Transcription
[music] D. >> [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Heat. Heat. >> [music] >> Hallelujah. >> [music] >> you. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. [music] Heat. Heat. All right, [music] good morning. And uh, yeah, let's try that again because we need to warm up a little bit. Good morning.
>> That was better. All right, we're warming up. We're in the house of God. Ready to worship him. I know it's, you know, we're cold and tight and we need to like get our voices going here and it's good to see you all this morning. I know we're missing some folks due to cold and other reasons, illness, but we're in the house of God and on the Lord's day and that's a good thing. We're going to begin with a scripture reading as we typically do. Isaiah 43 will be that reading and I'm going to need your help with the response uh the evenumbered verses. So, let's turn to Isaiah 43 and let's stand together. Out of respect and reverence for the holy word of God. Isaiah 43 and it's verses, we're looking at verses 1 through 15. Okay? So, you know the drill. I begin with verse one, you respond with verse two. When we get to verse 15, we can say that all together.
So, Isaiah 43:1, but now thus saith the Lord that created thee, oh Jacob, and that formed thee, O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name. Thou art mine. For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Savior. I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Siba for thee.
>> Fear not, for I am with thee. I will bring thy seed from the east and gather thee from the west.
>> Even everyone that is called by my name, for I have created him for my glory. I have formed him. Yay, I have made him. Let all nations be gathered together and let the people be assembled. Who among them can declare this and show us former things? Let them bring forth their witnesses that they may be justified. Or let them hear and say, "It is truth." I even I am the Lord and beside me there is no savior.
>> Yay. Before the day was, I am he, and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. I will work. And who shall let it?
>> Together. I am the Lord, your holy one, the creator of Israel, your king.
We see in this passage and of course uh the passage in context is talking God is talking to Israel and he has plans for them and he's talking about how he's going he's going to uh redeem them, how he did redeem them from Egypt and all that. Definitely principles here for us because what we see here is be is the basis for them trusting in God. The basis for worshiping God and for wanting to follow God is that he created them and formed them. He says that right away. And the reason for trusting God that when thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee. Well, there is no other God. He's the one that created us. We can trust his design. We can trust uh what he says. He says in verse seven the the reason for which he created us. In verse seven he says I have created him for my glory. I have formed him. Yay I have made him. So the the purpose that God made us he made us to bring glory uh to him. He he's our creator. He's our designer. So uh as we follow him we it it follows what we see in verse 15 is that he is our holy one. He's our creator and he is our king.
So let's turn in our song books now to 463. 463. It's only in the one who created us, the one who designed us, the one who who who ransomed us. It's only in him that we can be complete, that we can find purpose and fulfillment. So let's sing 463.
[music] Complete in thee. Complete [music and singing] indeed. No work of mine may take dear Lord [music and singing] the place of thine. Thy [music] blood has pardon bought for me and I [music] am now complete in thee. Yay [music] justified. [singing] Oh blessed thought and sanctified [singing and music] salvation brought. Thy blood hath part [music] [singing] and bought for me and glorified I [music] do shall be complete in thee. No more shall sin. Thy grace [music and singing] has conered reign within. Thy voice [singing and music] will bid the tempter flee and I shall stand completedly. Justified. [music] Oh [singing] blessed thought and sanctified [music] salvation [singing] wrought. Thy blood hath part and bought for me and glorified [singing and music] I shall be. Verse three, complete [music and singing] and each one supplied and no good thing to [singing] me denied since thou my [music] portion Lord [singing] will be at thy restor complete to me.
>> [music and singing] >> Justified. Oh blessed thought and sanctified [singing] salvation wrought. Thy [music] blood a heart and [singing] bought for me and glorified I too shall be. Dear Savior, when before thy [music and singing] bar, all tribes and tongues assembled [singing] are among the [music] chosen [singing] will I be at thy right hand [singing and music] complete in thee. Yay, justified. Oh blessed [music] thought and [singing] sanctified salvation wrought. Thy blood [music and singing] hath pardon bought for me and glorified [music] [singing] I too shall be complete in [singing and music] thee forever blessed of all [singing] thy fullness. [music] Lord possess thy praise throughout eternity. [music and singing] Thy love I'll sing complete in thee. Yay justified. [music and singing] Oh blessed thought and sanctified salvation [music] wrought.
>> [snorts] >> Thy blood [singing] hath part for me and glorify [singing and music] I too shall be.
Wonderful singing. You may be seated and we're going to take some time to reflect some time to spend with the Lord individually, personally, making sure our hearts are ready and prepared for worship. So let's spend some time now.
Just want to bow before you this morning. We humble ourselves before you. We we recognize that to this man we will look to the one who is contrite and trembles at your word. So Lord, we come before you as needy people uh recognizing how much we need your love and mercy. We come before you also uh knowing so many wonderful things about you, Lord. Knowing that you're a great God, you're a holy God, you're a just God, you're a righteous God. Uh knowing that you love us, knowing that you want to walk with us, that you want to dwell among us, that you want to know us. And Lord, we want to praise you for that, Lord. So we come here this morning with all those things in mind and and other things as well, Lord. That uh we come before you not just coming here just because we want to do the right things. Of course we want to, but we want to do the right things. We want to follow what's right because you're our creator. You're our designer. You're our redeemer. And you've given us purpose. You've given us completion in Jesus Christ and his salvation. And Lord, I just want to pray that you'd fill our hearts with joy this morning, but also Lord, that you'd challenge us to want to follow your design for our lives. That we would reject uh the anti-God culture spirit of our age in favor of the timeless truth that you've given us in the scriptures. Lord, we ask that you'd help us to see that, to apply it to our lives. Lord, we ask that you would work in our hearts. Pray you'd help those who cannot be here with us this morning. Pray help the Shugs and Kon with this injury that he has. Lord, we pray you'd help him. And we want to ask that you help others that are ill and unable to be here. And Lord, we pray for those watching online. Lord, that you'd help them to to focus in and to worship you as well and to bring us here to be with us and as soon as possible soon as they can. Lord, we want to ask your grace upon us now in Jesus name. Amen.
