[0:00] We may now consider for a little as we shall be enabled words you will find in the chapter we read together. The Gospel according to Luke chapter 16.
[0:19] And we may read again at the 13th verse. Luke chapter 16 at verse 30.
[0:34] No servant can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other.
[0:46] Or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. He cannot serve God and mamma.
[1:01] In the context, we have the parable of the unjust steward.
[1:20] Whom his Lord commanded for his wisdom. And we are told that in their own generation, the children of this world are wiser than the children of light.
[1:48] Christ advises his disciples to emulate or to imitate the children of the world in this respect.
[2:05] In their wisdom. Not in their wickedness. Or in their worldliness. But in their wisdom. That they, that is the children of light, should show as much wisdom and exercise as much prudence in spiritual things.
[2:27] As the children of the world in the world in the world in the world. As the children of the world exercise in worldliness. And, uh, without entering into the intricacies of this parapleg, and we might say in passing that, perhaps no portion of scripture has been given so many different interpretations.
[2:49] Because, uh, of certain in here are difficult. But without considering that at the moment, we may go on to this all important inference that Christ himself draws from his own teaching.
[3:11] He makes it a statement, but it is an inference that follows. Naturally and necessarily from the doctrine he had been preached.
[3:23] Namely, no servant can serve two masters. But either he will love the one, and despise the other.
[3:45] Or, he will take to the one, and deserve the other. And then this all-important empathic utterance that admits of no contradiction and no qualification, he cannot serve God and mammon.
[4:15] Now for a little this morning we may consider first the fact that we are servants.
[4:36] We are servants. There is nothing whatsoever we can do about that. And that is our position and condition in the order of created beings.
[4:57] Yea, all created beings are servants. They are servants of the Creator.
[5:11] At least to begin with. We are servants. We cannot do anything about it.
[5:24] That is, we have to serve. You remember that the sin of man to begin with has a close relationship to this.
[5:42] When the tempter tempted our first parents, he said, Ye shall be as gods.
[5:57] And that implies not only the knowledge of good and evil. That is certainly the first thing. But it implies more. Ye shall be as gods.
[6:10] That is, you will be your own masters. You won't be servants any longer. But what happened?
[6:24] The only thing that could possibly happen. The only thing that could possibly happen. Man did not get away from being a servant.
[6:36] What he did do by his sin was, he changed his fast. He changed his position.
[6:49] He deserved it. God turned away from him. And sworeed himself. Albeit unconsciously, but nevertheless really.
[7:04] Sworeed himself. To another man. The devil. He couldn't get away from being a servant. You remember how Paul brings the servant in the episode of the world.
[7:19] In the episode of the Romans. When he were without God, he served. Diverse lusts and flesh.
[7:36] He served them that are through by nature are no gods. That's not only in the episode of the Romans. It's throughout the Old, the Old New Testament and the Old one for that matter. But now, serve righteousness.
[7:53] Righteousness. Give your members to be servants of righteousness. You must serve.
[8:08] And furthermore, you must serve one of two masters. With all the multiplicity of service there is.
[8:23] With all the variety. There are in the last analysis. But two masters. He cannot serve God and mamma.
[8:37] And there is no other master. It's one of these. It's either God or the devil. One or the other.
[8:49] About that, there is nothing that can be done. It is imprinted on our whole nature.
[9:01] In virtue of our creation. We must serve. We must serve one of two. But, it cannot be said in the same way.
[9:15] that, there is nothing that can be done above those choice of masters.
[9:34] About being servants we can do nothing. And that he can be done for us. But, above those choice of masters. There is something that can be done.
[9:50] And there is something that we always do. In the first place. We choose our masters. Both.
[10:09] The wicked and the just. The righteous and the unrighteous. Choose their master. That of course follows inevitably.
[10:22] And that of course follows inevitably from the fact that man is a responsible being, or rather his responsibility follows upon his power of choice.
[10:51] It is impossible to conceive of responsibility apart from the will. Man has a will, and he is responsible for his choice.
