Andrew Johns - Examples of Youth in Service & Action - Class 5 - Mary - Developing Godliness in You

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1. 0:00

   We’d now invite our brother Andrew to come forward and speak to our son Mary. Developing godliness in youth my dearly. Beloved brothers and sisters and dear young people, the apostle Paul said when writing to the Galatians. When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law to redeem them, that were under the law, that we might have the adoption of sons, or as it should really be, that we might receive sonship when the fullness of time was come.

2. 0:54

   For 4000 years God had waited for that day that He had long foreseen to come. His own people had rejected him many times and had now become almost totally unresponsive. Through the prophets. That he’d he’d raised up and sent to them early. Speaking. Late and crying and. Appealing to their hearts. And there’s no more response. The wickedness of both the Jewish and Gentile worlds was rising rapidly to its peak, and there was only one last thing we know from the parable.

3. 1:40

   There was only one last thing God was prepared to try. There was nothing else He could do in order to save. Humankind but send his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh.

4. 1:57

   And when the fullness of time was come, God, being an intelligent and emotional being, knew exactly what that meant. He knew exactly what men were going to do to that Son when he sent him into the world. He knew the. Cruel agony of rejection that was going to come. He knew that they would mistreat him and put him to death, but the whole. Of his purpose, the whole of the salvation of individuals like Abraham and David, and those who had gone before, all depended on this son who was yet.

5. 2:39

   To come whom God had seen, seen in his foreknowledge the seed of the woman. And when that day came, God looked in Israel, in the House of David, for a woman to bear his son. A woman to whom he could entrust the early development and the character building of his only begotten son. What criteria would he use in choosing out a woman from amongst all?

6. 3:17

   Those who at that time lived and belonged to the house. Of David, their father. Would he look for a stable family? Would he look? For someone who was who was well able to maintain a lifestyle, that would be. Easy and satisfactory. Would he look for someone who was well educated? That could guide that son. Would he look for someone in middle class so that he was protected from the the vices of the rich? And the poverty of the poor, well, when we come to consider, as we will briefly tonight, brothers and sisters and young people, that wonderful young girl that God chose, we’re going to learn a great deal about our Father in heaven. We’re going to read this record very carefully. Our study tonight is going to be very different from our last few studies.

7. 4:26

   We’re going to look very carefully at what God did and what He said and consider what the Father considers to be really important, more particularly in the life of a young sister. But it’s just as applicable to us all, whether we’re young, old, male, or female.

8. 4:53

   Let’s look at how the record introduces Mary to us in Luke chapter 1, Luke chapter 1, and verse 26. In the sixth month, that is, in the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, she was expecting John. In the sixth month, the Angel Gabriel was sent from God under a city of Galilee named Nazareth to a virgin Espouse to a man whose name was Joseph. Of the House of David.

9. 5:27

   And the Virgin’s name was Mary. It seems to be just a very ordinary introduction, doesn’t it? But think about. What that’s really saying. If we read it carefully, we’re told quite a bit. Because this Angel Gabriel, who we were told in verse 19 of that same chapter, stood in the presence of God himself, was sent from God. Now why say that?

10. 6:00

    God is intimately concerned about what’s going to happen in this scene. When angels came on past instances, we didn’t have to be told that they were sent from God. But now, explicitly, we are told that Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God, was sent from the face of the Father out. And who did he go to?

11. 6:20

    Where did he go? He went to. Galilee despised Galilee of the Gentiles. That no one would. Ever. Expect an Angel of God, especially one with a special. Mission from him. Personally would ever go to And then in Galilee he came to a town called Nazareth. And whoever heard of anything good? Coming out of Nazareth and then in that city, despised as it was. It came into the House of a humble virgin whose name means bitterness, and from the highest, loftiest heavens. God has come down and is visiting one of the lowliest houses in all of Judea, and appears to a woman, a young virgin by the name of Mary.

12. 7:25

    The Angel wasn’t sent to Jerusalem. Brethren and sisters and young people. He didn’t go to a palace. He didn’t go to a wealthy family of status. He went to a city of Galilee named Nazareth and to a humble house. And she was probably a young maiden who was only in her late teens at this stage. And look what the Angel says in verse 28. The Angel came in unto her and said, Hail thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee, blessed art thou among women. And there is the first words divinely we hear about Mary. This is God’s assessment.

13. 8:20

    He has scanned all throughout Israel. He has waited for. 4000 years for this moment and now it’s come. He has picked the right 1A virgin whom we are told is highly favoured. Look at the margin graciously accepted before God. And Mary verse 29, when she saw him, was troubled at his, at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be. And the Angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favour with God.

14. 9:03

    And he repeats. Almost the same words. In the Greek that he used before in verse 28. Thou art highly favoured. The Greek in fact uses the same word, grace on both occasions. The word troubled there in verse verse 29 really just means to be agitated. And she passed in her mind she was considering what, what on earth this could all mean. Who was this man and why was he saying what he was? And no doubt in her mind, she immediately thought that it may have been an Angel.

15. 9:40

    But the Angel tells her as she thinks very quickly about what’s going on. The Angel says thou hast found grace with God. And twice he mentions that in 2 verses, Thou hast found grace with God. Do you know, brethren and sisters, that there are only 5 other individuals in scripture who are so honoured?

16. 10:08

    Jesus was 1. Noah was another Moses, Samuel and David were the others. She is the only woman to be so favoured with that salutation. And twice the Angel says it, that thou hast found grace with God. And verse 31 says, And behold, the Angel goes on, Thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shall bring forth a son, and shall call his name Jesus. He should be great, and should be called the Son of the highest.