Okay, let's sing continue singing God's praises. The number 652 652 in your song is trusting Jesus. You may remain seated for this. Trusting Jesus. That [music] is all. That's [singing] so important that we trust him. He is good. 652. Simply trusting [singing] every day. Trusting through [singing and music] a stormy way. Even when [singing] my faith is small, trusting [music] Jesus, that is all. Trusting [singing] as the [music] moments fly, trusting as [music and singing] the days go by, trusting him what dare [music] [singing] fall. Trusting Jesus that is all. Brightly [singing] doth the spirit shine into [music and singing] this poor heart of mine. While [music and singing] he leads I can not fall. Trusting [music and singing] Jesus that is all. Trusting as [music] the moments fly. Trusting as the days go by. Trusting in [music and singing] what dare fall. Trusting [singing and music] Jesus that is all. Singing if my way is clear. Praying if the path is dre if [music] in danger [singing] for him call. Trusting Jesus [singing] that is soft. Trusting [music] as the moments fly. Trusting [music and singing] as the days go by. Trusting him what dare follow. Trusting [music and singing] Jesus that is all. Verse four. Trusting [music and singing] him while life shall last. Trusting him till earth is passed. Still within [music and singing] the Jasper wall. Trusting Jesus [singing and music] that is all. Trusting as [singing] the moments fly. [music] Trusting as the days go by. Trusting him what dare fall. [singing] Trusting Jesus that [music] is [singing] all. Amen.
All right, let's turn back a few pages to number 647. 647. And let's stand together for this song. We do sing a different tune than what's in the song, but I think we're pretty familiar with it by now. 647. Let's stand together if you're able to. We rest on thee, our shield and our defender. [music] We rest on thee, our shield [music and singing] and our defender. We go [singing] not forth alone against the foe. [music] Strong [singing] in thy strength, safe in thy keeping tender, [music and singing] we rest on thee, and in thy name we go. Yay. In [singing and music] thy name, oh captain of salvation. In thy dear name, [music and singing] all other names above. Jesus [singing and music] our rightousness, our sure foundation, [singing] our prince [music] of glory and our king of love. We go in faith, our own great weakness, [singing and music] feeling and needing more. Each day [music and singing] thy grace to know. Yet from [singing] our hearts a song of triumph healing [music] we rest [singing] on thee. And in thy [music] name we know. We [music] rest on thee. Our [singing] shield and our defender. Thine is the [singing and music] battle. Thine shall be the praise. When passing [music and singing] through the gates of pearly splender, victors [singing] we rest with thee through endless days.
Wonderful singing. You may be seated as the ushers get ready for the offering. I do have some announcements for you first. So hang in there and we'll take up our offering in just a bit and but uh very important announcement concerning next Sunday. I made the announcement before but uh and to say it carefully because it's very important. Our annual meeting will be next Sunday. Uh and Sunday, February 1st, we'll have our birthday fellowship lunch next Sunday. So we're doing it a bit differently than we've done it in previous years. Our annual meetings as we've as we've grown as a church, you know, increased in length as time goes on. And we've done it in the past where we have a morning service and then annual meeting to follow that. And um I think it's better that we don't try to pack so much in. So we're going to do our annual meeting in the place of the afternoon service. So the annual meeting will come right after lunch, but we are going to try to move the schedule up a bit so that we can start the annual meeting closer to 12:30. uh then to one. So we will try and do that. But um of course no evening service then next week. Clipboards on the bulletin board as far as dish to pass and dessert. So check that out if you haven't already. And uh so big week next week. Please be in prayer for the annual meeting as we'll be talking about some important things and making important decisions. So we need God's help with that. Coming up on Friday, February 6th, the Valentine's Day party. It's for married couples. And there's more details on the bulletin concerning that. So check that out. We will plan to observe the Lord's supper on Sunday, February 8th. Then and then we have a big day also on the 14th because that is the Bible quiz and we are hosting it here at 10:00 a.m. And so we need all hands on deck to host that and uh and prepare uh you know set up and and food of course is a big deal. And so um just stay tuned on that as we'll be looking for help for sure. And that's all I have for announcements. Let's have our ushers come forward at this time uh for the offering as we continue our worship as we have opportunity privilege really to to give back u all that belongs to God. So I'm going to ask uh brother Stephen if you could please ask God's blessing on the offering.
Heat. Heat. >> [music] >> And one more song before the message number 739. Let's turn to number 739. I think it'd be nice if we could stand together for this one as well. If you're able to do that, 739, his way with thee. It's our attitude toward God. We want his way. Follow his design, his plan. 7:39 would you live [singing] for Jesus and [music] be always pure and good? Would you walk with [singing] him within the [music] narrow road? Would you have him bear your burden, carry all [music and singing] your load? heart and have his way with me. His [singing and music] power can make you what you ought to be. His blood can cleanse your heart [singing and music] and make you free. His love can fill your soul and you [singing and music] will see. It was best for him to [singing and music] have his way with thee. Would you have him [singing] make you free and follow at his call? Would you know [singing and music] the peace that comes by giving all? Would you have him save you [singing and music] so that you can never fall? Would you have his way with me? His power [singing] can make you what you ought [music] to be. His blood can cleanse your heart and make you free. His love can fill your [singing] soul [music] and you will see best for him to [singing] have his way with thee. One more verse. Let's sing it out. Would you [singing] in his kingdom [music] find a place of constant rest? Would you prove him [singing and music] true? Each providential test. hold you in his service labor always at your best [singing and music] to live his way with me. His [music] power can make you what you ought to be. His blood [singing] can cleanse your heart and make you [music] free. His love can fill your soul and you will [music] see his burden to have his [music] way [singing] with me. Amen.
Wonderful singing. And you may be seated and a blessing and a privilege to sing God's praises with you this morning. That's part of God's design is that we would together with lifting voices together glorify him with our mouths. and we've I believe been doing that this morning and that is a great blessing and I believe it's pleasing unto the Lord as well. Let's turn in our Bibles to 1 Timothy chapter 2 once again. 1 Timothy chapter 2, three days from now on the 28th will mark the 40th anniversary of a tragic event that occurred in our nation. Does anybody know what that tragic event was? Some of us are old enough to remember it, including me. Anybody remember January 28th, 1986? Nobody remembers. I'm a little surprised. Yes.
>> Was not Apollo 13. I'm not that old, but it goes back further. Uh, yes.
>> You're close, though.