[11:10] Absolutely responsible. Now where a question or a difference of opinion comes in here is not on the fact that man has a will, not on the fact that man is responsible for his choice, but there is a vast difference of opinion as to what this will is, what it can do, and what it can't do.
[11:48] No relative to this point to his choice of master, sorry, to his choice of a master. We say emphatically that, then the man who is a servant of Mammon chooses his master.
[12:12] It is his own choice. Of course when you ask, can he do anything else? That's another question. An entirely different question.
[12:26] But, basically, any other question affects not this condition that man in whatever state he is chooses his master.
[12:46] Mammon, in a state of innocence, did choose. He refused, he turned away from God, and he chose the devil as his master.
[13:04] He chose Mammon. Mammon. Now, while Mammon refers more often to this world's goods, Pelfilucra, as Paul puts it, here we may take it as meaning that which is distinct from and contrary to God.
[13:26] He cannot serve God, and it could be anyone else. No man chose his master.
[13:38] And that choice is repeated. In all his children, by natural generation, they choose their master.
[13:50] They are slaves, yes, but they are willing slaves. They wish to be like that. And, uh, while a man wishes to be, and wills to be something, he is responsible, wholly responsible, for his own action.
[14:15] And, uh, when he is responsible, he is responsible, for his own action. Man, therefore, has to lay whatever service he is in.
[14:27] The fact that he is in it, he has to trace to himself. If he wants to complain of hard service, if he wants to get away from this hard service, he must always remember that he himself is responsible for it.
[15:00] Both by the act of his first parents and his own. Here he is.
[15:12] He chooses his master. He chooses his master. He chooses his master. He chooses his master. He chooses his master. He chooses his master. You know, this is an exclusive choice. There cannot be two.
[15:23] Now, perhaps, there is nothing in this world so common on the part of men as an attempt to serve two masters.
[15:38] It is most common, people, despite the clear warnings of scripture, still go on thinking that they may serve too.
[16:00] They think they can serve God and mammon. They think they can serve truth and falsehood, righteousness and unrighteousness.
[16:21] Maybe it is not common to find people doing this deliberately.
[16:32] They try to hide from themselves as well as from others the fact that they do try to serve two masters.
[16:43] They wish to hide it from themselves. And of course, they like to think that they serve God and not man.
[17:04] Now, if one's whole life is service, and if he cannot divide his services between two masters, and he feels responsible for the choice of masters that he makes, then that must be a very solid, and thus a very serious business without any doubt.
[17:44] And furthermore, see the comprehensiveness of this. It is not the case of a man saying, well, I choose God for my master.
[17:59] But remember, my friends, as far as we are concerned, and we are talking from that side just now, from that viewpoint, as far as our own personal activity is concerned, we choose everything.
[18:13] We choose almost every moment of it. It is something that causes itself upon us. Something which we cannot escape.
[18:36] Every difficulty, every problem, every moral problem that comes our way, comes with this question. Who is your master?
[18:49] Who is your master? Who is your master? Who is your master? Who is your master?
[19:01] You are going to serve whom? Who will you serve? It comes up again and again and again.
[19:14] and there's no getting away from it. It is not in this sense a choice that one makes once and for all and has nothing more to do with.
[19:29] It is persistent. It is inescapable. It forces itself upon us, however much we would like to hide from it.
[19:43] Now you know that. In a steward it is required that one should be found faithful.
[19:59] In a servant it is required that one should be found faithful. Faithful to his master.
[20:12] No. The servants of Mambo, the servants of the evil one are 100% faithful.
[20:26] They are faithful all the time. They are always in his servants.
[20:38] They never get away from it. And even while it may appear at some times that they are unhaired in his servants, actually they are not.
[20:56] The unrighteous do nothing but unrighteousness. They are always in a state of unrighteousness.
[21:10] The confession of fear puts it like this. Although men in a natural state may do many things that are commendable in themselves.
[21:27] Many things that are for the substance of them good and white. Yet, because these things are not done from a right word to a right end, they are not righteous.
[21:42] They are sinful. Hence, we say that the servants of Mambo are always faithful to it.
[21:54] They never do anything else but unrighteousness. But at last, that is not true of the servants of God.
