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[no audio] [applause] Thank you so much, my dears. Thank you very much, President Chu. When you're president, you can always add a few years on to something, you know.

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We understand that. I'm so delighted this evening to have the cornerstone voices here to sing for us before I present them, I owe a personal word of gratitude to Pastor Booker and the St. Matthew Church. Pastor Booker and his wife are very good friends and when I asked them if they would come and sing on this night they

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were delighted to do so and I have been honored by their presence and my soul yes has been blessed by their coming. Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Forever and ever. Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Forever and ever.

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Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Forever and ever. Hallelujah, Hallelujah, And it shall reign forever and ever. ♪ Oh, America! ♪ [music]

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>> Oh, Lord how excellent, how excellent, how excellent. Oh, how I miss you, my dear. [MUSIC PLAYING] [INAUDIBLE]

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♪ Oh Lord ♪ ♪ How I've longed to see ♪ ♪ How I've longed to see ♪ ♪ How I've longed to see ♪

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♪ How I've longed to see ♪ ♪ See ♪ ♪ My dad ♪ ♪ Oh Lord ♪

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♪ How I've longed to see ♪ ♪ How I've longed to see ♪ ♪ How, how, how, how, how to love ♪ ♪ How, how, how, how, how to love ♪

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♪ Me ♪ ♪ Oh, Lord ♪ ♪ How excellent ♪ ♪ How excellent ♪

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♪ How ♪ ♪ Oh ♪ ♪ How to love ♪ ♪ Me ♪

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♪ I do ♪ [singing] [Music] [Music]

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[Music] ♪ I'm a man ♪ ♪ I'm a man ♪ ♪ I am ♪

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♪ You know ♪ [singing] (chanting) ♪ I'm going to be a good man ♪

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♪ I'm going to be a good man ♪ ♪ He's my name ♪ ♪ I'm going to be a good man ♪ [Music]

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[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

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[Music] [Music] [music] Could I be found complete?

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Can you teach me what it means? I am fed by the Christian blood of Jesus. Oh, I can you see I'm saved, I am saved, by the blood of Jesus.

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My, my, can't you see? I'm saved, I am saved, by the blood of Jesus. ♪ Oh, boy if I am ♪ ♪ He'll pick me up one day ♪

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♪ And I'm not alone ♪ ♪ I'll say ♪ ♪ Oh, mother ♪ ♪ I'm so close ♪

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♪ I'm really close ♪ ♪ Oh, yes I am ♪ ♪ One day she ♪ ♪ I gave up chains to save ♪

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♪ To save a wretch like me ♪ ♪ Guilty I was ♪ ♪ And I could find no hope within ♪ ♪ And I was drunk ♪

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♪ I was tired of ♪ ♪ Everyone take a look in the well of sin ♪ ♪ But right this way ♪ ♪ By the presence of Jesus ♪

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♪ One day Jesus ♪ ♪ So glad he came ♪ ♪ You say that they were ever like me ♪ ♪ Guilty I was ♪

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♪ And I couldn't find ♪ ♪ No hope in this ♪ ♪ I was a wrapper ♪ ♪ I was tied up ♪

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♪ He was tangled up ♪ ♪ In a well of sin ♪ ♪ The drapes are found ♪ ♪ By the crucifix ♪

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♪ Of Jesus ♪ ♪ Oh, ah, I'm saved, yeah, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ Oh, I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪

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♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I am tied up ♪

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♪ By the crucifix of Jesus ♪ ♪ Oh, I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, oh I'm saved ♪

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♪ It be all for I'm saved ♪ ♪ It be all for I'm saved ♪ ♪ Oh I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪

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♪ Saved, oh I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved, I'm saved, I'm saved ♪ ♪ Saved ♪ ♪ I am saved ♪

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♪ By the crucifix of Jesus ♪ ♪ Of Jesus ♪ ♪ Of Jesus ♪ ♪ Oh, I'm saved ♪

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♪ Saved ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, I'm saved ♪ ♪ Saved ♪ ♪ I'm saved ♪

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♪ I'm safe ♪ ♪ I'm safe ♪ ♪ Thank you, Lord ♪ ♪ I'm safe ♪