17. 10:46

    And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his Father David. And he shall. Reign over the House of Jacob Forever, and of his Kingdom there shall be no end. And her mind must have been racing. This obviously to her meant that this man was talking about the Messiah. She knew the promises to David. Obviously she knew Daniel’s prophecies, which. Had pointed to her very own day that considering the 70 weeks prophecy that was given in Daniel Chapter 9, that those who were godly in Israel at that time had considered and pondered and and thought about it and worked out that in their own times the signs of the times pointed. To the very time in which she was living. And she knew that.

18. 11:37

    That the Messiah must be in David’s line. And she knew, too, that she was a daughter of David. Could it all be true or was this a dream? There was an awesome responsibility began to began to rest in her mind if this meant that Messiah was going to become was was going to be coming and this was the messenger of Yahweh to tell her that she was to be the bearer of that great son.

19. 12:12

    What would she say, what would what was going through her mind, brothers and sisters and young people to bear God’s? Only begotten Son, What an awesome responsibility to bring him up in godly ways, that he might be the sinless Saviour of the human race. Brothers and sisters and young. People, you think about it, what greater work could God have ever given to any human being on earth at any time, man or woman?

20. 12:46

    What greater thing could the Creator of heaven and earth ever have asked a human being to do than to bear and then guide and bring to maturity His own Son, that he might be sinless and save the race? The whole destiny of the human race depended on this son, and on what happened to him in His very earliest days was going to be dependent upon the mother whom He chose. Of course, God was going to be very carefully guide and protect that child, and the influence of His hand was always going to be there.

21. 13:29

    But, brothers and sisters, never let us underestimate the power of the mother upon a child of young age. And oh, this is going through her mind.

22. 13:41

    And what would have you asked? Well, look what she said in verse 34. Then Mary said unto the Angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man. She never questioned that it would happen. She said how she had none of the incredulity of Sarah of old, who laughed in her tent and said, oh, how could this ever happen to me? She had the faith of Abraham, who, considering that it was impossible that he could have a son, still believed what God had said.

23. 14:20

    She had the faith of David, who believed that God would raise him up a. House, a great and mighty house in the day yet to come. It’s an inquiry, brothers and sisters, that shows that she’s. Thinking very clearly. Though it’s an awesome situation that she’s in, but accepting in the spirit of David and Abraham, her forebears look at verse 35.

24. 14:54

    And she listened very carefully to these words. The Angel said unto her, The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall over shadow me. Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. And behold, he goes on to say, thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age, and this is the 6th month with her that was called Baron.

25. 15:25

    For with God nothing shall be impossible to have a son and have no human father. It had never ever happened in human history before it. Was. In. Short a human impossibility and look at the amazing answer that she gave in verse 38, and Mary spontaneously said, behold the handmaid of the Lord. Be it unto me according to thy word.

26. 16:04

    And the Angel departed from her. You know the Angel didn’t ask for any response from her. The Angel came to tell her what was going to happen. But Mary, having listened very carefully to all those words and her mind bursting with the enormity of the revelation, shows tremendous faith with no evidence at all in something that was humanly impossible.

27. 16:31

    What a marvellous woman she was. Do you know what? When she went to see Elizabeth, Look what Elizabeth said as soon as she saw her. She. By under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, says in verse 45. And blessed is she that believeth, for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her of the Lord.

28. 16:53

    In fact, that verse is not terribly well translated. It’s the punctuation that’s not very good. And the RSV says this. Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of that which was spoken to her from the. Lord, she believed implicitly the moment the Angel had said it, not just because she accepted anything at at faced value and just blind faith.

29. 17:19

    Her mind was ticking over through all of that, brethren and sisters and young people, and there was no evidence. She was told that in her womb would grow a child and had come to be the Messiah. She had no evidence of that at this stage. And yet there’s a willing implicit obedience and submission to all that God had said. She didn’t say young people.

30. 17:44

    Oh, can you just give me a few days and I’ll just turn it over and then I’ll come back to you with an answer. There was no thought of self. There was no thought of personal loss, though some of those things might have darted through her mind. The Angel, not having asked her for response, receives this spontaneous, beautiful expression of faith. Oh, what a wonderful spirit there is in this girl, a spirit of response to what God’s requirements are. Can we see the point, young people? If only we could match that level of faith and obedience in all that God has said, and just spontaneously say, Here am I, Lord, be it unto me, according to thy will. You know, our answer goes further than that. It actually reveals something about Mary herself. It gives us an insight into the mind of this, this truly lovely young sister.

31. 18:51

    And note this. She’s probably almost in shock because of seeing the Angel and the. The enormity of the revelation that’s just been proclaimed to her, she didn’t have time to rush off and get her Bible or her concordance reference. Books or anything? Else and what spontaneously comes out of her mouth is the language of messianic Psalms. Can you believe that?

32. 19:20

    Do you know where she was quoting from young people? Brothers and sisters, do you know where she was quoting from? Because she knew where she was quoting from. The words of the farms just came straight out of her mouth. Now that’s an interesting observation, and you might like to make a note. We’re not going to look it up at the moment, but in Psalm 86 and at verse 16 and Psalm 116 also at verse 16, those psalms speak of the Son of God’s handmaid messianically. And you know what?

33. 19:51

    This is saying to us it is spontaneously comes from her mouth. It must clearly imply that she was longing and waiting for Messiah to come. She wasn’t necessarily expecting that she was going to be the mother, though. There may have been many in Israel who hoped that one day they may be given the privilege of being the mother of God’s Son, but she was earnestly looking for Messiah. And she’d poured over those Psalms. She’d read them time and again, and she’d caught the spirit of it.

