God’s Only
Provided Place of Worship # 47
Brian Kocourek
May 10, 1995
Testing the Lamb
Sunday we
spoke on the subject of The test, and how our being
tested by God was actually a sign of His approval.
Psalm 26:
2
Psalm 139:
23 Prayer
Wednesday night we spoke from PP's 154 - 162 & 168
where brother Branham said, " The
Lamb was tested"....
"He was tested to see where He was
standing, see, tested in every manner, tested like we are tested. But there was
no giving in to him at all. No, sir! That was the Son of God. James 1: 2 - 4 Joy?
We showed how God has through every age tested man. He
tested and examined His own Son to see how He would handle the Word test and we
know that every son that cometh to God must first be tried and tested. But we also found that the test is to prove
us. Not to disapprove, but to approve. To show us off.
Not that we have anything within our own selves that merits anything, but the
fact is that We are a chip off the old block so to speak and God just loves to
show off His Kids. 1 Peter 4: 12 - 13 Rejoice
That's exactly what He did in Job's day. He put Job
through the test because He knew what Job would do. You don't test your kids
for Algebra if they haven't
even learned their ABC's yet. You teach them their ABC's and then
you progress onto higher things. And so when you are tested you should know
this one thing. God has found favor in you, or you have found favor in His eyes
and He is just bragging on His kids.
I.PETER.1: 3
- 7 Read ( especially verse 7)
That the trial of your faith, being much more
precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be
tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the
appearing of Jesus Christ:
Wuest : In which last season you are to be constantly
rejoicing with a joy that expresses itself in a triumphant exuberance, although
for a little while at the present time if perchance there is a need of it, you
have been made sorrowful in the midst of many different kinds of testings in order that the approval of your faith, which
faith was examined for the purpose of being approved, that the approval being
much more precious than the approval of gold which perishes, eve though the
gold be tried with fire-testing, may be discovered after scrutiny to result in
praise, honor and Glory at the time of the Revelation of Jesus Christ; So
we see then that God only tests us or puts us to the test with the Purpose in
mind of Approval.
I.CORINTHIANS.10:13
There hath no
temptation taken you but such as is common to man: ( In other words, there are certain kinds of trials and
temptations we receive just because of our human nature, but the key is the
next thing he says here... but God [is] faithful, who will
not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way
to escape, that ye may be able to bear
[it].
This word tempted here is a Greek word, PEIRAZO which means
to : To try, or to make a trial or test for
the purpose of ascertaining the persons
quality, or what he thinks or how he
reacts during the trial.
So we see here, that God purposely has a means or method whereby He
assures Himself of the progress He is making in our behalf. To put it in better
words, God has
everything under control. He uses tests to give Himself feedback and to give us
feedback as to our Spiritual growth. Just like we do with our
Kids. We hold up a tape measure to see how tall our kids get, and we
have them hop skip and jump to measure their physical growth. We teach them subjects and we
test them in those subjects to see how well they are coming along. Well, God is our Father and why should we be
surprised when we ourselves are being put to the test. 1 Peter tells us we should
consider it great joy when we are being examined because we know that we can
not fail the test, and besides, the test is given because our Teacher and
Tutor, the Holy Spirit of God believes we are ready to move up a little higher.
Just like your final school exams each year.
We looked at
Job and we saw How God was bragging on His servant job just like a proud father
bragging on His Son.
Job 1: 1 => 12 Notice how God is bragging on His Kid Job. He says to satan, Have you considered my servant Job... Have you
considered Him... Now the word consider means this,
Have you made a careful mental note to yourself, Have you taken notice of so
that you might understand him better? And of course satan doesn't give in to God's bragging about His kid
Job, so he says, "Aw, yeah, but He
doesn't serve you for nothing. You give to Him and you protect him and watch
over him and you've even put a protective hedge all around him, so who wouldn't
reverently fear you with that kind of payback." Then we see that Job is subjected to many
trials all at once that
satan does, but that God allows . And again we see God bragging on His Kid Job
in chapter 2.
