Crunch issue, question

Here's an outtake from an old sermon I clicked on tonight and thought was pretty concise:

The way you meet isn’t the issue. Whether you meet in someone’s home or you meet in a building, that’s all a matter of a form following a function; you’ve got to have light to start with. You don’t build a box and say, “Hey, Lord, jump in the box.”

We used to have a Bible conference in a famous Roman Catholic monastery in Pennsylvania and somebody complained, “You guys are up there among all those idols.”

We met in an auditorium that had all these idols and the “stations of the Cross,” and some people thought we shouldn’t be there. Brother Darryl Mefford said, “You know, I remember Paul preaching among the idols.” The building was nothing to us; it was just a nice place to meet.

How did it all get to that? Ephesians 3: [2] If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to youward:

You see, the real problem, the real blunder is a failure to HEAR about Paul being your apostle. The real failure is the failure to recognize the importance and place of the ministry and the message committed to the Apostle Paul.

Because when you don’t understand that, you don’t understand ANYTHING about what God’s doing today.

[3] How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words,
[4] Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ)
[5] Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit;

Notice, this is an issue about what’s in the Bible; what you read in the Scripture.

There was a time in your Bible that the information that Paul’s revealing wasn’t there.

[9] And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ:

From the time God put man on the earth to the time of the Apostle Paul, there’s information that God never told anybody and had hid in Himself. Not hid in the Scripture; hid in Himself.

When Paul came along, the Lord Jesus Christ revealed to him some information that had not previously been revealed. That means that where you study in your Bible . . . Listen, if you’re always back over in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John looking for God’s will for you, you know what? You can take a flashlight and a blow torch and never find it! Because it is not located in those books!

By the way, every one of the 13 books of Paul's begin with his name. Thirteen times the first word God wants you to read is Paul. Think about that.

I Corinthians 11:1: [1] Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.

Paul says, “If you want to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, you follow me because I’m His spokesman.” He’s saying, “Be followers of my doctrine.”

I’m convinced that I Corinthians 11:1 and Romans 11:13 are not in most preachers’ Bibles. At least they’re not in their vocabulary.

Romans 11:13: [13] For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office:

We teach you to ask the crunch question: “Has anybody ever loved you enough to ask you, ‘If you were to die today do you know where you’d spend eternity?’ ”

Do you know most people have never been loved enough to be asked that question? If you ask it that way, you won’t generally get somebody being angry at you because people aren’t used to people loving them.

I was in an airport once waiting for a delayed airplane and sat next to a man going to Detroit like I was and after we had a little bit of a conversation, I asked him that question.

He looked at me for probably 15 seconds and then said, “That is a strange question.” He said, “Mister, nobody’s ever loved me enough hardly to ever even talk to me about (anything spiritual), much less ask me that.”

You know, there’s another crunch question to ask people once you know the answer to that one: “Do you have any idea who your apostle is?” That’s probably the second most important question you can ask somebody. “Where do you go to get your instructions from God?”

Israel went to Moses. Jesus told them, "What Moses commanded you." Now, it was God through Moses who commanded. In fact, Jesus Christ was Jehovah who gave the law to Moses.

And when Jesus is here on earth in His human flesh, He says, "What Moses commanded you." Now, Moses never said, "It's me." He said, "God put me in this position and made me the law giver."

Paul says, "It isn't me, but there's something God gave to me and I speak to you Gentiles because I am the apostle of the Gentiles."