34. 20:21

    She’d sing what God was going to do, that there would be a son of his handmaid and the words that just come. Out of her mouth on that occasion are. Behold, the handmaid of the Lord.

35. 20:36

    What a marvellous thing if we knew our Bibles like that, sisters as well as brethren. But that’s not all we know about her mind. She went to see Elizabeth and after Elizabeth. Had said those words we read a moment ago in verse 45. We find that Mary spontaneously in verse 46 of this chapter. Bursts into a song.

36. 21:07

    Often referred to as the Song of Mary, as if. As if she’d sat down and written this thing out and was then being prepared to sing it, or others to sing it at some later generation. It just comes out as soon as she’s there. She’d obviously been thinking about all these things as she’d run across the Hill Country.

37. 21:26

    From Nazareth right down to Bethlehem. But when we read very carefully those words from verse 46 through to verse 55, there is a tremendous spirit that comes out of these words. And by the way, the record here does not say that she was speaking under inspiration. It may have been true, but the record doesn’t say it.

38. 22:00

    It does say it about Elizabeth, but it doesn’t about Mary. But her mind was was churning over all these things, pulling together the scriptures and contemplating the enormity of the Commission that had been laid upon her that would once and for all. Change the direction and the dimension of her life. Verse 46.

39. 22:23

    And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord. My spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour, for he hath regarded the lowest state of his handmaiden. For behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed with a spirit of thankfulness there, young people. That. Spontaneously welled up in her heart. This is the girl that God chose. Her spontaneous reaction to the news was implicit faith and obedience.

40. 23:02

    When she speaks to Elizabeth and confides in her the first words that. Come out of her mouth are. Show her sense of gratitude and thankfulness to all that God has done. What a spirit. And we can all learn from that because we live in an unthankful generation. It’s one of the characteristics. Of our age, but let’s learn from Mary verse 51 goes on to goes on to speak of her wider understanding of the purpose of God. He hath showed strength with his arm. He hath gathered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats and exalted. Them of low degree see.

41. 23:48

    The insight of this young teenage. Girl. He’s looking. She’s looking through the scriptures and casting her mind through all those. Things that she knew. And is pulling out from there, brethren and sisters and young people, those things that God truly delights in. And she’s right on track because God cannot stand the mighty and the proud and the lofty who arrogantly parade their own righteousness and themselves before him.

42. 24:19

    He will look to them that I’ve a meek and a contrite spirit. And she speaks of it there in verse 52. Verse 53. He hath. Filled the hungry with good things, and the rich hath sent away empty. He hath hope, and his servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy. She knows something about God, doesn’t she?

43. 24:42

    She’s read her Bible. She’s thought about it. As he spake verse 55 to our. Fathers to Abraham and to his seed. Forever. She knew what the promises were all about. She knew what the character of God was like. She knew why God had given promises. She knew the intent of the Father in the heavens.

44. 25:03

    And she’s in her teens, young sisters. No wonder God looked favourably upon her. And she speaks of the wider development of the purpose of God. What fantastic understanding. But her words are based fairly and squarely on the prayer that Hannah gave in First of Samuel chapter 2. I’m not going to turn to that now, brothers and sisters and young people. But she’s not just sighting Hannah’s prayer, she’s expounding it.

45. 25:47

    Why Hannah? Why did her mind go back to Hannah? And how come she remembered all of these things? Could you cite Hannah’s prayer? I tell you young people, brother, sisters, I can’t.

46. 26:00

    She could, and she could go one step further. She knew what it all meant. But why did her mind go back to there, to Hannah’s prayer? Why did you know? Because she did that, Hannah was the first person, and a woman at that, in the Old Testament to talk of the Messiah. Of course, the Messiah had been promised in other terms as the seed of the woman and Abraham’s son and so on.

47. 26:27

    But there in Hannah’s prayer, we find her referring to Messiah in Septuagint. It’s the same as the Greek for Messiah in the New Testament. And she doesn’t stop there. She weaves in many illusions from the Psalms. Her mind is just full of scriptural connotations of Messiah because it was the time. That she was.

48. 26:49

    Anticipating so keenly, she looked for the return of her Lord into the midst of Israel, because Daniel had said it was the time he would come, and she’d given her time, her mind to those things. And she’s only a young teenage sister. Where’d she spent? The other part of her teenage years, where had she spent her lunch times? Young sisters in department stores, chasing fashions? Reading romantic novels?

49. 27:27

    Women’s magazines? What do we feed our minds on, brother and sisters? Well, what comes out of our mouth most readily will tell us what our minds are feeding on, and if it. Frightens you to see what comes out of your mouth at times. Brethren and sisters and young people, start feeding your mind. We all have to do it, don’t we?

50. 27:59

    We’re wretched and we go off the track and our minds get concentrated on this or that and we get completely waylaid from scriptural. Ideas and the Spirit of God and the expectancy of of Christ our Lord. But this young sister didn’t know that on that day in that house an Angel would appear and give her such great news.

51. 28:33

    It was her reflective mind, her meditative spirit, her her thinking mind, brothers and sisters that God really delighted in. She not only knew what the Bible said, she’d thought about it long and hard and turned it over in her minds and her quiet moments. But she’s. Also portrayed in the record of Luke. And I wonder whether you’ve ever noticed this. She’s portrayed in the record of Luke here as an observant, reflective, thinking young woman, and I’ve chosen those words deliberately.