[22:09] They are not always faithful. The others are faithful because they cannot be anything else. But in the case of serving God, the position is entirely different.
[22:30] One may be and one often is unfaithful.
[22:41] And this is the heart of the problem. When a righteous man performs an unrighteousness, whose servant is he?
[23:05] Whose servant is he then? He is doing the work of unrighteousness, the work of Mambo.
[23:16] Yet, he is a servant of God. With a fair two son faithfulness as a servant. Whose servant is he then?
[23:29] At that particular moment, he cannot be the servant of two masters. That is an interesting question. And it takes to do with the whole position and the whole condition of the sanctification.
[23:40] of the believer. Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat progression? In the work of sanctification? In the work of sanctification? Does the believer ever know that he is a believer? Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat progression? In the work of sanctification? Does the believer ever go back? Does the believer ever go back?
[23:51] Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat? Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat progression? Is that a threat progression? Does the believer ever go back? It is a threat progression?
[24:19] Yes. He is unfaithful. That question doesn't arise. Yes, allowed on all hands.
[24:32] But that's not exactly the same I see. That, uh, he has become, at least for the time being, the servant of Mama.
[24:46] But has he? That's the question. Well, of course, like every other question, we have to look at it from all its phases.
[25:04] Nothing is so fertile of error as looking at the thing from one side and ignoring every other side.
[25:19] Now the answer to that question is both yes and no. No, in the sensible text.
[25:31] No man can serve two masters. And the believer, once he comes into the service of God, is always under God as his master.
[25:49] Hence, there is a world of difference between what we might call the unfairfulness of the sin and the sin of the unbeliever.
[26:07] This is one of them, at least. It doesn't clarify the situation much, but perhaps it may give us an idea.
[26:19] There is a difference between a traitor and a prisoner of war.
[26:31] The traitor goes over voluntarily to the enemy. To do the service of the enemy against his own country and countrymen.
[26:45] The prisoner of war is in the enemy. The prisoner of war is in the enemy's power too. Yes. But he is there not as a traitor. He is there as one who has been overpowered by superior force.
[27:03] His heart is still loyal to his own country.
[27:15] He is in the enemy's power, no doubt. But there is a limit to the way in which they can use the prisoner of war.
[27:29] He still can put up with his own. Within well defined limits, yes. But he still can. He hasn't sold his country.
[27:44] He is not able to do much for it, no. Nevertheless, his heart is still loyal. Now that, that illustration can only be carried so far.
[28:00] If it could account for all the factors in the case, then we would have an answer. But he doesn't. And the reason is this, that in Morag problems, and more so in spiritual problems, there are such a rest of the genes which we do not find in the things of this life at all.
[28:25] Hence, no illustration taken from the works of nature or from the works of man can, in all points, set before us, the, um, set before us, spiritual questions or spiritual questions or spiritual problems that may be analogous in some respects to the one we take in the, um, Who's servant this is?
[28:41] Who's servant this is? We reply that he is the servant of God. But he is the servant of God. But he is the servant of God doing what he ought not to do.
[28:52] He is the servant of God doing the work of the devil. And he is the servant of God doing what he ought not to do. He is the servant of God doing the work of the devil.
[29:15] And sin is always the work of the devil and is nothing else and can never be anything else. Nevertheless, as to his standing, he is the servant of God. What follows?
[29:27] Well, it's this. That there are accusations of his sin that cannot be found in the sin of the unbeliever.
[29:42] So far from justifying him, the position of his sin is this, that considered in itself, it is the most dangerous.
[29:59] And the condition has tended with most gifts that one can possibly be. A believer's unhaithfulness to God has aggravations in it that cannot attend the sins of the unbeliever.
[30:19] Hence, my friends, the call to take this to heart, ye cannot serve to master it. For you profess to be the servant of one and be his servant indeed.
[30:36] Oh, then how thankful, how much one ought to be, lest one should find oneself in the service of the enemy.
[30:50] He only says God to Israel, have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you.
[31:01] Grace does not lend itself to lasciviousness, it has the very opposite effect. Grace understood, in its biblical setting, as the most powerful motive to holiness that we can possibly conceive of.