>> Yes. The Challenger explosion. 40 years since that already. The space shuttle Challenger. It tragically exploded that morning of January 28th. It was a cold morning. uh even in Florida. And that was part of the problem. See, at first the explosion seemed like a freak accident and indeed it was an accident. Uh, but the accident was the result of some tragic assumptions. There were two uh rubber O-rings that were designed to seal the joint between the two lower segments of the rocket booster. And but it the rocket booster and these O-rings was designed with certain limitations. One limitation was that the O-rings were not designed to have maintain resiliency in sub freezing temperatures. And it was a cold morning like I said in Florida that day. And sadly, the crew ignored these design spec specifications and the launch proceeded resulting in an explosion just 73 seconds after takeoff. And history is filled with uh such tragic examples of destruction that occurs when design spec specifications and limitations are ignored. There's many examples of that. In fact, we're coming up on another 40-year anniversary in April of Chernobyl. Similar thing, warnings and design specifications were ignored leading to disaster. But anyways, history is filled with such thing uh where people ignore the limitations that are set by a designer. Mankind also has a designer, don't we? Has our designer given us any specifications or any limitations to his design? Well, yes, he has. And one of God's specifications is that he has designed men a certain way and he has designed women a certain way, a different way. Each with unique specifications concerning attitude, concerning attire, concerning action, and concerning authority. And though our flesh rebels against such limitations, following God's design principles for manhood and womanhood leads to redemptive blessing and to fulfillment in marriage, in families, in churches, and in all of life. And to ignore God's design limitations and specifications as we are seeing today results in destruction all around us.
So return to our text of scripture this morning in 1 Timothy chapter 2. And that is our base passage as I'm, you know, preaching through Paul's letter to Timothy. And this is we come here to one of the many we have we we started this a couple weeks ago. We come to really one of the many scriptures that set forth distinct instructions for men and for women. So let's go ahead and read this passage and then we will continue to consider this matter. So 1 Timothy 2:8 is where we are at and we'll read to the end of the chapter. I will therefore that men pray everywhere lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting in like manner also that women adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness and sobriety not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly array but which becometh women professing godliness with good works. Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to [clears throat] usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding, she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith, in charity, and holiness with sobriety.
Let's pray. Father, we look to you for this passage. We know that for anybody who is not all that familiar with your word, this passage, it seems very abrupt in contrast to our culture today. And it can be rather jarring to see what it has to say, but it it has said what it has to say for thousands of years. And you haven't changed. So Lord, I pray you'd help us to understand it properly. Help us to apply it properly uh to our lives. Help us to to understand overall what your word teaches about h about what you designed for us. And help us, Lord, to not to see limitations and restrictions and specifications as uh something to reject or rebel or chafe against, but rather to see it as source of great blessing and purpose and fulfillment. Lord, I pray that you would help us with this this morning. Help those that may be watching online to to tune in to to stay tuned and focus. We ask your blessing upon this time in Jesus name. Amen.
So, this passage has uh it presents to us two very crucial issues that we're kind of taking some time to kind of back up and and see what the Bible says as a whole about them. And uh these issues are covered elsewhere in scripture. And in Paul's letter to Timothy here, he's just he's kind of bringing up some instructions. And and the instructions really depend on a a greater understanding of what the Bible says about these issues. And the first issue is of course what we're talking about today, God's design for manhood and womanhood. The other issue we'll get to, Lord willing, next week is God's res regard for the internal for both the internal and the external. And so Paul writes here some instructions that come within the framework of the whole council of God. And without understanding other things about God's design and especially living in the culture that we do like I when I was praying I said you know it can seem kind of abrupt or jarring to read this if we're immersed in this culture somebody who's not familiar with the Bible and you were to show them this scripture they would be like well yeah that's why that's who can accept that that's so outdated but the thing is we aren't the first culture to become permeated with anti-God ideology. This was written to to Timothy uh pastor of the church at Ephesus. And remember, Ephesus was immersed in this cult of the goddess Diana. Uh and it was a very much a feminine type of worship and a feminine goddess and all that sort of thing. And so, uh, people who have been permeated and conquered by, you know, a culture that's been permeated with and conquered by a philosophy that runs completely counter to what the Bible teaches, it can be, uh, very, very difficult to embrace what God has said. But, um, we must, of course.
So, I started this section a couple of weeks ago with an overview of the passage and these issues and how they are directly connected here. And I want to remind us that this is connected directly with the gospel of Jesus Christ. In verses uh four and five and six, the Bible speaks of how God wants all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. How there's one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. How he gave himself as a ransom for all. So the gospel message. And then we get down to verse 8 and verse 7 speaks of how we need to preach that message. And um and uh verse eight we see I will therefore because of this truth because of these truths about who God is what he's done for us that I'm going to give you instruction that's connected to that because of the gospel. And so many people want to separate this and say issues like this like about you know manhood and womanhood and what we do and what we what we wear and things like that. You have the gospel over here and these other issues are peripheral. They're way over here. That's not the way it reads at all. It reads with a therefore connecting them together. And so I talked about that. So last week also I gave some background on the prevailing mindset of our culture concerning the issue of manhood and womanhood. And of course our culture is in a really really bad place right now regarding that. Uh the prevailing views of our society are now light years away from God's design. But it's important to understand it wasn't always that way. Now, I'm not saying our society, our culture was at one time just right in lock step with the Bible. I'm not going to say that. But it was a whole lot closer at one time concerning this issue in particular. And so I talked about how did we get to where we're at now? Because if we're if if we act like we just kind of got dropped, you know, out of a spaceship onto Earth, we we we can maybe not realize. And for people who are younger and and haven't studied this or maybe some of us are older and haven't studied it, it can be hard to understand what's so bad about, you know, what's going on and how did how did this happen? Well, what happened in a nutshell is the the feminist movement happened. It's deeper than that, of course. It was a it was a part of a larger Marxist anti-God movement, particularly secondwave feminism. But um the seeds have been planted for rebellion against God's design long before secondwave feminism took off in 1963. But feminism is the product of rebellion against God, not the cause of it. Uh so last Lord's day we considered the four waves of feminism and how they serve to transform our nation helped to transform our nation in an overall destructive manner. I say overall because I'm not going to say that every change that has taken place as a result of feminism is bad. Uh I gave one example. Used to be acceptable for men to harass women in the workplace and just say you know off color comments and that sort of thing to them. It's not considered acceptable anymore. I'm glad for that. I'm glad it's not. People should have done that based on the Bible and maybe some did, but for the most part, feminism did have an effect on that. So, we have to acknowledge that. We talked about that last week, so I don't want to go over it again. But, uh, overall, it was a very destructive u change that took place. And that's the point here for now.