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♪ Safe ♪ ♪ Thank you, Lord ♪ ♪ I'm safe ♪ ♪ Oh, thank you, Lord ♪

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♪ I'm safe ♪ [Music] by the precious blood of Jesus. In his absence, Vice President Albert Chu, Wallace S. Hartsfield, and Stephen John Thurston,

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Other distinguished general officers of the National Baptist Convention of America, Inc., presidents of the Congress, H.T. Rimm and H. Walden Wilson, and the other esteemed Congress officers, the illustrious host pastor for this session, Dr. Marvin C. Griffin,

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distinguished guests who honor us tonight with their presence, particular deference, the Reverend Dr. E. Victor Hill, my beloved brother ministers, fellow proclaimers of the gospel of Jesus Christ, to all of you, my brothers and sisters in the Lord. Greetings in the strong name of our King, even Jesus, who has been given a name that is above every name.

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It pleases me again this year to first acknowledge the presence of my wife of 45 years. I'm going to ask her to stand so you'll know that this pretty lady belongs to me. That's our sister Elise Wilson. Two children the Lord gave us, firstborn Roberta Nicholson and Robert Wilson, Jr. stand up please.

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(applause) And our first born granddaughter, Danielle Nicholson. (applause) As the years take their toll of my energies,

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the unfailing support of my family becomes even more important. My church family, the Cornerstone Baptist Church of Christ of Dallas, as they have in so many times in the past, have again tonight exerted special effort

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to be present and to be supportive of their pastor. I do particularly appreciate presence of this choir and representatives of the ushers and all of the other members who are here present, and I thank them all for the gestures of kindness and presentations and and what I know is of the prayers and the concerns of the many who cannot be here tonight but who

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are praying for this hour. Last year at Shreveport on this night I told you that in spite of the experience of literally thousands of sermons preached over this 50-year plus span, Brother Albert, that I was then embarking upon a new experience, that I was about to try to do something I'd never done before, to deliver a presidential address.

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That was last year at Shreveport. Now tonight, I'm an old hand at that, Brother J.D. This is the second time around, so. But in all seriousness, I do continue

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to feel an unmistakable sense of history in the making, as this newest auxiliary of the National Baptist Convention of America, Incorporated, shows healthy growth from the beginning just 12 months ago.

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Last year, I urged National Baptists to come to Shreveport to see the baby born. Thousands of us came and witnessed that blessed event. This year, I have been urging our fellow Baptists

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to come to Austin to see the baby walk. what happened to the crawling stage? Some have asked me. You talked about being born,

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and now you're talking about walking. What happened to the crawling stage? And my reply to that has been, we don't have time to crawl.

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(audience laughing) Indeed, this Congress, as an auxiliary of our convention, is long overdue. And so we must be up and about the business of our king.

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Dr. Edward Jones, our convention president, and those of us who followed his leadership in organizing this Congress, proceeded on a clear principle that meets every standard of right and of reason. Indisputably, it is a principle that should require no defense among Baptists, here or

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elsewhere, for its grounding in the essential nature of both our theology and our polity defies attack. If we know what the Bible teaches, if we know where Baptists have stood traditionally, then it does not need to be defended. I suspect if we don't know those two things, it isn't worth trying to defend. If the principle of a church having its own church school is right,

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then what this convention has done to have its own Congress is right. And if what we have done to have our own Congress is wrong, then it's wrong for you to have a church school subject to your church. As stated in that first address, I reaffirm tonight the understanding that this Congress

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is not a convention designated a school of methods. We shall steadfastly resist any urging toward action contrary to our nature. As an auxiliary of the National Baptist Convention of America, Incorporated, we will continue subject to the convention and submissive to convention leadership.

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Now it's only fair for me to say that as a pastor and as a member of the convention, I or others may indeed hold opinions at one time or the other different to the opinions held by somebody else, but that has nothing to do with the essential nature of the relationship between this Congress and the Convention.

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I believe it's clear to us all that the Congress fulfilling its role is in the role of an auxiliary to the Convention. Now, however, I do risk the ire of some

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who seem threatened by the assertion that I continue to make, that though this is a Congress that is an auxiliary to the convention, in two very important respects,

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it is not like other auxiliaries of the convention. One of these is that every other auxiliary, by the constitutional provision of this convention, addresses itself to some specific group of the convention.

