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0:55It's really a good English lesson, if nothing else. But it is a very rich journey through biblical theology. It's the journey of a soul that comes first under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and goes all the way to the celestial city. So it goes from the journey begins with the conviction of soul and follows that soul all the way into the entrance into heaven. It's rich in theology, rich in truth, rich in Bible, and he has a very keen And sharp understanding of biblical theology and able to articulate it in an allegorical fashion and relate biblical truths to it. It is a masterpiece. We started several years ago just experimenting and trying to walk through this journey. It's something that we need to know. I mean, I don't think it's go through the church, a Bible-believing church, without really being exposed to pilgrims' journey. And so, but it's something, if you notice, we got the word community behind us. You know, we have three major values that we like to express around here: truth, the biblical truth, biblical community, and biblical mission. The story is so rich with Pilgrim's Progress that we realize that one year we'll spend more time on the truth, dealing with the theology that underpins it. This year, we spent more time on the community aspect. That's why we developed many of the characters, many rich characters. You saw formalist and hypocrisy, and another one, talkative and ignorance. You know, many of our kids grow up in the church, and they're in the way of this Christian journey, and yet they really haven't come through the cross. And so, specifically, I have a burden for those kids in our church that grow up. Maybe in the shadow of the church, going to church all the time, but they're there because their parents are there, or they're there for other reasons. They're not there because they have entered into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. And so I wanted us this year to focus on that aspect and point out some of these characters of formalists looking like you're a Christian on the outside, but in being in a very dangerous situation, and the pretenders, the ignorance wouldn't hear, who met his destruction, and all of these who people, real people, and real disposition. You met obstinate and exhorted the kids to not be obstinate. Get rid of the obstinates in your own heart. Pliable, somebody who goes along while it's easy, and just so many characters, so much rich truth. And so this year, the emphasis was beware of the community, or be mindful of the community that you're in. And so we had four major themes for each day. First day, well, the whole thing was about walking in biblical community. First day was flee the community of death. Second was grow in the community of the church. Third, beware of the community of bad company. And fourth, home in the community. Of God. I'll just talk briefly about each one of these. This isn't going to be lengthy, but it'd be enough to give you an idea of where we're coming from and what we emphasized and how relevant these truths are for us today. Flee the community of death.

4:48Proverbs 28, 13, whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. In this world, there are two communities. When you boil it down, the Bible boils it down to do. There's a community of death, there is a community of life. There is a community that is very much at peace with being separated from God and growing in that separation, growing in the ability to articulate that separation and completely formalist, hypocrisy, worldly wise men, ignorance, talkative, and on down the line. They were people who are from the community of death. They live in the community of death, and they are content to be there. And the Bible is very clear about transgression, and there's an urgency in the Bible that I think we've lost. Flee. Flee the community of death. If you are in this world of death, if you are separated from God, if you are walking in sin, walking in the way that you know is wrong, the Bible has one word for you: flee. Leave. Flee. Just like. Joseph, before Potiphar's wife, flee. Just like Paul telling Timothy, flee youthful lust before it grabs a hold. Flee it. And we've lost that urgency in much of our modern message. We've kind of grown comfortable in many ways, even in the way we articulate the gospel. No, there is a soul in danger that is content in the community of death and growing in the community of death. And the Bible says, flee. Flee. So we, and listen, the word is very clear.

6:36If you conceal your transgressions, you're not going to prosper. But if you confess and forsake, you will obtain mercy. So the message to Christian, come out, flee the city of destruction, flee that community of death, flee that world that is to be destroyed. Do not grow in that contentment of being separated from God. And so the burden, the burden, this conviction of sin can be a good thing if it leads you through the right path. The awareness of your sin can be a very good thing. That's what started this journey and brought Christian out of the city of destruction. He obtained mercy. He obtained mercy. How does one flee the community of death? They flee by turning away, by recognizing their sin, turning away from that sin, coming to the cross. Letting that burden, there's ways to deal with the burden and guilt of sin.