52. 29:29

    There are four specific terms that are used in just these two chapters in Luke here. That tell us. About Mary’s mind, by the way, these details are on the Bible marking sheet for tonight, so there’s no need to copy those off the overhead if it’s difficult. But in chapter 1 and verse 29 there we find this term she cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be.

53. 30:09

    And of that word Vine says it means to reason through, to bring together different reasons and to reckon them up. It’s actually used sometimes in in terms of accounting to to make things balance, to bring things together in the mind and to reckon them up. And she was doing that it, it seems evident that there was a a little bit of a pause between the angels speaking and and before he went on, and she was thinking about all these things. There were a rush of thoughts came into her mind. She was trying to put them all.

54. 30:40

    Together and wrecking things up. And though at that stage she may not have been able to do that, we find that she was a person who actually tried to store things away and think on them later in chapter 2 and verse 19. There are two. Terms there that are used in that very same verse.

55. 30:59

    This was in the context of when they had after the birth of Jesus and the angels had come and spoken and told Mary and Joseph all the things that had happened out in the hills of Judea. It says. But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. To think means to preserve what a kink quotes think very safe.

56. 31:24

    And while we’re told in verse 18 that all they that heard these things wondered at those things which were told by them by the shepherds, Mary is singled out here because it says in verse 9. But Mary was different. She kept them. She kept them and pondered them in her heart. She preserved those words she’s heard, listened very carefully to all the words that those that those shepherds.

57. 31:51

    Had told her. She didn’t know some of the things that they’d said. It hadn’t been revealed to her via Gabriel. An Angel hadn’t told her some of those things, and when someone else came and said they saw a host of angels in heaven, and they spoke these words and we saw all this manifestation, she locked it away in her mind and she pondered them. She put one thing with another when considering circumstances. She was clearly a very.

58. 32:16

    Reflective person that kept churning these things over and in chapter 2 and verse 51, after they’d lost Jesus temporarily in the in Jerusalem and had come back and found him and he’d answered his mother in a way that had surprised both her and Joseph. Verse 51 says, and he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was subject unto them.

59. 32:46

    But his mother kept all these sayings in her heart. It means to keep with care, to have one’s eye upon throughout, so she never ever let go of those things. Brethren and sisters and young people. And through all that, she. Didn’t take well. So it seems it didn’t have a pencil and paper in the Manger in the stable in in Bethlehem. She remembered it all, she remembered every word and she kept on going over it.

60. 33:18

    You know, we are a brain lazy generation. Our education system’s not helping. Because it’s said that knowledge is increasing at such an alarming rate that most of what you learn at school will be out of date in five years time. In some fields even shorter periods. And so it’s no good learning anything. All we should be doing is learning how to find out information when we need to find it out. You know that policy is suicidal. When we come to the.

61. 33:48

    Bible young people suicidal. Don’t listen to it. Use your brain. Commit things to memory. Try and remember you have to try. Our brain is a muscle and it will work better with exercise. So when our young children are encouraged to learn verses from the Bible, parents encourage them to do. It because they will be stood in good.

62. 34:16

    Stead in later years, train the mind to think about things. To look at the. Circumstances. Because that’s what she was doing. She was taking what she saw around her, what she’d heard, what she’d heard from the Bible, and put it all together, while others just wondered at the amazement of some of those events and forgot it the next day.

63. 34:38

    She was very different. She was a. Young woman of deep contemplation, observant and always thinking about how things fitted in to the grand scheme of things that the Creator had in the beginning and now was about to work out in her very own life. You know God is honoured when we think about Him and His Word and His will. He’s.

64. 35:08

    Honoured by that. When we try to grapple with the principles of His ways and His word in relation to our own lives, and we weigh up circumstances and we agonize over things and we pray to Him and put it before Him, and we think things through and we try to put our lives in order to go in a certain direction. God, he’s honoured by all of that. You know, we see Mary and Joseph for that matter, doing just that in the record that we have have of them here because God wanted His Son to be influenced.

65. 35:42

    And to imitate that godly, reflective spirit, God wanted his own son to be like that. Now let’s take a lesson from that, because. Here is the great creator. Of heaven and earth. That’s looked around and has found the right sort of mind that he’s really interested in what he really values is starting to show in the life of this young teenage girl. Just hold your hand in Luke and go back just a few pages to Malachi Chapter 3 to words that we are all very familiar with. But we want never to lose the power. Of.

66. 36:22

    Young people because they’re in a time of. Great apostasy and. Deceptiveness of heart in. Israel Malachi is sent and he says this verse 16 Then they that feared Yahweh spake often one to another, and Yahweh hearkened and heard it and a. Book of Remembrance was written. Before Him, for them that feared Yahweh, and that thought upon His name. And they shall be mine, saith Yahweh of hosts, in that day when I shall make up my jewels, and I will spare them as a man spareth his only son that serveth Him. They are very precious.

67. 37:10

    To him, they’re like jewels. They’re his and they will be claimed as his in that day. Oh, it might be a difficult time now to think upon his name. But there’s real purpose in all that God does. What is to think upon his name? What does God’s name embody? Brethren and sisters and young people. It embodies His purpose.

68. 37:39

    His name bespeaks his purpose. How many of you think about his purpose, the extension of his purpose, what it will mean in the earth, what it will mean in the lives of individuals? Do you just think about the Kingdom and what it will be like and why? But it embodies more than his purpose. It embodies his very character, the characteristics that he delights.

69. 38:02

    To see in every one of us. And those that thought upon, those thought carefully about the circumstances of their own life in the context of his name are very precious to him, Very, very precious indeed. And he chose one of those jewels. He chose one of those jewels. To be the mother. Of his only begotten Son, reflective thinking is is fast disappearing.