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The senior women address senior women. The brotherhood addresses brotherhood. Even the youth address the youth. But the Congress is the teaching arm of the convention,

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charged to teach the whole convention. In that regard, it is different. I think also that it is different in that it is not a fundraising auxiliary.

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The other auxiliaries feel a responsibility until we do come fully to the point that Dr. Hartsfield made tonight, and I pray for that day hurriedly, when by cap we'll do all of our supporting. But in the meantime, the other auxiliaries feel a commitment to help the convention raise the funds, to collect the funds, secure the funds that are needed to operate the convention's program. This is not true of the Congress, for the Congress itself is an objective of the convention. It is the teaching arm of the convention.

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Now the true record of history will recall that I did not seek the office of Congress president when it was decided that we would have our own Congress. In fact, I was asked to serve as president. But I do want to thank President Jones and I want to thank all of you of this convention

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for the honor of these two terms in this office. And I give all praise to God for whatever measure of success we have had in trying to get our Congress started. That's my only interest.

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That's my only concern, that we should get this convention's Congress started and on the way in such a fashion that all of us can be proud of it. Many people are owed much praise for their contribution. I dare not try to call names tonight, but I want them to know and I want you to know

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that from the very bottom of my heart, I thank every person who has worked in any measure to make this Congress successful. I'm under no illusion. President can't make an organization what it ought to be

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because he's the president. No matter who the president is, we need the cooperation of many people, teamwork if you please, of many individuals.

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Now my prayer, my dream, is to see our National Baptist Congress of Christian Workers function as a legitimate and authentic school of methods. We should look forward to an early date for the establishment of a required core of courses

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to be taken over a four-year period, leading to recognized academic credits. And we can do that. We can set up the program. we can have it so registered and so recognized that academic credits will be given for regular

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and established study. We should meet the needs of our local churches, thus enabling them to do a better job of equipping the Saints. Now this requires the enrollment of the very best faculty available among us, the development

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and the following of the best organizational plan of which we are capable. Now let me say as an aside, I just don't believe in doing business in an un-businesslike way. I don't believe in bumbling and fumbling and acting like we don't know what we're doing. I don't want anybody to be able to talk about, you know how they sometimes describe business.

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I don't want them looking at anything I'm doing and calling it that kind of business. I want what we do to be able to stand up beside what anybody does, whether they like us or not, and they have to admit that it's well done. And so we must develop the best plan of which we are capable and follow that plan. We need the commitment of all of us, the most faithful effort possible.

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Now local churches must be encouraged to select courses of study based on their particular needs. I hope you're listening. Not on the popularity of teachers, not on the auxiliary identification of the messengers, But send people from the churches to get what you need to help you in your church.

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I might not need at Cornerstone what you need at your church. Or you might not need at your church what I need at Cornerstone. And so we ought to select courses to meet our needs. I observed this year that some churches sent seven, eight people taking the same course.

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That's ridiculous. That's wasteful. Send one person in there to get the information and bring it back to the whole church. Select courses. And you know, some, two or three folk have asked me this year, "Dr. Bob, where's the Brotherhood meeting?" The Brotherhood ain't meeting here.

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Where the minister's wives? The minister's wives ain't meeting here. We don't have auxiliary meetings in the Congress. We teach courses that help folks in these areas to do what they are trying to do. But that ought to mean you don't want to be in the same course every year. Surely you ought to get it. Whatever they are teaching, you ought to get that and get on to something else.

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Isn't that right? Oh no, you see I'm a usher in my church and I want to know where the ushers are meeting. That's not why you come to Congress. You don't come to fellowship with ushers. You come to learn what you can take back to your church to help your church be equipped to do the service and the work of the saints. Amen. Now it goes without saying that our behavior in faithful attendance, our behavior in not standing around the building, our behavior in not loitering in the hotel lobbies, will speak louder for us than anything we can say. If we are about the Lord's business, folk can look at us and know that we are. But how we act, we'll surely declare that.