7:36You can ignore it. You can basically sear your conscience. You can defile your conscience. You can stop listening and learn, just like one character named ignorance. And you can stop listening to the Spirit of God who is convicting you and making you aware of sin. That is death and a growing in death. But you flee. You leave by turning away from that sin and pursuing God's remedy. God has a remedy for sin, and that is the righteousness of Christ. And it is through Christ and through Him alone, through recognizing sin, by coming to Him and seeing in Him what He has done at the cross. God has made a way for His righteousness to be imputed to His people. And it's by taking in the beauty and the glory of Christ upon the cross and taking that in. And so that's how one flees the community of death. Second message is to grow in the community of the church. Ephesians 4:15 says, Speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, into Christ. That is now having been called out of the community of death, placed in the community. Of life, given life. We are placed in the church to grow up. This is what we call in theological terms sanctification. Having come and been justified by Christ's righteousness at the cross, then we're to grow. We're to grow up and to grow up in every way into Him who is ahead. And God has given us the church. He has left His people here. This is a community. What we're doing up here tonight is gathering around the truths that are central to our faith, the words of our faith, to understand them, to talk about them, to celebrate them, and to grow in Christ's likeness. There's so many. There's a beautiful picture in the story of the church. There are a place called the House Beautiful. This is where a Christian comes after coming to Christ, after going through the hill of difficulty, after meeting formalist hypocrisy. He comes to the house beautiful. And the house beautiful is the church. It's the depiction of the church. And there's four virtuous women of the church. Well, there's the pastor that brings them in and watchful, but then there are four ladies, four sweet spirits. There is discretion, the one who is able to distinguish between what is good and evil. And then there is that piety. She is that personality or that virtuous spirit that is devoted to God. And devoted to his word. And so then there's the third one. Remember the third one? Prudence, right? Thank you. So you had discretion, be able to distinguish between right and wrong. Piety, the one who's devoted to the things of God, and then you've got prudence, the one who wants to put distance between herself and sin, the one who is wise in regards to sin. And then, what was the last one? Remember?

11:02Charity, yes. And charity is about love for people. So you see, in that setting, you have this very vivid picture of the spirits of the church, the ability to grow in distinguishing between good and evil, grow in piety, the devotion to God, grow in prudence, the distance and wise living with regards to sin, and charity with response to loving one another and being devoted to God's or their eternal welfare. And it's there that he is equipped. He puts on the armor of God, that he's going to go out into the world, and his faith is going to be tried. It's going to be hit hard. And you saw that in the valley of humiliation, where a Christian was nearly destroyed. His faith, it's a place of humbling. It's a place that brings you down low, but it's a place where Christian learns to completely depend upon God. And we all have these valleys of humiliation. I'll tell you, there's going to be things that try your faith. And if you live long, you know what I'm talking about. And so, but it's here. You flee the community of death, you grow in the community of the church. And you've heard me say this, and I'll say it again: God has no will for you outside of a local body of believers.

12:20If you are in Christ, He has placed you in the church, and it is there where you are going to be sanctified and grow up. It's there where we learn to live in community in Christ. It's there where we learn to love one another. It's the practical ways that you can't exercise your gifts in isolation. God never called us to be islands. He is a king of a community, of a kingdom, of people. And He puts us together that we would live together in community, that we would serve together, that we learn to forgive one another. You know, there's nothing more God-like than forgiveness. And He puts us in community with all of our shortcomings, with all of our collisions, and all of our warts, and all of that stuff. And He is sanctifying us through the ministry that we have for one another. And there are people in the body that you need for your walk, and there is people in the body who need you for their walk.

13:21We're not a bunch of islands. And so flee the community of death. Grow in the community of the church. Third day, beware of the community of bad company. Proverbs 13:20 says, Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm. And so, Christian, along his journey, he meets many people who are in this community of death, and they are bad company. We met money love. This person loved money. Atheist. Boy, you'll meet a lot of atheists. Sometimes there's going to be professors, sometimes there are going to be friends. These are going to be influences when you travel down life's highway that you're just going to run into, and this is going to be a part of life. And they need to hear you, stand for truth. They need to hear your message. And it was through the testimony of faithful that one who lived in Vanity Fair, the most sensuous, sinful place in Bunyan's book. It's where all the empty and vain pursuits of life are bought and sold. And it was there at Vanity Fair that Faithful, as he is standing for the truth, and Christian is standing for the truth, that one young man who is totally into the whole world of Vanity Fair, a sinner among sinners, hears the words of faith, and his heart is changed, and he becomes hopeful. And he becomes the one who has the greater faith, even at the very end of the book, when they're crossing the sea of death. Death, Christian is sinking, and it is hopeful. This sinner, this foul sinner from Vanity Fair, is the one at the end of the day who going through death was the shallowest for him because he had truly gripped the eternal truths of the gospel and understood forgiveness and was able to encourage even the strongest of Christians. And so it is through all this to beware of the community of bad company. Yes, the bad company needs our witness, but you're never to enter into a union with them. They're never to be your bosom friends. If you're watching Anna Green Gables, which I think somebody was watching it in my house today. Anyway, the whole idea, you know, you're going to associate, but not to become that intimate, bosom friendship with the world. Beware of that company because you will suffer harm. But whoever walks with the wise becomes wise.

