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[Silence] [Music] [Silence] Maybourn heads.

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[Silence] Bless us, O Lord. Speak now to our hearts. [Silence]

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Grant that we may hear what you have to say And that we may be not only hearers of the word but doers also Amen In the book of the Prophet Jeremiah the 31st chapter verses 27 and 28

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Are these words? "Behold, the days are coming," says the Lord, "when I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. And it shall come to pass that as I have watched over them to pluck up and break down, to overthrow

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destroy and bring evil so will I watch over them to build and to plant says the Lord the subject of the message building a new people building a new people Israel and Judah as nations are torn down. They are destroyed.

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Israel, the northern kingdom, falls in 722 B.C. About 100 years later, 597 and 587 BC, Judah falls. Israel is conquered by the Assyrians, and Judah is conquered by the Babylonians. It's rather strange when we consider the history of the people of God, the ancient

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Hebrews. Once they were together, God brought them out of Egypt as wandering tribes and molded into a nation. They were united as a family. The united monarchy was established and in the course of time the kingdom was divided. They became

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rivals. The division of the kingdom is an expression of the nation being divided against itself. Israel constitutes the northern kingdom with ten tribes and Judah the southern kingdom with two tribes. This is what happens. This is the romance of the history of the people of God from captivity in Egypt to freedom

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in Canaan to rebellion and division then captivity and exile then deliverance restoration and reunion. The plight of the ancient Hebrews is symbolic of the plight of all peoples. The experience of the exile contains the great themes in the story of redemption, sin and

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death and life, destruction and rebuilding, punishment and forgiveness, ruin and restoration, despair and hope. God does not give up on his people. He continues to work to redeem. He does not leave us to die in a far country. He comes to save us.

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He comes seeking to save that which is lost. This is the meaning of the Advent season. It's a time of preparation for the celebration of the coming of the Lord. do wrong, they must be punished. Israel and Judah are carried into captivity, but

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their troubles do not last always. The holy light of freedom pierces the dense darkness of bondage. The night of despair ends and hope dawns. The Prophet Jeremiah announces the dawn of the new age. Behold days are coming says the Lord when I will sow the house of Israel in

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the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. The two houses long divided by rivalry. Houses that have long suffered the pain of alienation. Houses that are victimized by apostasy and hypocrisy. Houses that are separated by strife, behold days are coming when a new age dawns. But God is doing something new. God is going to invade history. He is going to invade

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the lives of his people in a special way. There are times when nations and individuals shut the door and decide that they're going to do business without God. Times when people decide that they do not need any help from God. This was true of Israel and Judah.

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Then came the time of captivity, their time of punishment and destruction. There are times when some things must be destroyed in order for other things to be established.

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Some things are shaken in order for us to recognize and appreciate those things that cannot be shaken. Sometimes we do not fully appreciate freedom until we are in captivity.

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The comforting thing is that the same prophet who proclaims bad news to the people is also the bearer of good news. The same prophet who proclaims gloom and doom also announces hope and salvation. Behold, days are coming. Look, a new age is dawning. There is ruin, there is sin and destruction, the nation has suffered captivity, but in the process repentance

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has occurred. The great prophecies of the Hebrew people occurred during the exile, during the darkest period we see the brightest light. In the time of deepest despair, the people expressed the fervent faith of the nation in God. But here is a word that announces the coming of a new age, a new time, a new era, a new history. And

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This remains the hope of humankind, a new age. We in our nation always look forward to that which is new, that which promises better. And we look forward to every election.

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We have promises and we hear it from one party and then we hear it from another party. each one is somehow promising that they will be instrumental in ushering in the new age. God often permits people to be reduced to a new level, and in the process something

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happens to them. And we always find a great deal of tension between the new and the old. We become accustomed to that which is old and it's familiar to us and we like it just as it is.

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And we are somewhat disturbed when something new invades our history. I can remember some time ago I had my office arranged in a certain way and the desk was against a wall and it sort of had my back to the door and I had become accustomed to it and I came home one evening and I found that my desk had been turned around and I

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just couldn't get it ready for that. And I understand something of human nature, that we find it difficult to get accustomed many times to something that is new. We often find ourselves becoming enslaved or in bondage to tradition, whatever that

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may be. I remember in the Sunday school, which I grew up as a lad, that the pastor came in and organized the Sunday school and had it according to certain grade levels.

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And we didn't have it like that. And some of the sisters never got over that because they had their Sunday school class broken up. They didn't understand that this was something new

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that was designed to make the educational process more effective in the life of those children and those families and in the church, they were just thinking about my Sunday school class

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has been broken up. And some of those dear sisters went to their graves holding that against the pastor. Sometimes we can't get ready for something new.