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I ask you please to pray earnestly for the Congress. I ask you please to remember President Jones, all of the Congress officers, staff, and teachers. Pray that God's will may be our common aim and goal. Let's determine to make Austin an experience of learning that will stimulate and inspire

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continued effort. Let's look forward even now to the next year to New Orleans and to the attention we have to make this Congress grow round by round to higher and higher heights to serve the purpose of our Lord.

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Now turn with me for a few minutes to a word from the book as I move toward the close of this. The program in a catalog that I thumbed through included one headed, an article headed, "Lower Your Cholesterol by Up to 40% in Just 60 Days." Guaranteed. Another one of the articles in that magazine that I got out of the back of the seat of an airplane said, "A breakthrough system characterized, or rather guaranteed, to get you the job you want at the salary you deserve." A guaranteed system to get you the job you want at the salary you deserve.

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The covering label read, "For the way life can be." Now what a fetching description of a universal desire that is. To live life the way it could be. But really that's but another way of saying that most of us are dissatisfied with life as it is.

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Most of us know dissatisfactions, sometimes achingly so, with mankind and with ourselves. We're disappointed with ever more dastardly reports of man's debasements. And every news report, every headline almost, sinks us deeper and deeper. grandfathers who raped their own grandchildren. And we are ashamed that too often our general conduct falls so far short of what we know our father expects.

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And while that dissatisfaction may include what we have and/or what we have achieved, for the thoughtful it invariably begins with what I am. The dissatisfaction we feel toward ourselves is generally at the level of what I am. In a random selection of persons, how many per thousand do you think there to be

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who are absolutely satisfied with themselves as they are. How many of us do you think there are in this room tonight who are completely pleased with ourselves as we are? I think you agree with me, wouldn't be too many.

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But then I raise the question, whence comes this image of the ideal, dissatisfaction breeding comparison of what I am with what I could be. If, as the evolutionists would have us believe, I'm always today a higher being than I was yesterday, that we're

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always a higher being now than we were a hundred years ago. If they are correct, then surely I have to raise the question, how can it be that I yearn for a better me? If the species grows better through random selection, then obviously there can be no goals, no schedules for future events.

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According to that theory, that's all it is, if we become better tomorrow, it is but an accident of concurrent events. You are going to pray with me, aren't you? I submit tonight that my longing for a better tomorrow is but my racial memory, though only faintly perceived, of the true Adamic nature before the pollution of sin when mankind walked in the true image

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of God, his creator. The new man, Jesus Christ, came doing in the flesh what would have been possible for the old man Adam, had he not said. And what we will do tomorrow, when freed of these mortal bodies we will really be new creations in Christ Jesus. In other words what we are now is but a faint promise of what we can become. Indeed of what we

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who are now the children of God will become when Christ Jesus shall appear. The promise of the word is clear when he shall appear we shall be like him. That's what I want to talk about for a minute. When he shall appear we shall be like him. That's first John 3 and 2. Now it is with a shouting joy and an

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undiminished assurance that I declare unto you upon the authority of the word the best is yet to come. Now walk with me around that text and let me try to lift up two or three simple things. First, the first man Adam and the new man Jesus Christ are hints of what we who believe shall become. The first man Adam and the

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new man Jesus Christ are hints of what we who believe shall become. You see God created man in his own image. That's in the book isn't it? This first man that God created was not another God named Adam. He was a man made in the image of God. But now listen, since the finite mind cannot exhaustively catalog the attributes of divinity, to what

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Follows is we can't really know how much Adam was like God We can't Our minds won't stretch that far To write down number down all of God's attributes and since I can't

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list or catalog exhaustively the attributes of God I I cannot know how much like God Adam was. Now we do know that Adam had freedom of choice

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and we know that Adam was therefore responsible for his choices but there's nothing to suggest that that's the only way he was like God. That's just all we happen to be able to figure out. He was truly made in the image of God.

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Now this second man, Jesus Christ, did not cast off his divinity in order to live among us as one of the sons of men. He simply masked or clothed his divinity with flesh. Isn't that right? Jesus chose to acknowledge the limitations of the flesh, but he was never locked into the embraces of the limitations of the flesh. He chose to be a man, but he was never only a man.

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He was altogether a man, but he was also altogether God. Hallelujah here. I remember one day some folk tried to grab him, they were going to throw him off a hilltop. Don't you remember?