16:06There is the fourth day. Spoke about home in the community of God. And this is Ephesians 2:19. You are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. That's who we are. Our time on this earth is brief. We're passing through. And our home is not this world. Our home is in that kingdom to come. Where all of this is just passing, and we are to encourage one another. We are to walk with one another. But we serve a king of an eternal kingdom, an enduring place. And as Gehazy learned, this is not the time for us to amass wealth and acquire lands and all that stuff. No, these are our pilgrim days. Our eternal home is someplace else. And the rewards that we can enjoy forever are someplace else. And so we are not strangers.

17:20We are citizens of another kingdom, of another king. And he has us here for a while. And while we're here, we are to serve, to love, and to make the most of our time and walk in those works that he has ordained for us to walk in. Not because we're anything, but the works themselves are ordained by him. So they're perfect works, even if we are somewhat slow and somewhat fallible even in the execution of them. There's nothing wrong with the works. They are what we are to do with our lives. And so That was our message. An urgency, a fleeing, an aggressive growth, devotion to the process of sanctification through the local church, the mindfulness and awareness that there are many evil influences that we will encounter on a daily basis, and ultimately that our home is not here in this world, it is another place. And so, all of these truths came well came to mind all this week, and so those were what we did. And I think, even as I'm talking, I think you can get a sense of the biblical message and where you are.

18:47The book ends on a very horrifying note. One called ignorance, one who put his fingers in his ears, so to speak, throughout the book, and wouldn't listen, wouldn't listen, said basically in his heart, I'm good. I'm good in my heart. And I know I'm good because my heart tells me I'm good. And my heart is good because it tells me it's good. And I can trust it because I'm a good person. And this whole circular reasoning is our world today. I'm good. I'm fine. I'm good. How do you know you're good? Because my heart tells me I'm good. And how do you know your heart is good? Well, because I'm a good person. And how do you know you're a good person? My heart tells me so. And back and forth. And yet, this is the one who, at the end of the day, at the end of the story, finds that there is a doorway to hell right at the gate of heaven itself. And that's how he ends the book: with that one last reminder and question: Are you in the right path? Do you belong? Have you come through the gate? Have you come through the one, to the cross? Have you truly come to him? Are you in his way? Or are you like formalists, like hypocrisy, or like talkative, who likes to talk about the journey? And or are you like ignorance along and all this?

20:14And so that's that's what we want to impress in the impress this week: is asking ourselves, Are we in the way? Are we following our King with all of our hearts? And so appreciate all the help. And next year, we may pick up the theme on mission. I'm not sure exactly what we'll do, but we'll be able to develop other aspects of the story. And so, anyway, well, I'm going to close this in a prayer. And by the way, if anybody wants to, we've got a tailgate out there, got a tailgate trailer that was given to the church. So, if anybody has an A mind to help with the tailgate ministry. Maybe this summer evenings we can, after the service, have a time of fellowship out there. But it's a complete tailgate trailer. Come check it out. But we do have some mint lemonade in it, and I hope you can have a cup before you leave tonight. But anyway, I want to pray and then we'll dismiss. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your goodness and for all your mercy. Thank you for just the way your truth has continued down through the ages. Thank you for this body of believers. Thank you, Father, that you are very much still calling people out of the community of death, that you are actively transforming lives through the ministry of your Holy Spirit and the church. Father, we thank you for his work. And we thank you, Father, for the reality that you are our King and our home is with you. So help us, Father, as we sojourn together that we would serve one another and serve one another well for your glory in Christ's name. Amen.