And so this morning, we're going to begin to consider uh beginning at here at verse at uh 1 Timothy 2, we're going to consider what the Bible says about God's design for men and women. And I trust that we're going to find that the one who created man and the one who created woman also designed them each with with unique specifications. If we believe Darwinism that everything just kind of happened, then we can look at, well, yeah, there's some differences between men and women, even though you're not even supposed to say that now. Well, there's some differences there, but it was all just random. So, everything can, you know, there's no real uh purpose there. But when we understand things in the context of of a creator and a designer, we can we can recognize that that that men and women are designed differently for different unique purposes and for very good reasons. And we'll talk about that. And so yes, God designed men and women with unique specifications and yes, limitations not to harm us, not to withhold something good from us, but to actually give us a purpose. A purpose of perpetuating the truth. A purpose of glorifying God, a purpose of reflecting the gospel to a lost and dying world that now is so desperately in need of purpose and direction and hope. And the more we stray from God's design, the more we're demonstrating to world that to the world that yep, you're you're right. There is no purpose. There is no design. There is no fulfillment in this life. It's just we're just it's just whatever we'll be will be. We're just here. Let us eat and drink and be merry for tomorrow we will die. But as we follow God's design in everything that we do, we demonstrate to the world that we have a great designer with a great purpose. And so we will look at that more specifically.
So what does the Bible say about God's design for manhood and womanhood? Um, now before I I show you, I I'll I'll remind us again, though I I probably don't have to, uh, but I'll remind us again that if we claim to believe that the Bible is God's word and that it is infallible and it is sufficient. If we claim to believe that, then we must believe it consistently. That means we can be reading something and we can see certain nice pleasantries in the Bible about heaven or we can see things about how we are to cast our care upon him for he cares for you. And we say, "Yes, I love that. I love that God said that." But then we might come to something and it says, "Oh, it also says that I'm there's something I'm not supposed to do. There there's certain roles I'm supposed to have and responsibilities I must have and there's certain other things I'm not supposed to have." And we can come to that. We can say, "I don't really love that very much, God. I don't I don't like that part." And we all have the f our flesh, right? And so we all have that tendency to be like, I don't know about that one. Or we all have that tendency that somewhere in there to be kind of reconstructing it to mean something that fits a little bit more what we would like it to mean or what we have traditionally thought it meant. And we can't do that. We have to as best we can objectively approach the word of God and say, "God, what do you say here? What do you what is your design? What do you want me to do?" And that applies certainly of course to to not being affected by the thinking of the culture and and swayed by that. It also could mean there might be traditions uh that and I don't think this affects us nearly as much today anymore, but there can be traditions within Christianity that that that created some ideas there that that aren't really don't necessarily flow from scripture. In each way, whichever it is, we need to go with the word of God. So, we must be willing to receive everything that God says, even those things that might run contrary to the traditions of our times. We must be willing to receive God's design plans and to say, "Well, they came from the designer, the architect, so they must be right. They must be good." And he is good. And so, we can trust him with that. That he knows better than a culture that is no longer even willing to define what a woman is.
So, let's first talk about God's design as it relates to creation. We talked a lot about how God did not design things and how things have gone astray from that. So, now we're going to talk about what he does say, what he does set forth. And so, it we're look at how it relates to creation. We're going to stay right here in 1 Timothy 2 for now, but we are going to move around a little bit. So the idea that the creator of all things made man and woman with a distinct make up and purpose and roles, it permeates the scriptures right from the beginning. So we're going to look at just kind of an overview of of this topic of manhood and womanhood, but the I it runs throughout the scripture and I'm so this is not going to be comprehensive everything, okay? But uh it's going to be an overview, but it runs right from through the scriptures right from the very beginning. And here in our passage here in 1 Timothy 2, we can see that God expects different things from men and from women within the church or at least some in some cases a different emphasis. And so we see here in verses 8-15 1 Timothy 2. If you'll look at it with me, we see that God gives one set of instructions to men and then another set of instructions to women. Right? He says here in verse 8, I will therefore that men pray everywhere lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting. Doesn't mean that women shouldn't pray. It means there's a specific instruction here for men. And then in verse 9, we see in like manner also that women and it gives specific instruction concerning women. And again, we'll look at these specific instructions in greater detail later. But let us now acknowledge the fact that to a person that doesn't know the Bible very well. Again, this could seem very abrupt as I'm sure again it was to the people in Ephesus uh with the with the cult of the goddess Diana. Uh surely there would be some who would object saying, "Well, why should why should a man be in leadership and and praying and leading worship while women are supposed to dress modestly and do good works and and be in silence?" Why the difference there? I mean though we can get tired you know that kind of attitude from our culture you know why can men do certain things and not women and vice versa we can get tired of that attitude but I think we have to admit that's actually kind of a pretty good question isn't it I mean why are there different instruction here for men and for women it's not a bad question we have to have the right spirit about it why why is that why don't why isn't it just the same for everybody all the time so Paul must have thought it was a pretty good question. Uh, the Holy Spirit of God must think so because he inspired Paul to address that question in verses 13 and 14. And he addresses it in verses 13 and 14. He says, "The reason that this arrangement is appropriate and necessary is because these instructions are in line with how the great designer designed things right from the beginning. And these are his specifications. And God gets to decide. He knows best. So, more specifically, he speaks here of order in creation. So, look at it with me in verse 13. We we've seen the we'll look at the instruction. I'm not trying to avoid some of the difficulties of this passage and and uh but but but I'm just looking at an overview right now. So, he gives that instruction and then in verse 13, he gives the u explanation in verse 13. For Adam was first formed then Eve. So, why did it happen in that order? Why was Adam first formed and then Eve? Did that just kind of randomly happen? Well, no. God designed it to happen that way. That was for our creator's design and it wasn't an arbitrary one. Obviously, he's saying here, God, that he did it that way because he wanted there to be an order. He did it that way in creation. He did it that way all the way from the beginning. So, nobody could say, "Well, that's just Old Testament. That's just the law. That's just whatever. No, it goes all the way back to God's original design. And he he did it to demonstrate his purpose. Adam was created first and the woman derived her existence from him. I didn't say derived her importance or value from him. Says derived her existence in creation. Okay? And so, uh, this idea is echoed elsewhere. We're going to look at Genesis, of course, in a bit, but this idea is echoed elsewhere in the New Testament. We'll look at this at some point as well, but in 1 Corinthians 11 and verses 8 and 9, it says there, "For the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman, but the woman for the man." That's what the word of God says. So, the hierarchy of men over woman, man over woman, was God's original design, not just a cultural construct. The second argument is that of nature. And I want you to understand and and we'll get into this more, but I want you to understand this can come across as God saying, "Well, women, they just don't understand. Men are definitely superior to women." And that's why I don't think that's what it's saying at all. And I'll explain that. But in verse 14, it says, "For Adam," and Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. I, you know, we have to ask ourselves before we start thinking, "Oh, so Adam was better and Eve was." Hell. What's worse, being deceived and doing something wrong or knowing exactly what you're doing and doing it wrong? Okay, so I don't think it's necessarily painting Adam in a in a better light there at all. But anyways, uh Eve, she not only ate the forbidden fruit, but also was drawn out from under the authority of her husband. And Adam was to be the head of his wife, and we'll look at that, and to provide her with protective leadership. Likewise, if a woman in the church today abandons the authority and protection of her husband, uh she can become, and I realize there's singlehood and all that. We've talked about that, but she can become as vulnerable as Eve was. The Bible speaks of not women as an inferior vessel, but a weaker vessel. We'll talk about that. But there's a purpose there for that. And Christian husbands must provide godly leadership for his wife. And it must be the man, a man providing godly leadership for the church. Not just any kind of leadership because he's a man, but godly leadership. That is God's design. So both are here. Both are saying Adam did something wrong. He didn't fulfill his purpose. And same with Eve. And we'll look at that more in more detail in the future.