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And the book says he walked through that crowd untouched and unscathed. I remember when he took a child's lunch and made sufficient provision for more than 5,000 people. He was in the flesh, but he was not locked into the embrace of the flesh. As a matter of fact, there were times when his specially prepared body could not fully hide his glory.

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It was as if his glory peeked out through his flesh. This word transfigured, don't you remember? That on the mountain they said his facial expression changed. It became bright as the sun.

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And his garments glistened with a dazzling whiteness, brighter than any earthly bleach could have accomplished. He was transfigured or "mortemephasized" meaning the essence of a thing separate from the accident of its appearance. It may look like something, but that isn't really what it is.

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That's just what it looks like. So there came a time when His glory broke through His flesh. Hey! Well I'm trying to hurry on here.

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I've been trying to say but one thing thus far. And that is as we look at this passage before us today that this first man Adam and the new man Jesus Christ are hints of what we who believe shall become.

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Let me say a second thing. Our becoming is already in progress. I'm talking about believers. Our becoming is already in progress. For you see, though there will indeed be a finished product, there must first be a process. All of us are children of God by creation, for Why else would we exist?

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Except that God made us. But some of us have become children of God by redemption. Now the definition or the distinction between non-believers as children of God

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and believers as children of God is one of fulfillment as well as one of contracts. For though the complete fulfillment is future, It is attested to by the direction of our travel.

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You see, if I stand here, I know that New York is roughly north of where I am. I can't go west and hope to arrive in New York. Matter of fact, if you see me driving west

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and I tell you I'm going to New York, you ought to know I'm on the wrong road. Isn't that right? But if I say I'm going to New York,

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Although I'm still here in Texas, I'm headed north. My direction gives credibility to my testimony. The text declares, the text says, now are we the children of God.

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And that isn't talking about creation, for that would have been redundant. See, he's talking about redemption. Now are we the children of God.

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That process begun in the new birth moves steadily toward confirmation in all believers. Now, there are gradations in consciousness of eternal life.

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I'm talking about in believers. There are gradations in consciousness of eternal life. And there are fluctuations in awareness of the glory of God within.

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But let me put that a little simpler. None of us are strong all the time as we are sometimes. Most of us know that there are times you're not as close to God as you were some other times.

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So there are gradations in our consciousness of God. And there are fluctuations in our awareness of the glory of God. But if you've been born of God, there

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There is never any denial that you're on your way to the Father's heart. Amen. I mean, I mean, the road, the road may not always be that steep going up. It may sometimes, you know, just be a little bit, but it's never going down.

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Amen. But our future state, our final future state is unknown to us. Does not mean that it is unknown to God. The book says it does not yet appear what we shall be.

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That doesn't mean God doesn't know what we're going to be. That means he hasn't disclosed it yet. He hasn't manifested it yet. But he did tell us we shall be like him.

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Amen. We shall be like him. The first man Adam and the second man Jesus Christ both began in the similitude of God. The first man lost the father's likeness. The second man honored it even unto death. Amen. Now the believer, the true believer, wants nothing so much as he desires to become what God would have him be. And he puts that in the common language of saying that I want to be more and more like

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Jesus. That's that word transfiguration. I want to be metamorphosized. I want to be changed from what I am.

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I want the glory of God to shine in my face. I want the power of God to motivate and guide my life. I want to be more and more like Jesus. ugly caterpillar that crawls along under the underside of leaves. Furry, ugly creature. I don't know anybody who likes caterpillars.

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You know, he has many legs, furry, ugly creature. But there comes a time when nature knocks on his door. A time clock goes off. And that caterpillar secretes from his body a substance that makes for himself a coquery that we call a cocoon. He hides himself inside that shell, and he stays there and waits until nature knocks again on his door to tell him the time has come. When that schedule is announced, that caterpillar that went in that cocoon, the cocoon begins

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to break open. But lo and behold, the fiery, ugly creature that crawled in there is not there any longer. comes out, there comes out a gossamer winged creature with slender legs, with bright colors, a butterfly who does not crawl underneath leaves but flies from flower to flower. We shall be changed.

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We shall be changed. I know that's good news. And so the believer, the true believer, wants nothing more than to be like Jesus. I'm almost finished.