70. 38:32

    It’s disappeared just about from society. It’s fast disappearing in our own ranks because the age is getting faster. We don’t have time to think, do we? But we must. We’ve got to find time to think. I find it a very difficult thing when the phone goes non-stop and there’s so many things to attend to and do and go to and we’ve got to be here this at this time. So we push ourselves and we’re there and we do this and we pick up our our bags and we go there and, and all the other myriad of things that we have on our minds and it wears us down, doesn’t it?

71. 39:09

    And we can’t think. And sometimes I get so frustrated I sit down in my study at night and think there’s so many things going around in my mind. I can’t think about divine things. Ever felt like that? But we’ve got to learn to have quiet time to make it, because God loves those who think upon his name. We’ve got to not let the Hurley burly of this age. Push us around and to think about the real issues. The real issues of life.

72. 39:47

    And of the truth and parents, let’s set an example. Oh, it’s very difficult. Life is very busy with a young growing family, isn’t it? We all know. That, but let’s set an example. In a world of depraved wickedness, where people’s minds are going over and over and over all sorts of ungodly and self-centered things, we’ve got to desperately pull together, all of us brothers and sisters pull together and help each other.

73. 40:20

    To think about the name. And come together as families and as groups of young people and talk about those things that really matter. Oh, it’s easy to say, but it’s desperately important that we all, all of us, young and old. Try to do that. Because when Jesus came along, he was very deeply, very deeply influenced by the spirit of his mother. He had thought long and hard long. Before he ever got to his public ministry about issues of. All.

74. 41:04

    Kinds he could never have answered as he did some of the questions that we find him so masterly handling. In his ministry had he not churned and thought and and pondered and meditated and. Kept. Those things in his heart and put scripture with scripture and experience with scripture and thought about that experience and observed. People and God saw that his Son needed that. Influence.

75. 41:37

    And don’t our children need that? We need it too, and we need to be like that to each other. Because God is not looking for robots. He doesn’t want somebody to just press the button and outcomes an answer or exactly the right thing at the right time just by pressing a button. He’s an intelligent creature, and he will be pleased by the intelligent and reasoned response of hearts who fear Him. It’s interesting to notice, but in the life of Mary and and Joseph and many others of many generations, many of those young people that we’ve already looked at over the past few days, God just does not reveal all that they needed to know at once. He will tell them so much.

76. 42:33

    There will be so much revealed. And for us, it’s just the same, is it not? He didn’t tell Mary, for example, where Jesus was to be born, But she’d worked out that it had to be in Bethlehem, and she’d wondered how she’d get there. And she must have churned over that for months and months until suddenly, one day an announcement was made and the world was to be taxed and they had to go to Bethlehem. And she saw in all of that the hand of God tell her that at the beginning she wondered how the prophecies would be fulfilled from Micah and other places, that he was to be born in bed. And she knew that, but she didn’t know how it would come to pass.

77. 43:20

    But she exercised her mind upon that. So I told no instructions about how to bring that child up. She wasn’t told many of the things that the shepherds came and told her, but she exercised her minds on all those things. And what a tremendous lesson and example she is for us all, and particularly tonight to our dear young sisters and our young girls. I want to talk.

78. 43:51

    For a moment to you specifically, everything that we’re going to consider really is of as much applicability to brethren. Of any age and sisters of any age. But let’s just take this young girl. And don’t think that, because we are not brethren, and we don’t. Or will not be called. Upon in ecclesial service to do talks or to be a chairman.

79. 44:21

    That there is therefore no need for us to do any Bible study or thinking or meditation about godly things here. Mary was given. Listen to this. Mary was given a task greater than any brother or any speaker has ever been given in all human history. And she needed to be prepared. And mothers in Israel?

80. 44:54

    Have got a task almost second to none to influence the heritage of Yahweh. You know children. Are just not our. Children, they belong to God. They’ve been loaned to us in order that we might for a short time, guide and influence their minds in godly ways, that we might give them back to Him in loving service.

81. 45:18

    They may be of use to Him One day. We hope and pray in the Kingdom of God to turn the the wickedness of this world around and forever to be in fellowship with him in the in the days ahead. You know He wants brethren and sisters, our sons grown up, as the psalmist said in Psalm 144, our sons grown up in their youth and our daughters. As cornerstones after the polished after the similitude of a palace.

82. 45:49

    Palace and just notice in passing. That daughters are the cornerstones, and there is a difference in that Psalm between sons and daughters, in how the psalmist saw them. Mothers have a unique and very important. Role to play. For God in heaven in bringing many of his children to a state of mind that they might respond in intelligent and reasoned service before him. You know mothers have a very powerful influence fathers have a powerful influence too.

83. 46:28

    But mothers are more powerful influence over their children at a younger. There’s a more powerful influence over their children at a younger age, and they can influence so, so powerfully the attitudes and the values the. Way of thinking. And the godly development of young children, both for good or I’ll, as the records of the king so plainly outline, when the mothers in Israel’s dynasty and in Judah’s Kingdom are often mentioned when either a very good or a very wicked king came along.

84. 47:09

    This is a tremendously important word that’s largely underestimated and denigrated in the by the age in which we live. But you know, young sisters, you’ll never ever be able to bring up a Son of God or a daughter of God in your house unless in. Youth you have. Learned the value of godliness in your life unless you think carefully about the direction and the issues of life.

85. 47:39

    Unless you feed your minds with godly things, you won’t have time. Lady, you go and ask a mother with four children how much time she’s got to read the work, the literature of the truth and the the the Bible every day. She’ll find time if she’s a godly. Woman, but she’ll tell you she will do it under extreme tiredness late at night, early in the morning, catching a nap, catching a a chance here or there.