So in creation, we see something about about man men and women in in their personhood as persons. So let's go back to Genesis chapter 1 now, if you could with me, please. Genesis one to to the creation. I'm going to give a little credit. I got some of the kind of the outline here from uh something that's called the Danvers statement and I don't necessarily support everything that that group has done, but it's a pretty good basic framework for understanding this issue. So, I I did borrow some of that. But as far as persons and personhood, we look let's look at Genesis 1 and verse 26- 28. And God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have the have dominion, [snorts] over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." [snorts] Verse 27. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him. [snorts] Male and female created he them. So when it uses when the Bible uses the word man in verse 26 and in verse 27. So God created man in his image. Is it saying there that only males are created in God's image? No, not at all. Because it says it's talking about man in the generic sense. They're mankind. And [snorts] it says male and female. He created them. So we'll talk about that that God's design for men and women is that made in God's image with value and purpose. And we'll come back to that. But uh [snorts] so Adam and Eve were created in God's image. Both Adam and Eve were equal before God as persons and distinct in their manhood and womanhood. Big word that's used for that is complimentarianism. Uh the fact that there's different purposes that complement each other but equal value before God. Equal as people made in the image of God. Okay? [snorts] And both can certainly be true and they are because that's how God declares it. And so that's God's design in creation concerning their personhood also concerning well let's look before we get go beyond that let's look at ver uh chapter 2 verse 18 [snorts] chapter 2 verse 18 and it says there and the lord god said it is not good that the man should be alone I will make him and help me meetat for him okay it's important to understand that help me meetat for him meat is is modif ifying help. It's talking about a helper suitable, a suitable helper is basically the idea there. [snorts] And uh he's making someone that would compliment him. It's not good that he would be alone. Again, I I'll say this a few times. It can sound like, you know, we're saying, well, if you're single, you're just not fitting God's design. No, that's not true. 1 Corinthians 7 addresses that that God has a purpose for people who are single. So I just want to make sure I say that because it can kind of sound like that. It God has a plan concerning men and women in marriage [snorts] that uh fits particular you know it's supposed to uh demonstrate something. So um we see here that before the fall it says is not good that the man should be alone. So God makes a helper. God made the wife. God perfectly designed someone that would be per was supposed to not be an exact replica of Adam but someone who would compleiment him. Not somebody who would be inferior to him, someone who would compliment him. It's very important different roles. Let's talk about different roles. um distinctions in masculine and feminine roles are ordained by God as part of the created order and uh should find basically a meaning and purpose and an echo really in every human heart that God's designed us that way. If we look a little bit further here, uh we see in verses 21- 24, it says, "And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept, and he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh instead thereof." One one person said, and Bible says that Adam that the man fell into a deep sleep, and scripture never said he came out of it. But anyways, maybe that's true of some men. But anyways, in verse 22 it says, "And the rib which the Lord God had taken from man made he a woman and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, this is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh, and she shall be called woman because she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh." And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. So this is before the fall. Everything is perfect. Everything is good. And God established this order where there'd be different roles where there would be the man the man would have a certain role and the woman would have a certain role. And and [snorts] that brings us to uh the issue of headship. And the fact that Adam's Adam would have headship in marriage where he would be the head of the wife, the leader in marriage. Now uh we'll see this. I me I quoted this verse earlier but let's turn ahead to 1 Corinthians 11 please. 1 Corinthians chapter 11. [snorts] I want us to see this for ourselves. 1 Corinthians 11. Oh, there's a lot in this chapter, but I'm not I'm going to avoid that. I'm gonna avoid that rabbit trail. 1 Corinthians 11:8 it says for the woman for the man is not of the woman but the woman of the man neither was the man created for the woman but the woman for the man and so we see there uh the idea of headship okay uh that u we're going to see this in in uh another passage as well that God put um put Adam as the man as head of his wife uh that uh if If we if we look at verse three of here of chapter 11 but I would have you know that the head of every man is Christ we would say amen to that right of every man Christ is head Christ is has some has authority over the man but the same language it says and it's not saying the man is Christ and the head of the woman is the man and the head of Christ is God. So that's the language of the scripture that there's a such thing called headship that men would take have a role of authority and women would have a role of influence equally important roles by the way equally important uh but different and so Adam's headship and marriage it was established by God before the fall before sin ever entered the world was not a result of sin there were some things that the result of sin and we'll look at that but in all of life Christ is the supreme extreme authority and guide for men and women.