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And I think we are somewhat going through that here at Ebenezer. We have had the gospel choir, and we have had the Ebenezer choir, and we have had the chancel choir.

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And there are certain of those that have said, this is my choir, and they have torn up my choir. And it's no more. And somehow, we have lost sight of the fact

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that we said that we dedicate ourselves to God and we are singing in the Lord's choir and we want to have the best choir to do the best job that we can for the Lord. We've lost sight of that. Many people have.

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But that's what happens. It's somewhat like that absent-minded professor who went with one of his comrades to catch the train and the train came and they were talking as the train came and one of the men rushed and got on the train and the train pulled away and the man

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who was standing there he said yes but I was the one who came to catch the train and so often we pray for certain things to happen we pray for progress to be made and when progress comes we begin to say well it it wasn't like that this is not to what I have been accustomed to. The new age creates certain tensions and

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people had prayed and had hoped and they had the law and the prophets and the wise men and all of those had somehow pointed to the coming of the new age but when the new age came there were many who were not ready for the new age. Behold days are coming and who brings the days it is certainly not man's

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action this is God's action it is God's action in our history God ushers in a new day he is acting in our history every one of us got up this morning for the first time God somehow showed us a day that we had never seen before Behold, days are coming.

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The house of Israel and the house of Judah will be united. They will be a new people, a new family. They will have a new population of people and cattle. God is sowing new seed.

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God is building up a new people. God is bringing into being a new humanity. And so often something happens to us. Something goes wrong, just as it went wrong

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in the life of Israel and Judah. And God has to do something radical. God permitted them to be taken into Babylonian captivity. But even though they suffer, even though they

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carried into captivity. Here is a note of hope. Behold days are coming saith the Lord when I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast and it shall come to pass that as I have watched over them to pluck up and to break down to overthrow destroy and bring evil so I

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Will watch over them to build and to plant saith the Lord So you see what God says to Jeremiah even when he calls him is that I'm going to tear down and I'm going to build up That you see he is destroying and yet he's building up He's plucking up and then he's planting and God is still doing that today

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So you see when you really, when we really understand the meaning of history, God is involved in our history sometimes when things are going against us, when they are adverse. We don't like to think about God being involved in that, but he's involved. You know it was a rather radical thing even in that period for the people to think about

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God sending a foe from the north. thought of themselves as being God's chosen people. They thought that you know if I love God, if I pray, if I attend services, if I give my time that God's gonna really take care of me. He's gonna put more money in my pocket and I'm

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gonna have easy sailing. But Jeremiah said no you're going to have a fall from the north because somehow you are not living up to God's commands even though you have the temple and you have the ark and you have all of those things that are symbols of a form of righteousness that God is concerned about a new people.

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And the comforting thing here is that he does bring it to pass. Days are coming. What does it mean to be a new people? Well if we would be a new people, if God would make of us a new people in our own time, we

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must have a new sense of self-awareness. Some people don't really know who they are. And we can so easily forget who we are. It's not very difficult for one to get beside himself

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or herself and to forget who you are. I was going out you know to a social affair something like that as a teenager and I was about to go out my mother and father would be there in the room and she'd come in here Marvin before you go out and I would go in sometimes they

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would they would be there on the bed resting or something and say and she'd say to me now remember who you are. She didn't have to say any more just remember who you are and I understood what it means to get off somewhere and to forget who you are, to forget what you've been taught, to forget what you have been ordered to do

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and the way you are to conduct yourself. Remember who you are. Well, that's what God is somehow saying that if you would be a new people, you must have a new sense of self-awareness.

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You know, we somehow forget who we are. We sort of lose our identity trying to be someone that God never meant us to be. And you know, when we get in prosperity, in the new era, the Civil Rights Bill has been passed and we can go different places and we've got some positions that we haven't had

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and doors open that have been shut, and some of us have forgotten who we are. Some of us don't really have much time for the church. And when you mention prayer meeting, they laugh.

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They don't really have much time. In other words, Reverend, you ought to be very, very grateful if I decide to come in and spend an hour and a half. You know, I'm so busy.

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And when some people really feel that they compliment God and they can't spend an hour and a half, they come late for that. We've forgotten. We have forgotten how we got where we are.

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And that's not only true of us as a people. That's not only true of us as individuals. somehow true of us as a nation. It's not an accident. God has strange ways. It's not an accident. Many of the people that we help, they become our enemies. God has a strange way of waking us up.

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And it's rather easy when we have a little problem how we can rush in and we want the preacher to pray and we think that God is like some errand boy and we can just call him up and say, I want you to do this, but God is concerned about a new people and a new people somehow that are rightly related to him.

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The house of Israel and the house of Judah are to be united. In other words, overcome fragmentation. Good thing to talk about loyalty to Christ. We've been talking about that all this week.