86. 48:12

    You know, I’ve been very encouraged young people over the last few days to see the the spirit in which many young people. And included in that a great number of our young sisters and our young girls who have diligently stayed up at night or got up early in the morning in order to ponder over the records that we’ve been looking and to mark something in their Bible and to think about God’s ways and his. Word God will.

87. 48:46

    Bless that spirit young girls, he’ll bless it. And young lads, make no mistake about it, like he blessed this godly. Young girl, you know this world has gone crazy in so many ways. It’s inverted God’s values on almost every hand and openly challenges and decries the value and the role of motherhood of all things.

88. 49:13

    What a tragedy that is. Look at these words. Horrific. They just about burn the screen. They’re words that were spoken by one Simone de Beauvoir at the World Conference in the International Year of Women in 1975, at the rural watershed of women’s liberation movement. And in the concluding remarks when the World Action Plan was being formulated, she said no woman should be authorized to stay at home to raise her children.

89. 49:57

    Women should not have that choice precisely because if there is such a choice. Too many women will make it. It’s a way of forcing women in a certain direction, and we see it as part of a global reform of society which will not accept that old segregation between men and women, the home and the outside world, as long as the family and the.

90. 50:23

    Myth of maternity and maternal instinct are not destroyed. Women will still be oppressed. Oh, there might have been some. Motive behind that because in many. Countries of the world, for many centuries, many women have been oppressed by men. But what blasphemous nonsense.

91. 50:46

    And from that time forward, with great determination, there’s been a powerful worldwide lobby, particularly effective. In the Western countries of the world. The eventual result of which has been, in almost every Western nation, the passing of what we know as equal opportunity legislation, the proliferation of childcare centres, enormous sums of money going into women’s shelters.

92. 51:20

    And childcare centres and drastic changes to the marriage and divorce laws of countries around the world, including Australia. And initially there was great resistance from conservative middle. Class society who was brought up on a set of values which were basically biblically based and conservative and right. And you know what? The activists knew that they would never, ever change society.

93. 51:54

    Until they got at the minds of children and the equal opportunities legislation was pushed onto the education agenda for implementation and in the public education sectors of every state in this country and in almost every country in the Western world. You will find equal opportunity policy reigning supreme and by that I mean this, that girls are to be actively encouraged to seek further education, to set up career structures from an early age, to be.

94. 52:33

    Actively discouraged when they leave school, from having a family or staying at home if they do. To be encouraged actively, to be assertive, to be proactive, to be more vocal. They’re told I’m wrong without boys at school. Now you ask your children if they’re at school, if they’re not getting this sort of message in social education classes and social conditioning that’s going on within our school societies, both private and public systems, they’re told to rethink. The stereotypes rethink the family. You know, the education department of SA has a document that that is basically it’s policy document on the cover. It has, apart from the title, a picture of the family that they’re educating. 1 mother, two children, no. Father.

95. 53:31

    Rethink Relationships don’t get bound up in marriage. It’s likely to hurt you. Think about it, Children are being told challenge traditional roles. They’re no longer workable in this sort of society. You know, brothers and sisters and young people, that legislation is working marvellously, marvellously well. They’re brilliant strategists. They knew that if you go head on to conservative, middle-aged society, you’ll never, ever change it. But you get down to little children who don’t know any different and you start brainwashing them, and I use that term brainwashing them, by making an environment where the language has changed and everything about it is all now different.

96. 54:22

    Eventually thinking will change. Within society all there is active discrimination of women promoted into executive positions and administrative positions within education bodies. Very important within schools, again very important because policy has to be influenced decision making in many schools in this state. Brothers and sisters. Is. Absolutely hamstrung by feminists, and that’s no understatement. Hamstrung and people, administrators, principals are powerless with their hands behind their backs by equal opportunity legislation that tells them what they have to do despite what they know is best.

97. 55:15

    To do now. That whole movement is based, once again, on humanistic principles. No God, no absolutes. Why should there be a difference between males and females if we all evolved anyway? We all came out of a lump of Jelly. Who’s to say there’s any difference? Why should there be? And so goes the reasoning.

98. 55:40

    Girls, Beware of that subtle indoctrination, because that’s what it is. Oh, it sounds very plausible. And on occasions. You may be called together. As a group of girls at school, it’s happened in the school that I work at, girls have been taken into a room for three days where no male was allowed to step into the room.

99. 56:05

    And top ranking feminists from around this city came in and talked to them and taught them how to be more aggressive, how to direct their careers, how to think about this and that and. Build their minds with all sorts of things. It’s being aggressively marketed, aggressively marketed within our school system. And I say, brethren and sisters, all power to the move to establish a school within our own community. We’ve got the ability to do so that’s going to be based on godly principles because that underpinning philosophy is ripping society apart.

100. 56:50

     It’s a movement, brethren, and. Sisters, that’s even affecting the English language. Can you believe it? It’s affecting the English language. You ask any young people in senior secondary school today that happened to be doing any of the subjects like English or the social sciences, and if they use sexist terms in their writing, they will be downgraded. I know there are young people in this hall here tonight who have been told by teachers you didn’t get an A. This is a very impressive piece of work. But I have to give you AC because you’ve used this language, because you’ve said he instead of she, because you’ve called this husband and wife instead of partner. Our young people are facing that. It’s a serious business.