So, this is important to understand. I've talked about this before. Um, no earthly submission, whether it be domestic in the home, religious or civil, no earthly authority ever implies a mandate to follow a human authority into sin. Understand what I mean by that? Nothing in the scripture does not teach that we should follow if authority tells us to do something wrong or authority is abusing its authority that you always have to follow that. You have to follow authority over the cliff into sin and in some horrible situation. The Bible's very clear. We looked at a situation with Abigail and Nabal last week. [snorts] Um there's uh scriptures that speak of this in in uh Daniel. The authority there was Nebuchadnezzar. Uh we might be seeing hearing something about this from Levi tonight so I won't steal his thunder. But uh Nebuchadnezzar was the authority and and they did not bow down though and do what Nebuchadnezzar said. Uh Shadrach, Meshach, and Abedneo did not. Why? Because to do so would be to sin against God. In Acts chapter 4 uh and five, we see the
Apostles and the early church there, and they were being told, "Do not speak in this name. Do not talk about Jesus." And they didn't say, "Well, God ordained them to be the authority, so I guess I won't talk about Jesus." No, they said, "We would rather obey God than man." It's very important to understand that principle. Even though I'm not getting into it a whole lot here, I want to mention it.
And so, uh, authority, the only one with absolute authority is who? God, right? He's the only one with that. He's the only one we give unquestioning loyalty to. But yet, God has an established order of things that we, for us to follow. So, uh, so we talked about persons, what creation says about their personhood, what creation says about the roles of men and women and about the headship. Let's talk about the value. Okay, the value.
Let's go over to, uh, Ephesians chapter 5. And this is, yeah, something we could go to lots of places, lots of scriptures on this. Um, but we see here, speaking of marriage, starting at verse 21 in chapter 5. First, it says, "By saying submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God." So again, in a marriage, you have a man and woman, and both are to submit to God together equally. Okay. But then there's an order of things. I won't read the whole thing, but it says, "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, he is the savior of the body." Therefore, as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. We could stop there and say, "Whoa, that's telling wives to submit to their husbands like we should submit to Christ." I didn't write it. That's what it says.
And, oh well, that's really, that must be really good for the men and everything's just pointing toward it just being so easy for men and women got to have to submit. Well, we have to read on because there's a, husbands have a specific responsibility and role as well. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church and what gave himself for. How did he give himself? By being sacrificed on a cross, by hanging on a Roman cross and suffering the most agonizing death of all time. Why? For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. He did that. So we are to love, husbands are to love their wives like that. Okay. So that's not easy, is it? That's not supposed to be, uh, easy. And so both have, but both have a different role. They're both, both the role of a, of a man has unique responsibilities, privileges, and challenges. And the role of a wife has unique privileges and responsibilities and challenges. They're different, but they both have challenges. There's both, there's difficulties and blessings involved with both. And so the Old Testament as well as the New Testament, it manifests the equally high value and dignity which God attached to the roles of men and women. And, uh, the Bible is often accused of as being patriarchal in the sense of of being male, you know, like a chauvinistic toward men. But as you read through the Bible, read it and read it for yourself, you see that the Bible many times over, you know, exalts, uh, what women, how women have influenced things, uh, throughout history. You can pick a number of different women. You can pick Ruth and how she said, "Your God will be my God," and she went and from Moab and and left her culture and and went, and she was a woman of virtue and, uh, she and she was a wonderful woman and she loved the Lord and God used Ruth because she did that. God used that so that she would be in the line of Christ leading to the Messiah. That's a great purpose. That's purpose. That's great value. And we could name you, we could talk about Mary. We could talk about so many women in the Bible and the value that they have within God's design. Very important.
So that's how it pertains to creation. But, uh, the fall, and we're going to go back to Genesis now in chapter 3. The fall introduced distortions into the relationships between men and women. And that brought about challenges that wouldn't otherwise be there. And so we're just going to read this. We're familiar with it, I'm sure. But we can see patterns here. And God records this for us as a pattern. He often comes back to these stories in Genesis, true stories, in order to show us something about ourselves. And so Genesis 3:1 says, "Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, 'Yay, hath God said, ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?'" And so, was that God's plan? Was that his design? Was he shall not eat of every tree of the garden? See, I just messed up his word and just, it's so easy to do. "Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden." And the woman said unto the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die." God introduced into his creation a limitation, didn't he? You have all these trees, but there's one you cannot eat of. Why did God do that? And he'd just make it so all, you know, there's no restrictions at all. Well, it, it was, it tested them to show to see, are they going to follow God or not? Are they going to trust his design, his plan? And of course, we know what happened. It goes on to say in verse four, "And the serpent said unto the woman, 'Ye shall not surely die. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.'" And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and the tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.
So, the fall introduced distortions. It, it teaches us something about, um, what happens when we, when we look at and say, "Well, I can do, sure, I can do all this, but why can't I do that one thing? Why is there any restriction? Why are there limitations?" And that became a problem for them. Um, so there's changes here in the fall. We're going to look at a couple other verses here, um, in verse 12. We see, this is, you know, after they sinned, and the man said, "The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat." What's happening there? What's Adam doing? Blaming. Is that what he said? Who is he blaming? He's blaming his wife. Is he really though? He's blaming God, isn't he? He's mainly blaming God and his design. You designed it. You, you formed me. You saw me. I was, it was not good for me to be alone in this woman that you gave me. She did. So, yeah, he's kind of blaming the woman, but he's ultimately blaming God, isn't he? He's blaming God's design. Okay, it's not just women that do. Men do that, too. "The woman whom you gave, thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I had to eat." Uh, so, yeah, blame shifting and finger-pointing is in her, isn't it? It comes right from Adam.
All right. So, um, in the home, uh, the husband's loving, humble headship tends to be replaced by either domination or passivity. Um, that, that's how the fall has affected us. So what we as men can tend to do to distort God's design is instead of being loving leaders like Christ loves the church, we can tend to either be, uh, domineering and and authoritarian and and heartless and cold, or we can be passive and and not take responsibility of leadership that we're supposed to do. That's not an excuse. That's, but that's part of the temptation that comes in in our nature, our sin nature with the fall. If we look at verse 16, we see something else introduced there. And I'm not going to get into all the details here, but it says in verse 16, "Unto the woman, he said, 'I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.'" And so there also becomes a, a tendency for women, uh, that the wife's intelligent, willing submission tends to be replaced by usurpation or or basically a desire to kind of undermine the husband's authority. And, uh, so that's part of the fall and that's the part of the challenges, the distortions that have been introduced through sin that we have to deal with. That our, we, we have the tendency to sin, but that doesn't really cover it. Our flesh, you know, tends us towards sin, but it tends us towards sin in very specific ways sometimes that are introduced right at the fall. And that affects the family. It also affects the church.
