darkness will not bear fruit, unfruitful works of darkness. Don't have fellowship with it. Walk in light. And then finally verse fifteen, he says, see then that you walk circumspectly or cautiously not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time because the days are evil. Walk in wisdom, walk in wisdom. The wise person redeems the time. Walk in love, walk in light, walk in wisdom. And we've been speaking about the Spirit's guidance in our life. Just look at that verse seventeen. Wherefore be ye not unwise but understanding what the will of the Lord is. walk in wisdom, understanding and receiving the guidance of God. May the Lord help us with these thoughts to be encouraged in our wilderness pathway to follow the Spirit of God and enjoy and rejoice as he leads us forward. Let's pray. Our Father again, we come to thee giving thanks for all thy goodness to us. Lord, our testimony is truly how great thou art to take us who have been rebellious in our hearts, bring us into thy family, seat us at thy table, and then, Lord, the wonder of it, that we might be led daily by thy Spirit. We ask that thou will help us to be open to his leading. Help us, we pray, to turn from self and to turn to thee each day. Bless thy dear people here and encourage them much as they go on for thee. and we'll give thee all the glory and thanks in the worthy name of Jesus our Lord.