101. 57:46

     It’s conditioning, but rapidly we’re beginning to see the consequences of such a policy. You see the rate of marriage breakdown is increasing alarmingly. Family. Problems only two years. Ago when I had a Home group in the school that I was teaching at in. Not a very bad suburb, I suppose, not certainly in the worst areas to teach in this state. 65% of the children in that Home group had one parent at home. And there’s all sorts of social problems, as we well know, that are coming out of that.

102. 58:41

     Society is turning God’s values upside down. But the worst thing is they’re trying to influence our children and to some degree, brethren and sisters, I say succeeding.

103. 58:58

     What is the truth? What is the truth? About equal opportunity, young people, do you know You know God in the beginning made man and woman differently by different processes for a very good reason. He made them that they might complement each other, not to paint with each other. He made the woman second, the man first. He made the woman as a help fit for the man that she might draw from him the latent characteristics that were there and together form a beautiful harmony of characteristics and be able to develop the divine character together. And their roles are very clearly established in the Scriptures. But before God in a spiritual sense, young people, man and woman, are equal in the sight of God as the apostle Paul. Said ye are.

104. 1:00:03

     All one in Christ Jesus, there is no male, no female, there’s no race barriers, there’s not one greater than another. They’re you’re all male and female, all sorry, one in Christ Jesus, Peter said. You’re ears together. Of the grace of life. But that’s not to say that God has not clearly defined roles and responsibilities.

105. 1:00:30

     That have been based upon the pattern of His creation, which He alone as Creator knows what is best for each. Of those two groups, and the wisdom of this world in their utter folly, has chosen to ignore it. And that’s not new, because they’ve ignored it on many occasions in many ages in the past.

106. 1:00:55

     In the 1st century, exactly the same thing happened. I like to come first to Corinthians Chapter 11. 1st of Corinthians Chapter 11 verse 3.

107. 1:01:17

     But I would have you know, said the apostle, that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God. There is a clear distinction. There are clear levels of headship which God has established. That are appropriate. God, Christ, man, woman. Evident in all that he does and purposeful. In the development of of his purpose throughout the earth. You know, in Corinth, in the days in which Paul wrote these words, women were removing their head coverings as a protest asserting equality of rights, that it wasn’t fair that the men were.

108. 1:02:02

     Allowed to do this or that and they weren’t. And Paul had to deal with the issue. And he said, in effect, brothers and sisters and young people, that those women were showing both their own ignorance and their own wrong motivation. Because the head covering was in recognition of a divine principle of headship that got it always established right. From the beginning, it’s a principle which is divine. And it’s in operation throughout all this dispensation of things. And it’s not only applicable to married women and married men or baptized girls and not unbaptized girls. It’s a universal principle that God has established just as Christ.

109. 1:02:51

     Is subject to God, so the ecclesia ought to be subject to Christ. So likewise, in the same way is the woman to be subject to the man in this dispensation. In the time to come, in the age to come, we will be equal to the angels. There will be no difference. But it’s sad to see, despite Paul’s clear statements here and elsewhere, that we. Haven’t got time to look at tonight. It’s sad to see in recent times, young girls and sisters, that some of our girls are not at an.

110. 1:03:24

     Age. Of clear mental ability. And appreciation of divine things, Not wearing hats to meetings, removing them the very moment the piano or the organ stops, as if to make a statement. If that’s coincidental to a forceful campaign for equal rights and to denigrate everything that’s been biblically said about it in our age, well, so be it.

111. 1:03:57

     But it’s an awful coincidence if it is. You see, God is. Aligned for men and for women. Vital roles for each, vitally important, both of them. And they’re not the same. They’re equally important and all we have to do. Brethren and sisters, young or old is understand the role that God has for us.

112. 1:04:22

     You know, there’s, it’s vital to our, to our families and to our ecclesias that our sisters especially see in this age of distortion of values, see very clearly what some of those issues are. You know, the New Testament makes it very clear that the role of sisters in the ecclesia is generally not public. But it’s just as important as the role of any. Brother in the meeting and this crazy. World is out there educating our girls. And bombarding our sisters during the day through the radio and whatever else, and telling them that they should be the same as males, they should be more aggressive, they should stand up for what they think.

113. 1:05:12

     Don’t be pushed around you make your own way. You have your career, you do what you like, when you like and don’t listen to what the men say. Sisters, if that’s coming across a radio all day, don’t listen to it because we’re influenced to what continually goes through our minds. Brother Thomas in a well known passage in Elpis Israel, said this.

114. 1:05:35

     And truer words for this age, they never were. When women aim for an equality for which they are not physically constituted, they degrade themselves by the exhibition, and in proportion as they rise in assurance they sink in. All that really adorns a woman, young girls and young. Sisters, take that. And think about it. The apostle Paul and brother Thomas were not anti women. The apostle gives some advice.

115. 1:06:05

     Let’s look at it quickly in Titus chapter chapter 2 and Titus chapter 2, just as one example. And there are many others. In First Timothy chapter 2, for example, we’ll look at Titus 2 and at verse three he says for we ourselves sorry, wrong. Chapter Titus 2 and chapter and verse three, he says the aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given too much wine, but teachers of good things.

116. 1:06:43

     That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not not blasphemed. It’s not an onerous task, but we’re going to be to be subjected unto all sorts of cruel torture and treatment and to be made to do things against their will.

117. 1:07:08

     That’s not what Paul is talking about. Under any circumstances, there ought to be a very beautiful balance. In family life but there are roles that the apostle talks about older women adorning themselves as he says in another place with. Good works which in the sight of God are of great value. Sisters understand that good works, the hidden man of the heart, are of great value to God and can achieve in a cleansing life more than words from a platform can ever do.