In the church, sin inclined in their flesh inclines men toward either a worldly love of power or an abdication of spiritual responsibility. So because of the flesh, because of the fall, a temptation for spiritual leadership in the church, you, I'm preaching to myself now, can incline us either to want to take an authoritarian model where you have to accept everything the pastor says and touch not thine, you know, touch not the Lord's anointed and all that junk and and treat the the pastor as a king. That sin inclines men toward that. Or an abdication of spiritual responsibility in protecting the flock from spiritual danger, the passivity like Adam did in the garden. And in, and concerning the church, this tendency of the fall in sin inclines women to resist limitations on their roles or to neglect the use of their gifts appropriately according to scriptural guidelines. And so that can tend to happen. And of course, in society, this all blows up because society, you know, is a mix of is mostly unsafe people. And so that happened, the fall has greatly affected that obviously as well. I won't get into all that right now. I did last week.
So, we had the fall. Uh, but that's not the end of the story, is it? It wasn't just, oh, we have a fall, we have the flesh, and oh well, that's the way we are. What are we going to do about it? But there's also redemption. Redemption in Christ aims at removing the distortions introduced by the curse. One day, praise God, glory to God, one day all those distortions will be removed, right? One day, even the very temptations and tendencies we have to sin will no longer be there. Right now, those are there, but redemption in Christ aims at at, uh, glorification of God by seeing those things removed, those distortions removed now, by seeing, by by demonstrating God's design in this life before this world today. And so we see here, even in Genesis 3, in the story of the fall, is there any hint of redemption in Genesis 3, in the fall story? Is there anything there? Or is it just all bad? It's not all bad, is it? We see in verse 15, "And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." That's the first mention of God saying, "I've got a plan. I've got a solution for this." In that there's going to be a seed of the woman. There's value on the woman there, isn't there? That would be end up being Mary, who would be who would give birth to the Messiah, and he would crush the serpent's head one day. And there was a plan for that. And there's clo, they're clothed with coats of skin, and there's redemption there, uh, in even in Genesis chapter 3. And so redemption again aims at removing the distortions introduced by the fall, by the curse. And that, that, that involves the family. And we talked about some of this already.
So in the family, uh, how this applies then is husbands should forsake a tendency for harsh or selfish leadership and grow in love to to sacrifice and care for and love and cherish their wives. And then also in the family, wives should forsake resistance to their husband's authority and grow in willing, joyful submission to their husband's leadership. And the Bible addresses that in various passages. Uh, we'll look at, uh, first, let's turn to First Peter chapter 3 right now. Um, though time does not allow me to kind of hesitant to even go there because I can't deal with it, uh, thoroughly, but let's go there just to point it out because the question of course arises, um, yeah, but you know, husbands are often times not very Christ-like and sometimes very much not Christ-like, and what is the solution for that? And, um, First Peter 3 addresses that. I will, I'm just going to add here that First Peter 3 does not teach that a woman has to stay in the same location as a physically abusive man. Okay, I'm just going to say that because I want you to get the wrong idea. But let's look at First Peter 3, verse one. "Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives." That means behavior, conduct, conversation does. "While they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear. Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel." We'll look at that as it pertains to First Timothy 2 in the future. "But let it be the hidden man of the heart." That's the internal, right? "In that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price, great value, right?" And then it goes on to talk about holy women of old, Sarah, and that sort of thing. And then it speaks of husbands in verse 7. "Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honor unto the wife." We see that it's not saying, it's not saying women are a weaker vessel, therefore just kind of stomp all over her and and you can just treat her however you want. No, it says giving honor to the wife. Giving her honor as unto the weaker vessel. And as being heirs, what's the next word? Together. Together of the grace of life, that your prayers be not hindered. So it's very important, um, that we follow that.
Now, in redemption in the church, redemption in Christ gives men and women equal share in the blessings of salvation. Okay, let's look at, uh, Galatians 3 and verse 28. We'll be closing, finishing up here soon. Galatians 3:28. Let's start. We can look at verse 20. Start at verse 26. Galatians 3:26. "For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male or female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." So heirs together of the grace of life. I think it said that in First Peter. And we see here, so male or female. So equal standing before God. Men are not like more saved or necessarily more spiritual than women. Heirs together of the grace of life. That doesn't mean that they have the same roles. And so they share in equal blessings of salvation and inheritance in Christ. Nevertheless, there are some governing and teaching roles within the church that are restricted to men. And we'll talk about that and, uh, very clear teaching in 1 Timothy 2 about that and other passages. And also some other things people will wonder, well, what about, you know, Deborah? What about prophesying in 1 Corinthians 11? We'll talk about that. But, uh, very clear instructions in 1 Timothy 2 about that.
So we're going to close with this, and that is purpose. So we talked about, uh, creation, we talked about the fall, we talked about God's design as it pertains to redemption. Now, God's design as it pertains to purpose. Because on one hand, we are tempted to look at this and say, "How dare anybody say that there's any restriction?" That's our tendency, right? Don't tell me what to do. Don't draw any lines, or I'm going to want to cross it. Okay? Don't tell me that I have to be a certain way and other people have to be a certain way. I, I'm just going to, you know, you just, you be you, do you. You know, that's the saying today. And, uh, I'm just going to do what I want to do. And we have that tendency all in our flesh for that. And we can think, in our, in our corrupted minds, we can think that would be nice. Wouldn't that be wonderful if there was no restrictions, no limitations, no specific, no specifications in God's design? Just that's just freedom, isn't it? It's not freedom. That's not purpose. Because if, if, if something is made without any uniqueness at all and there's no specificity and no limitation, no restriction, there also isn't any purpose. Okay? A train has to, it's restricted to the tracks, right? And it's designed in a specific way that it latches onto those tracks, and then it has freedom to go down those tracks. Wouldn't it be great if it could just plow across the countryside? That wouldn't be great at all. That wasn't, that was not what it was designed to do. Okay? And we could, I could, analogies abound on that sort of thing. Okay? So the fact that God has given us specifications is is inherently involved in God giving us purpose. Okay? We have a, because God designed us in a specific way, it shows us that we have a specific purpose.