Job 2: 1
=> 10 So now the
trials become even more personal but yet Job continues to fear God. Satan even
uses his wife to throw criticism's his way but he even hold his head above
that. And so we see Jobs friends come along and they also throw criticism's his
way. Have you ever been through a trial when you felt that everything that
could go wrong was going wrong, and then to put salt on your wounds, your
husband or your wife criticizes you too. And then on top of that your friends
join in the criticism. That's when you feel like you are all alone in this
world with no one who understands you. But rest assured. God understands you
and the very purpose of these kind of trials is to let you know that He does
understand and He is just using the test or trial to tell you to come on up
higher.
Let's look at another of His Son's. His
only begotten Son, Jesus. Hebrews
5: 8 - 9 Chastisement = to train
Educate, instruct
Ephesians 6: 4 Nurture
= Discipline
Hebrews 12:
1 - 6 (read) God sent forth His own Son into this
world and tried Him and tested Him. But notice the Trials did not come when He
was in His younger years. You hear nothing about Him from age twelve to thirty.
But When He learned obedience it came though suffering. We do not hear of a
Suffering Jesus from ages twelve to thirty. But as He learned and Grew in Grace God
tested Him just as He tests you and I.
We find Jesus receiving the Holy Ghost in the water when John was baptizing
Him. The heavens opened up and the Holy Spirit of God came down like a dove and
entered into Jesus. Then He went forth in a mighty ministry showing the people
just Who it was that had come down to earth and was in
this man. But if you will notice, when God was through with
this ministry. When His Message had been rejected, and the Messenger
seemed to be defeated, That's when God stepped in to
finish the exam for Him.
In the Garden, God left Jesus there to suffer alone.
He asked His only close friends to come with Him to pray knowing full well what
fate awaited Him the next day, and yet His Friends could not even comfort Him,
they could not stay awake with Him. They kept drifting off to sleep. So He
knelt there alone as any man could be.
Matthew 26:
36 => 50 ( read)
Surrounded by friends and yet so alone.
Facing His testing alone. And you know what. The
trials came hard and furious for a couple days and then when it seemed like it
was all over, God said, My Son, you have passed your test, come up higher, and
He raised Him from the grave and this morning He sits in heavenly places
"ever living to make intercession for our confession."
And he says to you " Come Up higher, You've passed your
examine. You've passed your test" Let's Pray
169 GOD'S.PROVIDED.PLACE.WORSHIP - SHP.LA - V-7 N-4 - 65-1128.1M
And the lamb was tested, and was kept up for
fourteen days. That was two Sabbaths, or two ages. Once for the Jews, which
they offered the lamb in type; once for the Gentile, who has a real Lamb, and
all of them was made perfect by believing this Lamb would come. But He was
tempted fourteen... or examined fourteen days, He was the Word.
170 GOD'S.PROVIDED.PLACE.WORSHIP
- SHP.LA - V-7 N-4 - 65-1128.1M
And you can examine the Old Testament, say "It condemns the New." You're
wrong! The Old Testament only bears
record of the New.
171 GOD'S.PROVIDED.PLACE.WORSHIP
- SHP.LA - V-7 N-4 - 65-1128.1M
A man was going to challenge me not long ago,
said, "What's the matter with him?" Said, "Well, he even teaches
out of the Old Testament." A Christian preacher, think
of that. Said, "The Old Testament's dead and gone." Oh, no!
Oh, no! It's only a schoolmaster,
it shows what's wrote on the wall. See? That's right.
Now let's just stop here this evening and examine this
little thought here, because I believe many people still today get hung up on
whether it was in the new testament or in the old
only. Here we find brother Branham
telling us the Old testament is very important to us
because as he said, It bears record of the New testament. It's only a schoolmaster,
it shows what's wrote on the wall. See? That's right.
Galatians 4:
1 - 7
John
2
Corinthians 3: 1 - 18 Show the importance of the old pointing to the new.
Hebrews 6:
16 => 11: & onto Faith 8:5 Moses made the tabernacle after what He saw in
Heaven. 10: 1 The old testament was only a shadow
not the very covenant itself.