118. 1:07:42

     We can teach by word and example. And it’s sadly. Lacking in our community and young sisters. Do you think your role’s a boring one? Well, it’s only because you’ve been influenced by the thinking of this evil age if you think that. Life is a. Boring one in bringing up the the future kings and priests of an age which is going to be the good most glorious time that there has ever been on earth. What an enormous.

119. 1:08:07

     Responsibility, that is, and evidently it wasn’t being done in the 1st century either, because Paul says older sisters teach the younger ones that the word of God be not blasphemed. God has put into the hands of our sisters a tremendous work, a great responsibility. There may not be outward recognition, an adulation now in the age to come, there will there will be great praise and honour.

120. 1:08:35

     But shaping the next generation, shaping the next generation of those who are coming to know God and allowing public work of the truth to proceed by their support and their their care and encouragement in the home is a vital work. Remember the? Words of the Psalm. Our daughters are to be as cornerstones, polished after the similitude of a palace. Solid, beautiful, unmovable, and gloriously precious in the sight of God.

121. 1:09:10

     As if in a. Palace and done by quiet godly works an example a caring sympathetic spirit that only women crying can extend the fall where sisters there is a vital. Work in the Ecclesia. Young girls don’t. Ever let anyone tell you otherwise? And it’s often more effective and more powerful than that of many brethren. Now Paul appreciated the work of many sisters. You pick up Romans 16 at your leisure and read it and you see what he said about some of the marvellous work of sisters and bearing the yoking youth, sisters and young girls. What better way to bear the yoke? The yoke of self denial, being compassionate and caring of concern, ministering to others wasn’t. That’s the spirit of our Lord Himself and encouraging build. When brethren and sisters in the equator of God can cooperate in those complementary roles together, what a glorious and happy place it will be.

122. 1:10:18

     But the circumstances that we find in Mary’s life from this time onwards are very instructive. We’re not going to look at them in any detail, but we know that she lived in despised Nazareth in what was almost certain poverty. She offered, for example, the offering of the poor when she came to Jerusalem, and she would have offered better if she was able her own.

123. 1:10:47

     The spirit in in her song identifies with the poor and the downtrodden. And isn’t it interesting that God saw fit to put his Son into that environment? Brother Roberts once said the lap of luxury is notoriously unfavourable for the development of character. And so it is. And perhaps we ought to take that as a warning, parents. But her trauma went on.

124. 1:11:16

     There was a great deal of unknowns in her life and. And she had to face the. Stigma of being an unmarried mother in Israel and the talk of the town and all the innuendo. And patiently bear with that. If she explained to me, well, they didn’t believe her and that no one in that generation called her blessed. Even though it was prophesied that she would, it didn’t matter what she said.

125. 1:11:41

     Her reputation was destroyed and 30 years later the scribes and Pharisees threw those words into the teeth of Jesus when they said, we be not born of fornication. We know who our Father was, so they never forgot.

126. 1:12:04

     And she was called upon to accept great difficulty, mental torture through her very earliest years, as with difficulty, she struggled to bring up the Son of God in a home that we know had at least six other children. There was the tragedy that she almost. Lost Joseph but got intervened and spoke to him through an Angel and there on the back of a donkey.

127. 1:12:36

     She travelled to Bethlehem only to be turned around and cast out from every venue that they turned into and ending up in a stable. The king of the world was born. The king of the world, you know, God’s telling us something. He’s not interested in what man thinks is important and great. But as Paul said in first of Corinthians chapter 1, he said God has chosen the base things of this world and things which are the spies and things that which I’m not to bring to naughty the things that are. That no flesh should glory in His presence. And so it was.

128. 1:13:19

     And she was forced to flee to Egypt and amidst all the. Uncertainty of that. And to come back again to the innuendo. Back in Nazareth. Oh, what a terrible. Early life it was brethren and sisters and young people. Sisters, Just think about all the trauma that she went through and all that time in her youth, God was preparing her for the great work of influencing His Son. And so that young lad began to grow. And began to delight because of his mother’s instruction in God’s way.

129. 1:13:50

     And he grew to love his Father in heaven and divine ways. He learned to think like his mother and reflect. On his father. ‘S thoughts and his ways. And he saw in his mother a patient example under tribulation. He saw that in that home. He learnt what it meant to just close your mouth and accept the innuendo of men. He learnt what it meant to be poor and to suffer. He learnt all of those things by singing. The pressures of family life bore down upon him. But Mary grew by all of those circumstances in her youth, and God bore it upon her that she might, with this precious gift, perform a mighty work in Co operation with him. Young Sisters.

130. 1:14:43

     That’s the role that you have. And brethren, we too have the role of development in cooperation with God amidst life’s joys and sorrows. God hasn’t said that He will provide a a flower strewn pathway to the Kingdom. But the experiences of life will make so much more sense if in our youth we can develop our minds and think, meditate and reflect upon the marvellous things that he’s done.

131. 1:15:23

     What a beautiful character Mary is in her youth. What have we seen? That God delights in those who show faith and willing obedience to Him, the delights in those that think upon His name and reflectively consider the circumstances of their life. And that youth is by far the best time to develop such godly thinking, that we may in time be called upon even youth to suffer unjustly for the name of Christ and to bear it patiently because God life was not to be easy for any of God’s servants. We’ve learnt that societies change the divinely appointed roles of men and women, but fulfilment and blessing and true happiness will only come by accepting God’s way in Co operation with Him.

132. 1:16:42

     Thank you, Brother Andrew. Let us brothers and sisters and young people take the lessons from the life of Mary to thoughtfully consider the Word of God and willingly submit ourselves to what God requires of us. We’ll close tonight’s meeting with him. 62 followed by pray.