So, let's talk about that just a bit, and hopefully this will be encouragement as we go. Because this is not the message isn't just, "We all got to get in line. God's got our, God designed men this way and women this way. Everybody get in their place. Now, let's go home." That's not the message. But maybe that's part of the message. But, but the, but also the message is that God gave, designed men and women differently for value and purpose and fulfillment. And so the reason why we're seeing so much lack of fulfillment and satisfaction and despair in our country today, one of the big reasons for that is we pretty much told them, well, everything happened by design, by not by design, but by random chance. And so any features that we have that might appear to be distinct or distinct, they're just accidents. There's no specification. And the result of that is there's no purpose. "Who are you to tell me what to do?" Okay, I won't tell you what to do. Now, you have nothing to do. You have no purpose. You have no meaning. You have no value because you don't think that you're designed for anything. But God designed us with a purpose. And both men and women, there's a heart, God has given us a call to serve, a call to service. Now, what, what happens is what many people will say is, you know, "I'm called to such and such." And someone can say, "But you don't line up with the scriptural guidelines to that." Um, and, you know, I'll just give you a clear example. The Bible says for pastors, "husbands of one wife." If I, if I was a, if I was divorced, I could say, "Yeah, but God called me to be a pastor." So you have to believe that call because God called me. No, you don't have to believe that. In the same way, you know, a woman will say, "Well, God's called me to preach and God's called me to be a female pastor." We don't, we don't have to believe that because it doesn't line up with God's biblical criteria for ministry. And so, biblical teaching should remain the authority for testing our subjective discernment of God's will. That applies to a lot of things. We could say, "Well, I think God wants me to do this." Yeah, but the Bible says this. Yeah, but, but God told me. Well, he didn't tell you. If, if the Bible says something else. Okay, that's what I'm saying. So serve, there's, we all have this purpose of of serving the Lord, and there's uniqueness in that.
Now, we're just going to look quickly and then we'll close at Romans 12. I just want to remind you of something there. Obviously, this is true for roles that are designed for men and roles that are designed for women, but it's also true down to the unique individual. That's what, that's what we see in the Bible. And we see in, uh, Romans chapter 12, in verse three, it says, "For I say, through the grace given unto me to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man," that's not just talking about males, "every man the measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every member one of another. Having then gifts, what's the next word? Differing according to the grace given to us." Then it lists those gifts. Every believer has been gifted uniquely. Now, now there's seven categories there, but even within those, everybody has been gifted uniquely for a specific purpose and for fulfillment. So with so many great needs in this world, including the the work of the gospel, uh, countless needs, including the stresses and miseries of sickness and homelessness and and aging and addiction and crime, incarceration, all these other things, loneliness, there is a lot, there is a lot of work to be done, and no man or woman need ever live without a fulfilling ministry for the glory of God and for the good of this fallen world. And so God's design leads us to our purpose in this, in this life is to serve him. And that leads to fulfillment, to satisfaction, knowing that God designed us. God gave us his manual, his instruction manual. He designed us with a specific purpose, and we're fulfilling the purpose for which we were made. So following God's design principles for manhood and for womanhood leads to redemptive blessing and fulfillment in marriage, in families, in churches, and in all of life. And a denial or neglect of these principles leads to increasingly destructive consequences in our families, in churches, and of course, we're seeing it in the culture at large.
So our application today is pretty simple. Do you embrace God's design? Do you embrace that God designed us with particular specifications, rejecting popular trends and ideas in favor of what God says? Or have you struggled with that? Are you, have you descended from Adam? In other words, because if you have, you struggle with that. Struggle with, "God says this and there's a restriction there, but I want to do such and such." We've all struggled with that to some extent. Maybe there's something specific that God's put his finger on that, you know, you've had this attitude about something or or you've been doing something that's outside of of God's design, and you need to turn to him and repent of that this morning and get that right and trust him for his design. Maybe you're struggling within it because, um, in God's design, the people that, whether it's in marriage, whether it's in family, whether it's in church, we don't always, you know, do things. Sometimes people can, in authority or whatever, can be very difficult, and we struggle with trying to do what God says and yet being in a difficult situation, and that we need to have compassion on that and and seek God's help. So let's spend some time with the Lord. Let's go to the Lord in prayer now.
Father, we want to ask your blessing upon each individual man or woman in this church and for families and for this church itself, that we would follow your design. Lord, we humbly ask your forgiveness for the many times where we've desired to, and not only desired to, but we have stepped out of line and wanted to go our own way. And so, Lord, I pray that you would help us to, uh, all to submit to you and to one another in the fear of God, and that you'd be glorified in our lives, in our marriages, in our church, and how we relate to one another. And help us, Lord, to to follow your plan for our lives. And we want to thank you, Lord, so much for the purpose that you've given us and the fulfillment that we have in Christ. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Let's stand, spend time with the Lord now for a minute or two seeking him for what he's taught us. Okay. The song that Jonathan's playing is "You Are Always Good." We had a little trouble with the screen earlier. Hopefully, it's working now. We could get that up on the screen. Let's stand together. Is it working now or is something going wrong there? There we go. There you are. Always good. God is good. We can trust his design for our lives. Looking back, I can see your fingerprints upon my life. Always seeking my best. There were times when your way would make no sense. But as you said, you have never left. You are always good. You are all good. You are always good to me. Though my eyes can see, help my heart believe. You are all only good. Looking in, I can see my frailty, my sin is great, and my strength is so small. Still you stay and your mercy shelters me. You hold my heart and you hear my call. You are always good. You are only good. You are always good to me. Though my eyes can see, my heart believe you are always good. Looking up, I can see your sympathy. I doubt myself, but I'm sure of your love. This grace was poured out at Calvary, securing me for our home above. You are always good. You are all good. You are all good to me. Though my eyes can't see, help my heart believe. You are all good. Amen. God is always good. He's only good. His design and his plan is perfect. And we can trust him. We can trust the specifications that he's given us in his instruction manual in his word. And we can seek to follow him according to his perfect will. And so we'll be dismissed in a moment. We look forward to this evening service. Uh, brother Levi preaching tonight. I look forward to that. It's always a blessing. And so, please join us again at 6 PM. And, uh, I think that's all I have. Make sure you check the clip the board in the back concerning next week's uh fellowship to make sure that, uh, you got something you're planning on bringing. And I think that's all I have. So, Brother Gary Patterson, could you please close us in prayer?