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it ought to be expressed in our loyalty to one another. That's right. In how we treat one another, in how we relate to one another, that is the loyalty to Christ. It matters not how much we sing loyalty to Christ, on to victory, on to victory. how does it relate when it comes to how I deal with you and you with me. A new

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people, God's holy family, that's what he calls us to be. A new people set apart with a special mission in the world and in the midst of Israel's suffering she was scattered among the nations and then she was gathered and in the scattering and gathering there emerges a new Israel, a new people with a new understanding of

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themselves and their mission in the world. And that comes through suffering. There's something redemptive about suffering, something redemptive about it. The new people have a new sense of commitment, a new sense of commitment, a new people, new sense of commitment, new sense of dedication.

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In other words, "Lord, I'm giving myself to you. I'm committing myself to you." Now some people are all mixed up about that. Their loyalty is to the preacher.

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And they say, "Now you know when Reverend so-and-so "was in the church, I did this and I did that, "but I don't relate to Reverend so-and-so "like I relate to Reverend so-and-so."

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Their loyalty is to the preacher. It's not to Christ. It's to the preacher. And some have loyalty to the circle president now.

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Now when so so and so is my friend and since she's leading I'm gonna be there But when she's no longer the leader, I will be there That's loyalty to a person And some have said, you know reverend say now you expecting us to sing every Sunday that's too much

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The thing doing it two Sundays and then rest two and come stay in the bed the other two but to do it every Sunday God wants our loyalty Not not just once in a while

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There's some people who go to church go when they work on the job. They're gonna be there every Every day if you keep it If you keep it, you're gonna be there every day And if you're not there every day and you start missing long stretches then

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they will replace us. Isn't that right? And look God doesn't give us his love sometime. He doesn't give us his grace sometime. He's not a sometime God. He's God all the time and his love is all of the time. It's always reaching out even when we don't know it. God loved us. His love. Before we loved him, he was loving us. So

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a new people have a new sense of commitment. A sense of commitment to God. You know, we'll have a new church when we have this new commitment. We'll have a new church. We'll have a new You know we have, we make some new changes and we have deacons doing different things and they put them on, sometimes they put them, they don't know when they're going to be here

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and when they're not, some of them. But when we have a new sense of commitment, that's right, I know you all are going to get cold on this, but this is what we need to hear. You know, we think many times that we can treat the church any way we want to treat

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it, and the Lord has to take it. That's not the way it is. Half of the membership of this church doesn't contribute each month. Half.

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That's pretty serious, isn't it? Half. And it didn't get like that yesterday. It's been like that all the years.

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Half. means that half don't do anything every month. But if we ever have a new church, if there ever is the dawning of the new age, if there ever is a new humanity, there has to be a new sense of awareness as to who we are. We are the people of God, and we love God, and

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we're going to serve God no matter what happens, no matter what the preacher says, no matter matter what the deacon says, that I'm going to serve the Lord. That's a new sense of commitment. And when we do that, you'll be a new you. And I'll be a new me. It's a new sense of commitment. New sense of commitment. And you see, this new people have a new sense of self-fulfillment.

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A sense of certainty that what God promises, He will bring it to pass. God said, "You know, I'm watching over you. I know you're going over there and you're going to be in Babylon for 70 years, but I am watching over you.

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You are my people, and even though I must chastise you with many stripes, I'm still watching over you. I love you. You are my people."

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watches over us. He's the watchman on the wall of human history. He's at work. He builds a new people. He plucks up and he plants. He overthrows. He destroys. He watches over his people. Well, we can't have this new age, the new humanity, without this new self-awareness and this new fulfillment without

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having a new spirit. Now we can dress up on the outside and we can look beautiful on the outside but God is concerned about how we look on the inside. How we look on the inside. A new spirit, new spirit, new spirit. Never can have a new you a new age, new people without a new spirit. And God says, "Behold, days are coming when

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I will sow the seed of man in Judah and in Israel." In other words, I will do it, a new spirit. In other words, revival, renewal, being a new people, new spirit, a new spirit new spirit. My grandmother every year about this time would say now you need a purgative. Now you all know what that meant. Some black draught or some castor oil or something

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to clean you out. And one family, one grandmother expressed it to her child, said that, "Now when I give you this black drop, you're going to have a catharsis." And you look up that word catharsis, it means that you will have a cleansing.

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And a catharsis is an emotional cleansing. A whole lot of things we got in us, in our minds and in our hearts, that keep us from being what we ought to be. We need a cleansing, we need a purgative.

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We need to get a whole lot of this stuff eliminated from our systems in order for us to be new, in order for us to be strong, in order for us to have the cleansing, renewing power of God! We have to have this catharsis, a new spirit. [ Silence ]