[31:25] It does not, and cano, encourage one in sin. The abuse of it may, yes. But not grace, as it is said before us in the word of God.
[31:40] No. You cannot serve to master it, if you profess to serve God. See, the obligation you are under, to be serving him always.
[31:55] Not to be found in the service of the enemy. For while your position as a servant cannot change, your exercise may change great.
[32:06] And in that sense, your exercise may be the service of the devil. In your person, you are a servant of God and can never be anything else.
[32:19] But yet, you may do the work of the devil. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
[32:34] No servant can serve true master. He will love one and despise the other. Yes. So consider that. Consider that.
[32:45] And that my friend is included in the service. To love the master. Look at Peter.
[32:56] He denied his master three times. Denied him with oath and curse. Yes. But he still loved. He still loved. And the proof of that love was.
[33:07] And when the Lord looked upon him. He went up and wept bitterly. He loved him.
[33:19] And the proof of that love was. That when the Lord looked upon him. He went up and wept bitterly.
[33:30] He loved him. He loved him. He loved him. He served him therefore. And his service was a service of love. And this must be the case with all who serve.
[33:45] They must love him. But this is the first thing he asks of them. Thou shalt love the Lord.
[33:57] Thou shalt love the Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord.
[34:07] It is possible to change one's service. To change the s- To um... Leave the service of mammon. And enter the service of Christ.
[34:19] Or of God. Not of course by any power from the human will. certainly cannot do it by that. But it is possible that this should take place.
[34:33] And it is possible because the grace of God includes this in it. It calls from darkness to light. From the kingdom of sin to God to serve Him.
[34:50] But at the same time, each one is responsible for the master whom he serves. He is responsible for his choice of master.
[35:03] And is held responsible by God. And furthermore, the word comes out from God always.
[35:15] To see this day whom he will serve. This day and every day.
[35:30] To see this day whom he will serve. It is a daily thing.
[35:42] As to vote exercise. As for me and my purpose.
[35:53] We will serve the Lord. So said God. Choose ye this day whom he will serve. He cannot serve two masters.
[36:09] Choose ye whom he will serve. As for me and my purpose. We will serve the Lord.
[36:21] And that was the utterance of a man who was on the brink of the grave. On the threshold of heaven. He knew what he was saying.
[36:37] He wasn't talking about something he didn't know. He had tried the servants. He found good servants.
[36:48] He walked in this way. He found it a safe way. And at the end of his life he leaves this testimony.
[37:01] He said. He said. He said. He said. As if he had said. I am not doing anything new. My life is almost at an end.
[37:13] But I do know what I have done. Long ago. I do the same thing. Choose.
[37:25] I choose to serve the Lord. He wasn't sorry for his choice. Many people are. They find out what it is too late.
[37:39] That it was a wrong choice. That they served a hard master. That they were serving a master who was given poor wages.
[37:50] For the wages of sin is death. But this one says Joshua. This master whom I served.
[38:02] I don't want to serve any of it. I am quite pleased with himself. Pleased with his servants. Therefore. For whatever others may do. As for me and my house.
[38:16] We will serve the Lord. For the blessed testimony. Testimony through grace. And it is the testimony of ever renewed heart.
[38:30] Even in the midst of many failings. In the midst of many corruptions. It is the testimony. The same testimony. As for me and my house. We will serve the Lord.
[38:42] As the servant in Israel said. When he did not want his freedom. At the end of the specified number of years. I love my master. I love his herbs. Therefore.
[38:53] I wish to continue with him. And to serve him. Yes. I love my master. I love his herbs. He cannot serve the true master.
[39:06] Hence. Choose ye this day. Whom he will serve. Whether Jehovah are the gods.
[39:16] That were on the other side of the club. But as for me and my house. We will serve the Lord. That was his privilege. That was his duty.
[39:28] And that was his blessing. As we face the future. It would be an inestimable benefit.
[39:38] If we had this spirit. The spirit of serve. With the Lord. And then nothing could harm. Nothing could harm.
[39:49] Who can harm. Do ye yourselves. Be followers of that which is good.